ReelAbilities Returns to Lehman
By Leonel Henriquez
Kitty Lunn, star of “Dancing on Wheels,” shares her experience with the audience. Photo by Leonel Henriquez.
On March 6 and 7, the ninth annual ReelAbilities Film Festival: New York returned to Lehman for the fifth year running. The festival showcased ten films from all over the world---features, narrative shorts, and documentaries---on the lives of individuals with a wide range of disabilities and their families as they cope with their day- to-day lives. Some were born with disabilities such as Autism or Down syndrome, while others acquired them later in life through traumatic experience, illness or disease. “By bringing these films to the campus we’re really trying to raise awareness,” said Merrill Parra, the Director of Student Disabilities Services at Lehman. “The bottom line is that disability is only one characteristic of what a person is all about.” The festival aims not only to educate people about the lives of the disabled, but also to show the commonality of the human condition shared by everyone, and that each person has a struggle to overcome in life.
For James Roll, a 2009 Lehman grad with an M.A. in recreation attending for the fourth time, the best part of the festival is, “trying to get some of the other students who don’t have disabilities or people in their lives with disabilities to come in to watch and see how much like everybody else they really are. They’re really just like anybody else.”
This year was the first time Doreen Mendez, a 50-year-old who survived a stroke five years ago, attended the festival. Now suffering from aphasia, a form of language impairment, Mendez came because, “I am interested in advocacy for disabled people after this happened to me. That’s why I wanted to see other people that are going through the same thing and what else they need that I have not seen yet.”
One festival highlight was an appearance by Kitty Lunn, the subject of the film directed by Qingzi Fan, “Dancing on Wheels.” Lunn, 66, is a dancer who was paralyzed from the waist down after falling on ice in front of her building in Manhattan in 1990. She spent three years in the hospital and underwent five spinal surgeries.
“Being a dancer was my identity,” she told the audience.“It’s one thing when a dancer decides they want to stop dancing and do something else but that’s their choice. I felt like my identity had been stripped away from me and I didn’t really know who I was.” The film chronicles her life as a wheelchair dancer, teacher and choreographer and is an inspirational testimony to her struggle to identify as a disabled dancer.“ I was terrified,” she recalled.“ I had been dancing since I was eight years old, but I had to find a way.”
New Animal Planet Series Explores the Bronx Zoo’s Inner Workings
By Abrian De Luna
Our very own Bronx Zoo is the focus of Animal Planet’s “The Zoo.” Source: NYC-arts.org.
“The Zoo,” a new documentary series in the opening sequence of every episode, from Animal Planet that debuted in “If you ask a child to draw picture of a February, uncovers what goes on behind zoo, chances are they’re going to draw the scenes at the Bronx Zoo. It attempts an animal behind bars. We gotta take to enlarge audiences’ views of both the that image and change it.”
“The Zoo” does this partly by detailing from Times Square, has 6000 animals what the general public does not see and 530 employees---and its borough. As happening behind closed doors. For Bronx Zoo Director Jim Breheny puts it, example, in the first episode, a silverback gorilla named Ntondo is responding to target training more slowly than usual, indicating something is wrong. It turns out that Ntondo had glaucoma, which increases pressure in the eyes, damaging them and causing vision loss. Ntondo needed laser eye surgery, which Breheny said was something that the staff had never done before. This was the first documented case of a gorilla suffering from glaucoma. Viewers get to see Ntondo being prepped, the operation itself, and how it succeeded in preventing his vision from deteriorating further.
The series also does an endearing job of showcasing the staff’s passion for the animals. In the second episode, Melanie Lumba, zookeeper of the children’s zoo, introduces her favorite animal, Mert, as “the best goose in the whole world.” We see the two walk around the zoo together, with Lumba opening doors and clearing paths for him. She even has full-on conversations with him, and when Mert has to be sent to an animal hospital for a check-up, we see Melanie is genuinely concerned for him as if he was her own child.
