Faith, hope, love - and joy.

My work here in Rwanda requires me to travel around to many different organizations, as part of the program development for my company and for specific clients. As a result, I get to meet a lot of very interesting people in this country who are doing invaluable work for development, reconstruction and reconciliation in Rwanda. Recently I had an experience that easily makes it into my top 3 most treasured and meaningful moments of my life here in Rwanda, and it brought my heart and mind back to a place that I hadn't visited in quite some time - a place of authentic joy.

On a very hot, dusty afternoon, I accompanied a client from Indiana University to one of the villages of an organization known as Prison Fellowship Rwanda. PFR began with one pastor who would visit the prisons of Rwanda to preach the gospel to inmates, many of whom had been involved in the genocide of 1994. These inmates went from being initially suspicious of the pastor, thinking he was a spy, to being cautiously optimistic to openly seeking spiritual guidance and friendship from him, over the first few years. Out of this was born PFR, an organization that takes ex-convicts and reintegrates them back into the community when they are released. In the context of Rwanda, this often means reintegrating these people back into villages where they might be living next door to a family directly affected by the violence this individual personally inflicted during the genocide. But PFR doesn't just dump ex-convicts back into random communities - rather, they provide housing and create these communities from different groups of displaced people - in this case, there were Rwandan refugees that had returned from Tanzania, there were Tutsi genocide survivors, and there were Hutu genocide perpetrators - all living together in one village. What is so fascinating about this model is that the process of reintegration is an active one - these different groups of people work together on businesses, in cooperatives, they attend church together, they develop their communities and they share their lives and homes and children with one another. Reconciliation takes a long time, but these communities are dedicated to living together again, and they emphasized to us that their capacity for forgiveness and compassion (after such a violent tragedy as the genocide) is founded in the teachings of Jesus Christ.

The village we visited that day is in Kayonza, about two hours outside of Kigali on the paved roads, and then another grueling 45 minute drive down one of the worst dirt roads I had ever been on in my entire life. The heat was blistering, but we had to leave the windows rolled up to keep from choking on the dry air thick with dust that was billowing in through the windows as we rumbled along. Finally, we arrived at the PFR village, probably the most remote rural area I have yet been to in this country. Flat, dry dirt roads and little mud huts scattered about, but in a very orderly fashion, with small gardens and tidy fences delineating people's property. There were what seemed like a bazillion children of all ages, shy but quick to smile at us and fascinated by our presence there. The people in this community were amazing - warm and welcoming, and so grateful that we had made the long, hot journey to visit them. They asked us to sit, and welcomed us with traditional Rwandan song and dance. I was overwhelmed with admiration and gratitude.

After the music and dancing came to an end, a handful of individuals came forward to tell us about their past, and how they came to live in the PFR village in Kayonza. We heard from genocide survivors and genocide perpetrators, as well as refugees that had returned home to Rwanda after long and painful absences. Both women and men came forward, and it was a moment of truly visceral reality for me. In Rwanda, it is not socially (or politically) acceptable to talk about the different ethnic groups, and this was the first time I had heard Rwandan citizens openly call themselves Hutu or Tutsi; it was even more surprising to hear from one of the community leaders who openly admitted to being a Hutu directly involved in the genocide. To read about the horrors of the genocide is one thing... to visit the memorials is another... but to be face to face with people who lived through it and were actually willing to tell the story to us, complete strangers, this made it so real for me that I had to take a moment to process what was happening. They spoke of how hard of a struggle it was to forgive those who had hurt them, betrayed them or harmed their families, and how they had to work at it every day to move forward and forgive. Make no mistake, this was no utopia, but these people were determined to overcome the past, and the process seemed to be working. Little by little, reconciliation was taking root.

