Rwandese Flowers_ 1 to 6

are synonyms, since they refer to more than one individual as well as Twa and Matwa to one. The Twas are a Pygmy
citizenry of small stature, average weight, and height about a meter and a half, who are indigenous to Central Africa
and parts of Asia. Reports of their presence in the region go back to the time of the Egyptian Pharaohs.
At the early stage of the country's historical formation, the three ethnic groups – the Hutus, farmers, the
Tutsis, herders, and the Twas, hunters, and collectors, coexisted in harmony until the Europeans colonized the region.
The Brussels conference, in 1890, granted Rwanda to Germany. The Germans controlled the region until their defeat
in World War I when the protectorate of Rwanda passed into the control of Belgium.
The Belgians divided the Rwandans into two major groups, adopting racial identification that instigated
ethnic division. They approached the Tutsi minority to govern the country and discriminated the Hutus, what
exacerbated the racial hatred.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the Hutus took power, expelled the Belgians and massacred the Tutsis, who
fled by thousands into exile in neighboring countries where they founded an armed resistance movement. Because of the
death of nearly a million Tutsis, people see a parallel between the Rwandese Genocide and the
Jewish Holocaust perpetrated by the Nazis during the World War II.
After I arrived in Kigali and on the way from the Kanombe Airport to the Hôtel des Mille
Collines, I did not see a single familiar face, since most people I met in 1994 died or fled the country.
At first, I intended to leave Rwanda after seven days, as I had planned to be present during the full
week, yet I changed my mind. I asked the hotel manager to obtain a ticket for a flight on April 7 so
that I left the country in the first phase of the event. I did not see any sense in staying in Kigali not
even a tiny bit more than a couple of days. In fact, when I set foot in that place another time, I
deduced I had nothing to do with it anymore, and I washed my hands of Rwanda. Furthermore, I
thought I could meet the wishes of my clinical psychologist and the needs of my health care,
spending just two days in Rwanda. Sadly, I was not hopeful of getting a flight available going to the
West, since the city was replete with visitors of other nationalities who would also go by air. While I
was walking around town, I saw sad people passing by me.
They looked like a sorry little girl who had thrown her doll on fire and could do little while the flames
were consuming it. The next morning, once removing the ashes, she finds nothing more of her favorite toy apart from its
memory. Therefore, she assumes a guilt that she carries with her from then on, for burning her doll, carelessly.
People were heading to the local football stadium where the main ceremony was to
happen. Whoever survived Rwanda 1994 carries death as a burden on his memories or life as a gift
for having escaped the clutches of the genocide. Therefore, many Rwandans credited their existence
to a stroke of luck, feeling as if they had died in the remembered year, and, after a decade, they were
having a fresh start or mourning the anniversary of a sad story. People looked at one another and did
not know whether they smiled because they were alive or wept for their dead.
My name is Isabelle, and I am an American doctor from New York and I have French
ancestry. My grandparents migrated from France to the United States of America where Father was
born. He is a nationalist politician who loves France maybe thanks to his parents' origin. The French
Government, for its part, respects and honors him in gratitude for his support on the Franco-
American business agenda.
Block after block, as I was walking down Kigali streets in 2004, I felt good to see that
the inhabitants I came across did not recognize me. Amid the sad crowd, I feared to be unprepared
for the recurrence of the past events, whispering to myself and cursing my psychologist for having
sent me back to that place, blackmailing me with the achievement of my healing. Such being the case,
I wondered why I did not keep the displeasing story with me, broke into the USA and affirmed to
my shrink in New York that my difficult issues were gone, remained in the past and were currently
resolved.