~The Game was on~

And so the days went by and the work kept coming with the promise of that deposit that never came. 9 weeks into this adventure and we were broke in India and by Indian terms. Which in Western terms is really in deep shit. After 24 hours of non stop editing to hit a deadline Mr T, as I will call him from now on, was exhausted and sick. As was I. After a vomit-diarrea-fever-cold sweat extravaganza we decided it was time to go to the hospital.
Yes honey, we were in the hospital in New Delhi, it is like nothing you have ever seen. It looks like a combination vintage store on La Brea Av. and a soup kitchen down on San Pedro street.
I have never seen poor or sick like I saw in this place. As we walked into the Dr.s office Mr. T started to look faint and ran out of the office into the bathroom, barely making his run, he projectile vomited all over the bathroom door. The Dr. was taking my pulses, because in India they do 2 pulses, your veins and your arteries. He took one look at me, heard the vomiting down the hall, and said in a firm voice, You must be admitted at once!!! This is dengue fever. Very very dangerous. You do not have much time and you will need a blood transfusion.
WHAT!? OK, that was the scariest news I had gotten since my Mom came out of the closet in 95.
Next thing I knew, we were rushed from the Dr's office to the emergency room to a private room and before I knew it we were laying in a bed with an iv up our arm. The room had no windows, it was like a 1942 mid war hospital room, something right out of a movie. Karan , my dear friend, came in. He was worried about us but had some awkward news to share. He said; Be very careful with what they put in your iv, these people are very good friends with hospital. they want to steal your stuff! I heard them talking in the office! Don't say I told you, but be very careful, they want to get rid of you and not pay. Mr T was half gone but his eyes widened with disbelief. for a split second. I felt sick, and it had nothing to do with the dengue fever. Now we were broke ass, sick and persecuted foreigners laying in a hospital room with no windows to escape from.
All right, I thought, this has gone far enough I think? I looked at Mr. T and said; We are not sleeping in this place, so you better work and get all the fluids you can because we are going home honey. He looked at me and fell right back to sleep. The door opened slowly, the nurse walked in with a big smile on her face, it was right out of a David Lynch film, she was carrying a tray full of needles. She lifted my arm, made sure the iv was in place and started to prepare a needle. I looked at her and gasped, what is that? I said. All she said in her broken English was, Dr. say this good for you, thank you please. Thank you please.
Noooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!

~Leverage~

Its funny how being stuck half way across the globe in a third world country can make you do the strangest things. At that moment out of pure desperation, I started bartering with God.

God, if you help me get home I will never ever, ever complain about L.A. again. I will give up sugar for a year, help the homeless, volunteer downtown on Christmas eve, anything you want!!! Please take me home!!!! I will do anything, anything!

Night came, we talked. He understood my desperation. I understood his position. We slept hoping the sun would come out tomorrow as Annie had always promised.

The sun came out as promised by Annie, and new ideas came to mind about how to handle this situation. Me, being the brains in the family, started planning how to not get screwed by Evermean and her Indian posse. I woke up and headed straight to the computer Karan loaned me to check emails and do my editing chores. I opened word and started typing away a memo. When I was done I woke him up with a bright smile that spelled, I got it! He looked at me and immediately said; what now? Nothing honey, I just figured out how not to get screwed. Here is my plan. I wrote a memo for them which, if you agree, you can sign. It says you wont be able to deliver the CUT LIST to them until you get paid the full amount owed. Without the CUT LIST, they have no film. They will have to comply.

· The cut list is a numerical list, which tells the computer the order the shots in the movie have to be in, so that it all actually makes sense. It’s a file. Very Mission Impossible*

He thought about it for a moment then said, great. You are right. I have their movie in my hands. If they don’t pay I’ll just delete it. Exactly. I said! Or email it to them when they do pay. Now we have leverage. Now we’re talking. Nighttime came and the producers, including Evermean, were coming over to see the trailer T had worked on for Sundance. They were desperate to get in the festival, which happens every January in Utah. This was their chance. They were coming with one of the judges from the festival, so he could guide them with their submission. They came, they saw, they loved it. Good for us.

