‘I feel kind of selfish because I’m talking with you here in this fancy place and I’m so upset, but imagine being there – it’s 10 times worse,” says Ola Labib. The British-Sudanese comic took a break from gigging when violence broke out in Sudan last month. “It’s been constant anxiety,” she says about the conflict. “You can’t go on stage and make people laugh and be all happy when this is happening.”
In a rooftop cafe in London, she tells me her family were in Khartoum when the first clashes erupted. “My cousin flew to Sudan to surprise her dad for Eid but then she got stuck. When she had internet access, she messaged me saying, ‘Pray for me, forgive me if I’ve done anything to you.’ When people message you stuff like that, they think they’re going to die.”
