My morning at the clinic was started with some somber faces, perhaps in light of the theft that Chantal experienced yesterday. However, as I sat down outside her office to wait for her, a women exited from the trauma counselor's office in tears. Wrapped in kitenge and clutching a black, fake-leather purse, she heaved herself into the white plastic chair outside his office and let her head fall into her hands. As her shoulders heaved from the tears that were springing forth, I fetched a napkin from my purse and brought it to her. "Morakoze" she uttered and I felt helpless, not even knowing the correct response in Kinyarwanda. Leaving her privacy to cry and be sad, I stared back at my computer and recalled the disappointing news that has surrounded the last 24 hours. Lizzy's bitten feet, Chantal's stolen computer....and I remembered that while our pain can heal with some medicine and the purchase of a replacement computer, hers was springing from a much deeper place of hurt and sadness. As Chantal arrived, she floated to the crying woman's side and placed her hand on her back, guiding her into her office. The woman shuffled in slowly and with the weight of a heart that holds more grief that I would wish upon my worst enemy. The things that these women have experienced.
