The Award
The Award -
-krishnaprasad
Scene 1
7.30 am :
I shudder once, I shudder again in my sleep, and I turn around and try to sleep again. I couldn’t. The images came on fast, blurry, and yet with accurate amounts of pain that dint let me pass off this sequence of events as another dream. I dint fight it. I offered to lie back and endure it.
Scene2
Some Balkan countryside, shades of war in the air, Gunshots.
2.30 pm:
A youth ran past our battered truck, for one instant I looked straight into his eyes as he checked for trouble into our truck, finding none. He ran across to the barricade, he swiftly negotiated it, raced down the ravine, and scrambled up the embankment. It was just another moment, a very uninteresting moment. It was well past lunchtime and I waited in the back of the truck with the other people wanting to get to some place across this war-ravaged town. A small 8 km ride had never taken so much time before. It was sinister to imagine I was part of this hellhole. I was here just for the pictures, just for the money, just for the early evening banter and applause in some hotshot magazine event. I was the man they made a scapegoat to send here to this city, any city, so they could fill their coffee table magazines with graphic pictures that fuelled ground breaking conversation about the socio political mess here.
Yes, Another Balkan story, another mission. I was a photographer.
Looking out again I saw the youth had managed to become but a speck of red and blue in the distance, as he sneaked into yet another battered looking town. I felt like getting off the truck, and finishing my story in this town, shooting the usual dead people and getting this assignment over with. My trusty laptop was going to help me churn the intensity of my shots manifolds., as I relaxed in the evening, between hot tea, silence and my pack of cigarettes.
3.00 pm:
Six hours of sitting tightly packed with ten others was taxing. My crotch hurt, I needed a bath, a change of clothes. It had been a continuous, slow 6 hours by road and the unrelenting dust heat and tension in the air gave anyone a “dry nosed airy uncomfortable feel.” I looked at my camera bag and the dirt on the belt. It was many years now, that belt used to be blue. I continued to sit cramped with the rest, as our vehicle moved a little and stopped again. I wanted to get out.
3.15pm:
I was jolted by some more gunfire, it sounded very far away, but my jumpiness wasn’t unnatural. It was as scary as it sounded the first time I heard it, dull thuds, and repetitive sounds of metal, death. It stopped. I sweated more.
6.00pm:
Finally reached a place called Ohan, from where I was to get to meet someone by the name of Yazru. I checked my stuff one last time before getting down. I paid the driver of the truck a few crumpled notes. It was getting cold, and raw was the way this air smelt. Cold and Raw. I wanted to walk, and it was good that night had enough light in it to show me how far I’d have to go. I was a brave man by any standard. I belonged elsewhere, worked from anywhere, spent time with people of different nationalities, running, hiding, shooting limping, cursing, crying. I had done it all.
7.11pm:
Stopped at the border post. Searched. All papers intact. Thrown into another truck, 2 minute drive into ‘town’.
Dropped off before a dull building that stood very dangerously intact amidst bullet ripped walls and shambles. Tea, stale cardboard like snacks, a couple of cigarettes later I sat back, leaned against the alabaster. Yasru recounted not exactly in the chronological order of how it all started and built a surprisingly dramatic one-sided story. I humored him, as always. War had a strange way of never taking sides. There could never be a glorious war…. there could be insinuating, gripping, even interesting events…but never glory. I was biased. I wanted to change, get some hot water, to get ready for action. Nothing seemed to happen here today. Yasru and his brother left. They’d come back if they weren’t dead he joked.
8.30.pm:
I could hear more gunfire in the distance, faint yet very disturbing. I was ready. This assignment was bad. Nothing great about waiting, nothing great about waiting. …Waiting. Maybe tomorrow would be a good day with the boys. Was I a sadist?
8.50 pm:
Boredom Meets Sleep.
6.50 am:
Woken up to sounds of heavy feet running up the stairs...Wooden creaky stairs. Someone had gone into the nearby town from here. The air was excited. I hadn’t figured which town, who it was and whatever happened …until.
Scene 3
7.30pm:
Running across a road, dodging behind the milk truck and going straight across to the embankment, then using my arms to clamor over the top, running down the dusty slope, I had to make it fast before they clamped curfew. It was the result of two weeks of research, pouring over maps of the area. I had devised my plan. It was now six pieces of paper sitting in my pockets. I ran.
I heard gunfire as I ran towards the city. I was going straight into it. There was no other alternative. This brick kiln was the only way I could enter undetected, alive.
7.45:
30 mins left for closure. I had to meet her, get her belongings, an automobile was out of the question, we’d have to run all the way back and pray we’d not be seen. It had to be precise. I had just about enough food stashed in my pockets for a day, but this cold was going to create a problem I knew.
