Rwanda Diary

Training Day, Part 3: The Afternoon

After lunch, we debriefed from the morning’s Lego exercise, and talked about what their responses were to each other during lunch about why they wanted to be leaders, and what the potential upsides and downsides were for them.

The next section of the agenda was a few lessons about creativity. Most leadership training comes from the business sector. I teach leadership and social entrepreneurship workshops and seminars coming from an arts perspective. Creativity – nurturing it, training for it, the reasons to think about it and consciously engage in it – then becomes an important component of this training. I explained, to many nodding “yes” heads, that as leaders, we all jump from one crisis situation to another, from one meeting to another, and then, BOOM! We’re asked to quickly come up with creative solutions to our agency’s challenges. We might enjoy the challenges, but that doesn’t make it any easier.

What does make it easier is being good at tapping into one’s creativity. And what is also true is that we can train ourselves to be more creative and to get better at idea generation. I took the group through four of the steps of what I call “creative caffeine,” each with accompanying hands-on exercises (not all of which I’ll include here – I don’t want to OD my readers!):

1. Paying attention to one’s environment (with listening and seeing exercises)
2. Knowing the difference between creative and creation (creation requiring action)
3. Learning about intuition and making use of the “pregnant pause”
4. Asking the right questions.

At this point, it was time to ask the participants to begin working in small groups

to better prepare them for their future work in the interfaith coalition they’d be forming. Instead of having them choose their own partners, most likely people they knew and with whom they were comfortable, I had them count off in 4’s and then find their “new” working partners for this exercise.

Because our time together was so short, I wanted them to have as many opportunities as possible to work with as many different partners as possible, and this was one way to make that happen.

Once regrouped, I gave them this scenario and challenge:

An architect in Kigali built a cluster of office buildings around a central green.

When construction was completed in the spring and the buildings were occupied, the landscape crew tried to find the architect to ask him where he wanted the sidewalks, but he’d already left Rwanda for his next assignment in Burundi.

Their challenge was to take over the architect’s job and come up with the best way to determine where to place the paved paths between and around the buildings.

They worked diligently in their groups for about 15 minutes.
I then asked them to share their solutions with all of us.

Interestingly, every single group included a central green and garden in their plans,

and a circular drive around the garden was also incorporated into most of them. (I didn’t realize why until I was driven into town that afternoon on an errand. There, in the middle, was a central green and garden with a circular drive around it!) Their solutions to this challenge were, as always, articulate and well-thought out.
But I pointed out after they were finished sharing that they hadn’t really answered the actual challenge – To find the best way to determine where to place the paved paths between and around the buildings. – and that maybe they were making the challenge more complicated than it needed to be. One of the lessons from this exercise is learning that what differentiates the solutions to a challenge are often the questions used to find them. If they aren’t finding the right answers, maybe they’re not asking the right questions.

They might, for example, want to do less searching passively for approval, and more asking, “What if…?” That’s a question of wonder, a question that, coupled with a proper pause, might be followed by something extraordinary, from that place where great ideas are born from sharing. What if, for example, they just planted the grass solidly between the buildings and waited a few months? After a time, the grass would have paths of trodden grass between the buildings, paths that would be sized according to traffic flow and which would have responded to the needs of the users.

I offered another example of looking at the direction of questioning with this parable:

There was a hero who, in the course of wandering about the countryside, came upon a crowd of disconcerted citizens gathered on the bank of a river.

When the hero inquired as to the nature of their distress, they pointed out a victim being swept downstream.

The hero jumped into the water and rescued the victim,

But no sooner were they safely ashore than a second victim was swept into view.

The hero also rescued this person.

However, when a third victim floated down the river, the hero began to journey upstream.

"What kind of hero are you," the crowd jeered, "if you fail to rescue the third victim?"

"Rescue the victim yourself," the hero replied. "I'm going upstream to find out why all these people end up in the water."

We ended the day’s seminar with a discussion of ways to focus their attention and energy on what could reasonably be accomplished within the context of any given challenge. I gave them this list of the five questions I always ask myself before starting any project or challenge:

1. What’s the problem?
2. Who controls the solution?
3. What needs to happen in order for change to occur within the context of this problem or challenge?
4. What part can I play in affecting that change?
5. What do I need in order to do this work?

After the participants left, two young people walked into the room. Alexis Ntagana, now 27,
and Chantal Ntare, 23.
They are what are commonly called survivor children in Rwanda – children whose parents were killed during the genocide. Many of them took on the responsibility of raising their siblings, as did Alexis and Chantal, becoming the heads of their households and taking on enormous levels of responsibility while still extremely young. Alexis was 14 when he took over the care of raising his younger sister and two brothers, and Chantal was only 9 when she took on responsibility for her sister and cousin, the only two surviving members of her family.

