‘Why I prefer writing to law practice’

How has it been since you arrived for your residency at Ebedi?   It’s really been a great experience; for the fact that one is in a new environment, one is removed from your everyday life, and there is nothing much to do except to concentrate on what brought one to the residency. Isolation has […]

How has it been since you arrived for your residency at Ebedi?

 

It’s really been a great experience; for the fact that one is in a new environment, one is removed from your everyday life, and there is nothing much to do except to concentrate on what brought one to the residency. Isolation has a way of making one to be focused, without the pressure from friends, relatives, children, etc, and that is the major idea behind residencies anyway. So, I have been able to do something with my time here.

You have also been in other residencies around the world; how will you compare those ones with Ebedi?

This is the first time I will go out of my country for a residency in another African country, although I had been to residencies in other parts of the world, but their surroundings don’t give one food for thought, because they are so foreign from your own experience, but here, seeing another culture makes me think about my own culture, and I am learning about myself as a Ugandan when I look at those things around me. I notice many good things that we share, as well as the problems that we share. Although most writers may look at the possibility of going West when they want to go for a residency, but I think it is a good thing that there is something like this here, where African writers can come to and have a lot done, and then they wouldn’t have to think they are far away from home. I know residencies are in South Africa, Kenya, etc but in Uganda, we have not yet set up something of this nature. However, we have workshops like the Ugandan Women Writers Organisation.  Here, we bring people together and we critique our works. However, this is different, and I think Ebedi is a great literary idea.

How are you coping with the food here?

It’s quite difficult. Nigerian foods are too spicy. I have had to cope with that, but they are nice, anyway, and it is a good cultural experience.

You have a law degree and an MFA from an American university; why have you jettisoned law practice in favour of writing?

I love law but it was just not creative enough for me, although other lawyers would say there is creativity there, but my kind of creativity has to do with imagination, storytelling, and a different way of thinking; so I prefer writing. I imagine situations and issues and then create something out of them.

You once spoke about having a ‘good time’ during the Idi Amin’s regime, which many consider as Uganda’s most terrible regime; can you share how it was for you then?

It wasn’t that I really had a good time, but it was normal. Like if you grow up in the desert, it will be normal to live with sand, while it will be abnormal to have green around you. So as a child then, it wasn’t strange for me, despite all what was going on, but it was after the regime had been overthrown that I realized it was an abnormal situation. But before then, we had a life, we were going to school, church, etc, we were living our lives; for example like in Nigeria now, you hear of the bombings in the North, but the fact is that it is not changing the way people live, especially in the Southern part of the country. So life was just normal for me then, and it wasn’t that we were living in horror day after day, as some would think.

In 2005, you wrote an article in The Guardian of London in which you said your audience expected you as an African writer to tell them about hunger, war, disasters, etc in Africa; it’s been seven years since you wrote that article, but has anything changed?

I think there are still those expectations. The world still looks at Africa in negative light, but in Lagos, for example, there are skyscrapers, flyover bridges, etc; this is a functional modern African city and can be compared to other modern cities in the world. However, because of how the continent had been painted over the years in the West, people find it difficult to believe the Africa of today is not the Africa they used to know. Now, when you ask these major publishers to tell you what people are reading about Africa, these are the things they will tell you, and many of these publishers are outside Africa, so they can’t know what is really on ground here.

What is your suggestion on how to improve the Ebedi residency?

I want to commend Dr Wale Okediran, the founder of this residency. He has really done a great job. However, I hope there can be different time frame for the residency, like six weeks, three, six and nine months, as well as one year. This will make it possible for writers to be able to come down at anytime of the year to work on their projects.