The staff often looks heroic as they help animals in need. In the third episode, when a western diamondback rattlesnake needs oral medication to treat an infection, Bill Orrico, senior reptile and amphibian keeper, moves the snake into a bucket and then puts its head into a tube. He mentions this is the most dangerous part because it puts his hand in danger of being bitten by the rattlesnake, which then has to open its mouth so that a catheter is inserted deep enough into its throat to administer the medication. Naturally, the rattlesnake is agitated, so the danger of being bitten is very real. Orrico admits this is stressful for him and the staff, but he has to make sure the rattlesnake gets its medication.
“The Zoo” also provides viewers a chance to learn about obscure animals such as maleos, an endangered bird species from Indonesia. They can make vocalizations which Alana O’Sullivan, senior keeper of the ornithology department which studies birds, said “don’t even sound like they’re from this planet.” Viewers are then treated to see the courtship rituals maleos undertake, consisting of the birds sharing peanuts, which O’Sullivan describes as “maleo crack.” However, the series could do better at giving viewers more context and basic information about the animals, such as noting how many maleos remain in Indonesia and how many the Bronx Zoo has, in order to really sell the conservation mission as well as explaining how its work applies to the study of birds.
Overall, “The Zoo” is a great documentary series that is easy to get into. It shows that the Bronx Zoo is not only a place to display animals that the public would normally never see, but also a haven for endangered and unique animals. This focus on rare animals make each episode stand out from a typical zoo visit, and does a fine job of shining a spotlight on what makes the Bronx Zoo special.
New episodes of “The Zoo” air on Saturdays on Animal Planet.
Student Allegedly Assaulted in Carman Hall
By Juan B. García
The southeast stairwell at the basement level of Carman Hall, where the incident allegedly occurred. Photo by Juan B. García.
Multiple reports were made to Public Safety about a Lehman student being assaulted on Feb. 8, 2017 by four unidentified attackers, two males and two females, at approximately 4:25 p.m. in the basement level southeast stairwell of Carman Hall.
According to Public Safety, the Lehman student had a verbal altercation with the females. Public Safety didn’t disclose to the Meridian the reason the argument started. The altercation began off campus at Kingsbridge Road. The student then entered the campus through Gate 13 on Jerome Ave.
“While the student was walking onto the campus, it looks like [the two males] were on the phone and following him,” said Department of Public Safety Director Fausto Ramirez. “We also captured some of the footage on video of a car pulling out and two females approaching the vehicle,” said Ramirez. There’s also footage where one can see the student running and the two males and females pursuing him.
According to Public Safety, once inside the basement of Carman Hall, they and the student got into a fight. The student pulled the fire alarm to call for help, and the building was evacuated. The four attackers fled the area in their car after the incident. The student was severely beaten, with injuries to his head, his hands, and his face, according to Ramirez.
During the fight, multiple calls were made to Public Safety, with some students reporting a fight and others calling 911. In the meantime, the fire alarm was going off. On top of that, a call from the Old Gym reported that a person got sick and had to be taken to the hospital. “It was the perfect storm,” recalled Ramirez.
After the attack, the Lehman student was taken by Emergency Medical Services to the hospital where he was treated and released the same day. Once Carman Hall was considered safe, all occupants were allowed to reenter it.
Public Safety searched the campus but did not find the attackers. However, while investigating, they recovered evidence and footage of the incident which has been turned over to the detectives of the NYPD 52nd Precinct, where Detective Michael Smith was the lead investigator. When reached by the Meridian, Detective Smith declined to make any comments regarding the case. Eyewitnesses provided the license plate number of the car in which the attackers fled. Public Safety found an ID which belonged to one of the females, which was from Monroe College.
“During the altercation and the assault, one of the females dropped her ID card,” said Ramirez. Two weeks later, she was arrested. According to him, there have not been more arrests.
Public Safety is asking anyone who may have additional information regarding this incident to contact them.