One Year of Reality and How It Nearly Killed Me: My Life Behind the Scenes (10 page)

I just sat there.

I wasn’t quite sure what to do. Obviously he hadn’t understood me, and now I was in the middle of nowhere with no idea what to say or do. Then he said something to me that I could not understand. I was in a hurry, and was feeling a great deal of pressure to make it back to location in time. I started to cry a little. “El Jem, El Jem, El Jem.” I just kept saying it over and over again. Finally the guy got out of the car, opened the door, grabbed me out of the car, and literally pulled me across the street toward a building. I was a little concerned about where we were heading and why, but I couldn’t think of a better option. Inside the building was an open area where a lot of cars were jammed together and parked in a disorganized fashion. He took me into the middle of this mass of cars and people, all of whom were yelling at me, wanting my business. He led me over to another guy and talked to him for about five minutes. I envisioned what he was saying. “She’s American, take advantage of her. She wants to go to El Jem, but you can probably get her for a few hundred dinars, after all, she overpaid me by a whole lot.” I don’t remember how much I gave him, but I know it was way too much. I had a tendency to overpay, as I could never understand what they were saying the price was. So I’m sure I screwed myself on that one.

Next thing I know, I’m in the new taxi driver’s car, and we’re on our way somewhere. I figured that anywhere was better than where I was, even though I didn’t understand what was going on. I was just praying that I was going to make it to El Jem. I’m a little slow, but it finally occurred to me that the name El Jem reminded me of something I’d heard in the past… I couldn’t figure out why. I was completely stressed, but my mind did not race with worries about getting killed or robbed or left in the middle of the desert. I was more concerned about making my destination on time than whether or not I was in mortal danger. I also wished that I was a whole lot savvier at traveling than I was turning out to be. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, I saw the road signs for El Jem and knew I was going to be okay. The driver stopped at the Coliseum and started talking.

But I had no idea what he was saying.

I figured he wanted to get paid. I was fumbling for my money and trying to figure out how many dinars I needed, when someone from El Jem came up to the taxi and started to translate for me. “Fifteen dinars. It’s fifteen dinars, madam.” I was so grateful. I gave the driver twenty and thanked him, then got out and paid the translator another five and thanked
him as well. “That is my restaurant over there,” he said. “You come and visit.”

“Okay. I cannot come now, but maybe tomorrow.” I knew I probably wouldn’t—after all, I was staying at a hotel that was thirty kilometers away. But I was sincere in my insincerity. Nevertheless, I ran off to the location. I was there in time to see the crew running through what would happen for the finale of this portion of the race. The host and the producers were there too, and everyone was waiting for the contestants and the crews that were following them. The field producer was getting up-to-the-minute information from the drivers and people who were watching the teams so they could be ready.

As the contestants neared the finish line, tension was running high. I’m sure I missed something that had happened at rehearsal since I was out and about, but Bert was especially nervous. At one point, he took the steadicam operator’s camera and started to film the proceedings himself. Since he had been a cameraman in the past, this was the moment for him to get the shots he wanted. The cameraman hung out in the background with me. We just looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders. We also had torches going for effect. It looked pretty cool. We were all crowded around the finish line, and one
of the torches that was lit was knocked over, starting a small fire in the Coliseum. We put it out right away, but it was a scary moment.

One by one the contestants crossed the finish line. I don’t think anyone was eliminated at that point, but the time they arrived would be the time they got to leave the next morning, twelve hours later.

I started going about my business of checking in with the contestants regarding their money situation and receipts. Each time I started this procedure, I was always pulled away for some reason or another. Eventually I stopped even worrying about their money. If it was so important, no one would try and tear me away from it. It might’ve been a psychological play on the part of the producers to make the contestants think that if they cheated by using more money than they were given, they could be eliminated.

