Walk Together

From time to time, I should insert some interesting stories based on my activity in my school other than gloomy stories for your mental health, though it is also very important to talk about politics, economics, hypocrisy, lies, wars etc. in order to understand “International Development” well. This is going to be the last term at Savelugu School For The Deaf as an ICT teacher in my life, so to end off my duty with smile, I decided to make a film with students on the theme of the Deaf.

I required original stories from students and 4 students brought their stories, but they’re not good enough to shoot in our environment. A student brought a story of king, but it’s not easy to prepare palace, car, clothes, and food for king, basically we have no budget, and another wrote a story ending with murder, but I don’t want to touch any murder even in a film. And the stories were not long enough and didn’t have theme, so I made up a story based on their stories. In addition, most students wanted to act so I made roles for everyone, which added more scenes. As a result, the story became long and good enough with the theme of issues between the Deaf and hearing people. I would say that it’s a love comedy based on real issues of the Deaf. Here’s the theme:

The film questions two issues between the deaf and hearing people through two couples of deaf girl and hearing boy. The deaf have less possibility to get a good job in society than hearing people, which results limited possibility of choice of marriage, especially with hearing people. And also communication between the deaf and hearing people is the biggest issue unless hearing people learn sign language. Understanding of the deaf from hearing people is the key to solve the issues. 

The plot of the film is the following. The story starts with a fight between deaf and hearing boys, which is stopped by a teacher of deaf school. And one of the hearing boys (Yaw) meets the teacher again by accident and is invited to the deaf school. When he is exploring in the school, he meets the deaf boys again and shows his apology to them, but the deaf boys reject it. Then a teacher suggests having a game to become friendly and one of the deaf boys accepts it, though other boys are reluctant, because he plans to cheat to win the game. But after the game, the school prefect finds their trick and advices them to become friends. And when Yaw sees dance training of deaf girls, he is very impressed and invites his hearing friend (Fatawu) for a dance show. In the event, a deaf girl gives a speech: “Please call us with our name”, insisting that the deaf have sign names so don’t call them just “DEAF”, which touches Fatawu’s heart. There is a deaf couple in the school and they love each other, but accidentally the deaf girl misunderstands that her boyfriend and her best friend is kissing in classroom. She was so shocked and when she walks alone, Fatawu finds her crying and apologizes for his miss behavior in the past and he confesses that he likes her. And Yaw starts learning sign language at the school with deaf girls who all like him, yet Yaw likes a deaf girl (Dalajatu) who is not interested in him then. There is a deaf boy who always walks alone on his way and seeks for his dream that he will make a bridge between the Deaf and hearing people, but his classmates don’t follow him, saying “Impossible”, except Dalajatu. And Yaw confesses his love to Dalajatu, she accepts it finally, thinking of better future. In the last scene, the first couple of deaf and hearing go together by motor cycle and when Yaw and Dalajatu are about to leave, she stops him and says “I’m sorry, but I can’t…”, and she runs to the dreamy deaf boy and they walk together.

Well, I don’t know if we can make it as planned above, but we will try to do our best. You will see;)