March
4, 2013
Today was a work day, and we started with
interviews with the entrepreneurs that we’re assigned to. Evan is working on editing the episode
from Myanmar about Prakti’s adventure in the markets showing off their stove,
so we did a pick-up interview with Mouhsine.
He’s always a pleasure to interview because he’s
been trained well to repeat our questions and provide exposition in his answers. He was also a fellow from this past
summer’s Unreasonable Institute.
It’s been so fun to watch his business grow and see the passion he has
for helping with the problem of inefficient cook stoves and smoke inhalation in
the lower income sectors of the countries they serve. They’d love to move into Myanmar and feel like they’ve got a
great market, so they left some stoves to test them out with a couple
distributers. Go Prakti!
After the interview, we got lunch with the team and
planned out the workshop that we’re going to lead teaching the students about
video production.
It’s been decided that Semester at Sea is going to
run a 72-hour film festival on the ship in which students will have to create
their films starting when we port in Mauritius. It started as a way to bring the shipboard community
together more and get some more interaction between the Unreasonables and the
students.
In order to equip the students for the festival,
the media team agreed to lead two workshops: one on production and another on
post-production.
With an hour’s preparation, we headed to the Union
where we had about 50 students, lifelong learners, faculty and staff show up to
learn how to use their cameras.
It’s dangerous to get us talking about film stuff because we’re
extremely passionate and can go on for hours. We did pretty good sticking within our hour for
presentation, then broke out into groups with the students so that we could
have some one-on-one question time.
The producers went to one corner, shooters in another, sound people in
another, and we had a great turnout to each area. The downside for the students is that they don’t have much
equipment, so we also had a one-on-one about shooting on your iPhone and making
it look and sound good.
I was so proud of our team. They did a great job! And, we got a ton of people
complimenting the event and looking forward to the post-production workshop.
Before each port, there are themed appetizer events
in the faculty lounge (or the Tipsy Toucan, as we call it) where you can order
up a $5 plate of appetizers from the country we’re about to port in and hang
out with the staff and faculty from the ship. They’re always fun events and the appetizers are really
good.
Matt and I had one reserved, so we headed up with the
team to hang around and snack on Indian food. The appetizers weren’t enough, so Matt and I scarfed down the
second part of our meal in the dining room, then got ready to film a panel at
19:00.
The panel was about the question: “Can we really
change the world?” and featured Tori Hogan, who just wrote a book called,
Beyond Good Inentions, about how some aid hurts more than it helps (I’d
recommend it!), Ken Banks, a National Geographic Explorer and Unreasonable
Mentor who founded FrontlineSMS and kiwanja.net, and Archbishop Desmond Tutu
who doesn’t need much of an introduction.
The panel was wonderful. Tori led it and went back and forth with questions between
Ken and Arch. Arch picked on Ken
for being British and mocked his accent a couple times, then when he found
himself amusing would laugh with his high-pitched giggle and kick his feet in
the air. I was glad that I was on
the wide angle to capture it.
All three of them had a really impactful message
about what it means to “change the world,” what role we, as individuals, play
in that, and whether or not one can even quantify how much impact a single
person has had or will have.
Arch is always so uplifting and he spoke about us
as a community of people who were having their eyes opened to what life is like
around the globe. The panel came
about because students have been so affected by what they’ve witnessed in these
countries, and they don’t know what to do with it. How do you process the poverty? How do you help?
How do you turn your back and go back to our developed world?
I feel the same way. I thought that this trip would be an awesome opportunity to reset
my life. I thought it would be a
transitional project that would show me the world, then lead me back to options
I had set out before leaving and help me choose the right one when I reached
home back in Colorado.
However, instead of shrinking my options and
showing me the correct path, this trip has blown up my world. There are more
options than I had ever imagined to choose from. My job as a storyteller is so needed in places like we’ve
visited. Our world is more
connected than ever, and yet there is still so much that people don’t know
about each other. Even with our
connectedness, we still have bubbles in our countries and societies, and media
is a bring people out of them.
So, my questions have begun: What’s my job in all
of this? Where do I belong? Where will I have the most impact? Where will I be happiest? And where can I meet in the middle of
impact and happiness? Is that
important in the grand scheme of things?
Do I want to entertain or just inform people with my work?
I can’t answer these questions now, but my
perspective on life, my career, my future, my country and the world has changed
so much in the last two months, that I realize I’ll need longer than I had
thought to process this when it’s all said and done.
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