It was a Friday night at Cornell University. We were all huddled around the TV in my dorm — eyes fixed on Baabel, a Senegalese drama. Volume up, subtitles on, ears pressed to the speaker. At the height of the drama, I paused the show.

“That’s not what she said,” I jumped in. "She didn’t mean him, she meant her. “

The energy dipped, our excitement waned by the confusion of my non-Wolof speaking friends.

Scenes would pause, rewind, explain. What should’ve been a moment of joy or tension would get flattened, distorted, or lost completely in translation. But it also made something clear: the problem wasn’t the story. It was how it was being told to those outside the culture.

Seetan Media started as an instinct — to fix that pause. To build something better for African content to be experienced fully, without explanation. To make it make sense without losing what made it special in the first place.

That small screen became the first stage in a much bigger story: one where our shows, our languages, our jokes, and our emotions didn’t just travel — they landed.