Greetings from Rwanda

Hundreds of jubilant Rwandans were blasting air horns, cheering, and dancing greeted the Reconciliation's Reach at the Kigali international airport today. Boys with bright green wigs and gold jerseys alongside men with elaborate masks and children pounding drums all stood by as we exited the airport into the 80 degree dry, dusty sunshine.

While the crowd awaited the return of their victorious national soccer team, recent winners of a tournament in Sudan, we left to enter the heart of the capital city. Our driver Kalisa, from Nyamata Rwanda, dutifully answered most questions with a bright smile and a sincere, “no problem” as he wound his way through Kigali's hilly streets to meet our translator at our hotel for the night. After several stops and starts, an unexplained stop at the gas station, a chat with policemen (former colleagues) and a call for directions, we found Dora Urujeni. Dora is a presence, with her long flowing hair of tightly wound braids greeted us like old friends with hugs and welcomes.

Immediately, it's clear she can take charge and get things done. Dora, a former member of Parliament, shepherded us around the city expertly to take care of business, checking out apartments for the month, changing money, buying a cell phone (remarkably cheap and easy, 10,000 Rwandan Francs, about $14) and a visit to the national soccer stadium. The renovated green, yellow, and aqua stadium looks much like any other in the U.S. and it houses the Ministry of Sport & Culture. Inside, fortunately the Minister's assistant remembers our many emails and conversations and will deliver our film permit tomorrow. As anyone who visits the third world will tell you, rarely does anything happen fast here.

Over “African Tea”, a sort of chai with ginger, we learn that Dora, like nearly every Rwandan has a remarkable and tragic story of her own. She was born a refugee in the Congo, her parents fleeing to escape pogroms in the 1970s. She was only able to return to Rwanda after the genocide in 1994 when she was 17 years old. Numerous members of her family were killed. Now she works to teach young people, aged 15-34 how to build peace and transform conflict. After studies at SIT in Vermont she is now completing her practicum on that topic. We can tell there is much more to Dora's story that we will surely learn in the coming weeks.

After a very long day photographer Scott Ippolito, producer Bob Koenig, and I shared a dinner of roasted goat brochettes, delicious grilled fish—probably talapia, served whole with a pile of onions and a fiery hot sauce that left us all groping another sip of our 75 cent beers. Following nearly 24 hours on planes and about 2 days without good sleep we are ready for some sleep under our mosquito nets.

Tomorrow we'll visit the National Genocide Museum here in Kigali, where hundreds of thousands of victims have been laid to rest. We will continue to update you as much as possible. The internet is intermittent and slow, we hope to be able to transmit pictures soon!

--Adam Mazo, Director, Reconciliation's Reach

Documentary Team Leaving for Rwanda

UPDATE: Our team is leaving for Rwanda beginning Sunday July 12th, 2009-August 11th. Come back here for updates.--- The Fourth of July is a time for celebration of liberation, quality time with family and friends and good food... in Rwanda. 15 years ago on America's birthday in 1994 is the date many Rwandans point to as the turning point in their national nightmare. On July 4th, 1994 exiled Rwandan fighters took over the capital of Kigali. But not before extremist Hutus slaughtered approximately 800,000 people, mainly minority Tutsis, also moderate Hutus. Neighbors picked up machetes to slaughter neighbors, husbands killed wives, children and their own parents. The Rwandan Patriotic Front forces then murdered hundreds of thousands more civilians, mainly Hutus in the weeks that followed. Amidst the killing, rape was commonplace.

Today nearly every Rwandan suffers from the psychological, if not physical scars, as they struggle to find ways to coexist. That battle is becoming especially difficult as the prisons, horribly crowded with killers, are releasing killers. The murderers often have no choice but to return to the same neighborhoods where they killed. The Reconciliation's Reach team will document encounters between these released prisoners and survivors. The two groups will spend several days together learning about the history of the genocide and beginning to attempt to find ways to rehumanize their enemies, work together, or at least live side by side peacefully.

One group, REACH, founded by a Rwandan Minister who lost 36 relatives in the genocide, will celebrate the culmination of 13 years of this work on July 17th. Our filmmaking team will be there as REACH opens its Center for Unity and Peace in Kigali.

The next day we travel to Ruhango village where young people come together for two days of learning, entertainment and fellowship at the Rwanda Youth Healing Center. Many leaders of the organization have grown within the group to become teachers. They focus on healing the psychological trauma of the genocide so that young people can lead productive lives.

July 21st we will travel to the village of Rusumo, a small town close to the border of Burundi. REACH will hold a 3 day workshop we will attend. We will stay in the village for several days to see what happens when participants take lessons learned back into their community. How do survivors cope with the knowledge their families killers are back living next door? How do killers manage to try to rebuild a life in a neighborhood they helped to destroy?

In late July we will visit a different 3 day workshop sponsored by AGLI (Africa Great Lakes Initiative) called HROC (Healing and Reconciliation Our Communities). This workshop in Gasabo brings together an equal amount of survivors with recently released prisoners. We will explore the different tacts the two groups take in their seminars.