When the discussions wore down, the community asked us to stay for another series of songs and some dancing, as a way of saying goodbye to us. The drumming began, and the whole community was singing along, men, women and children, and it was some of the most beautiful, heartfelt song I had ever heard, even though they sang in Kinyarwanda and I had no idea what they were saying. It moved me immensely. The positive energy of the song and dance seemed to rise and swell around us, and the air crackled with the emotional electricity of the moment. The dancing became more enthusiastic, more vigorous, the crowd grew louder and louder, and people began to clap and shout. An older woman approached me and pulled me up from my seat, inviting me to dance. I waded into the crowd of dancers, smiling from ear to ear. The woman grinned at me and danced along with me, happy that I hadn't politely refused to join her. We whirled around and around as the music intensified, the drumming grew louder and more insistent, and everyone seemed to be laughing and shouting along with the song. The sun beat down on us, baking the dry earth under our feet, but no one seemed to notice or care. I gave up thinking about anything other than the pure, uninhibited joy and freedom of that moment, and in the words of my favourite poet, Pablo Neruda, I felt as though my heart broke loose on the wind.

When the moment finally ended and we were on our way back to Kigali, I reflected quietly on that day. It seemed like a dream, a strange environment so alien to me, far, far away from everything, surrounded by people who did not speak the same language, and yet we shared a moment of authentic joy together and recognized that moment on each other's faces, without the need for words. I thought about those three big ideas, faith, hope and love, and realized I had witnessed them in full force that afternoon. Faith had brought these communities together, and hope kept them hanging on when they wanted to give up, to give in to the anger and pain and resentment that they battled every day when confronted by their own trauma and their old enemies. And because they did not give up, love had begun to grow between them, and within them, love for themselves and for each other. And perhaps when all three come together, and blend in just such a way, joy bursts forth, wholehearted and unashamed, in spontaneous moments of song and dance with total strangers, who for a moment seem just like they could be your own family. 

On being myself

I have made many sacrifices to be myself. I have lost the good opinion of some who don't like what I say or do, or who frown at my openness or expression. Being a woman and allowing yourself to be as sexually expressive as you feel inside is a difficult thing. Many parts of the world still do not accept the reality that women are sexual beings. Some of us are okay with it and feel that we want to be honest and express ourselves. But many are not.

Kigali is my second home, but has one particular trait that I despise. Gossip. So many people here gossip about anything and everything, all day and all night. If you are someone like me, they will talk about you non-stop. What's worse is that the concept of "casually dating" someone or a few people just doesn't really exist here. You are either in a very serious "heading towards marriage" relationship or you are completely single and just waiting to get in to such a situation. So if you are seen talking to a guy anywhere here, everybody wants to know what's up, and many people, it seems in many cases, want to paint you in a negative light.

And it doesn't stop there. This kind of culture of gossip is all-consuming. People will feel the need to hunt down information about you on Facebook to scrutinize and criticize, and see if there is anything they can read about you that will give them something to trash talk about. As many of my friends back home in Vancouver will appreciate, for someone like me with an open and uncensored kind of personality, all of this really starts to get me down.

Which brings me to a recent discovery. People often comment to me that I seem like such a happy, bubbly person, and I can say with confidence that this is true. I am happy, quite happy, most of the time. So why should I start to feel sad, to feel attacked, to criticize myself because of the influence of others? People whom I have never met, in most cases?

The reason I feel so happy in my daily life is because I feel free. Nothing is more important to me than being able to be myself, fully and freely, and to know that those close to me really and truly love me for exactly who I am, flaws and all. I don't want to be merely tolerated - I want to be embraced. I have been judged and rejected so many times in my life for being "too much" or "too little" of this or that. I have been bullied by both girls and boys in my youth, and alienated by the opposite sex more times than I can count for being too confident, too outspoken, too "unfeminine", too much of something, too intimidating in my assertions, my personal strength, my power, my energy, and absolutely my sexual expression.

I remember distinctly feeling smothered at many times in my life, feeling suffocated by the expectations and judgment of others. The pain and frustration this caused me is difficult for me to describe.

All I want is to be free and to be loved for it. And because this is so important to me, I try to give that freedom to others, to not judge them for things they say or do that may shock or surprise me, but to recognize that all people are essentially rabbit holes of colliding thoughts and feelings and needs and wants, and that what I may see or experience in a fleeting moment with one person is only a fraction of what goes on beneath the surface, and to have compassion for that process in myself and in all people, as much as possible.

As I said, I don't want to just be tolerated; I want to be embraced. I want to be loved.

