00:01:20.750 --> 00:01:25.255
You know, what I'm more interested in,
in this film,

00:01:25.422 --> 00:01:28.675
I'm more interested
that you show my work,

00:01:30.094 --> 00:01:33.848
give more space to my work than to me.

00:01:38.853 --> 00:01:42.649
But you had an extraordinary life.
Isn't that interesting?

00:01:44.526 --> 00:01:47.946
I only realised when I came to Europe,

00:01:48.780 --> 00:01:51.115
when people started saying,

00:01:51.283 --> 00:01:53.786
"You've led an extraordinary life."

00:01:53.953 --> 00:01:57.164
I never thought of my life
as extraordinary.

00:02:06.799 --> 00:02:09.469
Can you still remember
when you took this photograph?

00:02:09.635 --> 00:02:11.262
Yes, yes, yes, yes.

00:02:11.429 --> 00:02:16.977
I remember every single moment
of my two years with these people.

00:02:20.188 --> 00:02:27.237
This was a Turkana woman
up on Lake Rudolf in the north of Kenya.

00:02:28.154 --> 00:02:32.075
But now I hesitate a lot
to go to those places

00:02:32.325 --> 00:02:37.413
because unfortunately my body
is betraying me.

00:02:38.539 --> 00:02:43.211
And the things that I want to do,
you have to be young and strong.

00:02:43.877 --> 00:02:48.382
And I was young and strong
when I went and did these pictures.

00:02:58.099 --> 00:03:01.895
I found a film from 1962
that you were in,

00:03:02.061 --> 00:03:05.439
called "L'Eclisse"
by Michelangelo Antonioni.

00:03:05.607 --> 00:03:10.237
Yeah, it's quite interesting
in the fact that what he wanted

00:03:10.404 --> 00:03:13.950
was not somebody who was a known actor.

00:03:14.116 --> 00:03:17.912
He wanted to have something exotic,
I suppose.

00:03:26.504 --> 00:03:28.006
So you played Marta, right?

00:03:28.173 --> 00:03:31.802
Yeah, and I was one of the characters
that he had written in,

00:03:31.969 --> 00:03:35.180
based on my life and on my work.

00:03:42.271 --> 00:03:45.942
How old was I then, 30? I was 30 then.

00:03:46.108 --> 00:03:48.152
And now I'm 89.

00:03:55.117 --> 00:03:59.079
And this is Naivasha in Kenya,
where I grew up.

00:04:00.497 --> 00:04:03.208
That's the volcano Longonot.

00:04:03.375 --> 00:04:07.797
What are you feeling while watching this
after such a long time?

00:04:07.963 --> 00:04:12.551
Well, it's quite interesting
to look back at my work.

00:04:16.764 --> 00:04:20.768
I had just started
my photographic career

00:04:20.935 --> 00:04:24.564
and this was showing the world my work.

00:04:50.215 --> 00:04:54.386
My life actually is driven by my eyes.

00:04:57.723 --> 00:05:03.271
My basic interest in being alive
is beauty.

00:05:08.234 --> 00:05:10.695
And what is beauty for you?

00:05:12.613 --> 00:05:14.782
That's a difficult question,

00:05:15.616 --> 00:05:17.868
because there's all kinds of beauty.

00:05:21.372 --> 00:05:23.374
I do notice...

00:05:24.708 --> 00:05:27.002
the beauty in people,

00:05:31.132 --> 00:05:33.551
the beauty in nature.

00:05:38.056 --> 00:05:40.016
For all my life,

00:05:40.767 --> 00:05:46.064
I was attracted to anything
that is beautiful.

00:05:53.447 --> 00:05:57.576
That is what I try to capture
with my camera.

00:06:19.599 --> 00:06:21.434
Okay, shall I sit, Mirella?

00:06:21.601 --> 00:06:25.980
Yeah, sit with your legs over there,
your bum, that's right.

00:06:26.148 --> 00:06:30.027
More your legs over there
and turn round, that's right, there.

00:06:30.194 --> 00:06:32.822
-Like this?
-Yeah.

00:06:33.489 --> 00:06:36.325
-Shall I not sit straight?
-No, no, no.

00:06:37.660 --> 00:06:41.372
The thing is, you know,
I haven't taken the light reading...

00:06:41.539 --> 00:06:43.041
So I don't know.

00:06:43.208 --> 00:06:46.044
Where's your camera?
Give him your camera.

00:06:46.211 --> 00:06:47.921
-She has it already.
-I got it already.

00:06:48.088 --> 00:06:49.464
Give it to him.

00:06:49.632 --> 00:06:52.135
I want to take him with the camera.

00:07:03.104 --> 00:07:07.651
You see, if you could only use
photographs like that of me,

00:07:07.901 --> 00:07:10.278
that would be acceptable.

00:07:11.196 --> 00:07:13.991
Why don't you like it
when I'm filming you?

00:07:14.532 --> 00:07:19.329
Because I'm thinking of how
will I be remembered when I'm gone.

00:07:19.495 --> 00:07:22.999
And I don't like
to be remembered as old.

00:07:23.791 --> 00:07:26.502
It's horrible to be old. I hate it.

00:07:27.253 --> 00:07:30.589
Because my whole life has slowed down.

00:07:32.591 --> 00:07:36.011
Somebody who's had the kind
of life I had,

00:07:36.637 --> 00:07:39.932
it's quite difficult to swallow.

00:07:41.850 --> 00:07:46.021
And then I meet people like you
who come all this way and find me

00:07:46.187 --> 00:07:49.315
and want to make a film
and are interested in me.

00:07:49.774 --> 00:07:51.984
It makes me feel very good.

00:07:55.071 --> 00:07:57.406
-Put it on him.
-So...

00:07:58.783 --> 00:07:59.909
Do that.

00:08:01.786 --> 00:08:03.245
There, there.

00:08:03.996 --> 00:08:06.832
Up. No, no, no, no, no. Up.

00:08:07.249 --> 00:08:09.835
To begin with,
Mirella has asked to interview me

00:08:10.002 --> 00:08:12.171
about my perspective on
our collaboration.

00:08:12.337 --> 00:08:13.796
Right. That's good.

00:08:13.964 --> 00:08:15.423
-Is it good?
-Yeah.

00:08:16.675 --> 00:08:20.637
Are you pleased with the way we worked

00:08:20.804 --> 00:08:25.309
or did you find it difficult
to do it the way you did?

00:08:25.476 --> 00:08:30.523
It was very interesting
at the beginning that you said

00:08:30.689 --> 00:08:34.151
you don't want to be filmed
in the face from the front.

00:08:34.318 --> 00:08:36.528
But I thought I accept this.

00:08:36.695 --> 00:08:40.782
And so I think we found
our way around in this film

00:08:41.325 --> 00:08:42.952
of working together.

00:08:43.786 --> 00:08:45.496
And actually,

00:08:46.163 --> 00:08:49.499
I'm glad that I had the idea
of doing the interview with you

00:08:49.667 --> 00:08:52.712
because it shows the other side
of the story.

00:08:53.504 --> 00:08:58.009
You're about two generations
away from me.

00:08:58.509 --> 00:09:01.887
In what way did you hear about me?

00:09:02.138 --> 00:09:06.059
-I just read about you in a book.
-What book was that?

00:09:06.225 --> 00:09:08.519
It was the autobiography
of Leni Riefenstahl.

00:09:08.770 --> 00:09:09.938
Oh.

00:09:10.104 --> 00:09:11.898
And she mentioned you

00:09:12.148 --> 00:09:15.026
and I thought,
"Who is this person, Mirella Ricciardi?"

00:09:15.276 --> 00:09:17.904
So I found your books,
I bought your books,

00:09:18.071 --> 00:09:21.199
and then I got so captured by the books
and by the photographs in it

00:09:21.366 --> 00:09:24.619
that I just thought I have to
meet this person, Mirella,

00:09:24.870 --> 00:09:26.872
and I have to make a film about her.

00:09:27.706 --> 00:09:30.041
And everything was interesting,

00:09:30.209 --> 00:09:33.713
like to get an insight to your work
and to yourself.

00:09:33.880 --> 00:09:38.009
And you learned a lot about
me and us as a family.

00:09:38.259 --> 00:09:42.555
Because you also met Amina and her boys,

00:09:42.722 --> 00:09:46.142
and now you're part of our family
because of that.

00:09:46.309 --> 00:09:47.685
How does that make you feel?

00:09:47.936 --> 00:09:51.231
I wouldn't say I'm part of the family,
but maybe I'm a friend of the family.

00:09:51.398 --> 00:09:54.609
-It feels very nice.
-No. We consider you part of the family.

00:09:54.776 --> 00:09:59.489
Because you have been so deeply involved

00:09:59.739 --> 00:10:02.409
with who we are.

00:10:06.246 --> 00:10:10.167
I feel honoured that Mirella
considers me part of her family.

00:10:10.793 --> 00:10:14.714
And now I have been invited,
together with her daughter Amina,

00:10:14.880 --> 00:10:16.882
to her archive in Sussex.

00:10:17.925 --> 00:10:21.512
We're gonna have to put the little
heaters on just to heat the kitchen.

00:10:21.679 --> 00:10:23.639
What heaters are they?

00:10:24.349 --> 00:10:27.185
-The gas heaters.
-No, the electric heaters.

00:10:27.352 --> 00:10:30.856
-Do the gas heaters work?
-No, we don't have any gas.

00:10:32.232 --> 00:10:33.734
-This is the house?
-Yeah.

00:10:33.901 --> 00:10:35.778
There it is on the left.

00:10:36.236 --> 00:10:37.863
It's huge.

00:10:40.407 --> 00:10:42.952
But we live in here,
this little house here.

00:10:43.368 --> 00:10:45.162
This is our house.

00:10:45.370 --> 00:10:46.955
Voilà.

00:10:49.166 --> 00:10:51.126
Oh, God, it's cold, eh?

00:10:54.379 --> 00:10:56.882
This place is much colder than London.

00:10:57.799 --> 00:11:01.010
And because the house
hasn't been lived in,

00:11:01.845 --> 00:11:04.348
it takes a long time to heat it up.

