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Patience Shema

Patience Shema Profile

My life in Rwanda is very bad and hard. I have don’t have the abilities or opportunities of other children because I do not have a family that pays for basic materials, and sometimes I do not eat.

I was born in Kigali, Rwanda and I am 17 years old. I was born on August 22, 1994. I was born into a family with two children: myself and one other brother. My parents got divorced, and I took my brother to a village because I didn’t have money to support him. They told me that I could not stay there because it is too hard for them to help us.…

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Jean Damascene Nsengimana

Jean Damascene Profile

I was born in 1992.  My mother is Syphose Mukarugumwa, but I don’t know my father.

When my mother died, I was taken to the south of the country to live with my grandmother.  There, I started to study, but life in the rural area was hard.  I decided to become a street kid, which was also difficult because I didn’t have any place to sleep.

After a long period of time, FIDESCO came and took me from the street along with some other children.  They gave us the opportunity to return to school.  Now, I am in the fifth level/grade of high school, Senior Five. …

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Moses Safuri

Moses Safuri Profile

I was born in 1993 in Uganda.  My parents were Rwandan, but all my family died in the genocide and I became an orphan.

I had no one to help me, so I started to live on the streets.  I lived there for five years and slept under a bridge at night.  I found food in the trash dumps.  I also caught some disease and I’ve had it for most of my life, but I don’t know what it is called or how to heal it.  My friends all had the same lifestyle.

Then, I came to FIDESCO.  The staff here helped me find a way to go to school, but everything else I have to do on my own. …

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Divine Ntungane

Divine Ntungane Profile

I am 20 years old and live in Gisenyi.

I was born into a family with six children: four girls and two boys.  I am the last one in my family.  My parents and my sister died during the 1994 Tutsi genocide.  Of the six children in my family and three of them died when I was three years old.

My uncle came to save my life.  He told me that I must go to school.  I started to study, but when I reached the first year of high school, my uncle became sick.  After five months, he died.  My uncle’s wife did not love me, and she told me our relationship was finished because my uncle died. 

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Shema Divin

Shema Divin Profile

I live in the Southern province.  I was born in 1992.  I was two years old when the genocide happened.  I lost my entire family.

I don’t remember anyone because I was so young.  In 1995, I was adopted by a family, which doesn’t know anything about me.  In 1997, I went to nursery school, and I started primary school in 1998.  In 2006, I was able to start secondary school.  Through my studies, I was also helped by other people because I could not afford the school fees myself.  In 2009, I started my concentration in chemistry, biology and mathematics. …

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