After all of the contestants had arrived, the crew didn’t leave. They hung around and interviewed the contestants, asking them how they were feeling, what happened, and what they thought of the other contestants. So it was going on sunset when the crews finally started back to their hotel. I went with a couple of producers back to our hotel. It had been a very
long day, and it was great to be able to relax on the drive back to the hotel, since I would need to start the second part of my day as soon as I got there.

Within moments of my arrival, Greg came over to me and said, “You need to stay with the contestants. We don’t have anyone staying with the contestants.”

“Why me?” I asked. “Who else can we send?”

Well, I could think of a few people. I just felt that I was a bad choice because of all the work I was doing to figure out where they are going next. I didn’t want them to come into my room and see confidential information. I certainly did not want to repeat what had happened in my room in France, even though the contestants hadn’t gone through anything then. I felt like a teenager who’s been asked to sit at the kiddies’ table for Thanksgiving. I wanted to hang out with the producers and get caught up on plans for the next couple of days, but instead I had to watch the children. I understood why they were sending me; I just felt a little sorry for myself.

Dejected, I checked out of my hotel and got into a van with the field producer for the Tunisia shoot, Jared. I think he was going to check on the contestants to make sure the hotel was okay and meet up
with the facilitators to ensure the next day’s shoot would go off without a hitch. He was pretty cool. I got into the front passenger seat and Jared was behind me in the back seat, near the sliding door. The producers and executives were all hanging around outside the hotel, talking about where to go eat dinner and have some fun. Man was I feeling sorry for myself. I wanted to cry.

And then I really did.

Just as I reached back for my seat belt, Jared shut the sliding door of the van. The door slammed into my fingers…all of my fingers. I was so paralyzed with pain to the point that I couldn’t talk. I was trying to say, “Open the door,” but it wasn’t coming out very loudly, and I started crying. The third time I said, “Open the door,” Jared heard me and realized what had happened. He opened the door. Bert had seen everything, and he ran over to see if I was okay. I was fine, sort of. I kept my hand above my head so that the blood would drain away. I couldn’t tell if my fingers were broken, I just knew I was in terrible pain. We drove away. I didn’t think of going to a hospital, let alone know where we could find one. And no, no one offered to rush me to the emergency room because I insisted I was okay, even though I could barely talk and the pain was crazy awful. I NEVER
wanted to be a problem. As we drove away, it was quiet for a moment, with the exception of my sobbing, and then I heard a little crying in the back. I knew it was Jared.

It was obvious how bad he felt, and through the pain and tears I told him that it was okay, that I knew he hadn’t done it on purpose, that I’d be fine. But I think we were both crying for reasons other than my fingers. We were tired, him especially, since I felt that his part of the show was the hardest, with the lack of English-speaking people. And from what I could tell, he was all over the place trying to keep things together. We were both tired, frustrated, and the job was overwhelming. So much to do, so much to fix, and no time to do anything except keep the race going. I call it putting Band-Aids on bleeders. When something goes terribly wrong, you solve small problems, but the big ones still persist.

So we would patch up problems as they cropped up and redefine rules as the show crept along. I knew everything would get solved after the race was over; in the meantime, I just had to do what I could.

I arrived back at the contestants’ hotel. By that time the excruciating pain in my fingers had gone down to a painful throbbing, something I could
handle. I’m double jointed, so I maneuvered my fingers around to check if anything was broken. I could move all my fingers and joints. I breathed a sigh of relief. It was dark and the hotel looked like a haunted mansion. I checked in with a guy who did not smile or speak. I tried to crack a couple of dumb American jokes that went unnoticed. He just gave me a key and pointed me toward my room.

I passed a television room that had some local programming, and then I walked out into a courtyard. There were ten Tunisian men sitting around staring at me. I stared back. When I got to my room, I heard that they would be serving dinner shortly. So I raced into the dining room with the contestants and ordered two lamb dinners. I had only eaten one good meal on the trip, and I wanted to make up for lost time. For the first time in days I realized I was starving.

