Thursday, November 10, 2011

You are as good as the people you work with. Part 4

In an industry as competitive as the commercial production industry, people tend to keep their resources as close to the vest as they can. And everyday you find less people recommending others because they feel they might be giving away advantages.

I think otherwise. I recommend people because all of them will go out of their way to work with me and viceversa. It is a mutual understanding of what really matters in life: respect and loyalty.

Respect derives from professionalism and  loyalty comes from respect. You are loyal to the people who respect what you do and treat you accordingly.

This is the reason I started the series of  "You are as good as the people you work with" to praise professionals that I respect.

So today I will talk about a Location Manager from Mexico who has made our lives so much easier by looking out for our needs and interests.

His name is Juan Duran.

He gets totally involved from the beginning to the end.

Making sure that the location is used correctly and constantly overlooking the work being done on the location.
And of course he likes to participate and contribute.
In our last project in Mexico, he had to get a location that would give different looks and yet allow us to shoot a very complicated project within a day.
He did that to everybody's satisfaction, and more.

Juan has been an asset for the last five years and hopefully more to come.

And now,  a little bit of Summer:

(Yes I know it's Autumn, but  there's still an Indian Summer and the Southern Hemisphere it is almost Summer).

Cold pasta:
Soooo fresh!
And so easy to prepare.
 As usual, I will not give you specific quantities of ingredients so you can be creative about it.

The ingredients are:
Fresh sun ripe tomatoes
Garlic
Coarse Sea salt
No more than a teaspoon of white vinegar or lime juice
Onion
Olive oil (lots)
Fresh basil or fresh cilantro.
Pasta (I like Linguini Fini or spaghetti)
Chop the tomatoes, the garlic and the onion and put them in a bowl.
Add salt, lime or vinegar and then top with olive oil to marinate for 2 hours.


You cook the pasta as usual and when it's done you put it in the strainer and under the cold water faucet until it's at least at room temperature.
Then you serve the pasta and put the sauce on top with either basil or cilantro (two totally different taste experiences).

Usually I combine dishes with wine but today I am going to make an exception because this dish goes great with ale, from France.
It's amber, it's delicious and it is so difficult to find. But hey, it's worth it.