P.S. Ten points for you if you caught the Mother Goose reference in the title.

Since then, I’ve worked on a couple short films, made some great contacts and got a freelance position with a studio. Sporadic work but it’s better than none at all and I feel like I’m moving forward finally. I still need a part time job though, to kill the bills (see what I did there). Oh Bills how I loathe thee!

“There is something to be learned from a rainstorm. When meeting with a sudden shower, you try not to get wet and run quickly along the road. But doing such things as passing under the eaves of houses, you still get wet. When you are resolved from the beginning, you will not be perplexed, though you still get the same soaking. This understanding extends to everything”

Rest assured, I will not!

The range of material that has inspired my writing, directing and ways of thinking about film is both vast and varied. From the angst, rebellion and experimentation of the French New Wave (in particular Godard), to the social messages found in 70s dystopian science fiction, (including Logan’s Run and Planet of the Apes etc), to the adventure and imagination found in Anime (Cowboy Bebopand Samurai Champloo for instance), I like to think of my particular vision and developing style as an amalgam of these very different things. In particular though, if I had to pinpoint my biggest audiovisual influence, it would be, surprisingly perhaps, the long running American children’s educational program Sesame Street, specifically the 70s and 80s incarnations of the series.

The ideology of the pre internet era version of the show ultimately falls in line with my own vision as regards the potential of both Film and Television. Firstly, as a public funded project, it was not made solely for profit and was in essence“for the people by the people”. This in my view is, at least in part what made its creators strive for excellence in everything they did. The quality of the work is the first thing that stands out for me, even thirty years after the fact there is a certain relevance and value to it. The ability to create something which withstands the onslaught of time is what I aspire to in my own work. Additionally, the series was able to find a balance between entertainment and education which is another craft I hope to master in my career as a practitioner. I believe that film and television, already social forces, can be sculpted in such a manner as to effect positive social change.

As far as crafting and technical aspects of Sesame Street goes, I am to date still impressed with the old format of the series and its varied use of cultural elements from a wide range of literary, filmic, philosophical and musical sources which served to promote both diversity and eclecticism, something which, in my case has stuck with me for life. One short film for instance, featured a simple flower, with beads of water dripping from its petals, shot in extreme close up and cut to Vivaldi’s “Guitar Concerto in D Major” comes to mind. The final shot of the piece was a slow zoom out to reveal that the flower, before occupying the whole screen was in a small pot on a Brooklyn rooftop and was in the context of the shot the only thing of life in a smoggy concrete jungle. While at the time of my first viewing, I did not have the ability to understand what the film meant beyond the flower being a small object in a much larger world, I have since come to find many debates about man versus nature, life and death and personal struggle in this piece of about two minutes in length. I would go so far as to say that that particular short and many others like it, stimulated my early interest in film and pushed my toward my present path in life. Overall, there is a very raw passion that can be felt in the work and in the series which I found admirable and personally aspire to. Have a look.

It’s beautiful

I was supposed to write about the irony of my father holding onto a Republican viewpoint and my trip to the Coca-Cola factory but somehow this piece made it’s way out of my head. Sorry about that. Maybe I’ll get back to those other topics at a later date. Enjoy this for now 

“Do you play cricket?”

The young man stared blankly. He was as unsure of the intended recipient of this question as he was about the one which preceded it. The uncertainty he showed was obviously annoying Mr Mc Loed

“You boy, you.”

The teacher whose hair colour and afro hairstyle made a pun of his name, pointed with a shaky hand toward C*. Finally, the young man stood, slowly looking around to make sure he was the one. The other students in the class giggled at his awkwardness. The boy shook his head.

“No sir.”

“Well it’s obvious that you don’t. You see in cricket, the batsman must always know where he is in relation to the stumps.”

