Museum of Toilets

I know it sounds strange, but today we visited the International Museum of Toilets located here in New Delhi. Really.
Audrey's Canadian friend, Alexis joined us for this adventure... The museum is managed by an India-based NGO called, Sulabh International. The organization's mission is to develop low-cost, reusable, disposal systems for human waste. The systems actually pretty interesting. They are designed to range in cost from about $20-200 per unit.

The designs use local materials like wood, brick, stone, or even concrete made from bacteria-free, recycled human waste. Sublabh's proven concept eliminates the escape of greenhouse gases, and removes the need and cost of transporting waste. The majority of the waste is recycled locally into 99.9% bacteria-free fertilizer. Units have also been designed and successfully built to capture and distribute bio-gas for local use in cooking, lighting and heating.
The museum provides a guided summary of the 4,500 year old history of toilets. (beginning with the Indus Valley civilizations and winding its way through Egypt, Rome, Europe, England and the Americas) The history toilets culminates with NASA's high-tech vacuum systems used by astronauts and cosmonauts on the International Space Station. The staff and scientists at Sulabh shared their ideas about the future of simple, yet proven biodegradable and sustainable technologies.
In the past 25 years, Sulabh International has constructed some 650,000 twin "pour-flush" toilet systems in India and the developing world. Within India alone, it is still estimated that over 600 million people continue do their "business" outside because of cultural habit or because they do not have access to sanitary, functional facilities.
Human waste is huge issue for public health and safety, and continues to be one of the main contamination sources of public drinking water. The problem persists throughout other parts of the world including Africa, many parts of South Asia, Central & South America and throughout rural Pacific island nations..
For more info on Sulabh Interational and their innovative sanitation, power and human service initiatives, go to:

http://www.sulabhinternational.org/

It may be toilets, but its important, and curiously fascinating stuff.

The Video Shoot

My Canadian friend, Mark and I got to do a video shoot last week. The phone rang and a voice asked: "Can you play a part in a "Scratch Video?"
I'm sure there was a long pause before I gave the voice an answer.
It turned out to be Priyam. She works at a company that I had done voice-overs for in the past.
So I said: "Sure, I guess so."

Then Priyam asked: "Do you have a friend who can do it with you?" There must have been another long pause.
"What exactly is a scratch video?"
"A demo. This is a video of a talk show we're planning. You'll be the person being interviewed and your friend will be the Interviewer."

"You know I'm not an actor," was all I could say. "I do voice-overs."
"Do you have a friend who can do it?" I thought of Mark. He's been in India for 6 years. He speaks Hindi and has even done a scene in a Bollywood movie. Poor Mark.

"Yeah." I said, fumbling for his number, still confused.
"Have him call me and I'll send you the script."
Another long pause.
"We shoot tomorrow at 12:30. It'll only take 20 minutes." Priyam hung up.

I got the script and it was longer than I had imagined. Mark's character asked a few questions, but my part was the "Criminology Expert." My character was an ex-cop and had lengthy responses to Mark's one-liners about correctional facilities, recidivism rates and judicial procedures.
Recidivism? I had to look that up on Wikipedia.

In the morning I was a nervous wreck. I'm not an actor. I'd gotten to be pretty good with audio, but video... I look like a middle-aged hack with bad posture, caught in on-coming headlights. I was sure Priyam just wanted to meet her requirement to have two western looking guys sitting in the studio chairs.

I called her.
"You'll be fine," she said. "I'll make sure we have a teleprompter. See you at 12:30."There was no teleprompter.
The studio was in the basement of someone's house in South Delhi. Everyone there was nice. Priyam gave us each a glass of water and a script. The font was slightly larger than the one she'd emailed me. But the text was grayed out as if the script had been highlighted in yellow, but printed out on a black and white printer.

"Can you make the font larger so we can read it? Maybe get rid of the gray?"
The crew wagged their heads from side to side - Priyam, the sound man, the camera man and the project coordinator. Beads of sweat were forming on my forehead despite the AC chilling the room.

"Here, just put it on the table." Priyam said. "It will be close there."
"But I told you, I'm not an actor. I'm not very good at memorizing lines."
Everyone wagged their heads again. I looked at Mark. I was afraid he was going to wag his head from side to side.

"Let's do it."

It took the crew about 15 minutes to realize what we really needed were cue cards. The project leader wanted the lines read exactly as printed. A second script appeared for me. The font was in a larger size and Priyam offered to hold it up for me. But then she kept getting in the frame. Finally an old microphone boom was dragged out onto the set to act as a "teleprompter." My script was clipped to the boom and we were ready for business.They filmed me for 30 minutes and then it was Mark's turn. Of course he had tried to memorize his lines, but the crew wanted precise dialog.
"Do you think you could do the same for me?" he asked. I could hear the frustration growing in Mark's voice. There was another chorus of wagging heads. And a long pause.
He sighed: "Same deal. Bigger font. Hang it on the boom."

The crew filmed reaction-shots and then Mark's new, bigger, whiter script appeared. We were almost done.

The experience ended with us all sitting in a circle of chairs surrounded by video and sound equipment sipping masala chai and munching on biscuits."We'll call you if something else pops up," Priyam said smiling.
I shook hands with her and wagged my head:
"Why not?

Escaping the Heat

It's been really hot in Delhi... topping 100 F degrees for several weeks now. Today was a particularly ugly 111 F. When you are used to the convenience of central air conditioning these temperatures are certainly manageable... No such luck here. Only room air con and unpredictable power outages.
Thankfully, We managed to escape the heat for three days this past weekend by taking the train to Dehradun and a taxi up to the town of Mussoorie. The temperatures were 3o degrees cooler, the sky was fresh and clear and the mornings were cool and crisp!
Lesa's cousin, Hannah was along for the ride, enjoying a two week visit and also happy to get out of the heat. This was the second time we visited Mussoorie - such a great place to relax. Walking the Victorian paths, seeing the snow-covered Himalayan mountains in the distance, eating fresh momos (Tibetan dumplings) and chicken soup

Mussoorie is a bit of a remnant of the British Raj era, choc full of flower gardens, Victorian wrought iron railings, gates and cute mountainside cottages. Wish I was still there...