‘Stories of Our Lives’. Kenya’s LGBTQ Community. In Their Own Words.

Kenya LGBTQ Stories of Our Lives


Created by Nairobi-based artist Jim Chuchu, “Stories of Our Lives” is a candid look into the lives LGBTQ individuals in Kenya. The stories, which are first person accounts are told anonymously. They were originally compiled by the NEST Collective, an arts collective, which began documenting the lives of Kenya’s LGBTQ community in 2013.

“Stories of Our Lives” is Jim Chuchu’s first ever film, which he states he made as a protest.

I made this film because these stories are important to me, because I’ve always believed that having the power to define your own beliefs, to make work out of things you love doing, and to surround yourself with people you love and who love you back is the greatest privilege ever.

I made this film in protest at the fit-everyone-in-a-box crusades that are so loud, insistent and omnipresent in Kenya and all over Africa – as if we must all believe in one God and all wear uniforms and all have the same opinions.

I made this film in protest at the bullshit that allows someone like President Museveni to attack art students for “having no solutions to the country’s challenges” – as if the only careers fit for Africans are in the army, construction and finance. Who will sing our songs if everyone is working in a bank? When did our women’s bodies become so ugly that we’re now making laws to police the length of mini-skirts? And when did forming angry mobs to evict and kill gay people become a nation-building activity?

Films and music and art and color and song and dance have never been more important in Africa than they are now – when we’re trying to define who we are and who we’re not, and when everyone’s jetting in with money and agendas and opinions about who we should aspire to be.

Music plays an important part in the artistry of the film. Here is a selection of some of the music features in each vignette.



“Stories of Our Lives” premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and is headed to Nairobi next. Go here for screening information.