Beach boys

Another Saturday afternoon, another dusty hot walk through the tiny streets of James Town, past the lighthouse and to CTC, where I meet Reggie, nervously pacing up and down. He’s a big guy, into his boxing, articulate when leading workshops, but he’s been surprisingly hesitant in front of the camera while taking part in the InterACT! video link project.

A couple of exceptions aside, we’ve now received the video postcards from the UK practitioners taking part in InterACT! and it’s time to start making the second videos from the TfaC facilitators. Reggie is first up – we’d spent a couple of hours in an internet café the day before watching his video from Jacqui Rice at Company of Angels and he’d spent the evening planning what he wants his next video to her to look like.

It’s part of the development of the project that I want the facilitators taking part in it to take more ownership in the making of their videos this time around. The first time I was making a lot of suggestions, guiding them – both to help the participants but also to ensure that each video we made showed a different side of Theatre for a Change. This time I want everyone to think about what they’re going to say, where we’re going to shoot the video, how it’s going to fit together. We’ve talked about storyboarding, about drawing on themes brought up in the video response sent from the UK, about developing and expanding the conversation.

Reggie is keen to feature some of TfaC’s youngest members in his video – the ‘Group of Hope’, so called because their age, 8-12, means they are unlikely to have started doing those things that might put them at risk of sexually transmitted diseases and are thus at an ideal stage to start talking about those issues. We visit Steven’s workshop, although Steven, for some reason hasn’t turned up yet, and Reggie leads some warm ups and interviews some of the kids in their native Ga language.

After a bit, we venture down to the beach next to the fisher folks’ village: pure white sand where tiny half naked kids play in amongst the piles of rubbish and the breaking waves. I’ve never been down this far – have always felt a little intimidated walking into the village as it feels separate from James Town somewhere, private almost, although none of the doors are shut in the little shacks where the incredibly hard-up fishermen and their families live.

Reggie settles himself on a massive fishing net and does his piece, hesitantly, to the camera, troubled by the shouts of kids throwing themselves from the little pier into the water and by a sudden difficulty with the English language that only materialises when the camera is on. He’s still charming though, and silly too – he whips off his shirt right at the start and, as soon as the camera beeps, pretends that we’ve stumbled across him sunbathing and apologises profusely.

The sun is still incredibly strong; it’s one of the hottest days I’ve experienced here so far. We finish with Reggie and I give him some cash to help with his travel for the project – a tiny amount but really important for someone who chose to give up his other, paying job to concentrate on Theatre for a Change. We finish the last bit of video and I stumble off to meet the next two facilitators.

Forster and Amanda, younger, more articulate and bouncier than Reggie, have a detailed plan for their video postcard which involves shots of them leaving their homes, standing in the middle of James Town, walking down streets, asides to the camera during their workshop and lots more. We end up shooting over 35 sections of their piece but only once or twice do they stumble on their words or look blank. In fact their challenge is more to know when to stop talking – they speak across each other, repeat and expand on what the other has said, are constantly itching to add new ideas. The result is mildly chaotic and endearingly entertaining.

On Monday and Tuesday I’m due to meet up with Nii and Collins to shoot their video postcards. When we met last week to watch the videos sent to them from the UK, Nii remarked upon how watching the video from Gabby at the Young Vic made him realise that there were people doing the same thing as him – or close enough – all over the world, and how comforting that was. It made me really happy to hear that, because it’s what this project is all about – finding common ground and sharing ideas within situations and contexts that in many ways are radically different.

Forster and Amanda’s second video to Hampstead Theatre’s Debra Glazer is online now at the InterACT! Project blog. Reggie’s will be up by Monday evening, Nii and Collins by Tuesday night.

Back in Accra

Monday morning. My first meeting in the office after a couple of weeks out on the road making videos for the InterACT! project and visiting some schools and placements in the Ashanti region of Ghana with the people who run the house where I live in Accra, Volunteer Abroad.

It was good to be back at TfaC's tidy offices upstairs off a little balcony in Labadi. Owusu, Johnson and Amanor (Linda is away in Togo) are funny, enthusiastic and occaisonally very silly. They are all so committed to their jobs too: all had worked over the weekend; Amanor stopped off at an in-service training session on his way to a wedding on Saturday.

You often hear stories in Ghana about corruption, about NGO money wasted, projects not working. I think most of them are exaggerated but even if they're not I've only seen positive things at TfaC in terms of they way its staff are so committed to the cause, so determined, so passionate. They're also, importantly, really fun; able to take and make a joke; and kind too.

The Monday morning meeting at TfaC is a chance for the team to come together, compare notes and discuss the week ahead. Amanor, Owusu and Eric all report back from their weekend visits.