Mc Loed always had a penchant for making cricket analogies, allegories and comparisons. He loved the game probably as much as he loved teaching Spanish, and showed the same abyss like depth of knowledge with respect to both topics. In the pre Worst Indies Era,** I too was a cricket fan. Naturally it followed that his subtle hints and references to the sport became my fondest memories of his class. Everything else was torture, as Mc Loed was a strict disciplinarian. He could make the baddest bad boy stain his pants with just a look, or cut him down to size with just a few words. Of course in those days, students didn’t carry guns and knives to school. I’m not sure the same methodology would work in 2010. Times change. In any case, I always found myself a little bit terrified in his class, the five foot three inches or so of him, had a presence a thousand times larger than that. This was not overcompensation, not a Napoleon complex. This guy was the real deal. His efficient use of language and generally stoic expression made him an extremely difficult character to read. Combine that with his apparent X-Ray vision and tyrannical teaching methods, (pop quizzes, randomly picking one or two people to read and translate text for the duration of the class etc), and the intimidation scale was close to the breaking point. Well, at least in my world. I hated that class, but for all my hatred, I would find myself consistently on or near the top of the pile come exam time. To this day, I still remember a lot of the Spanish I was taught.

It was only after many years of suddenly breaking out into Spanish under the influence of alcohol, that I understood that there was method to old cloud head’s madness. He was not in fact trying to send his students to an early grave. He was teaching us discipline,discipline of the highest order. Indeed, during that time the West Indies cricket team was a well oiled unit, capable of taking on and beating the best the world had to offer. His admiration for the side was thusly understandable. Like a good skipper then, the old man put us through the toughest of drills; the pop quizzes and seemingly random translator picks not unlike asking the team to always be prepared to step up it’s game on both a collective and individual basis. His understated acts of praise for a job well done; a rhythmically repeated “that is correct” were akin to a pat on the back or an embrace from the captain.

In retrospect, all the skills learned, all the discipline inculcated into me from his class have remained  to this day. In this new phase of my life, I find myself relying on them, a lot. In honour of him I will summarize the current happenings with a fairly cheesy yet effective cricketing sequence. Now, I once tried Mc Loed’s cricket analogy technique during a bout of drinking. Safe to say, it didn’t work. After I told the young lady that she had two fine legs and that there was probably a deep gully in between…I had reduced motor skills for about a month. This time however, there are no spirits involved, so I expect less dramatic results. Here goes;

Right now I find myself in a test match. We’re on a foreign ground and the home team have amassed a substantial first innings total. We are facing the greatest pace attack assembled since Garner, Marshall, Holding and Croft left the game.I am making my debut in a team where all the players are stars and if you come from where I come from, you get no respect. As a matter of fact, you’re expected to get out for duck. None of that matters to me though, I just want to bat, I know what I’m capable of and I have no fear. Mc Loed taught me to master that. I’m low down in the order though, number ten, so I patiently wait even though I see wickets tumbling. Number  nine goes out and I wish him the best although secretly, I won’t mind if he soon returns. I see the bowler run up and release the ball. Number nine swings. He misses. Middle stump is going to fly. I tighten my grip on my bat and smile wryly…

* Name withheld to protect the identity of the individual (no it wasn’t me)

** Era following the retirement of CEL Ambrose and C Walsh the last of the noteworthy West Indian pace bowlers and the beginning of the slump in West Indies Cricket

***Playing Away is also the name of a movie by Trinidadian filmmaker Horace Ove.  Just thought that was worth mentioning.

When I was nine, I wanted to be a superhero, to champion the cause of the underdog, fight for those who couldn’t fight for themselves. By seventeen, the superhero dream was shelved and so I decided to do the next best thing, become a graphic novelist. I wanted to write, to tell (figuratively) the stories of those forgotten by the system within which we exist, to change the world with every word I wrote, every illustration I made. Of course this was never going to fly. I was a teenager living on an island where people thought of comic book enthusiasts as freaks, geeks and weirdos…wait, that’s pretty much what they think everywhere but at least in other places, far away from here, there was hope of making a career out of something like that; following one’s dream. Cue my parents;

“Engineering is the way to go; you can make money doing that. Forget that comic book rubbish.”
Well maybe they didn’t say that exactly but it was implied in more ways than one. The day the application forms for John D*arrived on the dining room table signaled the ending of that particular dream. In those days, there was no GATE**and no online registration so going to UWI*** or any other tuition based institution and registering online were pipe dreams. Off I went to technical school. It was free then.