00:11:10.646 --> 00:11:12.690
Okay? Do it.

00:11:14.525 --> 00:11:15.943
Action.

00:12:05.535 --> 00:12:07.996
You should see this picture
about Brexit.

00:12:08.163 --> 00:12:10.207
Try and film it.

00:12:12.918 --> 00:12:15.295
You are obsessed by the camera.

00:12:16.129 --> 00:12:19.257
And so am I.
So, you know, we've come together.

00:12:19.424 --> 00:12:22.260
And now you're here.
And then who knows where else you'll go.

00:12:22.427 --> 00:12:27.224
Before you know,
you might come to Africa with me.

00:12:27.557 --> 00:12:29.892
-If I ever go back.
-I would love to do this.

00:12:30.060 --> 00:12:33.438
Because, you know, I don't want to
just go back to Africa anywhere.

00:12:33.606 --> 00:12:38.319
I want to take you back to
where I came from, to that place.

00:13:20.737 --> 00:13:22.864
This is Zanzibar, you see.

00:13:24.032 --> 00:13:25.742
I wouldn't go back.

00:13:26.451 --> 00:13:28.703
But it is your home, right?

00:13:29.204 --> 00:13:31.915
Well, it was. Not anymore, I've gone.

00:13:40.090 --> 00:13:41.925
This is Amina's work.

00:13:43.802 --> 00:13:46.096
This is seen from my bedroom.

00:13:47.889 --> 00:13:51.518
And this is my garden with my gardener.

00:13:53.437 --> 00:13:55.022
And the flowers.

00:13:55.439 --> 00:13:57.191
And the trees.

00:14:00.152 --> 00:14:03.948
-You did all these photographs.
-They're just snaps.

00:14:04.114 --> 00:14:05.699
Snapshot.

00:14:08.577 --> 00:14:11.122
But for snapshots, they're very good.

00:14:14.916 --> 00:14:18.211
Here, this is done here in Sussex.

00:14:20.422 --> 00:14:22.632
As I was telling my friends today,

00:14:23.508 --> 00:14:26.428
when you grow old,
you live with memories.

00:14:26.594 --> 00:14:31.516
And here in Sussex
is now a memory for me.

00:14:36.604 --> 00:14:38.314
At this memorable place,

00:14:38.564 --> 00:14:41.900
Mirella has agreed to share
her life story with me.

00:14:49.325 --> 00:14:51.953
When we start with the interview now,

00:14:52.495 --> 00:14:54.455
which part of...

00:14:55.540 --> 00:14:59.086
When you talk about your life now,
we're now recording your life story,

00:14:59.252 --> 00:15:03.715
my question is, which part of your life
you want to begin with?

00:15:04.382 --> 00:15:06.092
With your childhood or...

00:15:06.259 --> 00:15:09.345
Well, you know, I...

00:15:11.139 --> 00:15:16.144
I must say that I can really point out

00:15:16.311 --> 00:15:18.981
that the creation of "Vanishing Africa",

00:15:19.147 --> 00:15:21.858
my book, my first book,

00:15:22.693 --> 00:15:26.113
had completely changed
the direction of my life.

00:15:26.280 --> 00:15:31.202
And from when it was published in 1971,

00:15:31.869 --> 00:15:36.416
I have been living
in the shadow of that book.

00:15:38.918 --> 00:15:43.548
There was no book like that
before I did mine.

00:15:44.298 --> 00:15:46.550
The day before it came out,

00:15:46.801 --> 00:15:49.887
I was a completely unknown person.

00:15:51.348 --> 00:15:56.270
The next day, I was the author
of "Vanishing Africa".

00:15:56.728 --> 00:15:59.481
And I was propelled...

00:15:59.731 --> 00:16:06.155
I was propelled into the front line
by that book overnight.

00:16:08.615 --> 00:16:11.326
I photographed the Maasai...

00:16:11.910 --> 00:16:13.537
the Samburu...

00:16:14.245 --> 00:16:16.039
the Rendille...

00:16:16.831 --> 00:16:18.458
the Turkana...

00:16:19.876 --> 00:16:21.586
and the Swahili.

00:16:22.379 --> 00:16:28.718
People I photographed
had a specific beauty that...

00:16:30.679 --> 00:16:34.433
that was completely different
from any other I had ever seen.

00:16:36.435 --> 00:16:39.688
There was something about these people

00:16:39.855 --> 00:16:42.858
which was very, very...

00:16:44.026 --> 00:16:46.320
pure and...

00:16:48.030 --> 00:16:49.574
untouched.

00:16:51.576 --> 00:16:53.495
They were real.

00:16:54.579 --> 00:17:02.129
Their natural beauty
which was created by their lifestyle.

00:17:04.214 --> 00:17:09.136
And that is what fascinated me
when I was photographing them.

00:17:12.014 --> 00:17:14.684
Why did you start this book?

00:17:16.185 --> 00:17:19.563
Well, a friend told me,

00:17:19.731 --> 00:17:23.109
"You know, there's an American
photographer here,

00:17:23.360 --> 00:17:25.654
his name is Peter Beard,

00:17:25.821 --> 00:17:29.908
who's doing a book
about the end of the game.

00:17:30.158 --> 00:17:35.330
Would you consider to do a book
about the end of the tribes?"

00:17:37.958 --> 00:17:40.669
And I thought
that was quite a good idea.

00:17:42.505 --> 00:17:45.925
I didn't know very much of
where I was going.

00:17:46.467 --> 00:17:50.763
I didn't really know
the way these tribes were living.

00:17:53.432 --> 00:17:57.228
And I did a little bit of research
before I left

00:17:57.394 --> 00:18:00.730
to decide which tribes
I wanted to work with

00:18:02.399 --> 00:18:04.443
and where they were.

00:18:05.986 --> 00:18:09.281
That's about all I knew about
what I was doing.

00:18:13.619 --> 00:18:16.539
I was driven by my instinct.

00:18:17.915 --> 00:18:20.585
And when I went there
and I lived among them,

00:18:20.751 --> 00:18:22.878
that's when I learnt...

00:18:23.462 --> 00:18:27.884
the way the people who are not involved

00:18:28.050 --> 00:18:31.136
with the colonial powers were living

00:18:31.386 --> 00:18:34.556
and they had lived for centuries.

00:19:43.042 --> 00:19:47.464
This was the first copy
of my book when it came out.

00:19:47.630 --> 00:19:49.799
I gave it to my parents.

00:19:49.965 --> 00:19:54.512
And I wrote, "To whom I owe everything".

00:19:57.264 --> 00:20:01.268
My mother suggested
that I become a photographer.

00:20:02.477 --> 00:20:05.355
And she bought me the Rolleiflex.

00:20:05.855 --> 00:20:07.607
That was my first camera.

00:20:07.774 --> 00:20:10.610
My mother bought it for me
when I went to Paris

00:20:11.320 --> 00:20:16.617
and I joined the studio
of a fashion photographer,

00:20:16.784 --> 00:20:18.536
Harry Meerson.

00:20:21.914 --> 00:20:25.460
That kick-started
my whole photographic career.

00:20:26.877 --> 00:20:32.966
I worked 18 hours a day
and loved every minute of it.

00:20:34.217 --> 00:20:38.263
Once I had the experience
of the studio in Paris,

00:20:38.429 --> 00:20:43.017
having learnt the rudiments
of photography,

00:20:43.601 --> 00:20:48.023
I then became more and more interested

00:20:48.564 --> 00:20:52.151
in the potential
that the camera can give me.

00:20:54.695 --> 00:20:57.573
And one day I saw an advertisement

00:20:57.740 --> 00:21:01.536
for the New York School of Photography.

00:21:03.246 --> 00:21:05.123
And I took it to my parents

00:21:05.290 --> 00:21:06.792
and I told them

00:21:06.959 --> 00:21:08.711
I wanted to go to New York

00:21:08.878 --> 00:21:10.672
to become a photographer.

00:21:13.758 --> 00:21:17.929
And after a bit of persuasion,
they okayed it.

00:21:19.722 --> 00:21:23.268
I went to visit Erwin Blumenfeld.

00:21:24.310 --> 00:21:28.564
He was a famous photographer,
fashion photographer, in the 50s.

00:21:30.274 --> 00:21:36.322
And I said, "I've just enrolled
in the New York School of Photography."

00:21:37.657 --> 00:21:39.659
And he looked at me and said,

00:21:40.118 --> 00:21:43.079
"You have just made your first mistake."

00:21:43.789 --> 00:21:45.874
And I didn't know what he meant.

00:21:46.041 --> 00:21:48.085
He said, "Listen to me.

00:21:49.545 --> 00:21:54.550
Photographers are born,
only assistants go to school.

00:21:55.551 --> 00:22:01.682
Rather, you should take your camera
and take photographs."

00:22:04.643 --> 00:22:07.188
When I returned to Africa,

00:22:08.647 --> 00:22:11.525
after my stay in New York,

00:22:12.651 --> 00:22:16.822
I started taking
my first tribal photographs.

00:22:23.495 --> 00:22:26.331
So whatever I've done since then,

00:22:27.249 --> 00:22:29.293
I owe it to my mother.

00:22:32.254 --> 00:22:37.634
I also inherited her artistic genes.

00:22:41.388 --> 00:22:43.432
I have her eye.

00:22:48.938 --> 00:22:50.523
And...

00:22:50.690 --> 00:22:53.610
she recognised,
and everybody recognised,

00:22:53.776 --> 00:22:57.363
the similarity
between my images and hers.

00:23:00.741 --> 00:23:04.870
Hearing so much about your mother,
how did you experience your father?

00:23:05.371 --> 00:23:08.374
Well, my father,

00:23:09.500 --> 00:23:14.630
he was a very charismatic Napoletano.

00:23:15.714 --> 00:23:22.096
With all the charm and the good looks
of the Southern Italians.

00:23:23.722 --> 00:23:25.974
So what was his profession?

00:23:27.643 --> 00:23:30.313
He was a pilot in the First World War.

