Inspirational Life Stories for Short Films

 To be born a girl 

My name is Maya. I was born 14 years ago in a poor peasant family. There were already many children, so when I was born no one was happy. When I was still very little, I learned to help my mother and elder sisters with the domestic chores. I swept floors, washed clothes, and carried water and fire-wood. Some of my friends played outside, but I could not join them. I was very happy when I was allowed to go to school. I made new friends there. I learned to read and write. But when I reached the fourth grade, my parents stopped my education. My father said there was no money to pay the fees. also, I was needed at home to help my mother and the others. If I were a boy, my parents would have let me complete school. My elder brother finished school and now works in an office in the capital. Two of my younger brothers go to school. Maybe they, too, will finish. I know I shall have to spend long hours working either at home or in the field. And then I'll be married. I have seen my mother working from early dawn to late at night. My live will not be much different. If I were given the choice of being born again, I would prefer to be a boy. Amerigo, a Street Child My name is Amerigo. I am 13 years old and I live on the street, alone. My mother, who is separated from my father, doesn't want me. She told me to go away, otherwise she would kill me. Now she lives with another man. My father lives very far away. I want to go to him, but he won't take me either. I begged him to send me some money so I could buy a bus ticket. I am still waiting. He hasn't answered. The streets are now my home. Sometimes I find work. I used to collect trash and sell it to a vendor. I stopped doing that after I had a serious infection and a doctor told me to stay away from the trash dump. Once I worked for an ice cream shop owner and sold ice cream on the beach. But I got no money in return. The owner of the shop gave me something to eat, and let me sleep in his hut at night. The work was difficult and painful. The ice cream box is quite heavy when it is full. I had to walk for hours, offering my ice cream to whoever wanted to buy. There were days when I could not even sell one ice cream. In a way, I am lucky because I am alive. My friends who work sorting rubbish in dumps often suffer from serious diseases. One of them was recently killed after he fell into a hole that opened up in the pile of trash. Many of us work for 10 to 12 hours, and get so little in return that we can't even buy food. Shoe-shining is very popular among the street kids. A few of my friends also work in factories and workshops. A boy I know lost one of his eyes after a piece of hot glass flew into his eye at the glass factory where he worked. The owner refused to pay for medical help and fired him. For me, like all other children on the street, it is very hard. I am always hungry, and I don't know where I will sleep the next night. I would like to live in my own home and sleep there in peace. The nights are very cold in the winter. You can dies of cold in the street. If I were given the choice of being born again, I would prefer to be a boy. I hope I would sleep in a home again ...  Almost a Miracle  My name is Gopamma. My friends call me Gopi. Now, when you see me I may seem like any other normal girl of my age, except that I have crutches. But less than a year ago, I was walking on all fours, dragging my eight-year-old body like a sack of potatoes. When I was two, I got sick with polio. I was ill for a long time, and my parents feared I wouldn’t survive. I did—but I couldn’t walk any more. My parents were very poor. They didn’t have enough money. All their savings had been spent on my treatment. There was nothing more they could do to help me. Relatives often wondered what would happen to me. “Who would marry her?”, they asked. I felt very bad. I couldn’t go to school, I couldn’t play like all other kids. Children ignored me, or often made fun of me. I would sit by the side of the road and watch them play. I had no friends. Then a miracle happened. Members of a voluntary organization came to our village, looking for children who needed medical help. They found me. Soon they took me to a hospital where doctors did corrective surgery on me. Later I had another operation, Soon, I was able to walk with the help of two wooden crutches. I was excited to be able to walk. Doctors told my parents that if I had been given a polio vaccine in time, I would have be spared the pain. Just imagine, such vaccines cost less than a bottle of soda water! When my mother learned about it, she took my three-year-old sister to be vaccinated. I was glad that she wouldn’t have to go through the same suffering and sadness I went through. Now I go to school. My elder brother, who is 10, takes me there every day, carrying me on his back. Other kids often joke about me, but they are friendly jokes. I know my friends mean no harm. I hope one day I shall grow up to be a teacher. Then, I shall tell everybody how important it is to give children polio vaccinations.  A Victim of War  My name is Patricio Nthupuela. When I was born, my country was at war. One day an armed group of people entered our village, bombed our houses and burned them. Both my parents were killed. Many other people were killed, too. A few years later, more violence rocked our village. Armed people kidnapped my sister and several of my cousins. Luckily, I was able to escape the attack. Many people left our village, crossed the borders and went into neighboring countries. They now live in refugee camps. I had always wanted to study. A few years ago, after realizing that I could not study in my village because of the war, I decided to move to a town 100 miles away. As I was traveling, a land-mine blew up our car. In the explosion I lost both my arms. It was very hard for me to be without both arms. But I wasn’t going to give up. I soon learned to write by holding a pencil in my mouth. In spite of my disability, I was admitted to school, and later, I passed the fourth and fifth grades. Now I am in the sixth grade. At school, my friends are very helpful, always ready to do whatever they can. I can put my clothes on, but I can’t fasten the buttons. I would like to have artificial arms. I have even traveled to the capital to find them. So far, I have not been lucky. Luck is not on your side when you are crippled and have nobody in the world.  “I feel like a lion-tamer entering the cage.”  In the Gustave Eiffel vocational school in he Paris suburb where Chantal Collin teaches, it is not unusual for students to attempt to set fire to the school. Some have already had problems with the law. One victim of a schoolyard “racket” recently came to school with a breadknife in his schoolbag. Although such incidents are infrequent, the combination of delinquency, parental unemployment and the collision of cultures—80 percent of the students are of immigrant origin—means that violence is never far from the surface. “Rights without responsibilities”, is how Chantal sums upp the attitude of many students. “With second-generation unemployment, they are used to living on welfare and getting advice from social workers on entitlements.” This can cause headaches. “One boy dropped out for a whole term but still expected to move up a class,” says Chantal, remarking that his father also say this as a right. Only 10 percent of parents ever visit the school. Many, she feels, have abdicated their responsibilities. “Our training has not prepared us for this kind of situation,” remarks Chantal, who would like to receive specialized help to deal with disturbed teenagers. “Some students have never been taught how to behave. They leave the room without asking, they enter without knocking, they walk around during class.” This incivility affects morale in both classroom and staffroom: more than one teacher has had a nervous breakdown. A teacher of seventeen years’ standing, Chantall believes the students’ problem is the low self-esteem that comes from repeated failure. “I try to understand how learning takes place, and what has gone wrong when it doesn’t. I set about giving them confidence in their ability to lean.“ To establish a diagnosis, she asks students to memorize a photograph down to the smallest detail. Later, when they describe it from memory, she asks them how they managed. “They’d say ‘I thought about it on the bus’ or ‘I remembered it every time I passed your door’ or ‘I thought of one detail first and then built up the picture.’” After demonstrating that learning can take many forms, Chantal assures students that they can apply the same techniques to a text, for example, to one of the made-to-measure workbooks she has prepared on her computer at home. Her greatest pleasure is to hear the words, “I understand now.” The visual and auditory play a major role in Chantal’s methods. “I use a lot of eye contact,” she admits. She speaks affectionately of how one boy, who towered above her, offered to be her bodyguard. “I don’t have any discipline problems,” she smiles. “At first I felt like a lion-tamer going into the cage. It was eat or be eaten.” Her students often say: “Madame, if you had pistols for eyes, we’d all be dead!” Source (c) United Nations More

