Well, security at the Brussels airport started off the
adventure quite appropriately with nonstop haggling and fussing with the
security agents. I had to go through security twice because I absent mindedly
forgot to empty my water bottle that I filled before getting on the plane in
Chicago. Luckily, after explaining two times that my water bottle has a filter
and is not an explosive, I received some gracious help from an agent to
instruct me in English what to do while I head an onslaught of French around
me. She told me that I needed to go out of the terminal and come back in…at
this point, my flight was leaving in twenty minutes and my mind was racing with
nervousness. Was I going to miss my flight and have to wait another day before
I could fly to Kigali? I was already preparing for the worst.
So, I tried a second time through security. The
interrogation about my water bottle continued and after carefully inspecting
its parts and testing it for explosive residue, they accepted the filter
addition and considered the fact that I was flying to Rwanda and not a fully
developed nation. Once out of security, I feverishly tucked everything in my
bag, not caring that my medicine bag now had gum in it and that my pens and
pencils had gone missing. I slipped on my shoes without tying them and sprinted
to my next gate just to learn that I needed to take a shuttle in order to get
there. I met Anastasia (or Nastia as she prefers), another girl also in my
program. She studies at Brown as Political Science major (working primarily
with gender), lives in London, and is originally from a less affluent area in
Russia. It was reassuring to know that another person was stuck in the same
stressful situation and that we could engage in some sort of burden sharing
together. We immediately hugged once we say each other, and she said that she
immediately recognized me from my Facebook profile picture. We laughed about
passport photos, had enough time to buy bottled water before the flight, and
sat near each other on the flight. It was safe to assume that I had just made
my first friend.
I got to my seat, exasperated yet thankful that I had made
it. While rummaging through my bag (not knowing where a single thing was anymore
and trying to tie my shoes within the cramped aisles of the plane), an older
gentleman, out of breath and pink in the face, arrived and needed help with his
bag. He said that he had just run two miles from his previous flight from
London and was surprised that he made it, too. His heavy breath was evenly
matched by his heavy dousing of cologne and aftershave. He sat down next to me
repeated (with a subtle English accent) how tired and out of breath he was. I offered
him some water, but he refused insisting that he was “fine”—downplaying the
situation in order to escape embarrassment or age-based stigma.
He asked me where I was from and said that I did not “sound
American” and that my English was eloquent and classy. He told me his name was
James and thought I was European instead (no shock to me that of course
Americans are sadly not associated with proper English, the classiest of
syntaxes, grammar, or pronunciation). It was a compliment, and I took it. James
told me that he was a recording agent and was on his way to seal the deal for a
singer he knew from Cambridge. I told James that I had actually studied abroad
in Cambridge, and he recognized my dorm, Girton College, immediately.
James was polished, folding his hands neatly across his lap.
Allowing me to speak and asking clarifying questions along the way, I was
respected and the conversation continued.
He asked me if Rwanda was safe. I, with a crooked grin and
hidden teeth, hesitantly replied, “Sure.” After commenting on my abundance of
technology and asking me if my Emergen-C drink powder was cocaine (laughing so
hard at this point), things suddenly turned dark and James became extremely
vulnerable. He went on to tell me about a time two years ago when he was
kidnapped by a purported gang in Nairobi, Kenya. Held hostage for two weeks and
chained to a bedpost, James survived by eating a loaf of bread and drinking one
water bottle every two days. My heart sank in my chest. I was having a
conversation with a man who was lucky to be alive.
The men stole his ATM card, and James was left starving and
frail by the end of the first week. Fortunately, his daughter was a detective
for Scotland Yard and helped rescue him with an entourage of policemen and
local authorities in Kenya. He had escaped death and he was recounting this
tale as if it were another day in the park.
“You must not put temptation in their way. Watch your stuff,
watch yourself, and don’t play with your mobile cell phone in the street,”
James proselytized. “People will even steal paper clips if they can get their
hands near it—all the shiny stuff really.” I was left not feeling too scared,
but that I needed to be cautious and be an observer of my surroundings,
something that I am not typically accustomed to.
This post is dedicated to James for not only opening up to
me in the most vulnerable of ways, but because James – although traveling to
Uganda twice per month—did not know much about Rwanda or its history. Thus, I
would like to elaborate on my answer to the question: “What about Rwanda?”
Many write as if the genocide has no history and as if Rwandan
genocide had no precedent, even in this century replete with political turmoil
and economic struggle. In Rwanda, the government did not kill. It prepared the
population, enraged it and enticed it. The Rwandan genocide unfolded in just
one hundred days beginning on April 7, 1994, and because it was so extensive,
there were killers in every locality—from ministers to peasants—for it to
happen in so quickly. The killing ended in July of 1994 and no one can really
say with certainty how many Tutsi were killed between March and July of that
year, although estimates all seem to converge around 1 million. What is clear
is that a coup d’état, initiated after the crash of the presidential plane,
promulgated the organization of army and civilian leadership. In the process,
the Hutu majority were advised and encouraged to kill all Tutsi. The Rwandan
genocide was not carried out from a distance, in remote concentration camps or
beyond national borders. This was an internal, civil struggle for political
power. It is important to keep in mind that the genocide was not inevitable—not
for personality, tribal or demographic reasons. Instead, the genocide was a
result of a calculated, conscious, ad planned action on the part of the
political elite who feared losing their positions of privilege and were willing
to go to any lengths in their effort to hold onto power.
Dual colonialism formed from Belgian colonial power once Tutsis
were given delegate status of the central court. Thus, Hutus were obliged to
structural antagonism until the year 1959 when there was a revolution which marked
the end of domination by the exclusive Tutsi elite. The genocide was preceded
by other atrocities, notably in 1959, 1964, and 1973. This violence, although paralleled with a
model which closely resembles that of “ethnic” killings was not a representation
of ethnic hatred. Instead, they were specifically political acts. In 1972 to
1973, tensions in Rwanda were exacerbated by selective genocide in Burundi,
Rwanda’s neighbor to the south. This laid the foundation for the coup d’état that
brought Habyarimana, a militant and radical leader, to power in 1973. Habyarimana’s
regime further centralized political institutions and consolidated power in the
security forces, the presidential office, and the single party. Fast forward to April 1994, there were some
400,000 refugees from Burundi, mostly Hutu. So not only did the crisis in
Burundi serve to deepen the political crisis in Rwanda, but they also
introduced a large population of politicized and deeply bitter refugees.
During the genocide, Rwanda was portrayed under the
blanketing continental development of “Africa.” The U.S. was simply unwilling
to take political initiatives which could have saved hundreds and thousands of
lives so soon after an incident in Somalia which took the lives of eighteen
U.S. soldiers. Heightening this ignorance was the lack of accuracy in news
reports. Media pronouncements contended that this was just another “tribal war,”
rendered meaningless and illegitimate for foreign intervention. Unfortunately, the
media played to the popular stereotypes rather than engaging in any solid
analysis of events.
I hope to write more about the history of genocide as I
learn more, as well as offer more information about current social and political
facts of the country (specifically the city of Kigali) as well.
Goodnight for now,
Jaser
They say my country is so beautiful that although God may
wander the world during the day He returns at night to sleep in Rwanda" -
Rwandan Proverb
