Let’s add Rwanda

I believe that we must continuously educate our own compassion and moral understanding. One of the ways we can do this is by informing ourselves of injustice and suffering in history, and then remembering what we have learned.

This is a pedagogical imperative as well. Our children need to be exposed, in both school and home, to books and film and photographs that will teach them – in age appropriate ways – that terrible things have been done to people, that they have been done to these people unfairly, and that it is utterly wrong that they should have been done at all.

The historical events whose stories have been especially relevant for my own practice of this so far, and those I tried to ensure my children were exposed to, include slavery in America, Stalin’s regime, and the Holocaust. I’m sure these are very much a part of the moral awareness of most of us in North America. They belong to Western culture. (The tribulations under Stalinism additionally play a role in my Mennonite heritage.)

These periods, further, offer a compelling array of literature to help us. A few books I recall reading for myself, or aloud to the children, are The Diary of Anne Frank, Night by Elie Wiesel, I Am David by Anne Holm, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn, and Underground to Canada by Barbara Smucker. There are also numerous good movies around these horrors, which work to stir our minds to a posture of “never again.”

I would like to suggest that we add Rwanda to the above – specifically the Rwandan genocide of 1994 — as a site of learning, compassion, and remembrance.

There are several reasons I think this is important, besides the broad education of mind and heart already mentioned above. There’s a general awareness of the genocide already, especially if we’re old enough to remember the media reports of some 15 years ago, reinforced by the public agony of Canadian general Romeo Dallaire, his book Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda, the film of the same name, and other films such as Hotel Rwanda.

Second, there’s a significant and growing literature on the genocide to help us listen and learn.

 Third, the international community is complicit in the genocide, for its withdrawal, for its non-response. Perhaps caring now can continue to turn us around, even if it does nothing to reverse the murder of some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

Fourth, Rwanda is statistically a “Christian” country (65 percent Catholic, 15 percent Christian) and, if we are Christian, we might ask how those who worshipped with someone one week could be hacking them to death with a machete the next. 

Last, various groups, such as Mennonite Central Committee, are currently involved in reconciliation efforts in Rwanda. Is reconciliation even possible? And what can we learn from Rwandan attempts to live well, side by side?     

Entering into the burden of the Rwandan genocide may be a more difficult task than entering the “Western” historical pieces cited above. At least, that’s how I’ve found it. I was not schooled in African history, other than its broadest strokes, mostly linked to colonial conquest. Far away from it all, geographically and culturally, I sometimes struggled to remember how the narrative went, and even which group it was that killed the other. At one point, I have to admit, I wrote “Hutus killed Tutsis” on a piece of paper to fix it in my mind. (I refer to the genocide itself; there were also reprisals later in the other direction.)

However, little by little, I’m getting there. I recently discovered the work of French journalist Jean Hatzfeld, who presents the memories of a group of Rwandans in one small area of the country. I find that the stories of individuals are often my best path into a larger history and its larger demands.

In subsequent posts, I want to briefly introduce these books, as a way of remembering and reflecting on the Rwandan genocide. You may have books, movies, or other resources to suggest as well.

Songs for the Chaco

The Chaco of Paraguay is one of those places that cries out to be captured — described — appropriated somehow. Its climate and landscape are often inhospitable, yet there’s a compelling beauty about it too. Blood and sorrow run over it — from the awful Chaco War (between Paraguay and Bolivia) through the suffering and difficulties of Mennonites from both Canada and Russia trying to settle and survive it. A complex and fascinating mix of people have gathered to live in it, side by side, from various indigenous groups to German-speaking Mennonites to Latinos. 

There have been any number of fine attempts to reveal the soul of this place and its people through non-fiction, one of the most recent in English being Garden in the Wilderness by Edgar Stoesz and Muriel T. Stackley, and a classic in German being Immer Kreisen die Geier by Peter Klassen.