7.46:
The kiln wall was about 8ft high. Got in easily. I was in Kalashnikov country.
God!! Am I mad? If it wasn’t for the news I’d watched on TV, I’d never had wanted to smuggle her out. She was safer here. Or so I thought. Anyways it was too late to do anything…even go back.
I wasn’t against these people, not against the war. I was timid. Too scared to take sides. But one thought about someone hurting Reze was enough reason for me to attempt running across the street to the other side.
There was a truck, some poles from the scaffolding and tones of debris from fallen buildings.
7.48:
I ran quickly to the truck and hid, then dodged the poles and got into the building. Nothing happened, I walked through the rubble and froze.
A soldier was muffling the cries of a young girl as he tried to rape her. I shut my eyes instinctively…and took a step back, and then another…I was scared. I took a right and slowly sneaked past the maze of scaffolding along the building’s rubble filled interiors. This was not part of my plan. I could hear and sense soldiers, mercenaries, guns and a few billions other sounds. I was breathing too loudly, so I stopped. It was dark , but yet quite enough light to get shot in the face. I shouldn’t have come here. It soon sunk into me that I might not live through this. I was scared.
Everything went by in a flash. I had just peered at my watch went a siren went off. It was exactly 7.49pm. Three people walked into the room at the same time. Soldiers with gray clothes, grayer faces…guns. All was quiet. They saw me. I saw them. We were very quiet. My legs froze. One of them pulled out a cigarette and lit it. I moved to the corner facing the street. They sat.
I’d be dead in three seconds if only they knew who I was I prayed. Two of them left. The smoker remained. I dint engage eye contact, just checked my watch and looked tense. He came over. Gave me his cigarette. I puffed feverishly. …Coughed. I could have had a heart attack when he began to talk about some about some bastard shooting his brother on the bridge in the outskirts. He asked me if I was going anywhere. I said no, just caught in the wrong place. He asked me “Student”? I said, “Yes”. He slapped my head laughing. He’d never kill me I seconded in my mind. A second siren. I wasn’t going to make it. If I stayed , one whole night was too long to keep quiet. Then there were more soldiers too. I had to make plans. I slowly peered out and decided to leave. He asked me “where?” siren’s out. You’ll be shot. I nodded and moved. Maybe he’d found out, maybe he’d not. I was their enemy. I was among them.
8.15pm:
Cold, scary.. I slowly left the dilapidated house and ran into another. I was very lost. More soldiers were everywhere. I could not shut out the possibility of a stray bullet from the hundreds of snipers who kept watch. I COULD GET SHOT.
8.17pm:
I was at least 2 blocks away sideways from Reze’s house. So close yet so far. She was not going to be waiting for me today; it was too tormenting to think of both of us enduring what I was going through now.
8.25pm:
The soldiers were talking about someone who had sneaked in through the gap in the kiln wall, earlier that day… Me.
Someone had seen me? Why was I so important? I was here for her. I wasn’t here to kill anybody I was here for someone I love. I wanted a nice life, I was going to be caught and killed just two blocks away from her house. She wasn’t even going to know.
8.30pm:
it was well past the time I had to smuggle her out and she must have gone back in. My palms felt numb. I was going mad. More vans, soldiers, and sirens. I huddled…Unsure of what I was going to do.
8.40pm:
three soldiers baring their guns, tease me out of the building. We walk. They look pale yet with purpose. I am jabbed with the tip of a gun to head into a narrow alley…and into an enclosure.
I saw people, normal people. Preparing food, nursing wounds.
I was kicked in the calves. I fell.
He said” Is this the fellow? Someone came running and said “Gate” “Heavy firing”. The soldiers cursed and screamed out instructions before running out to the north side of town. I sat in the dust.
8.45pm:
I remember reading “Gaizka” on a t-shirt in fading blue, before this guy walked upto me and asked me a few questions to which I remained silent and tried to sound hurt. He ignored my pain. I looked healthy and he had no respect for me and slapped my face.
He made fun of me, slapped me again asking me the same questions, `Who was I here to meet? I broke down and pleaded, I was a student. More ruffians joined in amidst screams of “dog” “Enemy” Scum”,
I felt pain giving way to misery when the four youths took to me. I must have taken eight straight kicks to the face, when my eyes started to swell up and I attempted to crawl away. There was a fountain, and a huge gaping hole under the base.. a large dog could fit in. I crawled toward it as a huge mob went crazy around me hitting me with anything they could find. My clothes were torn, my watch taken, my shoes too. I could feel every part of my body hurt. My leg surely was broken at the ankle. It limply lay towards me. I was going to die.
Every now and then, I’d be kicked, until I had no more blood to cheer their cause. I was dismissed. My hands were good. I dragged myself to the fountain and slowly but steadily inched into the gap under it, my body soaked in the gray murky liquid sending needles of pain all over my battered frame. My senses of things around me were gone as I tried to go deeper and deeper under the crevice. Away from everything human.