I went to my computer and kept on editing scenes, while I watched them in awe of their film. T is a very talented editor, far beyond their expectations. As soon as they were done I handed over several copies of the memo signed by Troy. Their faces turned from joy to confusion. Evermean started reading. Her uncle, the man that gave her the job and expected the world of his unmarried old maid of a niece, was flabbergasted and embarrassed and also started turning a certain shade of green. I should have known! He looked at her and said, -What is this about?- bobbing his head like a little dashboard toy.

You should know that Sikh people, such as they are, are not fond of being embarrassed or ridiculed. They are, by Indian standards, the fools of India. (Kind of like Gallegos in Spain) So to them, dignity and pride are of the utmost importance. And right at that moment, their whole discourse about changing the reputation of Indian Cinema being corrupt, was exploding like the Challenger. Unexpectedly and fiercely right in their face, and in front of the Sundance representative. Evermean could not handle it and walked quickly into the bathroom. I think she puked, she must have, as the bathroom stench after she came out was unbearable. But then again, I think witches stink up when they get angry? I read that somewhere....

As soon as she came out she looked at me, kind of knowing this was all my idea. I looked back proudly. The game was on. We both knew it. She was ready to explode but couldn’t do it in front of Sundance man so she looked at me and yelled -You need to bring us an invoice!- I did, I replied. -Well, it was the wrong address!!!! It has to be made out with the London office address!- And she fiercely walked out of the apartment bobbing her head. Her uncle looked at Troy and said in a quiet held back voice, don’t worry, this’ll be handled immediately. And walked out behind his niece mumbling in Hindi. Troy and I looked at each other wondering what would happen. Suddenly I had to run off to the bathroom. Yes. I puked.

But there was this strange little voice inside my head while I puked, saying; -You did OK Cantina, not bad- I felt good. I stood up for myself. We often fail to do that because of fear, and believe me, these are scary people, but one has to stand strong with one’s beliefs or you’ll get pushed around endlessly only to realize, at the end, you could have had the life you wanted but were too chicken to go get it.
And so proudly I had my evening Tosht and papaya as I hummed my fave Winnie the pooh song....

Deep in the hundred acre wood
where Christopher Robin plays ...
A donkey named Eeyore is his friend...
and Kanga and little Roo.
There's Rabbit and Piglet and
there's Owl, but most of all.

Winnie the Pooh...
Winnie the Pooh...
Tubby little cubby all stuffed with fluff.
He's Winnie the Pooh...
Winnie the Pooh...
Willy nilly silly old bear.

~Stuck~

The shoot was done, we went home. Evermean was not really speaking to me or even looking at me. I liked it that way better. We got home and I asked again, Did you talk about your payments? Uh, yeah. I have a meeting at the office tomorrow to see about that. He said. I knew what we were into already, it’s very third world to keep people guessing about their money. Sometimes they keep you guessing forever.

The next day came, I was awakened by the classic, knock knock…madam? Tosht? Papaya? It was Bachu, asking if we wanted breakfast. I was gonna miss him when we left, I thought.

Yes Bachu! Papaya and Tosht! Which in English means toast. Later that afternoon Troy went to the office to see about his money again, but this time in person. I waited for about four hours, going out of my mind in that apartment. It felt like jail. I wonder if this is what it’s like being in jail? I thought. I watched TV, old Bollywood movies. Well, actually I couldn’t tell when they were from, even the new ones look old. It’s like a time warp in that place. It’s unbelievable to me that one of the oldest civilizations on earth can be so far behind on everything, everything. As they say. Wouldn’t it have to be the opposite? Wouldn’t the older civilizations have to be more advanced due to the fact that they have had longer to work on their societies and technology? Anyway, Troy came home finally around 5 pm. I was asleep by then watching Oprah and longing for a return ticket home. He walked in the door and looked happy.

I was excited to hear the good news. Which went something like this:

T: Hi Bear…

SH: Hi. So what happened?

T: Oh it’s all good… It was all a big misunderstanding. I told them you are helping me, they are very grateful for that. They are even paying for your plane ticket. They were really happy to hear that we’re almost done with the first cut.

SH: That’s cool. So what about the deposit?

T: Well, yeah I mean they’re gonna pay. It’s just been hard since 9/11 for them.

My face started turning a light shade of red….

T: I mean, they are having such a hard time making transfers.

SH: Yeah I noticed, its been 5 weeks….

T: Yeah, and they also said we do owe them money…so That’ s also why they haven’t deposited. They need the receipts you were supposed to bring to the office so they can figure out how much we owe them.