Urban Shelters - Everyone needs a home

Sense of place characterizes authentic human attachment and belonging to a place. This media piece was done for Adobe Youth Voices Training as an AYV educator. Location Colombo Sri Lanka. June 16 2012.
Inspiration
Inspired by Daphine Nakabugo, my fellow AYV educator, I thought that I would share my experiences of making "URBAN SHELTERS" sense of place, after I am getting first wave of positive responses. I thought informing my process of creation would be useful to fellow AYV educators and specially for my students .


When I got this assignment, I checked the wikipedia and I was able to understand the concept of "Sence of place" in a much broader sense. First I thought that I would shoot a place with a nice scene.  There are beautiful landscapes in my area. I felt that it may not be something global. I wanted something stronger and talking to the viewers mind. 


The Opprtunity
Then, I got a chance to travel Colombo to receive zonta award for my daughter for her community services. I decided to create my "sense of place" story in Colombo. I was in a very good mood like it was a leisure trip, with my wife driving to avoid me getting traffic tickets!  I came up with the idea of doing it on Urban Living. But exactly had no plans on what.


I traveled to Colombo thinking all the way of a theme. Since Colombo is four hours drive from my home. We had to left around 5.30AM in good early morning breeze. We chose a Upul's place to refresh and change ourselves from casual clothes to formal attires. Upul usually helps me with my community work in Colombo. They live in a small house, could be considered as a clean slum, except on heavy rains and city floods. He was kind to invite us for lunch after the event. Thanks to him, we also wanted get back to casual form before returning to Kandy. 


