You’ve probably heard a variation of this very cheesy story: There’s a beach with tens of thousands of fish washed up onshore and they’re dying. An annual migration of sorts.
A boy is on the beach picking up fish, one at a time, and throwing then in the water.
A man tells the boy that he’s wasting his time, he can’t possibly save all the fish and it really doesn’t matter.
The boy stops and, looking at the fish in his hand, says, “it matters to this one.”
I’ve been rather astounded over the past few months as I’ve spoken to groups and individuals, of the number of people who are like that boy.
They hear the “one billion” but then they immediately want to know what they can do to help a person or a family. “How can we make a difference in the lives of the poorest of the poor?”
My own family is on an odyssey of sorts. Jovelyn is the 15-year-old daughter of Jose and Elvie Alquino, the family under the bridge in Manila. Jovelyn is a shy girl, bright-eyed and eager to learn.
Working with some very very fine people in Manila, we’re exploring the possibility of having Jovelyn come live with our family here in Iowa, finish her last year or two of high school in our small town, then go on to Dordt College where I teach.
It’s sort of like the kid on the beach. That kind of opportunity can matter—big time—to one family. And who knows what the ripple effect will be?
Many others want to know what they can do for the one billion.
I suspect there’s a way to create connections, but it needs to be done without reinventing programs and opportunities that other fine organizations are already involved with.
I’m delighted there are so many out there like that boy. I hope his attitude prevails, and that of the “it-really-doesn’t-matter guy” become a very small minority.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
What's In A Name?
“The Slum Documentary Film Project.”
Not a real grabby title, is it.
Not like, “Warehousing the World’s Surplus Humanity,” or, “Zone of Silence” or a few other ideas I have for a title (in fairness, that first one about the “warehousing” comes straight from Planet of Slums by Mike Davis. I include it to make a point.)
So why the vanilla title?
As you may have read in a previous blog entry here, documentaries are definitely works in progress. They evolve. Heck, as of this writing, I’m still not 100% sure of the final direction this film is going to take. And I probably won’t know that ‘til I’m much further along in the shooting. To date, all I have is footage from Manila. Next month is Guatemala, and later this year, Africa. In between these will be interviews with a variety of experts.
As all this wonderful footage comes in, the ideas begin to gel, things come together, and yes, a title begins to emerge.
The title may come from something I read or a comment made during an interview. Some of the best titles come quite by accident in an off-handed remark made by someone, or the unusual juxtaposition of ideas when you see images cut together inside the Avid timeline.
What I’m saying is: “The Slum Documentary Film Project” isn’t the final title. It’s just a working title for a work in progress.
Eventually, something much better will reveal itself.
And then I’ll reveal it to you.
In the meantime, I’m wide open to ideas. If you suggest the title that ultimately gets used, be assured I’ll give you the credit when the credits roll on The Slum Documentary Film Project.
Not a real grabby title, is it.
Not like, “Warehousing the World’s Surplus Humanity,” or, “Zone of Silence” or a few other ideas I have for a title (in fairness, that first one about the “warehousing” comes straight from Planet of Slums by Mike Davis. I include it to make a point.)
So why the vanilla title?
As you may have read in a previous blog entry here, documentaries are definitely works in progress. They evolve. Heck, as of this writing, I’m still not 100% sure of the final direction this film is going to take. And I probably won’t know that ‘til I’m much further along in the shooting. To date, all I have is footage from Manila. Next month is Guatemala, and later this year, Africa. In between these will be interviews with a variety of experts.
As all this wonderful footage comes in, the ideas begin to gel, things come together, and yes, a title begins to emerge.
The title may come from something I read or a comment made during an interview. Some of the best titles come quite by accident in an off-handed remark made by someone, or the unusual juxtaposition of ideas when you see images cut together inside the Avid timeline.
What I’m saying is: “The Slum Documentary Film Project” isn’t the final title. It’s just a working title for a work in progress.
Eventually, something much better will reveal itself.
And then I’ll reveal it to you.
