Wedding Hunters!: From Wedding Hunt to Wedding Crash

Or, The Practice Wedding. Continued from the previous post!

by Stax. Photos by Stax.

Saturday arrived, so we gathered our gear – stripped down a little, as this would just be a practice run – and drove to Oncesti to have coffee with Bud at his guesthouse (Pensiunea Bud Mariana) before we crashed the wedding. As we drove into town, lines of cars on either side of the road and boisterous accordion music gave away the location, a small house near the top of the hill.

At Bud’s, we ask one more time: “Is it really okay if we crash the wedding?”

As every red-blooded American knows, weddings are for GUESTS via INVITATION ONLY.  You do not walk through someone’s backyard right behind their houses as a shortcut through the village (as people constantly do here) unless you want a visit from the cops, and you DO NOT crash weddings. Our American brains have difficulty comprehending that yes, it’s often perfectly all right for a foreigner to show up at the wedding of strangers in Maramures.

“Yes. Yes. Of course. It’s okay,” Bud reassures us. “People are very friendly here.”

Unfortunately Bud could not attend after all, so we’d be on our own for translators – hopefully there would be a teenager who wanted to practice their English there. We approached the wedding, striding purposefully toward the house to hide our anxiety. The sound of music and dancing grew louder. We were going to crash this wedding of complete strangers and worse, we were going to invade the proceedings with cameras and try to get some footage.

We stopped in front of the large wooden gate, next to a gaggle of young women who were dressed in a variety of very old and very new styles. Modern black dresses mixed with traditional sheepskin and woven wool vests over white puffy shirts, black and red skirts, tights and black furry boots. Some heads were bare, others covered in a colorful array of scarves.

The Women

Two older men in traditional garb stood, wobbling a bit with slight smiles on their faces, in front of the gate. One of the men brandished a giant bottle of tequila to pour shots for those just arriving.

“Is there a wedding happening? ” Ben asked one of the men n his inquisitive manner.

Before anyone could answer, a woman spied us from inside the gate. Her face lit up. She walked straight up to us and began to speak in rapid Spanish. From her gestures alone, we surmised her meaning: “Come inside, I’ll show you around!”

Her words hovered around my the language areas of my brain like hummingbirds, searching for flowers of meaning to pollenate. I struggled to snatch the different words. I hadn’t spoken Spanish since our trip to Spain and Morocco last year. My skills had been sitting in the dark and dusty parts of my brain and it was plainly obvious.

I tilted my head toward her and squinted my eyes a bit in concentration. With our powers combined, Beej and I deciphered that she was the sister of the groom and her name was Ileana. She grew up in Maramures, but she’d been living in Valencia, Spain, with two South American women – which is where she acquired the rapid-fire Spanish. While Ileana talked her father handed Beej the bottle of Tequila and urged both of us to take a deep swig. (Seriously, guys. Welcome to Romania.)

The groom’s father clutching his Tequila.

After the introductions, Ileana lead us past the revelers and into the house to show us the “traditional room” of the house. Many houses in the Maramures region have a room where they display large hand-crafted items – wool rugs, tapestries, and clothing – that the craftier women in the family hand-make. Ileana took down a particularly bright and colorful red vest and helped me put it on, gesturing for Beej to take a picture.

Dress
Not me, but another woman wearing the special wedding vest.

I took note of a row of heavy blankets and hanging from the wall, arranged similar the way that fancy wrapping papers or bolts of fabric are arranged horizontally in a store. Ileana grasped a part of one and rubbed the wool between her fingers. “Mi madre,” Ileana looked at us. “Mi madre hizo la manta.”

Her mother made this.

She pointed to my camera and mimed taking pictures. “Fotos.”

I held up my camera. “I can take photos?” I asked.

“Yes. Yes.” She nodded her head vigorously and waved her hand around the room. “Cualquier cosa.”

Anything. People started to fill the small room. One of them, a younger cousin in his 20’s from the area of Alba Iulia pretty far south of here, had very good English. So Ileana appointed him our minder during the rest of the groom’s party.

