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The mosquitoes
are a nightmare. I spent ages making sure none had got inside
the nets around the bed before I went to sleep last night, but
this morning there were half a dozen sitting there, all full
and red having gorged on my blood. What a way to start the day!
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| Lizards
by the pool |
Breakfast
was great fresh mangoes and coffee. Sat by the pool and watched
the lizards and talked with Neil and Devon about the filming
before going back to my room for another shower.
The heat,
even first thing is intense. You feel wet and sticky after walking
just a few yards.
The official
Roots 2000 opening ceremony at the July 22nd stadium was a riot
of noise and colour. The whole thing appeared to be chaos. Thousands
of spectators, drummers, dancers, and home comers all in one
single mass, and yet it all eventually came together.
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| Welcome
festival |
Neil got
some great shots and Devon did well with his pieces to camera,
which are always difficult in crowds with so much noise. There
was one we managed to film with stilt walkers in the background
which looked great.
Its been
an incredible night. We should have been filming a big music
event down at Arch 22 (named after the coup which brought the
current president to power) but there was a tropical storm and
so it was rained off.
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| The
festival was a riot of noise and colour |
Gambia television
had planned to cover the event live and without it had a big
hole in their programming, and so a bit of improvisation took
place and was replaced by a three hour talk show with all the
performers being wheeled in for the Gambian equivalent of ‘Parkinson’.
Devon, Neil
and me were also roped in. I’ve done loads of live television
but this was like nothing else. There were about twenty of us
sitting on various parts of the set, with the interviewer wandering
through and around us doing interviews.
After such
a busy day we wondered what the next day would hold:
Read
about Devon's second day
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