Roma Christmas, Manchester.

“I think it’s simply beautiful and just goes to show what can happen when people start to write their own story, both for real and on the page.” Jake Bowers, English Romani journalist and broadcaster

So, the MA is done, Christmas is over and we’re well into the new year. 2012…where did that come from? The past month or so has been the kind of hectic where you have little to show for it, plus some much needed rest, recuperation and family time. I’ve had lots of lovely feedback about Elvira and Me, my collaboration with Ramona, which has been viewed more than 1,100 times in less than two months. Many people seem to have read it cover to cover, which is amazing. I’ve been thinking hard about where to go with this work – the problem with creating a book is that mentally it feels like a project is finished, even as someone’s life and struggles go on and the desire to document them continues. Ramona has become a close friend though so I think our collaboration will continue – albeit at a more sedate pace – as long as she wants it to. Perhaps the project will be expanded to look at other Roma migrants, possibly using a different approach to the photography, or perhaps not. Time will tell and much will depend on funding. So now comes the time to start taking photos again and building up my freelance business, after two quite intense but highly worthwhile years of study. Am I more photographer or more writer? I’m still not really sure, but maybe that question doesn’t matter as much as I used to think.

Elvira and Me is now available as an eBook for iPads and iPhones, via Blurb.

Please check out my book layout.

A couple of short clips of Ramona talking can be seen below – she has such an amazing voice that it seems criminal not to share her words. These are not part of my MA submission….

and

I’m feeling a bit demob happy today – prematurely I’m sure, but I’m on the cusp of finishing my work for my MA and it couldn’t really happen too soon. I’ve loved the past few months and I’m sure I’m going to feel quite bereft once I hand in my work, but part of me is itching to stride out once again into the big wide world of full-time freelancing. I’m a bit sick of spending all my spare time looking at InDesign and am missing working as a proper journalist. I have all but finished my work – once I’ve received my final bit of Romanian translation I’ll be able to order my book, hand in my work, give a copy to Ramona and move forward with my life. Inevitably my mind is now turning to The Next Step – how to get this work in front of people with an interest in such things, and possible ways to take the project further, while keeping it relevant on a journalistic and photographic level and of course being able to still pay the rent. Exciting times ahead.

A selection of my photographs from Cedar Mount, a high school near my home, has been used to illustrate a study into the experiences of migrant Roma children in UK schools, written by Equality and published by the Roma Education Fund. Cedar Mount has about 100 Romanian Roma children – roughly one in eight pupils – as well as smaller numbers of Roma children from other Eastern European countries. I wrote about the school’s successes – and the challenges it faces – for Times Educational Supplement Magazine earlier this year. One of the things Manchester’s education authority has started doing – with great foresight in my opinion – is employing classroom assistants from the Romanian Roma community, almost all young adults who speak English but have not themselves benefitted from a formal education. There are several reasons for this – it shows the community that they are valued in this city; it raises aspirations by proving to Roma children that they can have the same ambitions and expectations as the rest of us in the UK, and it builds the confidence of this group of adults, who will hopefully go on to become links between different sections of the population. Ramona, who I have been focusing on for my major project, and who appears in the image above, is one of these people and the only woman. The report is available at Equality’s website.