In the meantime, I’m wide open to ideas. If you suggest the title that ultimately gets used, be assured I’ll give you the credit when the credits roll on The Slum Documentary Film Project.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
A Sense of Place
I went to Google Earth and found the very bridge where the Alquino family of Manila lives.
Diving around the planet on Google Earth is always a bit of a strange experience. Seeing places where you used to live, seeing places where you'd like to live, all from a bird's-eye view, makes the world seem like a very, very small place.
Going back to the bridge via Google Earth was rather strange in that, when we actually drove over the bridge--right there in Manila--it was so easy to forget, or never realize--that we were driving over an entire community and a family with a name. It was so easy for this unknown, unseen fragment of the one billion to just be completely anonymous.
Now, looking at the same bridge from the anonymity of a computer screen from thousands of miles away simply accentuates that "unseen" quality of this family.
Who would guess that beneath that bridge, on the Bay of Manila, an entire community is struggling to survive?
Friday, February 20, 2009
The Power of Media
“Slumdog Millionarie” is sweeping up awards and nominations around the world as people fall in love with the scrappy kid who wins it big in India’s version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”
Danny Boyle and his crew did an excellent job of capturing life in the slums of Mumbai. The grittiness of life there, and the desperation of slum dwellers is evident in many of the scenes in the movie.
Today, the news talks of some of the child actors from the movie who actually live in the slums. Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, who plays the young Salim, elder brother of the film's central character Jamal, recently had his slum neighborhood razed and is now hoping for an actual house.
His father, Mohammed Ismail Mohammed Usman, who sells cardboard to eke out a living, said that since the movie came out, "The only thing that happened was that I became well-known because of my son. That's it. Nothing else changed. My kid became a hero and I'm living like a zero. This is my shack," he said.
The power of a film like “Slumdog Millionarie” is the power to get public attention focused on a subject like abject poverty. These people were acting, yes, but when the lights went off for the final time and the camera crew left, not much changed and the world is taking notice … at least of the few who appeared in the movie.
I really don’t think our documentary is going to sweep the world in quite the same way this movie did (but I can always hope). But our movie, like this one, will do its bit to help focus public attention on a subject that really needs the public’s attention. Mohammed, mentioned above, gathers up cardboard in hopes of getting enough money to live on. The Alquino family in Manila does that too. So do several families I shot in various parts of Nicaragua. As do people all over the world and yet the vast majority of these people will never be featured in a theatrical release or a documentary film. That doesn’t make them any less important. It just makes them less known.
Meanwhile, this very popular movie will eventually come out on DVD, then move to the “old” section of the neighborhood movie store. Eventually our documentary will come out, perhaps make a splash then also fade from the scene.
But the poverty won’t fade away, and if projections are correct, the one billion slum dwellers will grow to two billion and maybe more.
The power of media is to focus that spotlight. But that’s where it ends. To actually do something about it takes people who are committed to seeing real change.
Danny Boyle and his crew did an excellent job of capturing life in the slums of Mumbai. The grittiness of life there, and the desperation of slum dwellers is evident in many of the scenes in the movie.
Today, the news talks of some of the child actors from the movie who actually live in the slums. Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, who plays the young Salim, elder brother of the film's central character Jamal, recently had his slum neighborhood razed and is now hoping for an actual house.
His father, Mohammed Ismail Mohammed Usman, who sells cardboard to eke out a living, said that since the movie came out, "The only thing that happened was that I became well-known because of my son. That's it. Nothing else changed. My kid became a hero and I'm living like a zero. This is my shack," he said.
The power of a film like “Slumdog Millionarie” is the power to get public attention focused on a subject like abject poverty. These people were acting, yes, but when the lights went off for the final time and the camera crew left, not much changed and the world is taking notice … at least of the few who appeared in the movie.
I really don’t think our documentary is going to sweep the world in quite the same way this movie did (but I can always hope). But our movie, like this one, will do its bit to help focus public attention on a subject that really needs the public’s attention. Mohammed, mentioned above, gathers up cardboard in hopes of getting enough money to live on. The Alquino family in Manila does that too. So do several families I shot in various parts of Nicaragua. As do people all over the world and yet the vast majority of these people will never be featured in a theatrical release or a documentary film. That doesn’t make them any less important. It just makes them less known.
