forced to be here by their parents, and
to make matters worse, they had the
air of, “I have nothing to learn from
you and your stupid theatre games.”
For three hours I worked to get
past forced smiles and polite conver-
sation to real dialogue. By the time
lunch came, we were all tired from
sitting together all morning in tension.
Their clenched bodies, wandering
eyes, whispering to each other, and
meeting my questions with silence
showed more hard-headed resistance
than I’d ever experienced. Despite
being warned, nothing could have
prepared me for what felt like a bad
start to the program.
I’d come to a point of despera-
tion trying to understand what the
problem was. I knew there might be
cultural, national, ethnic, age and
other differences to overcome, and I
did my best to be open to learn on all
fronts. I’d been told it would be fine to
speak English, and although everyone
replied to me English, they spoke in
Kinyarwanda and some French. So I
tried speaking in French too.
Nothing seemed to bridge the
chasm between us, and I was at the
brink. After a brief lunch break in
which I contemplated running to the
airport to the safety of my successful
American workshops, I got an idea. I
needed a way in. Their native lan-
guage, Kinyarwanda, was how they
spoke sitting around chatting. Even
though I spoke not a word and under-
stood nothing, I decided to give it a try.
We gathered again after a break
and the energy started crashing. Based
on the morning, we all anticipated a
crappy, boring and tough afternoon. I
didn’t care as much now, because my
idea excited me so much. They weren’t
bought in, so I had nothing to lose.
“Let’s play a game. Tell a story...
in Kinyarwanda. We will stand
in a circle and everyone say one
sentence.”
After going around the circle a
few times, their eyes were lit up and
soon all were laughing. I was clueless
about what they said, which didn’t
matter: the relief of breaking the ten-
sion and behaving as a group was so
sweet, it was like music to me. I had
them at last. The energy moved in
their bodies, words and minds. Now
we could start the work!
“Next... in three minutes, meet with
a group and create a scene. Show a
conflict and decide on the begin-
ning, middle and end. It must be a
conflict that is important to you.
Do it all in Kinyarwanda.”
They met to discuss their ideas,
then returned to the larger group to
show each other their scenes. I wrote
in my journal about this learning
moment:
Once I remembered how to teach
from my expertise, I began the follow-
ing days with games. The playfulness,
laughing and vigorous raising of our
energy broke apart the resistance and
our real work together began.
Stories of justice
I don’t tell the youth what to talk
about in the skits. I couldn’t have been
more surprised when all three groups
created skits about gender equality. I
watched their body language, facial
expressions and movements—I was lost
regarding the Kinyarwanda words. In
one skit, the father character belittles
the mother at home in front of the
children. In another, the boss character
chides a man for mistreating his wife.
The other showed a fight at school.
The skits held a lot of power for
those involved. The youth in par-
ticular were impacted by living their
characters’ experiences and birthed
a desire for change. The week carried
on with various sessions on mentor-
ship, public-speaking, and plenty of
scene rehearsal. We performed on the
final day for a small gathering of staff
and parents. After the performance,
the youth faced the audience on stage
and each spoke about their experi-
ence doing the program. Their words
moved the audience and the fellow
actors in a powerful way.
“Not only in Rwanda and Africa,
are women oppressed, children are
oppressed. Our skits show ways we
can work together and ways we can
solve this problem. Like the boss in
the skit who emphasized to the main
character, ‘if you don’t treat your
wife better, I am going to fire you.’
It starts with us, only us who can
do it—we join hands and put in our
effort.”
The teens discussed the impor-
tance of education not just for girls,
but for boys:
“I have seen in a lot of places,
women are more educated, and
women are given more workshops
to show them they are worthy, and
that they can do it, but men are
not given a chance to be shown.
So they still have that mentality. I
think men should also be informed
and given information about this
so that they can work together to
achieve equality.”
IMAGINE l spring 2017 9