Discombobulating: “Animals are more humans than human beings”

Discombobulating: “Animals are more humans than human beings”

Disclosure: I am frank. I tried hard to retract this statement and apologize as some of my pals wanted me to do. I failed. I am not denying, for a second, the goodness of some people, the kindness that goes beyond expectation, the love expecting nothing in return, the ‘planting trees in whose share people do not plan to sit’ ideology, the Ubuntu. I am informed. I am a big fan of humanity and brotherhood. But no, it ain’t enough. 

Some people called me names after I said the above statement. I didn’t take offense, I was a fiction writer, and my head was used to receiving eggs thrown its way, just as any writer who isn’t afraid to speak up on unpopular subjects and in unpopular ways. 

Every year on April 7, Rwandans and the country’s friends commemorate the 1994 genocide against Tutsis, one of the most horrible in recent human history that took around 1 million lives. Now, the country is in its 100-day commemoration period for the 28th time ( #Kwibuka28 ). 

In 1992, my biological dad, one of the elites of the time, graduated in a ‘noble’ field of study with honors from the most prestigious university in Burundi. A year later, he was elected one of the top leaders in the Northern region of Burundi. A few months after that, a terrible page of Burundi’s history was turned on: President Ndadaye, the first democratically elected, was savagely murdered (October 21, 1993). 

A few days away from starting his new job (higher/nation level), chaos reigned everywhere and dad was inhumanly assassinated. They called him from home. Mum didn’t think it was a good idea to go. “But these are colleagues, my boss is insisting that I attend this meeting,” Papa told mama, not knowing it was a “goodbye”. One day, two, three, four, mum knew it wasn't good news at all. It was the start of a civil war, countrywide. 

After the heartbreaking news came home, mum, pregnant with me started to receive death threats, from the same people who had invited her spouse, from many more others known and unknown to her, no one was safe but she was an easy-prey. She was thrown off balance, tormented, targeted, and brokenhearted. She ran away, many people, those who felt more insecure, fled to neighboring countries and others were internally displaced. 

After a few months in exile, mum gave birth to an innocent me. I was later told that many other mothers decided to abort because of dire life conditions on the new land. Others died of dysentery, Kwashiorkor, malnutrition, hunger… She decided to battle life with a little me in her hands, alone, weak, poor and traumatized. I was born in March in my ‘then-exile’, my ‘now-second home’. 

Before I was a month old, the land that gave us a ‘refuge’ stepped into the worst of human animosity: the genocide against Tutsis. There are no, in any language I master, words to describe what happened in Rwanda. Not able to go back home, not welcome in her exile where blood shed like our neighboring Kanyaru river, she couldn't find a way, either forward or backward. 

Like others (Rwandans), mum ran for her life, especially that of her 1-month old. Uganda was so far away, Tanzania was also far, they marched, me in my mum’s back and a few other people’s who kindly offered to carry me when she was extremely tired, under violent rains, crossed rivers with no bridges, passing through barricades, some being killed, some being wounded, a journey of more than 10 days on foot. 

Next home (shelter in a deep forest in the rainy season)? DR Congo. I was 6 weeks old, fun moments seemed still nonexistent in my world. My first human experience was that of someone who kills another, a child who is cut off limbs or broken their fragile bones in mortars. I, maybe, hated humans for at least some time after I even came back to my native country, I talked less, I listened a lot, I read a lot. 

But was it not going too far saying “animals are better humans than human beings”? Maybe, but maybe not. I am not to influence anyone’s judgment of things, I am not an influencer and don’t plan to become one. We (with mum since I don’t still know where I call home) came back to Burundi after some horrible months in those places that have left memories I don’t know how to describe, I was too young to know and too innocent to understand … 

Throughout my childhood, I have lived with young Burundians and Rwandans because I also grew up in a region so close to the border between the two nations I call mine. Students from Rwanda could come to attend schools in our neighborhoods, our girls would marry boys from Rwanda and our boys would get married to Rwandan girls. I love these ties, they are genuine, not strengthened or weakened by whatever diplomatic relations in place. Political hurricanes come and go, such relations, as much I saw, don’t get easily broken.

Growing up there, I met and befriended boys and girls from the other side of the river. Some of those could ask me, “Cédrick, is that your mum?” “Yes,” I would say. “Lucky you, I don’t know what it means to have a mum,” James told me often. Uwera, with a head covered with scars, some muscles still paining her in her back and on her legs talked to me in a calm tone, “Why did I not die?” But what for, I acted like I knew nothing. “I have no brother, no sister, no cousin, no uncle, no aunt, no mother, no father, no grandparent, no friend, no one,” Uwera would say. 

Confused, she sometimes asked me why I pretended to be listening to her but looking away. It was my way to hide that tears were flowing on one of my cheeks, I don’t why just that one left eye liked to “shame me”. I tried to wipe the tears but she would see it. I definitely had people who had gone through more, more painful situations, extreme human barbaries than the cross-road I knew of my mum and myself. 