Meanwhile, this very popular movie will eventually come out on DVD, then move to the “old” section of the neighborhood movie store. Eventually our documentary will come out, perhaps make a splash then also fade from the scene.
But the poverty won’t fade away, and if projections are correct, the one billion slum dwellers will grow to two billion and maybe more.
The power of media is to focus that spotlight. But that’s where it ends. To actually do something about it takes people who are committed to seeing real change.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
It’s All About Improv
They say filmmaking is all about improvising when needed. Situations come up and there’s no rule book to tell you what to do. You have to figure it out.
We wanted a shot that goes from the traffic on the top of the bridge, straight down to the ramshackle dwellings beneath the bridge.
We didn’t have a crane or a jib … or a helicopter, but we did have access to bamboo.
We asked a local under the bridge for a little help. He provided us with a rusty machete, a hammer of sorts, and two rusty nails that we straightened out. We used a long piece of bamboo laying near the canal and hacked off the end to make it flat. We pounded the two rusty nails in about three inches from the base of the pole. Then we put one of our came
ras upside down on the end of the pole and used gaffer’s tape to secure it tightly to the pole, using the nails to wrap the tape around (hard to explain, but it worked. The camera was very secure.)
Then we had a dugout go in the canal beneath the bridge while we took our pole and camera up top. Making sure we watched for traffic, we lowered the camera—upside down—(we’ll fix it in post) near the water and slowly pulled the long pole and camera up topside. After about 10 tries, we felt we had a few good takes.
Watch for that shot in the final documentary. And do me a favor: Appreciate the sweat and improv that went into it!
We wanted a shot that goes from the traffic on the top of the bridge, straight down to the ramshackle dwellings beneath the bridge.
We didn’t have a crane or a jib … or a helicopter, but we did have access to bamboo.
We asked a local under the bridge for a little help. He provided us with a rusty machete, a hammer of sorts, and two rusty nails that we straightened out. We used a long piece of bamboo laying near the canal and hacked off the end to make it flat. We pounded the two rusty nails in about three inches from the base of the pole. Then we put one of our came
ras upside down on the end of the pole and used gaffer’s tape to secure it tightly to the pole, using the nails to wrap the tape around (hard to explain, but it worked. The camera was very secure.)Then we had a dugout go in the canal beneath the bridge while we took our pole and camera up top. Making sure we watched for traffic, we lowered the camera—upside down—(we’ll fix it in post) near the water and slowly pulled the long pole and camera up topside. After about 10 tries, we felt we had a few good takes.
Watch for that shot in the final documentary. And do me a favor: Appreciate the sweat and improv that went into it!
Monday, January 5, 2009
"Poorism"
In case you’ve never heard of it, “poorism” is a term used to describe what some tour companies and individuals are now doing: offering tours to foreign visitors of the poorest slums in the city.
Mumbai, for example, has tours through the slums. Visitors come from around the world to gawk at the malnourished children and see the cardboard and iron-sheet structures that they call home. Some think this is a good form of responsible tourism as it exposes the more affluent to the reality of hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Others call it exploitation.
One person in India took this accusation of exploitation one step farther by saying,
"If you were living in Dharavi, in that slum, would you like a foreign tourist coming and walking all over you?" he sputtered. "This kind of slum tourism, it is a clear invasion of somebody's privacy....You are treating humans like animals."
A tourism official called the tour operators "parasites [who] need to be investigated and put behind bars," and a state lawmaker has threatened to shut them down.
Those are the thoughts I had in mind as all 10 of our students here in Manila accompanied our team of three into the garbage dump and slum in Cavite. We brought them in so they could experience first-hand what their teammates were filming, and to get a taste of what life is like in such a place.
Was this irresponsible “poorism”?
I sure hope not.
Did it feel weird to go in with 11 foreigners while dozens of Filipinos of all ages were scrambling … again… in the muck and garbage to
accrue the approximately $1 or $2 that most of them get by on a day? You bet it did. Ask any one of those students and they’ll tell you of feeling out of place, perhaps a bit exploitive.
