06 February 2009
Rwanda to America
Writing as Transformation
By Immaculée Ilibagiza
Immaculée Ilibagiza immigrated to the United States in 1998. Her first book, Left to Tell (2006), chronicles her experiences during the Rwandan genocide. Her most recent book is Led by Faith (2008). She gives inspirational lectures on peace, faith and forgiveness.
I’ve always loved to write. The most prized possession of my childhood was a notebook of sayings and proverbs that I had compiled over the years. Despite my love for writing, I never dreamed anyone would ever read the private thoughts I poured out in the pages of my notebook. Everyone has a story that is unique to them, but not everyone has the opportunity to tell their story to the world.
In 1994 I lived through an experience that created in me an unquenchable desire to share my story with people everywhere. That year I was home for my week-long Easter holiday. Two days before I returned to school, I found myself in the middle of one of the bloodiest, most efficient genocides in the history of the world. On the morning of April 7, President Habyarimana’s plane was shot down and the genocide began.
My parents, who were both teachers, agreed with my brother when he suggested that I should go and hide. I was one girl among three boys, and when I resisted hiding, my two brothers and my parents insisted that I go. Luckily my brother Aimable was studying in Senegal at the time so we all knew he was safe.
Against my will, and strictly out of respect and obedience to my parents, I went to hide in the home of a nearby Lutheran pastor who was a member of the Hutu tribe. I was a Tutsi and it was my tribe that was being hunted. Upon my arrival at the pastor’s house, he put me in one-by-1.5 meter bathroom with five other women. Later two more would join us.
The pastor instructed us to keep quiet and assured us that he wouldn’t even tell his children, who lived in the house, that we had taken refuge right under their noses. He told us that the war would likely last a few days and certainly not more than a week. Three months later we were still in that bathroom, sitting in complete silence for fear of being discovered. During that time we had very little food and the house was searched multiple times by our tormentors.
We emerged from the bathroom to find our tiny country littered with a million dead bodies. That night I discovered that everyone I had left behind had been brutally murdered. I kept thinking that it was all part of some terrible dream and that at some point I would wake up, but sadly I was living in a new reality. The reality resembled what I had envisioned the end of the world would look like.
During my time in the bathroom, I went through a physical and spiritual transformation. My body had withered away to a mere 65 pounds but my faith and will were rock solid. I can remember the exact moment when I begged God to make it possible to tell my story and the lessons I’d learned during my confinement to the world.
The desire to share what was transpiring in my heart and in my country was something I couldn’t ignore. Yet culturally Rwandans don’t typically write books or stories. Our country is sometimes referred to as “the land of words.” Traditionally my people have passed on our news and history from generation to generation at family gatherings through oral tradition. Yet there would be no one to pass stories along to now that my family and neighbors were gone.
I never thought I was capable of writing something that others would read, yet the thought wouldn’t leave me. I couldn’t begin to think how my dream to write my story would come true. I didn’t know anything about writing and I had never met an author. But when I put my faith in God I knew that nothing was impossible. My faith allowed me to keep hope alive.
I yearned to share my parents’ story and the lessons that they had taught me, right up until the last day I saw them. Their wise words had molded me into the woman I had become. I wondered how I would go on without being able to speak to them or to seek their advice. I knew that their words and their memory would stay with me forever, but I wanted to tell people how my beautiful family had ended.
During my time in the bathroom, I went from rage and hatred towards those who hunted us to a place of forgiveness. I experienced the pain of anger as I fantasized about killing those who sought to kill me and those I loved. My anger was like poison in my soul. It was simply too heavy and too painful to carry the burden of hating millions of people. It seemed as though evil and hate were smothering me until I begged God to show me how to see the good in people, how to love, how to smile.
I remember distinctly the moment when my heart was freed from anger. Forgiveness is the only word that comes to mind when I try to express what I felt in that moment. If we weren’t in hiding, I would have shouted with joy to my fellow captives in the bathroom how beautiful they were, even though in reality we all looked like living skeletons and none of us had showered in months. I realized that the killers were truly blind with anger and hatred. I saw that I could not change what was in their hearts and that I would change nothing by competing with them in hatred.
