Filmmaker Says "Haiti Is Facing Crisis"

22 October 2010

Korean Filmmakers: Tim Kim, left, and the Pursuit of Water Team

     Filmmaker Tim SolWoong Kim of Korea returned Wednesday to Smith County from Haiti where Kim  was shooting footage for an upcoming documentary, The Pursuit of Water. The film is planned for release on March 22, 2011, World Water Day.

   A water related crisis - an outbreak of cholera - was reported yesterday by Christian missionaries asking for prayer as hospitals in Saint-Marc and elsewhere were reaching capacity. The missionaries were associated with a clinic operated by Youth With A Mission in Saint-Marc, and their requests relayed by Breaking Christian News.

   The film's object is three-fold said Kim at ResonateNews.com offices in Garden Valley on Friday.

     “Many people don't realize that water has become an important Global Issue,” he said, “and the amount of suffering, including in  Haiti, because a clean water supply is unavailable. How much water is needed to survive is also largely unknown. We wanted to address those critical issues and also refocus attention on Haiti, which is slowly disappearing from the world's view.”

   A writing-shooting team of six traveled in Haiti for three weeks, conducting interviews and shooting footage. The situation in Haiti is “not good” said Kim.

   “The atmosphere in Haiti is very strange and difficult to describe,” he said, “but it's as if people can be panicked over small, insignificant things that normally would not be an issue, but now it is. Everything seems to be huge to people who have been affected, not only by the earthquake, but a series of storms that came before it.”

    Kim, of the Suwon Baptist Church in Korea led by the Rev. Billy Kim, has traveled in Tunisia, Egypt, Australia, Taiwan, Singapore, Germany, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Quatar, Dubai, the Dominican Republic and Jordan and has lived in Switzerland.

     “But what I saw in Haiti is different from anything I've ever seen. Some of our team members have been to the far East, and they felt the same," Kim said.  "There is an aggression among the children there, for instance, asking for money that our team members had not even seen in India or Nepal.”

     Visit the Web at wwww.pursuitofwater.org or Twitter.com/pursuitofwater for information about Tim SolWoong's film, The Pursuit of Water.