BurundiGenocideI Am My StoryRefugeeWhat We Carried

Dodge Ball, Kanembwa, Tanzania

Jim Lommasson
Jim Lommasson / What We Carried

Divine Irambona:

Life in the camp was hard for me. The only thing that kept me excited was playing a game with my friends. My favorite game was dodgeball   (a.k.a. Agapira Koguswata). Dodgeball that I played with my friends is not the dodgeball Americans play. The dodgeball (a.k.a. Agapira Koguswata) was a game made up for two teams of equal players on each team. The objective for both teams was to eliminate all players from the opposing team. A team wins a game when they have eliminated all players from the opposing team. The dodgeball completed my childhood. I use to play the game with my friends until it got dark, to the point my parents would ground me.  I didn’t care if I get in trouble at home for coming home late, because playing with my friends was more important. It wasn’t always promising that I would see my friends the next day, therefore I took advantage of playing with my friends whenever I had the chance. The ball was made of plastic bags and string yarns, and sometimes we would put a balloon inside to make the ball bounce.  Agapira Koguswata made my childhood. (Heart)