Salvavidas

Things are developing on both of my main fronts here. I've started volunteering at Piña Palmera to understand the organization and the people that work there better, and I've started meeting with the Salvavidas as well, informally and spontaneously in the afternoons and on the weekends.

I'm taking lots of notes. I feel like an anthropologist. I'm telling people that this project is 3/4 investigation and 1/4 filming.

I had an interesting experience the other day, however. Augila, a lifeguard, invited me to a lifesaving workshop and told me to bring my camera. I told him that I didn't want to start filming right away and thought it best to go to the workshop and observe, and to film later on at a different workshop. He seemed pretty insistant on my filming the workshop so I actually decided that, weighing the benefits of having him as an informant, I'd better bring my camera. Worst case scenerio, I wouldn't film anything good and I'd waste one tape. It actually ended up being quite interesting and I got a few great shots of people diving into the water and talking about lifesaving back on the sand. It also helped integrate me in with the rest of the group, as they all saw me filming and asked me questions about the project. So I learned something.