Staking Out With CNN - Part 3

This story is part of a documentary for Anderson Cooper 360 to be aired in Oct 2007. The trip to Guangzhou investigates the trade and consumption of wildlife in China. Click on image to view video of a cage of civet cats being filmed by the CNN crew at the 3-1 market, Guangzhou.



Day 5

0547 hrs 3-1 Market

It was like a police operation in the movies. Today, our van was packed. We had our host Dr Gupta and an expert from Traffic East Asia, 2 cameramen, 2 producers and another 3 of us in the crew. The animal traders were already busy unloading their trucks. All we had to do was to jump out of the van and start shooting, with Dr Gupta and his expert talking as they approach the animals. So it was set.

The producers were ready. “On the count…1…2…3…go, go, go!”

Someone tried to yank the door open. Silence. We stared at each other for a moment. The doors were locked. “Unlock the door!”

Ah, yes. We had to translate it to the driver.

So our 2 cameramen jumped out of the van and immediately started filming with their humongous video cameras and spotlights shining. Everyone piled out of the van after that and all hell broke loose.The traders started to keep their cages, buyers sped away on their motorcycles, some people started to run with their animals in hand. “Run, run!” they yelled. One guy spotted the camera and immediately ran off with a civet cat dangling from his hand. Mary Anne chased after one guy with her handycam as he tried to hide from the crew. Some bystanders were laughing and were thoroughly amused by the whole commotion.

In the midst of the chaos, some traders ran off leaving behind cages of animals. It was just our luck. There were cages of civet cats there and one of them managed to escape out of its cage to say hi to the camera. Being the culprit which caused the outbreak of SARS, civet cats have been banned for trading and consumption in China. The fact that there were so many cages of these illegal animals there was something that we had to get on camera. The crew continued to film as Craig pointed out the different wildlife species that were being traded there to Dr Gupta. We walked inside the market for more shots of the scene, with a producer watching out for each cameraman.

By that time, a crowd was beginning to form around us. As one of the two Chinese-looking person among the foreign crew, I was beginning to feel self-conscious. “If you perceive any threat at all, let us know immediately,” whispered one of our producers. The fact that he said this didn’t make me feel any more relaxed. If the market people start talking to me, I’m just going start speaking in Malay, I told myself. Don’t ask me why I brought these foreigners here. We’re just doing a story. Besides, I’m Malaysian J Yes, just smile.

But well, it all went on smoothly. I didn’t really get harassed, we got our illegal animals on film, we’ve got footage of people running with their animals (that was a good one), and we get to go home tomorrow. “I was expecting a brick to come flying our way. Now, that would be the money shot. But we’ve got our civet cats,” Phil commented.

Dr Sanjay Gupta's account of the visit to the illegal wildlife market in Guangzhou is available on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360 Blog