Yooohoo, Glorious Oddballs!
These photographs are drawn from a walk through Kamwokya. They capture fragments of everyday life including moments of work, movement, exchange, and connection. Seen together, they reveal the people, spaces, and informal systems that shape the neighborhood and keep it moving.
Hundreds of Pigeons line up on a roof–their regular spot. Somewhere in Kamwokya.
A woman passing through the dark and selectively lit chambers of a Kamwokya Local Market
FUN FACT
In high school, Senior 5, I once did a General Paper exam and scored 100 for 100.
Telling stories was my thing and when it came to those exams, I always opted for the Comprehension Questions over the Logic Questions and boy oh boy!
I felt free. Free to let my mind spin for a few marks but live the full experience of the ideas that flowed through my mind during those exams. Even the classroom was fun. Literature somehow flowed out of me.
My overthinking* had a place where i put the stories that came to me from just being in a place be it physically or metaphysically – other realms and such.
At the same time, I struggled with body dysmorphia all through school. I do not remember talking about it with anyone. I just felt the way I did and I did what I could to avert unnecessary attention including always wearing socks or closed sandals and shoes to hide Agip my ghost toe. I was born with Polydactyly.
/ˌpɒliˈdaktɪli/
A congenital physical condition in which a person is born with extra fingers or toes.
A motor mechanic fabricating/welding a motorcycle in Kamwokya Trading Center - Kampala.
My cousins called me Agip and they fabricated a song a for me. Not singing those lyrics. Not today. I remember using Agip as my name when I was around 3-4 years old and even when Agip was amputated I still went by it in places I didn't want to say my name for whatever reasons as a 6 year old at the time.
Growing up, I clearly was different from my peers but very much the same like them and so I did not isolate myself. I went out and had fun with my friends. I forgot all about the scars that I had and none of the kids gave a snort.
I remember there was this boy who had 2 rows of teeth in his mouth. Both up and down. Opio was his name. He lived not far away from our home and we played together with the other kids in the neighborhood.
Opio's house was a small grass thatched house and they lived right by the main access road with no fence. My house was near the road too but inside a barbed-wire fence and let me just say, we were, in government-aid terms and statistically, poor but they were even poorer.
A middle-aged Muslim Woman in a Hijab walking behind a mesh fence in Kamwokya - Kampala.
Now, let me set the record straight. I was not the social kind of child. I asked strange questions based on Mother's accounts and I was not talkative at all.
A seemingly distressed Woman sitting on the ground somewhere in Kamwokya - Kampala.
I had all sorts of friends growing up and it was easy for me to blend in and they never made me feel weird about myself and that allowed me to observe the world around me as a child in play. I went places and saw things and experienced so many mind boggling things from as early as i can remember.
Now, let me set the record straight. I was not the social kind of child. I asked strange questions based on Mother’s accounts and I was not talkative at all.
However, I had my moments when I got comfortable enough and I let my mind slip. With Mother, this was easy and fun and sometimes on the contrary like the time I was beaten so badly for throwing a plate after eating.
I was so mad at her I told her she was not my Mother anymore and in turn she stated clearly that I shouldn’t also call her “mommy” anymore.
Hours later, my Father comes back home. As is routine, Mother is serving him tea and I go, “Molly, I also want some tea.”
My Father asked what sort of nonsense was going on and my Mom had to do the explaining and I gladly did the exhibiting of the wound I sustained to which he reacted as he always did in protection of my three sisters and I.
He is not violent and they did not fight. At least not in front of us.
Portraits of People in and around Kamwokya - Kampala.
I spent most of my time playing by myself. Whenever I felt I needed social energy, I walked around and visited places far from home and on foot. I saw, heard, learned, witnessed, and did many things.
I saw how differently from us at home people lived, ate, behaved, spoke, celebrated, farmed, traded, loved, played, prayed, fought, stole and just generally existed.
Sometimes I got back home to whooping from Oh So Loving Father too.
Get this, I had the best childhood and I have been placed with the best parents. They acknowledged my weaknesses and amplified my strengths. My Father still calls me a genius. My Mother showed and taught me things about myself and how to behave plus so much more.
They did their best and for all the fuckeries, that’s on me as an individual and I continue to take responsibility for my life and those I co-exist with to the best of my abilities.
When I got older and onto high school, I had become more self aware and had also fallen prey to feelings of inadequacy and insecurities. For example, I started to hide my ghost toe, Agip. I began to be afraid even though I knew I did not look scary as such – on the contrary – *Handsome Smirk.
Posters and Signages in and around Kamwokya - Kampala.
Two Pigeons hanging out on a wire in Kamwokya - Kampala.
I had my strange abilities of observation and I was also able to put words to those things. That made subjects like SST, Literature, Geography, History, Arts, Music Drama, ICT, come somewhat easy to me.