It was actually a good thing that I hung out with the contestants. It was the first time that I was able to get to know them a little better without any cameras around. No one seemed to hate each other at this point, or at least we were all eating together in the same area without any open conflict. And it was good to hear them talk about their lives, what they were doing. I realized that they were opening up to
me more than they would to another field producer, probably because I’d known them from the beginning, and because I didn’t have a camera trained on them. I put in a call to one of the producers and said that he should be here at the dinner filming because there was a lot of good conversation going on that could be an asset to the show. A cameraman and producer finally showed up to film the contestants. And all the while, I was just eating everything in sight, making up for all that fasting.

Later, after everyone went to their rooms and I was in mine, I realized that I couldn’t get on the internet or fax anything. The phone lines were routed through the front desk, and all I could do was make calls. It almost felt like a day off, and then one of the producers came in and confirmed that we were going to have a day off the next day, and I needed to hang with the contestants. I was fine with that. I didn’t feel the pressure of whatever was going on with the producers who were trying to figure out the race. I had high hopes that the next day would be restful.

I didn’t know what to do with the contestants, but I had to keep them occupied somehow. We all got up kind of late and puttered around, and then I took the group of them for “walkies.” You know, what you
do with your dog when you take him or her for a walk. The major difference was that the contestants weren’t leashed. They didn’t need to be; they were pretty well-behaved, following me around. There wasn’t much to do in El Jem to fill a whole day, but I knew where we needed to go first.

We needed to visit my new friend, the translator.

We had lunch at the restaurant owned by the guy who helped me with the taxi cab driver. He remembered me and was excited to see me. We were a pretty large group, and I noticed that some of the cameramen were having lunch there as well. So it was cool to see the crew and contestants eating together. And the owner was so nice and generous to us. He even gave me a gift of a sand rock. It was beautiful, and I appreciated it. I was happy to have kept the promise I’d made to him the previous day. I didn’t really eat, though—I was too busy watching the contestants, making sure they didn’t go astray. I didn’t have any rules to go by except to spend time with them. The second unit crew was working that day, and we saw them driving around the Coliseum, taking footage of the sights around town. I took a picture with the host and the contestants as a memento.

After lunch we started walking around and did a little shopping. El Jem was definitely tourist savvy. And of course, my interest was in the men. I can’t imagine why a basketball scout hadn’t checked out Tunisia before, because everyone was so tall. There was this one shop owner who kept following me around and showing me jewelry. He knew very little English, but one phrase he knew very well: “Marry me.” So while we were shopping, this guy would shout out, “Marry me!” every now and again. I’m not sure if he knew what he was saying, but you could say that it was my second proposal of marriage. The first one came from a drunken cameraman who was so enamored with my talent of burp talking that he’d asked me to be his wife. Forget that he was already married. If I wasn’t in a foreign country and the shopkeeper guy spoke more English…who knows. He did quiet down a bit when I bought a couple of things from him.

One of my favorite memories of
Wild Things
was when the field producers came back from traveling to exotic locales with little gifts for the staff. Jared gave me a carved elephant that to this day, sits proudly on my dresser. So I knew I had to follow in that tradition. I had to bring home some things for the staff members who hadn’t been able to come with us.

Once we were done shopping, we did some more walking away from the square. I just started to walk around the Coliseum, thinking there might be some other shops or something set up. There were a couple of stands with drinks and ice cream, but that was about it. And then I saw it in the parking lot.

A camel.

He was standing there with his owner, and there was a sign that said something like, “One dinar for a ride on the camel.” It wasn’t a big parking lot, but I figured it would kill a lot of time. I got the contestants to join me, and asked if they’d be interested in riding the camel. I wanted to do it myself, but the animal took a particular dislike to me—he tried to follow me around and kept making evil snorts at me. So I passed. But a few of the contestants had some fun while the rest watched. That killed about thirty minutes. The ride was basically once around the parking lot. It reminded me of children taking rides on ponies in zoos. The worst thing was the camel was really smelly, not pleasant at all.