While I’m aware that I’m at risk of sounding like a wanky greeting card, I absolutely loved my time there and being surrounded by such talent and passion for photojournalism was beyond inspiring. Our team was so talented, welcoming and humble, not to mention so utterly hilarious that when I flew out on Sunday evening, my tummy muscles and cheeks ached from laughing and smiling. Just what the doctor ordered!
Right in the heart of the Catalan region of France, Perpignan is a classic French city and due to its proximity to Andorra and Spain (just a half hour drive away to the border); barely a word of English was spoken. This did wonders for my French, but also saw me copiously explaining that I was from New Zealand, not England, which was met with far more friendliness than moments before when they thought I was a Pom! I often play this card when travelling in France – that way they think of my broken French as endearing, as opposed to ignorant. If I could read their French minds I’ve no doubt they would be thinking: “Listen to her giving it her all – good girl yourself!” Rather than the “Get a load of the English imbecile” which was running through their minds just moments before. In fact my French got quite a good workout, and it would have been exercised even more so if I hadn’t been with a group of those annoyingly intimidating people who can speak 10 languages – ‘Italiano? No problem, I spent three years there as a toddler’; ‘Swahili? Of course, my Au pair was from the Kibajuni region’. Unfortunately whilst extremely educated in languages of the world, they were also incredibly lovely, so I couldn’t even dislike them or tar them with the ‘lickarse’ brush.
Despite being utterly hectic with media interviews, press conferences, exhibitions, manning the stand, whilst trying to do my regular job, my time there was wonderful, hence the title of this blog – never mind the London 2012 Olympics, it’s all about Perpignan 2012!
While there weren’t so many glitzy parties as in Cannes, Perpignan was far less pretentious and the people were so interesting, humble and had a fair few good stories to tell too. One of my colleagues was telling me how he’d recently been on assignment in Madagascar where he had captured images of an indigenous tribe, who host a circumcision festival each year, in which it is custom for the ‘surgeon’ to eat all the foreskin afterwards, with a banana. No exaggeration here I promise! Not surprisingly, I steered clear of ordering any calamari during my time here...
Of course it wasn’t all light-hearted banter and I’ll just say that the imagery being captured around the world showing the devastating loss of life, conflict, oppression and the uncomprehending sadness some people are suffering is just so harrowing. It has had a marked effect and I just can’t believe that all of this stuff is going on around the world, yet we don’t hear about it because the media choose not to cover it.
The content being shown at Visa was so diverse – including a seminar which I attended by a French film maker, who spent three months in New Zealand earlier this year filming a documentary on the All Blacks and the haka. It was such an amazing documentary and really moving to the point of complete shivers and a few tears of pride. In fact, if I had to fight the urge to stand up and scream something embarrassingly patriotic, or worse – launch into a rendition of ‘Tutira mai nga iwi!’ Thankfully I managed to catch myself just in the nick of time!
It was over too soon and while I was pleased to see Brad, I certainly wasn’t happy to leave the 30 degree heat behind. True to form, London greeted me with rain and freezing winds, meaning I’m now sporting my winter coat – just days into autumn!
Love to all.
x
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