In the
summer of 2009 when I went to Uganda to make a documentary in an orphanage I met
a local journalist who introduced me to a very different side of Uganda. One of
the stories that touched me most was the production of waraji in a village
called Jinja. waraji is a local Ugandan alcohol whose production is mostly
driven by widows needing to support their children.
When I got
to Jinja village I was shocked to discover the hard living conditions and how
dangerous waraji production is. After I spent some time with the local people
that live and work there I realised they have very little but they’re happy,
because the waraji business means they can feed their children and pay school
fees. It was hard for me to understand how people living in such conditions could
be happy and their positivity taught me to look at life differently.
The main
challenge I faced was the language barrier as some of them speak Luganda and I
couldn’t communicate with them directly so I invested more effort and time to
build a relationship and connect to the local people.
As a documentary
maker I aim to travel the world to explore and investigate different cultures
and share them with the world.