But the Chaco more than anything else, it seems to me, needs fiction and poetry and paintings and film and music — the kind of creative endeavours that tell its truth, but tell it “slant,” as Emily Dickinson put it. Here too, there have been various artists at work, including the afore-mentioned Peter Klassen, a resident of the Chaco, beginning with his stories in Kampbrand. For English audiences, there’s Rudy Wiebe’s stories in The Blue Mountains of China. I gave it a go with one woman’s story in Under the Still Standing Sun. Dave Dueck and Otto Klassen have done storytelling in film.

Locally, literature and the arts are beginning to flourish — something that is often possible once the heaviest problems of pioneering have finally been solved. So the above is no comprehensive list by any means, but it does bring me to “Paraguay Primeval,” a collection of 11 musical compositions by Carol Ann Weaver, soundscapes, photos, and readings, which premiered at Conrad Grebel College last Wednesday, March 4. 

My husband and I arranged a visit to our son and daughter-in-law in Toronto around the date of this premiere. H. grew up in the Chaco, lived there until 19, and I came to know it through him and his family who are still there.

I’m afraid I don’t have the musical vocabulary to describe what Carol Ann Weaver (below) does with her impressions of the Chaco, gleaned through her visit there after the Mennonite World Conference in Asuncion last summer, and with the texts she discovered through her reading afterwards, except to say that we both found ourselves deeply moved by the work of this talented and energetic composer.

Weaver tells stories, yes, but because melody and rhythm, and the sound of voice and instruments, carry the words. Thus one perceives the narrative and emotion directly and quite intensely. You feel “magnificent the Chaco sky” and 

strange beauty in this Chaco land
strange beauty in this promised land 

The songs tell of coming from Russia by ship, by riverboat up to Puerto Casado, by train past swamps and into the dense bush and open campos of the Chaco. Of well water “hardly drinkable” because of the heat. Of the death of an entire family from typhoid fever. Of the village settled by women who lost their husbands in Russia. Of the contrast between the indigenous Lengua women who walk like “stallions in spring” and the Mennonite women who cast their eyes to the ground. Of the beauty of springtime and nighttime.

There’s even a tango, called, fairly enough,  ”Tango — If They’d Have Tangoed.”

One of my favourites was “Chaco Christmas” which sings of the heat and dust of December in the Chaco, and then breaks into “Leise Reiselt der Schnee” (Softly Falls the Snow), to the accompaniment of the harp. This was a Christmas song the Russian Mennonites brought with them. For those who’d known snow, homesickness wound through the words, no doubt; for their children who had never seen snow except on pictures, there was mystery.

“Paraguay Primeval” was performed to a more-than-full-house at the Conrad Grebel College chapel. Composer Weaver was at the piano, Rebecca Campbell did the majority of the vocals, and Paul Dueck, Chris Snow, Kyle Skillman, and Ben Bolt-Martin accompanied with harp, percussion, and cello. (Here’s a KW Record report of the event.)

I don’t think that anything quite like this has been done to bring the story of the Chaco to English audiences, and I can only hope that it will land on a CD so that many others besides the March 4 audience can hear it. 

Yearning for Winnipeg

You know how it can be when you’re reading sometimes. You’re following the text but, on a parallel track, you’re glimpsing related stories of your own.

Immigrants in Prairie Cities (see previous post) provoked recollections of my experience with “city,” this in particular reference to Mennonites, and I’m going to try to work out — for myself — what I was seeing. If you’re interested, please come along!

Immigrants in Prairie Cities

Canadians know themselves as ethnically diverse, as belonging to a country where multiculturalism is “official.” Although we probably think first of major cities like Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver when we consider where this concept is displayed, the cities of the prairies – Winnipeg, Regina, Saskatoon, Calgary, Edmonton – have also shaped “a distinct variation on the Canadian model of cultural diversity,” say the authors of Immigrants in Prairie Cities: Ethnic Diversity in Twentieth-Century Canada (U of T Press, 2009).

They were relatively smaller, inland cities, and received wave after wave of immigrants, thus requiring “sustained inter-group contact.” They were “a forcing ground” for Canada’s long and ongoing discussions of multiculturalism.

