A personal reflection on navigating social dynamics in a Rwandan boarding school.

Someone on tiktok asked me about my experience at Gashora

Hi world,

I recently posted a subjectively compartmentalized “vulnerable” video on my tiktok. An anonymous account commented the text below on my tiktok.

@: I don’t think I’ll ever fully be able to explain how much Gashora messed me up! I know for a fact that I’m not dull, but constantly seeing the same people being given opportunities made me start questioning my own abilities. Over time, it planted this idea in my mind that I wasn’t good enough at anything. It’s gotten to the point where recently I had to sit down and really ask myself where all this self doubt came from, because this isn’t who I used to be…Gashora made me question my background nyine like it’s not good enough…Now I’m struggling to rebuild that confidence. I hesitate to do things that once came naturally to me, and people who knew me before keep asking me why I’ve become so withdrawn. Noneho I care a lot about people’s validation bc muri Gashora it was like let me do this and that kugira ngo bambone maybe next time there is an opportunity it will be me🤦🏾‍♀️And honestly, it’s frustrating, because I don’t even fully recognize this version of myself🫠 …One day, I would really like to hear your honest experience at Gashora. you were/seemed to be among the highly favored group, I’m curious to know what it actually felt like on your side…

Dear anonymous user,

I was moved by your mirrored vulnerability- partly because it read like someone I know who chose to remain anonymous.

To be honest, I dont think I’ll ever be able to get over how Gashora messed me up either. I can only imagine what that must have felt like- I was definitely aware of it. And had seen the same patterns from prior classes or at least warned in advance that it was a rat race and you had to make sure you came out on top. Now, was the rat race purely built on a metric system? Very debatable! This is where I have to reckon with my own class position. This is going to be a fun experiment for nuance.

Three major things shaped my experience at Gashora; Religion, class, and the undying aspiration for creating STEM machines. I will start with class for the sake of this video- it took me a while to understand why people were quick to label me a “rich kid” or assign me a pedestal built on this idea that I held a superiority complex for speaking English (read and write fluently). I had not understood that growing up in Kigali and attending Kigali Parents was not an everyday occurrence for a lot of people in Kigali let alone Rwanda. Gashora for me was one of the many experiences where I was put in a boarding school with such a diverse socio-economic background. I dont think any of us, as we were represented by the demographic of girls admitted from different provinces, had the tools to engage in civil dialogue across class differences. Now this doesnt take away from the fact that this same pedestal, as valid as it is, was also used against me. In many ways, it denied or at least reduced empathy for me or even acknowledgement for my individual hard work. Every achievement I made would easily be discarded as “you dont deserve it”, “you didnt earn it” “you dont know struggle”.

This is where religion also comes in, during my time at Gashora, I wasnt really known for my religious zeal- my lack of perceived merit within Gashora’s metric system was very much tied to my lack of religious indoctrination. You dont pray, you dont revise and do math with a passion. In other words, my religious freedom, class position, and lack of interest in STEM would shape my experience but at the time I wasnt able to really see the bigger picture and my role in it. With time, I have been able to hold a more nuanced perspective, to understand that the same tools I took for granted (proficiency in English, access to computers, technology, wifi, food security) would inform the “metric system”. For example, when it came to hosting tourists, joining debate teams, or later on applying to college and being able to write a college essay and affording application fees, CSS profile fees. All those things were silently part of the metric system which was explicitly linked to surplus capital- a luxury of the middle class. this also meant that this same metric system subtly rewarded symptoms of affluence instead of hardwork. But two things can be right at the same time, I can empathize with those that are left at the margins due to the intersection of class and gender.

But those spaces harmed my sense of self worth in a different way. That doesn’t absolve me from my privilege but it humanizes and validates my experiences of how people treat you when they see you as the symbol for the system’s shortcomings. I also developed self doubt from a different perspective. I have never been a STEM person, which is probably not the smartest thing to go to a STEM school. My metric for suceess and intelligence was never about passing math physics and chemistry! I always loveed activism, advocacy, media, film and entertainment but like every other African child- I was told STEM was the only way for class and social mobility or to be successful- especially at Gashora. My alternative fantasies were often labled naive, lazy, careless, ungrateful, not hardworking. But to be honest, everyone just has their groove and I knew what worked for me but it didnt please most people students, teachers, and administrators alike. However what I didnt make up for with grades, I compensated for with my extra curricula activities. I will say again specifically with debate and being “sharp” or speaking “unbroken English”- were simply results of going to a better funded school, in this case, KPS. In Gashora, as in many other institutions, my class position aligned with the metric system!

The third aspect that I feel is relevant to this discussion is that in many instances, there is a direct correlation between poverty and religion. At the height of the take over of religious fundamentalism in the social fabric of our school, I could sense religious leaders influence as a core guiding factor in moral and social relations as not being separate from the larger external social conditions that were shaping our class dynamics with one another. That is why I was very adamant on advocating for religious freedom bc I could sense that the extreme stances on church members joining extra curricula activities would also eventually end up factoring into this “hierarchical” system we seemed to operate in. Especially when it came to deciding who applies to go to college- a system that never made entire sense to me. Nuance is once again incredibly critical here because the administration was understaffed having one underpaid person cater to the needs of our specific class; the economic constraints of covid were being felt through out the world. I think that moment was incomprehensible to all parties involved because it showed everyone that in the real world, the thing we had been trained to believe would give us equity and or equality “education and hardwork” which were measured in grades and positions- did not apply in the real world. Nepotism could indeed beat both talent and hardwork and that is an unfair reality.

To go back to the point you brought up, witnessing opportunities ending up in the hands of the same people, while still being expected to be a child genius and a perfect religious woman can definitely shatter one own’s sense of identity- a reality we were all victims of. And for many of us, Gashora represented our one opportunity at making it out of a very difficult situation or our family’s only shot at social mobility (the female breadwinners of our families). You also mentioned seeking validation in people as a consequence to that and I just wanted to say that people pleasing is a natural response to the misogynistic communities we grew up in that told us that women had to be both incredibly smart and feminine and perfect to belong but also a community that rewards and punishes you worth depending on your grades, looks, and social status instead of who you are or what your ideas and contributions are.

On my side, I was frustrated because I understood and sympathized with what my peers were going through but I also understood that my positionality and subjectivity would never translate past a certain point. It was a very isolating and traumatizing experience in its own right. I hated the system even though I probably benefited the most from it. I wish that we lived in a more equal world but we dont.

PSA; This was originally supposed to be a script for a tiktok video (a hack I was trying out for the first time to control my adhd but also working on my delivery). I respected your boldness, purely because of its honesty, and it inspired me to write with intent, an open mind, and sincerity. It is an interesting time to be alive and I think we could all use a little bit more love, empathy, and transparency. Practicing having the difficult conversations will usher us into a new dawn, one not held back by algorithms and virality- but care and connection (She says as she posts on a website about a tiktok she made).

Agasarokeza-