Eventually, many years after the genocide, they both ended up in a housing area called a peace village where many of these parentless families came together. In trying to find ways to help the village’s residents to survive, they started two enterprises: a crafts business that sells what the children make, and, remarkably, a successful company that filled a void in Kigali: renting (and decorating) tents and other traditional Rwandan ceremonial gear such as drums

for weddings! When there were only 10 families in the village, each family made 30,000 Rwandan francs ($54) per month through these 2 businesses. Now, however, the population has more than doubled, there are 24 families living in the peace village, and Alexis and Chantal are looking for help to expand the rental company. They’re not talking about money, however. They’re looking for used, but still usable tents that they can use to grow their rental company. So I’m going to go to the tent rental companies in Louisville to see what I can acquire for them, and if there are those of you outside of Louisville who want to do the same, let me know and I’ll put you in contact with these two extraordinary young Rwandans, people who have survived the genocide, raised their siblings, made it somehow through secondary school, and are working to rebuild their country.

Training Day #1, Part 2: The Opening Exercise

My favorite exercise that I designed many years ago for training leaders and social entrepreneurs is one that uses Legos, two buckets of which – hundreds and hundreds of pieces – I brought with me to Rwanda. In thinking about this exercise the night before the seminar while I was working on my bed
to put the final touches on the agenda (the bed being the largest flat surface in my room), I wondered if the metaphors necessary for this exercise to work would be understood across languages by this group, whom I had not yet met. I needn’t have worried. They got it immediately and were utterly poetic in their responses.

Here’s how this opening exercise went: I spread out all of the Legos on the front table of the seminar room.

I asked the participants to take as many pieces as they needed to put together a structure that would represent their ideal place to live and work.

I told them that they could work singly, in pairs, or in groups. All I asked was that they produce a structure representative of that ideal place, and that they do it in 10 minutes. Slowly, tentatively, they began to come up to the table, one at a time. At this rate, it would take the entire 10 minutes just to pass out the Lego pieces! I encouraged them to just “Come on down!” as Bob Barker used to say, and then they all came at once. Having never seen Legos they were fascinated by them, and I showed each of them how they snap together in all types of configurations. Some took only a few, some took handfuls, and many came back for more once their structures began to take shape. They all worked as single builders except for one pair of women, although they worked near each other, laughing and gabbing as they worked.

I called time at 13 minutes, giving them a couple more to finish up. Then I asked them to share with the group what their structures meant. Not a single person misunderstood that these were not to be realistic interpretations of homes or offices or towns, even though I gave no such instruction. And their descriptions were as inspired and lyrical as their constructions:

This is the Friends Peace House where people from different tribes and ethnic groups can come together and when they are all together, they can do peace. It’s not finished because peace is not finished.

This is a building where many people live. I will help everybody but mostly I will try to help the women, who are the hearts of their families. Some women are wounded – that is the red color. Other women are hopeless – that is why there is the black color. Others started building peace and hope for the youth. In all of the house, there are different rooms. Muslim women will help me welcome guests because Muslims do that very friendly. My house will provide women rest. And guest militants for peace will stay in area where the white pieces are because white represents peace.

My construction stands for the European Union. As we say, peace is not the work of one person. Removing borders between countries will equal peace; peace will go beyond the borders. When you are a peace builder, you must know how to go beyond the borders.

This is a big town with tall and short houses. Here is a joyful man who wants to live in a town where people are not hungry or angry, where there is no discrimination. As these houses are all different, it means that diversity is possible.

I am still building a house of many colors. As I was building, I thought of many things we have around the world – war, discrimination, and my thinking was, “How can we build a house without discrimination, a society with people from different countries and colors but who are one for that society?” I will continue to build my house.

This is a boat in the sea. The sea is the earth. White represents justice and truth and how someone can feel to have another one, another person, in him. Blue is peace. There is no peace without justice and truth. When everyone can have his neighbor in him, he can live in peace.

Mine is stairs. It represents upstairs. We have to climb up to build a house of peace.

Mine is also steps up. We are people from different tribes and religions. We must find a way to reach the peace.

Mine is a flag representing Rwanda. It is a Rwandan image. The black is in the middle, our bad history. On one side of the black is green – life; and on the other side is blue – peace and hope. Yellow, the sun, surrounds the bad memories and history.

We built a big house, a house of peace, with different peace activities happening in the house. We will work in this house and need to have others join us to lead to peace. There is plenty of room.

This is a bridge. On one side is one country that people had to leave because of betrayal and killing. These people must move to another country where there is fellowship and caring. This bridge is an effort by all people. Peace builders have this bridge. They know that to have nice people, we must have the bridge.

It was an incredible and dramatic opening – of our eyes, our hearts, and to each other. Almost none of these people knew each other before walking into the room, and every one of them had been affected by the genocide; many of them were still dealing actively with their anguish. But after only an hour into the seminar, they were bonded by their common – and commonly expressed – dream of peace for Rwanda and surrounding countries, and their determination to help create that peace. I was stunned…and thrilled.

