Ambassador Joyce Kakuramatsi Kikafunda, born into a poor peasant family in colonial Uganda often called the ‘Pearl of Africa’, scaled up to enviable heights of success in diplomacy and education against all societal odds. Her personal journey narrated in ‘Triumph Over Adversity-My Extraordinary Life's Journey’ is an unabashed tribute to her relentless persistence, fight, and pursuit to ‘never give up’ on her dreams, ambition, and aspiration. Her captivating memoir, divided into twenty-two chapters, emits her quiet strength and courage in enduring pain during her unparalleled journey. The autobiography, a tale of countering countless trials and tribulation, gives an intimate glimpse of the historic subordination of women in Uganda’s society, class struggle, and the lingering impact of political and economic challenges on people’s lives.
Ambassador Kikafunda approaches to narrate the story of her life acknowledging the people who stood by her while outlining the lessons that anchored her to move forward despite several setbacks. Her visual account of their contributions and role in her life and the emotional cost of their eventual loss to death makes her memoir a heart wrenching read.
A woman of many firsts in her family, and Uganda importantly, Kikafunda recognizes her father’s unconventional thinking ahead of his time to raise and educate her as the first stepping stone to empowerment. Back then poverty, limited infrastructure, and most importantly cultural norms in Uganda favored sons, like in many parts of the worlds, considering women more suitable for domestic roles. Push for girls’ education was incorporated as a part of the national development agenda almost a decade after Ambassador Kikafunda was born when Uganda was granted its independence.
The memoir lucidly illustrates the prevailing class struggle in African society and her courage to translate the sense of discrimination as an armor of strength. Her light hearted account of her tryst with class discrimination at an early age while studying in school is relatable and revealing.
Ambassador Kikafunda’s step up to higher education at Mackrere University in 1973, back then the only university in Uganda, while preparing for bigger responsibilities, exposed her to the many challenges of love, marriage, and eventually, childlessness. While Kikafunda ascended to greater heights in achieving professional accolades, she struggled with the unforgiving challenges of African society where childlessness is deeply stigmatized, portraying a severe personal, social, cultural crisis. More than a health issue, childlessness is treated as a social taboo in African society, she narrates.
Kikafunda’s agonizing account of her painful experience due to childlessness that affected her self-esteem and self-confidence despite being exceptionally successful, echoes of the complex spectrum of non-empathy that exists in the world built on societal pressure, patriarchy, and insensitivity. It eventually causes her marriage to fall apart putting social norms and customs ahead of her personal accomplishments. For years, Kikafunda’s rewarding service to her adopted kids to feel the intimate emotion of motherhood is riveting and inspirational to read.
Through manifold experiences abroad as a student, academician, and diplomat, Kikafunda shares her struggles to adapt to social, financial and cultural challenges posed by newer societies and responsibilities. Her determination to overcome all the hurdles, no matter how insurmountable the obstacles were, makes her memoir unputdownable.
Kikafunda's growing up years coincided with Uganda’s independence and subsequent political transitions through intense power struggles, military coups, and constitutional reforms. Her autobiography gives a vivid account of dictator Idi Amin’s ‘Regime of Terror’ after deposing Prime Minister Obote from power in 1971. Idi Amin’s rule of Uganda that became a synonym of barbarity, as Kikafunda writes, had put Uganda ‘in the world for the wrong reasons’.
Years after Idi Amin’s fall, it was difficult for Kikafunda as an ambassador to promote Uganda’s tourism potential. Uganda has come a long way since Idi Amin’s downfall. As Ambassador Kikafunda puts it is one of the fastest growing economies in the African continent now. Simultaneously, Ambassador Kikafunda’s account of the Entette Raid incident in 1976 echoes through the reports of terrorism that continues to remain a significant security challenge in Uganda even today.
Kikafunda’s memoir touches upon another important aspect of Uganda’s society- Health. Besides shedding light on societal stigma attached to HIV, she brings forth the prevailing concern involving malnutrition in Uganda. Her PhD thesis in the UK on child malnutrition draws attention to its significant challenges leading to long term economic costs, impaired cognitive development, and high child mortality rate in Uganda.
The last part of her autobiography titled ‘Pause’ talks about continued momentum of the series of challenges that built her resilience, faith in self, and courage defining Ambassador Kikafunda’s life, choices, and journey. Her memoir elaborating on her experiences through several anecdotes is a living testimony of Nelson Mandela’s message, ‘a winner is a dreamer, who never gives up’. Retrospective of the ‘mountains’ and ‘valleys’ encountered, Ambassador Joyce’s memoir concludes echoing her endless spirit for triumphing adversity.