Even though I've worked in documentary for ahem, going on 2 decades, last Friday was the first time I've seen my work as a director on the big screen. And today, I found out that This Adventure Called California won the Jury Prize for best documentary!

To be honest, when I've seen other films with premieres and festival laurels, I didn't know if that would ever happen for my films. I've heard stories of films that don't get into any films, and based on my strikeouts on grant applications, I haven't found myself beloved by gatekeepers. And maybe this is our first and last festival, who knows? So we're gonna suck the marrow out of this win! (I'm gonna eat some mochi ice cream tonight!)

We also had a very positive review! Including the line, "it's a lovely film." I've had to tell myself over and over again that it's not about getting awards and approval, so now I don't know how to feel!  Mostly grateful, and hopeful that this might mean that people might actually want to watch the film. You can read the review for yourself here.

This Adventure was screened with a slate of other Bay Area films, we got to meet other local filmmakers --mostly narrative, which was really fun. And this was a great warmup for next month's very big screen, a drive in!

Rather than rely on festivals and gatekeepers, I'm working on an impact campaign --working with organizations and groups that can use This Adventure to support their work. In this case, anti-trafficking advocates, survivor service providers, labor unions, industry leaders working against exploitation, anyone who supports fair wages, fair trade, and workers' rights. If you know anyone like that who would be interested in our film, please send them my way! And come out to the drive in! Who knew we'd be on such a big screen!

A few months ago, Arnoldo told me that someone had stopped by his truck and helped him fill out his US Census forms. "That's good, right?" he asked. 

"Yes! That's very good," I said. I had been meaning to make sure he'd been counted, but someone beat me to it.

For the last year, I've been filming Arnoldo in a short documentary I'm making, called This Adventure Called California. He was labor trafficked right here in the Bay Area, and the film is following his emotional journey to recover and reconcile with his family. He lives in his truck, and it turns out that the person who helped Arnoldo with the Census was not a diligent Census worker, as I assumed, but Willis Reuter, an outreach worker for an organization called CityServe of the Tri-Valley. 

In addition to registering unsheltered people for the Census, CityServe provides a ton of critical services to the community --including helping people with resumes and employment searches, and assisting with housing, legal aid, and case management. In short, they provide a safety net for vulnerable people who might need food, counseling, a ride to the doctor, a job, or a shoulder to cry on. There are so many ways that our current society is failing its citizens --lack of affordable health care, housing, safe streets, quality education, trustworthy law enforcement...I could go on... so I'm grateful for organizations like CityServe who are stepping up to help. 

Willis remembered that Arnoldo is a painter, and introduced him to Carol and Craig, his in-laws, who happened to need their home painted. I've been wanting more footage of Arnoldo at work, and Carol and Craig generously let me come with my camera. It turns out, they live on a ranch.  A real ranch.

As I packed up my gear, I got texts from Willis: "There will be goats and cows roaming around freely. And we got a new puppy, Waffles, that might greet you. Oh, also, the goats might jump on your car... And the llamas are friendly, they won't spit on you." 

!!!!

After spending most of the pandemic in my home office, living life through screens, this was beyond exciting. Goats! Llamas! Puppies! But this is one of the greatest things about this work -- getting to enter different corners of the earth, and meet the fascinating people who live there. And in this case, dwarf Nigerian goats!

I don't think I can properly convey the cuteness, hilarity, and enthrallment of these goats. Named Rachel, Phoebe, Toast, Grits and Gravy, they were like a little pack of puppies. They were curious and unafraid of me, a new visitor, who had all kinds of tantalizing straps, cords, and cables to chew on. If I set off at a pace, they followed me. They tasted my fingers and my ponytail, and Arnoldo took a photo of a hoof print on my shoulder. (In truth, I feel like that could be a dog print too, because Waffles was super friendly as well.) And while they were uninterested in my car, the goats clearly felt very comfortable scaling Willis' vehicle, and making themselves at home.

Everywhere I turned on this ranch, there was something intriguing, historic, beautiful, or thought provoking. ​

Willis and his partner, Ariel, kindly invited me to a cookout they were having with Arnoldo that evening. Arnoldo made carne asada and charro beans, and I learned more about Willis' work. One of his projects is simply compiling a database of services available in the area, and it's been a challenge. Because of the aforementioned societal failings, a patchwork of services has developed, provided by different government agencies, nonprofits, and churches. But even identifying and navigating these services is nontrivial -- some might provide only to residents of the county, others only to minors, another to low income residents, others to seniors. So it's not always simple when members of Willis' team try to refer their clients to help. Hence, Willis' database.

