Easter Island,
The remotest spot of land inhabited of Earth, like a drop in the middle of the Pacific ocean. One of the word which often come along with the name of the island is mystery. Well, that's not really what I took with me there and that's certainly not the one word that I would have brought back from that trip. Of course I went there for a documentary about Belgian archeologists and their excavations. So the so called mysteries were outnumbered by the informations and facts that they've collected all along their 8 years of excavations (2 month each year). What would the word be for me ? Hard to say... During these 2 hard working weeks I've spent on the island, after sunset when we had our free time I did not watch any television nor dvd (although I had brought with me quite an impressive bunch of those). I just felt relaxed, at ease with myself. That would be the "Island effect" on me. I guess Rapa Nui (the other name of Easer Island - somewhere in the Pacific, there is a tiny Island called Rapa and the first explorers from Europe thought that Easer Island had the same shape therefor they called it "Big Rapa" or in Polynesian : "Rapa Nui") So, to come back to what I wrote before I rudely interrupted myself - I do apologise - So... I guess Rapa Nui is just not what you expect from it nor what you were told about (Mysteries, tribal wars, etc).
If some lucky days, you're lucky enough to be called "a lucky bastard" as some of my friend thought when I told them I was going to Rapa Nui for work, if some day you're lucky enough to visit the Island, don't do what most of the tourist do, don't get out of the airplane, stay 3 days, visit with a coach a few sites and then come back... No, I suggest you to take time. Stay there a while, talk to the inhabitants, rent a car and visit the Island and it's "out of tourist coaches road" places like unknown ahus, lost moais, manavais (collapsed lava tunnels, the local oasis), the hare pengas (originals houses) and read a lot before you get there so you can understand where you are and what you see... The difficult part is to find the good books. Not the one telling you these moais were build by ETs or by the inhabitants of a lost continent. Not the one telling you that they killed eachothers because of a tribal war brought either by madness or by a "ecological" crisis. Find the ones which are going to tell you about the diseases brought by the first Europeans, the slavery traders who took almost all the inhabitants of the island, the priesters who wanted to forbid the few remaining traditions that had not yet been distroyed by the Europeans and, last but not least, the British sheeps... No one eat any mutton on the island and when you'll know about the story of the island, you'll understand why. Find the books which tells you about the polynesian culture, about the slow evolution in the religion and and in the cult of the ancestors. Find the books which exlain you why the Rapa Nui people carrefully brought down all the statues around the island in a period of time of more than one century.
Rapa Nui is unique because its inhabitants had no other option than to stay there. The closest inhabited island is at about 2500km. Today, the situation is still the same : if someone just want to change is mind and get away from his 4000 fellow citizens, he has no other option than to take a plane for about 5 hours. That's the real "mystery" of the island : what's life like on a place like this
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My first music video for Mercury/Universal France
And my old first short movie
Hong Kong, in the night
Hong Kong, through the rain
Closer from me : la côte d'Opale (France)
And some special photos
The Hills of Taipei, Taiwan
AbsTract Photography 
