VOA- CONNECT
[AIR DATE: 03 09 2018]
[FINAL TRANSCRIPT]
OPEN ((VO/NAT))
((Banner))
Super Grains
((SOT))
“Why are we so much more anxious to sell a cell phone than we are to distribute a healthy meal to kids that really need it.”
((Animation Transition)
((Banner)
Sled Rangers
((SOT))
“It’s full contact hockey. There’s no other way to describe it. It’s ice hockey.”
((Open Animation))
BLOCK A
((PKG)) C. DAVID MOODY – PEOPLE IN AMERICA
((Banner: The Building Life))
((Executive Producer: Marsha James))
((Camera: Kaveh Rezaei))
((Charles David Moody Jr., CEO, C.D. Moody Construction))
“My name is Charles David Moody Jr., and I am the CEO of C.D. Moody Construction company, and I also run a website called Moodyspeaks.com that helps survivors of childhood sexual abuse. And I even wrote a book, called “Fighting through the Fear: My Journey of Healing from Childhood Sexual Abuse.”
One of the sayings I’ve come with now is to “live in the moment.”
We spend so much time waiting, hoping tomorrow is going to be better that we miss sometimes some real good moments, because time goes fast.
I’m a sexual abuse survivor that didn’t speak up about it till I was 55 years old, publicly and I went through the panic attacks. I had PTSD. I had a complete nervous breakdown when my business was only four years old. But God and my wife helped me get through it.
When I look back, there was a number of things my parents instilled in me growing up, but probably the most important thing was I could be whoever I wanted to be even though I was growing up during the 60s in the civil rights era where blacks were fighting just for the right to even vote, and be able to live free and live where you want to live.
My parents never made me feel like I had to limit what I wanted to do or who I wanted to be. In fact, my dad was a 2nd lieutenant in Panama, and my mother, she was pregnant with me there. She came back to the United States three months before I was born so I could be born in the United States, and she said, when I was growing up, “I did that so you could be president of the United States one day.”
My parents taught me to be whoever I wanted to be in life and don’t let anything hold me back.
We’ve done some really exciting projects in Atlanta, but one of them that really sticks out for me is the Ray Charles Performing Arts Center over at Morehouse College. What Ray Charles stood for, I mean, here’s a guy who was blind. The thought that he could do what he was doing was unheard of. That’s probably one of those buildings, when I go inside, I just stare because I’m like, ‘Man, we built this.’
Now, the cyclorama at the History Center means a lot to me because the cyclorama is a huge circular painting that’s over a hundred years old of the Battle of Atlanta during the Civil War. We had to help figure out how we were going to relocate it, and then drop it down through the roof of the new building, and then after we got it in, we had to unwind it and get it hung up, so now they can repair it and get it ready in 2018 for the public to see.
The dream is different as you age because when I was growing up, I never saw anybody who looked like me who was a contractor. I didn’t meet my first African-American architect until I was about 17 years old. My dream was just, have a good job, take care of my family, but to own my own business of this size, I never dreamed that.”
((Charles David Moody Jr., CEO, C.D. Moody Construction))
“I have saying I’ve come up with now, that says “nobody promised me that life would be easy, but it sure is fun if you don’t give up.” So we’re going to have bumps. We’re going to have challenges. We’re going to have some bad things.
I’m proud to be an American. I’m proud of what opportunities are here, and I hope we will continue to work to provide those opportunities and not forget those who don’t have hope.”
((PKG)) SLED HOCKEY
((Banner: Sled Rangers))
((Reporter/Camera: Tina Trinh))
((Adapted by: Phil Alexiou))
((POP UP BANNER: The Paralympic sport Sled Hockey is rapidly gaining popularity in the United States))
((BILL GREENBERG, FOUNDER, NEW YORK SLED RANGERS))
“The Wheelchair Sports Federation is an organization dedicated to providing all kinds of support to physically disabled athletes, mostly in team sports but also in individual sports, whether they be children or adults, all across the country.”
((JOHILENY MERAN, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“From the very beginning I wasn’t like a natural at it so I had to practice and continue on playing and continue on getting up.”
