Videography
Fuzzy Head FILMs
While I’m now focussed on print journalism, I used to work in TV making science, history and art documentaries for the BBC and Channel 4 (UK). I also directed, produced and edited short films under Fuzzy Head Films for the BBC, the Guardian, Mongabay among others, some of which you can watch below.
uganda’s rudest feminist on the campaign trail- THE GUARDIAN
Stella Nyanzi is Uganda's most outspoken, self-described radical queer feminist. She has been imprisoned for her activism and is known for her attention-grabbing naked protests and poetry. In an election campaign that has become increasingly violent, Nyanzi is standing to be the elected MP for Kampala, as part of the growing nationwide opposition to the 35-year presidency of Yoweri Museveni.
With most attention focused on Museveni's presidential challenger Bobi Wine, Nyanzi is on the streets and in the media campaigning for her own votes. She vows that, unlike other women who have been elected, she will not forget her commitment to feminism if she wins.
This is not a desert - Undark magazine
The multinational Square Kilometer Array (SKA) project aims to become the world’s most powerful radio telescope system. By delving into the darkest reaches of the universe, the SKA aims to solve some of the most vexing questions in astrophysics: How did the first stars form? And just what is dark energy?
The scientific implications of the project might well prove profound, but its arrival on the ground — a landscape with a complex history of racial discord, land seizure, and even stargazing — has been met with a mix of anticipation and suspicion by the region’s current occupants.
the male feminists inside uganda’s police force - Thomson reuters foundation
Balancing a heavy clay pot on his head with a baby tied to his back, policeman Francis Ogweng caused a scene as he marched down the busy highway towards Uganda's capital, Kampala.
With traffic backed up to the horizon, crowds of men stared and laughed as the baby girl swaddled in white cloth slipped precariously down Ogweng's back, pulling his khaki uniform into disarray. "We want to put ourselves in the shoes of women," he says...
Part of the European Journalism Centre funded project Big Men.
An ancient island at the centre of the world - bbc travel
Frozen in time, the island of Lamu in Kenya, was once the most important trade centre in East Africa. For Empires in the East and West, Lamu was a strategic island in the battle for global dominance.
While African in origin, and only 10km across, an incredible diversity of cultures have come together over the last 700 years from Europe, Arabia and India, creating a culture influenced by almost every corner of the world— yet one that remains unique.
meet the ecofeminists fighting for uganda’s forests - mongabay
“How come these people are coming to Bugoma to destroy our nature? Nature is protecting us,” says Beatrice Rukanyanga as she strides along the forest boundary. Twisting hardwood trees protrude from a tangle of foliage on one side, neat rows of pine and eucalyptus stand on the other.
Rukanyanga is part of grassroots network of women working to raise awareness, share knowledge, and directly resist the destruction of the environment while creating alternative models of development.
Africa’s crumbling train of fortune - bbc travel
The 1,860km-long TAZARA Railway is an ageing yet vital lifeline that connects rural communities across some of Tanzania and Zambia’s most spectacular landscapes.
Construction began in 1970, cutting a path from Tanzania’s port city of Dar es Salaam to the copper belt in central Zambia. Presidents Julius Nyerere and Kenneth Kaunda hoped to pave free passage for their people and goods away from then white-controlled Southern Rhodesia (today Zimbabwe) and South Africa. They called it the Freedom Railway.
for the love of nsenene - mongabay
Across Uganda, twice a year, the rains bring swarms of nsenene— or grasshoppers— migrating in search of food and a mate; and twice a year, traditionally, people across the country would painstakingly catch nsenene by hand.
Then, in the mid-1990s, some residents of Masaka had the bright idea of using powerful electric lights as a trap, attracting vast swarms of nsenene and a new source of income. But in recent years, with the loss of the crickets’ habitat and a rapidly changing climate, Masaka’s fortunes are also turning.