World's Most Dangerous Road

My daughter, Rhiannon, and her whole drama class, was asked to reenact a scary near death experience school bus accident on the World’s Most Dangerous road (the road into Yungas) for a National Geographic special. Apparently the film maker is an alumnus of the American School here in La Paz and in his junior year experienced first hand the school bus accident being dramatized. (The school no longer risks field trips down into the Yungas.) So, look for a National Geographic special on the World’s Most Dangerous Road – coming out I don’t know when. Anyway, let me have Annie tell you all about it:

Ok, I got to the school a little early, about six thirty – we were told to show up at 6:45 – but no one else actually showed up ‘til about five ‘til seven. The National Geographic people didn't even show up ‘til seven fifteen and we actually got on the bus around nine or ten. Then we did the filming of the getting on the bus scene from inside, outside, low, wide, and two of the bus pulling away from the school. On our way out to the village where we would be shooting the movie we stopped hundreds of times for the camera man to move, either getting out to film from the top of a car, or coming back inside (apparently most of their equipment got stuck at customs, so they only had one camera.) At the drug checkpoint on the road into the Yungas the crew just loved the vendor free-for-all when a bus pulled up, so they gave us a little money to buy stuff: fruit, candy and bread (and water guns, but our drama teacher confiscated those). After pulling up to the checkpoint a million times, and getting fresh batteries for the camera, we finally actually went through. The director wanted us to throw the bread we had bought to the wild dogs along the road. One time a boy named Matthias threw a whole muffin to a dog, but right then a car drove by. The muffin went bump bump bump rrooooolllll, over the car, after which the dog actually ate it. The lady in the car looked kind of confused. It was like she was wondering why we were throwing muffins instead of water balloons, and why we were throwing them at her?! So we drove on, stopping occasionally to let the cameraman move about, feeding dogs the bread we bought – not actually sure why, but we did (editor’s note from Dad: it is a Bolivian custom to feed the wild dogs who station themselves along the road into the Yungas because it’s believed to bring good luck to the traveler since the wild dogs are believed to contain the spirits of those who have died on the road and feeding them puts them in a charitable mood.) Eventually we actually got to the village near the road, where we would be doing the actual acting. The first scene was of the swerving bus, and so were the next million. Inside outside, forward, backward, of the driver, of other people, and so on and so forth. Then we did up the filming of up ‘til the swerving (all the while singing: "I know a song that gets on everybody’s nerves"; we had to sing the same song over and over, and guess what, it really does get on everybody’s nerves), the stopping on a ledge, the getting out of the bus, and the pulling the bus back on the road (this last bit was just for a privileged few, of which I was not a part). In the village where we filmed there were several dogs and tons of pigs. All of the kids there (especially the boys) enjoyed feeding all the extra food we had to the pigs. When they were filming some shots of just the driver we explored, and lots of the kids threw rocks over the edge of the road, smoked cigarettes, or fed the pigs. I just kind of tagged along with the pig-feeding group. (I was the youngest person there; everyone else was a junior or a senior) Finally it was done, or at least almost done. We started back for home. On the way we stopped and did the exiting the bus scene again and they got some good "off a scary ledge" shots. Since I had been sitting in the same seat by a window the entire time, I got a scene all to myself of me hanging my head out the window as the camera hung out the window too. After that the directors and the producers or whatever said goodbye and promised us hats, T-shirts, and a copy of the video. The techies stayed on and filmed a little more, but that was the last we saw of those guys. We FINALLY got back home around eight o'clock that night, even though they had originally said we would be home between four and five. Later we found out that they only had either a hat or a T-shirt for each of us, and there were only two people who would get a T-shirt. Lucky me I was one of the two people. They said the documentary would air in fall, and that they would send us a copy during the summer. I know we won't be here in Bolivia by then, but I hope the school will forward it on to me, so it should be fun! So there it is, my adventure making a documentary. It was quite an experience, and I'm glad Dad nagged me into writing it all down.