All of these groups claim success in healing seemingly impossible rifts in relationships. Throughout our journey we will meet and get to know the seminar participants, introducing them to you to better understand how they are able to begin to reconcile and in some cases, why they are not. We invite your ideas, comments and contributions as we embark on this exploration. ---

See what else we've been up to:

-Photos from our recent benefit concert event

-A live interview with the filmmaker on ABC-TV:

Adam on ABC7

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Heading to Rwanda

The Fourth of July is a time for celebration of liberation, quality time with family and friends and good food... in Rwanda. 15 years ago on America's birthday in 1994 is the date many Rwandans point to as the turning point in their national nightmare. On July 4th, 1994 exiled Rwandan fighters took over the capital of Kigali. But not before extremist Hutus slaughtered approximately 800,000 people, mainly minority Tutsis, also moderate Hutus. Neighbors picked up machetes to slaughter neighbors, husbands killed wives, children and their own parents. The Rwandan Patriotic Front forces then murdered hundreds of thousands more civilians, mainly Hutus in the weeks that followed. Amidst the killing, rape was commonplace. Today nearly every Rwandan suffers from the psychological, if not physical scars, as they struggle to find ways to coexist. That battle is becoming especially difficult as the prisons, horribly crowded with killers, are releasing killers. The murderers often have no choice but to return to the same neighborhoods where they killed. The Reconciliation's Reach team will document encounters between these released prisoners and survivors. The two groups will spend several days together learning about the history of the genocide and beginning to attempt to find ways to rehumanize their enemies, work together, or at least live side by side peacefully.

One group, REACH, founded by a Rwandan Minister who lost 36 relatives in the genocide, will celebrate the culmination of 13 years of this work on July 17th. Our filmmaking team will be there as REACH opens its Center for Unity and Peace in Kigali.

The next day we travel to Ruhango village where young people come together for two days of learning, entertainment and fellowship at the Rwanda Youth Healing Center. Many leaders of the organization have grown within the group to become teachers. They focus on healing the psychological trauma of the genocide so that young people can lead productive lives.

July 21st we will travel to the village of Rusumo, a small town close to the border of Burundi. REACH will hold a 3 day workshop we will attend. We will stay in the village for several days to see what happens when participants take lessons learned back into their community. How do survivors cope with the knowledge their families killers are back living next door? How do killers manage to try to rebuild a life in a neighborhood they helped to destroy?

In late July we will visit a different 3 day workshop sponsored by AGLI (Africa Great Lakes Initiative) called HROC (Healing and Reconciliation Our Communities). This workshop in Gasabo brings together an equal amount of survivors with recently released prisoners. We will explore the different tacts the two groups take in their seminars.

All of these groups claim success in healing seemingly impossible rifts in relationships. Throughout our journey we will meet and get to know the seminar participants, introducing them to you to better understand how they are able to begin to reconcile and in some cases, why they are not. We invite your ideas, comments and contributions as we embark on this exploration. ---

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The Final Countdown

When we celebrate our independence across America on this Fourth of July, Rwandans will observe the 15th anniversary of the liberation of their capital, Kigali, and the beginning of the end of the genocide, a 100 day systematic slaughter of 1,000,000 human beings. This horrible chapter in the history of humanity is creating an unlikely opportunity. Two weeks after that anniversary, the Reconciliation's Reach documentary film team will be in Kigali to document an event 14 years in the making, the opening of REACH's Center for Unity and Peace. We will also spend a week in the village of Rusumo to record a 4-day seminar bringing together recently released killers with survivors. Witnessing these painful first steps toward rebuilding destroyed relationships and neighborhoods is powerful. We have seen that viewing these experiences motivates students in America to consider opportunities to improve their lives.

Today, you can join in these efforts aimed at developing student leaders in the U.S. and around the world to prevent violence, improve communities, and build peace.

Despite the recession, you have donated $65,000 cash and in-kind donations since last fall, allowing this project to grow. This includes a $10,000 grant from the Germeshausen Foundation. The Boston-based Foundation supports institutions including Harvard, MIT, WGBH, and the Museum of Fine Arts. Organizations including Facing History & Ourselves, the United Nations, and Boston Public Schools are interested in distributing our project to their audiences.

The total price of tickets ($8,000) for our 3-person team, is just about 10% of what you have already contributed.

Many of you have asked when the next fundraising event will be, this is it!

When everyone reading these words gives just $50, we can get to Rwanda to build on our efforts to prevent violence in our communities.

Please find donations instructions here: http://peacedocumentary.org/main/you.

Or go directly to our secure tax-deductible donation page (be sure to select "Reconciliation's Reach" for your Purpose of Donation)

Thank you~ Adam Mazo, Executive Producer

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Boston Students Find Meaning in Rwanda's Lessons

“Learning about Rwanda... it gives people the opportunity to open their eyes about things that are going on in our neighborhoods (in the United States) so we can buckle up and make change. So, I think it's very important to learn it.” High School senior Maceyo Branch reacted to seeing a preview of Reconciliation's Reach at a discussion this week with the filmmaker at Health Careers Academy on the campus of Northeastern University in Boston. 25 seniors watched a 5 minute video preview of Reconciliation's Reach about genocide survivors efforts to reconcile with wives of perpetrators. Then the students, from neighborhoods across Boston, engaged in a lively discussion about why Rwandans stories are relevant to them and why they care about the struggles of people on the other side of the world.