I lived with them, dozens like that, some with stories I cannot tell here, some had trauma, some hated the days on which they were born, some cursed the world, some took their own lives. “Does it even have meaning at all?” I wasn’t surprised to sit with a person who had not laughed for a whole school year. But those stories haunted my core of being, I was terrified, I was sad, I wished I was born on another continent, I wished those little angels hadn’t gone through that hell, more evil than what I had gone through from Day 1 of my life. There was no holy in it. 

In the midst of all of that, my love and affection used to slip towards animals. What happened? My friend Kanani from Nyaruguru district in the Southern Province and many others told me a story that came back each night in my dreams for at least two weeks. I will elaborate on this in my memoir, discussions ongoing with my editor and publisher. 

Uwase, another childhood friend, witnessed the killing of all her siblings, mother and father, uncles, aunties, and family domestics, she was raped before they wounded her with a sharp sword. She fled sneaking and found a way in their house’s backyard, crossed the road stepping on one corpse after another, she made it into a grove close to their home. 

For the next 10 days there, Pamela met a friend. There were many animals passing by, wolves, tigers, … The friend she told me was no one of those. It was a huge snake that came early in the mornings and late in the evenings. “You can't be serious even in this,” I said when she recalled the story. She wanted to die, she couldn’t find death. All those animals were passing, just as if they wanted to say “hi” and continue their journeys. 

“I tried to scream so that those who had raped me could hear my voice and come to kill me,” she said. The company she had was of those wild animals. “I hate to call them wild and humans, humans,” she repeated. That baig snake would come with one ripe banana in its huge mouth. My friend would provoke it and see if it could bite her and probably spread its venom in her blood. The mission was different. This colossal snake would leave the banana there and go missing for almost two days. The one banana became Uwase’s food. 

“Not to lie, after some days, I started to miss the snake,” she told me, drying her tears. The story sounded to me as  one of those horror movies. My childhood night dreams painted the same story. She told me about her other relative who was killed by her own mother, just because ‘the politicians’ had said her kids were from a different ethnic group, that of their father.  “Can a mother sheep do this to her lamb?” she asked me. “Of course no,” I believed in my response.

In my teenage years, I went to places, cities as diverse as those few in Burundi and Rwanda, but I loved being alone, in gardens, in parks, on beaches. I was afraid of gorillas when I was young but grew up to realize that they are calm and peaceful. One of the trips I miss: Rwanda’s Nyungwe National Park.

Mountain’s Gorilla with her little one in Nyungwe, Rwanda. Photo by Shadows of Africa. 

I was always gleeful watching monkeys play, hippos marching on the beaches of Tanganyika or Rusizi river from the Rusizi National Park, Burundi. 

Hippos in Rusizi River, Burundi. Photo by Alpha Wild Safaris.

At Lac aux Oiseaux (Lac Rwihinda), birds were hilarious. They still are. The birds at Kirundo’s Lac aux Oiseaux’s island are surprisingly many in terms of breeds; they migrate from the western world during winter and go back when conditions allow it. They are international citizens and cohabitate. I watched them a few times, from parrots, penguins, cranes, falcons, to eagles and many more. 

After a few years, I was reminded that I had not seen the birds at Kirundo for some time. I decided to book a ticket with a tourism company to travel to the North province of Burundi. I couldn’t wait to see the island again. 

Lac aux Oiseaux island, Kirundo, Burundi. Photo by Birds view Burundi.

Among other things, sunsets and sunrises at the Lac aux Oiseaux are always fascinating. I have never seen anyone who fails to mention the experience after a trip there. Literally no one. Was it just the wild nature experience reminding me of its coolness, that it is a safer place to run to in case clouds of humans seem a bit hostile and annoying? Maybe. 

Heading to the home of birds on the Lac aux Oiseaux Island, Kirundo, Burundi. Photo by Cedrick Irakoze, August 1, 2021.

Sunrise at the Lac aux Oiseaux, Kirundo, Burundi. Photo by Cedrick Irakoze, August 1, 2021.

Am I trying to blemish humans and accuse them of all the calamities we have known on earth? Certainly not. I have seen much goodness in people in the few days of my life. Not everyone is evil. Amid the darkest moments of life when I experienced the weirdest part of humans, I also saw heroes, those who cared very little about themselves. In fact, I saw young men sacrificing their lives to save those of the elderly, I saw locals giving their own last meals to refugees in the camps, I saw victims forgiving those who took their loved ones’ lives. I saw people love naturally, selflessly, and effortlessly.

Maybe you have not yet healed from trauma caused by humans and still feel at peace around animals, I have been there. I am not trying to sell you my botched convictions about life while you’re seeing the complete opposite. I was in a worse place. I hated my own person to be human. I was not innocent but I was blinded. I wasn’t bold enough to appreciate the good in people, in myself, in God’s people. I learned to forge the good side. I saw people liberating their own beings just by forgiving and choosing to start over again. 

New life? I found it. Just let your eyes see the bright side of the immense globe, surely knowing the other one is dark. Can you please do the same in your own way? Give yourself a chance. You can heal. You can laugh again. You can love again. You can smile again. You can trust again. You can be … yes you can be happy and spread the vibes around you. You can chill again and contaminate the joy to those in your circle. Cheers!