Reflections on Khadar Ahmed's The Gravedigger's Wife by Faye Cano Valadez

Five men are lingering on a dusty road in front of a squat, white hospital building. They share a cigarette, trying to make the most of each drag. Suddenly, they jump into action, their languid movements turning into a hectic bustle. An ambulance is rushing into the hospital forecourt. The men run after it, carrying rusty shovels over their shoulders.

The ambulance doors open to reveal an injured but very much alive person. Noticing their expectant faces, an irritated nurse states the obvious: ‘No gravediggers needed this time. Thank you.’

The men slump.

No dead bodies mean no job and, therefore, no money to sustain their lives and families.

Such scenarios are a regular occurrence for them. Yet, the lack of income hits one of them harder than everyone else: Guled (Omar Abdi), whose wife Nasra (Yasmin Warsame) suffers from fatal kidney disease.

Khadar Ahmed’s The Gravedigger’s Wife is, first and foremost, a love story. But it is also the stark portrayal of life in a society without an established health care system or government-run welfare support. One scene shows Guled transporting his sick wife to the hospital in a wheelbarrow. Nasra’s condition worsens as the plot progresses. And when Guled is told that her surgery costs $ 5000, despair begins to set in.

Imagine $ 5000 being the difference between your partner living or dying.

I am sitting in the dark auditorium, following Guled on his way through Djibouti City, searching for a casual job or any opportunity to earn money. I did some early Christmas shopping before going to the cinema tonight, and now I feel the bulging bags pressing against my leg.

On the screen, Guled, Nasra and their son Mahad (Kadar Abdoul-Aziz Ibrahim) share a one-room shack made from corrugated iron. A single kerosene lamp dangles from the ceiling, and for a full body wash, Guled bathes in the sea.

I can hear the bags at my feet rustle and am overcome with sudden discomfort.

There have definitely been moments of sorrow and anguish in my life, but never enough to reach the point of utter hopelessness. One way or another, I always had someone to turn to or a hotline to ring. Now I am watching Guled knocking on doors, asking for money, to no avail. And I realise how lucky I have been. At some point in the story, Guled briefly threatens a money exchange clerk with a brick stone. Watching his trembling hand, it dawns on me that I cannot even begin to understand his level of desperation.

Guled does not attack the clerk in the end. Instead, he sets out on a journey to his family, whom he left many years earlier after they hadn’t approved of his choice of a wife. The plan is to reclaim ‘his share‘ of the goat herd from his brother and sell them in the city. Before leaving, he hands his young son a handful of crumpled banknotes. Guled tells him to ‘Take care of your mother’ and that he shall be back in a ‘few days.’

A ‘few days’…of a lone man traversing a seemingly endless stretch of barren countryside; on foot…

The level of faith needed is unfathomable. Not just concerning Guled, but his son, too. So many things could happen along the way. Nasra could die in the meantime. Guled could get lost in Djibouti’s desert-like plains and perish, and no one would ever know what had happened. Their son could get killed in the streets, trying to earn money by washing car windscreens. And still, Guled embarks on this journey because it is his only option.

If anyone asked me to walk back to my hometown on foot, I wouldn’t have the slightest idea of how to achieve it. Leave alone harsh weather conditions and inappropriate footwear.

Realising this, I wonder what makes people in Western society so fearful even though they have safety networks to catch them if they fall? We seem constantly afraid of losing something and brace ourselves with insurance, pension schemes and credit.

Yet how many men like Guled are out there who have no choice but to undertake a hair-raising venture to save the ones they love?

Director Khadar Ahmed did not set out to make the film dark and gritty despite its sombre theme. Instead, he had wanted to make it visually beautiful to ‘really support the emotional story of the film.’ [1] He has definitely succeeded, and as much as the landscape supports the story, the story sustains the landscape and a people’s love of their home.

At the Film Festival in Cannes, where The Gravedigger’s Wife was first shown, Ahmed and the two leading actors had been the only Somalians present. [2] In an interview with TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival), they speak about their shared love of Djibouti. Ahmed left Somalia during the civil war and has been living in Finland since he was seventeen. Going to Djibouti to film The Gravedigger’s Wife was his first time going ‘back home.’ [3]

Ahmed speaks of how proud he felt when this film was the first film his mother could watch without subtitles. [4]

While The Gravedigger's Wife is charming and witty, it still has you clutching the arms of your seat in terror… You find yourself hoping with Guled and wanting the best outcome for him.

And that's the film’s most striking aspect: hope in the face of the worst circumstances imaginable, always supported by the beautifully portrayed intimacy between the two main characters.

When the film is over, and the lights turn back on, I grab my heavy bags. Lifting them up, I ponder if people without faith in life just need more material things because they are so desperate to hold onto something.

[1] Tiff Originals. ‘Toronto International Film Festival: The team behind THE GRAVEDIGGER'S WIFE in conversation with TIFF’ [online] available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5CLH1T9fYA, [accessed 20 November 2022].

[2] Tiff Originals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5CLH1T9fYA.

[3] Tiff Originals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5CLH1T9fYA.

[4] Tiff Originals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5CLH1T9fYA.

words edited by Alicia Burden