THE PROJECT

Rwanda experienced one of the worst human tragedies in 1994. On April 6, 1994, the president of Rwanda was assassinated when his airplane was shot down. This act ignited tensions between two rival ethnic groups. Between April 6th and mid-July of 1994, one of the groups sought to extinguish the other in an act of genocide. The world mostly stood by and watched, and in the span of 100 days there are estimates that 800,000 to over 1 million people were murdered. Additionally, 2 million people were displaced from their homes.

The effects of the genocide live on today, over fourteen years later. Prosecutions are on-going, the country is trying to recover in many ways: politically, socially, and economically. A major effect of the genocide is to the family structure: wives lost their husbands, husbands their wives, and children their parents. Children are forced to be providers for their family at the age when children should not have a care in the world, but to go to school, play, and enjoy being kids.

Rwanda has also been hit by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. As with the effects of the genocide, this tragedy destroys the conventional family structure and children are forced to grow up faster than they should.