(Note: There is a second part to this exercise that we didn't have time to do during this seminar and wasn't really necessary for this group: each person writes out, in 10 steps, the directions on how to build their stuctures. Then they are asked to put their names on the back of their instruction sheets, put their constructions under their chairs or tables, fold their papers, and put them into a hat. Each person then picks out someone else's instructions and tries to build the construction from the directions. At the end of the given time period, each pair of structures is compared -- the original and the one built from the instructions! The purpose of this second half of the exercise reinforces the need for good and clear communication.)

It was then my turn to introduce myself and my organization, to tell them about the benefactor who had made this seminar possible and how he came to understand the true meaning of reconciliation, and to explain the range of topics we were to cover in the three days – creativity, innovation and risk taking, collaboration and coalition building, working with diversity, dealing with conflict, power and turfism, and setting up an interfaith organization! They listened raptly, writing down much of what I said as Osee enthusiastically and dramatically (sometimes too dramatically, I thought) translated for me. At times I thought he was embellishing, but there were enough Africans in the room who knew English well enough to know if and when that was happening, and gently brought him back on track the few times it actually occurred.

Suddenly, it was already time for lunch! Before we broke, I asked them to discuss these questions with each other while eating: Why do you want to be a leader? What are the benefits for you? What are the disadvantages for you?

Lunch was prepared on site by some of the QPH staff and over the course of the seminar days always consisted of some type of meat stew (beef? chicken?), many bowls of different starches (boiled cassava, cassava paste, rice, pasta, potatoes), soup, a vegetable (peas, cassava leaves, green beans), and fruit for dessert (pineapple, mango, papaya, bananas, and, my personal new favorite, passion fruit). This is a typical Rwandan meal, and this, or a variation of this, is what I ate whether at the QPH, my hotel, or elsewhere.

I thought of how and what we serve guests at our CIR office and how easy it is for us. We just call someone up and have them deliver sandwiches; we could even prepare something ourselves in the kitchen of the Residence next door if we wanted to – 8 burners, a big fridge, microwave, dishwasher, and even an icemaker. It’s not so easy in Rwanda, even at a place as nice as the QPH. This is the kitchen in which our meals were prepared:

Next post: Training Day #1, Part 3: The Afternoon

Training Day #1

While I was conducting the training in Rwanda for which I was asked to come, I didn’t have a moment of time or an extra ounce of energy to upload any blog entries. Once I started the “real” work, my days were 14 to 16 hours long, after which I slept so soundly I don’t think I rolled over or moved all night! The climate might have had something to do with the exhaustion, but I think it came mostly from being “on” for so many hours without a true break.

For those of you reading this blog who have taken the Meyers-Briggs test, you will know that introversion and extraversion mean different things in in Meyers-Briggs terms than we're commonly used to using. People with a preference for extraversion draw energy from action: they tend to act, then reflect, then act further. If they are inactive, their level of energy and motivation tends to decline. Conversely, those whose preference is introversion, like myself, become less energized as they act: they prefer to reflect, then act, then reflect again. People with introversion preferences need time out to reflect in order to rebuild energy. The introvert's flow is directed inward toward concepts and ideas and the extravert's is directed outward towards people and objects. It might come as a surprise to everyone who knows me that I am an “I”…off the charts! I can play an “E,” which I do as a regular part of my working day, but it’s exhausting for me. Consequently, by the time I had a few moments to myself at the end of the seminar days to reflect and write, I couldn’t find the energy to do anything except drag my body into the bed.

I knew this would happen, which is precisely why I scheduled catch-up time into my trip. I have a day now in Brussels to write and upload more blog entries, catalogue my photographs, walk around to try to unswell my ankles, write my reports and make my to-do lists for re-entry into Stateside life. What better way than to start with a luxurious cappuccino at an outdoor café?

And now to continue with the saga of my time in Rwanda:

Sometime before 9:00 a.m. on Monday, May 19th, my group began to gather in one of the rooms in the Quaker Peace House (QPH). Plain, wooden chairs were set up in a circle with the “teacher’s” desk right up front, covered with a white table cloth, simply adorned with a vase of flowers. Never mind that they weren’t real flowers.
The thought was lovely. I set about to put a composition-style notebook on each chair, along with other supplies that I had brought from Louisville. When asked where the pens were, I realized that I had mistakenly assumed that each participant would bring their own. The everyday things we take for granted at home – pens, pencils, paper, common supplies – are all somewhat hard to find here and are expensive when you do find them , so I bought a box of pens from the Quaker Peace House and distributed those as well.

