(1/7) “I inherited this orphanage from my father. I was in...

(1/7)  “I inherited this orphanage from my father.  I was in my twenties at the time.  I had other dreams for my life, but the responsibility fell on me.  When my father passed away, he begged me: ‘Damas, please don’t abandon the children.’  So I promised him that I never would.  When the genocide began in 1994, I’d been managing the orphanage for several years.  I was thirty-three.  I was newly married.  I had a one-year-old child at home.  When I heard news of the president’s assassination, I immediately ran to comfort the children.  Gunfire had begun to enter the air.  We were housing about 65 children at the time.  Many of them were Tutsis.  I told the staff that nobody was allowed to leave the orphanage.  As the day passed, more and more people began arriving.  I had a reputation in the community for helping people.  So everyone came to me for shelter.  Their neighbors had turned against them.  Many of them were being chased by killers.  I knew that the penalty for sheltering Tutsis was death, but I didn’t have the heart to turn them away.  So I invited everyone inside.  I thought: ‘We have institutions in this country.  The United Nations is here.  The danger will be over soon.’”
(Kigali, Rwanda)