Filmmaker Statement

My parents met on a plane. Mom was flying to Chicago. Dad returning from a NYC job interview. She was eight years older and just wanted to read her magazine, but he kept asking annoying questions about living in NYC. She gave him her business card, thinking he'd never get the job. He did. Eight months later, they married. There's freedom in the way you talk to strangers while traveling. The conversation doesn’t default to, “What do you do? Where do you live?” It’s usually starts with, “Where have you been? Where are you going?” and often ends with “What are your fears? What are your dreams?” When I was still in college, my sister (producer of LHTGH) taught English in China, kicking off years of her living abroad. Later she managed a hostel in Thailand, living out of van for a year. When I would visit, I would see slices of her life, at night in the hostel’s bar, talking to people from all over the world. It’s that magic, those people, and my parents that inspired Lia Has to Go Home