That’s me – Eric Riley, that is.

Burundi, Africa: There are many little countries in the world that I don’t know exist nor really care to know. So I understand that when people ask me where I was born, they usually need more details explaining the geography of central Africa. Burundi is connected to Rwanda’s southern border and is nestled between Tanzania and Congo, with the shore of Lake Tanganyika covering much of its western edge.

I was born in a house on a mission station called Kibimba, near Burundi’s geographical center.

The Kibimba mission station is historically relevant as a beacon of learning and health in a part of Burundi that was desperate for it. And Kibimba still represents a deep wound of racism and prejudice for the country.

In both Burundi and Rwanda, the predominant inhabitants are the Tutsi and Hutu tribes. There is a long history between them of racial tension and struggle for power and land. Tutsis have more distinct facial features and stature resembling Western cultures than the typically shorter Hutus with flatter and broader noses. When the Belgians took control of that area of Africa in 1914, they were attracted to the Tutsis’ appearance and placed them in positions of political and military power. This made the Hutus bitter, fearful, and vengeful.

Burundi and Rwanda won their independence from Belgium in 1962, the year I was born. Although there were times of war between the tribes before the European control, nothing compared to the genocides coming to both countries. The political struggles of the mid-1960s culminated in the first major Burundi genocide of Hutus in 1972. My family left the country shortly after; as a family, we never returned.

The minority Tutsi tribe ruled Burundi, and over the next two decades, there were a few reported massacres and even more that went unnoticed by the world. In 1993, an election was open to the populace, and the Hutu opposition party won the vote. The first Hutu president ever was in power.

Early in the morning on October 22, 1993, the national radio station reported that the Tutsi military kidnapped the newly elected president. When the news of this reached the countryside, echoes of the 1972 genocide struck panic in the entire Hutu population. At the Kibimba mission station, many Hutus armed with clubs and machetes quickly captured many Tutsi students, teachers, and staff – both men and women. They led the large group to a small filling station building near the main road and stuffed them all inside – more than 120 of them and possibly up to 250. Some of them were already dead by the time they reached the small building, but they were all crammed inside.

The Hutu leaders demanded the kidnapped president’s release, threatening all the citizens’ lives crammed into the small building. The mob immediately tore out the road in both directions to prevent the military from passing or getting close to the situation by conventional means. What they didn’t know is that the militia had already assassinated the president earlier in the day. When news over the radio announced that the president was already dead, the local Hutus at Kibimba set the little building on fire. They also surrounded it so that no one could run from the flames.

One badly burned student managed to escape late in the night, shielded from death by dead bodies on top of him. He was a competitive runner and even though his burns were severe, he ran and ran to save his own life. His name is Gilbert Tuhabonye. After he healed, he continued to train and represented Burundi in the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. Gilbert’s name will come up again later on in the story.

To this day, the memorial erected to replace that Kibimba gas station simply states, “NEVER AGAIN” as a constant reminder of the cultural scars that still exist.

The retaliation of the Tutsi military was swift and brutal. Many Hutus, including priests and nuns, were complicit in the massacre of hundreds of innocent Tutsis and the Tutsi militia slaughtered many thousands of them in response. Nearly 300,000 Burundians from both tribes were brutally killed. More than 800,000 refugees, mostly Hutu, fled to Rwanda, Tanzania, and Congo. That was the last part of 1993.

In April of 1994, as a response to the missile attack that shot down an airplane  containing the presidents from both Burundi and Rwanda, the Hutus seized the opportunity to enact horrific vengeance on the Tutsis of Rwanda. The movie, HOTEL RWANDA, gives a glimpse of the depths of evil when groups are blinded into the frenzy of killing in ways that only humans can. Of course, while the movie leaves a lot to the imagination to give you nightmares, it does not mention the details of the horrific intensity of human brutality. However, the main character of the film, Paul Rusesabagina, the hotel manager that rescued hundreds of people and fought for their lives, fled the country and now lives in the United States.

So let’s catch up. There’s so much more to tell you about my life, but THIS story seems especially important to me. I’m going to condense the first part of my life and jump to 2001.  

My family lived in Burundi until 1974, shortly after the most intense tribal genocide by Tutsis attempting to eliminate the Hutus. My oldest sister, Judy, had just graduated from high school, and Mom and Dad decided to be done with being missionaries for a while until my other two sisters and I could get our basic education complete. We ended up in a small town in Kansas that has a Quaker college. Dad worked in areas where his electrical skills were of the most value. Mom got her teacher certification to teach special needs students at the local elementary school, and all of us children made it through high school. My three older sisters got married to boyfriends they met in college. I was a freshman in the same college when Mom and Dad decided to be missionaries again. They went to Haiti this time. I graduated from college with a bachelor of arts degree, lived a couple more years in Kansas, and then moved to southeast Texas.