00:23:31.397 --> 00:23:34.650
He was a fighter pilot, but after that,

00:23:34.901 --> 00:23:39.989
he didn't have
any sort of specific career.

00:23:41.533 --> 00:23:43.702
Because he married the money.

00:23:46.580 --> 00:23:50.626
He went to Paris, where he had a friend.

00:23:53.254 --> 00:23:58.592
And one day, that friend was invited
to the studio of my mother.

00:24:00.970 --> 00:24:04.516
She was a student of Rodin,

00:24:05.182 --> 00:24:10.229
who was of course
a human being sculptor.

00:24:11.814 --> 00:24:17.152
And that night,
he wrote a letter to his mother.

00:24:18.696 --> 00:24:20.823
And in it he said,

00:24:21.532 --> 00:24:23.409
"I think I have met the woman

00:24:23.576 --> 00:24:27.330
that is going to change
the direction of my life."

00:24:35.505 --> 00:24:39.676
I read in one of your books that your
parents moved from Paris to Africa.

00:24:40.552 --> 00:24:45.515
Yeah. In 1927-28,
they went to Africa together.

00:24:46.475 --> 00:24:51.898
While they were living under canvas
for one year, walking with 60 porters,

00:24:52.064 --> 00:24:55.735
carrying their food
and their equipment and everything.

00:25:06.746 --> 00:25:10.292
They walked for one year
through the Congo.

00:25:14.546 --> 00:25:15.964
They hunted.

00:25:16.673 --> 00:25:19.134
I hate to say it, but in those days,

00:25:19.301 --> 00:25:22.304
that was what everybody did
when they came to Africa.

00:25:23.472 --> 00:25:28.060
And my mother
shot her first and last elephant.

00:25:28.227 --> 00:25:31.355
Why she did it, nobody knows.

00:25:31.522 --> 00:25:32.981
But she did it.

00:25:33.607 --> 00:25:38.529
And she was so upset
by what she had done,

00:25:39.113 --> 00:25:45.327
that she never, ever wanted to kill
another animal in her life.

00:25:48.623 --> 00:25:52.169
They had really touched
the core of Africa.

00:25:55.213 --> 00:25:58.299
The biggest life experience
they'd ever had.

00:25:59.300 --> 00:26:04.097
And I'll be very interested
to know whether you can sense that

00:26:04.263 --> 00:26:08.100
in the film footage
that you're going to look at.

00:26:13.064 --> 00:26:15.108
And during that year,

00:26:15.274 --> 00:26:18.736
my mother fell pregnant with my brother.

00:26:19.946 --> 00:26:25.243
And when at seven months
they were still walking in the jungle,

00:26:26.077 --> 00:26:30.999
my father said, "What are we going to do
about the birth of this child?

00:26:31.249 --> 00:26:34.252
Do you want to give birth in a tent?

00:26:34.419 --> 00:26:39.174
Or shall we find a place
which has a hospital?"

00:26:39.341 --> 00:26:41.802
So they pulled out the map

00:26:41.969 --> 00:26:45.598
and they decided to go to Kenya,

00:26:45.765 --> 00:26:50.019
which was a British colony then.

00:26:50.812 --> 00:26:56.192
So when my mother was in hospital,
my father hired an aeroplane.

00:26:57.569 --> 00:27:02.992
He had problems with the engine
and he had to make a crash landing.

00:27:04.868 --> 00:27:07.496
When he got out of the aeroplane,

00:27:08.163 --> 00:27:11.917
having landed successfully
without crashing,

00:27:12.417 --> 00:27:15.503
he was surrounded by a lot of

00:27:16.713 --> 00:27:20.091
black people who lived on that land.

00:27:21.050 --> 00:27:24.011
He asked them, "Where am I?"

00:27:24.596 --> 00:27:30.019
And they explained to him
that this was a farm of a white man.

00:27:30.769 --> 00:27:33.314
He was a South African farmer.

00:27:34.064 --> 00:27:38.486
And he told my father,

00:27:39.069 --> 00:27:44.700
"I am going back to South Africa
and my farm is for sale."

00:27:44.867 --> 00:27:48.078
And he said,
"Are you interested in buying my land?"

00:27:48.329 --> 00:27:50.123
He said, "How much do you want?"

00:27:50.539 --> 00:27:55.002
The guy told him how much he wanted
and my father said,

00:27:55.794 --> 00:27:59.631
"I'll give you half,
but I'll give you it in cash."

00:28:01.049 --> 00:28:03.176
They shook on hands.

00:28:03.343 --> 00:28:07.305
My father took off
and went back to Nairobi

00:28:07.472 --> 00:28:09.474
and went back to the hospital

00:28:09.641 --> 00:28:12.727
where my mother
was lying with her newborn child.

00:28:13.353 --> 00:28:17.900
And he said,
"I have bought you a piece of Africa."

00:28:20.861 --> 00:28:23.739
There was a lake called Lake Naivasha

00:28:24.239 --> 00:28:26.408
and it was on the edge of this lake

00:28:28.201 --> 00:28:30.954
that they built their African home.

00:28:34.249 --> 00:28:36.418
And that was the beginning

00:28:37.044 --> 00:28:39.880
of our African heritage.

00:28:42.592 --> 00:28:44.886
And we all grew up there.

00:28:47.264 --> 00:28:49.516
What is your earliest memory?

00:28:52.602 --> 00:28:55.855
-Of Africa?
-In general, of your whole life?

00:28:59.317 --> 00:29:02.028
-My earliest memory?
-Yes.

00:29:12.998 --> 00:29:15.918
I think it was when the war broke out.

00:29:17.169 --> 00:29:22.049
And as my father
was Italian in a British country,

00:29:23.008 --> 00:29:26.094
he was taken away from us
for five years.

00:29:26.595 --> 00:29:28.555
I was nine years old.

00:29:29.223 --> 00:29:33.853
I remember when the police came
and they said,

00:29:34.020 --> 00:29:37.941
"I'm sorry, Mario,
we have come to take you away."

00:29:38.525 --> 00:29:40.694
Almost apologetically.

00:29:41.736 --> 00:29:43.988
"You must have heard the news."

00:30:01.089 --> 00:30:02.674
And they were listening to the news,

00:30:02.841 --> 00:30:05.218
they were listening
to Mussolini's speech

00:30:05.386 --> 00:30:08.556
in that he was declaring war on Britain.

00:30:21.861 --> 00:30:25.072
And he said, "I'm ready."
That's the way he answered him.

00:30:27.033 --> 00:30:32.163
But I do remember
how traumatised my mother was

00:30:33.164 --> 00:30:35.166
when the war broke out.

00:30:37.460 --> 00:30:43.174
She overnight was left with
three children and no husband.

00:30:45.844 --> 00:30:49.640
My mother came from
a very privileged background

00:30:49.806 --> 00:30:53.477
and never had to think about
earning a living

00:30:53.643 --> 00:30:56.688
or having or not having money.

00:30:59.149 --> 00:31:04.572
But she was a very extraordinary
person, very, very strong.

00:31:05.030 --> 00:31:08.617
And it was only during the war years

00:31:08.784 --> 00:31:12.788
that she realised
that she had to pull up her socks

00:31:12.955 --> 00:31:16.208
and find a way to keep her family going.

00:31:18.711 --> 00:31:24.342
And she turned the playground
that we had into a working farm.

00:31:27.637 --> 00:31:33.143
My parents, they had a correspondence
which we've got here.

00:31:34.144 --> 00:31:36.980
But many, many, many times,

00:31:37.230 --> 00:31:41.442
the letters came back
completely censored.

00:31:41.609 --> 00:31:44.362
And sometimes we just received...

00:31:45.321 --> 00:31:48.783
a piece of paper with only the edge

00:31:49.408 --> 00:31:53.620
and "Dear..." whoever it was
to "Love, Papa".

00:31:55.790 --> 00:31:59.168
But when my father
came back from the camp,

00:31:59.336 --> 00:32:01.255
he found a working farm.

00:32:01.421 --> 00:32:03.256
And then he took over.

00:32:06.259 --> 00:32:09.095
It was difficult for us to understand
anything about

00:32:09.262 --> 00:32:12.432
what was going on in our family.

00:32:14.350 --> 00:32:16.727
He didn't talk a lot about... to us.

00:32:16.895 --> 00:32:20.190
He did to other people
and to my mother, of course.

00:32:21.232 --> 00:32:26.195
But just that there was the odd story
every now and then he would tell us.

00:32:26.780 --> 00:32:28.574
But not much.

00:32:30.534 --> 00:32:33.162
He was a broken man when he came back.

00:32:34.121 --> 00:32:37.667
And very, very nervous
and very, very tense.

00:32:38.167 --> 00:32:41.378
It took him many years to get over that.

00:32:45.257 --> 00:32:48.510
But we loved him to death.

00:32:51.972 --> 00:32:55.768
But of course
I do remember my childhood.

00:32:57.686 --> 00:33:01.106
When I was running absolutely free

00:33:03.192 --> 00:33:06.863
and without any boundaries.

00:33:09.574 --> 00:33:13.286
We played with animals instead of toys.

00:33:13.453 --> 00:33:17.207
And that is something
that very few people can say.

00:33:18.791 --> 00:33:23.296
We lived in a kind of surreal world

00:33:24.088 --> 00:33:27.800
of privilege and wilderness.

00:33:29.511 --> 00:33:32.264
It was only when I came to Europe

00:33:32.431 --> 00:33:34.850
that people began...

00:33:35.809 --> 00:33:39.563
to consider my life as magical.

00:33:42.107 --> 00:33:45.611
People think that it is a dream,

00:33:45.778 --> 00:33:50.115
but for me it wasn't a dream at all,
it was just my life.

00:33:54.454 --> 00:33:57.290
Everything has got two sides to it.

00:33:59.292 --> 00:34:02.921
There was a real divide between

00:34:04.047 --> 00:34:07.383
the Whites and the Africans...

00:34:08.885 --> 00:34:11.555
when I was a child.

00:34:12.431 --> 00:34:17.895
And one of the things that I remember
was when we would come back home

00:34:18.062 --> 00:34:22.692
from somewhere we had been to,
in Nairobi or something like that...

