Daniel is the elder brother of our friend Tony, who is currently living in Hull and working as a volunteer with a Catholic programme and in a refugee support centre. Tony’s sent back various presents for his family, and he also wants us to deliver a mobile phone to his mum, who lives in Magaburaka, beyond Makeni, in the Northern Province of Sierra Leone.

In Krio, going into the country is known as going ‘upline’.

It turns out to be an expensive trip. We buy rice and kerosene as gifts, fuel the car and set off, having got through £60 just like that. £60 is a very decent month’s wage in Sierra Leone.

It’s a big estate car with seating for 8, so with the girls in the back, Daniel and I in the middle seats, Jon and the driver in front, we eventually wind our way through the foul pollution and crowds of Kissy in the East Side, heading upline 130 miles toward Makeni on the finest road in Freetown, about as good as any country ‘A’ road in the UK.

The difference between Freetown and the countryside is striking. From tin roof shanty shacks piled against each other, to traditional, circular, palm-roofed mud huts and naked kids.

We stop by the roadside and a group of young locals prepare fresh coconuts for us. In various small towns we’re waved-through numerous police roadblocks (bribery points) as soon as the officials see the powerfully built Daniel in his uniform.

Across plains spotted with strangely-shaped termite nests, and dotted with swaying palms, the heat blazes and the hot wind rushes in through the open car windows, hotter than a hairdryer on full blast.

At a single lane bridge where cars are forced to slow down by a series of speed bumps, a small community of traders has sprung up, offering fresh bananas, mangoes, coconuts and pineapples. The children crowd around the windows shouting the prices, and posing for Jon’s camera shout “Snap mi! Snap mi, sah!” They want to hold our hands. I pull faces and quack and they laugh. Jon shows them their faces on the screen and they’re delighted.

On again across superheated plains, solitary figures till tiny plots of land, people walk by the roadside carrying things on their heads, more huts, bare-chested women sitting in doorways.

Someone told me there were elephants in parts of Sierra Leone, but that they were all eaten during the war.

Finally, we’re in Magaburaka, at the family home where Tony, Daniel and family were born. They’re a Temne family and don’t speak English or Krio. The house is in street of other similar houses, all built perhaps 50-60 years ago when Magaburaka was the regional capital (it’s since been superceded by Makeni).

The house has a colonial bungalow, plantation-style look from the outside – the town is a centre for sugar cane production so presumably the architecture fits the general picture. Inside it’s barn-like. Dusty, dark, no furniture. This is an agricultural existence, probably as basic as it’s been for years, but even more reduced since the war. There’s no power whatsoever, the kids wear scraps of clothing if any, there’s no TV.

But we get a wonderful reception. Uncle Daniel the educated army man brings the white guys to town, with their laptop and their video message from the much-loved Uncle Tony in Hull. It’s another moving moment, especially when you realise that our flying visit will be remembered by some of the kids here for the rest of their lives.

The older relatives watch the Tony message with Jon and then all record their own short filmed messages for him. We can’t understand a word they’re saying but they’re incredibly confident and fluent in front of the camera.

I chat to a local councillor, a lovely, intelligent bloke with a warm smile and a kind way with the kids. He formally welcomes us and chats about life in the community, how everyone is trying to care for each other, regardless of tribe or religion; how people live communally, and everyone takes responsibility for the children; how they have learned over the years not to rely on the government but to rely on each other.

I tell him about how Tescos and television and greed are destroying our traditions and communities back home. He says that we all have a lot to learn from each other.

While we wait for Daniel to finish his family conversations I play funny faces with the kids.

The journey back is fine for two hours during daylight. After dark it’s nearly two more hours of living nightmare on half a fading headlamp. I sit back in my seat and try not look out through the windscreen.

This is the amazing story of Studio D, a small recording studio in Freetown :: Sierra Leone.

All the boys from Studio D participated in the film making workshops we held at the British Council these last two weeks.

We’ve been working under extreme and difficult circumstances to get as much content live and online during the project as possible.

Irregular electricity, broadband that we now call thin band…. it’s been a problem from the start, but we’re happy to say that we managed to get three of the films uplaoded to Youtube.com and a very nice selection of images placed on Flickr.com.

Please click the link here to view Jons images from Sierra Leone

Friday evening Billy takes us to the National Stadium as guests of the SLFA to watch the game between a provincial team, Magburaka and a Freetown Team, Gulf Leopards, both of them in the SL Premier League.

