jifunze

Furaha (happiness)

Furaha , her husband, and three children had come from Rwanda as refuges to live in mountain village of Osha. One night, seven Interhamwe stormed the house and carried the family outside. They took her husband and strapped him to a tree, so that he had to watch while they each, in turn, raped his wife. Furaha was already two months pregnant and the violence of the rapes broke her water. The men dragged her into the forest and kept her there, raping her every night. Eventually they abandoned her down by the river, where she was found by a counselor from the DOCS program, Gueris Mon Peuple. She was brought back to the village to find that her husband and children had survived the attacks. They welcomed her back into the family, even though the rest of her extended family rejected her. In some ways, this rejection by her loved ones was worse than the rape.

Not only did they consider the rape to be her fault, but they thought her pregnancy from the rape was shameful. She also had a severe vaginal fistula (a hole in the wall of the urethra) that could not be repaired at the local hospital. So she was brought down to DOCS, where she had her fistula operation and gave birth to her daughter. Two weeks ago, she left to go back to her family in Osha and her husband, who will accept the baby as his own.

Mapendo (love)

Mapendo was living in the small village of Uvira with her mother, father, and brother. She was 18 years old and still in school when their village was attacked in the night. A group of Interhamwe raided their house and ordered the family outside. Then, one of the soldiers ordered her father to rape his daughter. He refused, telling them they should kill him instead. So one of the soldiers shot him, in front of his whole family. Next, they turned to her 17-year old brother and told him that he must rape his mother or he too would be shot. He refused. Their mother started crying, asking them to kill her, now that her husband was dead, rather than her son. The soldiers shot her as well and then caught both Mapendo and her brother. One group left with the boy; Mapendo has never saw him again and can only guess that he must have been killed. Another three men took Mapendo with them into the forest. Each one raped her in turn and then told her that she would live with them as their “wife,” taking care of them and having sex with them.

She was forced to live with these three men, in their camp in the forest, for one and half years. Eventually, she became pregnant from the rapes. It was then that she decided that she had to escape. She had seen the men kill the baby of another woman in the camp by using a stick just as she was giving birth and, as much as she did not want this baby, she knew she could not go through that. She tried running away during the night but was caught and brought back to camp. On her second attempt, she left her clothes and her shoes at the camp, to make it look like she was just going down to the river. Instead, already five months pregnant, she ran into the forest and up into the mountains.

After wandering through the forest for three days without food, she made it to the road that headed to Uvira. A driver from her village found her there, sitting on the side of the road. “Is that you Mapendo?” he asked. She said yes and that he mustn’t ask any questions but take her away from there immediately.

He took her into his truck and drove her to Bukavu. There he paid her way on a boat to Goma. When the boat docked, Mapendo simply sat there, unsure of where to go, until she was the last passenger left. An officer at the port brought her home with him for then night and then to DOCS the next day. She arrived horribly traumatized, crying constantly. She was wearing the shreds of a torn dress, bleeding from numerous cuts, and her left breast was horribly infected.

Counselors calmed her and worked with her slowly, each day, as she began to share her story. She had an operation and also gave birth to her son, Moses. Initially, she did not want the baby and asked them to kill him. So one of the counselors offered to take the child into her orphanage and Mapendo accepted. However, two moths later, she is still with her baby, and the two of them have moved together to the orphanage.

a day for women

Today is World Women's Day. And word is out that DOCS is the
place to find women. everyone from amnesty international to local
women’s church groups have come to visit; those like the former
making reports and taking pictures and those of like the later praying
for the women and singing; the red cross will feed everyone a big meal,
maybe fish or meat though we haven’t mentioned it to get
anyone’s hopes up.

I spent the early morning Saturday working with a counselor to fill in the holes
of some women’s stories. And it hurt. Even the simplest and most
straightforward are horrendous to think about, but certain stories, the
way they are told, the details they’ve left out and are now being
filled in, or the fact that it is certain women, who I’ve fallen
particularly in love with here, who suffered these terrible things, can
catch me off my guard and bring me to tears again, typing away at my
little computer.

And that rawness came with me when I went around with these women’s
groups on their visits to the tents and wards. Everyone here seems to
have a preacher in them; I’ve seen the DOCS driver lead the
funeral service, after driving out the truck with the body; the
administrative assistant holding services in the church after work hours;
students at a school start a lesson with a ardent prayer. (Even the
teaching style of many of the teachers I’ve met here borders on
sermon-like, in presence and delivery, not subject.) And these visitors
were no exception. The entered the tents calling out to the women,
letting them know that they were here to support them in their pain,
strengthen them in their healing, and be with them as the community of
god’s children.

