Rebop; 107; Martita / Todd and Artne / Kai Kee

ANNOUNCER:Major funding for Rebop was provided by... Additional funding was provided by... - -CHILDREN: Hooray for Rebop! Nobody can make it for you You have to do it yourself ¡A-Rebop arriba! Nobody can live or die for you You have to do it yourself Turn on to Rebop! Some people saythey can get it for you Others say they can see you through But if you need help Then you better help yourself Rebop, Rebop, yeah Rebop, Rebop You have to do it yourself

Rebop, Rebop You have to do it yourself Rebop! Do it, do it, do it yourself. (man speaking Spanish over P.A.) (audience applauding) (man speaking Spanish over P.A.) (speaking Spanish) (audience applauds) "Teatro: A street scene. "A scene of us-- you and me. "A scene... a Puerto Rican scene. "The scene of 'us,' as in 'we,' "as we express us and touch the heart "when we release our inner feelings of...

"'I am me' and 'you are you.' "Teatro, as in you, "as in we of the Lower East Side, "that set asidethat higher side down to us, when we go up and look down to them." (indistinct chatter) (chattering indistinctly) MARTITA MORALES:"Teatro. "With a world of our own "that we can see and they don't own. "See a street scene, "a feeling of love for our people, "as in 'us' that are 'we' of Ambulante." Le, le, le, lo, lai

Le, le, le, lo, lai, lo, lai Let me hear it on the drums there. (rhythmic clapping) That's it. BIMBO RIVAS: They asked El TeatroAmbulante if we want to help them. I told them we would. MARTITA: And what are we gonna doin the show for them? -Huh?-What are we gonna do? Well, they-they-they're working in a, on a... on a skit that is aimed at putting attention on the discriminatory practices that... that people, uh,in the immigration department are doing in coming downto pick up aliens, right? You know, pick up aliensand checking them and... -Right.-...making, you know, kind of, sort of, uh, harassing situationfor Chinese people, particularly Chineseand Latin Americans, right? Le, le, le, lo, lai Le, le, le, lo, lai, lo, lai Le, le, le, lo, lai Le, le, le, lo, lai, lo, lai Everybody!

Le, le, le, lo, lai Save the Lower East Side Le, le, le, lo, lai Save the Lower East Side Let me hear you! Le, le, le, lo, lai Save the Lower East Side Le, le, le, lo, lai Save the Lower East Side Everybody! BIMBO: "How fortunate is hewho enjoys good health. "How good to feel. How good to feel well. "How wonderful to go to sleep and rest. "How great it is to be at ease "on your last day on Earth. "Ha ha ha ha. Fantastic it is when you are ready for that every day." -All right!-(laughs) (speaks Spanish) (rapid drumbeat playing) Street sound! Street sound! (speaking Spanish)

(drumming continues) It's bad. It's bad. (speaking Spanish) (indistinct chattering) (man speaking Spanish) (speaking Spanish) You know? They'll put a hurting on your headto take that bread away. Thank you, George. Okay. (speaks Spanish) MARTITA:¡Chocolate! ¡Y tu! ¡Nene! Mami. (speaking Spanish) Your curiosity aroused youinto asking the question. Your curiosity was wondering. You wondered why allthe Spanish-speaking people

are of many different colors. ¡Mira tu, nene! Hey! ¡Mira! ¡Venga acá! But he kept on running. And you had no knowledge that this wasn't his namebut the name of his color, which was tan or brown. You did not know thatthe Puerto Rican people are a mixture of many different nations. You do not know, for you areso young and so innocent. But... as the child gets older, she rebels! Rebels against the fact that her parents would not let her havea boyfriend with an Afro, or con el pelo grifobecause he looks Black, and Black to them is dirty. But dead and silky blond hair

with blue eyes and white skinis supposed to be pure? See, this is a Puerto Rican girl... trigueña and 15 years old This is a Puerto Rican girl that, to her, her flag is gold! (cheering and applause) Save the children of the world

Save the children Boys and girls Save the children of the world Save the children Boys and girls Oh, save the children of the world... MARTITA:"My people...

"...your people, "our kind, "always rebelling against their own kind. "My people, mis gentes, "mis gentes del mundo, "the little mundo of Puerto Rico, "flying down to a big mundoof the United States, "the land of opportunity, "flying down to the dirty ghettostreets of New York, "hearing the soundof my people in New York, "screaming people and screaming babies "and screaming mothers and fathers, "and see my people, mis gentes, "these poverty-stricken,stinking ... streets. "Opportunity? Opportunity, you say? Nah, baby, there just ain't no way." (audience cheering and applauding) We are brothers.

