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An interview for Fourth Floor, November 2020
The following images are from a series I made during my time in Georgia, South Caucasus in 2019.
Gela Nadibaidze, founder of Georgian amputee football club
''Once upon a time, I did not even know disabled people existed, because in Georgia they are invisible.''
Veteran soldier Gela Nadibaidze founded an amputee football club after losing both legs in a car accident. Now the team is considered one of the best and most powerful football teams in Georgia. “On one hand it is sport," says Gela. "On the other, it is rehabilitation for us.''
The boots of a HALO Trust de-miner in the village of Dvani, Georgia. The team clear a hillside reported to have some grenade booby traps leftover from a former military position during the 2008 Russo-Georgian War.
A HALO Trust de-miner working on a hillside in the village of Dvani.
Davit Kotoashvili standing at the site where he discovered UXO (unexploded ordnance) in his apple orchard in the village of Brotsleti, Georgia. Contamination from cluster munitions and other ordnance still remains from the 5-day war between Georgia and Russia in August 2008, in which hundreds died and around 150,000 civilians were displaced.
Badri Khutsishvili, a local electrician in Shindisi village who saved the lives of 5 soldiers during the Russian assault near the old railway station. Nowadays, he looks back with disbelief at what he did, remembering the blood and limbs that were strewn across the fields. "I cannot forget the smell," he says as we sit on the same field, scorched in July heat.
Merab Mekarishvili, 57, from Dvani village looking towards his home that was bombed by Ossetian soldiers in 2008. The borderline is just a few meters away from where he stands. Crossing this invisible line, he risks being arrested by Russian authorities.
Lela makes cherry compote inside her home in Tserovani, Georgia. Located just outside of Tbilisi, Tserovani is a settlement for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from the breakaway region of South Ossetia. People began settling here following the Russo-Georgian War in August 2008, and it remains one of the largest IDP settlements in Georgia.
More from my HALO Trust project:
Why UK doctors are now prescribing surf therapy | Huck Magazine
Photos below from my time with The Wave Project, the UK’s first-ever surf therapy charity, in St Ives.
I wrote about it here.
Feature for The Calvert Journal, December 2018
I collaborated with friend/writer Elizabeth Sulis Kim on this piece for Positive News as part of a broader feature on people in careers typically associated with the opposite sex. (photo: Elizabeth)