Blankets
I know. It’s a dark picture. Sorry, guys.

At one point we were seated at a table outside behind the courtyard beside the musicians, who were playing up a storm. An older woman, explained to be the groom’s mother, came by with plates and pointed at the meat and bread on the table. The older women in the family tend to do a lot of the planning and cooking around the weddings, we are to find out.

Horincă was poured, of course, along with big bowls of ciorbă, a creamy and sour soup well stocked with chunks of of sheep and cow stomach lining (tripe) that Americans don’t normally eat.

The Woman Who Gave us Food
The mother of the groom. She gave us stomach lining.

Through talking to the cousin, we find that he was as lost as we were about some of the customs here.

“I am from another village in a different region,” he told us. “If anyone dressed like these people in my town, we would think he was crazy!”

The groom’s pre-party was winding down. Let me explain: before the wedding ceremony, the bride and groom have separate pre-parties where they eat, drink, dance and take pictures with their respective families. It’s kind of like a pre-game of opposing football teams, except the different teams will get married instead of pounding each other into the ground.

The Groom
The groom in the traditional room. It’s his party and he’ll smile if he wants to.

After this event, we were told, the groom’s party would drive a huge procession of cars about 20km to meet up in the bride’s town, Sighetu Marmatiel, to join with the bride’s side.

Now, it didn’t seem to us the safest proposition to be involved in this train of cars after the amounts of horinca we’d seen some of the guests drink. But with luck, the entire groom’s family would make it in one piece.

But even after this, the night wouldn’t be over. After carousing some more in Sighetu, the complete wedding party would drive east to somewhere in the mountains near Viseu de Sus – over 50km the opposite direction – to marry.

Anyway, we were pretty sure this was the plan, but we didn’t have much time to confirm because soon everyone was on the move up the street in a large procession. They were only headed to their cars; but what a grand parade they were.

Musicians played near the front and set the beat, while at the head of the pack, a guy we later identified as the the groom’s best man twirled and tossed a big colorful flag into the air like a majorette of a marching band. Cars arriving in town had to weave around the huge procession to pass through. At one point, the crowd moved to the side as a mammoth tour bus edged past them. As he passed, the bus driver honked enthusiastically at the groom’s party below while all the passengers stood, waved and cheered.

Though we didn’t get a chance to follow the rest of the wedding that night – this was practice for the main event later in the month – we managed to get some photos of the party.

Parade Time

Walking Guests

Saxophone

Music time accordion to this guy. (Haha! Get it!)
Music time accordion to this guy. (Haha! Get it?)

Groomsmen

Stay tuned for Part Three!

Breb, Romania: Welcome to Maramureş

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Text by Stax. Photos by Beej.

By the time we leave Romania, I’m going to be fat. They’re going to  have to roll me out onto the tarmac at the airport. Or better yet, just float me across the sea like a bottle.

After our long confinement on flights from Eugene to Seattle to Los Angeles to Oslo to Budapest, then the train to Cluj-Napoca, Romania, and finally our trip by car north to Breb, a nice open float doesn’t seem so bad.

When delicious food is combined with generous people who will keep feeding you until there is nothing left to feed you, it doesn’t bode well for the ol’ waistline. Our diet in Maramures consists of homemade broths and soups with tripe and other fats from various pigs, cows and sheep; potatoes, tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbage, peppers and herbs fresh from the garden; mushrooms gathered from the hills; and bread. Lots and lots of bread that magically refills your basket when you turn your head away.

So Breb. Where the heck is it and why are we here?

It all goes back to last year. When Beej and I traveled through Romania, we were told that if “traditional” weddings were what we sought, we needed to head to Maramures.  And Breb is famously one the most traditional villages in the the region. So that’s where we be.

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Our tiny European-made Ford Ka bubble car, with its lawnmower engine, can barely handle the grades as we descend into Breb from the narrow highway zigzagging above.The fields spread down below us all the way to the base of the distant Gutai Mountains. The small fields are dotted with towering haystacks in that distinctive Romanian style – bell-shaped surrounding a central pole, which we are told keeps the water from rotting the hay over the winter and thus keeps animals alive.