Forgiveness didn’t mean that I was supposed to make myself a victim by allowing another person to hurt me. It also didn’t mean that I should ignore the truth or that I should be naive. Justice can also be a form of forgiveness if done with the intent of changing a person and not with the intent to hurt or take revenge. I kept these lessons in my heart, and I intuitively knew that they were not for me alone but to share with the others, but the question still remained, how would I share this story?
At the end of 1998 perpetrators of the genocide threatened to kill me, just as they had killed many other survivors, because those who had witnessed the killing were a threat to them. I would be proud to give testimony but the truth is, I had not reported any of the killers. I hadn’t witnessed any killing firsthand, and I knew that those who had hunted me had undoubtedly killed many others, and I trusted they would be duly prosecuted. Like many other survivors, I visited the prison to see those who killed our people. I met a man who had killed some of my family members and I offered him forgiveness. I knew that I wouldn’t make a good witness, but, even so, my name appeared in the newspaper soon after my visit. I was identified as a witness who was accused of putting innocent people in prison.
Knowing I was at risk, and advised by American friends, I decided to leave my home in Rwanda and to immigrate to the United States. At the time I was working for the United Nations in Rwanda, which was one of the best jobs in the country, but I knew I must make the move.
I strongly believe that my move to the United States was inspired by God. However, my first months there were not easy. I found myself living in a completely foreign culture and I had difficulty integrating with my new environment. I had never experienced winter before and I arrived just as winter began. To make matters worse, I was pregnant for the first time in my life.
It was the first time I experienced short day days, long nights, and vice versa. In Rwanda, the weather is always between 18 and 21 degrees C all year-round. Every day the sun goes down at 6:00 PM and it rises at 5:00 AM. Kigali and New York were like day and night. The two cities couldn’t be more different.
Although I had to make many new adjustments, I felt strongly that I was born to live in the United States. It was a country where every race and every tribe felt at home. When I looked at the people around me, freedom was apparent in every face I saw. It was almost as if I could smell freedom in the air. People wore and did what they liked and no one seemed to be surprised by anything. The number of schools and opportunities was overwhelming. Every class I wanted to take or job I wanted to try was at my fingertips. New York seemed to be the center of the world. There were more varieties of clothes, cars, and people than I had ever seen in my life.
People’s warmth and willingness to help was very surprising. I will never forget the day I had a flat tire. I didn’t realize I had a flat until a car passed me and blocked me and forced me to stop. Two boys in white T-shirts came out with smiles and tools to fix my car. They fixed the car, gave me a tire, and left with a warm smile. To this day I still wonder if those boys were angels from heaven or real people.
After some time, I felt an overwhelming desire to write my story. It took me three weeks to write my first draft. When I revisited my writing some time later, it took another three months to go through my initial draft because by that time I had a job and I was trying to manage my editing and my job. My American friends who knew my story encouraged me to write.
Three days after I finished writing, I went to a workshop in New York. I didn’t expect anything more than spending time with friends. At the end of the workshop, I met a writer who asked me how I was doing. I responded, “Fine,” and after that one word, he asked where my accent came from. I told him that I was from Rwanda. At that he opened his eyes and asked me, “Do you know what happened there?” I told him what happened in a few words. We were both in a hurry. He was signing his books and I didn’t want to hold up the line. He then told me that if I finished my book he would help me find a publisher. As he promised, a short time after our meeting he introduced me to his publisher and to an editor. Eight months after we met, my first book, Left to Tell was published. To my great surprise, it became a New York Times bestseller only two weeks after its release.
I’m so grateful to the American people, who have received my story with open arms. I wondered how Americans could relate to such horror. Yet they did relate. They cried for my parents, laughed with me, and related to my struggles with faith. Telling my story has allowed my heart to heal.
In America I’ve found my home, and I found my shoulder to cry on. My children are Americans and I am proud that they are. I no longer feel like a stranger. I cheer for every victory and I cry for any bad news that befalls my new home. Most importantly, I look to the future of this country with hope and I pray for its well-being. As a little girl growing up in the tiny Rwandan village of Mataba, I was taught that America was the land of opportunity. Today I believe that to be truer than ever. In America I could tell my story.