Some students found it hard to imagine how genocide survivors could begin to accept a killer or a killer's relative. Ashley Harton-Powell saw maturity, “It shows how strong they are. Because if you went to one of us, or an American in general, and asked 'What if this was to happen to you, how would you feel if the wife of that person or the family member of that person came to you to apologize for their wrong doing?' A lot of people probably would not be able to accept the apology.”

Maceyo understood how some Rwandans have found ways to live side by side with former enemies, “After the genocide they were able to humanize the person cause they really got to know that, 'They're human just like us and they suffered just like us.' You can dehumanize somebody but you can also humanize a person too.”

Watching Reconciliation's Reach was powerful for Noadya Legrand, she said, “It's something that can really change you, can change your whole mindset and your values.” Some students see the possibility of organizing their community for action. Efrangely De La Cruz, “We're the teenagers in America and it takes one person to make a change. If one person starts it up and they tell people, more people become involved and become more interested in making that difference.”

Bendina Remy saw a clear connection between Rwandans work for reconciliation and her life, “It relates to me because just like the Tutsis and the Hutu, I live in Dorchester (a section of Boston) and there's a lot of gang violence between the Bloods and the Crips. And it just reminds me, they're killing each other over nonsense and you need to stop it. It kind of hit home cause I know a lot of gang-affiliated people. Maybe we could do something to change it. And if we could change it in Rwanda we could change it in Boston.”

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"We Have All Been Hurt"

“Each one of us knows what it is like both to be wronged and to commit wrong against another,” wrote Jordan J. Ballor in a recent review of “As We Forgive” a book which explores the process of forgiveness and reconciliation in response to the Rwandan genocide in 1994. The notion that Rwandans can teach Americans much about life, truth, healing and reconciliation is at the heart of the documentary project, Reconciliation's Reach. The movie will follow the excellent work done in the Laura Waters Hinson film As We Forgive. In Reconciliation's Reach we will show transformational moments occurring all over Rwanda as genocide survivors seem to forgive and reconcile with those who killed their families.

As Ballor wrote, because we have all been hurt, “therefore each one of us knows what it is like to need to forgive or to need forgiveness. While many of the wrongs we experience pale in comparison to the grisly crimes committed in those 100 days of horror fifteen years ago, these exceptional evils prove the necessity of overcoming even seemingly more banal and daily sins.”

It is for these reasons that we encourage you to watch our preview, explore our site, and engage with us. Send an email, make a comment, and get involved with an effort to spark conversations about conflict resolution and reconciliation in your community.

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The Pain of April

15 years ago this month years of tension, violence, and hatred exploded into genocide in Rwanda. For millions of Rwandans, April will always be a month of pain. In our initial investigation for our documentary film project Reconciliation's Reach one survivor, Felesta Mukasangwa said to us, "Whenever April comes, I remember what happened to me, almost every day the whole month." Because this year is the 15th anniversary of the quickest genocide in history the world's attention will once again be focused on Rwanda. World leaders, international media, and Rwandans will spend much of April commemorating the bloody and horrible events of the 100 days in 1994 that ended with 1,000,000 people dead.

One million people were murdered.

Rwanda and Rwandans have progressed in those 15 years. Organizations like REACH in Rwanda are helping to rebuild communities by focusing on individual relationships. Their method seems to be working. But there are still concerns about Rwanda's future, as reported in Rwanda on April 1, “genocide ideology was still rampant in several schools.” This makes the work of REACH and similar groups even more vital to the future of Rwanda . In the documentary film Reconciliation's Reach we will investigate whether REACH's efforts are creating lasting peace. We have seen examples where this seems to be happening. Please look through our site to learn more about our mission, REACH, our team and how you can help make a movie and have a positive impact on your community.

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Thank You for Supporting Reconciliation's Reach

So many generous people came out to our benefit concert in Boston to support our documentary film project Reconciliation's Reach, last night.

Thank you for visiting our site and a special thank you to those who joined us at the event. Your support is testament to the fact that the lessons Rwandans can teach us have relevance to the lives of people in Boston and around the world. As President Obama said in his news conference this week, he believes in the power of persistence, so do we and so do the Rwandans we will focus on in our film.

By the hundreds of thousands, neighbors killed neighbors. Now the killers share dinner with survivors. Reconciliation's Reach, will show how Rwandan women have become pioneers of reconciliation after genocide. An organization dedicated to rebuilding Rwanda is turning hated neighbors into friends, creating lasting peace in villages around the country. Survivors and perpetrators come together to learn about their past, apologize for their mistakes, and build a future together. This method of reconciliation has the potential to be used around the world.

Please dig deeper, learn more about project, and come back frequently to check in. We update our site often. Click here for more photos of our event, Rock Out for Reconciliation's Reach. -Adam Mazo, Executive Producer, Reconciliation's Reach