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Rwanda is known as a place of death, but I wish that
everyone could see the life in the faces of some of its orphans. It was 14
years ago this month that the slaughter began. By the time it was over, 100
days later, some 800,000 people had been killed in an effort by the
majority Hutus to eliminate the minority Tutsis from the face of the earth.
Some of the orphans we met two weeks ago were 5 or 6 when their parents
were killed in the genocide. Now young adults, they’re starting small
businesses to support themselves and their siblings, and some are even
taking in other young orphans to give them a chance, too. We met Beata, 23, inside her clothing store in the
small town of Gitarama, about an hour west of Kigali, the capital.
Men’s shirts are on display behind the counter, and colorful fabrics
for women’s dresses line the walls. She lives with two brothers and a
sister; both of their parents have died. She had dropped out of school to
take care of her family when she heard about a program offered by the
Rwanda YWCA that encourages young people to pursue their dreams. Through
the program, she enrolled in vocational training in tailoring and also
received training for microbusiness planning and management. Her tailor
shop grew into a clothing store, which has done well enough to pay school
fees and other expenses for her siblings. She’s reinvesting some of
her profits to grow the business, and now she goes on buying trips to
Tanzania and Uganda. Our group of eight admiring Americans bought enough
scarves and fabric from her to make her day. Her story made ours. The YWCA program is called “Giving Hope.”
Some of the children who join it had never thought much about a better life
until they were required to draw pictures of what they don’t like,
what makes them sad, what makes them happy, and what they dream for the
future. In our visits to hear success stories, each one brought out his or
her original drawing as though it were a personal Declaration of
Independence. Martin, 24, showed us his drawing of a cow and a banana tree,
his dream. An orphan since the genocide, he signed up for the Giving Hope
program thinking that he was going to get another handout. Instead, he
learned how to make greeting cards from banana leaves. He sold enough cards
to buy three goats. After a year he had 17 goats, then sold them and bought
a cow. Now, after three years, he owns three cows and a small banana
plantation while continuing to make greeting cards. He helps support three
siblings, plus the two young orphans he’s taken in. We asked Martin
whether he plans to get married. He grinned. Maybe after he gets his family
raised, he told us. When young people make money in their own businesses, they catch a spirit that
rarely visits someone with a job and a boss. We met Jovith, a 22-year-old
who now runs his own welding shop; Olive, 16, who sells sugarcane; and
Felicité, 22, who mills cassava flour to sell. Giving Hope reaches
about 14,000 children, a small segment of Rwanda’s estimated 1
million orphans, but the model works so well that it has spread to
neighboring Kenya. There, in a village that doesn’t have electricity,
we heard from more young entrepreneurs — a barber, a furniture-maker,
and a general-store manager. My favorite was a kid who had hooked up a VCR
and a TV set to a generator to show kung fu movies (with Swahili subtitles)
to a full house of paying customers every evening. He’s now the
richest man in town.
Would this work in Springfield? As I traveled through
the villages of Africa, I kept wondering how we could bring something like
this to our neighborhoods, where too many youths have too little to do.
Could the entrepreneurial spirit that goes into selling drugs be funneled
into legitimate businesses? Could we organize youngsters here to grow
vegetables and sell them at farmers’ markets? Start a lawn-mowing
business, a used-book store, a dress shop? What works in a poor country
might not work in a rich one, but Giving Hope gives me hope. One thing we
learned in Africa: Hope is contagious.
Fletcher Farrar traveled to Africa March 24-April 5
with a delegation representing Church World Service, which provides funding
for the Giving Hope program in Rwanda and Kenya.
Contact Fletcher Farrar at ffarrar@illinoistimes.com.
This article appears in Apr 10-16, 2008.
