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Thriller fiction and Non-fiction

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Live music

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I’ve always been a sucker for live music.

I admire the nerve it takes to get up on a stage and lay it out there. This isn’t American Idol. It’s paying your dues in a club, honing your skills and building up your calluses. It takes a lot of nerve to get on stage in a bar after midnight and sing or play an instrument. Half the people aren’t paying any attention to you at all. The rest are ignoring you. And everyone has been drinking. But still you do it. And you love it.
Jean Hanna Davis and Stan Bumgardner at the Boulevard Tavern.
I went to an open mic night last night. Jean Hanna Davis was in town and planned to drop by and sing a few songs. She always blows me away when she sings, so I went to hang out, catch up and see what was going on.
There were several people ahead of her on the list of people who had signed up for their chance to wow the crowds so we got a chance to hang out and talk before she finally took the stage. We listened to the musicians who came in and out. Some were good. Others, fair. A couple of the players were exceptional. But they all had fun. And they were all living their dream. One or two, including Jean, had “presence.” It isn’t enough to be technically proficient. You have to believe in yourself enough to step onto the stage, grab the microphone and take control of the crowd.
Jean definitely believes in herself. She hated to be out so late, and thought about leaving, but then she said, “But I really wanna play!” So, we stayed. The crowd that stayed around was rewarded with a great set, too. Several people came up to her afterward and wanted to know who she was and where else they could hear her perform. I know she loves that recognition, she is human, but she also plays because she loves it. And that shows through.
Without trying to be too philosophical, it takes presence to do anything you believe in. It obviously takes skill and practice to perform. But it also takes passion, dedication and patience.  It takes guts to stand up in front of a crowd and perform, to write, to paint, to dance.
There is a song lyric by Anna Lyric that always struck me.
“2 AM and I’m still awake, writing a song
If I get it all down on paper, it’s no longer inside of me,
Threatening the life it belongs to
And I feel like I’m naked in front of the crowd
Cause these words are my diary, screaming out loud
And I know that you’ll use them, however you want to”
The next time you get a chance to catch some live music, or anyone performing their talent, do it. And think about what it takes to stand up in front of a crowd, metaphorically naked. Then reward the ones who do it with your applause.
If you want to hear Jean, “Like” her fanpage on Facebook. She has some music recording and videos on there.

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Boat trip

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(This is the last of four blog posts about traveling and working with the NBC crew to tell the story of the lobster divers of Honduras.)

 

In my previous trips to Honduras, I had seen many, many injured divers—at the clinic, at home and on the streets. The one thing I had never been able to see was the divers actually at work. Last year when National Geographic was working on their online profile, they couldn’t find any photographs of the Miskito Indians diving either. (If they can’t find any diving images, you know no one has them.) 

So, when NBC offered me the opportunity to go along with their camera man to act as a safety diver and shoot photographs of the divers in action, I jumped at the chance. Even with that motivation, the boat was not exactly a pleasure cruise. At no time was I ever threatened or uncomfortable, but there was a time when we were 90 miles off shore, out of radio contact and not even sure what waters we were in, I got a little nervous.
Our captain, Nelson, and his crew liked to smoke pot and drink beer. A lot. There was some irony to that as well. The boat was originally a US flag vessel which means it carried the standard US Coast Guard placards that describe the no tolerance policy for drug use on board. Just a few feet away from that sign was where the crew prepared the pot to smoke it.

I’m not sure what the actual design of the boat was originally, but it had been dramatically changed with storage bins on the bow and stern…presumably for lobster. To make the trip, we were carrying extra diesel fuel in barrels on the narrow decks. Several times we had to stop so the crew could siphon more fuel from the barrels into the fuel tanks. Often the crew did this while smoking cigarettes. At one point in the middle of the night they must have spilled some because the smell of diesel filled the cabin where we slept and the next morning everything was greasy.

 

When we finally arrived at the lobstering grounds, it took us a few hours to find the dive boat we were supposed to meet up with. And when we did, he was in Nicaraguan waters. We were going to wait on him, but it was going to be a couple hours before he came back to Honduran waters. Fortunately we found another boat close by and they were willing to help. Bruce got on board and shot for a couple hours. It turned out that there was an injured diver on board the dive boat and so we brought him home with us. Elmer took began his care and he flew back to La Ceiba on the plane with us. It was the first time he had ever flown.

Chris and I went out in the skiff to dive. We had asked to have our own tanks, which we didn’t get and also have lead weights which weren’t there either. We ended up using tanks from the dive boat. We had to try 12 different tanks to find four that would work. They all had garbage for o-rings. Fortunately Chris brought along weights so we could dive, although not together. He did three dives and I just got in one, but still got in some good shots.

 

At one point Nelson brought the bigger boat over to tell us we needed to move. We had drifted into Colombian waters. During the trip, we had ventured from Honduras, to Nicaragua and then Colombia. All without ever setting foot on dry land.

