Heads, shoulders…

Our last day in Barmoi and we finish filming early, so we stick around and have some fun. We decide to film the children running behind the ambulance (in a bit of a comic relief moment) to end the film. As I usher them down to the other end of the village I realise they are copying me, so I start to skip and wave my hands. As they also copy this, I try something else. Having 20 African children singing heads, shoulders, knees and toes with me was a magic moment.

We pay the Barmoi actors and get them to sign release forms. Everyone seems to be either a Bangura or a Kamara and I am told this is true across the whole of the district. School must get pretty confusing. Each of them get 10,000 Leones ‘feedin’ money and 10,000 Leones fee per day. This works out to just over £3, a very handsome amount in their economy. We return to the base for a lunch of beans on toast (yum) and then to the hospital to film the last scene.

We are unsure what we will find at the Hospital as over Christmas there has been some trouble. It is hard for us to understand exactly what has taken place or the gravity of the situation but it seems some local members of the APC (the new governing party) disapprove of non-Kambians working in the hospital and have made allegations and threats towards the Chief Medical Officer and his team who have now left. It is pretty shocking to us that local pettiness can have such results, especially when there is only one doctor to cover the whole district. The few troublemakers involved seem not to understand the fact that finding new trained staff will not be possible. Everyone is unsure whether those who have left will return.

The hospital is very quiet with few patients, but we film outside using one of the Cheltenham Scholars to play a doctor and the concluding scene of the first story is done. On the way out we stop at Hassan’s, the only bar in Kambia, for a beer. I meet (another) Isatu, Hassan’s adopted daughter who plonks herself on my lap and proceeds to examine me in detail. Touching my skin, my face and my breasts she is transfixed by my white skin and very giggly, but doesn’t say a word.

As we walk back to the base, many people shout James’ name and seem to know we come from Cheltenham (well, we have all lived there in the past). People in the town often refer to the ‘link’ between Kambia and Cheltenham and despite knowing how long the Kambia Appeal has operated here, I am surprised by how well known the project is and how deeply grateful people are.