We pass a big white church with two towers and lots of rustic wooden houses that look handmade. Smoke rises from chimneys, obscuring the view as the pavement degrades to dirt and mud scattered with fist-sized rocks unearthed by the recent rainfall. The road narrows even more as we struggle in first gear toward Babou Maramures Hostel. Sometimes we have to stop for long minutes to let teams of horses pulling wooden carts full of pumpkins, hay, or tree limbs pass us by. I feel like we’ve entered into the Shire–if we give ourselves enough time, we may just find Hobbiton.

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Elderly women in traditional dress (patterned scarves, baggy black dresses, wool leggings, boots) – some carrying mean-looking scythes across their backs from the fields – stop us for a chat. They can’t speak English and we can’t speak Romanian, but somehow we manage. The two most common phrases we hear:  “Buna seară” (good evening) and “De unde sunteti?” (where are you from).

“America,” we answer.  They nod their heads in amazement. “Ahhhh…Amehreecaaaaah.” Sometimes they raise their hand to mimic a plane, suggesting we’ve come a long, long way.

For our first night, we stay at Pensiunea Maramou, a farm bed-and-breakfast owned and operated by a local woman, Maria, and her mother. We had planned to stay at the hostel, but they were booked.

I can’t complain. Though the cost is twice as much as the hostel, the comfort and free meals makes it seem like a steal at 100 RON a night per person: a beautifully decorated room with hand-woven wool rugs and heavy sheepskin comforter on the bed for maximum coziness, plus an all-you-can-stuff-your-face home-cooked breakfasts and dinners made mostly fresh from the animal products on the farm. To top it off there is a nice view of the town from our room.

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That first night at dinner, we chat with Mihai, the Romanian head of an ecological NGO, and two Icelandic National Park rangers who are staying at the Pensiunea. They all met 15 years ago during a National Park exchange between Iceland and Romania, and the three have been visiting each other in their respective countries ever since.

(In a weird sort of coincidence, Mihai and his NGO, Romanian Ranger Association, had written one of the first papers detailing the environmental destruction of the planned Rosia Montana gold mine back in 2001, when it was first proposed. We had gone to the FanFest at Rosia Montana a year before and met the filmmaker whose documentary chronicles the movement against the mine. Small world we meet someone so influential in that movement, which grew to encompass the E.U., here in Maramures a year later.)

Our talk is only interrupted by Maria and her mother try to burst our stomachs by giving us more food or to admonish us laughingly for not drinking enough horincă. We try to explain that while they’ve been working up huge appetites working in fields and farms, we have been sitting in a car.

And we can’t be blamed for going easy on the horincă, a clear plum-based sort of brandy distilled by everyone and their mothers in Maramures. While all ţuica is strong, the Maramureş version, horincă, will clean your insides. One sip from my tiny shot glass and I feel like I’m breathing fire.200

So anyway, here we are in what could easily be Middle Earth, but on our own Fellowship journey to find traditional weddings.  We aim to spend the next week narrowing down our search.  And we’re starting, of course, with the wooden churches.

More on that in the next post!

Read Our Guest Article on PeanutsorPretzels.com!

Hi Misadventurists,

Occasionally we guest post on other travelers’ blogs, and Liz and Josh from peanutsorpretzels.com were kind enough to invite us to post on their awesome, super-glossy website about filming our Web series in Cambodia. Liz and Josh are currently in an area of China with spotty wi-fi so we thank them doubly for putting our post up so quickly! Click the Buddhas below to read Stax’ scintillating article!

Khmer-Wedding-Pinterest
Our Guest Article on Peanuts or Pretzels!

This Week’s Bluff the Reader/Pop Quiz Answer Revealed

It’s the moment of truth for another Bluff the Reader Pop Quiz.

And so, Without further ado (or interruption, or digression, as it were, et cetera), the correct answer was #3!

strange-wedding-customs

Seems too ridiculous to believe, huh? But you must all have fish on your minds, because a lot of you beat us at our game and got this one right.