Ten years later, after being oppressed and all but forgotten my dreams staged a revolt. It may have been the fact that my boss at the phone company was wearing my patience thin with his mastery of the arts of “Sloth Fu” and “Bung-Ling-Do” or it may have been that the woman of my dreams decided she would play rugby with my heart. It may have been both. Whatever the trigger, my locked away aspirations conspired to convince me that I was not living the dream, but I was in fact asleep. I was much more than…whatever it is I was, much more. They soon took over, engulfing every part of my being and they knew I owed them, big time.

“We consolidate all your debt into one small monthly payment” the voice on the television blared as the frumpy woman with a worried look on her face suddenly became bright eyed. Debt… I owed a big one, to myself and to the world I thought, and I had to pay it. My installments had been amalgamated into this thing called film, a proverbial Mecha**** in the landscape of my being. All I had to do was get on board. With this “machine”, I could do everything I wanted to, tell the stories, change the world and be a superhero…well, maybe.

“You can finally be debt free.”
Time would tell. For now I was grateful that I could dream and not have to be asleep to enjoy it.

Next: My father the Republican or A trip to the Coca-Cola Factory, I’m not sure.

*The John s Donaldson Technical institute. Once the premiere technical institution in Trinidad and Tobago. The jury is still out on whether or not this is still the case

** Government Assistance for Tertiary Education. An allegedly endangered species in the Educational landscape of Trinidad and Tobago

***The University of the West indies, St Augustine, my Alma Mater and former employers 

****A big effing robot usually seen in  Japanese Anime

On a side note, Thanks J. You’ve always been good to me. I appreciate that more than I can express.

In order for me to work here legally, I must navigate the fields of bureaucracy. This will take 21 days. In the meantime, I find ways to occupy myself; one of these ways, driving. As expected, there is some confusion that occurs when driving on the other side of the car and the other side of the road. My 12 plus years of experience as a driver don’t seem to matter much right now. I feel like a learner again. Broke it down to two things, the driver’s side is always closest to the center* of the road and traffic will be coming from the driver’s side regardless of what country you’re driving in. By tomorrow I think I’ll have a handle on it, and fewer scary incidents!

Besides that, I think the amount of time I have to wait to be inducted into the system will affect the opportunity I was offered. They may not be able to wait so in the meantime, even though I’m hoping for the best, I’m making contingency plans. In a sense I’m praying, something I don’t really do much of anymore. This is not a return to faith but there is a certain amount of comfort to be found in meditation. It seems I’m on the flipside in more ways than one. Hopefully though, my “prayers” will be answered.

On a side note, what was that weird dream I had!!! (More on this later)

*Note the Americanized spelling. Have to get used to that as well

It’s been a long day but even the”random” searches didn’t get me down. I’m still feeling positive. I’m ready to get down to the serious business. Even when I fly across to London town I’ll be working, online and on the phone. I need to hit the ground running.
That aside, the first thing I notice at the airports in Mia and Atl, is the color/class stratification. It isn’t all that different from what I see back home. The names and faces might be different but the rules are generally the same.

In Miami it was the Latinos who held the menial jobs, while over here, it was the Afro American. Lots of soldiers at the airport in Atl as well, all very young, teenagers, mostly black and a few working class whites as well by my assessment. I think of the young lives being lost in an unnecessary conflict and I think about who exactly is fighting this war, certainly not the ones who benefit (profit) most from it.

Also, I’m left wondering if my ethnicity will have a bigger effect on this journey than I anticipated regardless of the level of my education and experience. I think I’m only worried because there is a burden of expectation that comes with my departure. This is not like the last time I left. Back then, the mood was light, I was just going to study. There is a certain tone of finality that resonates now. Everyone expects big things from me and indeed I expect them from myself. I do not know what exactly will happen, and the stratification lines I’m seeing now instill a bit of the reality of the situation into me. I’ve heard bad stories, but in life I do not think that there is any obstacle placed in my path that I cannot overcome. It is left to be seen what happens, but for now I remain cautiously optimistic.

It’s late and I’ve just arrived at the old man’s place. Will have a meal and settle in for the night. The work begins tomorrow, even if it is the weekend. Next, back to L town. Maybe a return to where the journey started will offer some perspective. Look forward to seeing some of the old gang as well

On a side note. I need to finish the script for “Infinite Regression” !!!