((MICHAEL ABRAMS, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“It’s really just a sled or like a seat though with skates under you and sticks that you use to push.
((BILL GREENBERG, FOUNDER, NEW YORK SLED RANGERS))
It’s full contact hockey and there’s no other way to describe it. It’s ice hockey.”
((SAMUEL, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“It’s a difficult sport, right, to play. But you sort of just fall into like a routine on how to do it.”
((BILL GREENBERG, FOUNDER, NEW YORK SLED RANGERS))
“What we’re trying to do is show that even though they may not be able to walk very well, or have other challenges in life, that they can get out of their chairs and be as active as anybody.”
((JOHILENY MERAN, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“I think one of the greatest things about the program in general is that they expect you to want to do things on your own.”
((SAMUEL, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“When I was younger my parents wanted me to be active and they started looking around for all different kinds of sports and they found sled hockey. And I really like just playing it and the aspects of it and so I sort of just fell into, you know, playing it more and more until I joined the team.”
((POP UP BANNER: Sled Hockey was invented in Sweden in the 1960s for people with disabilities))
((BILL GREENBERG, FOUNDER, NEW YORK SLED RANGERS))
“This money allows us to not only support the sled hockey program in terms of buying ice time and buying equipment which everyone knows are expensive. But we can do other amazing things too, for instance, in two weeks I’m taking 18 of these kids to Park City, Utah to go adaptive skiing as well as playing sled hockey and other winter sports.”
((JOHILENY MERAN, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“I think definitely getting involved in adaptive sports has changed my life for the better and I believe that children who have the opportunity to try adaptive sports should try them because it really does build a different kind of strength that you just don’t get in other activities.”
((MICHAEL ABRAMS, NEW YORK SLED RANGER))
“I just really enjoy skating on the ice. It’s really nice.”
TEASE ((VO/NAT))
Coming up….
((Banner))
Nap Time
((SOT))
“It started off as me just trying to discover a cool, comfy, quiet space to take a power nap in the middle of the day.”
BREAK ONE
BUMP IN ((ANIM))
BLOCK B
((PKG )) ROTI BANK
((Banner: Food to the Rescue))
((Reporter: Anjana Pasricha))
((Camera: P. Pallavi))
((Adapted by: Zdenko Novacki))
((MAP: Mumbai))
((NATS))
((SUBHASH TALEKAR, FOUNDER, ROTI BANK))
“We have seen people living on sidewalks, under the bridges, outside train stations, sleeping hungry and searching for leftovers in trash bins. This is common in Mumbai, in India and all around the world. At least 20% of the world’s population goes to bed hungry. There are those who do not even have a crumb so they starve. We wanted to do something for them. So, we started asking people to contact us, the lunch box carriers or ‘Dabba wallahs”, instead of throwing away their leftovers. This is how we started collecting leftover food and distributing it to the hungry. This is how the "Roti Bank" (Food Bank) came into being.”
((JAYAWANTI THAKKAR, MUMBAI RESIDENT, FOOD DONOR))
“Those who starve know what hunger is. I know how it feels to be hungry because I am on several medications which cannot be taken on an empty stomach. It is painful for me to think that there are people living on sidewalks who sleep hungry every single day. I have tried to take food to them but there always were more mouths than I could feed. My food was never enough and they used to fight to snatch from one another. If the lunch box carriers can collect and distribute leftover food to the needy in an organized manner, then that is very good.”
((SUBHASH TALEKAR, FOUNDER, ROTI BANK))
“There are 5000 lunch box carriers or ‘Dabba wallahs” working in this business, out of which only 200 are involved in this project. This became a problem because from 8 am to 6 pm, we used to do our normal job, and from 6 pm to 9 pm, we used to collect and distribute leftover food to the hungry. We had no time to sleep. So, former police commissioner D Shivanand and his associates came forward and donated a minivan to us. Now, we are able to pick up and distribute leftover food to the hungry in a timely manner.”
