Dan Parris is the creator of the documentary Give A Damn?. It is the story of Dan and his friends traveling to Kenya on a dollar a day in order to simulate extreme poverty. I hangouted (no idea what the right verb for Google+ Hangouts is) with him and he talked about his experience and the making of the movie.
Q: What was the most difficult part of your travels to Kenya (excluding the obvious plane crash and recovery in the hospital that brought your trip to such a screeching halt)?
I guess the most difficult was being with the same guy for a month straight, not eating, sleeping in random places, not showering. And I guess the hardest part was all of us just getting along.
Q: Did you ever find yourself thinking “I could just give up.” (Again, this excludes the plane crash/after the plane crash)?
Yah, I think like, the second day. We were walking down the highway [hitchhiking], it was 90 something degrees outside and no cars were picking us up and we were in the middle of Illinois. I was like “Are we going to make it 50 miles away from home? So that was a time when I thought, maybe this was a dumb idea. We could always hop on a plane or something, but as far as the whole hitchhiking thing, I felt like we were going to throw that out the window one second day. But, not too long after thinking that, a truck puller over and we hopped in and then we got an hour and a half ride. We’d lose hope, and then something awesome would happen.
Q: Would you say that the general conception that poorer people are less trustworthy holds any truth, or is it just xenophobia?
No, I mean. I would say that, when you’re in poverty, you’re in much dire circumstances. So if you put something out in front of their face…. I mean, you can leave your iPhone on a table and walk away and, because people have their own iPhones, they won’t take it. But, if you’re in a situation where you see that iPhone on the table and you think “I could sell that on the internet for more than I make all year”, and some people who live off a dollar a day could do that. I think that, people who live in extreme poverty are more likely to give in to that kind of temptation. It can be almost life or death, you know? I don’t think that people are poor because of some character flaw and if they were in the same situation that we’re in, they wouldn’t give in to the temptation. In fact, I think that they have better character than we do, in some cases.
Q: If you had to give one thing that you saw in Kenya that really surprised you, what would it be?
How functional even the slum we visited was Even though, from here you might think that everyone in Kenya is depressed and covered in flies, but that’s not the case at all. They’re moving around, hanging out. People are making stuff happen. People aren't waiting for a handout. It’s much more alive and vibrant and people are making their lives happen.
Q: How has your perspective on Africa in general changed since your trip, if at all?
I believe that the only difference between us and people in Africa is health, wealth, background. The actual level of intelligence and capability is just the same as ours. Everybody in the world want the same thing. They want to raise their family, live in peace, have a career that they are proud of, be able to take care of themselves, eat a couple meal a day, shelter. Everywhere I’ve traveled, I’ve noticed that we’re all much more similar than I thought.
Q: What is the best thing that people can do to help the situation in Africa?
What we kind of end our film with is asking two questions, what breaks your heart, and what makes you come alive. We want to find a way to put those two thing together. What breaks your heart could be extreme poverty, or it could be something else. It’s the thing in the world that you’re like, this should not be this way. What makes you come alive is what you enjoy doing. So I think the best thing you can do for extreme poverty is just to do what you do, but very well. On a more practical level, I think that everyone should give at least a dollar a day to relief in Africa.
Q: I’d like to finish off with some questions about the technical aspects of the movie. Were you hoping for a wider distribution of the movie, or are you happy with the amount that it has been distributed and will be distributed?
My original goal was to make it the best selling documentary of all time and it would change the world. Thousands have seen it. It’s getting close to ten thousand. My hope is that the movie will each hundreds of thousands. We’re doing a TUGG campaign. How that works is that we post our movie and if somebody wants to see it in their area, they try to sell tickets. If they sell enough tickets, than the movie gets shown. Then, you make money, the movie makers make money, TUGG makes money. It’s really a win-win situation. The hope is for iTunes, DVD, hopefully Netflix. No, it didn’t reach the audience I hoped but I still have hope that it will reach a wide audience.
Q: How many cameras did you have, how did you carry them, and did you ever have somebody try and steal them?
Yah, we had two small HV30 cameras. It shoots HDV. For the value, it’s very small and light and shoots very good video. In Kenya, we had a bigger camera but it got destroyed in the plane crash.
And, did you ever have somebody try and steal your cameras?
Yes, one time we were driving in a big van, taking nature shots. And one of the guys looked over to me and asked for my camera. I said no. He was probably thinking “you have two, why can’t I have one?” Another time, some guys approached our guys and asked if they could rob us. Our guide said “no, these are our friends.” Then, they walked away. Another time, David was bouldering in Tansania and some High School guys started following him, saying “give me your camera, give me your camera.”
Q: How long, start to finish, did it take to make this movie? I’m talking about the filming part of it, not editing. I’m saying, from the moment you decided to do this to the time that David and Tim stepped out of that terminal, did Give A Damn? take to make?
We left in July and [David and Tim] came back in November. So they were in Africa for 3 months.
Q: One last question: Can you speak a little about Y2Q (Your2Questions)?
We were making the film and people want to know what to do after watching it. We didn’t want to start our own non profit or tell people to donate to one specific charity. We know that it’s not any one specific thing that makes a difference, so we created Y2Q. To take [what breaks your heart and what makes you come alive] and combine them together, that’s really the way to make a difference. So, what we wanted to do was spread that message, and there wasn’t really any organization to donate to to do that. So basically [Y2Q] will be a site where you go in there and write down your two questions. If you don’t know what makes you come alive, we’ll provide links to websites that can help you figure it out. After that, you upload a 90 second video of you talking about how you put those two together. If you have questions on how to put them together, we can show you other people’s videos that you can watch, you can see people who have similar answer to the two questions. We’ll also try to produce original content about people who have done big things. If you still feel like you’re struggling, we’ll provide tools and links to help you use your time and your treasure (money) to help the world. Or we’ll hook you up with a new site called GivingLibrary that will show you how different organizations are ranked.
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