Royden Loewen and Gerald Friesen were professors of mine when I returned to university, about a decade ago now, to do a master’s degree in history. I also sat in on a few meetings of a group of post-doctoral and graduate students whose research would contribute to this volume.

Their book examines the ethnic networks or “webs” that immigrant communities developed in their new environments, and the activity in the “boundary zones” where established residents encountered immigrants. It also pulls into the mix the largest single group of “foreign” newcomers to the city – those second and third generation Canadian immigrants who were part of a great mid-century migration from the prairie countryside into the city.

If there’s one overarching impression Loewen and Friesen leave, it’s how rich and complex the whole process of immigration has been in prairie society. Immigrants faced huge challenges within, and sometimes against, established groups and structures. But they seemed endlessly inventive in negotiating identity and well-being in their new country. Religion and family were very important, though there was also conflict in these spheres as generational and gender expectations shifted.

The “old” Canadians changed too, of course, sometimes intentionally, sometimes reluctantly. (Loewen and Friesen take on the Canadian myth that we’re not a racist country. It’s exactly that: a myth.)

I’ll leave the scholarly assessments to other historians and just say that I enjoyed this book. I’ve lived in three prairie cities and am the granddaughter of immigrants to the prairies, so it felt more than theoretical to me at many points. I think it would be of interest, and useful too, to anyone who finds themselves in situations of ethnic diversity – in boundary zones, as it were – wherever it might be in Canada, but especially in one of the prairie cities. Knowledge of the past goes a long way to explaining the present and, in demonstrating how “old” and “new” have interacted, also suggests correctives and hope for the future.

My only critique would be of the cover. The painting, “Saturday Night,” is lovely but there’s an elevator in the background and to me the scene has the feel of a small town rather than a city.

e-admiration

A couple of things came together for me today.

One is a column by Catholic writer Ron Rolheiser I’d stuck into a file folder some years ago, about the need to admire. “One of the defining traits of human maturity is the capacity to admire,” Rolheiser writes. He quotes Thomas Aquinas who said that to withhold a compliment from someone is a sin — because we’re withholding food a person needs to live. But, adds Rolheiser, admiring others is also food we need. Admiration opens us to others, it sees clearly those who do as well or better than we. As per Hugo of St. Victor’s words, which Rolheiser also quotes, “Love is the eye!” (Read the whole column here.)

The other is realizing anew the amazing capacity of the internet and other electronic media to connect us with people. Consider links, for example. The computer cursor moves over a word that also exists as a link, and click, another world opens, and there, more clicks await to take us to other places and people if we wish, and on it goes. I know this is old, old stuff by now. But what’s involved in considering if and who and what to link to in a blog? And in the time it takes to create the link? Sometimes a link is simply there as a short cut to information, yes, or as a way of setting up a bit of an argument or response. But I think links can also embody a kind of admiration.

Such admiration of another person or their ideas, or at least attention to them, is always implied, of course, in writing that references the work and stories of others, and in scholarly work will be properly footnoted. But the way the internet is increasingly able to link to sources directly, and to those who build into one’s life (for me, the bones I borrow, and borrow), the admiration is not only more immediate, but deeper in a risky sort of way. It’s like introducing a friend to someone else at a party who may be much more interesting than you are, leaving you sipping at your drink with no one to talk to!

Another example comes my way via Facebook. One friend updated her status by speaking of her discouragement about an art project she was working on. Some time later, she returned to find a whole row of encouragements and also admiration for her work. “It’s truly amazing,” she wrote, “that Facebook (which is derided by so many) can reduce me to productive, cleansing tears.”

There is plenty to critique and to worry about in contemporary electronic communication — its addictive nature, its effects on attention and time, and so on — but there’s also room in it to practice life-giving admiration. Food for others, and food for ourselves.