At the same time, ask any one of those students if they have different thoughts now of what a slum is, of the reality of its awfulness, of the horrid, filthy conditions these people live in, and you might wonder if they’ll ever stop talking. These folks have now experienced firsthand what this stuff is all about.
I think there was a cost for us as Westerners to gain this empathy and understanding. The cost was some of the dignity of the people living in that slum. They knew what was going on. They knew rich people were coming to look at poor people. That’s a definite cost.
Was it worth it?
Time will tell. These students are on their way to becoming leaders in many different arenas of life. This experience won’t leave them. Perhaps they won’t leave the experience. Perhaps one, or two, or all of them, will use their considerable gifts and talents in the years to come to make a difference.
In my mind, that’s different than “poorism.” That’s tourism with a purpose.
Mumbai, for example, has tours through the slums. Visitors come from around the world to gawk at the malnourished children and see the cardboard and iron-sheet structures that they call home. Some think this is a good form of responsible tourism as it exposes the more affluent to the reality of hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Others call it exploitation.
One person in India took this accusation of exploitation one step farther by saying,
"If you were living in Dharavi, in that slum, would you like a foreign tourist coming and walking all over you?" he sputtered. "This kind of slum tourism, it is a clear invasion of somebody's privacy....You are treating humans like animals."
A tourism official called the tour operators "parasites [who] need to be investigated and put behind bars," and a state lawmaker has threatened to shut them down.
Those are the thoughts I had in mind as all 10 of our students here in Manila accompanied our team of three into the garbage dump and slum in Cavite. We brought them in so they could experience first-hand what their teammates were filming, and to get a taste of what life is like in such a place.
Was this irresponsible “poorism”?
I sure hope not.
Did it feel weird to go in with 11 foreigners while dozens of Filipinos of all ages were scrambling … again… in the muck and garbage to
accrue the approximately $1 or $2 that most of them get by on a day? You bet it did. Ask any one of those students and they’ll tell you of feeling out of place, perhaps a bit exploitive.At the same time, ask any one of those students if they have different thoughts now of what a slum is, of the reality of its awfulness, of the horrid, filthy conditions these people live in, and you might wonder if they’ll ever stop talking. These folks have now experienced firsthand what this stuff is all about.
I think there was a cost for us as Westerners to gain this empathy and understanding. The cost was some of the dignity of the people living in that slum. They knew what was going on. They knew rich people were coming to look at poor people. That’s a definite cost.
Was it worth it?
Time will tell. These students are on their way to becoming leaders in many different arenas of life. This experience won’t leave them. Perhaps they won’t leave the experience. Perhaps one, or two, or all of them, will use their considerable gifts and talents in the years to come to make a difference.
In my mind, that’s different than “poorism.” That’s tourism with a purpose.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Under the Bridge
Towards the southern end of Manila, on the Bay, lies Las Piñas City. There is a series of short bridges you must drive over to get there. And there must be a thousand cars and trucks and jeepneys and buses every 
hour that rumble across one of those nondescript bridges over just one more canal in this archipelago nation.
But this bridge is more than just a bridge. Underneath it is an entire community. Just below the rumble of traffic is a group of people eking out a living in the nearby Las Piñas dump.
For me, the “one billion” slum dwellers of our world now have a face, thanks to that bridge community. In fact, faces. An entire family. Spending time this week with this family is helping me move past the statistic and into the realization that each and every digit in that “one billion” has hopes and aspirations, dreams and wishes. I heard them today in our interview with the Alquino family beneath the bridge.
We (Piper Kucera, Peter Hessels and I) first met Jose Alquino Jr. and his wife, Elvie, in the dump in Santa Cruz, a small town in the Pulon Lupa Barangay in Las Piñas City. They and three of their six children were huddled down in garbag
e. Literally. Trucks from the city come in, disgorge their fetid contents and the residents of the dump swarm over it with short, curved metal hooks to help them get at the recyclables as quickly as they can. The Alquino’s 12-year-old son, Arnel, is the best at this as he’s small and quick. Jose and Elvie, with Jovelyn, their 15-year-old daughter, then sort through the garbage looking for plastic, aluminum, tin and best of all, copper. They, and dozens of other people from this community, spend their days sifting through other people’s garbage, trying to make a living.