Reality check

“The lotus flower blossoms, baring its exquisite beauty to all those who are aware, enough to recognize God unfolding.” Patricia Cori

I don’t want to be the white woman from the Western world, pointing her finger at developing countries and saying to them, “Change. Be like us. The way you are is wrong.” There are many things about the way the West operates that are harmful and unjust. However, as a person, I do not align myself with “the West” and whatever ideology that conjures up in the minds of different people. I align myself with universal human worth and dignity, non-violence, and the values of honesty, respect and kindness. I am concerned not with what others think of me as a white woman, or as a Westerner; rather I am more concerned with where these values lie in the hearts of others, or if they exist there at all.

As a student of international development, I am of the particular school of thought that homegrown development is where lasting and meaningful change lies, in small steps, in small actions, in small groups that start out slowly and quietly, and then breathe and grow and become larger and more powerful, capable of spreading change and ideas and innovations across great distances. When I heard about the film Africa Rising: The Grassroots Movement to End Female Genital Mutilation, I was deeply heartened. I know there are groups out there fighting against FGM all the time, and they have been for years, but more than anything, the voices of those who are threatened firsthand by such violent misogyny are the voices we need to hear from, and that is what Africa Rising is all about. The film follows the journey of a number of characters from various grassroots movements of both men and women against FGM in Burkina Faso, Mali, Kenya, Somalia and Tanzania. I truly believe that if FGM is ever to be stopped, it is going to be largely a result of grassroots movements against the practice.

Here we come back to where FGM is practiced in the world, and what kind of ideology allows it to continue. FGM is practiced mostly in developing nations in Africa, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, and Asia, with other smaller pockets existing around the world in the Middle East and North America; FGM in North America is practiced by specific cultures that have immigrated and have brought the custom with them. The practice of FGM is firmly rooted in a foundation of misogyny. Now, I know that might seem obvious, but the mindset behind the practice is more complex than just wishing to inflict violence upon women and girls. FGM persists as a result of a combination of cultural, religious and social causes. Some communities practice FGM because it is believed that the cutting of a girls’ genitals will dissuade her from premarital sexual behaviour, or keep her from committing adultery. In some cases, social pressure to conform to this already accepted practice allows FGM to go on, even when some members of the community may feel that the practice should not continue. Sometimes girls’ are forced to undergo the procedure with the aim of closing and tightening the inner labia so that sexual intercourse will be more pleasurable for her future husband, and therefore make her more desirable for marriage. All of these reasons for the perpetuation of this heinous practice come from one source – the idea that females in general are lesser than men, lesser even than some animals, that they do not have a fundamental human right to protect their bodies from such violence and that they can and should be controlled and dominated.

I hear a lot of women in the Western world talk about how the fight for women’s rights is, for the most part, pretty irrelevant in this day and age, that we have everything we asked for, that we can marry and divorce freely, have sex with whomever we choose, have children or not at all, get the same jobs as men and make the same kind of money (or more), and even marry another woman in some countries. We are free, a lot of them say, and while I agree with this statement on a few levels, I recognize that the battle is far from over. Personally, I won’t feel “free” until every woman on the planet can enjoy the freedoms and rights that I enjoy. I am willing to do whatever I can to support other women around the world, fighting for basic rights to protect their bodies, their hearts and their minds, because I am just lucky enough to have lived a life where I didn’t have to fight nearly as hard for such things. Can we all take a minute to stop and remember how hard our foremothers fought just for the right to vote, just to be seen as “persons” under the law? I think it’s also important to remember that if you travel to some countries in the world today, you will still be ostracized as a woman, even if you are a “free” white woman from the West. The same oppressions inflicted on the local women will be inflicted on you, and while you might get away with more as a tourist and a foreigner, you will, unfortunately, feel the sting of discrimination, sometimes even to the point where you fear for your personal safety.

I think it can be useful to keep these other realities in sight when we consider how much freedom women really have and specifically, how many more millions of women in the world are living with violence and discrimination as compared to women who already have nearly every freedom they could want.

Finally.... UN Women.