 

It was around 1 pm when we got back on the boat. And we still had to go home. Heading back to Puerto Lempira we had good weather and a following sea so it flattened the ride out nicely. We slept some and relaxed…until about 1130 when Nelson woke us up to tell us that he had run out of oil. We were only 10 miles or so from shore, but we decided to wait until first light to go in then. I didn’t really sleep the rest of the night. It was hot below decks in the cabin so I went up in deck and lay down on a pad. After the moon went down, the stars were amazing. I spent the night on a rocking boat staring at the stars.
It took us another 2.5 hours and another boat transfer to get back to Puerto Lempira. A total of 38 hours from the time we left. The rest of the crew was frantic when they met us at the dock. Natalie Morales, the correspondent, had already left that morning, but she called as soon she got to La Ceiba to check on us. Dr. Mejia had been in contact with the Honduran Navy and they had a boat out looking for us.
All in all, a pretty amazing trip. We were exhausted when we got back to town, but it was worth it. We got some fantastic footage that made the Rock Center with Brian Williams piece that much more special.
I hope that this show will bring some attention to this problem. It is slowly killing off an entire generation of indigenous people.
If you are interested in making a contribution to help support Dr. Mejia’s clinic, you can do so here.

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La Moskitia

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(Day three of traveling with the NBC crew to tell the story of the Lobster Divers of Honduras.)

Tuesday morning, October 4, we got up at 3:30 am to go to the airport for the flight to Puerto Lempira. We had the flight to ourselves which made it nice considering how much gear we brought along. And that was with leaving part of it in the hotel.

The Miskito Indians live in a region of Honduras and Nicaragua called La Moskitia, also known as the Mosquito Coast. It spans the far eastern end of both countries and the Indians pretty much ignore those borders. To get there, though, you have to fly or take a boat. There are no roads that lead from La Ceiba out to La Moskitia.

Same airport, same plane, but this picture was taken on my
first trip to La Moskitia.

The plane is a small high wing puddle jumper…which was appropriate since it was the rainy season and we landed in the rain with mud puddles on the dirt air strip. The recurring theme of this trip was equipment. It took a while for the baggage handlers to get everything off the plane so the rest of the crew wandered around the “terminal” buildings for a few minutes. They were surprised that one of the first human beings they saw was a paralyzed diver in a wheel chair. He was sitting in the terminal making crafts for sale.

The Moskito Indians are the only Hondurans who dive for lobster. And their semi-isolation tends to keep them close together. This makes them easy to forget about until you land in Puerto Lempira. Then, injured and paralyzed divers are everywhere.

We went straight to the hotel and then got ready to go right back out. We took most of our gear with us. Later that afternoon, we were going to meet up with the boat that would take some of us out to see the divers in action.

Before we left the hotel, though, Natalie was able to interview the director of the lobster divers association. He was the first to say it, but not the last, that even though groups hold meetings and make promises, they have received nothing from those organizations, not even a pencil.

The director and assistant director of the diver’s association accompanied us on a small water taxi boat to Kaukira. That is one of the villages where many of the divers live. When we got there, we went to the home of Nelson, who would be our boat captain as well. We loaded into his truck with his wife driving and went off to visit divers at their homes.

 

At the first one, where I had been before, the people next door were drunk and began yelling at us to go home, saying that people come to La Moskitia and point their cameras but nothing ever gets done. He yelled most of the time we were there.

We visited a couple more homes, taking time to talk to the divers and listen to their life stories. Most of them were just trying to feed their families. They didn’t really understand the risks of diving, even though they all knew others who had been injured before them. Every family in Kaukira has a disabled diver in it.

As I said, we all piled into Nelson’s truck to visit the divers. I tend to identify more with the camera guys, so I jumped in the bed of the truck with them. I was seated on the tailgate, with my camera up to my face most of the time. When we hit one deep rut in the dirt road, the rusted-through cable that held up the tailgate broke, nearly sending me crashing into the mud. Fortunately, Dr. Mejia was sitting beside me talking and he grabbed my arm to steady me while the camera crew yelled for the driver to stop.

When it was finally time to go to the boat, we cut straight across the peninsula, rather than going back around to the roads. We drove through a swamp and then came out on the beach where we met a small boat that took us through the surf to get to the large boat.

As soon as we got on the boat we knew there was a problem. It was old and run down and there was no bathroom. Space was very tight and there were only 5 bunks. We had 10 people with a crew of 6.

 

Very quickly we decided that three of us would stay on board the boat to see the divers diving. The rest of the crew returned to Kaukira and Puerto Lempira and visited more divers in their homes. It really worked out for the best as we had almost no room for ourselves and by splitting the crew, we got a lot more done.
If you are interested in making a contribution to help support Dr. Mejia’s clinic, you can do so here.

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Another day, another diver

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(This is the second installment of the behind-the-scenes account of traveling with the NBC crew for the Rock Center story.)

Monday morning dawned early for most of us. The time difference was two hours then (daylight savings time was still on) so even though most of us wanted to sleep to be.

 

It worked out just as well, though. Photographer Bruce Bernstein and soundman/grip Chris Nickless and I were having breakfast around 7 am when Dr. Mejia came to the hotel. He was on the way to the dock to pick up another diver who was arriving right then. The man was more severely injured than the divers the night before. We all jumped into a car and took off for the clinic. 