The participants began to trickle in, having made the trip to the QPC by car, taxi, bus, and in some cases, by walking. They were people representing all faith traditions in Rwanda, and the group included Samuel Kamanzi,
a Quaker from the Congo whom I had met a few days earlier at the Transformative Mediation seminar. He is keenly interested in putting together an interfaith coalition in the Congo and stayed in Rwanda to attend this seminar in order to learn how to do that.

I was introduced to Osee Rugagaza,
the man who was to be my interpreter for the next three days, a huge, ebullient Congolese now living in Kigali who speaks 10 different languages. He’s a seminary student and so was very interested in this assignment. He is married with 8 children, some of whom are adopted, not an unusual narrative in Rwanda. After the genocide, so many children who survived the slaughter were orphaned, and many of them were adopted while others became the heads of their households, raising their siblings.

It wouldn’t have mattered what activity I had planned to open the “seminar,” as the Rwandans called our training days together. They had their own traditional African way of beginning things: after the group had settled, they began to sing in Kiyarwandan, the national language, to welcome me as their teacher. Next, Antoine Sanyura,
the clerk of the Quaker Meeting, rose to introduce me, to “express our joy in having Jan from Kentucky with us,” and to officially open the seminar.

He was followed by Sizele Marcellin,
an amazing man who is the Director, or “Coordinator” as they say, of the Quaker Peace House and its many programs, During the genocide, four of his five children were slaughtered, as was his wife, his father, and many others in his extended family. And yet he, along with a few others, saw the need for reconciliation rather than revenge and started the QPH.

“We say that peace is not the work of only one person,” he told us, in a quiet yet passionate voice. “When I have it at my home, but my neighbor or a person of another faith does not, there is no peace and I don’t have it either. Whatever we learn in this seminar, we must put into action! Working in this simple room is metaphoric – we can’t enter the university without having first been to primary school. We must develop our roots first. This seminar is very important. You have been invited from all faiths throughout Rwanda. You are free and safe here.”

He continued with the story of how the QPH came into being. “When we started our work, we began out of a church. But the Muslims and Pentecostals couldn’t come. So we changed our strategy and moved from the church, renting a house in the town. Then the government gave us this land and we built our compound. All of our committees have people from different houses of worship. We are now working in all 5 provinces of our country, most heavily in three districts so that we can see a change there. When we see real change, we move to others.”

The group then introduced themselves to the rest of us, and, at my request, said from which faith tradition they each came. I took these photographs of them over the next couple of days, but I’m adding them here so I can introduce them to you as they introduced themselves me, and so you can get to know them a little because you'll see them a lot in the next few postings.

And with the next post, I’ll begin describing the seminar’s activities.

Alexi Nemeyimana, Grace and Shalom Church

Antoine Sanyura, clerk of the Quaker Meeting

Cecile Niramana, Quaker

David Bucura, Quaker

Sister Donatirra Mukadekuru, Catholic

Eustache Harerimana, Church of God in Rwanda

Innocence Rwabuhihi, Quaker

Isaac Nkundabantu, Presbyterian, Administrator in charge of Justice, Peace and Reconciliation

Janet Kimuzaire, Catholic

John Mahirwe, Resurrection Church

Julienne Uwimana, Quaker

Zienabo Hamisi, Muslim

Marie Chantal Kantarama, God's Family Revelation Church

Mustafiri Nadok, Quaker

Osee Rugagaza, Interpreter (faith tradition unknown)

Paulette Baraka, Quaker

Samuel Kamanzi, Quaker

Sizeli Marcellin, Quaker, Director of the Friends Peace House

Theophil Ruhilimbura, Good Shephard Pentecostal Church

Therese Mukamanzi, Assemblies of God Church

Mostly Photos, Too Tired for Text!

I apologize to all for not posting yesterday, and for being too tired to do much tonight. The "seminar," as the Rwandans call the training, is going beautifully (they seem to write down every word I say which never happens when I teach in the States!), but the climate, and the energy it's taking to teach all day and then prepare for the next day, makes me feel as though I've hit a brick wall at the end of the day. But I've heard some of the most remarkable and wonderful responses, comments, questions, and poetic language that I've ever experienced as a trainer, and have taken notes on all of it. I promise to get you all up to date, but that probably won't happen until I hit Brussels on the way home.

In the meantime, I've posted some photos here -- I'll make sure they all get explained when I get caught up!

Quaker Meeting in Rwanda

I’m just back from attending Quaker Meeting with my F/friends here in Kigali. This was like no Quaker Meeting that I’ve ever experienced before! As you might know, there are unpastorized Meetings (silent Meetings like ours in Louisville), and pastorized Meetings (like the one Richard Nixon attended, led by a pastor). This meeting was VERY much unlike either one of them!