Paraguay Primeval

Just a heads up — especially for readers who may live in the Kitchener/Waterloo area of Ontario — about the premiere next week of a new multi-media piece, “Paraguay Primeval,” with music by Carol Ann Weaver, text by various Paraguay writers, including yours truly, at Conrad Grebel Chapel/University of Waterloo. It’s a noon-hour concert, March 3. More information in Events. H. and I hope to attend; we’re combining it with a visit to our children in Toronto, and looking forward to both!

What I like about Lent

Lent was not part of my experience growing up in a Mennonite church. It was something that “others” did (read: Catholics), and when one is young, what those others do often seems vastly inferior to what one’s own people do. We celebrated Good Friday and Easter and that was enough. Lent had an aura of gloominess and “works righteousness” about it, and we were beyond all that striving and uncertainty and climbing the stairs to heaven on our knees. (I speak as a child.)

But in the meanwhile, many Mennonite churches adopted various practices of the liturgical calendar, and I’ve come to appreciate Lent’s invitation to reflection, to deep consideration of Christ and the cross, to give up or to take on. To see oneself as one is: in the words of Thomas Merton — “I walk from region to region of my soul and I discover that I am a bombed city.” To hear oneself named “Beloved” in the midst of that desolation. 

One can do this any time, of course, but Ash Wednesday with its formal beginning, and the six Sundays leading up to Easter with their liturgies and sermons and reminders are helps along the way.  

So it’s a good time. But one of the things I like best about Lent is that it’s not a big deal in the wider culture. It’s not commercial. Having ashes imposed (I love that word for this ritual) to mark repentance and awareness of being “dust” seems, by now, in fact, the strange activity of a strange minority. 

Oh I know Mardi Gras is a big party and that many people participate in some form of Lent. I also know that Lent can take on a kind of trendiness. Just the other day I caught myself asking someone — casually, as if inquiring about the latest flavours at Starbucks — what they were giving up for Lent. As if it was any of my business. (It’s a fast, isn’t it?)

But mostly, Christians observe this odd season quietly, almost underground, like seeds swelling for the resurrection, while the real days get longer and winter turns to spring, while the Olympics play out, while ordinary life goes on. There are no cards to send or gifts to buy. No advertisements guilting us into spending, like at Christmas or the Hallmark holidays. No aisles of Lent toys or candies. No Lent carols playing in the malls. And nobody shouting “Happy Lent!” 

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Photo: facade, Black Creek (B.C.) M.B. Church

More stories on sports

There’s a great article in today’s Globe and Mail on the Bilodeau family, by Ian Brown. It picks up the heartwarming story already familiar to us about how oldest son Frederic, who has cerebral palsy, inspires his brother Alexandre, Canada’s first gold medallist of the current Olympic games. But Brown pushes a little deeper — not to undo the inspiration, but to give it greater nuance, greater complexity. He asks, for example, if Alexandre also inspires Frederic. And he gives Frederic, now something of a celebrity himself, a presence for readers that includes but is greater than his disease.

I always enjoy Ian Brown’s writing, and here I appreciate — and also marvel a little — at how directly he pushes into Frederic’s reality, more boldly than many journalists might, I think. I’m guessing this is because Brown has a son with severe disabilities and is not, therefore, uneasy or afraid of him. I haven’t yet read Brown’s book, The Boy in the Moon: A Father’s Search for His Disabled Son, which recently won both the Charles Taylor Prize and British Columbia’s National Award, but I remember the compelling honesty of the series in the Globe that became the book. (A good review of it here.)

Today’s story also reveals how much Alexandre’s win is affecting the family. The change doesn’t feel entirely good. The father, Serge, insisted two nights after the win that they have a meal as a family again. He didn’t want to let the media “steal Alex from us.” But, of course, he’s already been taken. When the family arrived at the hotel to eat, hundreds of people were there, clamouring for Alexandre’s autograph.

It makes me wish we could all just leave him alone now; he has his medal; we Canadians have ours. But as soon as I write this, I realize the irony. I’m feeling quite free to discuss him and his family, as if, in fact, they belong to all of us. This too is part of the complexity of sports.

