Huckfinn 2.0

At first they seemed naïve. Too innocent to face the greed, violence and corruption of 18th century America… neither the thieves, the brothels or the dead bodies changed their mind, they were there, like props in a movie. But then,

BANG! BANG! BANG!

And it suddenly hit home.

Better be on raft than on firm American land.

A collection of personal videos...

http://youtube.com/my_videos

The conditions Huck found after running away
Heavy rain
In LA this could be an Earthquake or the Santa Ana winds

First Encounter
Frame house
- women’s clothes
- dead man
- money
Brothel → Pimp → Cadillac
Park, condoms, sex
- Only safe park is on La Brea
Upstairs from Mike’s apartment
- Sound of vacuum covering up women screaming
Hustle
- drugs
- sex
- money
- violence

Second Encounter
Steamboat
Crashed
Raining
Adventure
Thieves
Planning a murder

Third Encounter
Wealthy family
Feud with another family
Killing members of other family
Like The Sopranos

A portrait of America
- lawless
- darkside
- sleazy
- violent
- gangland

Jim and Huck
Runaway slave & young man
Minorities
Innocent
The future of the country

Everything was dead quiet, and it looked late, and smelt late. You know what I mean -- I don't know the words to put it in.



I got out amongst the driftwood, and then laid down in the bottom of the canoe and let her float. I laid there, and had a good rest and a smoke out of my pipe, looking away into the sky; not a cloud in it. The sky looks ever so deep when you lay down on your back in the moonshine; I never knowed it before. And how far a body can hear on the water such nights! I heard people talking at the ferry landing. I heard what they said, too -- every word of it.



One man said it was getting towards the long days and the short nights now. T'other one said this warn't one of the short ones, he reckoned -- and then they laughed, and he said it over again, and they laughed again; then they waked up another fellow and told him, and laughed, but he didn't laugh; he ripped out something brisk, and said let him alone. The first fellow said he 'lowed to tell it to his old woman -- she would think it was pretty good; but he said that warn't nothing to some things he had said in his time. I heard one man say it was nearly three o'clock, and he hoped daylight wouldn't wait more than about a week longer. After that the talk got further and further away, and I couldn't make out the words any more; but I could hear the mumble, and now and then a laugh, too, but it seemed a long ways off.

"Yes; en I's rich now, come to look at it. I owns mysef, en I's wuth eight hund'd dollars. I wisht I had de money, I wouldn' want no mo'."



After reading this passage we went out to the streets to find out what people thought about Jim owning himself and what they thought they were worth....



Funny enough... nobody really mentioned anything about the institution of slavery.... as if it had happened so long ago or if it was this abstract thing that had no real meaning in todays world....



Mostly, they consider "worth," as the accumlation of money and assets....


huck has to leave everything behind he chooses to cut from the root eberything his money, his family, his friends.... to find himself

jim also realizes he is for the first time coming face to face with himself - with owing himself....

and now people just got it because of trump....

Borders...



Passages...




Networks...

The Underground Railroad

The Underground Railroad, a vast network of people who helped fugitive slaves escape to the North and to Canada, was not run by any single organization or person. Rather, it consisted of many individuals -- many whites but predominently black -- who knew only of the local efforts to aid fugitives and not of the overall operation. Still, it effectively moved hundreds of slaves northward each year -- according to one estimate, the South lost 100,000 slaves between 1810 and 1850.



An organized system to assist runaway slaves seems to have begun towards the end of the 18th century. In 1786 George Washington complained about how one of his runaway slaves was helped by a "society of Quakers, formed for such purposes." The system grew, and around 1831 it was dubbed "The Underground Railroad," after the then emerging steam railroads. The system even used terms used in railroading: the homes and businesses where fugitives would rest and eat were called "stations" and "depots" and were run by "stationmasters," those who contributed money or goods were "stockholders," and the "conductor" was responsible for moving fugitives from one station to the next.

For the slave, running away to the North was anything but easy. The first step was to escape from the slaveholder. For many slaves, this meant relying on his or her own resources. Sometimes a "conductor," posing as a slave, would enter a plantation and then guide the runaways northward. The fugitives would move at night. They would generally travel between 10 and 20 miles to the next station, where they would rest and eat, hiding in barns and other out-of-the-way places. While they waited, a message would be sent to the next station to alert its stationmaster.

The fugitives would also travel by train and boat -- conveyances that sometimes had to be paid for. Money was also needed to improve the appearance of the runaways -- a black man, woman, or child in tattered clothes would invariably attract suspicious eyes. This money was donated by individuals and also raised by various groups, including vigilance committees.

Vigilance committees sprang up in the larger towns and cities of the North, most prominently in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. In addition to soliciting money, the organizations provided food, lodging and money, and helped the fugitives settle into a community by helping them find jobs and providing letters of recommendation.

The Underground Railroad had many notable participants, including John Fairfield in Ohio, the son of a slaveholding family, who made many daring rescues, Levi Coffin, a Quaker who assisted more than 3,000 slaves, and Harriet Tubman, who made 19 trips into the South and escorted over 300 slaves to freedom.

The Los Angeles River Revitalization Plan:

http://www.lariverrmp.org/

This is the face lift Terta Tech says it's going to do:



The Master Plan:



Ideas for navigation...

http://dcbid.cartifactmaps.com/