War and what comes after

Clemantine Wamariya was six years old when the Rwandan Civil War forced her and her sister to flee their home in Kigali, leaving their parents and everything they knew behind. In this deeply personal talk, she tells the story of how she became a refugee, living in camps in seven countries over the next six years -- and how she's tried to make sense of what came after.

Words matter.

They can heal

and they can kill ...

yet, they have a limit.

When I was in eighth grade,

my teacher gave me a vocabulary sheet

with the word "genocide."

I hated it.

The word genocide is clinical ...

overgeneral ...

bloodless ...

dehumanizing.

No word

can describe

what this does to a nation.

You need to know,

in this kind of war,

husbands kills wives,

wives kill husbands,

neighbors and friends kill each other.

Someone

in power

says,

"Those over there ...

they don't belong.

They're not human."

And people believe it.

I don't want words

to describe this kind of behavior.

I want words to stop it.

But where are the words to stop this?

And how do we find the words?

But I believe, truly,
we have to keep trying.

I was born in Kigali, Rwanda.

I felt loved by my entire family

and my neighbors.

I was constantly
being teased by everybody,

especially my two older siblings.

When I lost my front tooth,

my brother looked at me and said,

"Oh, it has happened to you, too?

It will never grow back."

(Laughter)

I enjoyed playing everywhere,

especially my mother's garden
and my neighbor's.

I loved my kindergarten.

We sang songs,

we played everywhere

and ate lunch.

I had a childhood

that I would wish for anyone.

But when I was six,

the adults in my family
began to speak in whispers

and shushed me any time
that I asked a question.

One night,

my mom and dad came.

They had this strange look
when they woke us.

They sent my older sister Claire and I
to our grandparent's,

hoping whatever was happening
would blow away.

Soon we had to escape from there, too.

We hid,

we crawled,

we sometimes ran.

Sometimes I heard laughter

and then screaming and crying

and then noise that I had never heard.

You see,

I did not know

what those noises were.

They were neither human --

and also at the same time,
they were human.

I saw people who were not breathing.

I thought they were asleep.

I still didn't understand what death was,

or killing in itself.

When we would stop
to rest for a little bit

or search for food,

I would close my eyes,

hoping when I opened them,

I would be awake.

I had no idea which direction was home.

Days were for hiding

and night for walking.

You go from a person who's away from home

to a person with no home.

The place that is supposed to want you

has pushed you out,

and no one takes you in.

You are unwanted

by anyone.

You are a refugee.

From age six to 12,

I lived in seven different countries,

moving from one refugee camp to another,

hoping we would be wanted.

My older sister Claire,

she became a young mother ...

and a master at getting things done.

When I was 12,

I came to America with Claire
and her family on refugee status.

And that's only the beginning,

because even though I was 12 years old,

sometimes I felt like three years old

and sometimes 50 years old.

My past receded,

grew jumbled,

distorted.

Everything was too much

and nothing.

Time seemed like pages torn out of a book

and scattered everywhere.

This still happens to me
standing right here.

After I got to America,

Claire and I did not talk about our past.

In 2006,

after 12 years

being separated away from my family,

and then seven years
knowing that they were dead

and them thinking that we were dead,

we reunited ...

in the most dramatic,
American way possible.

Live,

on television --

(Laughter)

on "The Oprah Show."

(Laughter)

(Applause)

I told you, I told you.

(Laughter)

But after the show,

as I spent time with my mom and dad

and my little sister

and my two new siblings that I never met,

I felt anger.

I felt every deep pain in me.

And I know that
there is absolutely nothing,

nothing,

that could restore the time
we lost with each other

and the relationship we could've had.

Soon, my parents
moved to the United States,

but like Claire,

they don't talk about our past.

They live in never-ending present.

Not asking too many questions,

not allowing themselves to feel --

moving in small steps.

None of us, of course,
can make sense of what happened to us.

Though my family is alive --

yes, we were broken,

and yes, we are numb

and we were silenced
by our own experience.

It's not just my family.

Rwanda is not the only country

where people have turned on each other

and murdered each other.

The entire human race,

in many ways,

is like my family.

Not dead;

yes, broken, numb and silenced
by the violence of the world

that has taken over.

You see,

the chaos of the violence continues inside

in the words we use

and the stories
we create every single day.

But also on the labels
that we impose on ourselves

and each other.

Once we call someone "other,"

"less than,"

"one of them"

or "better than,"

believe me ...

under the right condition,

it's a short path to more destruction.

More chaos

and more noise

that we will not understand.

Words will never be enough

to quantify and qualify
the many magnitudes

of human-caused destruction.

In order for us

to stop the violence
that goes on in the world,

I hope --

at least I beg you --

to pause.

Let's ask ourselves:

Who are we without words?

Who are we without labels?

Who are we in our breath?

Who are we in our heartbeat?

(Applause)