I took some photos at the event but failed to create emotions with too yellowish color, too posh and less variety in scenes.


The real experience
On the way back to Upul's home, I got a real opportunity sitting on the front seat and not driving. I got a very good angles from the middle of the road. I shot low angles through window and windscreen. Bright sun, blue sky with white clouds created a good shooting experience. My mood also was perfect and relaxed. My wife drove me around the city for me to take photos. We returning to Upul's place for refreshing. After lunch. he took me around his community. His daughter also joined us. I also got my daughter to do an act for me of a urban women looking outdoor. I took her shot against the light. Good that she had done drama acting. I got a near perfect shot. A directors cut they say. The best thing I had was about 3 hours photography of urban scenes with varying lights, objects, people and shadows.  I would have captured much softer afternoon colors, If we had waited till late afternoon. 




Creating the Story
I had done about 70-80 shots of the day. Selecting best once were easier. Making to a 15 was harder. 12 was even harder. I kept it to 15 shots initially. Looking into the photos, I was searching for a real story. My friend's daughter's shot was my  best took. Zooming it, You can see me photographing her in her eye.  She always interacted with me with lots of fun. I made her my main character and heroic. Added her brother, father, mother,a friend and the crows on the galle face green canon to be sub characters in story. Finally I had captured "Urban Shelters" in my shoot. My blurred script idea really became completed. Script from shots isn't a bad idea for "sense place" creations.




When editing, I wanted to create a feeling with colors, to amuse the viewer. The Colombo City shot had a interesting bluish look, with blue sky background. Te World Trade Center blue glass walls matched it perfectly. I decided to use a blue tint in scenes to create an emotions in the story. I re-arranged order of scenes many times to create smooth flow of emotions. I used the long wide shot of Colombo sky-rises to established the location identity for my story. Thanks to my friend pro photographer Lanka who taught me to "establish location of the story". Colombo! everyone knows. The Harbor fence, reminded me of some prison at the first sight. A type of shelter people don't want to be. The rest aligned to the story smoothly to show the gradually changing differences of classes of people. I ended the story with the best shot, that's Upul's daughter looking directly into my lens with some hope, i guess from her eyes.


The message
I wanted to create a global message for AYV. Yet, I felt something is missing. I asked myself that "OK! I have shown Colombo's urban shelters, their differences. So what message would it finally deliver to a global audience?"  I started brain stroming with the idea of "need of a shelter", after sometime ended with "Everyone needs a home" message. The idea of putting the message inside a house was entirely my daughter's. I created the house graphic with freehand using windows paint. It has a wonderful set of brushes for free hand art.


Sounds & Transitions
I felt that I had a good story. Sound was my challenge. I wanted a sound that create empathy, some sadness and sense of reality. I wanted to capture the mind of the viewer at the scence.  I tried using shutter click sound of a camera to create a live feeling at transition. It worked. I added black empty spaces between scenes to create a stop and restart effect to make viewer see each scene uniquely. Films use this technique when changing scenes. I I wanted to keep viewer focused, not knowing what comes next. I actually try to show the story like a film rather than a photo story. I avoided captions, narations and text in the middle to differenciate it from a photo documentary. I wanted it to be a short film. One student said that this piece "captures the mind of the viewer like it's a film".


Background Sounds 
I found that the gaps between shutter clicks were empty and dull. I wanted to fill it with a sound. I asked my self "Why people need shelters?" Oh! the rain. Rain made people to want shelters first. That's how rain sound came into the background. I kept the rain sound low as shot done in sunlight. 


The Critical Review
Finally I loved what was created. Mostly of what I learned in the process and what would I do in the next. The critical reviews by youth I teach, were really helpful to me. They critisized everything from shots, angles, colors, sounds, title and message. Good that I had thought them to review media critically. They were the ones inspired me to my best. I


Lessons Learned
I have learned many things in this media creation process. Some of them are 


Follow the process of  planing -> production -> editing -> review -> exhibition


Think wider & See wider
Find an interesting idea to you
Let creative thoughts flow
Create emotions in the story
Collaborate in creation 
Deliver a message
Review Critically
Re-wise & Rework 
Do it with Joy!


My self expression on "URBAN SHELTERS" is that "I had an idea, blur with no complete script, deep and wide. I engaged myself in a creative production process, creating emotions with scenes, colors, sound and a message. I collaborated with others to review and improve it and did it with joy!" 


In abstract "I created with a purpose".


Niranjan Meegammana
AYV Educator
Shilpa Sayura Foundation