00:34:24.944 --> 00:34:28.740
we would go through
the front door of our home

00:34:29.866 --> 00:34:33.745
and the Africans would go...
on the back.

00:34:35.622 --> 00:34:38.583
We lived in our home.

00:34:39.751 --> 00:34:44.381
They had their quarters
down 100 yards away.

00:34:45.840 --> 00:34:49.427
We were completely segregated.

00:34:50.219 --> 00:34:54.431
We treated them well,
but we didn't mix with them.

00:34:56.183 --> 00:34:59.436
They were just our servants.

00:34:59.603 --> 00:35:02.148
Not ever our friends.

00:35:03.899 --> 00:35:07.277
That word didn't exist,
an African friend.

00:35:16.119 --> 00:35:19.748
When I first met Mirella,
I did not expect that I would

00:35:19.915 --> 00:35:23.836
learn so much more outside
of her life as a photographer.

00:35:41.937 --> 00:35:43.606
What's so special about this tea?

00:35:43.772 --> 00:35:48.277
I just like the taste. I tasted it.

00:35:49.152 --> 00:35:51.487
When was it? Which year?

00:35:52.072 --> 00:35:55.868
About... 40 years ago.

00:35:56.910 --> 00:35:59.663
When I was doing "Vanishing Africa".

00:36:00.831 --> 00:36:02.666
-Have you had sugar in there?
-Yes.

00:36:02.833 --> 00:36:05.168
-Is it good?
-So tasty.

00:36:07.087 --> 00:36:09.590
-So delicious.
-So delicious?

00:36:09.757 --> 00:36:13.844
Mirella's hospitality has made me feel
like I'm part of the family.

00:36:14.845 --> 00:36:17.848
Now I'm curious
about her own family life.

00:36:19.308 --> 00:36:23.687
How did you meet your husband, Lorenzo?

00:36:25.106 --> 00:36:28.693
He rang me and I was just going to bed.

00:36:29.861 --> 00:36:32.280
And he invited me
to come and have a drink.

00:36:33.323 --> 00:36:38.703
And my mother heard my conversation
on the phone.

00:36:39.705 --> 00:36:44.793
And she came and she said, "Who is this
calling you at this time of day?"

00:36:46.462 --> 00:36:51.509
And I said, "I don't know. It's some
unknown Italian photographer who..."

00:36:51.675 --> 00:36:54.761
No, unknown Italian cinematographer.

00:36:55.471 --> 00:37:00.059
"He wants to meet me
because he's looking to hire me,

00:37:01.310 --> 00:37:07.483
because he has seen my fantastic
photographs at the Equator Club bar."

00:37:11.237 --> 00:37:14.866
And she said, "Are you crazy?
I'm not going to let you go out

00:37:15.033 --> 00:37:17.327
with a man you don't know."

00:37:19.162 --> 00:37:22.290
So I said, "I'm so sorry I can't come

00:37:22.457 --> 00:37:25.668
because my mother says
I should meet you tomorrow."

00:37:28.588 --> 00:37:31.299
I was already 25 years old.

00:37:33.051 --> 00:37:35.345
So was it love from the beginning?

00:37:35.512 --> 00:37:37.931
At first it was completely on his side.

00:37:38.098 --> 00:37:41.644
I wasn't that interested.
I wasn't looking to get married.

00:37:41.810 --> 00:37:44.771
I was only interested
to take photographs.

00:37:46.273 --> 00:37:48.943
But then I joined the crew
and I went with them

00:37:49.109 --> 00:37:51.654
as they were scouting for locations.

00:37:52.613 --> 00:37:55.949
And we got stuck in the mud.

00:37:56.617 --> 00:38:01.747
So I suggested
that we go and look for help.

00:38:03.166 --> 00:38:10.215
No one was allowed to move
in the park on foot at night.

00:38:11.216 --> 00:38:15.679
Because all the dangerous game
is on the road.

00:38:17.222 --> 00:38:21.518
And we went
for about five hours, we walked.

00:38:22.394 --> 00:38:25.689
Lorenzo turned to me and he said,

00:38:25.856 --> 00:38:30.403
"I need a woman like you in my life.
Will you marry me?"

00:38:32.655 --> 00:38:36.909
And I was quite surprised and I said,
"Yeah, this wouldn't be a bad idea."

00:38:39.745 --> 00:38:41.830
I married him for love.

00:38:43.707 --> 00:38:46.168
I fell in love with him. That was it.

00:38:48.837 --> 00:38:52.257
I had never met anybody
like him in my life.

00:38:54.134 --> 00:38:59.973
His idea for life
was he wanted to be a film director.

00:39:01.474 --> 00:39:03.893
And so he went to live in Rome.

00:39:04.060 --> 00:39:06.813
It was the centre of Italian film world.

00:39:07.606 --> 00:39:09.525
So he took me to his home.

00:39:09.691 --> 00:39:11.526
He carried me through the door.

00:39:14.113 --> 00:39:19.744
It was not an apartment.
It was just an attic under the roof.

00:39:20.537 --> 00:39:24.541
And we decided that we could

00:39:24.708 --> 00:39:29.171
turn it into a really nice place to live

00:39:29.421 --> 00:39:33.008
because it was
in such a fantastic location,

00:39:33.258 --> 00:39:35.302
which was the Fontana di Trevi.

00:39:36.386 --> 00:39:41.433
The terrace of the apartment
looks down on the fountain.

00:39:44.061 --> 00:39:49.274
So when Fellini came to shoot his film

00:39:49.900 --> 00:39:51.735
"Dolce Vita,"

00:39:52.445 --> 00:39:56.491
I was next to him and took photographs.

00:39:57.783 --> 00:40:05.624
It was a crazy time in my life
and I was totally unprepared for it.

00:40:07.335 --> 00:40:12.340
And all this sophisticated life of Rome

00:40:13.049 --> 00:40:15.384
was very alien to me.

00:40:17.554 --> 00:40:21.766
And I was invited to go to Los Angeles,

00:40:21.933 --> 00:40:26.145
to go to Hollywood by Columbia Pictures.

00:40:27.856 --> 00:40:30.108
And when I was there,

00:40:30.275 --> 00:40:36.073
the producer tried
to make me enter the movie world.

00:40:38.200 --> 00:40:44.456
And he told me,
"Mirella, if you do what I tell you

00:40:44.624 --> 00:40:51.298
and you stay in L.A.,
you can become a big movie star.

00:40:53.550 --> 00:40:56.178
But there's one condition,

00:40:56.928 --> 00:40:59.889
you are going to have
to leave your husband

00:41:00.056 --> 00:41:03.476
and you cannot bring him to Hollywood."

00:41:05.687 --> 00:41:10.734
And I had no intention
of giving him up to become a movie star.

00:41:10.900 --> 00:41:14.821
I never wanted to be a movie star.
I was a photographer.

00:41:16.489 --> 00:41:19.993
And next day I bought a ticket
and I flew back to Rome.

00:41:22.328 --> 00:41:25.456
Did you make plans
for the future together?

00:41:27.541 --> 00:41:30.752
We didn't make plans.
We just lived them.

00:41:32.838 --> 00:41:35.090
Wherever he went,

00:41:35.257 --> 00:41:39.053
he wanted me to be there with him.

00:41:40.137 --> 00:41:45.100
And that took me to many
very interesting places in the world.

00:41:47.520 --> 00:41:49.564
So you married adventure?

00:41:50.190 --> 00:41:53.694
Exactly. It was the only time
our relationship worked,

00:41:53.861 --> 00:41:56.781
was when we were on an adventure.

00:41:59.241 --> 00:42:02.745
Was it your plan to start a family,
getting children and a house?

00:42:02.912 --> 00:42:04.831
Absolutely not.

00:42:06.290 --> 00:42:09.543
I didn't have the need to be a mother.

00:42:12.213 --> 00:42:17.301
But then when I got pregnant
with Marina, Lorenzo said,

00:42:17.468 --> 00:42:21.430
"This time you keep it",
because his grandfather had just died.

00:42:22.598 --> 00:42:24.975
And his name was Marino.

00:42:25.559 --> 00:42:28.229
And that's why she's called Marina.

00:42:30.939 --> 00:42:33.316
She was born in 1960.

00:42:34.693 --> 00:42:37.779
And Amina was born in 1963.

00:42:39.948 --> 00:42:41.700
-I see.
-What year were you born?

00:42:41.867 --> 00:42:43.577
1996.

00:42:43.744 --> 00:42:46.539
1996? Wow...

00:42:50.959 --> 00:42:55.046
Did you ever separate your private life
from your professional life?

00:42:59.092 --> 00:43:04.264
I don't actually know what you mean
about separating my professional life.

00:43:04.430 --> 00:43:07.766
My life was my profession.

00:43:10.353 --> 00:43:13.481
I wasn't really a stay-at-home mother.

00:43:13.648 --> 00:43:17.610
I was just a photographer artist.

00:43:18.445 --> 00:43:22.366
My camera was always near me somewhere.

00:43:24.368 --> 00:43:28.747
And my children and my family

00:43:30.041 --> 00:43:34.463
were fantastic models for my camera.

00:44:32.271 --> 00:44:35.733
The photography recorded the family

00:44:37.526 --> 00:44:39.861
and it became one.

00:44:43.324 --> 00:44:47.203
How did you manage having children
and working as a photographer?

00:44:47.411 --> 00:44:49.788
I didn't manage well,

00:44:51.207 --> 00:44:53.209
but I did make a point

00:44:53.376 --> 00:44:56.462
of being there for them
as much as I could.

00:44:58.924 --> 00:45:03.929
I'm a very responsible person,
I was a very responsible mother,

00:45:05.348 --> 00:45:07.976
but it did not come naturally to me.

00:45:12.480 --> 00:45:15.733
And how was the upbringing
of your children?

00:45:16.317 --> 00:45:20.279
The upbringing of my children
was very much like my own.

00:45:20.446 --> 00:45:22.656
They grew up on the farm

00:45:24.242 --> 00:45:26.828
and with all the freedom that I had.