So many, in fact, we actually had to get out the Sorting Hat (a.k.a, Beej’s greasy old ball cap he’s worn all around the world and never washed ONCE), which we only break out of its glass case on special occasions like this (because the smell). From this hat, we drew three winners:

1. Lady Miriam Barber of Santa Cruz
2. The Right Honorable Matthew Ten Eyck of San Diego
3. Duchess Debbie Libokmeto of Kansas City

Sadly, after an exhaustive YouTube search we couldn’t find a video of the practice (idea for a future episode?), but as a consolation, here’s an awesome remake of “Gangnam Style” done at a Korean-American wedding in Oakland, CA:

Bluff the Reader/POP QUIZ

Okay loyal readers. It’s time for this week’s Bluff the Reader Pop Quiz! Again, guess which wedding tradition is the real one of the three, and you could win a cool postcard with a personal message from yours truly. No Googling, Scouts Honor (and Beej was a Wolf Scout. If you cheat he’ll know.)

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We’ll announce the answer and the three winners of the drawing on Saturday Jul 25.
READY?

1. In some parts of central Russia, before she can be considered married, a bride must burn her childhood rag doll (commonly given to daughters) on the groom’s doorstep, then grind the ashes into a loaf of bread.

2. Wedding dinners for important families in some Amazonian villages include an amazing display of eating prowess. The groom’s brothers compete in a raw crocodile-egg-eating contest for the right to court the village head’s daughter.

3. If you’re a groom in parts of Korea, directly after you tie the knot you can expect your groomsmen to tie your ankles together with rope, remove your shoes and socks, and take turns  slapping your feet with little dead fish. It’s supposed to make you more….ahem….e-fish-ent in bed on your wedding night.

Guesses can be posted in comments, or if you’re an email subscriber only, message us by email at misadventuristfilms@gmail.com. Good luck!

POP QUIZ!

POP QUIZ:
Here’s a new quiz for you all!
One of these weird wedding traditions is a real practice. The other two are fake. Respond in the comments or with a FB message with what you think is the REAL wedding tradition (no Googling, people! Just your best guess) by the end of tomorrow, and the correct answers will be entered into a drawing for a special prize: a cool postcard from somewhere in the world.
READY?

1. A Ghanaian tribe’s tradition states that before a man can marry, the potential groom and his future father-in-law must race through sometimes thick forest – on only one leg – from the groom’s village to the bride’s village. If the groom loses the race, the wedding is off!

2. In some Hindu belief, a bride (or groom) that is born under certain a certain unfavorable astrological sign will be doomed to an unhappy marriage. The situation can be remedied, according to some traditions, by the afflicted partner first marrying a tree. If the tree is then burned, the effects of the bad luck will be nullified.

3. In far northern Norway, some villages still practice an old tradition: The entire village gathers to throw fish innards at a newly married couple as soon as they emerge from the wedding tent. It’s believed to bestow good fortune on the couple.

Okay, pick which one you think it is and either respond in comments or by email!

We Launch our Kickstarter Campaign Tomorrow! Are You Ready?

We are finishing up all the preparations, finalizing our rewards/cost analysis, and running our campaign preview by trusted friends to get their last-minute impressions. Our campaign should be live sometime tomorrow!

We’re excited and nervous and a bit daunted. Throwing your ideas up to to bear the full scutiny of the Internet is never easy. But we’re also optimistic. Kickstarter….AWAY!!! Make it so.

Battambang, Cambodia: “The Bong”. Part II

by Beej

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Croc-headed hero at Wat Prithhearam, Battambang. Image (c) 2014 Benjamin J Spencer

In the last post we talked about some heavy history. But Battambang has a ton more to offer these days.

For example, there are places you can scarf down mezze platters while ogling fine art, browsing literary works of spiritual gurus, or watching indie films in a small theater. Namely, the Lotus Bar and Gallery.

