Page 67 of Kate & Frida

Frida Rodriguez ... En Route

June 4, 1994

Paris, France

You’re flourishing, Fair Kate! If you want to give me any credit, I’ll take it, but only if you’ll take some credit for what I’m about to tell you. I went to Sarajevo because of Niko, but no matter how I feel about Kirby – and I have a lot of feelings – ha! – I can’t go to Vietnam because of him. I know they’re not the same people. Not even close. The point is that this isn’t about them, this is about me, and I couldn’t have seen that without you.

It’s true what I wrote in Sarajevo. This IS my story. And not just the story I’m supposed to tell but the story I’m supposed to be living. I hope the universe wants Kirby and me to be together in the future, I really do, but right now I need to be here taking care of the Ramonas. I just wish it wasn’t so hard. Every time we think the war can’t get any worse, it does. And now there’s Rwanda too. Did it make its way through all the news about Kurt Cobain over there? There was a massive candlelight vigil for him here, but I haven’t seen anything like that in the streets for the Tutsis. How is that possible? There’s always some group or other protesting something here, especially on the Left Bank. I can’t wrap my mind around the numbers. What kind of evil bulldozes a church with twenty thousand people hiding inside and then kills anyone who tries to escape with machetes? Two hundred and fifty thousand Rwandans fled to Tanzania. Where are they going to go? If the world doesn’t care about white ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, no way is it going to care about black genocide in Africa.

It’s affecting the Ramonas. I felt especially helpless when Lejla read about the rape squads recruited to infect Tutsi women with HIV. Systematic rape is used as a weapon in Bosnia too. Irena is still there. All the women in Lejla’s life are still there. How do you help people find joy in the face of atrocities like that? How do you help them feel secure? I have to figure this out.

Determinedly,

Frida