'Try again next time': my three visa rejections

After being offered a prestigious international literary residency, Nkiacha Atemnkeng was excited for his first visit to the US - until he turned up at the embassy for his interview

I am a western visa rejection expert. Three times - even though I work at an airport. But I am mostly a literary reject, a reality which also, somehow, always presents itself in sets of threes. Like a trilogy.

I am at the US embassy in Yaounde, Cameroon's capital, waiting outside the gate and the high fence. I admire the white tiled buildings and poles flaunting American flags. We stand in the morning sun. A Cameroonian security guard walks towards us.