Curtis: The thing is I’ve decided to leave the Attitude family and although it’s been
a fantastic six years it’s time to move on, so today I’m going to take you on a
bit of a journey of my time here at Attitude about some amazing experience…I’ve had
some forgettable moments…
Curtis: People with dementia can gradually lose their ability to communicate; the loss
of the odd word to communicate can escalate until speech disappears all…all together?
Curtis: Am I the only one that wants to dance? I can just dance with no music.
Curtis: I’ve met some great people along the way.
Curtis: What are you most proud of?
Paul: I like people who encourage me; they look at me and assume a lot of negative things
about me.
Curtis: Red tell me about some of the worst stories you’ve had in regards to bus rides?
Red: If you’d been here five minutes ago – you’re too late now, he drove off.
Rodney: Check out this one on my back man!
Curtis: I’ve travelled the globe and been to some amazing places…
V/O: I’ve been with the company since the programme began and we’ve covered more than
1000 stories in the last six years. When I first started I must admit I was completely
raw television talent but I was excited just to jump straight into it.
Grant: Hi I’m Grant
Nicky: Hi I’m Nicky
Curtis: And I’m Curtis
Grant: Our brief is to reflect the interests and issues of the disabled community.
Nicky: We’ll be covering everything from politic and sport to lifestyle stories.
Curtis: And medical advances.
Curtis: I don’t have any formal training as a journalist; I came into this as a sports
jock – a guy who likes to have a good time so it has been a steep learning curve for
me.
V/O: It was just my luck that my first assignment was a travel story – I was on holiday overseas
in Turkey when the Attitude film team decided to join me mid way – I had no idea how this
whole TV thing went but I was up for it. This was also the first time you got to see me
being an intrepid traveler; we’ve proved that people with a disability can go off the
beaten track.
V/O: Well the first shoot I ever did was right in the middle of Turkey; it’s an amazing
part of the country. The next day we were up at 4.30 in the morning and we were going
hot air ballooning which is great, I love those sorts of adventures, I had no idea how
I was going to get into the basket – it turned out really well because the guy that
was running the show he had a special seat adapted (he’d had people on the balloon
before that had been in chairs) so that fitted in really well with the Attitude kind of theme
as well.
Curtis: We were just going about our day in this little village and this guy came up to
us and said “hey you guys making a TV show?” and I said yeah and he said “well just around
the corner in that house there’s a little boy who was hit by a bus and he’s in a wheelchair,
would you like to come and meet him?” Yeah sure let’s go so it was an impromptu thing
so grabbed it with both hands so the next thing you know we’re in these people’s
houses.
V/O: Inside we meet a young boy about 10 years old.
Curtis: Can you tell me what’s wrong?
V/O: Yeah the little boy revealed his leg and it was … I mean it had been totally
smashed and he had bolts coming out of his leg and I had to look away, it really took
me by surprise, it was horrible, he had a chair that was really too big for him, he
could hear the other kids playing outside and having a lot of fun and here’s this
six year old going “man this sucks”.
Curtis: Pretty close to tears then.
Curtis: The little boy in Turkey definitely had a big impact on me, certainly something
I’ll never forget and I guess his story in some ways was repeated a lot throughout
the stories that I covered over the six years of Attitude. You know a lot of the stories
that I did were people just going about their day but people with a really strong message,
you know people saying “look I may have a disability but I am part of society as everyone
else”.
V/O: Travel is something I think about all day every day, I’m always on the lookout
for destinations that I’d like to go to, different adventures that I’d like to go
on, if I could travel 24/7 then I would do that.
V/O: To get here we’ve travelled over 10 ? hours throughout the mountains on windy
skinny roads while I was toing and frowing all right – because I don’t have trunk
function I was sick.
Curtis: You couldn’t get much more Hawaiian than this, it’s awesome and full on, I actually
do this back home but I’ll be sure to get some tips.
Curtis: Nothing to see here!
Curtis: See that? That’s the Bay Bridge!
Curtis: They’re wanting me to pray to Buddha so he can help me to walk one day.
Curtis: Very good!
V/O: I’ve travelled to all corners of the globe with Attitude but some countries and
their people live with you long after the trip has ended. Like when I went to Fiji with
my mate Cameron and we got to meet one of the local Kamatua.
V/O: When we were in Fiji and we were up in the Highlands and we went to a village and
the chief up there had sustained a spinal injury 40 years ago (they were playing rugby)
and he was somewhat paralysed – not as paralysed as me but he had no wheelchair, he was just
sitting around on a mattress all day every day but he was the chief of a village you
know? He was a guy that everybody respected and looked up to.
Fijian speaker: We’re going to go into the chief’s house now. When we go in we’re
going to bring Kava to the headman of the village, it’s like asking him.
Curtis: When I found out that Leo has a similar problem to me I was very much looking forward
to coming here and talking with you.
V/O: The village chief Leo is 78 years old, he was injured in a rugby match more than
40 years ago. Initially he walked with a limp but without proper medical care he’s slowly
degenerated and succumbed to using a wheelchair 20 years ago.
Curtis: Leo I am a little bit concerned because I was just told that your wheelchair is a
plastic wheelchair – that’s not very good and doesn’t suit your needs very well.
Village Chief Leo: I haven’t got anything else to sit on.
Curtis: Well I’m going to do my best and talk to some friends of mine and we’ll…I
want to get you another wheelchair.
Curtis: Man I want to do something for that guy Cameron.
V/O: And so I made it a mission of mine to get this guy a wheelchair and so I made a
couple of calls and a few months after we got home a wheelchair arrived for him and
hopefully that’s made his life a little bit easier.
Curtis: We’re in LA and we’re doing this story on the homeless people with mental illness
and that was…you know I’d been to third world countries before and I’ve never seen
what I’ve seen.
V/O: This is skid row, a place referred to as America’s only third world city, it’s
home to hundreds of homeless people, many of whom are mentally ill or impaired. We’d
be warned but nothing prepared us for what we saw as we cruised the streets to the heart
of skid row. We’ve filmed in plenty of places but we were surprised how bleak and frightening
this place was. Film crews aren’t welcome here and none of us wanted to get out of the
van. Our first destination was the Union Rescue Mission; it’s the largest and oldest organistaion
in the USA working to support homeless people. It was started by the founder of Union Oil
Lyman Stewart 118 years ago.
Rev. Andy: Skid Row in LA which is really one of the worst human disasters in the US
and it’s really been caused by corralling and containment of people who are struggling
with homelessness.
Curtis: We’re out on the street at this stage with eight security guards giving out
water and the desperation on peoples faces is what got to me – it was like you’re
living on the street man, there’s no where else to go and
I felt pretty helpless.
Rev. Andy: We’re the capital of homelessness, we have more people on our streets than any
other city and double what New York and Chicago have combined – every suburb, every region,
every city has kind of dropped off their folks who are kind of struggling in this spot in
LA and forgot about them.