Communicating With Rice Mother

It’s not much of a stretch for me to assume that I am one of very few American citizens who has the ability to communicate with the Mae Posop.  She is, after all, an ancient and sacred spirit in faraway Southeast Asia (SEA) and I am far from being a devoutly religious man.  However, over the last four years I have studied and come to accept her spiritual values. 

 I am attracted to her myths and rituals that provide poor rural rice farmers with a whole paradigm of how to live in harmony with nature and its cycle of birth, death and rebirth, creating equality in society, and respecting the feminine power as the source of life.   The Rice Mother has become a close friend of mine.

Our long path together will, I expect, end only when her documentary film series (The Search For Mae Posop) is being produced and distributed, as I envision, exclusively over the Internet in the aforementioned, faraway SEA.   Such a task would seem impossible to achieve without my daily dialogue with Mae Posop.   She is able to critique me, and patiently guide me as I endeavor to advance daily, in any way that I can find. 

During most of my relationship with Mae, her spirit has seemingly arrived at my side in the form of intuition: a sixth sense about what is important.  More recently, I am also learning to how to have a one-on-one dialogue with her through meditation.  Meditation requires a quiet mind and lots of practice.  I'm working on it.  On top of all that, I’m confident that Mae will also be appearing in my dreams.  Or so I’m told.  I wait hopefully.

My most recent dialogue with her informs me to continually monitor media coverage from tha part of the world and to wait for political calm before taking my small camera crew back into SEA.  The United States has elevated its warnings to recommend that Americans postpone non-essential travel to Thailand.  If we were going to travel only to Thailand, I would travel without hesitation, but now the State Department recommends that Americans currently avoid China’s Yunnan Provence as well.  That’s where the Mekong River begins it’s journey through SEA and where our series begins. On top of that my Asian friends, both here and over there, suggest it would also be foolish to travel into Myanmar, Vietnam and Cambodia at this time.  All of the above are experiencing some turmoil and political uncertainty. 

There is an old proverb that proclaims, “Smooth seas do not make skillful sailor.”  And so I take this opportunity to shout from the rooftops, “If I can’t do what I want now, I will be even more prepared to do what I want in the future.”

Job number one: get the trailer for the doc film series edited and make it available to the Ford and Sundance Foundations.  There is an urgency to the project that keeps me fully occupied.  Well, nearly.  I'm also setting up to shoot a film next month.  The script (A Lovely Adult Beverage) is an award winning script written a few years ago by San Franciscan David Asher and me.  I'm also working daily on a coming-of-age, art heist thriller screenplay called Objects of Belief.  

Stay tuned, won't you?

Chiseled In Granite

Usually it’s someone calling my name out from across a San Francisco street. “Hey Leo,” they’ll ask, “What’s going on? Anything?” There’s a lot going on. Let me fill you in a bit.

First, please spend a few moments studying the accompanying map - the second in the series of four. You will see that this one illustrates the route of my next trip to Southeast Asia during the window of time described as June, July and August of 2014: Thailand's North West Heartland, Myanmar's Shan State, and China's Yunnan Provence before turning south into Laos to follow the Mekong River Valley to Vientaine. Should I assume that you all understand the goal of the mini-documentary film series - The Search For Mae Posop? It’s said by the ancients that the road to perdition is paved in assumptions. Therefore, let’s take a close, hard look at the mission again. Just in case. Here it is in 17 words. The goal is to enhance the effectiveness of NGOs and CLC programs for the poor rural rice farmers throughout SEA. There are many levels to our mission, but know this: at its core, it is that. It is already chiseled in granite. So then, how does one proceed? Well, for one thing, I wisely continue to rely on Mae Posop to point the way. She has never failed to bring to my attention the next step. Right now the next step is to search for and find cooperative community farm networks (NGOs and CLCs) to visit with our cameras during the next trip to the other side of the world. What are the resources I can draw upon to accomplish this vital task? Well - fortunately during my first trip to SEA, I was introduced to highly regarded people and organizations that have offered to assist to me in arranging this activity. I am currently pursuing these much anticipated relationships. Lastly, I have begun the important search for a sponsor for Mae Posop’s mini-doc series. There are two seasons (each made up of 8 episodes) and thus two opportunities for a progressive enterprise in Southeast Asia to make a significant regional impression. The potential benefits to the sponsor are great and I am already presenting my case to important decision makers. Organic is the operative word here.

Mae Posop's Profile

The question put to me was, "Tell us about the title of your doc series. The Search For Mae Posop. What does it mean?" Wonderful question. I love to talk about my new best friend. In most rice growing areas of Southeast Asia there is an ancient spirit of rice that resides in a Rice Goddess or Rice Mother. For thousands of years her birth and life have appeared in legend and folklore in all regions of Thailand where she is called Mae Posop. Fast-forward to today: now rural rice farmers are concerned that she is being taken for granted and that their rich rice cultural heritage is fast disappearing. Only in the past five decades has her veneration been threatened by modern agriculture, changing rice growing economics, and industrialization. Wait for Superman no more. In The Search For Mae Posop she will be returned to center stage where she will direct our cameras to rural farmers learning and working hard to remain resilient and to continue to feed their families during this era of climate change.

Her offer of hope lies in the alternative rice farming movement that seeks alternative ways to cultivate rice which are in harmony with nature. Being in harmony with nature is a concept that is instantly desirable to us all. In the title, the use of her name, specifically in the Thai language, will be understood and considered both clever and clear by its narrowly defined Southeast Asian audiences: clever, in a way that is compelling to the rural rice farmer audience and clear, in a way that tells the viewer what it is they are going to see. It is critical that the huge rural farm populations of Southeast Asia (a) expands its understanding of the risks already underway, and (b) grasps what its seeing and is able to assess their own options within that paradigm. Is there a better way to protect their families and their greater communities? Far greater than considerations of economic and civic infrastructures is how a single man may feed his family. This documentary series, distributed only over the Internet, will help begin that effort.

Panning For Gold

The climate of the Mekong River Basin ranges from temperate to tropical. All I know for sure is that where we find ourselves today it is hot and humid and there is nothing but 'white water' ahead. So much to see and never enough time. What a rush in every sense of the word. During our second week in SEA the production team of three focuses it’s cameras and all it’s energy (and remaining shekels, I might add) on discovering the rural rice farmers who farm along a section of the Mekong River that sweeps down the broad curve of the river that borders Thailand, from Vientiane, Laos to Don Khong Island, Laos down near the Cambodian border. Here, the lives of the farmers revolve around a section of the Mekong that has long served as a lifeline into this interior. Along the Mekong there are astounding visible signs of history stretching back to the 6th and 7th century: gigantic Buddha statues atop mountains, breathtaking ruins and an ambiance that evokes an authentic awe in so many travelers. And there is genetic evidence that shows that rice originated 8,200 to 13,500 years ago and began moving down this important waterway. It is an important part of the world and we sense it. So - what do you do when, after a long trip to the other side of our planet and a long, red-eye railroad trip to this exact destination?

Well, the thinking was given that there was about to be a spectacular sunset on the river, it was unanimous: a cold beer with a view of the whole event would be in-order. Soon we realize that we’d better find a place to rest for the night. No problem as long as I leave it in the hands of the all-female crew. I take a cold shower and hit the rack with Mark Twain’s “Roughing It.” Wun goes for a jog. Jogging in that kind of heat is unimaginable to me. Gloria goes shopping for batteries. Stick a fork in me - I'm done.