paul.

we just arrived in kampala and i’m elated. i was swimming in a haze in Rwanda, and i didn’t even realize it until i left and i could breathe easy again. i’m sick of the genocide. i’m sick of Rwanda and i’m not entirely looking forward to going back for practicum.

something ridiculous happened last night.

we’ve become friends with a boy/man named Paul who works in a craft shop in downtown Kigali, Rwanda. Paul lost all his family in the genocide and is only supporting himself by the grace of the some friends whose mom owned the store he’s working at. this guy’s had it rough.

he’s a smooth talker, a tad manipulative, but i don’t think his intentions are terrible. i think he has attachment issues and some understandable residual emotional trauma he’s working through. he wants peace, he’s an outspoken humanist, and he’s more compassionate to street kids and vendors than anyone i’ve seen thus far. he’s great.

but last night he told one of the girls in our group that he was in love with her. stifle your laughter, please. this guy was dead serious. he handed her a letter, told her, in front of me and another girl, that he’s loved her since he first saw her and that he wants to be with her. this love he feels his beyond his mind and his wish is that God wants them together. he then proceeded to follow us to another separate date that he had already made us an hour late for.

later, with tears in his eyes after he asked to speak with me away from everyone else, he told me that i was like family to him, that God didn’t create tribes or skin color, only personality, and that i will always have a brother and a protector in Rwanda; he said i’m like the sister he lost in the genocide. then he asked me if i would be the mediator between him and her while i’m in Rwanda for practicum and she’s in Ethiopia. he said he’s lost so much in his life and it’s time he found someone to share his love with. he wants me to convince her of his sincerity, and he wants me to wish them to be together. i owe this to him because of the role i’ve become in his life…

he then told me that his boss was going away for a month and he would struggle with paying rent. he wanted me to help, and despite the unrest i felt about it, i did. i felt manipulated, but i couldn’t blame him.

this event really weirded me out.

i think the core of my confusion/puzzlement/amazement is how seemingly unreal it all is. Paul’s a genocide survivor. he saw his mom killed. he saw people he trusted do it. he’s experienced things i will pray with my entirety i never have to deal with…perhaps i just imagined or expected some kind of strength of character to develop from this – some kind of emotional sobriety that i assumed was essential in coping with something like that. i think i just expected something completely unlike me.

but here he was, emotional immaturity and all, wrestling with the pain of his past and that wonderful agony of new love…and then there’s me, being swept up into it, feeling completely inauthentic and slightly manipulated because i don’t know how to embrace these sentiments he’s more than offering me, much less know how to react to his seriousness when all i want to do is laugh at how ridiculous it all is.

what the hell am i doing here? i don’t know how to help these people. i can’t even get over myself or pick up my own cross, much less carry anyone else’s.

i’m struggling with what i’m supposed to do with not only the reality of pain and suffering, but the mundane complacency of it. there’s nothing particularly extraordinary about the people or situations where pain is so real…these people are just like me. there’s nothing romantic about it at all, despite the kind of emotional gravity concepts like genocide warrant.

the most difficult part is being here, experiencing firsthand, or at least from primary sources, some of the worst shit in the world, and i don’t feel transformed…at least not in the way i was expecting. i think i was hoping seeing this would make me selfless. i would’ve hoped that forming a relationship with someone like paul would really shake me up and get my over myself, but i kind of just want to withdraw even more…

i dunno. it’s just weird.

….

could use some prayer as far as motivation is concerned…i, for the first time, felt the pain of my academic ‘doing-thorough-research-and-writing-a-good-paper-scares-the-shit-out-of-me’ anxiety. we did a presentation on the church’s role in the Rwandan genocide and i was ashamed. i’ve been a half-asser all my life and i’m sick of it.

please pray that i’d be able to overcome procrastination.

also, can i pray for you? how?