Would you rather be a well fed slave or a hungry free man?

This is a question that Juma is asking in Bongoland after experiencing a disappointing life in America. Follow Juma as he chases an ever-elusive American dream in his new land after leaving everything behind in his native Bongoland.

Bongoland is one of the few entertainment films to be created especially for the Swahili speaking community. Josiah Kibira, a native Tanzanian now living in Minnesota, wrote and directed the film. This is his first film. Africans produced the story in conjunction with the local Minnesota Independent filmmakers.

Follow Juma as he deals with the issues that come up when his dreams for a better life in America collide with the realities of everyday life for an undocumented worker. After having experienced some initial successes, Juma's world starts to crumble. He finds himself facing the difficult decision of whether he should continue to struggle for success in a country that is supposed to offer so much opportunity or return to his native Bongoland.

To date, there are less than 5 movies ever made in this language. This is despite the fact that Swahili is spoken by more than 100 million people in the world mainly from Africa south of the Sahara. Josiah Kibira, did not see his first television program until he was about 23 years old. This is due to the fact that there were no television stations in Tanzania.

The story of Bongoland, is challenging a widely held belief in the third world countries that once one gets to the US or Europe, their problems of poverty are all resolved. There are many young people in these countries that see that the only way out is for them to emigrate to the west.

The experience of Juma turns out different results. A viewer of the film will have to make up their mind as to what caused these problems. There are questions of being an undocumented worker; there are questions of racism or just a case of bad luck.

This is a story that any person that came to the US as an immigrant can relate to. There is also a discussion about the amount of information the immigrant send home about the living conditions here. Most of the immigrants project the image that life is really good. This makes the people left behind to continuously put pressure on them in their daily lives. There are demands for help for the school fees, there are demands for money to start new projects etc.

The people who receive these requests from home, somehow find ways to fulfill them. This means working 3 jobs. It means accepting manual labor just to make a buck regardless of the education.

This is what Juma is asking. Is this lying and pretending that life is good really worth it?