One thing that impresses me is that Willis goes to where the need is. He found Arnoldo in his truck, in the parking lot of a shopping plaza. I have tried to connect Arnoldo with various services since I met him, but most of them require Arnoldo to make a phone call or a visit, and some have curtailed services during the pandemic. And mostly, Arnoldo doesn't call, for all kinds of reasons. I certainly don't blame agencies for choosing how they spend their limited resources, and for expecting people to take some initiative in their own self care. But not everyone is in a position to do that. While it's exponentially more time and labor intensive to be out in the community, finding the people who have fallen through the cracks, that's exactly what Willis and CityServe are doing.

When I imagine doing this work, approaching people who are living on the street or in their cars, who may have mental illnesses, be addicts, or have other issues and vulnerabilities, it seems scary, and potentially dangerous. But it doesn't faze Willis. He had a difficult childhood, with violence in his home. No child should have to live through that, but it uniquely prepared him for this work. "Sometimes, the honesty makes more sense than the plastic smiles of the corporate drones" that he left behind at his last job, he says.
 
So often, in hearing the stories of people who've lived through trauma and violence, we think of them "overcoming" their pasts, or leaving them behind. But Willis is framing it in a different way --using his past as his secret superpower that lets him enter situations with a deeper level of understanding, resilience, and wisdom. And he says the work is therapeutic for him, too. I find this so inspiring, to think that survivors can potentially leverage their trauma into a hard-won advantage.

So I am on a flight from Davao to Cebu, and going through security I had to laugh at what they would see with their x-ray vision.

The current contents of my purse:

1 cooked ear of corn, bought from a bus vendor.

(There’s actually more, but you get the picture. On top of that. I have my backpack with the actual video camera and very precious hard drives of footage, and then a massive duffle full of dirty clothes, tripod, light stands, and a carefully curated selection of accessories and gear.)

I came to Mindanao with one of the directors of My Refuge House, Rose Ann, to film her with her family on her mom’s 66th birthday. The State Department warns Americans not to come here, but I figured they should also warn us not to come to America, land of the random mass shooting. Plus everyone who has actually been here told me it was fine, and I bet the person who wrote that State Dept recommendation has not actually visited. It turns out that it is very peaceful, at least where I went, the Compostela Valley, and like everywhere else I’ve been to in the Philippines, people are friendly, curious, and eager to help and engage. I never felt remotely I danger, and as advertised, Davao (hometown of Duterte) is clean, organized, and orderly.

4 hours from Davao by bus, Rose Ann has helped her family build an amazing little community. Her parents, brother and sister all live in 3 adjacent houses, sharing meals, child rearing, looking after her parents and grandmother, and the water pump that Rose Ann had installed out back. We couldn’t go anywhere without a handful of kids or teens joining us, jumping on the back of the motorbike or running ahead of us on the paths. They were so interested in me and all of the gear I brought, in particular, the fuzzy “dead cat” — a windscreen for my microphone that turns my camera into something like a pet to them. They would literally pet it every chance they got.

In the US, a lot of us relocate for our jobs, leaving our parents and families behind, and get together only for holidays or special occasions. We miss out on that ease of communal living, the cousins growing up together like siblings, the aunts and uncles involved in raising them. But it comes at a cost here, too. Rose Ann’s sister works 4 hours away. She comes home every weekend, but during the week, must leave behind her young children. Her husband must raise them —but not alone, there’s a lot of family around. She’s been doing this long distance commute for more than 15 years.

So it’s a trade off. But it was great to see how close and familiar everyone was, and others in the neighborhood as well, who come to the pump and wash their clothes and dishes there, and whose kids run around like part of the family. (I’m still not sure of the provenance of some of the children, to be honest). It’s a great way of life, one that I envy and that I think we ought to consider if it could be feasible in our own lives.

I’m sure we have all noticed the issue of consent blowing up our headlines these days. Even before the recent Weinstein, Spacey, Louie CK, Roy Moore, Charlie Rose, and Al Franken scandals, the issue has been gaining traction for a long time. As I grew up, I learned about rape, I learned about cat-calling, I adhered to the dress code that my school imposed on girls, saw depictions of prostitutes on TV, fantasized about bondage, was fascinated by what might make me attractive to boys, and accepted the simple fact that my actions – conscious or not -- determined boys behavior. These were all separate issues for my friends and me, all part of a wide-flung web of adult knowledge that we were desperate to grasp.
 
As part of a mindful millennial generation, we are starting to make sense of this web, tying each type of incident to the next to form an outline of respectful consent. So let’s break it down; consent is simply making sure you’re on the same page as every other party involved in your actions. It’s not only about sex, but also giving the basic respect to those around you to consider how what you want might not be what they want, and proceeding to check with them on that.
 