In high school and college, I had the opportunity to visit that area of Texas through my involvement in a couple of different choirs and singing groups. I also spent a summer doing a church startup internship in Austin, Texas, where an admired missionary that I knew from Burundi was the pastor. Through that experience and the impact of an extraordinary couple in the leadership of that church, I was convinced that Texas was my future.

I moved south of Houston and worked at a specialty trucking company and developed a small graphics department for them. I also did some low-level computer programming. After two years and a lot of support from my generous friends, I opened a t-shirt printing shop that let me explore graphic design on more creative levels. The business expanded to signs and embroidery and other printed products. That lasted about 17 years and included other projects such as publishing a local weekly newspaper called TIMES COMMUNITY NEWS. You can view the PDF versions of all of the issues on ericriley.com.

I was blessed to have amazing employees during this chapter of my life, including a remarkable manager. They all gave me the space to explore the possibility of traveling back to Burundi again after all those years.

I made plans to be away from my business for six weeks. The first two weeks would be in Kigali, Rwanda, and the other four weeks in various parts of Burundi. This was in 2001, before instant access to people via social media or WhatsApp. I wrote emails to my friends in Africa to confirm everything that I intended to do.

I updated my passport, got a regimen of shots for any possible diseases, and bought my round-trip ticket.

I was one of the first to board the 747 at Bush Intercontinental Airport on the north end of Houston, Texas. It was thirty years since I was in Africa as a kid in grade school, but it seemed like only a few years had passed. Memories of fascination and fun were vivid, and I was beside myself with excitement.

As I settled into my assigned window seat, most of the places around me began to populate, except for the seat next to me. I’m a big guy, so any time I’m in coach class with extra elbow room is an excellent flight, so I was crossing my fingers. Finally, a thin, young, well-dressed, and well-groomed black gentleman walked down the aisle with his sharp-looking book bag and sat next to me. Darn. There went my extra space.

After he settled in, I introduced myself.

“My name is Patrick,” he replied. His accent gave it away – he was from somewhere in Africa.

“Are you traveling from Houston?” I asked, generating as much relatedness as I could.

“No. I go to a university in Tucson, Arizona, and traveling back home to visit my family for a few weeks.”

I was eager to share my adventure, but I held back and listened a bit more. “Oh, really? That’s great! What are you doing in Tucson, then?”

“I have a full-ride track scholarship and am studying international business for now.”

“Running, I assume.”

“Yes, I run the 800-meter dash. I’m currently ranked number four in the world.”

“So, you were at the 2,000 Olympics?”

“Yes, I didn’t win, but it was an amazing experience.”

At the time, Patrick Nduwimana attended the University of Arizona. He represented Burundi in the 2000 and 2004 Olympics and still holds the Burundi national record in both the 400 and 800-meter dash.

“Where’s home for you?” Remember, I was in Houston, Texas, on a big jet with 400-plus assigned seats as the first leg of a journey that required five different flights over 24 hours.

“I’m from a little country in the middle of Africa called Burundi. That’s where my family is.”

“Really, Patrick? That’s where you are going now? I’m going there too. I was born there.”

I’m not sure if it was a relief for him that he didn’t have to recite the geography script about Burundi’s location, but I could tell he was genuinely excited to share something this big with a stranger he met only a few seconds earlier. “Where, exactly, were you born?” Patrick asked.

“Kibimba. Do you know where that is?”

“Of course I do!” he exclaimed “everyone in Burundi knows where Kibimba is. It’s beautiful there and holds so much history for us.” Patrick filled me in on the political mood since the genocide and some efforts for lasting peace between the tribes. There was such an aggressive global reaction to Rwanda and Burundi’s pressing need that it seemed that the whole world was participating in the peace process.

The first 747 flight ended in Newark, New Jersey, where we were cleared for international travel and then on to Amsterdam. Patrick and I arranged our seating on TWA to continue our conversation across the Atlantic to Amsterdam, as well as the next flight to Nairobi, Kenya. Even though the destination for both of us was Bujumbura, Burundi, I wanted to visit some friends in Rwanda first. So we parted ways, and I arrived safely in Burundi a couple of weeks later.

Landing in Bujumbura International Airport was surreal. I don’t know if I kissed the ground after landing, but I thought about it hard enough that it seems more factual than not.

