Volunteer Perks

One of the most wonderful perks of being one of the 1650 volunteers at Sundance is the volunteer screenings they hold and I was able to go to two on Thursday. The first film is part of the U.S. Documentary Competition, Being Elmo: A Puppeteer’s Journey. I can’t recommend it enough. It was a bonus that the director, cinematographer (who are wife and husband), and editors were all there to announce the film and do a Q&A at the end. What a labor of love. They’ve been working on the film for over six years and showing it to the volunteers was the first time they’ve shown it to an audience. I think they were very pleased with the audience reaction. I believe it was one of the editors who commented that he noticed every time Elmo the puppet himself was on the screen and talking into the camera was when the audience smiled and laughed the most. What can I say, we all fell under Elmo’s spell.


The second film was adapted from a popular UK novel that I read last year called Submarine. It’s one of those quirky, witty, British coming of age films. The cast was great and the art direction and cinematography was way more creative than my mind’s eye when I think back to the way I perceived it as I read it. The audience responded very positively to that film too.

As I walked back to my car shivering the whole way I was thinking how I impressed I was that people volunteered for some of the outside jobs like transportation coordinator, helping people in and out of the shuttles. It’s cold here!

Sundance - Theatre Training

Volunteer check-in done, theatre training done, now it’s time to see some films before I start my shifts.  I’m working at the Temple Theatre which is out of the main thoroughfare in Park City so everyone has to take a shuttle to the venue.  I’ve never noticed it on the side of the road before but I’ve been passing it every time I come into Park City.  Why is the Temple Theatre named as such?  Because the theatre’s “day job” is as the Temple Har Shalom.  The temple is three years old and during the tour we were told that when it was constructed, they collaborated on the design with Sundance so it could be used as a venue.  As we were sitting in stadium style seating in the theatre we were told that this was the same place that services were held.  It’s a beautiful building.  The films that are shown at this venue are all documentaries this time around.

Pre-Festival Volunteering Done

I went yesterday to the Park City Marriott to help with Headquarters setup. This is where festival staff, filmmakers and press will be located during the festival and it was pretty cool to see. I spent my day mostly in logistics where radios, headsets, and other communication devices were being barcoded, scanned, and inventoried among other things. I met a lot of people that I assumed must have worked for the festival but they were volunteers like me. The dedication and the motivation in everyone is obvious in the way they tackle tasks. The excitement for the festival to begin is building.

Oops

Thought living in Utah would guarantee fresh mountain air?  Not so much in the winter.  We’ve got something called inversion that happens and here’s a description.  It looks foggy when it’s in effect.  So we didn’t realize until this week that we might have been contributing to the problem.  A coworker said to me “It’s a red burn day in Salt Lake County”.  I had to look this up.  Again here’s a description.  I love having a fireplace again and now we’re wondering, how many days we had fires going when it was a red day?!  I need to pay more attention.

Snowshoes Anyone?

I was talking to a co-worker one day in the kitchen asking what he did over Christmas and he mentioned that he’d been doing some snowshoeing and cross country skiing. I asked him more about snowshoeing like where one did this and if you could rent the gear. He said that REI rented snowshoes and polls which come in handy. I was interested.


Fast forward to last Friday night when H and I went out to dinner. I start telling him about this in the car when we’re coming home, how this co-worker went snowshoeing and how enjoyable it is. After 21 years of marriage, even before I can finish my story I can sense that H is just waiting for me to finish so he could say, what are you getting at here? So I finish the story with, “So would you be interested in trying that?” His tone was hilarious with a touch of outrage that I’d ever suggest such a thing and his response was, “Not especially…what’s the purpose?” Hahaha, and you know, I didn’t have an answer. I only answered his question with another question, something like, “Don’t you want to wear those cool snow shoes?” I don’t remember if there was an expletive in his response but I’m sure you can guess, his answer was no. I’ve been laughing about this conversation for over a week now. I’ve since done some research and found this website which touts snowshoeing as a fast-growing winter sport. Sport? Come on, that’s a bit of a stretch isn’t it? Nevertheless, I am interested in trying it because honestly the idea of skiing or snowboarding scares the devil out of me.

This actually got me thinking about that hilarious website Stuff White People Like which I’m listening to on audiobook right now and another popular activity here, snowboarding. Check out what SWPL has to say about snowboarding here.

Volunteering for Sundance - It Begins

Last weekend was my first weekend volunteering for the Sundance Film Festival. I worked in the box office in Park City. If you live in Summit County, which is where Park City is located, you can register for a timeslot to purchase tickets early. When I arrived for my shift at the box office on Saturday, I was shocked at the number of people. During my shift I probably checked the IDs of about 500 people. The other volunteers were great to work with, especially the veterans who shared lots of festival tips with me. Park City residents in general are posh and usually not year round residents, but just come for ski season. Many of them queued for their tickets directly off the ski slopes still wearing some of their gear.  I've never been to Park City during ski season and when I left the box office on Saturday night and walked down Main Street it had an energy that I'd never experienced there before.  It's really a great place to visit.


Today I’m off to help set up the headquarters for the festival in Park City. I have some additional training to attend this week and they are screening some of the films for volunteers before the festival which I plan to attend. Everything officially kicks off on Thursday and I can’t wait!

If you’re interested in reading about the films being shown at the festival or the festival itself, go here.

Groupthink

Merriam Webster defines groupthink as:

a pattern of thought characterized by self-deception, forced manufacture of consent, and conformity to group values and ethics


A co-worker told me yesterday that this Friday night he'd be sleeping outside in a canyon with his eleven year old and his scout troop.  He was given the choice of sleeping in a snow trench or a snow cave.  Of course the kids think this is the greatest idea in the world but what adult proposed this to the group and how did they all agree?