As a producer working in developing countries, it’s important for me to have my priorities in order.  My list looks a little something like this:

1.  The safety of my friends.
2.  The security of the equipment.
3.  Not getting ripped off by taxi drivers.
4.  My safety.

Over the course of working for JS0 I’ve developed a few strategies and techniques to help make sure that everything remains cool.  I can’t share them all with you, sadly, because then they won’t be as useful, but these are the things I’m thinking about on a daily basis.  Anytime we plan a trip to a new town (or go somewhere unplanned),  walk into a dark, bustling club, or attract the glances of on-lookers as we film in the streets, I’ve got an eye out for possible problems.  As travelers in a foreign land we already stand out, but with the camera in hand our visibility and the ensuing risk can quickly multiply.

Some solutions are simple.  Putting the camera away and looking angry works 80% of the time.  Other times we have to leave the situation entirely.  It’s shitty, but it’s a fact of life.  Or it is in Ecuador, anyway.

I’m trying to think of instances in Vietnam when I feared for the safety of my friends or my gear, and I’m coming up short.  That’s not to say that Saigon is some crime-free paradise; while there I saw cell phones stolen out of tourists’ hands by guys on motorbikes and a couple shady situations that I had to steer clear of.  But after living in Saigon’s backpacker district for a month and taking proper precautions, I felt safe walking around unaccompanied with the camera.  Vietnam may have some petty theft, but muggings and robberies are almost unheard of.

Not so in Quito.  The backpacker district, La Mariscal, can be one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in town, especially if you’re carrying a camera.  Staying in a group is always advisable. The neighborhood is littered with dudes sketchily loitering around for reasons that become all too apparent if you’re by yourself.  Luckily, this wasn’t much of a problem.  Laurene, Freddie and I only lived in the area for a few days before finding our apartment in another neighborhood, and we played it safe in those early days.

I thought that our move might improve the situation.  Santa Clara, our new hood, was relatively clean, busy, and filled with students from the nearby university.  So on our first day in the new place, I filmed Freddie and Laurene as they went to get keys copied at a key-copying-phone-charging-AA-battery-selling-magazine stand on our block.  We had only been on the street for a few minutes when a guy bumped into my bag from behind.  At the time it seemed harmless since I was kinda blocking the sidewalk.  But moments later, as I reached to grab a fresh battery from my camera bag, I realized that something was amiss.  My bag had been sprayed by mustard.

Mustard. Yeah, I don't get it either.

This is the first step in an asinine scheme that the thieves of Quito regularly attempt (and I hope never successfully pull off).  First an unseen hand sprays the bag with mustard.  Next, a well-dressed man approaches, alerts the tourist that he’s been sprayed, and offers to help clean the bag.  The grateful tourist hands the condiment-soaked bag to the Suit, and another guy (probably the mustard-sprayer) runs by and grabs it out of the Suit’s hands, disappearing around the corner.  The well-dressed man is apologetic, the tourist is apoplectic, and the thieves are GONNA GET DRUNK TONIGHT.  Luckily for me, the well-dressed man never materialized, not that it matters much because I would never hand my bag over to someone after it mysteriously rained mustard and he conveniently had some tissues.  To me, that’s this plot’s biggest flaw, and I sincerely hope that no one has ever been stupid enough to fall for it.  But I digress.

I was still apoplectic without the con being completed, as now it seemed that I couldn’t film on my own block.  That’s a shitty-enough feeling even if filming a travel series isn’t your job.  On top of that, the asshole had managed to get mustard down the back of my pants which I had to wear unwashed for a week afterward, giving the appearance that I only own one pair of pants which, while true, isn’t something that I really need advertised.  The situation grew gloomier that night when we were given a security talk by our neighbors, Mehda and Erika (you can watch part of it in Episode 2… the part where they tell us about finding a dead guy).  Their warnings dominated all future shoots.  There’s a reason why the opening shot of Ryan’s night skateboarding scene is taken from our roof, and that’s that I wouldn’t bring the camera outside the apartment at night until I had scoped out the entire street, and even then I couldn’t leave the front of the building.  I had done research prior to coming to Ecuador, but this day spelled it out:  Staying safe in Quito, especially with the camera, was gonna be a hell of a challenge.

Over the next couple months, I would have to out-maneuver followers, sew a few new pockets, and get sprayed by mustard again.  I was annoyed but on guard, and I thought I had it figured out.  Sadly, I was wrong.  Check back when Episode 3 goes up to read about the time I failed.