Strength In What Remains
by
Tracy Kidder
(Submitted 9/25/09. Revision submitted 10/12/09.)
by
Tracy Kidder
(Submitted 9/25/09. Revision submitted 10/12/09.)
Published 10/22/09
Smells of burning flesh, decapitations by machetes, bodies floating in the rivers, swarming flies, and wild dogs carrying human body parts in their teeth would haunt Deogratias forever. This is the gripping ordeal of a 24 year old East Central African’s escape from the Tutsi’s and Hutu’s genocide in Burundi and Rwanda in 1993-94. Various estimates range from 300,000 to 1 million slaughtered, and millions of refugees.
Deogratias, named from the Latin Thanks be to God that his mother had learned in church, grew up in the mountains of Burundi tending cows and farming with his family. So poor that one pair of shorts and one shirt were laundered every night to attend school, he was an eager and gifted student. He wanted to study medicine to help his community overcome numerous diseases. He excelled in school, passing rigorous exams and was offered a scholarship to a Belgian university. (Burundi had previously been a Belgian colony.) He eventually attended medical school in Bujumbura, the capital, where he began to hear about his country’s ethnic antagonism and ethnic wars in both Rwanda and Burundi. But the medical school was paradise compared to his earlier years. While there, he befriended Jean, a wealthy student who later helped his escape to New York City.
One might think that was the happy ending to Deo’s journey, but his first years in New York were almost intolerable. Indeed, the author states, “I would not have survived.” Prior to Jean’s help in getting to New York, Deo’s experiences in Burundi in 1993-4 were horrendous. He was interning at a hospital in northern Burundi, when the President of Burundi (a Hutu) was killed on October 22, 1993. Violence erupted, and for six months Deo was on the run trying to avoid both Hutus and Tutsis who were burning villages and slaughtering each other and had decimated the hospital, its workers, and patients. Deo had hidden under his bed and was able to escape. He finally reached Rwanda then to Bujumbura where Jean’s family gave him money and tickets to the USA. He landed at JFK Airport and a baggage handler offered him help. Sleeping in abandoned tenements, or in Central Park, surviving on just milk, bread, and cookies, he found work delivering groceries from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. for $15 a day.
Miraculously, one of his deliveries was a church in Manhattan where he became acquainted with one of its workers who helped him find medical care and a decent place to live. His life changed because a generous couple gave him a place to live, encouragement, and financial help. Deo’s “strength in what remains, ” the rest of his story, his return to Burundi, and his new Burundi Village Health Works are truly remarkable.
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Smells of burning flesh, decapitations by machetes, bodies floating in the rivers, swarming flies, and wild dogs carrying human body parts in their teeth would haunt Deogratias forever. This is the gripping ordeal of a 24 year old East Central African’s escape from the Tutsi’s and Hutu’s genocide in Burundi and Rwanda in 1993-94. Various estimates range from 300,000 to 1 million slaughtered, and millions of refugees.
Deogratias, named from the Latin Thanks be to God that his mother had learned in church, grew up in the mountains of Burundi tending cows and farming with his family. So poor that one pair of shorts and one shirt were laundered every night to attend school, he was an eager and gifted student. He wanted to study medicine to help his community overcome numerous diseases. He excelled in school, passing rigorous exams and was offered a scholarship to a Belgian university. (Burundi had previously been a Belgian colony.) He eventually attended medical school in Bujumbura, the capital, where he began to hear about his country’s ethnic antagonism and ethnic wars in both Rwanda and Burundi. But the medical school was paradise compared to his earlier years. While there, he befriended Jean, a wealthy student who later helped his escape to New York City.
One might think that was the happy ending to Deo’s journey, but his first years in New York were almost intolerable. Indeed, the author states, “I would not have survived.” Prior to Jean’s help in getting to New York, Deo’s experiences in Burundi in 1993-4 were horrendous. He was interning at a hospital in northern Burundi, when the President of Burundi (a Hutu) was killed on October 22, 1993. Violence erupted, and for six months Deo was on the run trying to avoid both Hutus and Tutsis who were burning villages and slaughtering each other and had decimated the hospital, its workers, and patients. Deo had hidden under his bed and was able to escape. He finally reached Rwanda then to Bujumbura where Jean’s family gave him money and tickets to the USA. He landed at JFK Airport and a baggage handler offered him help. Sleeping in abandoned tenements, or in Central Park, surviving on just milk, bread, and cookies, he found work delivering groceries from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. for $15 a day.
Miraculously, one of his deliveries was a church in Manhattan where he became acquainted with one of its workers who helped him find medical care and a decent place to live. His life changed because a generous couple gave him a place to live, encouragement, and financial help. Deo’s “strength in what remains, ” the rest of his story, his return to Burundi, and his new Burundi Village Health Works are truly remarkable.
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