Left to Tell by Immaculée Ilibagiza
Read for: Global Reading Challenge
Wow, was this one ever intense! Immaculée was a university student who had travelled home for easter in 1994 when the Rwandan genocide began. As a Tutsi, she and her entire family were in danger. She managed to make it to a neighbour’s house where he hid her and several other women in a tiny bathroom for over 100 days while the country literally went insane killing over a million Tutsi people.
I had heard of the Rwandan genocide before but I didn’t really know anything about it. As I was reading this book, not only was I disgusted by the attitudes of the people responsible for the genocide, I was amazed by how quickly the general population adopted those same attitudes and joined in on the killing. I am astonished by the capability of human beings to act in this manner, to be so cruel to each other. In many cases, Tutsis were hunted and murdered by people who had been their neighbours and close friends. And what they did to children? Unforgivable.
I think what bothers me the most about the whole thing though is that we, the so-called civilized nations just sat back and allowed this to go on. We knew what was happening but it took over three months before anyone was willing to enter to country to try and stop the slaughter.
This book made me so angry and sad. It’s especially saddening to know that this is not a unique circumstance. It happens all the time. Why do we as humans feel the need to divide ourselves along racial lines? Why do we have to feel superior to other races, sexes, religions? And why does that feeling of superiority give us permission to imprison, enslave, torture and kill those we view as inferior?
I think this book (and others like it) are so important for us to read so we can take steps to prevent these kinds of things from occurring. What struck me most was that Immaculée’s father was so confident that nothing was going to happen. On the eve of the genocide, his children tried to convince him that they should leave but he wouldn’t believe that anything could go wrong. How often do we think that way about where we live? How often to we read books about the terrible things that go on in the world and think “That could never happen here.”? “It’s ok for me to be a little bit racist because that could never happen here.” These are the kind of attitudes and thoughts that eventually lead to hate crimes.
The subtitle for this book is “Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust”. I think this is a little misleading because Immaculée was already very religious before the genocide began. There is definitely a lot of religion in the book as she is a very devout Catholic but it never bothered me. It wasn’t preachy or in your face religion. It’s just what got her through this difficult time in her life. Because she was able to forgive the killers (which I am astounded at – I can’t even forgive them and it didn’t happen to me!) she was able to move on and get past this terrible thing that happened to her. She was able to be happy again. Amazing.
This is a book I think everyone should read although you may not enjoy it!
Tags: Immaculée Ilibagiza, Rwanda