Because my parents were missionaries, the community of benevolence and faith was the community I was exposed to and participated in. Meeting Patrick opened access to another group of people in Burundi – the Olympic community, which, in turn, introduced me to a few different government ministries. My adventure expanded and occurred as “magical” and “miraculous” every day.

Patrick’s older brother Henri also proved to be a very inspirational connection. He worked with the reconciliation between the Hutu and Tutsi tribes. Then, he went on to work in Kampala, Uganda rehabilitating child soldiers that were sucked into the conflict in the northern part of the country and rescuing child soldiers from southern Sudan. I met him there in Kampala a few years later to witness some of his fantastic work. I’ll mention Henri again a little later.

When true heroes are passionate about what they do, it’s impossible to ignore the results. The passion of a saintly school director in the interior of Burundi caught my attention most. Her sacrifice manifested effective and lasting peace education for children. 

Her name is Modeste Karerwa Mo-Mamo. During the intensity of the conflict in the early 1990s, she started a school for pre-primary-age children that incorporated actions and habits promoting equality and peace. Primary education is available to some Burundians, but not all. So when the children in her class were old enough, she started a primary school for her kids. Modeste also recruited other children of various tribal backgrounds, religions, and income levels to learn and practice equality and peace daily.

“Igiti kigorogwa kikiri gito” is a Burundian proverb in the local language of Kirundi. “Straighten a tree when it is young.” This was the grand strategy – to create an educated generation of Burundian citizens that would live peacefully and not repeat the genocides of the past.

The students of Magarama Peace Primary School in Gitega, Burundi, scored in the country’s highest ten percent. But compared to the number of primary schools, there were only enough secondary schools to handle about 2% of the primary school graduates nationwide. Going to secondary school was a luxury, and a lottery system managed acceptance. Even though Modeste’s peace school offered some of the most intelligent children in the country, very few were allowed to continue. The government awarded some land to Modeste outside the city to build a secondary school and educate her brilliant students.

Modeste and others in her group campaigned vigorously to raise the nearly $180,000 required to build an entire school campus. An organization in Holland sent enough to erect an administrative building and do some groundwork for the preparation of several other buildings, but that was it. No additional money had come in for the worthwhile project.

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She introduced me to two of the watchmen she hired to watch the property when she showed me the land and the progress. They were there to ensure that bricks and tiles weren’t stolen by other locals needing materials for their own homes or to sell for food. After the introductions and translations from the local language, Kirundi, another conversation sounded apologetic. I asked what was going on, and she explained that there was no money left to pay the watchmen who were without pay for already two months.

“How much do they receive?” I asked, feeling curious about what grown men with families get paid in the hills of Burundi.

“Eight dollars,” Modeste replied.

“Per day or what?” I continued.

“No. Per month. They each get paid eight dollars per month,” she said as flatly as she could, regretting that they couldn’t be paid more for their tireless work.

“Listen, please let me help. I don’t have a lot, but I know that I can cover this.”

Modeste accepted. So, for $32 US, I paid two grown men two months of wages. I then understood why Burundi was the second poorest country in the world at that time in 2001. For those of you curious, Sierra Leone was rated the poorest country in the world by Amnesty International in the same report.

Both watchmen were extremely grateful. But one of them said something in Kirundi and started giving some of the money back to Modeste as a payment for something owed.

“What is that for?” I asked.

“He needed malaria medicine two weeks ago for his five-year-old child, and he didn’t have the money to pay for it. So I gave the medicine to him and he’s paying it back.”

“OK,” I said, looking a little confused. “And how is the child now?”

“She didn’t make it. She died the next day.” Modeste replied like this is just part of daily life in Burundi, Africa. My Mom and Dad told me that I had malaria when I was a toddler, but I don’t remember it and now feel incredibly fortunate to live through it.

I convinced Modeste to return the money to the watchman and I would settle his account later on. They were both deeply grateful.

This day was indeed very impactful. I never before knew the effect of what seemed like a small portion of my resources, making a big difference in another person’s life or, in this case, in the lives of two families.

Modeste’s peace education curriculum became nationally recognized, and she was invited to speak and share her passion internationally.

At the time of writing this, Modeste also makes a difference as a part of Burundi’s parliament and was an advisor to the previous president. Modeste also heads up an international committee dedicated to regional multinational peace education.

Honestly, it was the accidental place of my birth that gave me the most inroads into this war-torn culture.

My good friend, Burundian brother, and hero, Aime, taught me many Kirundi phrases, proverbs, and basics to present myself conversationally polite and capable for about 30 seconds. 

