Peru Trip #7

I skipped a year visiting Peru, but I’m back. Before I leave it always seems like such a hassle, and then the second we land in the jungle and take off in the car from Tarapoto, I feel home. The heat makes sense. The colors and crazy moto taxis - they just feel calm.  Everything is the same…but this time not. Little things, like the Lima airport doesn’t have their game show red light / green light random security system for searching bags. Peurto Mirador Hotel no longer has a switch for hot water you have to turn on 30min before you want to shower. There’s a new beer, Tres Cruces, but it’s still just as cold – colder than anywhere I’ve ever had beer. But the rest is the same, we arrive at the hotel with the group of 8 doctors and are greeted by Luis - hugs and then “Okay, 7min and then we leave for Yantaló .” And we’re off, pack well, because filming starts 10min before you’re ready. Straight to Yantaló for the usual tour of the clinic, and the shock of pulling up and seeing the progress was even more than usual. It’s SO BIG!

I always forget how grateful and impressed and inspired I am by the people who congregate to Yantaló,  instigated by Luis. There are always late night dinners, a table full of over 20 from around the world. It’s 10pm and we’re eating and drinking pisco sours. The doctors wake up at 6am and perform 6-8 surgeries in a day. I think josh and my days are hard, carrying around cameras, they’re cutting people open and saving babies! To us filming is fun, to them surgery is fun. Everyone at the table is brilliant, whether a 25 year old student from Lima, President of a hospital from the US, or top surgeon from France, everyone is laughing, and drinking, and completely happy. 

I’m not 100% sure why we're all here, but pretty much all of us will be back, or have been returning- again and again. 

THE Hamptons - LA - Mammoth - Bahamas - LA

Fourth of July weekend in THEEEE HAAAmptons, Darling. Avoided most of humanity in the pool. Plus fire on the beach - dug and created by me - after stumbling upon such glowing beach fires after July 4th fireworks.

I feel like I missed some locations. But it might just be that I gave up my apartment to NYC apartment hell and two weeks before departure moved some of my belongings into a storage unit and gave up the rest. Backpack, purse, and camera, and I'm off to LA, I learned my pack light lesson years ago and am thankful I remembered it - it may have taken a few heavy loads.

LA - wonderful friends, unique job, and sun. I find myself putting in "____'s couch" into my calendar. I'm coordinating my "home".

Quick 1 night Mammoth trip for a Peru Volunteer House meeting

BAHAMAS - Josh & Annah wed-cation. (wedding #3) So much love for these two. The whole thing made me feel so adult. A VACATION, what is that word you ask? It's where you feel like your brain and body is in slow motion. Where the sun beats down and you drink straight from a machet-ed off coconut at 9am on a Monday for breakfast and follow breakfast 10min later by adding rum to the next coconut. I let my brain stop.

 I also checked a fear of flying step off my list. Propellers. Done. Survived.

Seattle again, & weddings begin - Virginia, Vermont...

SO behind on travels -

Won't try to keep track of all my Vermont comings and goings. But there are visits. Quiet, green, and smokey fire visits.

Was back in Seattle for a shoot beginning of June. That place is beautiful, so much water, huge mountains, and low layered clouds that look like they're from a 3-D painting. Also lucked out with sun for 3 days, although one morning was advised to be thankful for the "bright grey". Had a few free moments at the end and overlapped with Josh who was in town on a different job - thanks to near constant travel, at some point our paths had to cross. We wandered the city with no plan and ended just where I wanted - kayak rental.

Got back to NYC on a redeye to go straight to the office on Tuesday. Brushing teeth in the office bathroom has become a thing. Then Friday night I headed to -

VIRGINIA for 1 out of possibly 6 weddings this year. Maybe I'll figure out the whole reasoning behind weddings / marriage after all this.

First guess: Awesome reason to get together with old and new friends from all over and have a huge party like no other.


