Shoutout Sundays - Raha Salehi

Hello and welcome to my blog series called ‘Shoutout Sundays’, where I highlight creatives and entruepenuers that inspire me. I have written two posts previously about my lovely sister Romarni Brytz and my amazing friend Sofia Fernandez (Miss Loud Queen). This week I would like to shoutout my dearest friend who is the reason I know that soulmates aren’t just limited to romance.

Her name is RAHA SALEHI.

I truly believe I have met all of my best friends in the most marvellous and out of pocket ways. I met Raha during our undergrad at Brighton University. It was nearing the end of our first year in May 2018, we were in the thick of deadline season so our whole cohort was spending the majority of our free time in the library (shoutout to Aldrich library - a staple location during our degree). Despite being on the same course and having a couple of mutual friends, Raha and I didn’t have any classes together so we had no idea who each other were. One day, I was walking through the library, and there was this absolute mad girl walking towards me singing “the phantom of the opera is there inside your mind”… as a theatre obsessed kid, as we crossed paths, I naturally had to join in. From the moment we harmonised with each other, we knew we would be besties - and the rest is history. We have since seen The Phantom of The Opera together in the West End too - a very full circle moment.

Raha is one of the most incredible people I met while I was living in Brighton. So full of life, creativity, and an abundance of zestful ideas; we became pretty inseparable, always working on various creative projects together - both as part of our academic studies and as part of passion projects. We constantly pushed each other to strive to be the best we could be. Without her, I quite literally wouldn’t have finished my degree (throwback to my last ever essay submission and break down in our third year in 2020 - Raha you know how much you helped your girl through that, so thank you).

As we graduated as the first ever ‘Class of Covid’ in 2020, we never got a proper graduation - we ended up graduating on zoom (which I am still bitter about LOL). One of my favourite memories from uni working with Raha was when we were hired by the School of Media in our 2nd year to record interviews at the graduation for the year above us. It was my first ever paid videography job, and obviously unbeknownst to us at the time, it was even more special as it was the only taste of a proper graduation we would get. We had a whale of a time as well, it made me realise how much I love interviewing people. We also got to meet the wonderful Kelly Wong doing that job, another one of my biggest inspirations and fabulous friends who will get her own shoutout Sunday dedicated to her at some point!

After we both got 1st class honours in Media Studies (#smasheditm8), Raha went on to do a masters degree in producing at Met Film School. As for myself, I finished my journey in education and entered the ‘real world’; but I am so grateful that I could live vicariously through Raha and get a bit of a university fix as she would get me involved in some of her projects she created for her masters - which are all INSANELY GOOD by the way. I got to go on my first ever film sets because of Raha which wasn’t only really cool but also amazing experience for the work I do now as a freelancer. These pics are us on our first ever film set for a film called ‘I Close My Eyes To See’.

For Raha’s final project, she made an incredible short film called Unlocked - which went on to win various awards, and will one day become the biggest and greatest anthology TV series that has ever hit Netflix (watch this space). I had the pleasure of taking some BTS on this shoot - I put together this behind the scenes video from the week - which is probably one of my favourite things I have ever captured and created. She pulled together the most incredible team of people to create Unlocked and they all had amazing things to say about Raha, which is a massive testament to the incredible person she is.

Since graduating with a 1st class masters degree (go on GIRL), Raha has worked on a variety of projects and built up her repertoire of work both in London and in Dubai (which is where she was born and raised and is currently based). She inspires me on a daily basis, she has so much passion for what she does and it is really motivating to have such a positive force of nature in my life. She also has such an artistic and creative eye which she carries into her everyday life, so I know whenever I see or speak to her I am going to be filled with creative energy. I love you so much Raha, I can’t wait to see all the wonderful things that you’re going to achieve! Check out her showreel and her website.

Thanks for reading, I hope this encourages you to show some appreciation to someone you love this Sunday!