Partyin' with the Bish

Generally, I try to go into shooting a story with some sort of background info on it. However, there are always times when you show up and realize that you have no idea what's going on.

On Sunday, I was handed a "special assignment", to shoot a service for some religious group as a part of our recurring "Our Culture" series, which presents short documentary-style pieces on local cultures. I was told what to shoot, what not to shoot, etc., but for some reason it didn't occur to me to ask what exactly it is.

As I drove the 90 minutes to get to the service, I figured that I'd be able to figure it out pretty quickly once I got there. After a 3 hour church service and an additional 3 hour banquet, I had no idea what I'd just covered.

It wasn't weird or anything, it was just in another language the entire time, and if you thought church was boring to begin with, try sitting through it when you have no clue what's being said.

Turns out it was an Assyrian church. Lovely service, excellent food, friendly people (or at least I assumed, as they kept speaking to me in their language, though they were smiling as they did).

As I was shooting the banquet portion of the story, a guy came over to me and said that the Bishop has personally requested that I join them for their meal. As I ate with the Bish's personal bodyguards, it was explained to me that he's a famed bishop visiting from Australia, which is a great honor for them all. I didn't ask too many more questions, as I didn't want them to realize that I didn't even know who they were, but apparently the guy that I've been shooting all day is somebody important. Throughout the service, all I could think of was that he looks exactly like Artie, the hard-headed chef that pushes his luck with Tony on The Sopranos:

Uncanny.

It was certainly an interesting way to spend a Sunday afternoon. After I returned, my sources (Wikipedia) filled me in on the religion and what I had just taken part in. As people clamored over the Bish, I figured that must be how old folks feel when they see people screaming about Lindsay Lohan, but they have no idea who she is.

My thanks to the Bish for a lovely meal and an enlightening experience.