The Jungle Calls

So I decided last minute to go to Costa Rica for my vacation from my vacation. Where the first part of my adventure in the Caymans was scheduled to the hour, everyday.. I wanted the exact opposite for my next adventure. So I didnt make any hotel plans, or schedule any tours...just bought a ticket into San Jose, and tried to be open for opportunities.
I ended up meeting this Canadian woman on the plane and we ended up chatting the whole time. She was also traveling by herself, and going to a Global Humanity conference in three days. Once we landed, we shared a cab into town together and then went to dinner. She offered for me to crash at her hotel until I find something or figure out what I was doing. And as chance would have it, her room had two beds...to make a long story short...we ended up becoming best of friends. We did a Canopy tour, had a crazy all nighter of dancing with the locals, and also met up with her family member who owns an artist retreat there. In the first 5 minutes of meeting him, he asked if I would like to teach a painting workshop and I almost fainted! I'm going to take him up on it, but I have a lot of work to do

StingRay

I went to StingRay City today! They took us out on a Catamaran in the middle of the ocean, it actually gets really shallow- enough so that you can stand and play with the stingrays. It felt like a wet portobello mushroom. If you cant tell by my smile, I'm a little nervous and folding it in half like a taco

Travel time

So now that shooting is over, I am looking forward to actual sight seeing and possibly reading a book. The original plan was that Cindy and I were going to travel together, but she just got an amazing job opportunity, so she's heading back toNY today. I've decided to stay here with friends for a couple days , and then head to the airport and find a cheap ticket somewhere...

I've been using her computer since I've been here, but now that she's leaving, I'm not too sure what kind of accessibility I'll have..

But I'll touch base when I can, and will hopefully have some more good stories for ya!

Turtle Wrangling....

...aint no joke!!! it was the last day of the shoot yesterday, and those turtles bitch slapped and sliced every last one of us!
We ended up taking a company field trip to the local sea turtle farm-they were set up in huge tanks by size- smallest that we saw were about 18" diam. and the largest in the pool was 500 lbs..(I didnt get to see this one though..it could have been an urban myth)

There were 6 turtles selected for the casting- all about 24-30" wide and 30"-36" long. Heavy SOB's-about 150 lbs and SO strong. It took about 2-3 people to handle them.

So they were trucked over to the beach and set up near the water. The scene was that the boy in the movie was running down the beach and saw these turtles on shore and started playing with them.

There were about 12 of us placing these turtle in the sand, about 2 feet from the ocean (and their freedom) The difficulty was getting them into place, watering them down so they glisten, and then filming it fast enough before they made their break for the water.

By then end of the day, we all had looked like we got Zoro- marked with their flippers and shells. Not to mention being bathed in turtle goo.

but it was an awesome experience!- I'll have to upload photos when i get back.

Week 3- wrapping up

Week 3-
We finished up on Da Brac last night and flew into Grand Cayman this morning. We get Sundays off , and the whole crew spent it on the beach- Funny how a bunch of strangers can become family so quickly. Good people. The native Caymanians are really endearing and quirky, but I guess you get that way way living on an island for so long...Very colorful characters, they give the Ibethencos a run for their $. The really embraced us as family, letting us into their homes and their lives, their island, and their culture.
So I have service I my cell here- and I'll be here until Wed or so if you'd like to chat!
Tomorrow is supposed to be an easy day at the Turtle Farm. The Art Dept isnt really needed for sets, but we're going to be helping with wrangling sea turtles. They're pretty big- up to about 150 lbs and 2'-3'. We have to keep them from scampering off the beach with either wood boxes, or by sitting on them. Ride 'em cowboy!

Week 2- ...and ACTION!!

We started filming this week and we're off with breakneck speed. I just try to stay out of everyones way and be helpful when i can. We shot the house scene, a dock scene (which we had to remove a 12 foot wood ladder from the water and relocate it to another area..the thing must have weighed 200 pounds...we also had to remove a sign that was about 10 feet up in the air suspended between 2 poles and on the end of a curvy dock. (Side note, the owner of the dive shot..super hottie beach bum, chill guy...reminds me of the turtle in Finding Nemo, flirty too..my little Ray of Sunshine here)..also had to make anchor weights out of coral rock...hmm what else? we also shot a couple of scenes at a motel- one room was supposed to be a bedroom, so not a big design problem for us....but we had to make an office out of teh other one, which consisted of making a counter top/table- pillaging office items from the car rental place down teh street, and making a key holder out of driftwood...added green screen to a curved TV.
By the end of each day, everyone just wants to drink to get the edge off (people get pretty worked up in this industry) . I learned a new shot of absynth (gag reflex just kicked in) with a caramelized sugar cube on top...no bad if you shoot it fast..

Week 1-do you know who I am?

so its been about 2 weeks of being on the island, I need to catch everyone up. Cayman Brac
is a tiny island and I dont get any phone service, and due to my crazy work schedule, can only check emails every few days.

For the first week, only us, the production dept. and directors were here, basically scouting out locations and getting things ready for the rest of the crew arriving the following week. - Our job, being in the Art and Production department was basically to create sets and backdrops for the movie, but we could only use what was the either already on the island, or whatever could fit into our checked luggage. It was called 'Prep' week but really should be called 'Befriend the Locals and Scavenge the Islands" - week. This included getting to know the local people and seeing what they were willing to get us. Various items ranged from an old peeling paint caymanian rowboat, to garbage from their landfill to fill a yard, to bargaining with local fisherman to get fresh fish for a scene 1 week prior, to learning that there are only 4 hardware stores on the island...and what one store doesnt have the otheres will- learning to drive on the left hand side- customary to wave at everyone as you drive past them, maybe even offering the walkers a ride to the other end of this 12 mils island.

seeing that i am not getting paid for this, and am treating this strictly as a learning experience, I've basically just tried to be helpful and sit back and watch all the madness unfold. Our hours are a minimum of 12, for 6 days a week. we get sundays off..yay!
Our first set was to make a new house look dilapidated. We did this by gathering truck loads of garbage from their landfill and construction sites and strewing it about their front lawn. We also gathered 15 bags of leaves and 6 wheel barrel fulls of palm fronds and tossed them about as well. we took off the hurricane barriers on the windows-took out the screens, removed the lattice work from the base, got a hold of a couple of 'project boats' for the lawn-this took about 4 days- and their is a first for everyhtings- I worked in merely a sprts bra and shorts...in public. and I also found out that I'm no the best at applying sunscreen-I have three different sports bra tan lines, and also a couple of finger tips streaks along my lower back- look like a topography map. I have a whole new appreciation of manual labor. While its fulfilling on so many levels, it freakin tiring! And the schedule is so tight, the ocean is only 15 feet away, and I'm not allowed to take a dip (they use the guilt trip here a lot). But I stay positive in that at least I have the sun on my back and the ocean breeze cooling me off...while you suckas are stuck with 0 degrees ! ha! ;)

so I'm working for with my friend Cindy who is an Art director and her boss Rick who is production- I'm basically assisting both of them . I realize I'm pretty low on the totem pole here, but its weird that in the beginning , my opinion didn't really matter....and plus I was working like a immigrant laborer in the fields, at times I just wanted to shout, "do you know who I am ??" but then laugh it off at how ridiculous I know it is, and am just grateful for having this opportunity to learn something new..and get away from February in NYC