SH: We owe them? WE OWE THEM??? I can’t believe these people. I have been paying for the food for this apartment and it’s entire 6 people crew for weeks now!!! How do I owe them money? They have never paid the per diem they were supposed to! I have brought them receipts each week! They lose them…Troy, can’t you see what they’re doing?

T: Calm down. It’s gonna be fine. They offered me a Directing gig next year. If everything goes well, I will be Directing for them in a few months.

My stomach flipped upside down. Was he serious? He wanted to stay in India for another year? I looked at him. And my own personal Evermean came out.

SH: Yei, you get to direct a movie for free!!! How exciting!

T: You don’t have to be a bitch about it. It’ a great opportunity.

SH: Yeah, I know. To Direct an Indian film for free sounds amazing.

Troy looked at me and left the room. I sat in bed wondering what the fuck I was doing on the other side of the world broke and trapped. How did I get myself to this place? I wanted to leave. I left the room and went to the office. I sat down and said: I want to go home. I’m not happy here. I don’t want to live here for another year. But I don’t want to leave you. I thought you said you were going to quit? We can go home and start over.

How, he asked. We have no money, no job. At least here I have this job and the chance that they will pay me the 30,000 pounds they owe me. We don’t even have money for the return tickets.

True. We didn’t have enough money for our ride home. Fuck. We were stuck.

~Evermean~

I even felt nostalgic over leaving, but in reality we were never gonna make any money being there. If they decided to pay, it would be over the thought of having to start over. So they left us no choice really.

That afternoon Troy and I were summoned to the set to partake in the shooting of this film. I was gonna play, guess what? A waitress…and he was gonna play the antagonists lover in a jacuzzy scene. Great.

As we arrived to the set we met the Producer in the lobby, a young 20 something, single, Indian female we will call, Evermean, as in the wicked witch of the East….

My first impression was that she looked like she was gayer than a 2 dollar Hello Kitty bill. Gay is not a very accepted thing to be in indian society, although it is hard to tell as everyone is same sex friendly. But, I thought, wow, how modern of her. She must be cool. Always dressed in men in black suits.

And so she greeted us and her first question to me was; So, are you ok with the fact that your boyfriend is going to be in a jacuzzy naked making love to another woman? Arent you uncomfortable with this? And all this said with a big fat grin on her face…ejem, actually Evermean, I trust Troy so much he could lick the girls asshole and I would still feel ok about it. I trust our love that much.

Her jaw dropped to the floor, her face turned form that lovely Indian witchy green, to a tomato red. Troy was flabbergasted. I was….enjoying my best bitch back ever…..bitch.

From then on I knew she had a thing for me, I was not sure in which way though. I didnt know if she wanted to fuck me or fuck Troy or maybe both, but boy did she hate me. I became her Dorothy. I could feel it, every time she came over to our place, as soon as she left, I puked. I was unsure if she dropped arcenic in my food and drinks or if her mere energy and presence provoked my gag reflex, but something was terribly wrong about that woman. I could see she really liked Troy, and obviously wanted to make me jealous. I think she relized the impossibility of her fantasy and that made her hate me even more. Karan told me she nicknamed me the Mexican whore at the production office. Indian women are special in that way, I think they are bitter creatures. I once had a weird experience at a salon. I personally went there to get my Pancho Villas removed from my upper lip. I only remember entering the salon and feeling a group stare. I guess I confuse people from that part of the world, I look Indian or Irani or Italian, depending on where youa re from I look it. So as I walked in every woman in the joint turned and looked at me. Looked me up and down, not an unfamiliar thing, in Mexico I get those looks all the time. Not particularly me, anyone entering a restaurant or salon or store is stared at, judged, scanned and released. It is normal. As it is in India as well. I guess it is a classification process, what class do you belong to? Once people figure you out you are free to continue about your business. Anyway, enough about this jealous bitch and back to my story.

~New Delhi~

We arrived in New Delhi at the Hotel Royal. Finally met the Director and the music supervisor. They were very friendly and excited about the film. Roger, the Director, a British man in his 50’s seemed very fond of Troy and was very happy I came along. We only stayed at the hotel for the first few days with them and then again moved into an apartment in “Defence Colony”, a gated community in New Delhi.