“That’s all I could think of today, I’ll be better tomorrow.”
Scene 4
My cameras were finally cleaned; it’s been a very uneventful week now except for some shots of sniper victims I clicked down the road near the level crossing. But now even that area is barricaded with cars, drums, trucks and sandbags, I’m told that there has been a series of talks going on and I could use it to get into the next town. I jumped at the idea. It was a full 2 days since I had been holed up in this place. I was a pro. I needed action. I was going back to where the heat was on.
8.50 am:
From the outside, this place dint have much to offer, no spectacularly thrashed landscape, no bullet riddled barebones buildings, no amputees, in fact it could be termed a boring place.
My truck dropped me at the edge and I made sure I had in open view of all, my cameras and my other journo equipment. No sniper worth his salt would want to shoot at me. Especially since I was here to cover his city, his wronged people, his kin.
8.55 am:
Some soldiers led me into a building and I had my papers checked. A pair of dirty-bandaged hands rummaged thru my equipment. I was asked what I was going to shoot? How long I was planning to stay? I was sternly asked to keep it apolitical, no shooting flags, no shooting religious places, and no shooting politicians and army equipment.. I have sat through the standard briefings before…I did the same thing here. Nodding my head. I was suggested a place where some severe mortar shelling had caused a house to cave down on its hapless victims. A lieutenant of sorts offered to take me in his jeep there. The driver dint have an ear…Eerie I thought.
9.55am:
What did I expect to see, I planned out a well-tried sequence I often used, burning trucks and children nearby was my signature piece. The people loved it. It won each time. I was never the “severed limb”, man. I wanted drama. Perhaps I could “fix” up a scene. Maybe my man Friday here could hustle me an award winning shot. I enquired about kids with broken limbs and got a curt “No”. So I tried the “RED CROSS” trick. Offered to pay for the kid’s medication if he got me an injured crying child. He simply said “I’ll take you to right place”. After all he owned the war; the “others” were the enemy. He was a Messiah; I was on his side.
11.10am:
The roads has been opened up but yet we were going in circles, the residents had themselves put up barricades and roadblocks which had to be cleared for the jeep. The going was slow and things were yet ugly in some parts of the city.
We were the friendlies, yet our jeep invited an occasional hand thrown missile from the streets. Why does war make men so jumpy? I thought. I took war well. Almost too well. Why was I unaffected. I had never felt any hurt, any remorse, any pain, my fingers caressed the camera’s button just once and the world I opened up to the “others” brought forth tears. People took out parades holding up pictures I’d taken of Cambodian kids running for cover. I was never shaken… I was never hurt.
Am I a product of the war? There is no war within me. I didn’t have an opinion; I couldn’t take a side. I was interrupted.
We’d passed by a rather peaceful section of people near what looked to me like a market place. It had a small narrow alley leading into a more broad flat ground, surrounded by buildings. It was a dead end and there was this metaphorical visual in front of me.
My mind raced as always, while I signaled the driver to stop. STOP! Someone in front seconded my wish. It took me more than a moment longer to scramble out of the jeep. Yacud came over and stood beside me. I signaled to him saying “Quiet!” He seconded it.
1.00pm:
I sensed excitement within me. This didn’t happen too often. I could sense a story, but my blood curdled in a strange way as I walked into the debris filled marketplace. These people had seen the worst and I was strangely unwelcome…I retaliated equally. I wasn’t on their side, I knew that instantly. I walked among them. I was busy composing imaginary shots, planning in quick succession the number of subjects, the slowly diminishing light and the impending curfew.
I clicked a murky panoramic shot of the marketplace entrance. The composition felt evil, devilish I thought. The marketplace was like the present state of affairs in the war torn city….a complete standstill…DEAD.
I clicked a piece of what was once a SONY walkman cover, as it lay in the black gutter the yellow piece of plastic still gleaming from below. I clicked a few kids as they tugged on a shirt. I began to feel a strange disturbance right from the time I’d landed. Something about what I’d seen elsewhere came back to me. The crowd had cleared and I could work with some more freedom and then I saw it.
Bang! Right in the middle of this gray and black world stood this ancient looking watering hole
---A fountain.
I walked toward it.
I thought it would make a complete centerpiece balanced on either side by buildings that had once housed a lot of happy families. There were a few people around the fountain talking about someone and I dint like the tone of their voices I clicked. I kept clicking.
The late afternoons had rendered a lovely top light to the buildings and I decided to balance its brilliance with the dark shadow under the fountain. It was going to be a great picture. I knew. I decided to go lower on the angle.
Our eyes met.