It seems like what has happened as we start placing issues under the singular concept of consent, is that we begin to see all the odd adult mysteries interweave with each other; stringent gender roles beget rape culture, anti-LGBT theology begets violence, demonization of sex work begets ignorance of sex trafficking.

Holding Each Other Accountable
At college campuses, more reported incidents of misconduct are getting the follow up they deserve. The recent infamous Brock Turner case is a great example of this.

The details surrounding this case touched on issues of class, racial inequality, misogyny, and college campus security. But especially brought to light was the prevalence of rape culture, and just how much we have to educate and learn about consent. In the video, an analogy is made between consent and a $5 bill. The analogy was attributed to twitter user Nafisa Ahmed, who said:

It’s a great, simple illustration of a framework for consent. But the analogy surprised me because it showed me how unable I was to define my own vision of consent until I heard it compared to something more tangible.
 
Where can we start to educate?
It comes down to the little things, like the notion that “boys will be boys.” Boys are taught that their very nature eludes consequence. Females, in contrast, learn passivity and acceptance of harassment. Growing up with this type of notion has the potential to snowball in some personalities into abusive behavior. But boys must be held accountable for their actions, and girls have the right not to be held accountable for the actions of males.
 
The recent Harvey Weinstein case is a great example of this. So many people were victim to his sexual whims. There are a plethora of videos of women and men sharing their Harvey Weinstein incidents. One story I particularly remember was about a woman who said she told everyone about Weinstein’s inappropriate behavior with her, only to be told “Oh yeah, that’s Harvey” in response.

In essence, his abuse was able to go on for so long because he was just a boy being a boy. Just a boy breaking into someone’s room and masturbating in front of them. Just a boy grabbing a stranger’s ass at a party. Just another boy committing rape. Just a boy using his power of people’s careers to blackmail their consent.
 
I have high hopes and expectations that this newish concept of consent will become common knowledge in the near future. I’m sometimes shocked, but also proud of the young people I know in high school and middle school who can have real discussions on these issues, and who know more than I did about each other’s worth. They have what would have been called in the year 2000 ‘an attitude’ about how they deserve to be treated. And even with all of the pitfalls of social media, they can curate their own reference points, newsfeeds and communities that open up so many realms of thought and perspective on self care and advocacy that they can bring to their peer groups and to their own identities. In middle school, I believed the slut-shaming I got from teachers, family members, or peers for wearing shorts or a v-neck. The generation in middle school now knows a little better than that.

We all pass the roadside billboards that say "End Human Trafficking" and "Not For Sale," but a deeper explanation of the issue of sex trafficking is hard to come by. In fact, there is only a rickety bridge of information between the billboard messages, and the dense online research articles; no scannable, marketing-style resources that can make their way more easily into the general consciousness. Sex trafficking information comes in either a light tap or a heavy downpour.

So far, this blog has served to give you valuable updates on the progress of our documentary project. But we also want to add infrastructure to the bridge of information, and allow this to be a resource for those learning about what sex trafficking is, and a guide for possible steps the average person can take to help affect change on this issue. We will continue to provide updates on the ever-evolving documentary project, and on My Refuge House, and provide insights and news into the world of trafficking.
 
Defining Trafficking
So what is human trafficking exactly? Trafficking is a global slavery epidemic. It happens everywhere, in every country, every city, right under our noses. Its clutches and snares grow out of the economic issues, and gender roles of each and every culture it inhabits. But it is also very hard to define because there are so many forms of it.

Where Did the Term Originate?
In researching this term, it is hard to find out it's origins, as it refers to most forms of modern slavery. The broadness of the name has deterred understanding, coverage, and the political actions necessary to prevent it.
The more specific term ‘sex trafficking’ may have been born of the feminist movement of the 90s as a means to help narrow down the difference between voluntary and forced prostitution. Putting a name on the coercion of women and young girls into prostitution lead to legal classifications of trafficking, which made the creation of protective laws possible.

Though its name suggests otherwise, sex trafficking does not need to involve the transportation of it's victims to be considered trafficking. In other words, the issue of this form of human slavery is not the fact that the enslaved were moved from one place to another. The issue is their forced participation in sexual labor. Some girls have even been ‘trafficked’ and forced into prostitution while still living at home. Their silence and coercion is held in place by threats of violence against them and their families by their ‘trafficker.’ 

There are several ways that victims can fall into human trafficking that usually involve deception of some kind. False ads for employment are used against people in economically strained areas. Many children are deceived by close community or family members who manipulate their trust to fool them into captivity.

Blake Lively recently spoke about the horrors of child sexual exploitation in a PSA/acceptance speech for Variety's Power of Women New York honoree award.