The apartment came equipped with Bachu, a little man that served us day and night. Bachu was about 5’3” and the skinniest man I had ever met. He spoke no English except for Tosht, (which in English is toast) madam, papaya, coke, coffee and chai. All useful words when that’s pretty much all we ate.

Defence colony became our hood. We had running hot water, a shower that was not on top of the toilet, a shower curtain and a phone with tone!!! We were back in business.

The film started shooting and Troy started editing the film. He got a couple of assistants to come work with him but he had to train them. Days would go by and surely the assistants would stop coming to work as they were getting paid a whooping $200 dollars and an old samsung cell phone for the whole movie, meaning for 4 montrhs of work. About a week later Troy got tired of training people and asked me to jump in and help him. I had assisted him in another film that spring, so I already knew the system and how he worked. I was also glad he asked as I was growing tired of New Delhi, the city of rape.

Rick, the musical director moved into the apartment about week 3, so did Karan, Roger’s assistant. Then a few days later, came another British friend Dave. We were all one big happy family.

The problem was, Dave, didn’t really have a room. He slept like Karan in the living room on a cot. Karan on the other hand, slept on the floor. It was strange. Everyone wanted to be part of this film for some odd reason even if they had to sleep on the floor.

One day I asked Karan why didn’t he ask the office to bring him another cot. He said, “No, I’m ok on floor. In India it’s different. People don’t care to sleep on bed.” As long as he was allowed to the film set he was ok on the floor.

I had little to do those days so I spent a lot of time with Karan teaching me about India and their social scheme and nursing my never going away cough from hell. Karan brought me an ayurvedic cure for cough, it still took about another 3 weeks to get over it. Anyway I found out India has about 1,652 languages, out of which 400 are the most spoken ones.

It’s mostly Hindu 80% about 13% Muslim and 2.3 % Christian. Men and women can’t hold hands on the street, but men and men can and so can women vs. Women. But non of them are “gay”, just same sex friendly. It’s better to wear long sleeves. Not sure what arms do. And they use mothballs in all their cleaners to keep the insects at bay. My God that place smeels like mothballs!

Every week Karan and I took a trip down to the market to get fresh fruits and vegetables for Bachu (which means little one) to cook for all of us. Rick would give me his part of the market money and we would do the shopping. We were told by the production to keep all the reciepts as we would be reimbursed for our food expenses. Every week we would try to make an appointment with the office accountant to turn in reciepts and get reimbursed but he was never there. We dropped off reciepts for weeks. I thought it was weird. But then again what isn’t weird in India as compared to what I’m used to.

While I got my Indian culture clash course with Karan and tried to keep our home economy balanced, Troy was editing no stop, transferring tapes and converting media to get the job done on time. He hardly slept. The pressure started building as they wanted to make the Sundance Festival deadline. We had been in New Delhi almost 2 months now and the film was nearing it’s final stages of post production.

My cough was finally gone. The fall had begun, so we got a care package from Troy’s mother full of candy and Canadian things. Paper napkins with a maple leaf on them, little Canadian flags and Canadian candy bars. Canadian bears holding Canadian flags a plethora of Canadian parafernalia came in a little envelope that when opened shot out a cloud of tiny Canadian maple leaves Bachu had to clean.... Sheesh.

My parents on the other hand were Mom in Miami shooting a novela and my Dad still shocked from my trip in Mexico City.

I can’t imagine my parents sending me a package full of Mexican flags, tejocotes, duvalines, tamales, pelon pelo ricos and what not... I can’t imagine it because they’ve never done it. No matter how far I have been, they just don’t do that kind of thing.

See, my parents are divorced, my Father left my Mother when I was one year old. Wait, according to my Mother she left him when I was one....? Those are my parents. Competitive, famous 70s Mexican Movie stars of the biggest kind. Still acting. Still competing. So to keep things cool lets say they just left eachother and in the end, it ended up working out that I stayed with my Dad.

It was an unusual arrangement for those days but I think it worked out for the best. My Mom was at the top of her game and decided she would try out for the good old Hollywood game, so she left for Los Angeles with film director Sam Pekinpah. My dad was also at the top of his game, but stayed in Mexico City as it was easier to have my Grandma take care of me when he was working.