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Speaking of which, I’d like to draw attention to a comment by Leona written to my earlier post, reacting to Christopher Hitchens’ cynical view of sports. Comments add a welcome and unique dynamic to a blog, but I want to highlight this one in particular. It counters Hitchens’ grumpiness with a personal witness to the sporting event featured in the movie Invictus. Leona and her husband were living in South Africa at the time. Invictus is a good movie, and so is her story.

Ash Wednesday: Remembering the Beatles

After my valentine and I had finished lunch out on Sunday, we went over to the Manitoba Museum to see an exhibit of 84 never-published photos of the Beatles’ first visit to North America in February 1964.  

Bill Eppridge, who was assigned to the story and has 38 images in the exhibit (the rest are from CBS archives), recalled to a Winnipeg Free Press reporter how surprised he and the other photographers were when the mop-tops emerged from their plane that day in 1964 — “four young gentleman in dark suits and ties, so neatly dressed you couldn’t believe it.” Although Beatlemania was rising, it was in its early stages and, according to Eppridge, then a 25-year-old reporter, the  four seemed “generally unaware of their importance.” The photographs show them looking truly polite and tidy, as they confer with Ed Sullivan for their debut on his show, as they practice and play. The camera also captures them having fun — “genuine” fun, it’s called — clowning on the train ride from New York to Washington, and in the ocean in Florida. It brings back, says Eppridge,  ”an innocent, joyful moment in U.S. history.”  

That’s what struck me in the exhibit too. How impossibly young the Beatles look, how wholesome the entire scene! Even their songs playing in the background of the exhibit seem strangely insubstantial, almost tepid by today’s explicit standards.  I Want to Hold Your Hand!  I remember my parents disapproving of it. I suppose that what’s fresh and obvious to the young seems to their elders too blunt, too needy, especially if you already know what hand-holding is about.

To Christopher Hitchens: Let it snow

Just when I was feeling downright cheerful over the hours I’d devoted to television this weekend — watching the 2010 Olympics opening ceremonies (wasn’t that W.O. Mitchell piece, with the kid running and flying over the prairies, terrific?) and the ski moguls and the figure skating, along comes Christopher Hitchens with “Fool’s Gold,” a rant hot enough to melt the remaining snow of Whistler, B.C.

Well, the man can certainly write and I enjoy seeing his skills in action as much as the manuevering of an Apolo Anton Ohno in speed skating. There’s a lot of truth to what he says as well. But I don’t think he’s the winner this round.

Patriotisms and loyalties of any kind can easily become excessive, even dangerous, and we all know that, and I have to say too that I’ve often wished broadcasters of the Olympics wouldn’t focus so much on the athletes of their particular country — just highlight whoever is great at what they do, no matter where they’re from. Certainly the chatter about the somewhat quixotic quest for Canadian gold might be tamped down here. But still, I think there’s so much more and so much better to the stories unfolding in Vancouver than the criticisms Hitchens lobs at them. To watch the Olympics is to watch one small and fascinating drama after the next, and to find in each some pleasure, or sympathy, or even inspiration.

Last night NBC, the American station covering the winter games, was running some minutes behind CTV, the Canadian station. After we’d watched the Alexandre Bilodeau win in the moguls competition on CTV, we turned to watch it at NBC, to see how they would “call” it. Would they focus on, and commiserate over, the American skier, now bumped to bronze?

No, they were equally excited with all the elements of the story, including the motivation Alexandre gets from his 28-year-old brother Frederic, who has cerebral palsy and, Alexandre says, never complains, as well as the fact that this was Canada’s first gold on home turf. And, it was the most perfectly executed run of the evening! It’s a kind of performance art and it’s hard not to be thrilled about that.

I probably couldn’t ski my way down a bunny hill without falling, but I like to watch the Olympic games. I’m amazed at the dedication and training and keen spirits of so many athletes. I find the human dramas that unfold compelling, the skills on display simply remarkable. From me on my couch to Hitchens and his “Fool’s Gold” I say: let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.