And they did come together - to pray and sing and support eachother:
forty women in tent, both visitors and patients, some whose feebleness
seemed heightened to me by the comparison. I rarely see the women cry
here, even when they are talking about their experiences to a counselor
or lying in bed, post-op, without any of the bevy of painkillers
we’d be taking in the same situation back home. And yet today was
full of quiet tears, covered, and maybe thus allowed, by the fervent
prayer coming from everyone in the room; arms outstretched to the sky or
covering one’s face, some crowded up together and holding hands,
which is where I would snuggle in, others lying down in their beds, being
alone for a moment in a crowded room. Long prayers but overall the
moments short-lived, when considered against the scale of their
experiences, pain, suffering, and loss. And then the next song would
begin and by its end, there wasn’t a women left whose face still
had its privacy. They don’t show their suffering - sometimes
tiredness or listlessness, of course their very real physical pain and,
even then, only when it becomes extreme, but, for the vast majority, I
have been greeted every single day with easy smiles.

No lesson for today because of all the celebrations, but all I wanted to
do was be close - to sit with them on their beds, entertaining each other
with jokes, broken language games, song lessons, and reading the letters
the advanced students had written me for homework. Sitting here late at
night, I almost want to go back and sleep there. Maybe I’m feeling
my own version of what draws my sweet performer to follow his art: making
a day-job out of sharing his creativity, his talent, himself with other
people because he is paid back in the joy it brings to others; when they
laugh for a straight three hours, leave realizing they’ve let go of
what ever was troubling them that day, or are inspired towards their own
creativity and energy. It heals; it’s simple; it feels right; and,
more and more, it’s beginning to feel worthy of my taking it
seriously, as seriously as I take the “real work” I do here.
Two months of slow realization and what I can now say I want to do with
my days, in addition to creating this school project for the future, is
to spend my present with these women and their kids, just making them
happy as they sit around this hospital, slowly healing and waiting for
what will come next. It’s not that they need it; I don’t
know how not to generalize that the people here (Congolese, Africans?)
are the most joyful of any group I have ever met. I learn from them what
joy is, what open-hearted feels like, but with that, I think, is growing
a desire to share that back. My teaching, organizing programs, gathering
stories is all hopelessly overshadowed by how much I love to see and feel
them happy and want to do anything that makes them so.

“learning about yourself is always in the present and knowledge is
always in the past, and as most of us live in the past and are satisfied
with the past, knowledge becomes extraordinarily important to us. That
is why we worship the erudite, the clever, the cunning. But if you are
learning all the time, learning every minute, learning by watching and
listening, learning by seeing and doing, then you will find that learning
is a constant movement without the past.”

Krishanamurti

Hard to articulate but this describes my life here, in many ways,
relative to my life at home. I’d stick future in with his thoughts
on the past and it would sum up the slim sliver of a present I usually
live in back home. And maybe why, feeling myself relaxing in my
ambitions to “work hard” and “get things
accomplished,” it doesn’t feel like I’m losing any of
my love of being productive or engaged.

Catching Up: part III

march 1

so it's been a while, just wanted to check in....life here is beautiful,
grounded, home and still constantly new. all those struggles getting
here, and now i don't want to leave.

working with these women continues to be an entire life of itself: births
and deaths, sickness and true healing, new arrivals and going home, and
being together at every different hour of the day: all those early
morning chores, heat-of-the-day lessons, rainy afternoons stuck in the
church singing songs, social hour evenings, and worship at sunset. I've
started a new project to take down the each of their stories: just
interviews and photos. I'm not quite sure what I'll do with them yet,
but, for so many reasons, it just seems important that they be recorded.
Maybe that will finally be a use for my blog.

But just one.. this girl is seventeen, quiet now, but with teh most beautiful
voice. When her village was attacked, she was abducted by the Mai Mai,
raped and beaten. Apparently angry at her for crying, they tore out her eyes
and left her on the road. People from her village found her and tried to bring
her with them as they fled into the forest but she was unable to keep up, so
they abandoned her again. Eventually she was found and taken to one of the
docs counselors out at a rural clinic. From there, she was brought into the
hospital but there is nothing that can be done for her eyesight and she is also
almost deaf, from injuries to the head that got infected.

