Disabled Karateka wants to strike gold, make country proud

When Jules Rutayisire emerged from a small neighborhood near a bustling street around Muhima hospital earlier this week, and signaled for me to follow him, it looked like just another rendezvous. To onlookers, 26 year old Rutayisire passes as an average young man but he is not. A distressing speech and hearing impediment attacked him at the tender age of five, but today, he regularly beats hundreds of eager youths to make the national Karate team’s hugely contested line-up. He does not stand out only because he is one of the preferred 16 who will carry the Rwandan flag to the 15th Senior African Karate Championship in Senegal next week, or because he is a survivor of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, and an orphan. Nor is it just because of his likable smile and sense of self-assurance. The athletic guy is also hard working – at school and in the Dojo [Karate gym] – and a devout Christian. None of his teammates have the same disabilities as his. ‘Talking’ to him was enjoyable, but demanding. We arranged the rendezvous by phone sms. For the interview, however, we used his laptop, pen and paper, but mostly, the former. I typed a question on the computer and he typed his rejoinder, or nodded and gestured fittingly. The fact that he has a naturally honed ability to read body language also helped. “I only look at your lip,” he said [typed]. “I was born hearing but was 5 old years when I became sick. I [later] started learning to write in English. Now I hear some sounds.” During a three-hour interview which was cut short – prematurely – so that he could not miss his evening training session at the Amahoro National Stadium in Remera, Rutayisire took me through memories of his deprived early days, schooling, dreaming big as well as his love for Karate. His interests as a youngster included playing football, basketball, volleyball, swimming and traditional dance. Today, however, he concentrates on Karate, and “normally, to relax,” loves going to church, jogging and playing pool. He is a member of the Rwanda national union of the deaf (RNUD) and a Christian who worships from “the deaf’s evangelical church” in town near Union des Evanglise Baptiste au Rwanda (UEBR). “I am a sign language instructor in RNUD. And I am a servant of God as I can share [the] word of God with the deaf people [who] want to listen.” Accolades His 18 Karate accolades, including three gold medals, 10 silver medals and five bronze medals – from different competitions in five years – speak volumes about his determination in tournaments where he faces unimpeded adversaries on the often unfeeling Tatami [fighting mat]. During the 2012 regional Karate championships [Zone V] which features Karatekas from Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, and others, he won silver and a bronze medal. In 2008, he grabbed one gold and one silver at the same competition. He has lifted top awards in interschool competitions and regularly shines during annual Never Again tournaments and national interuniversity games. Before the Genocide, his family of six lived “at Akabahizi” in the Cyahafi area of Kigali. Only Rutayisire and a younger sister survived the 1994 massacres. He attended primary school [1997-2004] at a deaf children’s center in Huye district, before enrolling in the Gatagara establishment for high school, from 2005 to 2010. Even though the survivors’ fund, FARG, paid his tuition fees, life “was so hard,” he said, and he “suffered” a lot especially as he had no parental support. In 2000, he discovered Karate. What intrigued him about the sport was his ability to use his vision as a source of strength. “I can control [and be able] to focus with my eyes and help to grow with my mind. I could see, by moving around players, what they were doing. I started copying their movements and Sensei [teacher] Sam Niragire [of the Kicukiro-based Mamaru-Do club] taught me the techniques. Even in Huye, in school, I would go to practice at NUR with Sensei [Tharcisse] Sinzi since 2009.” He started university in 2011. Today, the fourth year business information technology [department of management] student at the University of Rwanda (UR) dreams to compete in national and international Karate competitions “as a professional.” At the Huye campus, he sits in a class of 60 other students with similar disabilities. In school, he goes an extra mile to use the internet, read books, “Because I fear defeat in my life.” In high school, he said, “I passed without interpreters” just as in university. Big hearted IT enthusiast The distress he experiences makes him “dream, in future, to draw together deaf kids who want to learn Karate” and, he wants to form a federation for Karatekas with similar difficulties. “I will be a web designer, and do repairing of cisco system network, computer technology, manager of information for all [kinds of] problems in Rwanda through websites.” People living with disabilities like his, Rutayisire said, have problems because most gadgets – such as phones and TV sets – on the local market do not fit their needs. “I need to make [TV] using sign language with videophone, in Rwanda and East Africa. If some companies don’t have websites, I could make and produce for them. I will build deaf church in Rwanda, and support deaf homeless orphans.” In Dakar, he says: “I won’t be afraid. I still pray, and ask our lord to win gold then make our country proud.”