Artne is 12. Todd is nine. Todd is deaf. We live in Detroit... Michigan. ARTNE:It is dangerous to cross the street if you are deaf because the driver doesn't knowthat you are deaf. Strong vibrations are painfulto a deaf person, even to a hearing person. (indistinct television chatter) (Todd vocalizes)

ARTNE:Todd can't hear sounds, but he can feelthe vibrations from sounds. (Todd vocalizes) It's not bad when you can't hear. The only bad thingis when you can't communicate. And now... Todd Grundy's magic... magic act. Nothing here. Nothing here. At the count of three, he will appear. One, two... three. -Ah.-(applause) TEACHER:Todd... TEACHER:What color are they? TEACHER:All right, they're white. ARTNE:Todd's teacher can sign, but she isn't deaf. ...talk to Deanna or Robbie or Danny or Tracy. TEACHER:Right.

WOMAN:Todd, I think, is not happy. I am not happy for Todd because they do not treat Todd the same as the other children. But if Detroit Day School for the Deaf seems okay, then we will leave Todd. (vocalizes) -At the Detroit Day School.-(mother vocalizes) WOMAN:No. Why? Because... ARTNE: Sign language isa language, not translation. It's a languagewhich you can do on your hands. Yes, I know. (vocalizes) Todd, please talk and use your voice. I want to hear you, not... ARTNE:You have to learn how to talk without ever knowing how speech sounds. TEACHER:...so I can hear you. Use your voice. (Todd vocalizing) -TEACHER: Steps.-Step.

WOMAN: They have a program nowfor total communication. There are signs I will see if they tell me the truth. If they are telling me the truth,then, if not, next summer, Todd will go to Flint. (vocalizing) He will know everything. Pull it out. ARTNE:Signing is a natural form of communication for deaf people. You want to go to Flint School? No? You want to stay? But... if go to Flint... (mother vocalizes) ...Flint, learn more. (mother vocalizes) Learn more. (mother vocalizing) (mother vocalizes)

But if Todd goes to school in Flint, I will miss him. -I'll miss him.-TODD: Yeah, miss him. You want to go to school in Flintor stay with me? (vocalizes) (both laugh) Oh... Yeah! (laughs) (vocalizes)

ARTNE:Total communication for the deaf includes signing,lip-reading and speaking. (imitates crash) (laughter) (laughter) (applause) (Todd vocalizing) CHILD:On one, on two! Hut, hut, hike! ARTNE: Sometimes hearing peoplethink deafness is funny. Come on, come on, come on! Hearing people should nottease deaf people. We should try to understand.

(laughter) ARTNE:My deafness was corrected by surgery, but Todd's isn't. And now... ...for our last, final magic act. At the count of three, we will both disappear. One... ...two... ...three. (kids laughing) ARTNE: The kids in Todd's classwear hearing aids. It helps some of themhear a little better. WOMAN:But first, we will have to try

Detroit Day School for the Deaf. You know, our group and the groupfor total communication is fighting for better educationfor the deaf. We still are fighting, fight... We will always fight, fight, fight so that maybe your little girls and boys grow up maybe deaf and maybe not. But it will be better for them. -(vocalizing)-For all of the deaf people. Maybe. But wait. Maybe Detroit Day School will change. (vocalizes) If we fight hard enough, they will have to change. Yes. ARTNE:Deaf people are special people.

Hi. My name is Kai Kee Lau,and I live in San Francisco. - One more day - One more day One more day - I made it - I made it I made it One more day My friends are gone, but I'm here One more day - It's turned to midnight - One more day - I made it - I made it One more day Just because I'm walking... KAI KEE:Because I was born with a cleft lip

and a cleft palate, I did not learn to speak right. I'm living, living, living... In America, about one out of 800 babies are born with cleft palates. Glad to be here. Put your tongue behind your teeth at the back of your mouth. That's the palate. That's where your mouth grew together before you were born. But mine did not, so I had to have lots of operations. When these pictures were taken,you had your lip repaired when you were an infant in Hong Kong, and your palate was repaired in Hong Kong. And these are the first picturesI took of you when you came into the office, when we sat down and we decided what kind of surgerywe were gonna do on you. What would you like to have done next? KAI KEE:Dr. Capote is my surgeon. Remove the scar, kind of like... Totally remove the scars? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. No, that's somethingthat we can't do, Kai Kee.

We can't totally remove the scars. Wherever we operate, we're going to leave scars. But we try to leave very nice scars, and we will try to do that in your lip. If you can see my lip, where we have these little linesthat come down... -Uh-huh.-...which is the natural way that the lip is made, we're gonna try to make your scars look like that. So that you'll have a little pucker, and you'll have a little cupid's bow, we call it, in the middle. And these scars will be closer together so that it'll look more like a lip that has never been operated on. Are you uneasy because ofthe way your lip looks or because of the fact thatyou've had surgery on your lip? What if someone came up to you and said, "Why do you have these scarshere on your lip?" I would say, "I was born like that. What's wrong with that?" Nothing wrong. I think that's a good attitudefor you to have.

