How Dare the Sun Rise: Memoirs of a War Child

by Sandra Uwiringiyimana

I knew the sounds of war before I knew how to do a cartwheel.

As a kid, I was never afraid of imaginary monsters at night: All the monsters I knew walked in daylight and carried big guns.

I feel as if the older I get, the more I am losing her.

Kids appeared to think of school as a chore, a bore. I thought of the boys back in Congo who were forced to serve as child soldiers, and the girls who were married off, never given a chance to finish high school. School is a privilege.

thought about how being Christian doesn’t mean that everything is perfect all the time, or that you don’t face any struggles.

I started to feel pressure to look like what America considered beautiful. My dad helped me navigate the turmoil. “Beauty is in your head, not on your body,” Dad would say.

for the first time in my life, I became a citizen of a country. I got a New York state ID. It was the first thing I owned that proved I exist.

Kids at school would ask, “What are you?” What am I? “I’m an American,” I would say.

When you hear questions like that, it makes you feel like you don’t belong, like you have no right to claim American citizenship. I think it’s why refugee kids often develop low expectations for their lives. Even as citizens, they feel like outsiders. “Are you asking where I was born?” I would say. “If so, I was born in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. But now, I am an American.” What I often wanted to say was, “I’m a human being.

I started writing poetry, and also prayers. In my prayers, I did not ask for things, but instead, thanked God for things. I thought it might help my state of mind. I thanked God that I was still alive. I thanked him for my friends. I thanked him for my parents and their love, even though I was mad at them. I thanked him that my parents were still alive.