00:45:35.295 --> 00:45:36.922
When your children were growing up,

00:45:37.089 --> 00:45:39.174
how was the relationship
with the Africans?

00:45:41.511 --> 00:45:45.807
I wrote a memoir of our family

00:45:47.225 --> 00:45:50.186
and I called it the "African Saga".

00:45:56.526 --> 00:46:00.197
And I always, when I look at it, realise

00:46:00.363 --> 00:46:06.286
that quite unknowingly I had illustrated

00:46:07.287 --> 00:46:10.791
my new attitude towards the Africans.

00:46:33.772 --> 00:46:35.774
The light is so great.

00:46:37.818 --> 00:46:39.362
It's sunny.

00:46:40.446 --> 00:46:42.615
That's why I'm sitting out here.

00:46:48.579 --> 00:46:51.749
I wonder what led Mirella,
with her colonial upbringing,

00:46:51.915 --> 00:46:54.209
to see Africa in a new light.

00:46:58.714 --> 00:47:04.845
And what was the moment
when you changed your mind?

00:47:06.722 --> 00:47:08.766
What was the moment like?

00:47:10.851 --> 00:47:15.230
When I was on shooting
my "Vanishing Africa",

00:47:16.565 --> 00:47:22.279
I had a very interesting experience
that was the turning point in my life.

00:47:23.864 --> 00:47:28.201
I remember once sitting on the beach
with my children

00:47:30.329 --> 00:47:35.334
and I saw two black guys far away.

00:47:36.168 --> 00:47:37.712
Fishermen.

00:47:38.545 --> 00:47:41.173
But they were coming in my direction.

00:47:42.799 --> 00:47:47.679
And then when they saw us,
they stopped and they greeted us.

00:47:48.597 --> 00:47:53.185
And they invited me to come
and visit them in their house.

00:47:54.895 --> 00:48:00.150
And I was greeted by the family
of this beautiful boy.

00:48:02.986 --> 00:48:07.073
And they started talking to me
and they gave me some chai,

00:48:07.533 --> 00:48:09.285
the African tea.

00:48:09.452 --> 00:48:15.000
And I sat for a long time with them,
talking about all sorts of things.

00:48:15.250 --> 00:48:17.419
And they were so interested

00:48:17.585 --> 00:48:19.670
and they were so welcoming

00:48:19.837 --> 00:48:24.717
and so natural
in their attitude towards me.

00:48:26.802 --> 00:48:32.850
That I realised that it was the absolute
opposite to the way we are with them.

00:48:37.605 --> 00:48:44.112
I hired the young fisherman
to come with me when I was travelling.

00:48:46.239 --> 00:48:48.366
And he became my assistant.

00:48:50.702 --> 00:48:52.412
What was his name?

00:48:54.456 --> 00:48:55.749
Shaibu.

00:48:56.416 --> 00:49:01.546
He was a wonderful character
and he was always happy

00:49:01.713 --> 00:49:04.341
and he was always smiling.

00:49:06.843 --> 00:49:10.639
This is him here standing next to me.

00:49:13.475 --> 00:49:15.519
And these are all his brothers.

00:49:17.687 --> 00:49:22.525
And I wanted to go to an island
and they said, "We'll take you there."

00:49:23.360 --> 00:49:26.696
And I went off by myself
with them on the boat.

00:49:28.740 --> 00:49:33.036
Nothing seemed in any way
uncomfortable or dangerous

00:49:33.203 --> 00:49:35.288
that I did with the Africans.

00:49:40.543 --> 00:49:44.214
Yeah, I spoke the language
and I knew everything about everything.

00:49:44.380 --> 00:49:48.259
And they loved that because
they didn't often meet people,

00:49:48.802 --> 00:49:52.889
white people, with whom
they could relate the way I did.

00:49:56.310 --> 00:49:58.729
But you know, I was one of them.

00:50:00.189 --> 00:50:04.777
The only thing that was different
was the colour of my skin.

00:50:05.402 --> 00:50:08.447
But inside I was an African.

00:50:11.366 --> 00:50:16.288
I wonder if your parents
changed their mind in their life.

00:50:17.915 --> 00:50:20.167
Never. They never did.

00:50:20.334 --> 00:50:24.088
And they never knew
about the story I've just told you.

00:50:25.214 --> 00:50:27.466
I never shared it with them.

00:50:29.551 --> 00:50:33.055
As far as they were concerned,
he was just my assistant.

00:50:35.807 --> 00:50:37.892
But he became my friend

00:50:39.227 --> 00:50:41.604
and they would never have accepted it.

00:50:43.481 --> 00:50:47.152
He was not allowed into our house,

00:50:48.319 --> 00:50:51.906
which was a very difficult situation
for all of us.

00:50:54.743 --> 00:50:56.578
How did he react?

00:50:59.415 --> 00:51:01.209
He didn't react.

00:51:02.877 --> 00:51:04.837
He just accepted.

00:51:06.297 --> 00:51:08.216
Because he knew...

00:51:08.382 --> 00:51:12.428
it was permissible in his world,
but not in mine.

00:51:15.514 --> 00:51:18.517
And it stayed like that until they died.

00:51:23.397 --> 00:51:26.525
They were both buried in the garden

00:51:28.069 --> 00:51:29.988
on the farm,

00:51:32.156 --> 00:51:35.576
under one of the trees
that he had planted.

00:51:39.288 --> 00:51:40.664
And after that,

00:51:40.832 --> 00:51:47.130
our relationship with the Africans
totally changed 180 degrees.

00:51:51.385 --> 00:51:55.389
I wonder why Lorenzo
did not join this journey.

00:51:55.932 --> 00:51:58.435
He was not at all interested.

00:51:58.977 --> 00:52:00.937
That wasn't his thing.

00:52:02.731 --> 00:52:08.028
I was very much more part of his life
than he was of mine.

00:52:10.656 --> 00:52:12.283
I had...

00:52:13.242 --> 00:52:17.246
I had a bit drifted away
from him already.

00:52:18.164 --> 00:52:22.711
And I was in Kenya
and he remained in Rome.

00:52:24.588 --> 00:52:29.010
He sold our apartment without asking me.

00:52:30.094 --> 00:52:33.681
And he invested the money
in the stock exchange.

00:52:35.558 --> 00:52:40.105
He sent me a message and said,

00:52:40.730 --> 00:52:46.361
"We are rich now, Mirella.
I'm coming to Kenya with my yacht.

00:52:46.611 --> 00:52:51.908
Find a house. Want to spend Christmas
with you and the children."

00:52:55.620 --> 00:53:01.293
There was only one house available
and that one was for sale.

00:53:05.880 --> 00:53:09.967
And so I told him,
"I can't find a house to rent,

00:53:10.427 --> 00:53:15.390
but there is the most beautiful place
in the whole of East Africa,

00:53:15.557 --> 00:53:18.352
right in front of the Indian Ocean."

00:53:18.768 --> 00:53:23.064
And he sent me a message saying,
"Buy it."

00:53:27.152 --> 00:53:29.404
How was your trip, Lory?

00:53:30.030 --> 00:53:32.783
Fine, very well. Thank you.

00:53:35.327 --> 00:53:37.329
What time did you leave?

00:53:37.496 --> 00:53:39.540
Around six in the morning.

00:53:41.542 --> 00:53:43.336
How was the sea?

00:53:43.836 --> 00:53:45.338
Dull.

00:53:52.887 --> 00:53:55.890
And there we remained for 30 years.

00:53:58.518 --> 00:54:01.229
And it was during this time
that you also became involved

00:54:01.396 --> 00:54:03.899
in Lorenzo's passion for sailing.

00:54:05.150 --> 00:54:08.320
I read the book he wrote
about the Arabian expedition

00:54:08.486 --> 00:54:11.239
he called
"The Voyage of the Mir-El-Lah".

00:54:12.615 --> 00:54:15.701
And he dedicated his book to you.

00:54:15.868 --> 00:54:17.370
Yes.

00:54:18.621 --> 00:54:21.249
He wrote, "This book is for Mirella.

00:54:21.416 --> 00:54:24.211
If she doesn't know why, I do."

00:54:24.711 --> 00:54:26.713
I love that sentence.

00:54:27.797 --> 00:54:30.508
That was the good side about him,
you see.

00:54:30.675 --> 00:54:35.888
He wasn't an ideal man to have married
or to be a father,

00:54:36.055 --> 00:54:39.225
but he had a very magical side to him.

00:54:41.102 --> 00:54:43.813
I wonder sometimes

00:54:43.980 --> 00:54:50.404
if he would have been able
to finish what he wanted to do

00:54:50.570 --> 00:54:52.864
if I hadn't been there to help him.

00:54:54.032 --> 00:54:57.494
So in that we were a very good team,

00:54:57.661 --> 00:55:00.664
but unfortunately it wasn't a life team.

00:55:00.831 --> 00:55:03.208
It was just an adventure team.

00:55:08.130 --> 00:55:12.134
How did you experience
the Arabia expedition?

00:55:13.135 --> 00:55:16.972
The boat was built in a place
called Koram Shahr.

00:55:18.223 --> 00:55:20.392
So once the dhow was ready,

00:55:22.019 --> 00:55:25.648
we sailed down the Arabian Gulf...

00:55:27.274 --> 00:55:28.984
to Dubai...

00:55:30.736 --> 00:55:33.447
and then out into the Indian Ocean...

00:55:36.074 --> 00:55:39.035
all the way down the coast of Arabia.

00:55:40.787 --> 00:55:46.042
And from the Red Sea,
we went along the Somali coast.

00:55:48.253 --> 00:55:52.841
And from the Somali coast,
we sailed to Kenya and landed in Lamu.

00:55:53.801 --> 00:55:56.095
I don't know
if you've ever heard of Lamu,

00:55:56.262 --> 00:56:01.559
but Lamu is the Arab port of Kenya.

00:56:04.312 --> 00:56:07.774
It lasted for six months
and it was wonderful.

00:56:07.941 --> 00:56:13.196
It was absolutely fascinating
and wonderful for my photography.