Yeah, but in seventh grade,I get in lots of fights because of... of the teasing, so I quit, so I stopped fighting in-in eighth grade. Right. The fighting doesn'taccomplish anything. -(laughs)-In fact, if you keep fighting, you're liable to disturbsome of your surgeon's work. I know. -KAI KEE: Hi, there.-CLERK: What can I do for you? How much does it costto go out in... in a boat? -For salmon?-Uh-huh. Well, salmon is, uh, $20 a person. But your bait's included. $20? How much is it? Isn't that too much? Well, if you, if you save up moneyand you buy your own rod and reel, then every time you go out,you don't have to rent those. How much do you get in your job? How much do you get paid? Me? Well, a little. $50. -A month?-Yeah. Okay. Take me one half of my salary -to go one day.-(clerk laughs) Kai Kee, I'm gonna ask you to, um, say some of these speech sounds

and see how... how good the closure of your, uh... ...valve is here. -Okay, let's try "puh."-Puh. -"Tuh."-Tuh. -"Kuh."-Kuh. -"Buh."-Buh. -"Duh."-Duh. -"Guh."-Guh. -"Ch."-Sh. "Ch" as in "chair." "Ch." Chair. -"Juh."-Juh. As in "engine." Engine. Okay. Can you tap your tongue against the, uh... (clicks tongue) -Yeah.-(clicks tongue) Back of your front teeth. Good. This is my speech therapy class. I meet with Paul twice a week. Where... where is the switch off and on? Paul has lots of patience with me. CLERK:Let's see. KAI KEE: He always reminds meto feel good about myself. When you cast...

KAI KEE:He said that's the only way I'll get to speak better. Now, listen. (reel clicks) Oh, yeah. I always thought... I thought they... they will put some string right here, and then they,before they put the line in. What's that for anyway? You mean when they put that heavy, uh... String in there. That's for, that acts as a cushion. So, when you have a heavy fish or you have a fish on your,uh, on your line, you know, you've got a biteand you're taking it in, it takes the pressure off of, uh, of the reel, you know?You don't want it to... You know, it just, it's a cushion. That's how I got my... that is how I gotmy arm caught right here. -It got caught right here.-Really? Sometimes, you know,sometimes it's your fault, sometimes it's the equipment's fault. Talking to strangersused to be hard for me, but right now it's easier. PAUL: So, you had a good timein the bait shop, huh? KAI KEE:Yeah, pretty good.

PAUL: What'd you thinkabout the guy talking to you? Did you think you talked pretty good? Him? I thought he talked real good. -And...-No, how did you feel when you were talking? Good. Do you think he hadany trouble understanding you? I don't think so. No? Were you nervouswhen you first went in there and started talking to him? The speech is helping me to get, uh, get the fear away. Every time I'm talking to a stranger, not... not-not that much scaredtalking to a stranger. You're not that much scared when you-- -Uh-huh.-Okay. I thought maybe your speechgot a little messier because you startedgetting into the subject. You were talking about the fishing reels and the weights and the-the lures and the rods,and you forgot about your speech. That's okay because that way, you know, this shows me that you losta lot of your fear of speaking. You really didn't care, you were just... -KAI KEE: Just kept talking.-PAUL: ...talking like -everybody else talks.-KAI KEE: Yeah. (speaking Chinese phonetically) Uh-huh, uh-huh. Yep.

(speaking Chinese phonetically) -That one.-Is that right? It's... it's warm, it's warm. It's good. "I like chocolate milk." -That's right.-Right? Okay. (speaking Chinese phonetically) KAI KEE: Mr. Diamond isthe principal of our school. "I do not like chocolate milk." (speaking Chinese phonetically) -...Lee Diamond, right?-Uh-huh. Um... (speaking Chinese phonetically) (speaking Chinese) KAI KEE:Until I started teaching Mr. Diamond how to speak Chinese, I never realized why pronunciation was so important. MR. DIAMOND: Let's see ifI got all of my homework done. (laughter) What about that one, man? What about this? Oh, that one. -(laughter)-That's a bad word, huh? Is that a bad word? Ah, yes. Somebody wrote a bad word. Who wrote that one anyway? Oh, some girl wrote that one. -Oh! -Girl, huh?-Yeah, some girl.

She must be some kind of girl, right? Hey, what is it? What is it? It's my life Let it shine Let my life Mm-hmm Live my life Let my life shine So someone... (trolley bell rings) It may not happen In my lifetime But maybe my son Will have peace of mind KAI KEE:This has been fun. So long. Let it shine... Some people saythey can get it for you Others say they can see you through But if you need help Then you better help yourself Rebop, Rebop, yeah... ANNOUNCER:Major funding for Rebop was provided by... Additional funding was provided by...