Like the game we watched the previous week, it’s a scrappy affair, lots of passion but not much going on tactically; inexperienced, young players battling out a 0-0 draw. The stadium’s virtually empty apart from a few of us in the VIP area – Billy explains that the Sierra Leone game is so undeveloped that most Sierra Leoneans would prefer to pay the same price to watch the UK Premier League on TV in a bar, than support their own teams.

Nevertheless, there’s something wonderful about relaxing on the concrete stepped seating of the National Stadium, drinking cold beer, eating chilli-hot cow meat kebabs and fried plantain and chatting to Billy while Jon nods off.

Heading back to the hotel, Jon decides he wants to check out the poyo bar nearby (poyo a.k.a. manpalma a.k.a. palm wine). It’s a great set-up, a palm roofed lean-to with a small bamboo bar literally built around a tree and serving only poyo at 500L each for a litre-sized pickle jar-full. We sit on bush stick benches in the pitch black as shadowy figures lean against the bar chatting in Krio, dogs wander in and out and taxis rumble past on the red dust road. It could only be West Africa.

I’m not that keen on poyo to be honest. It’s got a very lively, slightly sour, still fermenting taste.

Jon’s loving it, yelling “poyo!” into the night and making friends with everyone. I sip at mine, fully intending to leave most of it, but when we go Billy and Jon encourage me to neck it, so I do.

It’s only afterwards that Billy tells me about poyo’s famous purgative effects. Back at the hotel I can barely speak at all. Not that I’m really feeling that drunk, I just can’t make my words come out properly.

Then my stomach decides that I need the toilet. Really quickly.

I can honestly say I have never had such a powerful series of bowel movements in my life. It would be wrong to try to describe it in any greater detail.

But I feel great the next day. Cleansed.

After visiting Conforti on Friday we meet with our new friend Mr Edward Billy Parkinson, a Sierra Leonean employee of the British Council and also a fully qualified FIFA referee.

Billy’s has arranged a meeting for Jon and I with the Secretary General of the Sierra Leone Football Association, one Mr Alimu Bah, so we head out to the Kingtom area of town to the SLFA headquarters and training academy.

Mr Bah is a young (by UK standards), intelligent, charismatic and clearly well-travelled man with lively eyes and a ready smile.

What we’re there to do is to try to help the Hull-based Freetown Society establish an annual Wilberforce Cup Youth Football Tournament, and also to see whether we can begin to build links between Hull City FC and the SLFA.

Mr Bah is full of enthusiasm. He speaks of the difficulties the SLFA have faced developing infrastructure in the wake of the war, and he seems genuinely keen to attract partners who might be able to help develop football in Sierra Leone and who might, in turn, be able to tap some of the country’s talent.

The National team, the Leone Stars, are visiting the UK in May, so we’re going to try to see if they can play in Hull. And we’re aiming for the youth football tournament to take place in October.

There’ll be much more work to do here, and it will be interesting to see how things develop.

Alimu generously gives us three of the rare shirts worn by the Leone Stars – one for me (though I think I’ll have to give it to my son), one for Jon and one for Adam Pearson, the chairman of Hull City.

Next stop Prince of Wales School, where our young friend Adams Philip Duwai is being elected as chairman of the school’s debating society.

Our new friend David Turner has arranged for us to visit a primary school in the East Side of Freetown, through the notorious Kissy to a place called Calaba Town, a semi-rural suburb.

It’s a long journey, maybe only six miles away, but it takes us nearly two hours of sweat in a taxi, limping through the traffic jams as street traders offer their wares. Again, we fend off the itinerant steering wheel salesmen, towel sellers, spanner hawkers, soft-drink boys and, of course, the beggars - the blind old people, the polio victims with legs bent almost double, walking around like crabs, and the kids with stumps instead of arms and legs.

In dusty, ramshackle Calaba we park under a shady tree and wonder nto the small but very tidy office where the Conforti School and community project are based.

Such a warm welcome. The whole thing was established by two brothers, Francis and Christian Mason, two very tall Krio guys with a wonderfully calm, capable and intelligent quality.

We pack into the office and the Mason brothers tell us their story…

In 1998, during the war, when Francis was spending some time in Calaba, he saw that there were so many children with nothing to do “wandering here and there like lost sheep”. So he decided to begin some informal tutoring, meeting kids daily beneath the tall tree where we’d parked, passing on some basic skills and learning.

Over time, more and more parents brought their kids to Francis’ lessons until a whole year group had formed. Christian got involved too and the brothers began to bring some structure into their work.

The next step was to get a classroom, so the brothers involved the community in building a classroom out of bush sticks and tarpaulin.

Year by year – and on the thinnest of shoestring budgets - they have added new year groups, employed more teachers and developed more buildings. And the whole community has galvanised around the school.

