While travelling in Rwanda we met a boy called Cloudy, and this is his story. I don’t want it to come across as a begging letter, and nor do I want to dissuade anyone from helping if they’re inspired to do so. This is just a story – one of many – from a part of the world that has had more than its share of pain, and it may be instructive for those of us who have been lucky enough to escape such misfortune.
Cloudy was born in 1991. Like many Rwandan Tutsis, he wasn’t born in Rwanda. His parents fled from persecution in 1959 and so Cloudy was born in Kasese, Uganda. His father was a soldier who joined the unsuccessful RPF invasion of Rwanda in 1990. In 1994, Cloudy’s mother and father returned to save their compatriots from the genocide, leaving Cloudy with neighbours in Uganda.
Cloudy later learned that both of his parents were killed during the massacres. Soon he was living on the streets in southwest Uganda, attending school when he could, begging or working to support himself. But Cloudy was lucky; in his teens he received funds from American sponsor, which allowed him to gain a diploma in computer studies.
Cloudy returned to Rwanda in 2007 and enrolled at the National University of Rwanda, Kigali, to study computing and telecommunications. Two years into his four-year course, his sponsor died; Cloudy had to quit his education, leaving him with few prospects. He is unemployed, though off the streets for now. His school fees, the amount he now needs to complete his studies, are just 500,000RwF a year (£550).
What struck us about Cloudy wasn’t just the misfortune of his story. His eyes are wet, even now, when talks about his loss; his voice still wavers. Rwanda is a country where post-traumatic counselling is scarce, and what resources there are must be allocated to the most serious cases, the very many children and adults who witnessed unthinkable atrocities – rape, torture, mass killings – during the genocide. For young people like Cloudy, life is just about getting by.
In a video testimony at the Genocide Memorial Centre in Kigali, one woman talks about losing her family. She says, ‘When I was with them, I was safe from everything. I was even safe from the thunder.’ For orphans such as Cloudy, the pain isn’t just from the death of loved ones; it’s from the fact that the very people who protect you as a child and shelter you from the evils of the world are gone forever. From an early age you know just how cruel the world can be, and you know that you’re on your own.
There are no guarantees in this part of the world. There is no guarantee that, even as a graduate, Cloudy would find work. There is no guarantee that, facing his demons alone, he will have the mental or emotional strength to fulfil his potential. But if anyone wants to contribute some or all of the fees Cloudy needs, I have his contact details, and you have mine.
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