By Gary Decker
“Mzungu”, meaning “white person” in Kiswahili, is how I am often greeted in Tanzania. During my time here, it has been a part of the very first sentence (if not the very first word) of each interaction with a new person or group. Since leaving Dar es Salaam over two weeks ago, I have encountered approximately six mzungu: the Director of the program, Reme Moya, who hails from Spain; the sighting of a white man about 100 meters away in Tarime (the people in town thought he was German, I was told); a quick glimpse of three white gold mine personnel as they zipped past our car in their shiny SUV going at least 120 km/hr, filling the air with a thick cloud of red dust; and lastly, myself, on the infrequent occasions that I glance in the mirror. During these sporadic glimpses at my reflection, I can almost hear it: “Mzungu! Mzungu!” read more…
Acting out conflict in Rwanda (Elise Webb)
We recently wrote about the impact of Search’s use of participatory theater as a conflict transformation tool in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Plays examining the impact of mass displacement, especially focusing on land disputes, have helped to mediate issues of contention between neighbors. A similar effort has been carried out in Rwanda, a country where land is scarce and thus property disputes are a major issue.
Rwanda is the most densely populated country in Africa and has an economy based primarily on agriculture. Every possible inch of land is cultivated. As Elise Webb, our international intern in Rwanda, wrote last month in her post “Divvying Up 1000 Hills”, dividing the country into 11.4 million tiny plots of land will give each person about five square inches of land, which is not enough to cultivate and support a family on. Clearly, a more sustainable solution has to be found. SFCG has used participatory theater to help Rwandans create dialogue around land conflict at a day-to-day level.
We’ll be highlighting some of the successes our participatory theater has had in an ongoing feature on the blog.
Your Neighbor is a Family Member
Nearly a year after the production August 2010 of Your Neighbor is a Family Member, people in Rubengera sector near Kibuye in the country’s Eastern Province enthusiastically recalled the theme of the play. One market goer who attended the performance said, “The theme of the production was a very important reminder for many of us. Often our conflicts arise from issues of deception in land sales and/or owners returning from displacement or jail.” read more…
A campaign called “No Women, No Peace,” by Gender Action for Peace and Security UK, works to ensure that women’s voices are heard in peace negotiations.
How to draw on the wealth of knowledge and skills to advance peace was the subject of last month’s Conflict Prevention and Resolution Forum and is something that informs much of the work we do at Search!
“We can’t build peace by leaving half of the people out,” says Nounou Booto, a Congolese peace maker featured in the video.
Check it out below:
What do you see as the greatest barrier to women’s participation in peace processes?
Cycling helps young Rwandans Forget their Painful Pasts
Members of Team Rwanda pass a small village and supporters as they ride through the rain from Butare to Kigali (Dominic Nahr, The New Yorker)
Last week’s New Yorker features a profile of Rwanda’s national cycling team. The article, by Philip Gourevitch, discusses how cycling helps the members of the team—both Hutus and Tutsis–cope with their memories of the 1994 genocide. As Innocent Sibomana, one of the Team Rwanda cyclists interviewed for the article, states “The bike is good. I forgot all the pain I had before I joined the team. Cycling is like a fatal drug. When you get into it, you don’t want to do anything else. You don’t look to one side or another.”
Team Rwanda was founded in 2007 by Jock Boyer, a former professional cyclist who was the first American to compete in the Tour de France. In the past four years since its founding, the team has been remarkably successful. In 2009, the world bicycling federation made the Tour of Rwanda an official race on the international circuit. One of the team members, Adrien Niyonshuti, has also qualified to represent Rwanda in the cross-country mountain bike rice during the 2012 London Summer Olympics. read more…
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
— Kahlil Gibran
This photograph taken in Sudan won the Pulitzer Prize in 1994. It sparked dialogue on the issue of famine but the photographer was also criticized for not helping the girl. The St. Petersburg Times in Florida said this of him: "The man adjusting his lens to take just the right frame of her suffering, might just as well be a predator, another vulture on the scene." (Kevin Carter)
What’s the difference between sensationalism and a story that’s sensational?
Search for Common Ground’s Radio for Peacebuilding, Africa project has just released a new training guide entitled “Covering Trauma.” The manual was prepared by Jina Moore, an independent multimedia journalist who specializes in Africa and post-conflict and human rights reporting. It aims to give journalists concrete tools for understanding the effects of trauma and for conducting sensitive reporting and writing on trauma stories, whether that trauma has been caused by civil unrest, war, genocide, communal violence, domestic violence, or sexual violence. read more…