He was at Kibimba during the 1993 massacre as a 14-year-old student. Of course, he speaks Kirundi but is also fluent in French, Swahili, and English. He was the perfect guide and teacher in all of my visits to Burundi. I took some videos of him pronouncing words and phrases in Kirundi. You can see them and learn some Kirundi for yourself on ericriley.com.

“Navukiye mu Kibimba” translated from Kirundi, “I am from (born at) Kibimba,” was one of the first phrases that I asked Aime to teach me. Of all of the basic Kirundi that I learned, this statement “Navukiye mu Kibimba” proved to be the most valuable.

“Navukiye mu Kibimba” became like a passphrase of instant cultural identification. It even landed me a meeting with a general of the rebel forces, General Evariste Ndayishimiye. His wife, Angelique, was also born at Kibimba. A mutual, well-connected friend informed me of the invitation and set up a time to enter the general’s fortress-like property and enjoy coffee, snacks, conversation, and relatedness by merit of my birthplace. I had my camera and took a picture of us all together. I took another picture from my hip of one of his fully armed soldiers most trusted for personal and family attendance. He seemed to be playing babysitter, holding the general’s baby while we visited. What an image of protection.

Eighteen years after that meeting, General Evariste is now President Evariste – the President of Burundi.

Kibimba had a primary school and secondary school for basic education and a Bible school to train pastors and Christian workers. Even though I was born in one of its houses, it had a hospital, too. Kibimba, located at the center of Burundi, was a beacon of health and education.

There have been no missionaries there for several decades because of the conflict. However, it still exists as “Kibimba” and offers top education and medical care with only a nursing school because the doctors fled under the threat of death during the genocide.

The doctor-less hospital and nursing school at Kibimba was in a very short supply of basics like gauze, syringes, needles, antibiotics, scalpels, and large bandages. There was a non-profit organization in Houston, Texas, that specialized in international charitable medical resources. They prepared a couple of large trunk-size plastic containers for me to take on one of my trips. The trunks were sealed with plastic zip ties and had “Kibimba” on the lids written with a magic marker. When I arrived at the airport customs, I knew that I would have to open everything and let them look influential and authoritative. It was worse knowing that valuable items in the trunks would be thrown away if found – like antibiotics that were illegal to pass. The customs officer was in an army uniform. He looked at the plastic containers and back at me. I said, “Navukiye mu Kibimba.” and he waved me past without a word.

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I delivered these supplies at the request of another of my heroes named Aloys Ningabira. Aloys was a nurse at Kibimba hospital when it had doctors to treat patients. Many people relied on the hospital’s limited staff to treat their injuries and sicknesses even with no doctors. Aloys rose to the occasion. He was inspired to teach others how to be nurses and started the Kibimba nursing school. Aloys also created a team of nursing students to travel to the nearby villages and educate them about the AIDS virus through entertainingly dramatic skits and songs.

I made five trips to Central Africa in four years, including Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda, but I always ended my Burundi trips. The last of those trips was in response to a wedding invitation from a friend getting married in Kampala, Uganda, 16 days after the request. His name is Andrew. He lived in the US for more than 25 years and planned a traditional Ugandan nuptial with his bride. We were both living in a small Texas town and frequently joked about being African brothers.

One morning, the week after Thanksgiving, Andrew walked into my t-shirt and sign shop. Making no small talk, he declared, “Eric, I’m getting married on December 15, and you’re invited.”

“Great! Where? I’ll be there,” I answered, looking straight into his eyes.

He smiled, almost laughing, and said, “Kampala, Uganda.”

I felt like it was a dare, and I didn’t want to back down. “OK, Andrew. You bet! I’ll be there.” 

Fake it until you make it, right? I knew I only had about $400 in my bank account, and business was in its slow holiday season. But I felt empowered by my declaration against the $2,300 that it had usually cost to make that trip.

There it was. It came out of my mouth. Another person heard it, and it became “real.” Andrew walked out, clearly pleased about the results knowing his “African brother” would be attending this important day with him halfway around the world.

I was a member of the local Chamber of Commerce. I knew another member that owned a travel agency a block away. Within the hour, I called her out of curiosity and told her the story and my current financial status. After a few minutes of looking, she said she could get a round-trip ticket for me to Entebbe International Airport in Kampala for a rock-bottom price of $1,900. I thanked her for her time and went on with my day.

At 3 pm the same day, two men walked in, asking for me. My store manager summoned me from the production area. I invited the two men to go to the back area with me for a bit of privacy. They were regular customers of mine but the kind where I would always go to their business to meet them and complete their orders. Their presence in my shop was rare. They owned a couple of “eight-liner” pseudo gambling salons that barely passed under the strict Texas gambling laws. My company designed and applied large and colorful graphics to their windows to attract customers. The older one said, “We hear you’ve been doing some good things in Africa and want to help a little.”

