IDFA at Home: We, Students!

Get to know a group of friends—Aaron, Benjamin, Nestor and Rafiki—who are all economics students at the University of Nangui, capital of the Central African Republic. Their lives are much like those of any other students, with parties, part-time jobs, constant lack of cash, flirting and the stress of exams.

But these young men and their girlfriends are more motivated than most. They spend a lot of their time discussing political and societal matters, and are full of plans to drag their underdeveloped country out of the swamp of poverty and corruption, as well as to build their own future.

Until that time comes, it’s a matter of getting good grades, doing your own wash, cooking, and earning money working at stupid jobs. And all the while, Rafiki’s camera is watching. He films his friends in every possible situation. This opens up new dimensions, for example, when one of them—in tears after failing an exam—asks the filmmaker if he actually sees him as a friend, or primarily as a character in his film?