She has no idea whether any of her family survived and has been terrified to
leave docs, not knowing where she can go. but lyn, through the network of
services and people she works with here, has found a hotel owner who will pay
her to do basic kitchen chores and a room in a widow cooperative where she
can live; there are kids there that can bring her too and from work. Its so much
more than any other hospital would do for a patient and yet I still dread the day
when she'll leave this community of women who are all healing each other to
live on her own. I'm selfish, but i hate to have them leave; though the actual
goodbyes are always uplifting, with the whole tribe out singing and celebrating,
a mix of being happy for the woman who is leaving and, i think, the hope that it
brings them for themselves.

the goma student fund project is coming along beautifully. my connections with people
and places from my last visit haave helped me immeasurably and every step
just seems to be falling into place. feels charmed, or meant to be. more
on that soon.

politically, we had a little scare when the RCD (rwandan party that used
to occupy this area) pulled out of the transitional government. almost
comical to have jo aka. my dad, head of docs, senator, just a general
congolese "big vegetable," called away from dinner because one of the two
govenors of a town was using his personal army to defend an arms cash
from the other govenor. everyone is in duplicate here, as the organizing
theme of this transitional period is to let the past lie, invited
everyone to take part in writing the constitiution, and not oust anyone,
even as a new system is set up in its place. a UN presence combined with
a figurehead leader so far are managing to keep everyone in line, with
the hopes of having the second congolese democratic election (the first
being in 1960, with independence.) a new friend here is looking for the
funds to start a civil education program to prepare the community for
elections but where do you start when so many people can't read, most of
the country is inaccessible by road (there are fewer roads now than there
were in 1960), and there are over 200 political parties, all oriented
locally or tribally. but this guy is amazing and if he does manage to
put together a project, i've offered him the gsf school in the evenings
to hold his classes. its amazing the gravity of an open physical space
for events, trainings, programs, possibilities. (course, all the sfers
already know this: see fp, hol, the roadhouse..)

Catching Up: Part II

For a while, I've been meaning to sit down and write an email about the
women I work with here during the afternoons. And then one of my
students died today. She had just arrived last week, sent down from one
of the villages because she had been so severely raped that she needed
surgery. She was so slight and frail, obviously HIV positive. She had
walked to the hospital in the evening, just as lyn and I were leaving,
and we gave her a blanket and a luna bar to last until morning. In class
she was very bright, wrote well, but so quiet and hung out in bed the
rest of the day. She hadn't been able to sit in class the last few days
and, when I came to say hi today, I found out that she died last night.
Its left me shaky and sad but also looking, with new eyes, at the other
women and what this little-hospital-that-could is doing for them.

But to back up (skip this little history digression if you want). There
has been a civil war in N. Eastern Congo since 1998, that has engaged 7
countries and killed 5 million people. The militias, by this point, are
almost indistinguishable, except for the interhamwe (a hutu militia that
did much of the killing in Rwanda in 1994), who the UN is now trying to
round up and send back across the border. (We see the envoys go by every
week.) This is part of a peace agreement imposed by the UN last year.
It has been effective in returning this province (RCD-Goma) to the DRC
(Democratic Republic of Congo) but has been less successful in bringing
peace to the villages, where the small militias (basically just bandits)
have no real political aims that can be bargained with and no real
incentive to surrender their weapons, as they survive by pillaging the
villages and smuggling goods across the borders.

Women have born the brunt of this conflict. The militias abduct the
women as a way to assert their control over the civilian population.
They then rape them from anywhere from a few days to a year, )(when they
are kept as army wives) The stories these women are mind-blowi ng. About
being raped eight times a night every night, tortured, watching your family
killed in front of you and these are women of all ages, from 8 years to the very
old. When they are finally released or escape, they have nothing and are often
rejected by their remaining family, because of the stigma of being raped or the
physical condition they are in.

The village clinics send the worst of these cases down to DOCS. Over
2000 women have already been identified who need vaginal reconstructive
surgery. This repairs the walls between the vagina, urethra and anus so
that the women can control their bodily functions. They come in smelling
terrible, severely traumatized, often infected with STDs/HIV, sometimes
pregnant. DOCS is only one of two hospitals in the whole province that
can perform these surgeries and tents for these women are quickly taking
over the little compound.

