Ours are the Stories that Matter….

Story matters… words matter… pictures matter. 

I take pictures. I share stories in this way…And being a snail mail fan taking pictures of places printing them and sending postcards is one of my love languages. That said over the years we seem to have lost the interest and art of sending loved ones postcards.

While I know that the world has gone digital and no longer sees value of handwritten letters and cards, I still cling to it. I place a lot of value in making time and effort in handmade and hand written gestures.

However, I have often struggled with postcards that paint Africa with very problematic imagery. The term “Big Five” is thrown around in Kenyan game drives despite its problematic roots. 

The phrase coined by western trophy hunters (read as those who kill wildlife for pleasure) who considered the lion, leopard, rhino, elephant and buffalo as dangerous but a challenge to hunt and kill.

It is not unusual to see bookstores, curio shops and stores displaying Kenyan postcards with images that display our cultures as backward and depictions that glorify poverty and slum tourism as well. 

I once tried to engage a renowned Kenyan hotel and resort to reconsider the postcards they displayed in their otherwise beautifully curated gift shops. I even offered them photos I took while at their resort at the Amboseli National Park. I wish they that it mattered to them about the pictorial stories they peddled out about us. 

I see postcard images that while beautiful, play into popular stereotypical narratives of ‘noble savages’ and to exotisize  and make a caricature of African cultural heritage.

…. We need to decolonise and reclaim how we are depicted in images and pictures. Let us hope the tourists lodges, resorts, stationery shops and stores that seek to serve visitors in our country distance themselves from imperialist  and racist tropes.

Just before each click of the camera I am always in awe of the vast beauty and richness this country has to offer. My pictures are just but a humble rendering of the grandness of our people, landscapes and wildscapes….