Today we met Sarah. She was one of eight pupils who was invited to attend the student voice session we held at KSV School this afternoon. She is a quiet, beautiful young woman who I noticed immediately on entering the room when we interrupted a boisterous choir practice to collect the students to speak with us. She seemed slightly more distant and reserved than the others. I later learned that she was older too. Much older than one would expect a secondary school student to be.

The students we interviewed had all left their home villages to attend KSV School and live in the boarding house or at the school itself. Before talking about the school and their learning, we asked all of them about their homes and their families. They all come from at least one hundred kilometres away and have made significant sacrifice to take up their place at the school. They cannot afford to visit home. Each in turn told their story, of mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters. And then it was Sarah’s turn.

She spoke softly and slowly. “I have no mother and father – they were killed in the genocide. I only have my brother now.”

However many times one visits Rwanda, one never ceases to feel the pain of the survivors, those who witnessed first-hand the terror and trauma of the 100 days of massacre. Sarah was just four years old when her parents and three of her siblings were murdered. Sarah and her brother only escaped death as they were rescued by an uncle, her mother’s brother, who as a part of the liberating forces, came upon her village after a day of killing. Most of those in the village had been murdered by the militia but Sarah’s uncle wanted to check carefully if there were any members of his family still alive. The two children were in hiding and miraculously he found and rescued them. Although she was only a small child, she remembers it all.

Today, Sarah is an ambitious young woman. With no parents to bring her up, her education was severely disrupted which is why now at 26 years old she is completing the vocational course in hairdressing. She has recently married and along with her husband has moved to live close by to KSV so that she can take up this opportunity which has only been made possible by the generous donations of Equip supporters. She plans to go back to her village when she completes her course and set up her own business so that she can employ others. She is determined to succeed. Let’s hope and pray she does.

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