Lively lays out a few ways to prevent the spread of child pornography, an issue closely related to and often stemming from trafficking.  The advertising of a minor child for the purpose of a commercial sex act, as explained in Lively’s speech, is considered an act of trafficking. The preventative measures laid out can help prevent child sex trafficking, as well as helping adult victims.

Along with providing escape for victims, education is the main way we can start combating these crimes. The more advocacy on the realities of trafficking from public figures, the more knowledge will spread on the issue. Educated politicians will instate laws that don’t criminalize sex workers. Educated communities and their targets will be less likely mislead by scams that would trap them in slavery. Educated citizens can start to mobilize against this issue.
 
Here are some great resources for getting informed on sex trafficking:
Polaris Project
Not For Sale Campaign
FBI Data & Action

Do you have any questions about trafficking? Let us know in the comments below.

My niece, who is 14, just told me that she wants to be an entrepreneur. Why?
"Because they're their own bosses!" She said. "And I want to do it all." 
"You don't want to do it all," I told her. 
"Yes I do!" 
I can understand her sentiment --the desire to try it all, learn it all, control it all. But I have learned very well that this is no way to run a business, or a film. The first rule of filmmaking: Get Help. Shooting and editing are just the beginning. Documentary filmmakers need to fundraise, form partnerships, network, bookkeep, maintain a web presence, develop branding, strategize distribution, write grants and scripts, communicate with their subjects, and do dozens of other large and small tasks. It's too much for one person, though many, like me, try to manage on their own.
You may have noticed that one thing I need help with is blogging...! And so I am thrilled to let you know that Treeclimber Media has a new contributing blogger! Claire Dugan is a writer, an artist, and a dancer who has a passion for women's issues. I danced next to her for a year before a mutual friend pointed out that we have a shared interest and might be able to work together. (Thanks, Joyce!) She'll be posting on a variety of topics covering trafficking, women's and girls issues, and whatever she is learning about while she becomes more acquainted with the themes and issues of The Long Rescue. Her first post will bring us back to a basic question that I have neglected to address: what exactly is trafficking, anyway? 

I'll let you learn more about Claire in her own words.

Q: Where are you from?
CD: I was born in SF and raised in the East Bay. Aside from a stint in NYC, I have lived here my whole life.

Q: What's your favorite sandwich?
CD: My favorite sandwich happened one night about ten years ago after a long shift of work. I got home late, and my mom surprised me with a sandwich from Andronico's (RIP). I was so beat and so hungry and it was some mystical combination of mustard, turkey, cheese, and veggies on wheat. Best sandwich I've ever had.

Q: What are your passions in life? What inspires you? 
CD: My passions always revolve around creativity. I think the non-verbal communication of art helps us reveal things that can't be shared in conversation. I'm inspired by social progress, and the learning and growth that has taken place in our society, particularly as oppressed groups now have the space to speak up and be heard. I'm inspired to help integrate these changes into a better society, and into myself.

Q: Why are you interested in working on The Long Rescue? 
CD: Trafficking is a women's rights violation, and a human rights violation. I'm happy to lend support to the effort of this documentary to educate and spread awareness about what is going on, and how this crime affects it's victims. I'm interested in learning about this issue and excited to be able to share that learning process with others through writing about it. 

Q: What books, films, or art have influenced your outlook or how you do your work? 
CD: I studied art in college, and was very inspired by the styles surrounding the Impressionist Movement. Now I'm getting into the simplicity of graphic design and the idea of saying a lot in a simple straightforward representation. I'm not as easily inspired by books or movies - anything that makes me laugh or cry is good.

Q: What is the most shocking thing you've learned so far in your first weeks of research? 
CD: I'm shocked about what a pulse this issue has all over the world. It's such an underground problem that unfurls into so many different surface issues and symptoms: prostitution, forced labor, child pornography, etc. These scattered issues grow from trafficking, but also obscure it as their root issue.

Q: What other projects are you working on? 
CD: I'm currently working on a few certificates at UC Berkeley Extension, completing courses in editing and in graphic design.

Q: What do you do to relax?
CD: Endorphins are always a great way to relax. I love getting a good workout in a dance class. Spending time outdoors being in nature is always centering, too.

Q: Where do you see yourself in five years? 
CD: I hope to be working in a more creative capacity to bring about positive progress in the world. How that will manifest, I have no idea, but being involved in projects like The Long Rescue is a great start!

Q: What's your favorite quote or words to live by? 
CD: ​Lately it's been "I am not here for you." It's a reminder to myself to disengage from anyone who uses me or others to fuel their ego. It's something I am still learning.