NELSON'S NOTES #81, Fun N Sun, San Benito, Texas, October 18, 2009
THE BIG READ IN HARLINGEN
Bruce and I hadn't read Bradbury's cautionary tale so we decided to take part in Harlingen's first Big Read. It began on Oct. 1 with a showing of the movie, Fahrenheit 451 and distribution of Ray Bradbury's classic science fiction novel. Individuals signed up to memorize two sentences which they will recite sequentially. This exercise parallels in a much smaller way efforts of characters in the book to memorize whole books before the books were burned by a squad of firemen. The book was so named because paper burns at a temperature of 451 degrees F.
Because firemen today don't start fires but put them out, the Harlingen Fire Department will receive an award for saving, not burning, books.
Photo courtesy of Eileen Mattei, free lance writer and photographer
Bradbury, now 89 and living in California, wrote Fahrenheit 451 on a rental typewriter almost 60 years ago. Unable to concentrate at home where his little kids were running around, he took a slew of dimes to the typing room in the basement of the library at the University of California at Los Angeles. Each half hour he put in a dime and typed furiously before the time ran out. Each day he went back to the library to write more. In nine days he finished the first draft.
THE BIG READ includes many other titles. Find out if there is a BIG READ in your area. Go to: www.neabigread.org
GRAND OPENING: SOUTH PADRE ISLAND'S BIRDING & NATURE CENTER
The Valley's ninth World Birding Center site opened on Sept. 26, 2009, after lengthy delays due to damage from hurricane Dolly in 2008.
The $6.5 million Center includes an impressive new building with a 5-story observation tower, 4,800 feet of bay-view boardwalks that wind through fresh and salt water habitats, and several viewing blinds.
While walking the boardwalks we saw . . .
this alligator . . .
. . . and these year-round residents, Black-Bellied Whistling-Ducks.
The Raptor Show was a popular event at the Grand Opening. Trainers Kelly and Mike from "Last Chance Forever, A Bird of Prey Sanctuary" in San Antonio, explained that the hawks and owls they showed us can never be released into the wild because having been imprinted by humans they have lost their fear of humans and sometimes think they are humans. So, they have become ambassadors to educate the public about the value of raptors. "Birds of prey are indicators, like canaries in a mine," Mike said. If something in the environment harms them, then humans will also be in danger.
The demo was almost called off due to threatening rain. However, around noon the sun came out, just as bright and hot as ever. This meant I would have trouble taking pictures. Even though a piece of "NuShield DayVue" covers my camera screen, I had difficulty seeing-- for example, I cut off Mike's head in places. Nevertheless, Bruce and I think you'll enjoy seeing Kelly and Mike work with the birds and listening to Mike's commentary.
raptor demonstration from studio221 on Vimeo.
HAWK WATCH, SEPT. 2009
When birds migrate between their northern breeding grounds and their wintering spots in Mexico and Central America, one of their flyways is through South Texas along the Gulf of Mexico. During migrations, birders also "flock" to our area in hopes of adding new bird sightings to their "life lists." One such destination was the Hazel Bazemore County Park in Robstown, Texas, where the annual Hawk Watch and Count is held. My friend Bee Orr went on Sept. 26; she describes the experience here:
"'Kettle coming in to the west!' someone shouted. Everyone at the Hawk Watch turned their binoculars skyward. Some acted as if they had found this flock of birds immediately while others scanned the blue sky dotted with white puffy clouds, looking and looking but saying nothing. George and I looked and looked. 'Grouping of four singles off to the south east,' someone else shouted. Hey, I could see these with a naked eye. They were teeny tiny dots high in the sky--and I do mean high. A few feet higher and I wouldn't have seen them at all.
"I learned one thing: hawks fly in groups called kettles. These are round, sometimes oval-looking groupings. Did I see one? No. Did I look? Yes, even with the binoculars. Did I care? Not much. It was so very hot even sitting in the shade.
"The group of professional birders as well as volunteer hawk watchers consisted of about 30 men and women. Some have come every year and every day during the 3-day Corpus Christi sponsored Hawk Watch for 14 years. Some were making an official count of each species of hawks. How they could identify the different species when we couldn't even see the kettles, was more than we knew. They were wearing T- shirts with CREW written prominently on their backs. They scurried along the wooden railing surrounding our viewing platform. Some of them carried huge telescopes costing thousands of dollars. My scope was dwarfed by them.
"Everyone was gazing skyward. One expert who had co-authored a book about hawks, gave an informal talk telling how many of which kind of hawk were found where in the United States. When he reached number 12 of how many more species he was going to cover, the intense heat got to me and I whispered to George, 'I'm going back up the hill to fix lunch in the motor home.'
"
CINESOL'S 16th ANNUAL FILM FESTIVAL, SEPT. 2009
An exciting CineSol event is the 36-hour film race held a few weeks prior to the Festival. This year the teams had 36 hours to do a 10-minute action/adventure short film in which they had to include a bakery, a mariachi, a cape, and say, "This is going in my blog." Of the 21 teams that registered, 14 made the deadline, 4 turned in late, and 3 dropped out.
Awards were presented during the festival, and trailers from the entries were shown. Bruce and I felt these short films carried out an important goal of Cinesol which is to "bring cultural and educational awareness of Latino themes, issues, and way of life through film and video to the Rio Grande Valley Border Region in Texas."
Cinesol's other goals are to: "provide independent filmmakers opportunities to showcase their work" and "promote the Rio Grande Valley Border Region to the film industry to bring economic development to this region."
HARLINGEN PERFORMING ARTS THEATER REOPENS
Crippled by Hurricane Dolly and closed for a year, the theater (called HPAT by locals) reopened on Oct. 17 with a pre-season gala fundraiser featuring operatic tenor Xavier Jaramillo accompanied by pianist Allie Haden. The first of the 11 productions planned for the regular season will start the first weekend in December.
After being reduced to shambles, the facility underwent extensive and expensive renovations including a new roof and removal of 16,000 gallons of water from humid air in the interior. Now the spiffy-looking theater has no damp odors and features new carpets, refurbished seats, and a refinished stage floor; new draperies are still to come. To us, it looked like nothing had happened. We are so glad HPAT is back!
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Marianna Nelson
To see more of Bruce's videos go to www.dadtv.studio221.net
