This strange forgiveness
Thomas Froese
13 hours ago
KAMPALA, UGANDA Forgive and forget is how the old saying goes, but you
and I both know it's not worth spit, that we'll never forget certain
crimes committed against us, maybe even imagined crimes like those in
a recent dream of mine.
It was a nightmare with Africans carrying machetes. I looked out my
window. The university grounds where I live were crawling with the
killers.
"We won't kill anyone," one said. He looked at me through a window of
a bedroom where my 10-year-old daughter lay sleeping. "We'll just cut
your arm off."
I grabbed my daughter -- we were the only ones home -- and hid her in a
closet. Locked it. My heart pounded. My mind raced. The killers
swarmed, then got in. I blacked out. Finally, I awoke, bewildered.
At the time of the dream, I hadn't read a word about what has since
been filling papers around the world, the 20th anniversary of Rwanda's
genocide. But the next day I came across a story about two Rwandans:
Alice Mukarurinda and Emmanuel Ndayisaba.
There's Alice's picture. She's holding one arm up, an arm with no
hand. Emmanuel had cut it off and hacked her head and left her for
dead in a swamp. Emmanuel also killed Alice's daughter.
This, in April 1994, the start of 100 days of horror when about one
million Rwandans, mostly Tutsis, were killed, usually by machete, by
fellow Rwandans, the Hutus. Mangled bodies were left on roads and in
septic tanks and bloody rivers and Lake Victoria where they later
washed up, bloated, on Uganda's shores.
Maybe this is why I dreamt what I did. Ghosts, apparently even for a
quiet Canadian, a Hamiltonian who had nothing to do with any of it,
can linger. And what can you do but hide?
Alice did something else. She forgave.
She didn't forget. No, every time she raises her arm she can't forget.
But she forgave so much that she and Emmanuel are now neighbours and
work for the same organization that builds simple brick houses for
genocide survivors.
"The Bible says you should forgive and also be forgiven," Alice told
the media matter-of-factly. "Forgiveness is possible. It's common
here. Guilt is heavy."
So heavy that after Emmanuel finished a six-year jail term -- he had
killed at least 16 people -- he sought forgiveness from his victims'
families.
"The first family I killed, I felt bad," he explained. "Then I got used to it."
This is what happens when that old lie, the one that says some people
are less human than others, is pounded into your head. Kill, kill,
even your family. Kill or be killed.
Then, eventually, this strange forgiveness. Not trite. Not glib. Not
obtuse to the ways of this world. But strange, nonetheless.
Yes, if someone ever came to my African home and murdered my daughter,
I'm not sure I'd have the intestinal fortitude to live, let alone
forgive.
But this is the story of Rwanda, a place of murderers and survivors
living beside each other.
In this, somehow, Rwanda is us. And through this, Rwanda has also
somehow found some dignity and unity and prosperity.
After the genocide tore apart its entire social fabric, most observers
in 1994 predicted complete state failure. Instead, most of two million
Rwandan refugees, mostly Hutus, have repatriated back into Rwanda's
population of 11 million.
Nine in 10 Rwandans say they feel reunification has been successful.
In healthcare and education and infrastructure, the country is now
among Africa's better developed nations. In 20 years, life expectancy
has almost doubled to 65 years.
And Rwanda's government, while hardly perfect, is among Africa's least
corrupt, meaning aid from the West has helped more than hurt.
Rwanda is still working at this, keeping people with painful
differences together, keeping people remembering. Genocide museums dot
its landscape. Some sites -- often churches -- have skulls and bones of
thousands piled high to remind visitors of humankind's darker side.
Help, in fact, is now needed to preserve such remnants for future
generations.
While remembering, many Rwandans have also imagined something
brighter, something for their children, something unexpected.
Now, with some measure of success, it has come to pass. And it's
rather beautiful.
Alice Mukarurinda
http://m.thespec.com/opinion-story/4472555-this-strange-forgiveness/
--
SIBOMANA Jean Bosco
Google+: https://plus.google.com/110493390983174363421/posts
YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9B4024D0AE764F3D
http://www.youtube.com/user/sibomanaxyz999
***Online Time:15H30-20H30, heure de Montréal.***Fuseau horaire
domestique: heure normale de la côte Est des Etats-Unis et Canada
(GMT-05:00)***
| Reply via web post | Reply to sender | Reply to group | Start a New Topic | Messages in this topic (1) |
.To post a message: RwandaLibre@yahoogroups.com; .To join: RwandaLibre-subscribe@yahoogroups.com; .To unsubscribe from this group,send an email to:
RwandaLibre-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
_____________________________________________________
More news: http://www.amakurunamateka.com ; http://www.ikangurambaga.com ; http://rwandalibre.blogspot.co.uk
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-SVP, considérer environnement avant toute impression de cet e-mail ou les pièces jointes.
======
-Please consider the environment before printing this email or any attachments.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sponsors:
http://www.afriqueintimites.com; http://www.afriqueintimites.com;
http://www.eyumbina.com/; http://www.foraha.net/
-=-=-=--=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==-
Comments
Post a Comment