Stop, watch out, you too could be a Lagoma!
Oct 14, 2004
Hello, meet this Ugandan. He is familiar to you, maybe. He has many siblings, scattered all over the globe. He is a Divello Lagoma, 23 years of age. He is semi-orphan, with no father. And he is searching.
Hello, meet this Ugandan. He is familiar to you, maybe. He has many siblings, scattered all over the globe. He is a Divello Lagoma, 23 years of age. He is semi-orphan, with no father. And he is searching. Searching for a password. People, Lagoma is searching and it is a serious problem in our midst. Unfortunately, not many seem to have noticed it, till Deborah Asiimwe of the Kampala Pentecostal Church (KPC) drama team wrote a play about the problem, invited the public to see it (the problem, not the play) and then everybody got out of the theatre muttering, “And you know, they are everywhere!†True. They are all over.
Lagoma is Searching is an epic traverse of a young man’s life, from innocence to full-blown despondence. Orphaned early in life, when his father dies, Lagoma lives with his mother, a step-dad and society. But they have no time for him. The mother, whom he constantly refers to as ‘that woman’, is a politician, and she just never focuses her attention on the boy. He, at the age of five, turns to booze, smoking, doing dope, and does all sorts of social ills.
The first thing the predominantly born-again audience wants to do is blame him for leading such a careless life, blame his parents for neglecting and ill-treating him, blame Aside, the journalist-cum-friend we meet through for only being interested in his story and do not ask why they have done nothing.
The play is a social critique of the neglect many have nurtured themselves into; with nobody caring for anybody. The only people who ‘care’ are the ones who will lead you into temptation. Then the finger pointing starts.
Asiimwe’s strength in this play lay in her ability to capture class, age and emotional state and depicting them in language, costume and movement. Lagoma’s spiky hair, chain hanging from the neck, cut jeans shorts, heavily tattooed body, leather glove on the left hand and gutter language, leave you with no question as to whether he is a social worker, or one of the wretched of the earth who fill our villages, suburbs and cities. The play has a two-character cast, earning a plus for economy, but at the same time putting a strain on the director and the performers for how to sustain the thread of the story. Much of Lagoma’s story is told through Aside, and through enacting certain important sections of his life’s journey in flashbacks and demonstrations. Another plus for Asiimwe here; the deliberate and successful diversion from the conventional.
And for Asiimwe, who has always gone for the crowded cast; multi-scene oriented dramas over the years, to delve into something almost virgin here, is commendable.
The play’s other strength is in its not offering a solution. Yes, our audiences always want a solution, but what solution do you offer in a play that talks about a problem no one has offered a solution to? Asiimwe did not preach; did not blame; she laid the problem bare.
She, however, needed to make the dialogue a little pithier. It dragged in parts, and audiences are quicker to react negatively than otherwise.
We as Ugandans need to look into Lagoma’s search. He says he is searching for a password to life – to love, joy and someone who will accept him. All he has known is hardship, rejection, neglect and abuse. His own mother called him a mistake, so he believes he is one. And, unfortunately, he does not believe Aside who tells him mistakes can be corrected. But can we, surely? We can. Lagomas are numerous. Help them. You could be a Lagoma. The password is available: J.E.S.U.S.
Ends
Lagoma is Searching is an epic traverse of a young man’s life, from innocence to full-blown despondence. Orphaned early in life, when his father dies, Lagoma lives with his mother, a step-dad and society. But they have no time for him. The mother, whom he constantly refers to as ‘that woman’, is a politician, and she just never focuses her attention on the boy. He, at the age of five, turns to booze, smoking, doing dope, and does all sorts of social ills.
The first thing the predominantly born-again audience wants to do is blame him for leading such a careless life, blame his parents for neglecting and ill-treating him, blame Aside, the journalist-cum-friend we meet through for only being interested in his story and do not ask why they have done nothing.
The play is a social critique of the neglect many have nurtured themselves into; with nobody caring for anybody. The only people who ‘care’ are the ones who will lead you into temptation. Then the finger pointing starts.
Asiimwe’s strength in this play lay in her ability to capture class, age and emotional state and depicting them in language, costume and movement. Lagoma’s spiky hair, chain hanging from the neck, cut jeans shorts, heavily tattooed body, leather glove on the left hand and gutter language, leave you with no question as to whether he is a social worker, or one of the wretched of the earth who fill our villages, suburbs and cities. The play has a two-character cast, earning a plus for economy, but at the same time putting a strain on the director and the performers for how to sustain the thread of the story. Much of Lagoma’s story is told through Aside, and through enacting certain important sections of his life’s journey in flashbacks and demonstrations. Another plus for Asiimwe here; the deliberate and successful diversion from the conventional.
And for Asiimwe, who has always gone for the crowded cast; multi-scene oriented dramas over the years, to delve into something almost virgin here, is commendable.
The play’s other strength is in its not offering a solution. Yes, our audiences always want a solution, but what solution do you offer in a play that talks about a problem no one has offered a solution to? Asiimwe did not preach; did not blame; she laid the problem bare.
She, however, needed to make the dialogue a little pithier. It dragged in parts, and audiences are quicker to react negatively than otherwise.
We as Ugandans need to look into Lagoma’s search. He says he is searching for a password to life – to love, joy and someone who will accept him. All he has known is hardship, rejection, neglect and abuse. His own mother called him a mistake, so he believes he is one. And, unfortunately, he does not believe Aside who tells him mistakes can be corrected. But can we, surely? We can. Lagomas are numerous. Help them. You could be a Lagoma. The password is available: J.E.S.U.S.
Ends