The Lotus Bar and Gallery. Image courtesy of movetocambodia.com
The Lotus Bar and Gallery. Image courtesy of movetocambodia.com

On the night we wander in, the British owner, Darren, lures us upstairs brandishing half-price cocktails for a screening of Jim Jarmusch’s 1990s black and white Johnny Depp vehicle, “Dead Man”.

(I’m a fan of many of Jarmusch’s films, but “Dead Man” is not one of them – it’s indulgent, simple minded, and much too fixated on Depp’s disturbingly angular, expressionless face. But it’s a chance to get a taste of home – it was filmed in Southern Oregon – so I give it another shot. Nope. Still sucks. Stax disagrees: expect a spirited defense of “Dead Man” from her soon).

The bland blankness of Johnny Depp in
The bland blankness of Johnny Depp in “Dead Man”. The proto-“Indian-face-painted hipster douche”? (Image courtesy of ImageShack)

After the screening we peruse the comic and curio shop next door, aptly named The Lost Stick. The British owner is an underground comic artist of some renown who opens up whenever the mood strikes him. I’m pretty sure he is this guy  – if so, he’s a great artist.

But not a conversationalist per se. As we poke around the store’s addictive mish-mash of old books, nihilistic comics, and 1960s Asian pop culture artifacts he’s focused, head down, on his galleys (he often works all night on his own art). He’s done wonders with the store though, with enough weirdness piled on shelves to fuel any collector’s imagination. I never would have guessed that this unassuming city harbors so much artistic talent. (The Guardian apparently knew, however.)

Just down street 2.5 sits the Madison Corner, a diner-style joint where jovial, self-described “French gypsy” owner Patrice blasts rockabilly or visiting live bands while he and his managers jaw and throw down shots. The overhead flatscreen stays tuned to Cartoon Network – an “Adventure Time” marathon – while servers crank out giant, delicious bacon burgers with slushy Cokes.

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Madison Corner. A great place to watch cartoons and drink. Image courtesy of visitbattambang.com

You can choose from plenty of young “gourmet” upstarts to choose from if that’s your bag, including Choco L’Art (awesome chocolate hazelnut cake) and Jaan Bai (great cappucinos and Thai food) – both these places are run by very worthy NGOs that help out local women and young artisans. There’s also some fancy-pants establishments like Pomme d’Amour (reportedly fantastic but too rich for our blood). But my hands-down favorite cafe in Battambang has to be Kinyei.

If there is a hangout spot in Battambang for foreign NGO workers and discerning local coffee connessoirs, Kinyei is it. The cafe doubles as a bike rental and repair center as well, the jumping-off point for bike tours of the town and countryside, although sadly we’ve arrived there just as it’s closing for the long New Year weekend.

In the lounge upstairs I pluck a dusty guitar from the wall while Stax talks to a web developer who’s working for an NGO in town. She’s an Aussie who volunteers and travels all over the world. After her hair-raising story of having to escape through the broken back window of an overturned bus in South America, our merely inconvienient Cambodian bus rides seem quaint and mundane.

Kinyei cafe's upstairs lounge is the perfect place to relax, pluck a guitar off the wall, and guzzle Battambang's best coffee drinks. Photo (c) 2014 Benjamin J Spencer
Kinyei cafe’s upstairs lounge is the perfect place to relax, pluck a guitar off the wall, and guzzle Battambang’s best coffee drinks. Photo (c) 2014 Benjamin J Spencer

Coffee, art, drink and desserts we’ve covered. But what of comfort food?

Most every Battambang expat will point to one restaurant that a first-time visitor should try. A magical place where the trifecta of cheap prices, awe-inspiringly voluminous menu, and good, plentiful food meet in one giant French-colonial style, balconied building. That place is the White Rose. Just look at my face in Stax’ photo and you can guess that we might agree with the expats.

Beej is so happy to find good dark beer in Cambodia that he's close to tears. Photo (c) 2014 Stacy Libokmeto
Beej is so happy to find good dark beer in Cambodia that he’s close to tears. Photo (c) 2014 Stacy Libokmeto

Later on as we hunker in our comfortable room at the Here Be Dragons guesthouse, it seems that everyone in town is either leaving for New Years’ festivities in other provinces, going on holiday, or celebrating with families in the surrounding neighborhoods.