This has put a huge strain on DOCS resources, as all of these surgeries
are paid for by donations and they have not even been able to raise the
money to rebuild the operating rooms and wards since the volcano erupted
in 2002. Fortunately, the situation has also caught the international
eye and visitors have been pouring in. Jessica Lange visited DOCS the
week before I got here and last week the BBC came to make a 4.5 minute
spot (they videotaped me teaching my Swahili literacy class but I didn't make
the cut). Next week it is a reporter from Sweden. And DOCS is getting written
up the Feb. edition of Elle (why not?). So far none of this piecemeal publicity
has manifested itself in any donations, except on the part of UNICEF who built
two wards for the women recovering from their operations. Even with their
help, we are at 50 beds for 80 patients and many in convalescence are staying
at a house in town.

So, back to me. These women are at DOCS for up to nine months, as many
require 2-3 surgeries, with 3 months post-operative care between each, to
fully recover physically. Lyn is also trying to meet some of their other
psychological and economical needs by hiring a few counselors and a woman
who does basic livelihood training (basket making, crocheting, sewing). My part
is to teach them Swahili Literacy and basic health. After a few weeks, I feel like
I am finding a good balance of teaching and more organizational/management
work on the program development side (which seems to move in spurts);
though it has also raised one of the questions I always struggle with: of whether
I want tp do the hands-on, person-to-person work myself or work on a larger
scale, with wider systems that effect more people, but from further away.

But the more immediate challenge is that I don't really speak Swahili.
(And only 1 in the 80 here have been to primary school long enough to
speak french). So far, I've been able to study enough each night to
teach them to read/write new words the next day, though they are so eager
I'm getting worried; today I had to forcibly leave after a three hour class! The
language barrier makes it a big game, with me acting everything out, drawing
comical pictures, and bringing in all sorts of props from home. It' s a great
class to have at the end of my day and I am hoping to expand to teaching at
the convalescent home as well.

Looking around at these women this evening though, I felt a little intimidated.
I've heard bits and pieces of their stories and played with their new babies, but
I can't understand anything about their lives or what they've been through. But
I do get to watch their transformation from when they come in with broken
bodies and haunted spirits to when they leave, so much stronger and ready for
what comes next. I can feel that they are healing, even though I can't imagine
the ways in which they were hurt.

Hmm, that was the first time I've smiled since I started writing this email.
When I began, I just felt numb. I don't come very close to death at home and
here, while it is always lurking under the surface, somehow it still doesn't often
hit me in the face.

Thanks for listening

Catching Up: part I

I have been hesitant about using this blog for a number of reasons, that maybe
I'll take the time to get into later. However, I now feel a push to revive it, if only
to share the stories of the people i have been working with here in Goma (N.
eastern corner of the DRC) - particularly the women.

First step is to post my last three group emails and then stories and photos will
come soon.

january 15

if i can spend time with these kids everyday, i will be a happy soul. and if i can bring home hat its like to spend a few hours learning the french names of kitchen utensils with this nineteen, age 5-11, they fall off a few benches in a little shack of a room, then i know i can support whatever project i put together over here. video suddenly seems essential. photos could do nothing to capture what made laugh, and cry, today: i'm sitting here grinning now, thinking of them snapping their fingers and waving wildly when they knew an answer, jumping up to give it, and giving "bravo" with claps and yells when someone got it right. and i thought urban was the best....

So I finally made it to Goma. my last week in sf was an emotional
rollercoaster with more time spent feeling anxious, insecure, and
attached to home than excited for/committed to this trip. its funny, it
likely won't even be that long. but somehow things felt different than
other times i've left. first, i was going back to somewhere i'd been and
somewhere i'd had a hard time readjusting from. telling people about the
congo had become a string of not-so-happy facts: civil war, volcanoes,
orphans, rape victims, times when i'd felt lonely or scared. but here
those are dealt with, and dominated by, the joyfulness people bring to
their lives, their warmth, generosity, and incredible positivity. being
here is all about the people. i'd just forgotten.

coming back, i don't have that rush of adrenaline i get when everything
is new, but i can make my way around, navigating my bone-shaking car
through the lava streets to track down the people i need to get things
done. with an agenda, i don't have a week or two to adjust to being
here, nor a boss to tell me what to do, but i do have the means to work
to meet a need that touches my heart (thank you to everyone by the way, i
promise to bring back a token of what you will have done here. i always smile when i think that the first person to donate was my most cynical friend)

and if you want to keep updated on the progress of the project; go to our website: www.gomastudentfund.org