We discuss the mobilisation of participants for the Amasaman project and the need to ensure that we don't just mobilise a load of young people who are already in school, who already aware of HIV/AIDS, of how to avoid teenage pregnancy. It's easy to find those kids - they're enthusiastic, willing to come to workshops regularly, but they're not the focus of this project: we'd much rather be working with those young people who have low levels of literacy, rarely attend school and are most at risk from the dangers posed by unsafe sex.

The rest of my week will be spent catching up with Nii, Collins, Diana, Forster, Amanda, Reggie and Susan and creating their response to the video postcards sent by the UK participants in the InterACT! project. It's been a real thrill to receive the videos made by the Uk participants - all of which are wonderful and thoughtful. I know that the facilitators here are really excited about seeing them and replying.

Video reflection

It's the Saturday after an incredibly busy week in Accra, most of it spent travelling, making videos, editing and uploading them for the Interact Project. It has been a real learning process: I hadn't done any video editing before coming to Ghana and have finally worked out my way around the software and the challenges of uploading to YouTube on a very slow and erratic internet connection.



I've been struck all week by how natural and confident most of the practitioners have been recording the videos, how happy they are in their work and how driven they are by the needs of the community in which they live and work. Things at Theatre for a Change aren't perfect, of course - nothing ever is - but what drives the work and gives it its heart is the commitment of the people who run it. I asked Johnson earlier this week whether he'd ever like to work in the UK or America, he said he'd prefer to do projects in Darfur or Sudan.

For some of the practitioners recording their videos was a real challenge, especially Reggie who suddenly became unexpectedly nervous when faced with the camera. His most natural, fluent moment came when talking about the way he had lost his job because he wasn't willing to give up on his commitments at the Community Theatre Centre - one of the most touching segments that we shot during the week.

I'm just about to set off for a few days away in and around Kumasi and am back in Accra on Friday. I really hope that all the practitioners in the UK find time in their busy schedules to record their videos on time - being away makes it difficult to make sure messages are getting through and that people are happy with what they have to do. I'm delighted that we've got such high profile theatres involved and such talented, interesting practitioners. We're all really excited to see their videos next week.

Interacting

A quick note to say that the second of the two projects that I'm running while I'm in Ghana has gone online today.

The Interact Link Project - www.interactproject.blogspot.com - is a video exchange project linking practitioners working for Theatre for a Change with practitioners working for some of the most exciting theatre companies in the UK. I'm still waiting for final confirmation from some of the UK practitioners, but am hopeful that the final list will have representatives from the Almeida Theatre, Company of Angels, Hampstead Theatre, Pilot Theatre, the Roundhouse and the Young Vic.

I have wonderful group of practitioners lined up to do the links from Ghana. It was only today that I realised that pretty much all of them have come through the Theatre for a Change ranks from the very beginning - either as founder practitioner or as young people in the Community Theatre in James Town.

Please do check out the Interact Project Blog for more information - I would like it to become a real focal point for the work of Theatre for a Change so do please pass it on to people who might be interested.



My other project - 100 Voices - is also going well, with over 65 interviews completed and more than 4,500 words transcribed (with lots more to go). The massive majority of those words are positive, with many young people citing real and substantial changes in their lives as a result of TfaC's work.

It has also been really heartening - as I think I've mentioned before - to hear so many passionate, well informed teachers talking about the impact of the work. One woman who teaches tailoring to young girls who have not had a formal education told us that the Interactive performance that she'd just seen was brilliant - but that it was most important to ensure that parents and teachers were spreading the right messages because "you come, you go ... we are always here". A difficult thing to argue with - and one of the reasons that TfaC targets all sections of the community with their performances and training.

I spent the weekend at the James Town Community Theatre and then, on Sunday, at Amasaman, where the new project has been going from strength to strength. What's great for me going there is that, because there are so many local languages represented in the room, the majority of the workshop took place in English. This means I get a much deeper insight into the world of the young participants and I learnt a lot about how having sex raises your status in your 'gang' at school, how people respond to HIV/AIDS messages and what the participants think are the main problems in their communities.

Almost without exception, the young people in Amasaman are passionate, clued up, responsible and generous with each other. Nii - who is also recording links for the Interact Project - is a gentle, encouraging workshop leader. I have no doubt that he will help produce some outstanding facilitators who will leave the group to set up their own throughout the area.

One sidenote - it was in Amasaman this weekend that I saw my first cobra of my trip - a long flash of brown and a startled look in its eyes when we discovered it sunning itself in the corner of the yard outside the workshop venue. Don't get many of them in Islington ...