Solange Maniraguha, the 27-year-old Assistant Coordinator of the HROC (Healing and Rebuilding our Communities) program of the Quaker Peace House (more on that program later) picked me up in a taxi this morning, and we drove to the Quaker Peace House. Other than the few main paved roads, the roads in Kigali
are the worst I’ve ever seen. I’m lucky that I have little or no fear response because there were many times I thought our taxi would flip over!
No amusement park in the world has anything on the driving experience here. This city is a city of steep hills, and it’s even worse during the rainy season because then the roads are flowing rivers of mud. Now, when it’s dry, the VERY deep ruts and what look like rutted riverbeds are simply left as the rains formed them and people just drive carefully.
Traffic is made even more chaotic by the facts that there are people walking everywhere, there don’t seem to be many traffic laws, and, on all but the main arteries, there are no road signs.

Just before we drove through the gates of the Quaker Peace House, a little boy of no more than 5, who was walking along the road with his mother, pointed at me and shouted in amazement, “ Umuzungu!” That means, “white person.” Despite the many foreign workers here, I guess we’re still somewhat an unusual sight to many.

As we settled into the Meeting room, which was the same room in which last week’s transformative mediation was held, I noticed the first difference between their Meeting and ours: the chairs were all facing front instead of in a “hollow square,” or all facing into the center. The second difference became evident almost immediately: this was definitely NOT going to be a silent meeting. I knew that in advance, but I wasn’t expecting such jubilance! The service began with three different choirs in succession, starting with the children’s choir. With each, there was not only singing, but dancing
as well – as ebullient and joyful as the singing.
David leaned over to me and asked if I had my camera with me, and encouraged me to take pictures throughout the service. “No problem,” he told me, a phrase I’ve heard many, many times since arriving here.

With Solange graciously interpreting for me (the languages varied from Kinyarwandan to Swahili to French, depending on who was speaking), I learned that introductions were next – of all who were new to the Meeting. When it was my time to stand up, Solange encouraged me to speak in Kinyarwandan, so I used what I’d learned and here’s what I said: “Amahoro. Muraho! Amakuru? Nitwa Jan. Ndi umuzungu. Ndashaka amazi. Murakoze cyane.” Everyone laughed, clapped and shouted out responses to my primitive introduction of myself. I had said, “Peace. Hello! How are you? My name is Jan. I am a white person. I need some water. Thank you very much.” It’s a good thing no one had taught me parts of the body yet, or I would have recited those, too!

The service lasted 2 and a half hours (!), with evangelical-style preaching, dancing, deep praying,


shouting,
offerings,
and so on. Throughout the service, small children would peek at me through through the window -- I must have been quite a site to them!

All the while, the room was getting hotter and hotter because like most buildings in Kigali,

this one was roofed with corrugated steel or tin. No one seemed to mind, and since they DID get me a bottle of water, I didn’t either (a fact which those who know me will find astounding).

Abruptly, it was over, and as we all began to file out, many of the children came up to me and grabbed my fingers to hold as we walked. At one point, I had ten small kids hanging on, one to each digit, and many more holding on to my skirt as we made our way down the walkway. I spend the next half hour photographing them and then showing each of them their photos in playback mode.

When I used to travel to foreign places, I always brought a Polaroid camera and plenty of film so that I could photograph the children and give them each a picture of themselves. But Polaroid has stopped making their film now, so I’ll e-mail these pictures to David and he can distribute them. How new millennium.

I’m now back in the room thinking about what I just experienced. What strikes me is the contrast between the people in that hot Meeting room and many whom I see attending houses of worship in the United States. These Rwandan people live their faith. They are earnest, loving, accepting and humble people and not duplicitous at all. When they praise their God, they really mean it and appear to be truly thankful for their lives, their neighbors, and whatever they have, which isn't much at all. They don’t have to be convinced to walk their talk. Many in the States (not all, of course!) seem to have no trouble at all separating out their faith beliefs from those that govern their lives.

I had lunch in my room so I could work. I’ll be finishing the final prep for my work that begins in earnest tomorrow. I didn't have the time at home to finish all of what I needed to do to get ready so I'm happy to have the time to "make it happen," as Tim Gunn on Project Runway would say. The staff here continues to be caring and attentive, and it's probably helping that I'm beginning to speak some Kinyarwandan with them. I learned their names the first day, including the women who obsessively clean my room, so they would know that I know that they're human beings. One of my staff members (you know who you are!) says that I'm pathologically inclusive, but I know from my reading about Rwanda that so many of the citizens here felt like less than animals as they were being slaughtered. So anything I can do to make them feel like human beings is a good thing and they do seem to respond well to that.

They continue to bring me baskets of fresh tropical fruit, and I remember that anything that I can peel or boil, I can eat.
I don't think the Rwandan Quakers meant to do this, but they happened to have chosen a hotel where, while primitive in some respects by our standards, everything they cook is organic and grown or raised right here.