Thousands, though, will reportedly head to the temple complex of Ek Phnom about 15km away, where a giant celebration is planned – including, intriguingly for us, large staged weddings involving dozens of locals who act out the ceremony step-by-step.

The temple sounds like the perfect place to get some footage for our doc. Simple decision, really. But in Cambodia at Khmer New Year, we find out that even simple plans can yield craziness.

Hong Kong: Lantau Island

A Note about this post: This isn’t a proper post about the project, but just something to let you know what we’ve been up to for the past few weeks. Greetings from Southeast Asia!

It’s been awhile since you last heard from yours truly – but there’s a good reason for that.

During that time, we sold off, stored with obliging relatives, or mailed all of the possessions save those that fit into two giant backpacks; gave two weeks notice at our cushy jobs in Manhattan; handed the keys to our Bushwick sublease reluctantly back to the owner (herself just back from Ghana); arranged to film a couple of traditional Khmer wedding ceremonies for our documentary project; and spent two weeks driving a Ford hybrid rental into the ground all around Oregon, mostly visiting friends and relatives (the highlight of which was watching our friends Brian and Heidi kill the room at Suki’s in downtown PDX with their dead on karaoke cover of the B52s’ “Love Shack”).

Then at the dawn of St. Patrick’s Day, we boarded the Bolt Bus from downtown Portland to Seattle, cruised to Sea-Tac on the airport tram, and flew 16 hours from Seattle – via Tokyo – to Hong Kong.
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March 17-20, 2014

The cabin explodes in applause upon our final approach at Tokyo-Narita, because amid 20 mph crosswinds our Airbus 330 drops, twists, and fishes wildly as if in a seizure until right about when we touch the tarmac.  Nice bit of flying.

Partly because of the winds tossing about everything with wings all over the Pacific Rim, we land very late (after 1 am) in Hong Kong International. The only option is to cab it to our hotel and hope  they left the light on.

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The cab driver barrels around 20km curves at a dead 60 km and strains up steep mountainsides in an old 1980s Chinese junker sedan. He almost leaves the engine block dropped through the chassis behind us on a few of his climbs.

A highlight of the ride: a giant black water buffalo with massive horns looms out of the darkness with his rear end to our cab, tail twitching,  lounging and chewing his cud on a sidewalk in front of a darkened shop.
Tourists-meet-Mui-Wos-water-buffalos.-Photo-by-Steven-Knipp-INLINE

Then SCREEEEEEEEEECH we’re there. Luckily the hotel has anticipated our lateness and left the light on. We gingerly navigate a narrow alley strewn with boxes behind a restaurant, catching whiffs of fish and old vegetables and the unmistakeable tang of the salt sea.
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So you may have noticed by now that we like to do things in opposite order. Call us contrary, but because of how the timing worked out with the first Khmer wedding ceremony (and the joys of nonrefundable plane tickets), we’re starting our trip with a vacation first – and not starting proper work until about two weeks in. I know, rough life, right?

Our first two days in Hong Kong are not actually in the towering, buzzing city everyone pictures, but in Mui Wo on southeastern Lantau Island. A town that not even many Hong Kong residents go (most of them head to Disneyland Hong Kong just north at Discovery Bay), Mui Wo doesn’t rate on most tourists’ to-do lists. But we end up digging the quirky village and its super-friendly locals, and of course its uncrowded and laid-back beach, Silvermine Bay.

Silvermine Bay Beach
Silvermine Bay Beach. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer
More Silvermine Bay. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer
More Silvermine Bay. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer

It’s a perfect place to shake off the jet lag.