And so it was. That letter I told you about at the beggining, it was asking my Mother why she left. And most importantly, why she left me behind!? All my crazy abandonment issues were spilled all over that 10 page letter I never sent. I was really frustrated at my mother because it seemed like I could never make her proud of me no matter what I did or how much I accomplished. I simply wasnt her. My acting carreer was in shambles, I was a broke struggling actress-waitress in every sense of the word. I was a hostess, dancer, power ranger, assistant for 120 a day kind of actress and I was exhausted! All I got from my Mother was negative feedback on how my life was going. And to top it off one fine day at her place she had the balls to say to me; Dont ever have kids, they ruin your life. Just like that. That is where that letter came from. But then again I never sent the damned letter…

So, back to India, when we got the gift from Troys Mom, we were so excited, it gave us that Christmas feeling. And it helped me remember I should have sent that damned letter!

Sorry....outburst.

So, days went by and Troy started feeling ill. So did I. At first I thought it was all that Canadian candy we ate in a very short time but I came to learn on the news there was a Dengue outbreak in all of Delhi due to the recent rain season called Monsoon. Apparently drains are so poorly kept, the water gets stuck and stagnant thus creating zest pools for mosquitoes and diverse diseases to be born.

Alas, something got us. We had stopped taking our malaria pills because they tasted so nasty. So our first thought was that, Malaria. Karan kept feeding us his ayurvedic tea good for –everything, everything- as he put it. Troy kept at editing. I kept at helping Troy meet his deadline.

But wait, let me rewind the book a little bit. Before all this happened one strange night Rick, the musical Director came into the editing office in a rage. He was mumbling about how the Producers owed him 60,000 pounds and had not paid him a penny yet. We had just gotten a $4,000 dollar payment as an advance so we thought everything was ok with us. He also informed us the whole movie was going to be shot, edited and finished in New Delhi, so we actually had 8 more weeks of being in this city. Apparently the London segment of Post had been cancelled. What!? I was shocked and dissapointed and frustrated instantly. I waited until Rick left the room which he did, after he ranted for about 45 minutes about how these fucksticks werent going to get away with it. It sounded bad. As he left the room Troy came close to me and started whispering, I said,

I dont know Troy. Hes been here longer and knows them better. What if we dont get paid, we will lose everything back home. Cant pay rent next month as it is, we have to get paid. Troy looked worried but he was trying to be positive about the situation. Our payments were on schedule so far. A week was left before the next payment was due. We waited. So another 2 weeks went by after that odd discussion about payment. And law and behold, the payment was late. They were having transfer problems due to 9/11. The money which came from a British account was being held by the FBI as protocol. What? What does that mean?

The food ran out at the apartment again. Of course we were feeding a crew of 6 people 3 meals a day 7 days a week. So Karan and I went to the office yet again to turn in reciepts and see if we could get any money reimbursed as my checking account was extremely low and I wasnt getting any reimbursements 6 weeks in. So we got to the office and again the accountant had no money to reimburse us with. So we headed back to the apartment to talk to Troy.

Troy was in a daze editing non stop as he wanted to meet his deadline but I on the other hand was frustrated he was not noticing all the discrepancies going on with the production. I went into the office and sat beside him, he looked tired. As I walked in he looked at me and knew. He picked up the phone....

He called. I waited.

T: Aha...Hi just calling about that deposit, sorry to be such a pain man I just really need the money.

I see. Ok, so Monday then....ok thank you please.

He hung up.

Has the deposit gone in yet? I asked.

Nope...Monday they said. Just be patient. It will go in.

That night we went out for dinner at a fancy place (fancy for New Delhi Defence Colony)

We decided to try their wine. Nice red wine, just what my body was asking for to cure all the money troubles, to get it all out. So we drank a bottle of red wine. The wine was Indian. I did learn one thing about Indian wine, you should not drink it unless you want to die. Our bedroom was a puke fest! It was awesome, it defenitely worked as far as getting it all out… both ways.

The next morning it was back to the grind, except as I woke up I got this strange feeling. I turned to Troy and said, point blank. Quit, You Should Quit. we should leave. They’re not gonna pay you. I have a really bad feeling about this, Rick hasn’t gotten paid, they’ve lost our receipts. Quit.

He stared at the ceiling and took a deep breath. He said in a low thoughtful voice: I was thinking the same thing Bear.

I was relieved to hear those words come out of his mouth. I hopped out of bed and jumped in the shower with a renewed sense of energy. We are finally going home...