Week back in NYC then wedding #2 VERMONT

Second guess: Bring together family and keep traditions (I do love Halloween after all), and give thanks




Third guess: someone has to say "forever" in order to believe and agree, might as well remember forever with a party (optimist believing in forever)

North Carolina Festival & Filmmaking notes

I've traveled by myself before - a road trip LA to Colorado for a job, a few New York trips, OH I guess BARCELONA for study abroad, but never have I really gone somewhere where I don't know anyone, by myself. That was the North Carolina trip.  4 days. Treated like some strange VIP for the Film Festival, the lovely driver with the sign greeted me at the airport with my backpack and late night arrival straight from the NYC office. My hotel room in the old mill factory had a bigger than King sized bed and an old fashioned chandelier. Instead of stress for setting out on my own, I found complete calm in my slight anonymity. Days were spent seeing movie after movie, wonderful thought provoking films by filmmakers that I was able to meet and befriend. Films are no longer these long off goals, but concrete things that I can discuss with their maker. The whole trip was surreal.

A step back from the travel side to my FILMMAKING SIDE-

1. REWARD: From another doc filmmaker - "It seems as if we've all shown up to the Festivals from a great battle. Wounded and without sleep. We've all been through war and now we get to raise our glasses and cheers each other, swap combat stories, and enjoy." Here I was watching movies (I never do that!), I took a nap in the middle of the day, one night I slept 8 hours and in the morning went to a bakery and bought 2 danishes and read my book!

2. LOSING: Placement in a Festival makes some kind of statement on success, but as a fellow filmmaker said, "my friends / family often see me as this person successfully living my dreams and being creative, but what they may not see is me failing, losing, and being rejected every day, over and over." As thankful as I am for yes, being able to live my dreams, everyday I'm told no, told I'm crazy, told my film isn't good enough, and I think it's not possible. For every Festival acceptance, I've heard the good average is 4 rejections. Everyday we keep going. We are crazy.

3. CURB SATISFACTION?: I don't completely recall the details of this one (here I'll thank the Festival's alcohol sponsors), but something along the lines of....you should never be 100% satisfied or happy with your job, because that would be impossible, you should always be striving to improve. Perfection doesn't exist. Which, as an optimist, maybe is depressing. OR is it reassuring coming from an optimist, in that it can always be better. I'll say, there can be perfection in that moment, full of pure joy, but you can also know you can keep striving to make it even better. Now THAT is worth something. 
"no amount of money could buy security, and if it could, it would be a bad bargain at any price, since security was a form of paralysis, just as satisfaction was a form of death" - Tom Robbins 

All that is great, but I still feel...when is it really over, when is the film really done, done? We all may have been taking naps, watching movies, and taking full advantage of the parties, but we also were answering emails for both our day jobs and our films, applying to more festivals, and preparing to head back to work. 

For me, back to the pulsating city of New York where my blood flows faster and my speed walking falls perfectly in line with the ebb of pedestrian traffic filled with every variety of person and dream.

2013 Begins - LA, Seattle, VT, Florida - NYC in between

This is going to be an interesting year of travel. Never before have I had so much travel planned in advance, to so many US cities, for such short stops. A lot of that has to do with this being the first year I've had friends getting married - 5 of them. Plus my circus film is doing the film festival circuit. Plus my work trips and other random adventures. I'd say this year also marks the first time experiencing flights where I didn't think I was going to die. Considering the amount I fly, it looks like it has taken since I was 5 years old returning from Hawaii until now, 23 year later, to stop thinking the plane was going to crash on every flight. Hopefully this sticks, that would be a lot more convenient. 

First up this year, in February I had a weekend trip to Los Angeles / San Diego.  LA was sunny and warm. A quick stop at a circus convention in San Diego and then classic night time adventures with LA friend Lindsey. A great friend hand off happened in a strip mall parking lot in Orange County. Concrete and palm tress. I was dropped with my bag and winter coat to wander for 10min before another friend picked me up. I couldn't have felt more out of place. It was great.

Nothing like brushing your teeth in the office bathroom after a solid nights sleep on a red eye flight home.

Back to work for 2 days in NYC and then off to the PREMIERE of my "World Circus" film in beautiful red rock Sedona, AZ. A perfect festival to start it all off. Awesome movie watching, meeting fellow filmmakers, and partying with Ian. 

I think next was a Vermont trip home for sugaring. Maple Syrup making. The smell of the sugar house might be what heaven is. 

Then came my two weeks of craziness - 

Seattle for my job. 4 days of shooting, non stop days, although I managed to squeeze in a dinner with a wonderful friend and her new baby. As we wandered the streets of Seattle and landed in a loud and delicious Mexican restaurant, the baby slept and was no deterrent to a good time. Maybe babies and husbands aren't so bad after all.

