In an unprecedented mission, Sorious Samura set out to understand the real stories of people living on the edge of starvation. He moved into a remote village in Ethiopia far away from the range of the UN and most NGO’s. Between August and September Sorious lived in a hut and survived on the same meagre diet as the rest of the villagers. As he arrived in the village Sorious got an unpleasant surprise. The villagers made it clear he was not welcome. ‘They think you are the Devil’ he is told. In the Ethiopian Orthodox tradition the devil indeed is usually depicted as a very black being, blacker than most villagers. It takes Sorious much persuasion to convince the villagers that he will not eat their babies and hasn’t come to rape their wives. Very soon Sorious settles into the routine of the village. He is amazed and exhausted by the hard work he must do to keep up with the villagers as they climb steep slopes to plough and till their fields every day. Despite the weather failing them on so many previous occasions the villagers always have hope that their next harvest will bring the food they so desperately need. Kirkos, Ethiopia There is food aid, but never enough. Sorious is living with a family where the meagre supplies supposed to last for two months have run out in two weeks. Now Mum and Dad, five children and Sorious must survive on a local weed called wild cabbage. A grown man would need to eat a room full of wild cabbage to satisfy a day’s nutritional requirement, but the plant, even though it makes the villagers sick, fills stomachs and at least gives the sense of food. Sorious has made friends with the deacons. Young boys who receive religious education but must beg for their school fees and for the food that they eat. Together they travel to other remote villages and eventually to the town of Lalibela to beg or to find work if they can. It is an awful journey, which brings us painfully close to the real lives of the poor. Away from the headline making famine, award-winning filmmaker Sorious Samura discovers that the daily reality for more than 40 million Africans is a diet ranging from nothing to a handful of weeds. In his unique style of filmmaking he questions how we can expect Africa to develop when so many Africans are engaged in a daily struggle to survive.