((JAYAWANTI THAKKAR, MUMBAI RESIDENT, FOOD DONOR))
“Our work is easy. All we have to do is cook and have the food ready, then call up the lunch box carriers. Their job is difficult, taking it to the needy and distributing it properly. I salute them for carrying on this noble work.”
((SUBHASH TALEKAR, FOUNDER, ROTI BANK))
“It is our desire that others should come forward and help us drive this “Vehicle of Humanity”. No one should have to go to bed empty stomach. We want others join in this effort so our dream, to completely eliminate hunger from the country, comes true.”
((PKG)) POWERING UP FOOD
((Banner: Going with the Grain))
((MAP showing Liberia and Silicon Valley))
((Reporter: Michelle Quinn))
((Camera: Deana Mitchell))
((Adapted by: Zdenko Novaki))
((THOMAS BOWMAN, CHEF, JUST))
“This is called Power Gari. Gari is also the Liberian name for cassava. It’s like an amazing cream of wheat, the texture, the mouth-feel of the cassava from the farm is just perfect. This is something they eat every single day there. And what we kind of have done is taken the product and kind of made a culturally relevant food better. This Power Gari has about 12 grams of protein per serving.”
((JOSH TETRICK, CEO, JUST))
“We want to end micro-nutrient deficiency in the world. We are starting with Liberia. And the potential to do it, I think quicker than a lot of people realize, is right in front of us."
((TAYLOR QUINN, EMERGING MARKETS DIRECTOR, JUST))
“How do we build a food system that works? And then here is one example of how it can work. But by no means is one product, one company, one person going to change anything. That’s ridiculous. We are hoping to prove a model and say, hey, here is an example that it can work. Now let’s try to help others and enable others to make it happen.”
((NATS))
((THOMAS BOWMAN, CHEF, JUST))
“We don’t make food that other people can make. And we really got down to the science of food, and I have always said, in my over 18-year culinary career, that I am 60 percent scientist and 40 percent chef. And just having this mentality of ‘We don’t make food that other people can make’, you know, coming in and disrupting the food space and making food that nobody else can make. Instead of cooking for 200 random strangers a night, my food can go out to millions of people.”
((JOSH TETRICK, CEO, JUST))
“Why are we so much more anxious to sell a cell phone than we are to distribute a healthy meal to kids who really need it? So, we want to take a mindset that often you find in for-profit enterprises and apply it to something that’s a lot more important than making sure I can access Snapchat faster.”
((TAYLOR QUINN, EMERGING MARKETS DIRECTOR, JUST))
“The important part of this work is that JUST has provided a lot of instigation and ideas but at the end of the day, this is a Liberian business, run by Liberians, and feeding Liberians, and that’s how it should be and that’s how it will remain.”
TEASE ((VO/NAT))
Coming up….
((Banner))
Always in Bloom
((SOT))
“This is a very elegant museum so the flowers have to be very elegant as well.”
BREAK TWO
BUMP IN ((ANIM))
BLOCK C
((PKG)) RECHARJ NAP CAFÉ
((Banner: Urban Siesta))
((Reporter: Faiza Elmasry))
((Camera: Michael Burke))
((Adapted by: Zdenko Novacki))
((NATS))
((Locator: Washington DC))
((DANIEL TURISSINI, FOUNDER, RECHARJ))
“It started off as me just trying to discover a cool, comfy, quiet space to take a power nap in the middle of the day. And walking around the city, doing some discovery, I couldn’t find any place suitable. So, along that path of discovery, I ended up finding a space for meditation as well. So, I was a little skeptical at first, but I was pretty desperate and felt that I would try anything out. Unfortunately, the place that I went to meditate had to close down. I was making a lifestyle change and I was feeling such a fantastic benefit personally and professionally. So, I decided I would put the pieces of the puzzle together and open my own beautiful power nap and modern meditation studio. We offer services in, kind of, two camps. We call them contemplative and restorative. So, contemplative is more your traditional seated, guided meditation. We offer mindfulness. We offer mantra. We offer metta which is love and kindness. For our restorative practices, we have some awesome offerings such as a sound bath. We also do Yoga Nidra which is a fantastic guided visualization where you are lying down, and of course our power naps which is, kind of, our hallmark offering. The power nap, by the way, is not a guided class. We’ve curated the space which is, kind of, optimal for the power nap experience. So everybody looking for a quick 25 minutes snooze in the middle of the day, this is the ultimate place to do that and find that sense of relaxation.”
