As I sit in The Perfectionist Cafe in Heathrow Terminal 2 Departures, it dawns on me that I've been at this airport a fair amount over the past 2 weeks. This is trip number 3, the first two being the toing and froing to Ghana for the second location shoot of my doc E-LIFE. Accompanied by co-producer Huw Poraj-Wilczynski, cameraman Alexis Wilski, composer James Bulley, and toxicology consultant Markella Koniordou, I was in the country for 10 days investigating the problems of electronic waste.
Drone filming at Agbogbloshie with (from left) Huw P-W, Hasel from Aeroshutter, our Ghana Production Manager Justice Anthony, Alexis Wilski, our Agbogbloshie guide Karim, and our actor for the day Abdullah (Carlos).
The first trip to Accra was back in Dec 2013 when the film received its first installment of investment from Barchester Green Investments. Although successful, we felt we missed a few things, the most pivotal of which was testing the soil at the eWaste site of Agbogbloshie for toxic heavy metals. This time around, Markella (from the London School of Hygeine and Tropical Medicine) lead the research on this front alongside Sampson Atiemo from the Ghana Atomic Energy Commission. This allowed us to use their facilities for processing the soil samples we took at Agbogbloshie, which has recently been ranked in the top 10 most toxic places on the planet by Pure Earth (formerly the Blacksmith Institute).
At the burning site at Agbogbloshie with (from left) Huw P-W, Markella Koniordou, and Sampson Atiemo.
My London stopover has lasted a grand total of three days, which has been taken up solely working on a new documentary project for one of Scandinavia's largest media houses MTG. Now onwards to LA for pre-production work (mixed with some leisure time) on E-LIFE with out US Producer Tom Fox Davies. Onwards and upwards, care of Air New Zealand.
Ghana field recording with James Bulley.