#when we walk

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My son, I am on the ferry this morning and thinking about how you are doing. I remember taking this ferry trip many times with you. Now that you are not here these memories cling in my mind every time I pass by the places we have been together; constant reminders. Thinking about you this morning. Dad.

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I was nineteen years old and living in white suburbia- Tsawwassen, Canada. I had just returned from an extended trip to India. Blending in was not something I was used to in Canada. As a brown skinned kid, I stuck out in white suburbia. In India, I loved blending right in and not sticking out as a minority or “the other,” to be more precise about how I felt in Tsawwassen. I loved being in Goa, India and enjoyed all of the experiences I had there. It felt so good, that when I returned home, I spent most of my time thinking about it and how much I loved traveling around India by train all alone and loving ­­­­­­the total anonymity of it.

I had gone to India to start shooting my first film. While back home looking at all of the raw footage I had just shot, I was having fun reliving all of my travels and dreaming of going back. Instead of returning to India, I spent the next two years at Emily Carr University and Rainmaker Labs editing and creating my low-budget, ten-minute film- Olivia’s Puzzle. I had no money except for my student loan, so that’s what I used to develop the film. I was really excited to see the footage. The footage was developed and then transferred to Beta SP- a high quality video format, which was the best thing to transfer to back in 1999.

The only way I could view my precious Beta SP footage I shot in India, was to transfer all of it to VHS. Sounds easy, but it wasn’t. Emily Carr had a VHS transfer station in its Avid Room, but it was the most sought after room. It was reserved for fourth-year students and being a third year student, it was a challenge to get to use it. To make matters worse, I was never taken seriously as a filmmaker, because I dabbled in multiple disciplines. That didn’t stop me though. I walked into that hallowed Avid room with my Beta SP, excited to transfer it to VHS and see all of the footage that I had traveled all the way to India and back for, had been working on for two years, and had put all of my heart and soul into.

Walking into the Avid room, I ran into Cliff and Ted, two fourth-year film students. “Can I use the Beta SP deck,” I asked in the most pitiful, hopeful voice, and added for good measure, “if you guys aren’t using it?”

They looked at me, each other, and back at me. “Yeah,” Ted said, “you can use it.”

“If you even know how to turn it on,” Cliff added.

They saw me as some laughable underclassman.

My twenty-year old pride was incensed. I had just traveled the world, rode on Indian trains, seen so much and worked so hard. Ted and Cliff felt like the shit sitting there in the Avid Room. But it was I who was the shit. This, they did not know. I knew how to turn the Beta SP deck on, but I turned around and left, muttering to myself many unseemly adjectives about Cliff and Ted.

I sat quietly down the hall in the cafeteria patiently waiting for them to leave the room. Finally, at ten o’clock they left. I put my bag of Doritos and cup of coffee down and headed back to the Avid Room to use the precious Beta SP deck.

The suspense of waiting to see my own work, my film, was intense. Back in 1999 there was no such thing as filming with digital camcorders or having LCD screens to see what one was filming as they filmed it. There was no such thing as instant gratification. Filming back then was an entirely different animal. I had to think about each shot before I shot it, especially since I only had a certain amount of Beta SP film and only so much time in which to do the shoot. Everything was super technical. I had to make sure the exposure and aperture was right, the loading and unloading of the film was right, and check each time to make sure no hairs slipped accidentally into the gate.

For better or worse I was stuck with exactly what I had filmed in India. Having spent so much time and money- over six thousand dollars- to travel to India and back, I knew that if my film sucked, I was screwed. As the film began transferring to VHS, I was ecstatic, as it was all looking quite gorgeous.

I spent the next year-and-a-half editing the film, which I named Olivia’s Puzzle. I found out later that there was a huge buzz at Emily Carr about the film. I was so preoccupied putting it all together, I really had no idea. Not until I showed the film at our Grad School Film Festival, did I start feeling the buzz. The theater was packed. I imagine everyone knew how long and how far I traveled to make the film and were intrigued by all of the work I put into it.

Three days after the film showed at Emily Carr, I graduated and moved to New York City.

With my Beta SP film in hand, I moved into the East Village at 11th and B. I would not of been able to have afforded the move had it not been for my little brother, Daniel- a rich asshole at the time- who leant me three thousand dollars. He’s not really an asshole.

I enrolled into Parson’s Master’s of Design and Technology Program and when Olivia’s Puzzle was accepted into Sundance, Manuel- an exceptional visual effects artist and one of my professors- broke out an expensive bottle of Tequila in class and for the next three hours celebrated my success with me and my classmates. One week later, I dropped out of Parsons to follow my dream of becoming a successful documentary filmmaker. It was the smartest decision I ever made.

In closing, I’d like to say to all of the Cliff and Teds out there, be nice to the scraggly looking undergrads. Let them use the AVID room, too.

[joysofbraindamage]

When They Walk

When They Walk is the final film in a trilogy chronicling my journey. The film looks outwards at disability and the world around me.

Jason DaSilva who is the creator of “When I Walk” and its sequel “When We Walk” is raising funds to make a 3rd film titled “When They Walk.” Please share and donate if you can. 

Jason DaSilva is also mentoring Tucker Salovaara who is in the film “Crips Not Creeps” and Tucker Salovaara  is responsible for adding audio description to that film. 

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Really excited that my film is finally out there. Now my big challenges is 

1. Getting to film festivals, as I cannot travel internationally under the current Medicaid plan. I’m worried that this is going to be very expensive.

2. I am excited but I’m also nervous about the film being out there in the world. It’s going to help a lot of people. 

https://caamedia.org/blog/2019/04/18/auteur-and-disability-rights-advocate-jason-dasilvas-new-film-when-we-walk-is-for-his-son/

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From a father to his son: I want every day to be a Sunday. I have got some good ideas about how to end When We Walk. I am happy to be planning all of this right now. It is important to remain flexible, especially when things don't seem to be going our way. No matter what our plans are, we have to remember that the universe has the master plan.

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Hi Jase, I woke up this morning and found a really good radio station of Carnatic music from South India. One day I hope to share it with you. For now, this is the best way I know how. At least that way you can trace and follow my thoughts when you are older and have a chance to look back. Hope you are having a good Saturday.

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To all of my supporters, I am slowing down on my Facebook posts and not doing the daily posts that I did during the summer. I am changing pace to focus on my film, When We Walk, and will be sending more personal Facebook posts no longer daily, but now they will be more pointed; letting you know my thoughts and sentiments as they arise. Thank you for following along with this change in social media that starts now and will continue on for the coming months. More to come soon. Thank you.

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My ultimate challenge is from this point forward as being a filmmaker is my lack of visual acuity.  It’s getting to be really difficult to see on screen myself and remain productive.  At night, more often than not, having the entire day of grappling with not being able to see properly frustrates me.  I finish the last night’s couple of hours by throwing in the towel. With a glass of red wine and accompany of a semi-interesting Netflix movie, I relaxed.  For example, last night I was partially enamored by “Making a Murderer”. Please.  Help me.  

The thing that really sucks is that I can only work as fast as others can help me. It’s been like that for a few years.  Now, I have to rely on others to do most basic things that I would’ve been able to do on my own.  Outside of the control of quality that I used to have, now I have to suck it up and be ok with everything moving at a much slower pace.  I can only move as fast as someone else when I am lifted out of an airplane or I’m watching a film.  I have to trust others and hope for the best moving forward.  I just hope that the viewers on the other side or the readers will give me the due benefit for the extra time, and creative effort it takes to do something as simple writing this blog or editing video.