2 days of work back in NYC and then off to Sarasota, Florida for the Film Festival. As I changed in the lobby bathroom, I couldn't quite believe it was dress whether. Really? People weren't wearing coats? 

Red eye home straight to the TimeSquare office for 2 days and then off to North Carolina Film Festival, which deserves a post of it's own....coming up next. 

2012 Travels so far: Colorado - CHI - LA - STL - Alaska - Nashville

Again, before I forget, let me catch up on where I've been. And mention my 1 year anniversary of officially living in NYC. Forgot how much I LOVE fall and all the seasons. 

I'll quickly mention my Thanksgiving in Florida (oh wait, that was 2011) and many many trips from NYC to VT. Living that dream of mine. 

Made it for my usual "whirl wind best friends / best city stop in Chicago on my way to something" trip this year. This time it was to film the final interview for my circus film in Wisconsin. Road tripped Chicago to Wisconsin and replaced a hotel for tent and quiet campground. Paused the whirl wind for a perfect 1 hour float, in the sun, in a canoe, on a lake. 

Spent almost 2 weeks in Breckenridge, CO in June. Mostly inside my hotel room & inside the production office trailer. But the views were beautiful and the air was crisp, although extremely scarce. I've been to Cusco / Machu Picchu and hiked mountains, but I don't remember having problems with the whole "lack of oxygen" thing. I definitely noticed it in Breckenridge. 

I escaped the NYC humid heat in August for a job back in Los Angeles. I had my first encounter with jet lag, leading to my first encounter of being a morning person. Who knew you could wake up with a smile on your face at 7am? The gleaming sun, blue sky, cat in my face, and amazing friends in the next room making breakfast may have helped all that. Was amazed at how I survived there for 5 years without ending up in an insane asylum for road rage, but didn't mind at all being back for a month. 

From LA, it was a quick family reunion in IL / STL and then I planned on heading back to NYC to finish, under a crazy deadline, my Circus film. Instead, I stopped in Alaska for 3 days. 

As the plane started the down tilt to land in Anchorage, AK, the pilot came on and laughed, "well, they're evacuating the airport due to high winds, and there is no one in the control tower, so I guess we won't be landing there." Instead I ended up on the Fairbanks airport floor for 8 hours. Over 12 hours late, I made it to Anchorage, without my bags (reminder to ALWAYS pack a spare set in your cary on). I headed towards my rental car in my shorts (I had packed for LA) and drove the 45min to "work". I have to say, as soon as I hit highway 1, along the water with the mountains as the backdrop, none of the travel pains mattered. Alaska is spectacular and I must return. In my few days there, even though 95% of the time I was inside a production trailer or my hotel room, I still saw a beluga whale, bald eagle, and a bear - AND drove an RV. Classic Alaska adventure. 

Most recently I spent a long weekend in Nashville, home of bachelorette parties, apparently. Awesome old friends, that are more like family, and 3 whole days without turning on a computer. I don't think I've done that in...years.  

2012 was the first time in 6 years that I didn't make it to Peru. Josh still went to see the amazing progress on the hospital, and see them break ground on our Yantalo International Volunteer House. Amazing progress! Definitely miss Peru, the people, and the language, and can't wait for next year. 

Chocolate & Cookie Filmmaking Metaphors

These just come to me as I'm working...so thought I'd share.

1.

When I finally get a scene translated that I have tried to edit into the timeline, it's like after looking at a huge delicious box of chocolate and trying to decide which ones to eat first, and then finally getting the little picture map of what is inside each chocolate. You have the answers and then you can really dig in.

2.

The whole long process of making my documentary is like following cookie crumbs through a dark, bleak, and scary forest. Every now and then I get a big cookie crumb and trudge happily ahead and then it's months till the next crumb and the doubt sets in. Am I on the right path? Is there even another cookie crumb ahead? Will all the crumbs actually even lead to a huge cookie at the end? No turning back now, I know there's no cookie crumbs left where I came from! So, we can just know there will be another crumb to inspire us and lead the way, and also know there will probably be many more dark spells in between, so strap on some comfortable shoes.

ARMED WITH CHOCOLATE (and maybe some ice cream and cookies), I CONTINUE THE EDIT ADVENTURE....THE SLOWEST ADVENTURE I'D EVER AGREE TO.