A Full Day in Kigali

Before turning in on Thursday night, I asked David Bucura
what our schedule was going to be for the next day. He said something about going to a workshop on transformative mediation. Luckily, I was only to be an “honored guest” since this is not a workshop I had prepared to teach! Click here for information on transformative mediation and why it's different from standard mediation practices.

After a breakfast of coffee with powdered milk, eggs, and fresh fruit, Sizele, the Coordinator of the Quaker Peace House, and Solange, a director of one of their programs, picked me up at 8:30 and off we went to the workshop. This was the last of a 5-day gathering of 20 Rwandans, Congolese and Burundi peace workers – many with other jobs as well, e.g. teacher, lawyer, doctor – who had been studying transformative mediation. They welcomed me warmly, probably much more than I deserved, and I was seated with them at their table. At the front of the room
was a man reading the news of the day so that everyone would be kept up to date. I was surprised to hear the words “Obama,” “Olympics,” and “Bush,” and came to understand that this was world, not just local news.

They next moved into a gathering exercise, in which I was invited (no, pulled!) to join. I wasn’t going to be allowed to be an impassive observer here! We circled up, and the facilitator threw a handful of folded papers into the middle of the floor, each with a name and an instruction on it. Everyone was asked to pick one up and read it. The exercise began by one person reading the name on their paper and the instruction for that person to complete. These directives ranged from signing your name with a certain part of your body (eyes, shoulders, buttocks), to naming everyone in the room, to singing, dancing or drumming
your name (p). When your name was called, you were invited into the middle of the circle to perform your task. Then it was your turn to ask the person on the paper you held to perform theirs.

Imagine my surprise when my name was called! And imagine my dread when I was asked to perform a traditional American dance!! All kinds of things ran through my head as I was pulled into the middle of the circle – jitterbug, waltz, the monkey. Then I remembered something I could do without a partner, and began…”You put your left foot in, you put your right foot in….” I did the hokey pokey, while everyone laughed, clapped, hooted, and tried to follow along! Talk about your icebreaker. By then I was well along to being part of their group, and got to ask the next person
to pretend to sing a song to their cows.

When we got down to the business of the workshop, they started a wrap-up of the week. It was fascinating to see that they were focusing on what I would describe as my violence pyramid (which many of you reading the blog have heard or seen described). They were having some trouble envisioning how to deal with something that was not visible, and they asked me if I was familiar with these concepts. I then had the remarkable opportunity to come to the front of the group, show them the pyramid/iceberg metaphor (which was simultaneously translated into French and Kinyarwanda), and see the sparks of understanding travel through the group. The facilitator jumped up, pointed to my diagram, and said, “See? Sometimes what is underneath is a bad memory of your tribe or ethnic group that you don’t want to reveal. These are deep conflicts. But there is no hiding.” I’ve had experiences in which people got what I was teaching, but never anything like this. It was as though someone had given them a key to something valuable. One of the participants later told me that much of Rwandan reconciliation efforts were only “at the level of the tip of the iceberg.”

After a tea break (actually warm milk), we gathered again, and the three ethnic groups described, in turn, what their traditional forms of mediation have been throughout their histories.
All of them involved meeting on the grass or a hill, with elders or wise people of the hill, and local beer when it was agreed that reconciliation had occurred. The descriptions of what happened when resolution did not occur were less pleasant, however – beatings, cutting off of feet, banishment from the village. Remember that these were the ancient ways of mediation and have been replaced by laws and more formal ways of doing things. But the word for grass in Kinyarwandan is gacaca (pronounced ga-cha-cha), and has deep meaning in today’s Rwandan reconciliation, which I’ll describe another day.

After lunch (chicken and many different types of starch – potatoes, pasta, cassava and rice), I was taken on a drive through Kigali as my hosts ran errands, one of which was to buy small gifts to give to their “secret person,” at that night’s banquet – a sort of secret Santa-type of game, but with a much different, and deeper purpose. Called cacahouete (the French word for peanut but meaning “little gift” here), this game is used to facilitate lasting fellowship and friendship among different peoples after the genocide. One person gets up in front of the group, and everyone shouts out questions about who their secret gift recipient might be. When they’ve guessed correctly (or when the person gets tired of answering the questions), the beneficiary is revealed, and he or she comes to get the gift amid much clapping and hugging. Considering that this group consisted of citizens of three different countries, as well as both Hutu and Tutsi, this cacahouete was a poignant end to the gathering at the evening’s banquet.

Here are some more photos from today's activities -- with much more to come! Just click on them for full images.

Kigali!

I have finally arrived in Kigali! Ours was the only airplane at the airport; I guess they don't get much air traffic here. Couldn't take any photos yet because at 7 p.m. it was pitch dark here. But I was met successfully by David Bucura, driven to where I'm staying, and have now unpacked, then repacked for tomorrow's activities. What I did notice is that Kigali resembles Havana in so many ways -- people walking in the streets, every interior lit with low level florescent bulbs creating surreal shadows, crazy traffic. I'm sure that's where the similarities end, but it was deja vue for me.