Jose says on a good day, the family can make about 200 pesos. At an exchange rate today of about 47 pesos for one dollar, that’s about $4.25 a day. Jovelyn is the only one of the six children in school because they can’t afford to send any more.
Elvie also sells fish in a market further north. She gets up at 3 a.m. to buy the fish near the sea where they live, then travels by bus and jeepney to a different market to sell.
These are hard working people. Uneducated, but desperate to see their children do better than themselves. We interviewed them and asked questions about their lives. They were open and honest and cheerful … mostly. Jovelyn cried—though she tried desperately not to—as she told us about going to school hungry. Elvie cried—before quickly bouncing back to her more exuberant self—as she talked about having one meal a day, usually. She said she wants her children to have a better life than she does, but it’s so hard.
Meanwhile, the traffic continues to pound the pavement just a few feet above our heads, and the KLM jets continue to roar overhead because this slum is directly under the flight path for the Manila International Airport.
We left at the end of the day to drive back into the center of Manila. As we left the slum and maneuvered our way back to the main roads, we finally got onto the highway and went North. As we did, we rumbled over a bridge. And I looked back and realized we had just rolled over—literally—Jose and Elvie’s bedroom.
And I almost didn’t notice.
hour that rumble across one of those nondescript bridges over just one more canal in this archipelago nation.But this bridge is more than just a bridge. Underneath it is an entire community. Just below the rumble of traffic is a group of people eking out a living in the nearby Las Piñas dump.
For me, the “one billion” slum dwellers of our world now have a face, thanks to that bridge community. In fact, faces. An entire family. Spending time this week with this family is helping me move past the statistic and into the realization that each and every digit in that “one billion” has hopes and aspirations, dreams and wishes. I heard them today in our interview with the Alquino family beneath the bridge.
We (Piper Kucera, Peter Hessels and I) first met Jose Alquino Jr. and his wife, Elvie, in the dump in Santa Cruz, a small town in the Pulon Lupa Barangay in Las Piñas City. They and three of their six children were huddled down in garbag
e. Literally. Trucks from the city come in, disgorge their fetid contents and the residents of the dump swarm over it with short, curved metal hooks to help them get at the recyclables as quickly as they can. The Alquino’s 12-year-old son, Arnel, is the best at this as he’s small and quick. Jose and Elvie, with Jovelyn, their 15-year-old daughter, then sort through the garbage looking for plastic, aluminum, tin and best of all, copper. They, and dozens of other people from this community, spend their days sifting through other people’s garbage, trying to make a living.Jose says on a good day, the family can make about 200 pesos. At an exchange rate today of about 47 pesos for one dollar, that’s about $4.25 a day. Jovelyn is the only one of the six children in school because they can’t afford to send any more.
Elvie also sells fish in a market further north. She gets up at 3 a.m. to buy the fish near the sea where they live, then travels by bus and jeepney to a different market to sell.
These are hard working people. Uneducated, but desperate to see their children do better than themselves. We interviewed them and asked questions about their lives. They were open and honest and cheerful … mostly. Jovelyn cried—though she tried desperately not to—as she told us about going to school hungry. Elvie cried—before quickly bouncing back to her more exuberant self—as she talked about having one meal a day, usually. She said she wants her children to have a better life than she does, but it’s so hard.
Meanwhile, the traffic continues to pound the pavement just a few feet above our heads, and the KLM jets continue to roar overhead because this slum is directly under the flight path for the Manila International Airport.
We left at the end of the day to drive back into the center of Manila. As we left the slum and maneuvered our way back to the main roads, we finally got onto the highway and went North. As we did, we rumbled over a bridge. And I looked back and realized we had just rolled over—literally—Jose and Elvie’s bedroom.
And I almost didn’t notice.
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