Nepal March 2010. Finally my crew and I were in Nepal after almost 3 years of thinking and preparations. We wanted to follow, photograph and film an extraordinary humanitarian expedition.
In fact, as extraordinary it was for us, for Dr. Sanduk Ruit and Dr. Geoff Tabin this was one of many they regularly do. Their purpose is to eradicate preventable blindness from the face of the planet. This is what they have dedicated their whole life to: operate hundreds / thousands of cataract-blind people, living in rural and difficult-to-access areas and implanting in each single eye a new lens, that will tale them out of darkness and transform their live for ever. This transformation does not only affect the single individual, it affects the whole family, thus the whole community. Nepal’s economy is based 80% on agriculture. Blind people are just a burden and cannot sustaing themselves like in Europe or USA. Most of the location where farmers live are very far away from the big towns. In those places there are no hospitals, no health care systems and no eye care services. That’s why these two doctors pack an entire hospital and transport if by foot along a 7 days trekking path to reach the place where more than 150 eyes will be operated by them with a success rate of 100% and with western standards. Imagine: each operation cost less than 20 USD and is carried out by the skilled hands of these two surgeons in less than 5 minutes. It’s like a race for the light.

Although we were well trained and prepared for this job, we really pushed ourselves to the limit. Without the support of Lisa (assistant director), Rosalie (sound engineer) and Luca (1st cameraman) this project would not have been possible. 12 Hours trekking a day and disastrous intestine infections made my job very hard. Filming documentaries is already demanding… imagine in these conditions. Anyway back in Germany now with my Editor it’s funny to see how much materials we have shot. I’m so much looking forward to see this work done. We also have hired an excellent flute player, one of the most famous in Nepal, who will develop the soundtrack. I’ll be posting some images for those who would like to have a little insight behind the scenes, along with little stories. In this post, you can already see what the porters had to carry, for so many days trekking, and the face of Dr. Ruit, full of pride and satisfaction for his work, after an old lady, blind since 7 years, sees her daughter again after successful surgery.