After a gratefully restful night in Brussels, I flew Brussels Airlines directly here. The Europeans seem to have this travel thing down, and in a much more civilized way that we do. For example, no one need remove their shoes to go through the security lines, which, I might add, are short and brisk, and are attended by very pleasant people who speak multiple languages. On the plane (which wasn’t full, allowing me four seats across to myself…napping made easy), people were cordially asked to move to other seats by the flight attendant so an airline-provided bassinet could be set up at the bulkhead where a baby could comfortably get some sleep during the flight. And in place of the normal, cardboard-like airplane food (which I happen to like anyway because it’s a symbol that I’m traveling somewhere and everything is in miniature), we were served a tray that included some great camembert, chocolate mousse, and a fine roll, which, as everyone knows, is just a vehicle for butter. I wasn’t disappointed in that, either – it was wonderful, sweet butter at just the right temperature for easy spreading. I feel as though I’m not just in another country, but on another planet.

My hotel in Kigali typical of this area -- more like what we might call a motel, one level, sprawling as a mini-village might. Same dim florescent interiors as I saw on the drive in, very basic accommodations. And wireless Internet! Took a while to figure it out, but the geek in me surfaced to help out. The hotel's restaurant has a fairly strange set-up: a young Rwandan man came to my room and asked me what I'd like for dinner. No menu. I asked what they had. He responded that, basically, I could have whatever I wanted. I suggested fish, and my two choices were with mushroom or provencal sauce. I chose mushroom, and was instructed to come to the dining room in 30 minutes, which I did. After another 30 minute wait, during which everyone in the service of the hotel came to greet me and practice their limited English skills, the food arrived. It was either fantastic, or I was so hungry that I would have eaten anything. I'm thinking the former. Sauteed fresh tilapia, wonderful rice, French fries, and that delicious mushroom sauce. Dessert was all kinds of fresh tropical fruits. Even the banana tasted sweeter than ours do.

I'm pretty wiped out, so all I got finished on our Rwandan history lesson was the Belgian years and the beginning of Independence. More later, as it happens.

The Belgian Years
During World War I, 1916, Belgian forces advanced from the Congo into Germany's East African colonies. After Germany lost the war, Belgium accepted the League of Nations Mandate of 1923 to govern Ruanda-Urundi along with the Congo.

Like the Germans before them, the Belgians decided to use the existing power structure, but began almost immediately to undermine the authority of the mwami, King Musinga, and his chief, to forbid some of their traditional practices, and in 1931 forced him to resign in favor of his more westernized son, Mwami Mutura Rudahigwa.

The Belgians were, like the Germans, fascinated by the sharp differences in the physical characteristics of Rwanda’s three indigenous groups. In the early 1930s, they conducted a census to identify all inhabitants and to catalogue them based on their physical measurements and their wealth. Rwandans who possessed ten or more cows were registered as Tutsi; those with less were registered as Hutu. The Roman Catholic Church, the primary educators in the country, subscribed to and reinforced the differences between Hutu and Tutsi, developing separate educational systems for each. At that time, the vast majority of students were Tutsi. In 1935 the Belgian colonial administration introduced a discriminatory national identity cards on the basis of this cataloguing, a system that was still in place at the time of the 1994 genocide.

Rwandan Independence
The formation of the United Nations in 1945 promised freedom, protection and justice to the colonized peoples of the world. Ruanda-Urundi became a trustee territory of the UN in 1946, and a few years later was visited by a UN mission. This, and subsequent visits, were highly critical of the Belgian administration, in particular with how they supported and reinforced the social and economic elevation of the minority Tutsi over the majority Hutu. In 1954, Mwami Rudahigwa abolished the ubuhake system of servitude, and in 1956 called for a complete independence and an end to Belgian occupation. Just prior to another UN visit the following year, the Tutsi majority Superior Council of Rwanda called for a speeding up of the independence process without any change to the system, while a group of Hutu intellectuals presented the Belgian vice-governor a Hutu Manifesto, calling for political power to be placed in the hands of the Hutu majority.

As the winds of independence blew throughout Africa, a number of rival political parties sprang up in Rwanda: the PARMEHUTU (Parti du Mouvement de l’Emancipation Hutu), and UNAR (Union Nationale Rwandaise). In July 1959, the Mwami Rudahigwa died in the hospital. Rumors of Belgian involvement in his death flew, and tensions increased throughout the country.

Some Background about Rwanda

Some Interesting Facts
Rwanda is a land-locked country in Central Africa. Bordered by Uganda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Tanzania, Rwanda has the densest population in continental Africa in a space approximately the size of Maryland, and is home to approximately 10.1 million people.