They opted out of government assisted status (it’s too unreliable and restrictive) and they’re still teaching in tarpaulin and bush-stick shelters, but this year Conforti Primary School’s exam results were the highest in the whole country.

As we walk the children, no longer lost sheep, literally flock to us, desperate to hold our hands and hug us, clinging to us. Christian and Francis smile proudly, there’s none of the shouting and barking you get elsewhere, there’s genuine kindness here.

The whole school gathers to sings for us while Jon films them.

And I’m choking back the tears again.

If you’re religious you might say that there’s something miraculous going on at Conforti. But I prefer to believe that this inspiring place shows how a very down-to-earth and practical belief in patience, humanity and kindness will be our salvation.

David, thanks for taking us to Conforti.

Things happen Africa time. The schedule slips a little. The logistics of movement in Freetown mean that you have to allow for a 6:30 start when the plan was to start at 6. Patience is a necessity here.

By the time the auditorium fills up there is a very respectable 150-strong audience, mainly of youth, but also a few older faces – which is good to see.

Linda Koroma opens the proceedings in the formal style that seems to accompany all meetings in Freetown (and probably all over Africa). I guess it’s a combination of tribal gathering and Colonial committee influences, all highly mannered.

The films go down well. Some of the stuff produced by young people from Hull is heavily accented and hard to understand, not helped by the poor sound quality in the auditorium, but it’s great to be showing work produced by pupils from Kingswood, Winifred Holtby, St Mary’s, Kelvin and Sutton Park primary in Hull to an audience in Freetown, Sierra Leone.

The young people working with Jon and Murray this time round have produced some fantastic work, varying from pieces which are enthusiastic and passionate to others which are genuinely informative, poignant, well-planned and beautifully shot.

For me personally, the film made by Barmmy Boy about a day in the life of his brother Samie stands out. Not only does it express the truth about the poverty that people experience here, but it also shows the brilliant resilience of Sierra Leonean children.
It’s already uploaded to the blog, check it out below.

After the filmshow Jon, Murray and I work the auditorium, collecting numbers and emails, hearing more of the earnest wishes of young people here to rise above the crap, save their souls and save their country.

We head back into the black ink of an unelectrified night, taxi back, sit on the hotel verandah blown by the warm breeze. Beer time again.

We head into the British Council on Thursday morning to check in and chat with the Director Tom Walsh. Friendly man, full of enthusiasm and support for the work we’ve been doing. He shows us a copy of an email detailing the fact that the Deputy Prime Minister of the UK, Hull’s own John Prescott MP, has praised the work of Cafesociety.org during a debate about the bicentennial of the abolition of the slave trade in the House of Commons this week.

“I want to mention Cafesociety.org, a project in Freetown. It has made a range of short films with young people in Sierra Leone that focus on a diverse range of topics, and include films about the role of football in post-civil-war Sierra Leone, the story of a former child soldier, and the life of the city’s market traders. The films will be shown by the British Council in Freetown and in Hull. Work is under way with one of our secondary schools, the Winifred Holtby school, and real links are being built between young people in Hull and Sierra Leone. It will mean young people from different parts of the world talking to each other, but having so much in common.”

Blimey. They’re talking about us in parliament.

Anyway, really good to talk to Tom and to know that we’ve got the support of the British Council.

We head back downstairs to the seminar room where we’re based and I sit down to prepare some kind of speech for the evening. We’re presenting a screening of the films that have been made by young people in Freetown and Hull and I’m going to be doing my front-of-house vox cafesoc thang.

Except I hit the wall. We’ve all done it at various times during the stay and now it’s my turn. Headache, blotches in front of the eyes, temperature controls gone haywire and a general fainting-style wooziness. I think it’s a combination of the extreme heat (it’s so amazingly hot), hard work, emotional exhaustion and late nights. Certainly nothing to do with the beer.

I go back to the hotel and lie down for three hours. There’s no aircon during the day so I lie there and sweat, drifting in and out of sleep, but it’s good to have some peace and rest.

3pm - cold shower, smart clothes, taxi back into town.

Another film produced by young people during our film making workshops at the British Council in Freetown.

This film is the first of the new films produced during our workshops at the British Council over the last two weeks. It was written, directed and filmed by Lansana Mansaray aka Barmmy Boy and tells the story of a day in the life of his younger brother Samie.

We believe this is one of the best films produced by a young person, participating in our film workshops. We salute you Barmmy Boy on your amazing achievements in such a short space of time. We are all looking forward to hosting Barmmy in the UK when hopefully he will be visiting us to take up a more intensive media training programme towards summer.