The Rescuers

“I was only ten years old at the time so I don’t remember much. Nobody explains things to you when you’re a child. I was never told that I was different. Or that some people wanted to kill us. My mother basically raised me by herself, but it wasn’t an unhappy childhood. I do remember feeling afraid sometimes. I remember occasionally being kept home from school. And I remember not being allowed to play freely in the streets. But these things were never fully explained to me. When the genocide began, I was visiting my grandmother. It was a school holiday. I’d made good grades that semester, so my mother had bought me a pair of yellow flip- flops as a reward. I was obsessed with them. I remember waking up that morning and realizing something strange was going on. I could hear gunshots outside and people screaming. My grandmother told me to stay inside the house. She’d recently had a stroke and was confined to a wheelchair, so it was just me and her alone in the room. Eventually I got bored and decided to sneak outside to see what was happening. All the streets were empty except for young boys with machetes. That’s when my uncle came over, and I overheard him telling one of the maids that it was extremely dangerous outside. He said that all of us might be killed.”

“We stayed in the house for two nights. On the third morning a neighbor warned us that the killing groups were coming our way, so we decided to leave without packing anything. We were fortunate because my grandmother lived right next to the airport. Her house backed right up to the airstrip, and it was one of the few places in the city still under the protection of the United Nations. So my uncle cut a hole in the fence, and we began running toward some old trucks. We couldn’t run very fast because we were pushing my grandmother in her wheelchair. On the way I lost one of my yellow flip-flops. I remember thinking: ‘My mother is going to kill me when I see her again.’ So I tried to turn back, but the adults screamed at me to keep running. Finally we reached one of the old trucks and climbed beneath it. We stayed under that truck for a week. The UN knew we were there, but they left us alone. Occasionally I’d run out and ask the soldiers for food. There was one soldier in particular who always gave me biscuits and sardines. He felt sorry for me because I was so small. And when the UN finally evacuated, he came and got us. They put us in the back of a cargo plane with some containers. Nobody explained anything to me. I was cold. I was hungry. I was tired. All I wanted to do was go home and see my mother.”

“The plane took us to a refugee camp in Nairobi, Kenya. It would be our home for the next year. When I finally learned what was going on, I became one hundred percent convinced that my mother had been killed. Other refugees were telling me stories. Many of them had lost their entire families. My uncle told me that everyone in our neighborhood had been captured, and he was almost positive that my mother was dead. Surely if my mother was alive, she would have come for me. My grandmother’s house was not far from our home. So I accepted the truth. But I didn’t have much time to think about it. Because we had to fight for survival in the refugee camp. My grandmother was paralyzed and couldn’t chew hard food. So I’d spend my days trying to find her things to eat. I’d negotiate with people for their eggs and bananas. I spent the rest of my time by her side. She couldn’t move so I had to keep the flies away. But it wasn’t all bad. I made friends with a few of the other kids in camp. And I remember one time we stole money from the adults. We snuck out of the camp and bought French fries from a roadside shop. They were horrible quality. They came in a little plastic bag. But at the time I remember thinking they were the best thing I’d ever tasted.”

“After a year we were chosen for resettlement in the United States. As soon as we arrived, I was separated from my grandmother. She was put in a nursing home, and two months later she passed away. It was the first time I’d cried since I left Rwanda. She was all I had left. I lived with my uncle for awhile but he was very abusive. He treated me like a maid. So I was removed from the home and put into foster care in Boise, Idaho. But that was also a bad situation. I was on the verge of running away. And I’m pretty sure my social worker informed my school. Because my art teacher started asking me about my plans. Her name was Anne Peterson. She was one of those teachers that you could talk to about anything. So I answered all her questions. I told her my story. And I started bragging about my plan to take care of myself. I think she decided: ‘Absolutely not.’ Because that’s when she chose to become my Mom. Oh my God, it was amazing. Ms. Peterson lived in a big, beautiful house. I was the only child there. I had my own room. It was safe. I didn’t have to worry about surviving. Mom took care of everything. She would wake me up to go to school every day. She always made sure I had lunch. She took me out to eat at restaurants. It was amazing. I was already fifteen years old. But for the first time in years, I felt like a kid.”

“During high school I got a lot of counseling. I began to process what had happened to me. I remember in tenth grade we had an English teacher who used to tell us to look in the mirror every morning and say: ‘I’m good and I’m beautiful.’ But I would always add: ‘And I’m extremely lucky.’ I’d look at myself closely and try to recognize my mother. I started reading a lot of books. One of them was called Anne of Green Gables, about an orphan girl who was different. I decided that I was going to be like Anne and not let my bad luck ruin my life. I went to college at Washington State. I got an internship to work in the US Senate. I even dreamed about one day becoming Secretary General of the United Nations. But it was during this time that I also began to meet other people who’d escaped from Rwanda. I listened to their stories. And I began to realize the full context of what happened during the genocide. I read about it obsessively. I learned that the world had abandoned Rwanda. The United Nations may have saved me, but they failed everyone else. One million people were left to die. At first I felt angry. Then the anger turned into guilt. Why had I survived? For the longest time I didn’t even want to tell my story. Because I didn’t want to give the United Nations any credit. I didn’t want my story being used to put a positive spin on the situation. I felt confused and conflicted. But then at the age of twenty- one, I was given an opportunity to return to Rwanda.”

“I was given the opportunity to visit Rwanda as part of my internship with the US Senate. I was accompanying an important delegation. But they must have thought I was crazy, because when we arrived in Rwanda, I began speaking to people in the streets. I was convinced that everyone looked like me. I wanted to find members of my family. I wanted to see my old school. I wanted to find my old house. But all I could remember was the location of my grandmother’s house because it had been so close to the airport. So that’s where we went. We knocked on the door. I didn’t reveal my identity. When I asked the current resident if he knew about me, he told me that I had been killed. But then he said that some of my family was still alive. He told us that my sister was working at a nearby market. So we decided to drive there. The sun was going down. At this point I was sure that I’d lost my mind. Because we drove by a playground, and I saw a little boy that looked exactly like me. I even took his photo. I had no idea that he was my brother. When we arrived at the market, it was almost completely dark. But I saw my sister. And she saw me. She recognized me immediately because of the scar on my forehead. Our brother had given me this scar when we were toddlers. He didn’t survive the genocide. When my sister saw me, we embraced. We both started crying. And she told me everything that happened while I was gone. And I won’t share the details, because those aren’t my stories to tell. But she gave me the biggest news of all. I remember picking up the phone, and immediately calling Anne Peterson. I told her: ‘Mom, you’re not going to believe this. But I just found my mother.’”

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