Suffice it to say, I like to travel; 'like' clearly isn't a strong enough word. I ache to travel; when I've had a hard day, when the mood strikes me, or when I want to resume my quest for the perfect spring roll. Last I checked it was on a street cart in Vang Vieng, Laos, but that's not definitive.
I almost always have the urge to hop a plane to a country I can't pronounce, with a clear language barrier, and many an opportunity for cultural incompetence. Apparently, ants in India are seen as ancestors, not as a nuisance one should wipe out with the stomp of a foot or a wave of bug spray, especially not in front of the hotel proprietor; you'll get kicked out of your hotel or you must upgrade yourself to the most expensive room at ten dollars a night. Although said upgraded room does come with a balcony, good for spying, yet another culturally inappropriate activity. But I digress…
Photography for me…now this is hard, because I promised myself I wouldn't use the word "capture". Maybe the best way to describe it is, photography keeps me sane. I'm able to transport moments of my trips back home and share them with those less fortunate than I, or those that don't have fathers that rack up frequent flier miles and are willing to share.
I especially would like to get into social justice photography, going to the areas that don't have a lonely planet guide, the ones on the US government's 'black list' so to speak.
Lewis Wickes Hine once said, "If I could tell the story in words, I wouldn't need to lug a camera." Sometimes words just are not enough. "Words unfortunately are inherently risky, arbitrary, and open to manipulation and not always in harmony with the original meaning. Photographs, on the other hand, do not rely on the mediation of words but rather rely directly on the image of reality itself."1 Sometimes those 'images of reality' need to be exposed to a larger audience, which is what I hope to do. But mostly, I just aim to capture the beauty of what's around us.
Dangit, I used 'capture.'
1Szto, Peter. (2008). Documentary photography in american social welfare history: 1897-1943. Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare, 35(2), 91-108.