The Humpty Dance

There have been very few times in my life that I have feared for my life. Actually, there really hasn’t been a time. I’ve been witness to death in my life, but not first hand. I’ve seen people die in movies, on TV, read about it in books. I’ve seen death through the comfortable camera lens, but never played a hand in it, or witnessed it first hand. Life is a fragile thing. This has never occurred to me until recently. I’ve been witness to a flurry of movies chronically the genocide in Rwanda. The view from my living room in the united states is a far reach from the horrible things Rwandans witnessed, took part in, and lived. This is the closest I come.

I’ve never thought my life was going to end. I’ve never thought about such things. I’ve been lucky. But with luck comes responsibility. I feel responsible for not knowing about the travesties that take place all over the world, until now. Why didn’t I know? Why didn’t I pay attention? The genocide in 1994 makes me think back to the things that happened in my country while hundreds of thousands were brutally murdered half way around the world. What was so important for the news not to trickle down to me? In my defense, I was only thirteen years old in April 1994. I was more focused on going out with girls and shoplifting candy bars at grocery stores. This is what thirteen year olds are supposed to be thinking about (well, at least the girl part). Yet, in Rwanda, the Hutus were killing the Tutsis, and thirteen year olds in that country had far greater worries than mine. One of those worries, perhaps, was dying.

I never have at any point thought that being who I was would cost me my life. In the last year, I have suddenly been confronted with these sorts of ideas – the ones that are compelling me to write this essay.

I went to Auschwitz, Poland this past summer. I stepped on ground that gave me chills. I walked in places killers killed, and children were murdered without even being told why. I walked into a gas chamber, where innocent people were herded thinking it was a shower. My eyes scanned across horizons where men, women, children once looked, hopeful that they would survive long enough to walk them. I, for the first time in my life, was fearful. I wasn’t fearful of death. I was fearful of life. I could not help from crying. I could not hold back. I could not speak. I could not process the reality that had taken hold of me.

When I returned, I could not speak of it without getting choked up. I could not explain it to someone who had not walked those grounds. I was confronted with the grimmest reality of my life, and I could not do anything about it. I had no way of articulating the anger, the hurt, the shock – the fear.

The fear was real. I was fearful of a living world that generated Nazism (I question whether it should even be capitalized). I was fearful of a world that lived through their mass extermination of Jews, and yet, when genocide reappears in Rwanda, the world that said “never again” turned away.

So, from the comforts of my American home, I watch the history repeat itself. The movies I watch, the TV that fills the background. I may not be thirteen anymore, but I still worry about going out with girls. At this point in my life, I worry if the girls I go out with understand my frustrations.

I wonder if it’s necessary for one to care about the world, they must be confronted with it. I came into this summer knowing I wanted to help people less fortunate than me. I left fearful that there are not enough people who are fortunate that want to help those who are not. That there’s not enough good in the world to overcome the bad.

But is this so bad? I am intimidated by the task at hand. In a lot of ways, I wished I had just remained ignorant. But I have been confronted with the darkest moments in the world’s recent history. I cannot make images of Auschwitz disappear. I cannot forget the graphic footage taken in Rwanda in April 1994. These are things I cannot undo. What I can do is imagine how much life would be different had I been a thirteen year old caught in the middle of genocide.

Every single “fortunate” person in the world has a responsibility; I am only now able to come to terms with it. I’ve never thought my life was in danger, and no one should ever have to. But the grim reality life is death. It would only make sense to cherish not only our own life, but the lives of others, for they could be the very ones who save yours.