Walk This Way: The Journey of a Rwandan Refugee

Publication

Walk This Way is Joseph Ndereyimana’s first-person account, told to Carolyn Neville and edited by Janet Jackson. Carolyn L. R. Neville published the 133-page illustrated paperback in Cape Town in 1999. The book includes maps and carries ISBN 9780620236058.

Library and scholarly bibliography records place the work among English-language testimony about the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda and its regional aftermath.

Journey to Dzaleka

The narrative follows Ndereyimana’s departure from Rwanda and movement through the region. In December 1995 he reached what the book calls the Dzaleka Refugee Centre outside Dowa.

His account describes a settlement very different in scale from present-day Dzaleka. At the time, the centre held roughly 150 residents, with houses for families and dormitories organised by nationality for single residents. Those observations make the book a rare named testimony from Dzaleka’s first years as a refugee settlement.

Historical use

The memoir is a primary source for one person’s route, observations, and memory. It is particularly useful for the early organisation of Dzaleka, but its population figures and descriptions apply to a specific moment in 1995 and should not be projected onto later decades.

The work is now out of print and most available copies are held by libraries or second-hand booksellers. This limited availability increases the importance of accurate catalogue data and careful citation without reproducing the book itself.