Dr. Mejia opened his hyperbaric clinic in November of 2009 to treat divers. This diver was his 227th patient in less than two years. He had serious weakness in one leg and no strength at all in the other. He was also unable to urinate on his own. Elmer placed a catheter and began the treatment; another US Navy Treatment Table 6. Dr. Mejia said he believed the diver would make a good recovery. He was already showing signs of recovery after the first few oxygen cycles of the treatment.

This treatment was the 596th time Dr. Mejia had run a treatment since opening the clinic. He averages seven treatments per patient; often multiple divers are in the chamber at the same time. While Dr. Mejia sees the most severe patients, almost always with some level of paralysis and often with bladder control issues, he has had tremendous success. He has an 81 percent success rate of divers leaving the chamber under their own power. Often they need a cane or a walker, but they are in much better shape than when they arrived.

 

What still amazes me is that Dr. Mejia only charges about $300 US per diver. That is for all his care, not per treatment. Care includes treatment, food, lodging, physical therapy, any tests he has to run. Dr. Mejia doesn’t charge the divers. He charges the boat owners, although sometimes they won’t pay. He is reluctant to raise his prices any, however, as he is afraid the boat owners will refuse to pay, or worse will skip treatment all together.

 

I asked Dr. Mejia what he needed. His first answer was a generator. It is Honduras and the power goes out from time to time. He said he was afraid every time he began a treatment at night that the power would go out. He needs a better air compressor, too. The one he has is an industrial compressor, not designed for this type of work at all. He said he needs money for wheel chairs, walkers and canes as well. And shoes. Most of his patients don’t make it to the chamber with shoes as they are taken right off of a boat and brought to the chamber.
But he does an exceptional job with very little. And he keeps doing it because it has to be done.
For anyone who watched the story last night on NBC’s Rock Center and are interested in contributing to help Dr. Mejia, you can do so here.

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Working With NBC

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A little more than a year ago, NationalGeographic.com profiled the problems with the lobster divers in Honduras; they used several of my photographs and quoted Dr. Matias Nochetto from DAN and I about the issue as we were both working on the Harvesting Diver Project.

In September of this year, I was contacted by a reporter from the New York Times who was headed to Honduras on a different story but remembered the NatGeo piece and wanted to do a follow up. That story ran in September (almost a year to the day to after NatGeo).

Just after the NYT story ran, a producer from NBC contacted me to get more background information. Over the next couple weeks I spent approximately 6 hours on the phone with them, talking about logistics and helping them understand the diving situation and terminology. They finally invited me to join their news crew for a few days when they went to Honduras.

And that is how I came to be standing at the airport in San Pedro Sula, Honduras on a Sunday afternoon surrounded by security, a dozen people and more than 35 cases and pieces of luggage. The camera guys had 23 cases of their own just for equipment. I knew this was going to be a completely different trip than any other trip I had made to Honduras…or anywhere for that matter.

Natalie Morales from the Today Show was the correspondent for the story. She is an extremely down-to-earth person and didn’t really want any special considerations. The network was nervous about her being there so they had hired security personnel for the crew and one man, Frank, was her personal security. 

After getting all the equipment and crew packed into five cars, which took a while, we headed out for the two-and-a-half hour drive from San Pedro Sula to La Ceiba where Dr. Elmer Mejia operates a hyperbaric chamber. I’ve written about him several times in this blog previously.

During the drive Dr. Mejia was on the phone with a boat owner. We learned that injured divers were on the way to the chamber. First it was 3, then 4 and finally 5 divers were going to arrive at the clinic. Since the story was developing so quickly, the crew decided to go straight to the dock to pick them up. By the time we got there it was pouring the rain and dark, but the camera guys went down to the docks with Dr. Mejia and got them. The rest of stayed outside as the port security was edgy about too many of us going inside.

With so many injured divers at one time, Dr. Mejia had to put two divers in the outer lock and compress the entire chamber at one time. This is not safe, as there is no way to lock someone in or out of the chamber if there was a problem, but Dr. Mejia felt he didn’t have a choice. After examining each of the divers, four had relatively minor problems, but one had more severe injuries. He began a US Navy Treatment Table 6 at 7 pm. The treatment would not end until nearly midnight.

Day 1 has a happy ending, though, as after a shorter treatment on Monday morning each of the divers was released to go back home. Whether it was the quick treatment or luck, we will never know. Unfortunately, many of the divers don’t have that sort of luck when it comes to dealing with paralysis caused by decompression sickness.

Before the group of five divers left the clinic, Dr. Mejia fed them lunch and got them cleaned up. And then Thelma Sakeyama came to the clinic. She is a special evangelical pastor to the people of La Moskitia. She sang and preached for them and they seemed to appreciate it. Before they left, she took down all of their names.

The next couple posts will detail my experiences with NBC in Honduras to help them tell this story. They asked me at the time not to publish these stories until their story was ready to air. The trip began on a Sunday and I flew home on Thursday afternoon.

For anyone who watched the story last night on NBC’s Rock Center and are interested in contributing to help Dr. Mejia, you can do so here.

Tomorrow, I will post about our first full day on the ground in San Pedro Sula. Stay tuned..

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