“It has been estimated that 90% of the children who survived (the Genocide) in Rwanda saw someone they knew die a violent death during that time.” Romeo D’Allaire – Shake Hands With The Devil.

In the opening scene from Romeo’s book, he tells the story of coming across a small boy, walking barefoot down a gravel road. In spite of the risk of taking fire (this was during the height of the conflict), D’Allaire got out of his vehicle and followed the little boy down a rocky lane. The child entered a small hut and ran over to bury his face in the skirt of his dead mother. His parents had been bludgeoned by machetes and clubs and left for dead at a little table. This child had been alone for a days, with no food, water, or protection as the bodies of his parents slowly decomposed.

This image continues to haunt me and I can barely swallow the lump in my throat as I think about that little boy. A child  – much like the one I’m holding in this picture. An innocent child, who in an instant became one of the 300,000 orphans created by the Rwandan Genocide. Who somehow survived the senseless killing of over a million people in the span of 100 days.

Unlike in many conflict situations, the women and children of Rwanda became a direct target of the extremist Hutu Interahamwe to ensure another generation of Tutsis did not emerge. Murderers used machetes, clubs, guns, and any blunt tool they could find to inflict as much pain as possible on their victims. Children were frequently forced to participate – by killing neighbours and friends and sometimes women were even forced to kill their own children. It’s devastating and unimaginable, isn’t it?

Like many people around the world, the impact of the Rwandan genocide didn’t really register for me at the time. Maybe I heard the odd news story, but as the horror played out, I was probably fixated on my latest Grade 9 crush or pleading with my Mom to buy me a pair of Guess jeans. While on the other side of the world, girls my age were running for their lives.

On our second day in Kigali, my fellow GVN volunteer and I clambered across the white rocks of the guest house driveway and into the hazy heat of the old Land Cruiser’s backseat. Our destination? The Genocide Memorial in Kigali. From the moment I stepped into the building, the genocide became real for me.

Each exhibit described unspeakable acts and I had to fight to stay present when my mind wanted to pretend this version of evil couldn’t possible be real. Stories about victims who had their tendons cut, so they couldn’t run away; about dogs feasting on the corpses that littered the streets; and about women raped and forced to watch their children murdered but then left to live with the emotional anguish and physical pain.

Just as I reached about the halfway point of the memorial and didn’t know how much more I could stomach, I heard a guttural cry. A sob laced with so much pain that it didn’t sound human. The hairs on my neck jumped up and I could do nothing to stop the tears from washing across my instantly cold cheeks. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw two people supporting a young woman who was bent over in grief. As they led her out of the building, her piercing screams continued to ricochet through the cavernous air above the exhibits. I don’t know if I will ever forget the sound of her pain and it’s taken me over a week to be able to write this post without crying.

So many of the innocent people of Rwanda have experienced unspeakable horror. Horror like neither you or I could imagine (even many of us who have walked through the trenches of cancer treatment). I see echos of the pain in the eyes of some of the people I meet and every day, I feel more inspired by the way the people of Rwanda have moved on from the past and found the grace and resilience to support each other. This powerful spirit and the light in the eyes of the children fills me with so much hope for Rwanda’s future.

I will leave you with the excerpt that opens the Memorial. The words moved me so much that I had to crouch down on the ground and copy them into my notebook.

Our Rwanda

“Rwanda is a country of hills, mountains, forests, and lakes, laughing children, markets of busy people, drummers, dancers, artisans, and craftsmen. We manage to squeeze thousands of hills and 8M people into our 26,338 square km. Our land is rich and fertile and our climate pleasant. This has been our home for centuries. We are one people. We speak one language. We have one history.

In recent times, though, genocide has cast a dark shadow over our lives and torn us apart. This chapter is a bitter part of our lives but one we must remember for those we lost and for the sake of the future.

This is about our past and our future; our nightmare and dreams; our fear and our hope: which is why we begin where we end…with the country we love.”