From the “Insanity in the City” Files
Wednesday, April 21, 2004
Recorded by Trainee #06, JC at around 2:56 AM
RE: DAY 3
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I can just say un-elaborately that we were just ordered around, or we had to just follow everyone around. If I was entirely pessimistic, I can say that was merely what our jobs were yesterday, and I can even cook it up to look even lamer. But I wasn’t looking at things like that yesterday and right now, in fact, I’m actually very optimistic, and it’s not hard not to: we were blessed with great people around that made sure we were really involved and we would learn, although we were doing things more than 14 hours a day.

To start our day, we have to pick up a lot of things up at RS Video/film Production in Makati at 5:00 am. Shit. I mean, at five am, I’m normally still dreaming about weird things.

Jurette and EJ came 10-15 minutes late, so we had to rush to RS Video in order to avoid being late. We picked up production things that cost a little less than 10 thousand for the rentals. EJ, being the guy, went with the production van while we rode on the fx they rented for the production staff. We arrived thirty minutes earlier at the client’s place, but that doesn’t make us relax a little: we had to fuss whether the materials were complete, whether the building was fixed, and whether the papers were okay. On top of that, we also had to give the production staff FF rented their breakfast at a nearby Mc Donalds.

At 7:30, people started trickling in. Ms. C soon started giving orders, while Ike, Gen’s director of photography, started to work with Gen on the building’s facade and on the staff of the client. The whole day we had to contend with the lights, the lines, the extensions. We of course worked as production assistants, and lived the day far more than that: we were bag carriers, camera toters, camera battery changers, staff barkers (that being people barking the orders to those people of the client who fucking refused to cooperate), order executers, shot listers, and over-all in chargers. The Director and DOP also had to check with us frequently if there were shots to be made, and what other shots were on the list, and other things. The whole day it was just insan, and considering we had only four hours of sleep, things were not looking good.

We even had to add a chapel location. It could have been okay, except… it was a funeral chapel. We also had to do crowd control because people thought there were going to be celebrities, aside from the fact that they were just plain curious. Can’t do much about that, I guess. Things wrapped up at around 8 PM, although the entire process took about thirty minutes or so. By 8:30 we were on our way to UP Teachers’ Village for a dinner at this place that served Persian food.

Afterwards, we still had to go to Makati because Jurette had to tally some of the expenses. She was put in charge for the money, and I’m just thankful for that I guess, because at least I don’t have to withdraw fucking 13 thousand from someone’s ATM account and have it stuffed in my pocket. We helped her with the computing because she was in this sudden case of memory block (she couldn’t remember the other expenses), and thankfully it tallied with the amount taken. EJ had to get his ID from the guard below because he forgot about it the other day. I took my new ID from the office too.

11 pm, that was when we were just starting to head for Ayala Ave. We were going home finally.

Goodness.

Anyway, that was last night. Today, Ms. C proclaimed this as rest day. Thursday, we’re back on a hectic schedule. Sigh. Thank god. Bring it on to us while we can still last, and while we’re still enjoying.

(Blog transfer from the now down http://ojtfiles.blogspot.com:
The Dummkopf goes to the city…to, uh, work? Oh God.)