((MARI APONTE, ATTORNEY & RECHARJ CLIENT))
“I come here every day around lunch time, pretty much around this time. What I like the most about coming here is that I can breathe, whereas my morning is very crazy, very hectic. I drink a lot of coffee sometimes and I am like moving too much too fast.”
((NATS: I invite you to come back to your thoughts.))
((PAIGE LICHENS, TEACHER, RECHARJ))
“There are many methods, many tools, and then it’s about noticing and saying, ‘you are going to have to discipline, concentrate, discipline and concentrate.”
((NATS: Notice the felt sensation on your body, breath and thoughts.))
((CONNOR GARRITY, IT CONSULTANT & RECHARJ CLIENT))
“I spend way too much time sitting down except now I try to spend more time on standing desks. And also, I know it’s stupid, but I have devised a system to lie down and be able to do whatever on my computer too.”
((PAIGE LICHENS, TEACHER, RECHARJ))
“There is a low-grade anxiety that many people, at least in the D.C. area, to be more specific, they are having. We live with the day of technology. We got all these tools and we are told ‘Oh, these tools are going to add more time.’ And surprise, surprise, they magically didn’t.”
((DANIEL TURISSINI, FOUNDER, RECHARJ))
“I think what we brought to D.C. is unique and I think it’s compelling. I think people are really interested. As this wave of lifestyle and wellness continues to expand and grow, we are finding that folks are flocking to coming to a place just to recharge, if you will. And that’s kind of our namesake, and that’s why we built this place. “
TEASE ((VO/NAT))
Coming up….
((Banner))
T-Rex on the Move
((SOT))
“She is the icon. She is our biggest attraction. She is beloved by everybody in Chicago as well as our visitors.”
BREAK THREE
BUMP IN ((ANIM))
BLOCK D
((PKG)) DINOSAUR MUSEUM
((Banner: Jurassic rePark))
((Reporter/Camera: Kane Farabough))
((Locator: Chicago, Illinois))
((NATS))
((Jaap Hoogstraten, Director of Exhibitions, Field Museum))
“Oh, she is the icon. She is our biggest attraction. She is beloved by everybody in Chicago as well as our visitors.”
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
“Millions of people come to Chicago every year in order to see Sue, the most complete and iconic T-Rex fossil in the world.”
((NATS))
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
"Sue is known the world over also because we have two casts of Sue that travel around the world. So we take Sue to other museums as well as people coming here to take a look at Sue."
((Jaap Hoogstraten, Director of Exhibitions, Field Museum))
"People that haven’t seen her have a relationship to Sue through social media. She’s a great ambassador for not only Field Museum but for natural history museums in general.”
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
“Those casts of Sue have been traveling for about fifteen years or so. In the aggregate, millions of people have come to know about Sue and they did not even come to Chicago.”
((Jaap Hoogstraten, Director of Exhibitions, Field Museum))
“A lot of visitors come to the Field to see Sue and feel that she is may be a little smaller than expected. The build-up is too big because this is such a huge space."
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
“We know from a lot of visitor studies that people want to see Sue and Sue’s natural environment and you can’t really do that in an environment like Stanley Field Hall. It really requires a different space and that’s what we are going to be providing for our visitors. So we are going to be using some multi-media in order to put people in the Cretaceous era where Sue lived. We are also going to be putting more specimens on display, specimens that were found with Sue when Sue was discovered back in the 90s and then also some other specimens like Triceratops and Edmontosaurus that would have been Sue’s prey for example. So we are able to really take the time and the space to flush out the full story of where Sue lived, how she lived, and what her daily life may have been like. So, we expect the demand for Sue to be just as great in the new hall."
