Zack and I are tired tonight after a full day of shooting, editing, and feeling like morons because we don’t know the language of the land. It never ceases to amaze me that you could have a PHD or have a brilliant mind, but if you can’t speak the local language, you might as well be the village idiot. What a powerful thing it is to be able to verbally express yourself. What a tremendous handicap to not be able to.
I had a frustrating morning due to the fact that the only Spanish I know I learned from Terminator 2. I couldn’t even place a call to my friend here, because my cell phone menu was in Spanish. Unbelievable.
Traveling puts you at such a disadvantage when it comes to communicating. But the benefits are worth it. Here’s a screen grab from some of the video we shot today. It’s just a simple little exchange between two school girls. It happened during the after-school program today. Shooting video can be a magical thing, because you are outside of the action of life, observing very intensely, and you often pick up moments that you never would in “real time.” I’ve scrubbed through the clip several times, just to see the girls look at each other, and then see them both break into laughter.
The little girl on the left is Adrianna. I’ll tell you right now, Ecuadorian children just MAY be the most beautiful, hope-inspiring, joy-inducing children in the world. Just watching them makes you smile, and if they catch your eye and smile back, it is a guaranteed “I got something in my eye” moment. Yes, their sweetness can literally bring tears to your eyes.
And Adrianna? She may be my favorite one of all. Maybe it’s because she is more quiet and reserved than most of the others. Maybe she reminds me somehow of my own daughters. But having the opportunity to catch a few moments of her day with her friend is a real blessing to me.
These kids are being helped, every day, by this new organization. I told Zack today, “Just think, the scene that you are shooting right now could move someone to give money so that child can keep getting meals for a whole week, or even a month.”
He didn’t say anything. He just looked at me and nodded.
Looking at Adrianna, and having my son working with me today reminds me that, thankfully, sometimes you don’t need too many words.