December 12, 2022
A Full Day...Full of Many Things...
When Joni and I were planning for this Rwanda trip, we knew that we would be working with the teachers from the PEBL Project on December 9 and 10. Joni asked me, “What will be doing the other days? What should I prepare for?” I answered with what I have learned over the years about coming to Rwanda and the Maranyundo Girls School. “Well, I am not really sure, but each day will be full; the sisters will make sure we have meaningful experiences that will teach us a great deal about the history of the country, rebuilding an education system to educate young people, and the promise of a strong future emerging from a dark colonial past.”
December 12 was a day to experience all of those elements. Sister Laetitia and Sister Juvenal were our guides.
Visiting Notre Dame de Auges Nursery and Primary School:
We drove from MGS to Kigali in the Nyamata-to-Kigali rush hour traffic, which has increased substantially in the past few years. People are moving to Nyamata to live in lovely new homes that are commuting distance from Kigali. Suburbs are growing. We met Sister Juvenal at her residence in Kigali, next door to one of the Benebikira Nursery and Primary schools, Notre Dame de Auges. Notre Dame is an impressive set of buildings that serves 800 students. We began our visit with the Director who has been Head of School for 1 year. We first talked with her about what we would be seeing: 3 early childhood classrooms; the primary school students on break (it is exam time); the Maker Space that 2 teachers who attended the PEBL teacher training have begun.
The Nursery Classrooms were delightful. The students are clearly enjoying being together in colorful, cozy rooms. Children showed us their paper structures, their keyboard and microphone for music,(the child who held the microphone the song leader!). Other students were working with stickers, having a porridge and milk break, marching to a version of If You’re Happy and You Know It, keeping the beat with a lovely drum. When we were summoned to leave the first classroom to visit the next, the children wanted to write their names in a lovely note book that Joni carries. She left the book for them to write their names. When we completed our tour, Sister Juvenal stopped back to the classroom to retrieve Joni’s book. Joni opened the book and the page she discovered is a wonderful gift. Each child had written their name, carefully guided by the lined page, leaving a signature to remind Joni and each of us of the energy and joy we witnessed in their being together. “I am here” each signature seemed to declare. “Remember that you were here, too.” Indeed we will!
The Maker Space at Notre Dame was a delight. The teachers and the Headmistress are proud to have started an engineering Club and sharing ideas and strategies of Novel engineering with their students.
After a leisurely Ladies Luncheon at Chez Lando (so many memories!) we were on our way to the Genocide Memorial. That experience begins with a delightful surprise. In 1994, in the days immediately following the cessation of killing, a three year old boy wandered to the place where Sister Juvenal and other sisters were gathering lost children. The sisters established their place as an orphanage while they tried to find homes for the children. This three year old boy, along with others, was not able to be placed. So an orphanage was established so the Sisters could care for these children. That tiny boy is now a leader among the docents at the Genocide Memorial. Jean St Croix hailed us as our driver drove into the crowded parking area, signaling that a special parking place had been reserved for us. Being from Boston, I appreciated having a connection to find preferred parking!
It was so sweet to see how Jean called Sister Juvenal “Mum.” The affection he showed towards her and Sister Laetitia was lovely. The affection and pride Sister Juvenal felt was very special. Jean ushered us into the Memorial and accompanied us through the English guided tour.
At this point, I cannot find the words to express what the experience of the Memorial means to visitors to the Memorial. Each of us responds in our own way. But those ways are not the same as the way Rwandans respond to this site. As Jean explained to us, “Many people see this place as a museum. For us it is a Memorial. For us it is a place where our people are buried. Many come to visit their families here.”
Personally, this was my 4th visit to the Memorial; each time I see something different, I feel something deeply. To visit the Memorial with Joni, who is Jewish, the comparisons to the Holocaust were particularly troubling, considering the mantra of “Never Again” and the work of Raphael Lemkin. The room which acknowledges the genocides that have transpired across the globe force us to reckon with the cruelty humans are capable of perpetrating with power to destroy. We all lingered over the photos and explanations in the Children’s Room of the awful deaths suffered by the youngest victims. I tried to hold on tightly to the image of those joyful children in the Nursery School we had visited just hours ago. But the contrast seemed like a deep cavern I could not escape.
At the end of the tour, Jean brought us to the café and we sat together with cool drinks, each quietly processing their own experience of what we had just seen and heard. It was a remarkable intimacy made even more profound by knowing Jean’s history with Sister Juvenal and her congregation. Jean introduced us to 2 of is “bosses” (proudly introducing his “Mum” to them. They each told Mum what a special young man she had brought them!) One of his “bosses,” Jeff, is Director of Education Programs at the Memorial. He spoke to us of how the outreach to other countries, schools and NGOs is so critical for the mission of the museum. “We must never tolerate violence, become immune to injustice anywhere. These are the first steps to genocide.” I thought how gun violence is becoming so familiar in our reports of mass shootings in the US. The commitment to educate the world to decry such acts is clear in the Memorial’s work.
After finishing our drinks and conversation, Jean gave each of us a rose to take to the gardens where 250,000 victims of the Genocide against the Tutsies are buried. ( about one forth of the total victims.) The Sisters sang prayers, blessings for the dead; thanksgiving for their lives. We each laid our rose on a sarcophagus. Then we strolled through the beautiful gardens that surround the innocent victims of this unspeakable tragedy.
Going Home
The ride back to Maranyundo was quiet. The day was so busy, so full of joy at seeing the children and accomplishments of the Notre Dame school. The day was so full of sadness, confronting the unspeakable cruelty that people are capable of perpetrating on one another. By the time we arrived back at the school, I felt that my own being was full of hope as demonstrated by the work of the Sister Laetitia and her staff and faculty at this beautiful school. The school motto, the promise of what students will learn here… Respect Responsibility and Leadership… brings hope to this nation in its on-going process of healing. And as I thought about the day as I turned out my light, I thought again of those words I wrote when I first came to MGS.
The more I take in this place, this school, the more I am learning why it is that the people in Rwanda are hoping that education will allow their nation to heal and develop a new voice in the world community. I am not naïve to the fact that politics and the wretched history of Colonialism and suffering that is part of the legacy the West has left this nation will shape some of the tone and cadence of this voice. But here at the Maranyundo School, among the girls eager to learn, among the teachers eager to teach, among the sisters dedicated to serve, one can feel a strong possibility that the voice will be a woman’s voice, resonating with song and delight, but very strong, complex, ageless and deep.
Linda V. Beardsley
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