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For two days we laze by the tidal canals:

Regatta de Lantau. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer
Regatta de Lantau. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer

, eat on the cheap in seafood restaurants overlooking the bay, enjoy sunny mountain views from atop Nam Shan

The view from the Old Village Path down Nam Shan to Mui Wo. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer
The view from the Old Village Path down Nam Shan to Mui Wo. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer

, and climb steep, ancient forest trails to a funky hillside village – where the architecture resembles shades of Dr. Seuss:

Mui Wo Village has some interesting condo association rules. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer
Mui Wo Village has some interesting condo association rules. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer

beat-up bicycles are the main form of transport, and amateur bird enthusiasts place cloth-covered cages up under trees so their budgies’ cries can attract flocks from all over the island.

But of the island’s famous resident water buffaloes, which reportedly cause traffic jams, are employed in various festivals and races, and otherwise wander anywhere they wish unimpeded by locals, we see nary a sign. The expat British owner of Caffe Paradiso – the best cafe in town, where gut-busting English style breakfasts and strong cappuccinos are the order of the day – disgustedly indicates a familiar culprit.

Eager real estate developers, Hong Kong dollar signs cha-chinging in their collective eyes, consider the buffaloes an obstacle and have won Lantau’s blessing to herd them out of the way to the marshy lowlands over Nam Shan, the southern mountain. And now even the marshlands are in their crosshairs.

The cafe owner sponsors a Lantau Buffalos youth rugby team:

Image courtesy of https://www.facebook.com/SLBrugB
The vicious, hardened South Lantau Buffaloes rugby squad practices. Courtesy of South Lantau Buffalo FB pg.

He also sells T-shirts (Keep South Lantau Horny!) with proceeds directly toward preserving the buffalos’ habitat (for more info on this great organization check out http://lantaubuffalo.wordpress.com/). But sadly the prospects don’t seem good for the beasts.

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Our final morning in Mui Wo we hang out on the ferry quay and wait for the boat to Hong Kong Island. We depart the lazy shores of Lantau knowing that we’ll see them again someday, whether in official capacity as filmmakers or as grateful return visitors.

But now it’s time to board the so-called “Ordinary Ferry” (read: slow boat) toward the craziness of Hong Kong Central. But that’s for the next post, which I swear will be more timely than the last….

The slow boat to China. Heh heh. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer
The slow boat to China. Heh heh. Image (c) Benjamin J Spencer

 

 

So Much to Do – So Little Time

Hello fellow Misadventurists,

We’re in the midst of a melee of preparation for our documentary.

If you were to come up a metaphor for our status, our company would be like a hot air balloon struggling to get aloft with a giant rhino charging toward us; but the basket is weighed down with ballast, and we’re furiously cutting loose ropes and throwing chests overboard to lighten the load.
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Image courtesy of 9wows.com

The ballast, of course, is all the stuff we’ve accumulated over our four-plus years here in New York City. Shifting operations overseas and becoming virtual expats, even temporarily, means reducing our overstock to nil. And you would not believe the amount of stuff that two people can hoard over four and a half years.

The charging rhino is our February 28 deadline, after which we’ll be flying to Oregon for a couple of weeks and then departing from Seattle/Tacoma International airport, ready or not.

By “ready”, I’m referring to externalities like immunizations, flight details, supplies, gear, visas (very important for China and Vietnam especially – luckily we can hop on a subway and apply personally at the Manhattan consulates for both countries, which speeds things up considerably). We have a likely fixer in Cambodia, a couple who is interested in being in the doc, and we even have some AirBnb bookings already (can’t wait to meet our hosts in Hong Kong, Kam and Eve.)

But that all said, are you ever truly ready for an adventure into the unknown like this? There are only so many contingencies you can plan for. Even with only a month to go before our departure from New York, – trading our view from this:
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Image courtesy of Bushwick Collective

to this:

Image  By © Timothy Allen/BBC
Image By © Timothy Allen/BBC

– there are still infinitely more crucial details unknown than are known. But perhaps that capacity for surprise and serendipity – yes, even for catastrophe – is what draws us again and again to this field and these kinds of projects.

In all the current melee it’s important to remember that this kind of career is a great privilege, a privilege that so few around the globe can hope for. The possibility of complications and failure is balanced with this knowledge, and with the immense gratitude we hold for our opportunities and toward the people that have supported us.

So on toward the unknown….