/ARTS WEEKLY/PLAY-KENYA: Winds of Change

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Katy Salmon

NAIROBI, Aug 14 2002 (IPS) - “There aren’t many times in my life when I feel proud to be Kenyan. All we see is corruption, poverty, politics . But this play makes me proud to say, ‘Yes, this is who I am’,” enthuses Angeline Ngugi, smiling at her tearful companion.

Ngugi, along with the rest of the audience at Cajetan Boy’s new play, Winds of Change, staged at Nairobi’s Carnivore are on their feet, enthusiastically belting out the Kenyan national anthem.

On stage, it is 1963. Kenya’s founding President Jomo Kenyatta raises his trademark fly-whisk in the air and proclaims Uhuru — independence from British colonialism – to the cheering crowds below.

Despite the hard times Kenyans are going through, they remain fiercely patriotic. There are not many countries in the world where the whole cinema audience stops munching popcorn and stand up every time the national anthem is played.

Whirling through more than 400 years of turbulent history, Winds of Change gives Kenyans a timely reminder of all that they have accomplished.

“The Kenyan citizen really deserves a pat on the back for having survived despite the way life is right now. We don’t have much employment opportunities. The educational system is not the best. But we survive, we persevere,” says Boy.

“I think adversity can make you a better person. It’s a matter of seeing what good can be got out of the bad times as opposed to dwelling on the negative things,” he adds.

The story opens on the Swahili coast in 1584, when 19-year-old Juma watches Portuguese occupiers crush local people’s “fires of revolution”. A drumming, dancing swirl of purple, turquoise, red, yellow and orange figures run helter-skelter across the stage as the whole town is massacred.

Shifting to the shores of Lake Victoria, western Kenya, Juma’s great-grand daughter, Awiti, goes through even worse horrors when she is captured by Arab slave traders and taken to work on the clove plantations of Zanzibar.

Awiti is seduced by her slaver, Mustapha, who promises to help her protect her but then cruelly sells her, even though she is pregnant with his child.

“Once you accept life as a slave, it becomes more bearable,” is her lover’s callous advice as she is dragged away.

The slavery scenes are brutal. The traders treat their captives like animals, whipping them and raping some of the women to death. When one mother complains that she cannot carry her heavy load, her baby is taken from her and smashed to pieces.

“That scene is my favourite,” says one of the cast, Mwalimu Derek Omfwoko.

“You can feel it moving the audience. Before the scene starts, they are shouting and clapping but when it reaches that scene all of them keep quiet. You can see them really crying,” he says.

In the third act, Awiti’s grandchild, Hamiti, is much luckier. He catches the Sultan of Zanzibar’s eye and becomes employed at the palace. When slavery is abolished, he gets a job as a porter with a couple of newly-wed colonialists, the McQueens, and heads back up country in search of a better life.

The experiences of Hamiti’s grandchildren, Ikua and Wamaitha, bring us into the modern era. Brother and sister find themselves on opposing sides in the heady struggle for independence.

Wamaitha is a member of the Mau Mau freedom fighters, hiding out in the forests, slaughtering the homeguard collaborators, while her brother hates violence, preferring to use words to rebel against the British colonialists.

“It was a very distinct decision to put a brother and sister on two different sides of the battle. Obviously, it’s still such a volatile history because it’s so recent. So that was our way of smoothing the line a little,’ ‘ explains Daniele Harford, artistic director.

Boy admits he was “very nervous” about delving into such a sensitive topic.

“There are as many opinions about Mau Mau as there are writers. Everybody has a different feel to the whole issue. So what I had to try and do was not step on anybody’s toes,” he says.

“We tried to tone it down a bit while saying the things we thought were important. The Mau Mau did end up killing some of their people but they had reasons for that. Maybe not justifiable but they had reasons.

“And had it not been for them, maybe we would not have had independence, ” he says.

When Wamaitha witnesses the Lari massacre – where the Mau Mau kill everyone in the village, including the women and children – she turns away from violence and tries to convince the Mau Mau leaders to stop killing their own people. Sadly, she herself is killed before she can succeed.

Boy explains why fiery Wamaitha is his favourite character.

“She’s strong which is something that was not expected for women at that time. When she realised she was doing something wrong, she switched sides. When she realised the killing of innocents was wrong, she had the guts to take a stand and fight against that,” he says.

The other main female character, the slave, Awiti, also has inspirational strength.

“I think a lot of Kenyan women don’t realise how much they contribute to society, to the whole system. It’s time that people realised that,” says Boy.

It is not only women’s strength that Winds of Changes celebrates but that of all Kenyans.

“This is a very nice play because it is written by a Kenyan and done by Kenyans themselves. It is a very special play,” enthuses Peter Mudanya Kisanya, another cast member.

“When I am doing it, I feel that I am possessing the energy that can make people feel what it is to be Kenyan,” he says.

Boy wants to awaken the same sense of energy in his audience.

“We should be proud of our achievements. Fine, there are a lot of dark things about our country right now but there is a lot of bright stuff. I think we should focus on that and achieve more,” he urges.