Finding some time during lunch for this.
It seems like every week, there's some sort of discouragement or low morale at some point. I think the root cause would be the way this industry has become.
I feel directionless, unwanted sometimes, inspiration-less, I feel like staying home with nothing to do, or go to Sungei Buloh and face the ironically bird-less forest and just stare at it blankly. The competitions are coming up but I have no ideas. Life is a bit of a drag now.
I had to drag myself a bit to attend a course the last three days in SMA. But I did sort of enjoyed it. Felt like I went back in time to level one. The other two participants were totally newbies. And when we all introduced ourselves, after hearing the experience I had, my qualification, and the achievements I've been part of, they all looked at me incredulously and asked "what the hell are you doing here?" Well I'd like to know that too.
But the good thing was, I met more people who're interested to join the industry and it was fun sharing my experience with them, apart from finding myself doing a location recording demonstration for them too. Very coincidentally, the head of programs in SMA is my ex-lecturer from Ngee Ann Poly, whom I was actually searching for. Now we're back in contact. He taught me Radio Production back in school, the only other elective I excelled in besides scriptwriting. It was a pleasure telling him how far I've been after graduating from poly.
So my instructor was teaching the basics of production, one thing he said which I felt was the most important thing for every film person to know, rekindled my drive a bit. Firstly, its the reminder that there's no fame or fortune. It comes for some but not everyone makes a name for themselves. In the end, the only thing you can run on is passion. Secondly, there's always a story to tell. There're plenty of stories that people have never heard. And a small story can make a difference to someone's life. Then again, its easy to believe in the power of media but not easy to believe in the power of the storyteller.
So what stories should I tell? I have not a clue. I'm bad at cooking up stories, another irony of a being a screenwriter. Need a day of bumping around in the uncrowded outskirts of the country and some black pepper crab would be nice.
