How time flies
We shot some “beauty shots” around Cape today, after our filming yesterday was put on hold due to unseasonably heavy rains making it impossible for the kids we were planning to film to get to school.
There is a sort of informal garbage dump within half a click of our house. It’s just a pile of random refuse with a couple of stripped trotros in front of it, a sign that says “no dumping,” and the occasional person walking by to do some, well, dumping of more refuse. Today someone dumped a bunch of coconut husks as we were filming, and several goats immediately showed up to eat the husks. We were filming that scene when several kids came up and wanted their photo taken. The photo at right is the result. I rather like it, despite the fact that some of my equipment found its way into the shot.
We roamed around Sidu and Kotakoraba shooting more candid beauty shots. Some worked out well, some not as well. At one point a random goat wandered up into the center of the frame about 4 feet from us and bleated directly at the camera, but unfortunately I got the focal mark slightly off so I don’t think the shot will work. Many other shots should come out though (I have only a netbook, so previewing footage here is an impossibility … it’s like I’m shooting film, but without the advantage of dailies, hah).
Miranda has been cooking a lot lately … I think today was the first day in Ghana that we’ve eaten entirely at home. Oatmeal and eggs for breakfast, macaroni for lunch, egg/tomato/onion sandwich for dinner. I am a happy boy.
I think the hardest part for me, to live long term in a place like Cape Coast, would be food. I don’t miss all that much about American culture, I don’t even miss high speed Internet all that much, I really just miss all the little things I would eat. I had a nice routine that I followed everyday, and droll as it might have been, it was a routine I liked. Sadly, there are no Bocaburgers in Ghana. So it is with some exuberance that I find Miranda to be developing ways to approximate what it was we ate in Seattle (with the addition of eggs and cheese to my diet, of course).
Tomorrow will be an interview shoot with Dom, which I have been much looking forward to.