00:57:15.885 --> 00:57:18.513
It was a world that I did not know

00:57:19.556 --> 00:57:25.354
and to experience it
on an Arabian sailing boat

00:57:26.021 --> 00:57:29.567
was the ultimate luxury.

00:57:37.157 --> 00:57:39.702
-This is the view out of your window.
-Yeah.

00:57:39.868 --> 00:57:41.620
-Have you got the window in?
-Yes.

00:57:41.787 --> 00:57:47.293
And then you can go more in close-up
to the trees which are moving.

00:57:49.545 --> 00:57:52.798
That wall is so nice and old...

00:57:53.382 --> 00:57:54.800
misty.

00:58:07.229 --> 00:58:11.358
I still have in the back of my mind
how I came across Mirella.

00:58:13.986 --> 00:58:17.322
Now, knowing her,
the connection surprises me.

00:58:21.076 --> 00:58:24.329
A brief mention in the autobiography
of Leni Riefenstahl,

00:58:24.496 --> 00:58:26.498
a controversial German artist,

00:58:26.665 --> 00:58:29.960
mostly known
for producing Nazi propaganda.

00:58:32.463 --> 00:58:36.885
In what began as curiosity
about the history of documentary film,

00:58:37.051 --> 00:58:39.261
I discovered Mirella.

00:58:42.932 --> 00:58:47.311
I met her because we had
the same publisher in London.

00:58:49.939 --> 00:58:55.152
And when she found out
that we had the same publisher,

00:58:55.319 --> 00:58:58.739
she invited me to a dinner

00:58:59.949 --> 00:59:03.327
and showed us some of her photographs.

00:59:06.288 --> 00:59:10.084
Technically, hers are much better
than mine, technically.

00:59:11.585 --> 00:59:13.504
But emotionally...

00:59:14.838 --> 00:59:17.633
mine are completely different from hers.

00:59:19.551 --> 00:59:22.387
She's a documentary photographer.

00:59:23.138 --> 00:59:24.973
And I'm...

00:59:25.808 --> 00:59:30.813
I'm much more an in-depth
human photographer.

00:59:33.107 --> 00:59:38.530
And we loved the same thing and
we were attracted by the same reasons

00:59:39.405 --> 00:59:41.782
when we were working in Africa.

00:59:45.411 --> 00:59:52.710
I invited her to come to tea with me
the next day and she came.

00:59:53.419 --> 00:59:55.463
And she sat on the floor

00:59:56.214 --> 01:00:00.551
and didn't stop talking
for four or five hours.

01:00:01.427 --> 01:00:06.057
And she told me her whole life
without stopping.

01:00:06.891 --> 01:00:12.188
From when she was born
to when she became a ballerina,

01:00:12.939 --> 01:00:16.901
a movie star,
a cinematographer, everything,

01:00:17.068 --> 01:00:20.780
it was the most fascinating
conversation of my life.

01:00:22.782 --> 01:00:24.867
And then she went off again.

01:00:29.997 --> 01:00:33.709
She's one of the most formidable women
I've ever met.

01:00:40.049 --> 01:00:42.719
So how was your relationship with her?

01:00:44.929 --> 01:00:48.641
Well, nothing. She went off
and she had her own huge life,

01:00:48.808 --> 01:00:51.311
which was completely different
from mine.

01:00:51.478 --> 01:00:53.730
And I lost track of her.

01:00:55.690 --> 01:00:58.109
She was often criticised for her work.

01:00:58.276 --> 01:01:00.695
Is this something you also dealt with?

01:01:00.862 --> 01:01:02.447
Absolutely, yes.

01:01:02.697 --> 01:01:06.326
I've met with a lot of comments about...

01:01:08.203 --> 01:01:11.039
the kind of photographs that I took.

01:01:25.721 --> 01:01:28.432
I had a friend who was a cameraman.

01:01:29.892 --> 01:01:34.980
And he went and sold the idea
to the French television

01:01:35.898 --> 01:01:38.275
to make a film about me.

01:01:42.905 --> 01:01:45.408
But I was quite heavily criticised.

01:01:47.993 --> 01:01:50.287
One of the criticisms was,

01:01:51.246 --> 01:01:53.999
who the hell is this rich white girl,

01:01:54.666 --> 01:01:57.252
photographing these Africans?

01:02:01.798 --> 01:02:04.217
What are they saying about your work?

01:02:06.177 --> 01:02:09.430
They don't recognise what I did.

01:02:10.306 --> 01:02:13.852
They did not see my book
through my eyes.

01:02:15.186 --> 01:02:20.149
And they feel that I used
these beautiful people

01:02:21.150 --> 01:02:24.111
as subjects for my work,

01:02:26.072 --> 01:02:28.575
not as human beings.

01:02:30.034 --> 01:02:35.623
That they were represented
only for their beauty,

01:02:35.873 --> 01:02:39.835
which is in a way true,
but in a very negative way.

01:02:41.128 --> 01:02:44.464
I looked at them
with the eyes of an artist.

01:02:48.427 --> 01:02:52.306
My work is not dictated by my head,

01:02:53.224 --> 01:02:55.769
but it's dictated by my heart.

01:02:57.020 --> 01:03:03.276
Without trying,
I automatically manage to capture

01:03:03.444 --> 01:03:07.365
the emotional side
of what I'm photographing.

01:03:07.615 --> 01:03:12.453
And that's why all my people
in my book are so beautiful.

01:03:17.250 --> 01:03:21.755
Looking through Mirella's archive,
there's a closeness and intimacy

01:03:21.922 --> 01:03:25.884
that makes me feel she had
a genuine connection with people.

01:03:27.010 --> 01:03:32.516
However, I have come across a collection
of her work that stands out to me.

01:03:39.105 --> 01:03:42.734
How was your experience
photographing the war in Eritrea?

01:03:44.027 --> 01:03:46.112
The war in Eritrea?

01:03:49.575 --> 01:03:51.910
Yeah, let me say that was the first time

01:03:52.078 --> 01:03:57.000
that I actually ever
came in contact with the horror of war.

01:04:00.169 --> 01:04:04.298
And I had never seen what I saw there.

01:04:08.469 --> 01:04:11.389
The famine, the pain, the killing.

01:04:12.598 --> 01:04:16.435
That was the first time
that I actually touched it.

01:04:19.772 --> 01:04:24.026
But I didn't focus on the horror of it.

01:04:26.737 --> 01:04:31.992
I'm not somebody who is interested
in the ugly side of life.

01:04:33.827 --> 01:04:37.748
And the war is definitely
an ugly side of life.

01:04:40.292 --> 01:04:45.130
So how would you describe
the photographs you took there?

01:04:48.633 --> 01:04:51.761
Well, dramatic, let's put it, dramatic.

01:04:51.928 --> 01:04:54.598
The word "beautiful" doesn't...

01:04:55.474 --> 01:04:57.268
is not part of war.

01:05:00.771 --> 01:05:03.274
Okay, we're just gonna take
a quick break.

01:05:09.697 --> 01:05:13.868
How the hell is he going to fit
all this in, I really don't know.

01:05:22.627 --> 01:05:25.046
I bet you all this gets cut.

01:05:28.383 --> 01:05:32.387
It'll fall on the cutting room floor,
as they always said.

01:05:51.198 --> 01:05:56.912
For me, it was probably the biggest
safari that I have ever done.

01:05:57.997 --> 01:06:01.000
We left Dar es Salaam

01:06:01.250 --> 01:06:05.379
on the Tanzanian coast
of the Indian Ocean.

01:06:06.630 --> 01:06:09.716
And we went up the Rufiji River.

01:06:13.220 --> 01:06:17.683
And only on land
when we couldn't continue.

01:06:20.686 --> 01:06:22.980
Into Lake Tanganyika.

01:06:23.689 --> 01:06:28.277
And then we went down the Congo River.

01:06:29.528 --> 01:06:32.489
And we entered the Atlantic Ocean.

01:06:39.205 --> 01:06:42.834
I think there were eleven or
twelve people who came with us.

01:06:44.335 --> 01:06:49.007
It was just me and two other people
who did the whole trip.

01:06:49.173 --> 01:06:53.595
We had three cameramen
at different parts of the journey.

01:06:53.761 --> 01:06:59.099
And we made the film, we did a 13-part
television series of our journey.

01:07:02.478 --> 01:07:04.897
And where was your family?

01:07:07.483 --> 01:07:09.527
Marina was in America.

01:07:10.194 --> 01:07:14.741
But Amina came
for quite a big piece of the journey.

01:07:19.078 --> 01:07:25.918
It was extraordinary. It was unlike
anything that I had experienced.

01:07:26.168 --> 01:07:31.966
Because it was beautiful to travel
on the boat along the river.

01:07:36.178 --> 01:07:41.266
About 5 o'clock in the afternoon,
when it started, the end of day,

01:07:41.516 --> 01:07:43.893
we would look for another place,

01:07:44.061 --> 01:07:47.022
spend the night there,
make a fire, make some food,

01:07:47.189 --> 01:07:51.276
eat, go to sleep in the tents
and travel during the day.

01:07:51.443 --> 01:07:54.947
That's the way we lived for 18 months.

01:07:58.408 --> 01:08:00.911
Did you ever keep a diary
of your adventures?

01:08:01.078 --> 01:08:04.456
No. I had one in my head.

01:08:05.916 --> 01:08:11.296
When I came back from crossing Africa,
the African Rainbow Expedition,

01:08:11.797 --> 01:08:17.553
and I sold the idea to a publisher,
I had to write the story.

01:08:18.804 --> 01:08:24.101
And then every day at 2 o'clock
I would stop whatever I was doing.

01:08:24.268 --> 01:08:29.023
I would sit on my bed,
I would look out of the window,

01:08:29.190 --> 01:08:32.944
and I would relive the whole adventure.

01:09:37.301 --> 01:09:39.386
So I didn't need a diary.

01:09:41.764 --> 01:09:45.059
As I was reliving it, I wrote it.

01:09:46.852 --> 01:09:49.313
It just came out of my head.

01:09:51.732 --> 01:09:56.237
Was there any standout experience
on the expedition?

