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A review by kamagates4
The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes After by Clemantine Wamariya
5.0
This is the first story I've read about the Rwanda Genocide and it was completely eye opening in many ways. Naively, I believed that genocides were all similar. I don't know where this notion developed but it made logical sense that the genocide in Cambodia must be similar to the one in Rwanda which much be similar to the in Nazi Germany, etc, etc. Yes, they technically explain the same mass/ethnic killings but there is so much more that makes each survivors experience unique.
“The word genocide cannot articulate the one-person experience—the real experience of each of the millions it purports to describe. The experience with a child playing dead in a pool of his father’s blood. The experience of a mother forever wailing on her knees...The word genocide cannot explain the never-ending pain, even if you live.”
This quote stopped me in my tracks. It's so powerful in it's meaning. Genocide, even if one lives, is never-ending pain. The book bounces back in forth between her life before, during, and after at multiple points. She describes the years of trauma and how it surfaces differently at different points in her life. It's heartbreaking and tragic.
However, the book is also hopeful in so many ways. It follows her path to America for better education and her reunification with family who was left in Africa. It's a story about courage, resilience, and kindness.
“The only road to equality—a sense of common humanity; peace—is sharing, my mother’s orange. When we share, you are not using your privilege to get me to line up behind you. When we share, you are not insisting on being my savior. Claire and I always looked for the sharers, the people who just said, “I have sugar, I have water. Let’s share water. Let’s not make charity about it.”
And my final quote to leave you with...
“I've seen enough to know that you can be a human with a mountain of resources and you can be a human with nothing, and you can be a monster either way.”
Be kind, be human. Read the book. 5 stars, audio.
“The word genocide cannot articulate the one-person experience—the real experience of each of the millions it purports to describe. The experience with a child playing dead in a pool of his father’s blood. The experience of a mother forever wailing on her knees...The word genocide cannot explain the never-ending pain, even if you live.”
This quote stopped me in my tracks. It's so powerful in it's meaning. Genocide, even if one lives, is never-ending pain. The book bounces back in forth between her life before, during, and after at multiple points. She describes the years of trauma and how it surfaces differently at different points in her life. It's heartbreaking and tragic.
However, the book is also hopeful in so many ways. It follows her path to America for better education and her reunification with family who was left in Africa. It's a story about courage, resilience, and kindness.
“The only road to equality—a sense of common humanity; peace—is sharing, my mother’s orange. When we share, you are not using your privilege to get me to line up behind you. When we share, you are not insisting on being my savior. Claire and I always looked for the sharers, the people who just said, “I have sugar, I have water. Let’s share water. Let’s not make charity about it.”
And my final quote to leave you with...
“I've seen enough to know that you can be a human with a mountain of resources and you can be a human with nothing, and you can be a monster either way.”
Be kind, be human. Read the book. 5 stars, audio.