((Jaap Hoogstraten, Director of Exhibitions, Field Museum))
"We’ve learned a lot about the science, the biomechanics of T-Rexes from studying Sue. Her gait, her bite force, and all kinds of things. We’ll be adding new research to the display in changing her pose slightly."
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
“Sue will be coming down bone-by-bone and moving into a brand new exhibition hall we’ve built just for her.”
((Jaap Hoogstraten, Director of Exhibitions, Field Museum))
"The way that she is mounted on this metal armature allows us to remove every bone individually, and that will be really interesting because we haven’t de-installed significant portions of her since she was installed in the year 2000."
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
“We are cataloging and cleaning every single bone that comes off display. It’s going to take almost 28 days completely. Then the work really begins in the new hall where Sue will be.”
((Jaap Hoogstraten, Director of Exhibitions, Field Museum))
"We keep the skull separate from the rest of the body, because it’s the main thing that people want to research. So even when she is reinstalled, we’ll keep the skull in a separate case for easy access. And there is the opportunity to feature this humongous Titanosaur that is actually more appropriate, in better scale to the space we think. It’s a Sauropod. It’s a 120 feet (36.6 meters) long, Sue is 40 feet (12 meters). So three times as long."
((Hilary Hansen, Senior Project Manager, Field Museum))
"Sue has been an icon not just for the Field Museum but for Chicago since its debut back in the year 2000. So we know and we are very aware of that legacy that Sue has and I think the visitors that come to the museum next year in March of ‘19 when we finally open the new exhibition, are going to see Sue in a whole new light.”
((PKG)) MET MUSEUM OF ART – FLOWERS
((Banner: Still Life with Flowers))
((Reporter: Elena Wolf))
((Camera: Max Avloshenko))
((Editor: Martin Secrest))
((Locator: New York, New York))
((POP UP BANNER: Every Monday morning, fresh flower displays are created for the Metropolitan Museum))
((NATS: Hi. You really want to shake my hand?))
((REMCO VAN VLIET, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, VAN VLIET & TRAP))
“Of course this is the greatest cultural institution here in the city if I might say. And it’s a huge honor for me to be here and to make these flowers every week. And it’s so noble for Mrs. Lila Acheson Wallace that she made this donation so all the tourists that come visit the museum, and also staff, when they walk into the museum on Tuesday morning, they receive a nice welcome. And that’s great. Of course, this is a very elegant museum, so the flowers have to be very elegant as well.”
((CLYDE JONES, METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART))
((Courtesy Chyron: Van Vliet & Trap))
“So Lila Acheson Wallace was the cofounder of Reader’s Digest. Mrs. Wallace was a longtime trustee of the Met and one of our greatest benefactors. She was an avid gardener. I understand that she had fresh flowers delivered to the Reader’s Digest offices every day. In the Great Hall, there are four niches that contain these beautiful flower arrangements that are redone once a week. And we also have in the center of the Great Hall this beautiful centerpiece here. The visitors are astounded when they walk in the doors. They don’t expect that they are going to see something living and fresh in the midst of this austerity.”
((REMCO VAN VLIET, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, VAN VLIET & TRAP))
“Usually, in order to make an arrangement here in the museum – and you see the size of these arrangements – the flowers that I buy are very, very tall. So they have to be at least 120 centimeters in order for me to be able to use it here in the arrangement. So the majority of the pretty flowers, like sweet peas or Dutch tulips – it’s all this tall – I can’t use those. And the flowers have to last a week. The nice thing about these weekly flower arrangements is that I have the opportunity to every week show something completely different. And that’s fun. It’s fun for the guests that visit to the museum, and it’s also fun for myself every week to come up with something special and have it become a surprise when people walk in.”
NEXT WEEK
((SOT))
“The little girl in what appears to be a confirmation dress, white confirmation dress, is me.”
((Music))
((SOT))
“I remember that dress particularly because it was beautiful organza dress and it has these little pleats in the front of it and little white gloves, and my grandmother standing next to me, it evokes such memories.”
((SOT))
CLOSING ((ANIM))
(Join) Facebook, (Follow) Twitter, (Watch) YouTube
SHOW ENDS
