After our trip to Nikosia we had only a few days at home until we took off for Uganda. We packed the same filming set: 2 FL tubes, a black backdrop, a camera.

Our journey began in Uganda, where we were invited to a traditional wedding. We then planned to travel through Kenya to Tanzania and Zanzibar. For some reason we were a bit too shy to ask people for an interview: so we left Uganda with a package of new memories but without any interview.

At Diani Beach, Kenya, we finally had the courage to ask the manager of the place for an interview, and he agreed immediately. This got us going, and we subsequently interviewed his staff and our German neighbour and his Kenyan girlfriend. It was amazing to have all these people talking with us about their life, their concerns and their idea of what truth means. We continued our journey and did some more interviews in different places in Zanzibar – some in English, some in Swahili. Especially the last ones were intriguing as we had no idea of what they were saying.

We made our most amazing experience when we went back to the mainland, and a musician we got to know took us to the suburbs in Dar-es-Salaam to his family. We could built up our small studio in their living room. But beforehand, we had to buy some electricity (everything in Eastern Africa is working in the prepaid system: no contracts for phones or electricity: if you need it and you got the money, you buy some). Our friend translated our questions into Swahili so we could interview his sisters and one of their sons. Again I had no clue what the answers were and I am really curious to find out!

It was a very intense and contradictory time – staying there as a white privileged European. Everything is working differently and you are getting a glimpse of how narrow and still colonial our view is. With our background we are incapable of describing this world, our own truth is so far away – even though we are all human beings and are dealing with similar fears such as children, money, security I don’t know yet how I am going to process these experiences, how to include them into this project since I am never going to be able to change my perspective: it remains the perspective of a European no matter how hard I try. This said, I am all the more happy that we did all these recordings so as to let everybody speak for themselves. The answers were amazing and I am going to show you a first collection of them soon.

 

Some anecdotes:

 

A guy from a guesthouse in Zanzibar wanted to have my whatsapp-number.

Me: I don’t have a smartphone right now, it got stolen.

He: We shall buy you a new one. It is very cheap.

Me: No no, I still got one at home which I just have to repair.

He: Repair? Why when you can buy a new one. It is so cheap.

Me: You know the working conditions at the phone production is really bad, a lot of modern slavery.

He: What? No, I don’t think so.

Me: But it is true!

He: I don’t believe it.

Me: You know, there is a lot of child labour going on, in Congo and other places.

He: But it is good when they work, they need to!

Me: But they don’t earn enough money. And the big companies have so much money. They are keeping the whole profit but they should instead pay their workers well.

He: Aha. Pause. Look for example his phone over there, the Samsung… it is very good!!

 

Another scene in Stone Town. We were filming a videoclip (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3zCBq_1M-Q). We always put the cigarette butt in our backpack. One of the guys saw it, took them out and threw them on the ground. I recollected them.

He: You don’t need to. Just leave them.

Me: We always collect them to throw them in the garbage.

He: No no. Don’t. This is Africa.

Me: But it is polluting the soil.

He: We don’t care, you can just throw them on the ground.

Me: You probably will care in a few years.

He laughs.

 

Stone Town.

He: If you give me 50 dollar, I will forget you when I have spent it all. But if you give me your knowledge and we share something, I will remember you forever.

 

Entebbe a day before the wedding. My boyfriend got a food poisoning. So we went back to our hotel early (which by the way was still under construction and empty besides the few of us who were staying there). Before we left we asked our driver if there were any bananas in the kitchen.

He: Do you want just fingers or a whole bundle?

We: A bundle would be great.

He: We don’t have.

We: Then fingers. Maybe three?

He: It is 1000 each.

We: Ok, then just one.

He: We can go and buy some, then it is cheaper for you.

We agreed because we thought we would just stop at the first village close to our hotel. We got into the car and he drove us to the next bigger place through a dusty and bumpy road through a very dark night, around 30mins into the middle of a big market and then to a store. He disappears with an empty beer crate for another 30mins. He came back with a full one, then we drove back, he stopped again at a bar doing something with another crate. We had no idea what exactly he needed to do . But we had an exciting trip, saw a night market and got the best bananas around.