01:09:57.280 --> 01:10:02.202
We made a special detour
in order to see the mountain gorillas.

01:10:02.368 --> 01:10:07.581
And it was an extraordinary experience,
but it was very, very tough.

01:10:08.166 --> 01:10:11.169
It was very tough to go

01:10:11.336 --> 01:10:15.423
to where they were
because we had to walk into the jungle.

01:10:17.425 --> 01:10:21.387
But I had never seen a gorilla before,

01:10:22.180 --> 01:10:25.600
and I had never been
that close to them as we went.

01:10:27.978 --> 01:10:29.563
And it was...

01:10:29.730 --> 01:10:36.820
My whole attitude towards animals
changed during my life in Africa.

01:10:36.987 --> 01:10:39.907
And I think my meeting with the gorillas

01:10:40.073 --> 01:10:46.412
was the sort of culmination
of my evolution.

01:10:51.877 --> 01:10:57.550
And in my day, when we saw an animal,
it was to be shot.

01:11:00.969 --> 01:11:09.436
And my sister and her family
have reverted the playground to Africa.

01:11:12.689 --> 01:11:16.693
That whole attitude
of killing game has changed.

01:11:18.027 --> 01:11:20.780
Now instead of killing them,
they're encouraging them to come.

01:11:20.947 --> 01:11:22.991
And they're coming, big time.

01:11:23.157 --> 01:11:29.831
We have giraffes, we have zebras
grazing right in front of the house.

01:11:29.997 --> 01:11:31.916
But I haven't seen it,

01:11:32.082 --> 01:11:36.545
and that's what I would like to see
before I leave this planet.

01:11:37.921 --> 01:11:41.257
And do you think
we would still go back together?

01:11:41.425 --> 01:11:44.386
I doubt that will happen, I'm not sure.

01:11:45.346 --> 01:11:49.100
I find it quite stressful to move.

01:11:50.726 --> 01:11:54.355
I'm getting sort of
settled into old age,

01:11:54.522 --> 01:11:59.569
settled into
not having to pull up my roots again.

01:12:02.822 --> 01:12:05.617
So when was your last adventure?

01:12:06.326 --> 01:12:08.286
In 1990.

01:12:09.830 --> 01:12:14.042
I spent six months alone
in the Amazon jungle.

01:12:15.919 --> 01:12:19.130
I worked with three tribes,
the Yanomami...

01:12:20.549 --> 01:12:22.468
the Kampa...

01:12:23.927 --> 01:12:26.888
and the Marúbo...

01:12:27.347 --> 01:12:31.894
without knowing how to speak to them
because I didn't have a language.

01:12:34.437 --> 01:12:36.940
They were very gentle people.

01:12:37.482 --> 01:12:39.109
They were living

01:12:39.359 --> 01:12:44.489
in an environment
that I had never experienced.

01:12:47.284 --> 01:12:50.454
They were like people
that belonged to that...

01:12:51.872 --> 01:12:53.248
forest.

01:12:54.542 --> 01:12:58.046
The people
were part of the whole scenario.

01:12:59.630 --> 01:13:03.801
They were very gracious with me.

01:13:03.967 --> 01:13:07.888
They didn't mind if I put up
my tent among their houses.

01:13:12.976 --> 01:13:18.231
And I just wandered around
and I got the most beautiful pictures.

01:14:30.263 --> 01:14:34.434
And I managed to do
a 70-minute film for the BBC

01:14:34.600 --> 01:14:36.769
about my experience

01:14:37.353 --> 01:14:40.689
and a book which I called
"Vanishing Amazon".

01:14:42.942 --> 01:14:47.905
Having to take stills and use
the video camera doubled my workload.

01:14:48.823 --> 01:14:51.951
But it was only work that kept me going.

01:14:52.201 --> 01:14:55.204
I'm finding it so difficult
to do everything.

01:15:02.712 --> 01:15:05.465
I think what I have to do now is...

01:15:10.095 --> 01:15:12.305
I need a break.

01:15:14.141 --> 01:15:17.144
It was so tough
I decided I couldn't go on.

01:15:17.603 --> 01:15:19.897
It was too much for me.
I was already quite old.

01:15:20.064 --> 01:15:24.486
I was 60 when I went into the jungle.

01:15:25.945 --> 01:15:31.659
So I stopped my adventurous life
with that journey.

01:15:42.920 --> 01:15:48.050
I started doing still photography,
still life.

01:15:49.594 --> 01:15:55.725
And I did a huge collection
of flower portraits.

01:15:55.892 --> 01:16:00.564
I didn't call them flower pictures.
They were portraits of flowers.

01:16:02.899 --> 01:16:06.611
I cannot even describe

01:16:08.613 --> 01:16:12.325
my attraction and my love of flowers.

01:16:20.000 --> 01:16:23.170
I have the impression
that Mirella's love for flowers

01:16:23.420 --> 01:16:26.131
bloomed at a difficult time in her life.

01:16:37.351 --> 01:16:39.228
Come here...

01:16:39.395 --> 01:16:41.439
All right, that's about as good
as it's gonna get.

01:16:41.605 --> 01:16:44.650
Cause I just don't feel like
doing any more.

01:16:44.858 --> 01:16:47.486
Oh, but where's the earring?

01:16:47.653 --> 01:16:50.030
Amina, where are your earrings?

01:16:50.864 --> 01:16:56.161
I've always been fascinated
by that in-between phase.

01:16:57.203 --> 01:16:59.998
I think it's a very fascinating time.

01:17:00.414 --> 01:17:04.919
And the same thing happens
when people are very old,

01:17:05.086 --> 01:17:08.172
when they are no longer

01:17:10.341 --> 01:17:14.220
bound by all the roles.

01:17:16.305 --> 01:17:18.432
Whenever you approach any transition,

01:17:18.599 --> 01:17:21.560
like with me,
I'm entering into a place...

01:17:22.311 --> 01:17:25.898
of very interesting freedom and...

01:17:26.899 --> 01:17:30.736
like a butterfly just stepping out.

01:17:34.365 --> 01:17:36.575
How do you remember your daughter?

01:17:38.119 --> 01:17:39.621
Marina?

01:17:41.581 --> 01:17:44.167
She was very intelligent.

01:17:45.127 --> 01:17:47.546
She was very opinionated.

01:17:48.964 --> 01:17:54.595
And she was
a difficult person for me to live with.

01:17:56.889 --> 01:17:59.559
The family nucleus was not a good one.

01:17:59.725 --> 01:18:01.810
She didn't like it.

01:18:01.977 --> 01:18:04.312
And so she sort of at about 19,

01:18:04.480 --> 01:18:07.733
she ran away from home
and went to San Francisco.

01:18:10.904 --> 01:18:13.490
And then one day the phone call came

01:18:14.032 --> 01:18:16.827
and she says, "Mommy, I have cancer."

01:18:19.996 --> 01:18:24.333
And I told her, "I think it's time
that you come home."

01:18:25.544 --> 01:18:27.463
And she said, "Never.

01:18:28.130 --> 01:18:30.215
I am not coming home.

01:18:31.175 --> 01:18:34.095
I'll fight it myself in America."

01:18:36.973 --> 01:18:40.309
When she was dying, we were there...

01:18:42.103 --> 01:18:43.562
with her.

01:18:45.148 --> 01:18:47.734
And the amount of friends

01:18:48.401 --> 01:18:51.154
that came to say goodbye to her

01:18:52.655 --> 01:18:55.074
was really quite extraordinary.

01:18:58.744 --> 01:19:01.079
In her Buddhist religion,

01:19:02.540 --> 01:19:05.251
things happen when the time is right.

01:19:08.713 --> 01:19:12.008
And her end was when it was.

01:19:18.056 --> 01:19:22.853
She said, "Don't worry about me, Mom.
I'm just moving on."

01:19:25.396 --> 01:19:30.651
Those sort of sentences she left
with me, and I think about them a lot.

01:19:37.491 --> 01:19:41.328
I made a little cemetery for her ashes,

01:19:43.164 --> 01:19:46.668
where we lived for 30 years in Kilifi.

01:19:49.212 --> 01:19:55.051
But she did tell Amina that she wanted
her ashes to feed a tree.

01:20:00.974 --> 01:20:03.184
After learning about Marina,

01:20:03.435 --> 01:20:07.564
Mirella and Amina are showing me
the tree where she is buried.

01:20:09.942 --> 01:20:12.820
So, 20 years ago, we planted this tree.

01:20:13.863 --> 01:20:16.282
-And that's her Buddha.
-And that's her Buddha.

01:20:16.449 --> 01:20:18.784
-So this tree...
-And now it's got a nice patina.

01:20:18.952 --> 01:20:20.662
-Yeah.
-Let me see it.

01:20:20.829 --> 01:20:22.373
Oh, yeah.

01:20:22.956 --> 01:20:24.541
Yeah, the Buddha.

01:20:24.791 --> 01:20:28.211
-Such a beautiful Buddha. Let me see.
-So my mum...

01:20:28.378 --> 01:20:34.509
I gave her this Buddha
that I found in the street somewhere.

01:20:35.510 --> 01:20:37.429
I can't believe how big it is.

01:20:37.595 --> 01:20:39.805
How tall would you say it was now?

01:20:40.515 --> 01:20:42.809
-I don't know.
-20 feet?

01:20:42.976 --> 01:20:44.435
No, more.

01:20:44.603 --> 01:20:47.231
-I'm five foot.
-50 feet?

01:20:48.149 --> 01:20:52.361
5, 10, 15... 50.
50 feet, I would say.

01:20:53.071 --> 01:20:56.199
But it is extraordinary,
it's really put into context

01:20:56.366 --> 01:20:57.951
the age of a tree.

01:20:58.118 --> 01:20:59.912
The passing of time.

01:21:02.540 --> 01:21:05.710
As I reach the end of my time
with Mirella in Sussex,

01:21:05.876 --> 01:21:10.548
I wonder how her experiences
have shaped her perspective on life.

01:21:21.100 --> 01:21:23.019
Well, I have to tell you that...

01:21:24.687 --> 01:21:29.275
I continue on a daily basis...