The nation is some 56.5% Roman Catholic, 26% Protestant, 11.1% Adventist, and 4.6% Muslim, original or tribal beliefs 0.1%, and 1.7% of those who declare no faith beliefs. According to the World Food Programme, 60% of the population lives below the poverty line and 10-12% of the population suffer from food insecurity every year.

The Earliest Years
The original inhabitants were aboriginal Pygmies called the Twa (or Batwa), (the name means indigenous hunter-gatherers) who came to Rwanda, some say, as many as 35,000 years ago. They are still about 1% of the population in Rwanda, and are known for their skill as potters. The next group to populate Rwanda, probably before 700 A.D., was the Hutu (or Bahutu), who began to arrive from the Congo basin and subsequently cleared much of the traditional hunting grounds of the Twa, chasing them further into the forests. The Hutu constitute about 85% of today’s population. Finally, somewhere between the 10th and the 15th centuries, the taller, lankier cattle farming Tutsi (or Batutsi) came from either the north or the northeast. They currently make up about 15% of today’s Rwandan population.

Eventually, either by conquest or assimilation, a hierarchy was established in which the cattle-owning Tutsis gained superior status to the Hutu farmers and ubuhake, a master-client relationship, became concretized. For centuries, Rwandans were ruled by a series of kings, or mwami, who ruled through several categories of chiefs below them, including cattle, military and land chiefs. The chain-of-command beneath the chiefs was a highly organized pyramid of administrators including, from the top down, leaders of the province, the district, the hill, and the immediate neighborhood. Despite this tight structure and caste system, the society functioned reasonably well through symbiotic relationships.

German East Africa
Despite no European ever having set foot on Rwandan soil, Burundi and Rwanda were assigned to Germany at the Berlin Conference in 1885. It wasn’t until 9 years later that a German captain, Gustav Adolf von Gotzen, visited Rwanda and was received by the Rwandan monarch, King Kigeli IV Rwabugili. At that point, no one in Rwanda had any idea that they had been under German control for nearly a decade!

The Colonial Years
Von Gotzen became Governor of German East Africa and, having found a highly organized country with an effective power structure in place, made the decision to rule “through” the King, believing that that would make the Rwandans loyal to Germany. In 1899, the Germans started exerting influence in the country by placing advisors in the courts of local chiefs, and in 1911, joined the Tutsi monarchy to put down a rebellion of Hutus in the northern part of the country. This helped solidify and reinforce the sense of Hutu resentment and grievance that grew and festered for decades after that, contributing to the 1994 genocide.

(Coming tomorrow: The Belgian Years, Independence, and the Rwandan Genocide)

The Power of One

I’m a 60-year-old, white mother and grandmother.

I don’t work for a governmental organization, an NGO, a large college or university system, multinational corporation or foundation.

As the Executive Director of the fairly small Center for Interfaith Relations (CIR) in Louisville, Kentucky, my days are generally spent helping to develop innovative programming that stimulates people to work together across faith traditions to engage in common action on behalf of all humankind, and then raising the money to fund those programs.

But when David Bucura, a Quaker Friend (and friend) from Rwanda wrote to me asking for help, I didn’t hesitate to say “yes.” David requested that I come to Rwanda and teach them how to create an interfaith organization based on our model, and to conduct coalition building and leadership training with representatives from all faith traditions in Rwanda and some others from the Congo who also wanted to learn how to establish an interfaith association there. They all felt that the tribal nature of the genocide in Rwanda, and recent spill-over into the Congo, created a barrier among Rwandans to trusting reconciliation efforts that stemmed from single faith traditions and that the population would respond better to reconciliation efforts from an interfaith coalition.

So why was I so enthusiastic and ready to assist David and the others in Africa, despite the facts of our tiny infrastructure at CIR, smaller budget, and lack of NGO or similar status?

Because both David and I believe in the power of one.

One person with a specific problem reached out to another single individual who had the skills necessary to help solve that challenge.

And then to fund the effort, I reached out to another sole individual whom I knew would understand the Rwandan predicament and who also believes in the power of one.

So if there is something you have been asked to do, or something that's been on your mind in which to get engaged, here are my three rules:

1. Don't wait for permission.
2. Don't wait for a government grant.
3. Don't wait for someone to lead you.

We can all be leaders, and we are, together, greater than the sum of our parts. And when I arrive in Rwanda tomorrow, we will together begin the work they requested just a few short months ago.

(For more information about the Friends Peace House, under whose auspices I will be working, go to this link!)

Getting ready to leave

Many people have recently asked me if I'm nervous about taking this trip. The only anxiety dreams I've been having have been about arriving without my teaching materials! So I'm spending a little extra time this weekend pulling everything together. Stay tuned for more (and more interesting) posts!