On July 2, 2010, after 4 long years of hard work and tireless dedication, the GEAR Campaign joyfully succeeded in their ultimate mission - the General Assembly of the United Nations voted unanimously for the establishment of a single UN agency to promote gender equality and rights for women the world over, known as “UN Women”, UN Women will bring together 4 previously separate UN entities under one agency, strengthening the world’s commitment to gender equality and the right of all women and girls to an education, economic independence, health care and security of person. The GEAR Campaign (gender/equality/architecture/reform = GEAR) is comprised of over 300 different organizations with a focus on human rights and gender equality, including such groups as Equality Now, Amnesty International and Women’s Environment and Development Organization. Recognizing the magnitude of the problem, these groups came together to lobby the United Nations to establish a single, driving force that rightfully gives greater recognition and credibility to gender issues in an international forum. As a result, the 4 entities now united under UN Women are the secretary-general's Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues and the Advancement of Women, the U.N. Development Fund for Women known as UNIFEM, the Division for the Advancement of Women, and the U.N. International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women. It is hoped that the establishment of UN Women will also result in increased funding and renewed commitment from UN member states to deal more effectively with gender equality issues.

With this new and wonderful development unfolding on the world stage, my mind is drawn back to a gender issue that has haunted me for many years: female genital mutilation (FGM). FGM isn’t easy to talk about, let alone think about. If you’ve never heard of FGM, you may be quite shocked by what you read here. FGM is sometimes referred to as female circumcision, although I have always found that name to be rather euphemistic; “mutilation” seems much more accurate. According to the World Health Organization, there are 4 different kinds of FGM practiced around the world, and they are as follows:

1. Clitoridectomy: partial or total removal of the clitoris (a small, sensitive and erectile part of the female genitals) and, in very rare cases, only the prepuce (the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris).

2. Excision: partial or total removal of the clitoris and the labia minora, with or without excision of the labia majora (the labia are "the lips" that surround the vagina).

3. Infibulation: narrowing of the vaginal opening through the creation of a covering seal. The seal is formed by cutting and repositioning the inner, or outer, labia, with or without removal of the clitoris.

4. Other: all other harmful procedures to the female genitalia for non-medical purposes, e.g. pricking, piercing, incising, scraping and cauterizing the genital area.


FGM has absolutely no health benefits, and violates the most fundamental basic human rights to security and integrity of person agreed upon by all 197 member states of the United Nations. And yet, it continues at an alarming rate. The age range of victims of FGM is roughly from infancy to about 15 years old; we should never forget that we are talking about children here. In Africa, about 3 million girls undergo FGM every single year. The WHO estimates that roughly 100 to 140 million girls and women worldwide are living with the physical repercussions of FGM, not to mention the psychological trauma caused by such a horrific procedure, the kind of emotional scar that I would imagine never really heals.

I call this blog “The Lotus Still Blooms” for a very specific reason. The lotus is a water flower that begins its life in total darkness, at the bottom of a pond or a river, rooted in mud. Over its lifetime, the lotus grows upward from the darkness as it seeks the light just above the surface of the water. When it finally breaks the surface, it blooms into a beautiful flower. When I think of the lotus, I think of perseverance. I think of inner beauty emerging from the darkest places. I think of the divine feminine in all of us, and I think of the obstacles overcome as the lotus strives to reach the light throughout its entire life. The lotus reminds me that the light is still attainable, even when our beginnings originate in the darkest of places.

With this blog, my intention is not to overwhelm the reader with horrific facts about FGM, or stories of pain and heartache. My intention is to remind women of the world (and men!) of our common humanity, and to appeal to that sense of compassion, to appeal to them not to turn away in fear or helplessness, but to move forward with hope and conviction, in partnership with others, to try to bring real change. For now, we will leave some of the more gruesome details out of this story, and in my next post, we will look at why FGM persists and where it occurs. You may be surprised to learn that is has likely happened in your own backyard.

UN Women’s official name is the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. My hope is that groups like UN Women will make it possible for women and girls around the world, especially the youngest and most vulnerable females, to continue moving ever closer to the light - to freedom, to equality, to security, and to a life of love and self-worth.