01:21:31.152 --> 01:21:34.363
to wonder, why is the world...

01:21:35.782 --> 01:21:39.578
and the people
and the animals and the plants

01:21:39.744 --> 01:21:43.164
on this planet the way it is.

01:21:45.167 --> 01:21:48.796
And when a child is born
and an old person dies

01:21:48.963 --> 01:21:51.048
and a tree grows...

01:21:52.258 --> 01:21:56.137
that does interest me and fascinates me.

01:21:56.304 --> 01:22:01.559
And I continue to be
in total wonder about it.

01:22:04.771 --> 01:22:08.942
And how do you remember
the passing of your husband?

01:22:10.109 --> 01:22:13.905
He died in 2013,

01:22:15.281 --> 01:22:16.908
it was midnight.

01:22:17.075 --> 01:22:21.997
It was Friday,
the 13th of December 2013.

01:22:22.163 --> 01:22:24.958
He was 83 years old.

01:22:28.294 --> 01:22:31.672
His time had come and he went.

01:22:33.758 --> 01:22:37.762
And I looked after him
for the last months of his life.

01:22:37.929 --> 01:22:39.723
I was his carer.

01:22:41.516 --> 01:22:43.351
But I wasn't with him when he passed.

01:22:43.518 --> 01:22:47.064
And that's something
that I really, really regret.

01:22:47.855 --> 01:22:50.400
Because ever since I met him, he said,

01:22:50.566 --> 01:22:55.154
"All I ask from you
is that you are there when I die."

01:22:57.323 --> 01:23:01.202
I had come to the end of my exhaustion

01:23:01.369 --> 01:23:05.832
and I had to go home
and eat some food and sleep.

01:23:05.999 --> 01:23:08.084
And that night he left.

01:23:11.422 --> 01:23:17.053
And I just would have liked to
have been there just in case

01:23:17.220 --> 01:23:20.390
he had something to say to me
before he went.

01:23:25.270 --> 01:23:28.148
And how would you like to be remembered?

01:23:29.983 --> 01:23:35.363
I would like to be remembered because of
the work that I had done with my camera

01:23:37.073 --> 01:23:40.702
during my passage on this planet.

01:23:43.121 --> 01:23:46.207
A lot of people are going to learn...

01:23:47.751 --> 01:23:49.628
and understand...

01:23:51.547 --> 01:23:56.094
and wonder
about the people that I photographed.

01:23:58.346 --> 01:24:04.185
Because I really captured something
that is no longer there.

01:24:07.022 --> 01:24:09.858
And I think
that it is part of the history.

01:24:12.069 --> 01:24:14.989
And I consider myself very fortunate

01:24:15.615 --> 01:24:17.909
that I was in a place

01:24:18.076 --> 01:24:20.203
to be able to record it.

01:24:23.289 --> 01:24:26.876
There's a kind of melancholy
that seeps in

01:24:28.002 --> 01:24:33.049
to think that once I was part
of those people and that life.

01:24:35.843 --> 01:24:39.555
I was part of that once.
I'm no longer...

01:24:43.684 --> 01:24:45.228
Now...

01:24:46.103 --> 01:24:47.647
I'm...

01:24:48.856 --> 01:24:51.359
I'm more interested in the future.

01:24:54.111 --> 01:24:57.406
That only came lately.

01:24:58.157 --> 01:25:02.411
I never thought of life after my work.

01:25:03.996 --> 01:25:05.414
But...

01:25:05.915 --> 01:25:08.418
But now I begin to realise,

01:25:08.585 --> 01:25:12.256
especially seeing somebody like you
who's so young,

01:25:12.964 --> 01:25:19.804
that I have created something that
can interest the younger generation.

01:25:21.180 --> 01:25:23.349
It gives a lot of meaning to what I did

01:25:23.515 --> 01:25:26.685
because I didn't just go out there
and take photographs.

01:25:28.437 --> 01:25:30.356
I've left a legacy.

01:25:34.360 --> 01:25:36.195
Okay, thank you for the interview.

01:25:36.362 --> 01:25:37.780
Thank you.

01:25:38.531 --> 01:25:42.285
I hope I gave you
what you wanted to find out.

01:25:44.955 --> 01:25:47.958
-So I can go now?
-Yes.

01:25:51.169 --> 01:25:54.047
Oh, I wish I had my stick.

01:26:02.598 --> 01:26:04.183
Okay.

01:26:10.731 --> 01:26:13.025
-You go out first?
-No, please go.

01:26:15.068 --> 01:26:16.737
Thank you.

01:26:16.903 --> 01:26:18.405
Thank you.

01:26:35.046 --> 01:26:37.131
-It's a lovely day.
-Yeah.

01:26:44.764 --> 01:26:46.766
Give me your hand.

01:27:02.282 --> 01:27:06.203
Spending time with Mirella
has shown me how important it is in life

01:27:06.369 --> 01:27:08.914
to connect across generations.

01:27:15.128 --> 01:27:18.548
Now, Mirella has decided
to move her archive to London,

01:27:18.715 --> 01:27:22.677
where she and her family
will sort it for future generations.

01:28:53.061 --> 01:28:56.356
This is my life, all in a box.

01:29:08.243 --> 01:29:11.872
It actually hurts for me
to look at these pictures.

01:29:12.039 --> 01:29:15.125
-Here, I'll put it away...
-Pigozzi Collection.

01:29:15.292 --> 01:29:18.587
-Why does it hurt, Mirella?
-Because they're all places that you...

01:29:18.754 --> 01:29:22.425
Because they're all places
that I went to in my dream,

01:29:22.591 --> 01:29:26.845
and for some reason I never went,
and now it's too late.

01:29:27.013 --> 01:29:28.598
And...

01:29:28.765 --> 01:29:33.312
that is why I've got all these books,
because it was part of my dream.

01:29:34.521 --> 01:29:36.356
A traveller's dream.

01:29:36.523 --> 01:29:41.028
I was too caught up in my family life

01:29:41.195 --> 01:29:46.533
and trying
to make a living with what I could do.

01:29:46.701 --> 01:29:50.079
So I got stuck for 30 years in Kilifi,

01:29:50.247 --> 01:29:54.043
when I should have been doing that,
and that is very painful for me.

01:29:54.209 --> 01:29:56.169
-But you were travelling.
-Can I have that one?

01:29:56.336 --> 01:29:59.756
-You were travelling a bit, though.
-I know, but not where I wanted to go.

01:29:59.923 --> 01:30:01.382
Yeah, yeah.

01:30:02.384 --> 01:30:05.429
-So, shall we...
-That's part of my regrets.

01:30:05.595 --> 01:30:08.223
I think it...
I don't like to be reminded of it.

01:30:08.390 --> 01:30:10.809
So, shall we donate this to Oliver?

01:30:15.730 --> 01:30:18.316
I've got the Bonaventura book here.

01:30:21.027 --> 01:30:24.072
"For Oliver who will live my dream."

01:31:44.237 --> 01:31:46.239
You are the two
we have been waiting for.

01:31:46.406 --> 01:31:47.991
Okay, welcome.

01:32:00.253 --> 01:32:01.880
Okay, straight.

01:32:02.047 --> 01:32:03.799
-Okay.
-Thank you.

01:32:30.784 --> 01:32:33.495
Beginning of July 2023.

01:32:35.038 --> 01:32:36.998
Naivasha, Kenya.

01:32:39.167 --> 01:32:42.170
Sadly, Mirella is unable to travel

01:32:42.337 --> 01:32:45.215
and cannot visit the place
where she grew up.

01:32:47.550 --> 01:32:50.636
I have decided to go and film it for her

01:32:51.137 --> 01:32:53.682
so she can live it through my lens.

01:33:00.855 --> 01:33:03.816
-Hello.
-Hello, Mirella, Oliver is speaking. Hi.

01:33:05.067 --> 01:33:10.531
Oh, Oliver. I'm so glad you called.
Oliver, are you all right?

01:33:10.781 --> 01:33:14.827
Yes, I'm okay.
It's so sad that you're not here now.

01:33:15.869 --> 01:33:18.372
Yes, I know, I know, I know.

01:33:20.666 --> 01:33:22.585
The filming goes well.

01:33:24.420 --> 01:33:27.465
And there are so many animals
around here.

01:33:29.508 --> 01:33:31.552
Today I filmed giraffes.

01:33:33.137 --> 01:33:36.974
You know, walking near Olerai House,

01:33:37.809 --> 01:33:40.479
eating the flowers from the roof.

01:33:41.521 --> 01:33:42.897
Good.

01:33:43.065 --> 01:33:46.360
Don't waste your money on the telephone.
I'll talk to you later.

01:33:46.527 --> 01:33:49.863
Thank you very much for calling.
I'm thinking of you all the time.

01:33:50.031 --> 01:33:52.116
That's so sweet. Thank you.

01:33:52.366 --> 01:33:55.912
-Okay, bye-bye.
-Thank you. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

01:33:56.078 --> 01:33:57.329
Bye-bye.

01:36:01.789 --> 01:36:04.667
I'm hiking the volcano Mount Longonot,

01:36:04.834 --> 01:36:08.087
Mirella's favourite view
from her house in Naivasha.

01:36:15.303 --> 01:36:18.264
Mirella's story
has become part of my own.

01:36:21.810 --> 01:36:24.813
As we go through life,
we meet new people.

01:36:27.023 --> 01:36:31.319
The conversations and memories
we share make us who we are.

01:36:33.905 --> 01:36:37.367
I wonder what memories we will make,

01:36:37.534 --> 01:36:39.661
and who we will inspire.

01:37:04.436 --> 01:37:07.814
I wanted to show you
what I did with the...

01:37:09.274 --> 01:37:14.988
those yellow roses that you brought me
when you first came here.

01:37:18.158 --> 01:37:19.702
I love flowers.

01:37:20.285 --> 01:37:24.707
If I hadn't been a photographer,
I think I would have been a florist.

01:37:24.873 --> 01:37:26.417
-Really?
-Yes.

01:37:27.750 --> 01:37:33.214
So, I keep them and when I look at them,
I think about you.