My ears perked up, and I replied with a smile, “Well, it’s funny that you should come in today. I just told a friend of mine that I would be at his African wedding. Afterward, I want to take a bus to Burundi for a few days and acknowledge a couple of friends who have been doing such amazing things. So thank you for being here.”

The younger gentleman pulled a folded check out of his pocket and handed it to me. “Here you go. I hope it helps.”

I thanked them from the bottom of my heart. We talked a little about their locations and more graphics they needed on a vehicle, and then they left. Out of professional courtesy, I didn’t unfold the check until they were gone. $1,500! Add that to my bank account balance, and it looked like I would be making good on my promise to be at Andrew’s wedding. What a day!

 I’ve learned that I do a lot in my life in response to a dare or the remote possibility of bragging rights. Whatever it was, it worked. I made my trip to Uganda and stayed there for a week to enjoy the wedding festivities.

During that week in Kampala, another meeting that happened that week was spending a day with Patrick’s brother Henri who was doing incredible work rehabilitating child soldiers. What a truly remarkable individual and equally outstanding family.

Looking back, my stay in Uganda might have been a little longer. I remember spending Christmas Eve of that year in Kigali, Rwanda, my overnight stay between bus trips over two countries from Uganda to Burundi.

Burundi was the same as the previous four trips; only the mode of transportation made it different. I think I was the first white guy or “muzungu” (similar to the word “gringo”) that any of these bus drivers had ever seen on their buses.

The next day, a missionary friend went up-country and gave me a ride to Gitega, Burundi, the Magarama Peace School site. I arranged a meeting with my two heroes, Modeste – the director and founder of the peace school, and Alois, the nursing school director at Kibimba. I listened to both of them for about an hour. I took the opportunity to fully acknowledge them for their miraculous effectiveness amid everything against them that wanted to tear them and their projects apart. I just told the truth and was generous with it for about 10 minutes.

That was it. That’s what I went there to do, and it was done. The following morning, I caught a ride to the capital city, Bujumbura. There, I boarded the first bus of two to take me back to Entebbe International Airport in Kampala, Uganda, and onward to my hometown in Texas.

At the time, I attended some seminars with Landmark Worldwide, a personal training and development company. There were several people in that community that knew what I was doing in Africa. A couple of months after my final return, someone gave me an August of 2003 issue of Texas Monthly. There was an article about the massacre at Kibimba – in Texas Monthly??!! The article was about the student running coach, Gilbert Tuhabonye, who escaped after being severely burned but was protected from death under a pile of smoldering corpses. Here’s a link to that article or added in the description: https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/running-for-his-life/

After reading the article, I found Gilbert’s home number and called him. “Mwidiwe,” I said in Kirundi. He asked me who I was and why I knew Kirundi.

“My name is Eric Riley. I read the article about you in Texas Monthly. Navukiye mu Kibimba.” That’s all I needed to say. He demanded to meet with me. 

Gilbert is still a running coach with a team of runners in Austin, Texas, called “Gilbert’s Gazelles.” He also was the choice trainer for VIPs such as Governor Perry and both daughters of President George W. Bush.

I drove from Houston and met Gilbert and his family at his house. Later that year, I joined them for Thanksgiving dinner as well. We had much to talk and dream about for Burundi and memories of Kibimba.

Two years later, my sister Teresa told me about a Burundian that she met at a refugee center in Dayton, Ohio, near her. His name is Pio. Teresa told Pio about me and my trips back to Burundi. He requested to meet me. I had no plans to fly to Ohio, but he said that he was traveling to San Antonio, Texas, to see some friends and asked me to join him there.

Pio and his friends are a small collective of Burundians and Rwandans that has a deep passion for lasting peace for both countries. Included in this collective is Paul Rusesabagina. The movie HOTEL RWANDA was about a hotel manager that risked his own life to protect the lives of more than 1,200 Tutsis in the Rwanda genocide of 1994. Paul eventually moved to the United States many years after and ended up in San Antonio, Texas. The meeting was at his house.

My buddy Matt and I met with Paul a couple of times after that for some possible business in that region of Africa. Nothing really came of that. Still, the experience of meeting and briefly participating in Paul Rusesabagina’s life was incredible.

Many key players were left out of this story who were crucial for the events to happen. Maybe I can share with you about them in a conversation sometime. 

This story reflects the kind of fortune that the guy in this body has been blessed to experience. And this is just one story of many that I’ve lived. It was a series of events, people, and curious connections that have left an unforgettable impact on my life.