“I have tried all the possible means but in vain, and  the only alternative now available is to sell my house,” I told her in a very depressed way. She never agreed with me on this but my sister was on my side as she tried to convince her that it was a good idea adding that when I come back I will be able to put up a bigger house. “Let him sell the house to get money for the things he needs for his journey, he will come back loaded like other people who go to Europe” she said. After carefully listening to our explanation, my mother finally agreed that we would sell the house.

I had a small house of three rooms that I had built with savings from my photojournalism job. I built the house during my teen age and it was a house for the beginner as you looked at it from outside. It took me a year to complete the house because I was building in bits due to financial constraints. I could buy cement this months, wait for another two-three months to raise  money for other materials. Constructing this house was not so easy for me because sometimes I could forego some things essential of my life and sacrifice doing other things including going to work to keep around the site to prevent builders from selling my building materials. My house had no running water inside but it had electricity, a landline telephone and it was valued at about 25 million Uganda shillings without the plot on which it is situated. The plot itself was worth 10 million shillings at that time.

We started searching for the buyers of the house. We engaged some brokers to help us find the right buyers but all they got were offering very little money and the brokers themselves were asking for 30% commission of the sell price, which was too much money. As the search for the right buyer continued, I remembered of some friend of mine who was staying abroad but was in the country at that time. I contacted her to see if she could buy my house. She agreed but she said she was willing to pay in instalments because she did not have enough money. “For how much are you selling that house?” she asked. “I am selling both the house and the plot for 20 million Uganda shillings” I replied. Though both the house and the plot had been valued at 40 million shillings I decided to sell it at a giveaway price because I wanted money so urgently. She asked me to reduce the price and she wanted to take it at 15 million shillings. Finally, we agreed at 20 million shillings. She paid the first instalment of 10 million shillings and she promised to pay the balance in one week’s time something that she did. After she had paid me, I changed 10 million shillings to get $4000 that was still due to the visa dealer. I used the rest of the money (10 million shilling) as pocket money for my trip and to upkeep to my family.