By Victoria Mullen, WKTV

In 1994, Rwandan native Angelique Mugabekazi’s life was upended when the Hutu majority government ordered the mass slaughter of Tutsis. Only five years old, Mugabekazi fled along with her family, but everywhere they went, conflict followed. The young girl saw people raped and killed in front of her, as well as starvation and disease outbreaks. She lost many family members, including her parents, uncles, and siblings, also neighbors.

“Before the genocide happened, my family was well off,” said Mugabekazi, a graduate of University of Massachusetts School of Law. “My dad was a civil engineer; we came from an upper-middle class country. And then we experienced poverty on a level that we had never seen before.”

Civil war conflict met the family when they reached the Congo. By that time, Mugabekazi’s mother and uncle were gone. The little girl and her family moved on to a refugee camp in Burundi, where they lived from 1994 to 1996.

“When you first come to a refugee camp, you get basic things like a tent and food,” Mugabekazi said. “When you have the means, you can make your own house. As a civil engineer, my dad built a really good mud house out of bricks.”

But her father lost his life in Burundi, and the remainder of the family had to move on when civil war broke out there, too.

“You see a lot of rapes and killings when you are a refugee in another country,” said Mugabekazi. “When you are in a camp, you don’t have laws that protect you.”

Mugabekazi said that the UN tried to protect them, but there were conflicts within the camps, and women and children were the most vulnerable.

“You are seeking shelter to keep yourself alive — shelter like a tent or mud hut. Basic, basic medical attention. It was hard. We starved a lot.”

The next move brought Mugabekazi to Tanzania in 1996 where she and her family stayed until 1998, when their house burned down. Next, she and four siblings made their way to a city in Zambia where they lived the next two years

“Then we had the opportunity to apply to come to U.S.,” she said. “We went through rigorous questioning, blood work, medical exams. It’s not an easy thing to come to this country. They interview family members separately, it’s a very invasive process.”

Mugabekazi and remaining family members settled in Boston, in the less-than-desirable Dorchester neighborhood, where gunshots were heard during the day. Culture shock added insult to injury. She was bullied in school because she looked and smelled different.

“It was not safe for us to keep living [in Dorchester], so we moved to a more Hispanic neighborhood, but it was still not safe. So we moved to Lowell, Massachusetts, where it was more predominately Caucasian but still had a diverse population. For the first time, I had friends who were white. That’s first time I enjoyed my experience in the states.

“It’s hard because I feel like I don’t have a home really. Although I know I’m from Rwanda, I feel that has been ripped from me. And moving from one place to another, even here in America, it just caused more trauma.”

Mugabekazi said that surviving all those tragedies has made her strong.

“Africa is a huge continent, so when I moved from each country, I learned a new culture and language — that was the benefit,” she said. “When I lived in more under-resourced communities, it opened my eyes to the poverty in this country. Before, I had this Disney picture of what America was. People of color don’t have wealth in this country.”

Mugabekazi has lived in Grand Rapids since 2013 and is a Community Health Worker with Health Net of West Michigan. She works with the African community; folks that come from same region she did, single mothers who are trying to navigate this culture, working, taking care of their homes.

“We work with them to connect with resources,” she said. “I get excited about social work and am passionate about injustice to women and children, especially because of my experience. I feel like my calling is international work. I feel there is more of a need there; they lack basic human rights.”

Listen to Mugabekazi’s VOICES conversation here.

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