photograph, photography and the photographer...

the photo is badly out of focus...technically, this shouldn't even qualify to be downloaded on the computer, let alone getting published on blip or any other site...

but I still like this photo...why? I don't know whether I know the answer or not...one thing that I am sure of, is that I am hopelessly in love with the contagious spirit of these little girls...I believe somehow this feeling seeps into my photos and my photography comes out best with these little ones...the moment I saw this on the LCD, I knew the focus was terribly off...under normal circumstances, I would have deleted it in the camera itself...but then I saw this girl running behind the pigeons in the mosque...I saw her happily posing for some of my fellow photographers for the day... I saw her holding her father's hand and dragging him into a flock of pigeons, scaring them away...I took a lot of pictures - all in my mind...for some 'security' reasons, we were not allowed to enter the mosque with our bags...someone had to stay back at the gate keeping an eye on the bags so that the rest can go inside and shoot...I volunteered to stay back and try to see what pictures can I get of the world just outside the gate...a lot of people passed me - kids with their parents, tourists, young lads, some unknown photographers with big Nikons and Canons...there were a bunch of beggars sitting at the gate right next to me...a young teenager boy running a small local perfume and accessories shop right at the gate...I got talking to most of these people...the beggars were not pestering me for alms, the shop keeper was not behind my life, asking me to buy his stuff...we were just talking like normal people...


the little girl came out of the mosque but this time, she was hidden behind her parents, I could've asked her to come out of hiding and smile and I'm sure she would have obliged me with a photo...there were a few other opportunities for photos where I could have asked people to pose or sit/stand in a particular position or place and ended up with 'better' photos...but somehow that's not my idea of capturing pictures...I want to shoot things how they are, not how I want them to be...I think that as a photographer I need to be minimal...I need to be smaller than the smallest speck around me...only when I see and regard everything around me as much greater in spirit than myself, I can capture photos with real stories...

...or maybe, it is just the crazy me talking...

under normal circumstances, this would have been the choice for blip.

my last visit to the mosque