Month: February 2010

Getting around in Kinshasa

Congo River - Kinshasa
Congo River - looking from Kinshasa across the river to Brazzaville

If you travel a lot over a long period you will probably have an accumulation of currency which is very colourful but now quite useless.  It will either have been devalued to the point of irrelevance or no longer be in use.  I was looking through my stash the other day and came across a 50,000  Nouveau XZaires note from Zaire before it became the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1997.  I have traveled to DRC several times, both when it was Zaire and as DRC.  I recall going to a small streetside shop to get a sandwich for lunch once and noting that the wad of notes it cost was thicker than the sandwich itself.  On one memorable trip to Kinshasa I learned that it is probably better to have a driver than to drive your self …. Continue reading “Getting around in Kinshasa”

Getting a boarding pass in Lagos

In all my years of working in Africa I did not personally come across a great deal of corruption  – this particular experience at Lagos International Airport is the exception rather than the rule.

Lagos is a very large city in Nigeria – it is the second largest city in Africa (Cairo is the largest) with an estimated population of 15.5 million. It is an overwhelming city which is full of life but also mostly poor and dilapidated.   I first visited Lagos in the late 1990s on an assignment for UNICEF – the UN Childrens’ agency.  We could only travel in convoy with an armed escort and it was not recommended that you walked around in the city.  I recall very clearly arriving at the hotel I was to stay in with a colleague from the United Nations.  As I checked in the clerk asked me how I was going to pay and I put my credit card on the counter.  My colleague slapped his hand down on the counter covering my card and gave it back to me saying that I must not use it or let it out of my sight anywhere in Lagos – I paid in cash.

My memorable experience of catching a British Airways flight from Lagos to London happened on the same trip as my remarkable flight from Abuja (read about it here) – it was a long day.  Continue reading “Getting a boarding pass in Lagos”

Photographing markets

Late last year I spent a couple of afternoons at the Borough Market in London.  I have always found markets to be intriguing places.  The traders are usually full of character – self made individualists most of them who are by nature fiercely proud and protective of their independence.  The Borough Market in the South East of London has been there in various forms for hundreds of years.  Today the market as a whole is run by a non-profit organisation (although all the traders are there to make a living).  The market has a wide variety of produce and is well worth a visit.

As with most photography, the objective is not merely to produce a picture of the subject but to capture the essence of the place – to portray the life, texture, colours, personalities etc. which reflect the character of the place.  Continue reading “Photographing markets”