Not in the sense that was the best at them, no. I had fun studying them. My imaginations ran wild and believe or not the sciences too intrigued me and still do and I have never separated myself from it because that in itself would be utterly stoopid and futile. – Like saying “I do not care about or follow politics”. Definitely not the same as “I do not follow soccer”.
Now, whenever I did the exams that required me to write out my own thoughts about something, I always did just that and I let all my experiences and perspectives, both currently going and recently shattered, just play.
In that particular Senior 5 General Paper in which I scored 100%, I was awarded 0 marks. Yes.
ZERO, ZILCH, CERO, NULL, NOT (LUO), 공,
Why?
Because, “Elvis, you have 100%. You passed everything excellently. However, you wrote in American English and so you have zero, essentially.”
That never took away my observation skills. I started to do as the curriculum required and in my senior 6, I had a distinction without the marks being redacted.
To this point, I was never the brightest student in class scoring 100s as such. Math and Chemistry had me by the balls and I collected F9s regularly. Considered S.O.Ps after senior 2 because Mole Concept was where understanding left the chat.
Need I add, I scored 100% in Senior 1 chemistry and I told my Nurse Aunt I was going to be a doctor. I guess at the time I thought chemistry was all about naming apparatuses.
I felt slow to grasp certain concepts in the classroom and outside especially for things I did not find myself playing at.
A young catholic girl passing through the dark and selectively lit chambers of a Kamwokya Local Market.
With that, I enjoy observing the world and I love to meet people from all walks of life.
From childhood, I enjoyed the crafty and arty business of creating and tinkering with toys, electronics, radios, bulbs, cardboards and everything in between and outside of the realm of play. As an adult, and a father now too, I still recognize the importance of Play in the things that I am predominantly creating things through design as my entry point.
I discovered computers and I learned I could play with them too and particularly the ones anciently known as the Camera Obscura.
Cable management 1O1 in Kamwokya
The camera obscura (Latin for "darkened room") originated in antiquity as a natural optical phenomenon, with early principles recorded in 5th-century BCE China and 4th-century BCE Greece. It evolved from a darkened room with a pinhole into a portable drawing tool, later directly inspiring the invention of photography
Camera Obscura Illustration — An early depiction of the camera obscura, showing how light passing through a small aperture projects an inverted image of the outside world onto an interior surface. This simple optical principle laid the foundation for the development of photography centuries later.
A cobbler mending a shoe with an eye-design on it. Below is a street Preacher in Kamwokya trading center.
Since I already spend hours on end noticing patterns both strange and obvious, new and old, familiar and ones that ring anxiety in the air, the camera obscura has enabled me to keep going about and exploring places and cultures, meeting people Old and Young, Dead and Alive, Yeah. That’s photography for me in a nutshell.
I get to step out of my head, chair and house and actively play in the unfolding of reality with each passing shadow of the clouds against the sky as is thought in the mind.
I am learning to accept me for who I am more and let go of fear. Fear that I am not smart enough, do not have enough, not that good and what not–whichever way imposter syndrome would have it–NOT!
Glovo Delivery agents relaxing under a shed by a wall fence in Kamwokya.
Joining this walk, I kept on thinking of how much I still do not know as a Photographer. I thought about how the others have all the cool gear. Matter of fact, someone said during the walk, “Nikons are the Itels of cameras”.
I was carrying a Canon so I giggled but the Sony Boys and Girls laughed out loud as though to laughingly say, “We agree”. Now I know how the Android guys feel.
I have walked around photographing on my own but I find it really helpful to do some of these walks with other Photographers. Not from the angle of competitive photography but simply perspective sharing.
After the walk, I felt a great deal of energy having spent most of Sunday 14th June, 2026 with the wonderful Humans who photographed and the citizens we came across who enabled us to create wonderful images.
The question was asked, WHAT NEXT? Now that we have these photographs, I thought about it but could not come up with an answer until now. I never share the things I write and I hardly show the photographs I create. I keep a lot of it for myself.
In an attempt to answer the question, I will be sharing stories about me, places and people through the photographs on this portal I call a website of mine and I look forward to featuring some of your creations as well.
Till next time, enjoy the rest of these images.
To the Kampala Photo-Walk organizers, and Photographers that were present, thank you so much for the opportunity and I eagerly look forward to more of these walks and around our city and beyond.
Specials thanks to
Badru Katumba and Monica Ahairwebyona.
Muwado, Global Shapers Kampala, FOTEA, UPPA, and Unpublished Africa.
Theme:
Documenting InformalityUrban informality is often described as “chaos”, yet many informal systems represent resilience, creativity, and community problem-solving.
The walk invited us to look beyond appearances and document the systems that help cities function.
Apwoyo.
THE COLLECTIVE
Yoohoo, Cool Humans!
It was wonderful walking around Photographing with you lot.
These are for you. I apologize if my camera didn’t see you entirely but your essence is in all the Photographs. Hihi 🙂