I deciphered quickly what were once a man’s limbs, after I made out what his position was. It was piteous. I dint want to click him but I did. I inched close…scared.
Peering into the small gap I saw him. He was alive. The crowd was getting furious. Yakud asked me to leave quickly. We got into the jeep and left. The crowd hurled abuses. I was quiet on my way back. Yakud told me “ He was enemy”, ”All they are liars,” “ Maybe brother, war is bad, It make people kill brothers.”
I wasn’t listening; my mind raced back and forth trying to piece up a connection.
And then I knew where I had seen those young eyes.
Back at the office where I had worked for 14 years, I leaned forward to pick up the photograph that had won me the Alfred Eisenstaedt Award for Magazine Photography.
In small type at the bottom the title read:
“The Young Croat” - Black and white - 15”x 11”.
Scene 5
8.30 am :
I sit up. Shocked and moved by the strange dream. Like a zombie i switch on the computer and sit down to write a story.
The end
If you like this story email me
-krishnaprasad
Scene 1
7.30 am :
I shudder once, I shudder again in my sleep, and I turn around and try to sleep again. I couldn’t. The images came on fast, blurry, and yet with accurate amounts of pain that dint let me pass off this sequence of events as another dream. I dint fight it. I offered to lie back and endure it.
Scene2
Some Balkan countryside, shades of war in the air, Gunshots.
2.30 pm:
A youth ran past our battered truck, for one instant I looked straight into his eyes as he checked for trouble into our truck, finding none. He ran across to the barricade, he swiftly negotiated it, raced down the ravine, and scrambled up the embankment. It was just another moment, a very uninteresting moment. It was well past lunchtime and I waited in the back of the truck with the other people wanting to get to some place across this war-ravaged town. A small 8 km ride had never taken so much time before. It was sinister to imagine I was part of this hellhole. I was here just for the pictures, just for the money, just for the early evening banter and applause in some hotshot magazine event. I was the man they made a scapegoat to send here to this city, any city, so they could fill their coffee table magazines with graphic pictures that fuelled ground breaking conversation about the socio political mess here.
Yes, Another Balkan story, another mission. I was a photographer.
Looking out again I saw the youth had managed to become but a speck of red and blue in the distance, as he sneaked into yet another battered looking town. I felt like getting off the truck, and finishing my story in this town, shooting the usual dead people and getting this assignment over with. My trusty laptop was going to help me churn the intensity of my shots manifolds., as I relaxed in the evening, between hot tea, silence and my pack of cigarettes.
3.00 pm:
Six hours of sitting tightly packed with ten others was taxing. My crotch hurt, I needed a bath, a change of clothes. It had been a continuous, slow 6 hours by road and the unrelenting dust heat and tension in the air gave anyone a “dry nosed airy uncomfortable feel.” I looked at my camera bag and the dirt on the belt. It was many years now, that belt used to be blue. I continued to sit cramped with the rest, as our vehicle moved a little and stopped again. I wanted to get out.
3.15pm:
I was jolted by some more gunfire, it sounded very far away, but my jumpiness wasn’t unnatural. It was as scary as it sounded the first time I heard it, dull thuds, and repetitive sounds of metal, death. It stopped. I sweated more.
6.00pm:
Finally reached a place called Ohan, from where I was to get to meet someone by the name of Yazru. I checked my stuff one last time before getting down. I paid the driver of the truck a few crumpled notes. It was getting cold, and raw was the way this air smelt. Cold and Raw. I wanted to walk, and it was good that night had enough light in it to show me how far I’d have to go. I was a brave man by any standard. I belonged elsewhere, worked from anywhere, spent time with people of different nationalities, running, hiding, shooting limping, cursing, crying. I had done it all.
7.11pm:
Stopped at the border post. Searched. All papers intact. Thrown into another truck, 2 minute drive into ‘town’.
Dropped off before a dull building that stood very dangerously intact amidst bullet ripped walls and shambles. Tea, stale cardboard like snacks, a couple of cigarettes later I sat back, leaned against the alabaster. Yasru recounted not exactly in the chronological order of how it all started and built a surprisingly dramatic one-sided story. I humored him, as always. War had a strange way of never taking sides. There could never be a glorious war…. there could be insinuating, gripping, even interesting events…but never glory. I was biased. I wanted to change, get some hot water, to get ready for action. Nothing seemed to happen here today. Yasru and his brother left. They’d come back if they weren’t dead he joked.
8.30.pm:
I could hear more gunfire in the distance, faint yet very disturbing. I was ready. This assignment was bad. Nothing great about waiting, nothing great about waiting. …Waiting. Maybe tomorrow would be a good day with the boys. Was I a sadist?
8.50 pm:
Boredom Meets Sleep.
6.50 am:
Woken up to sounds of heavy feet running up the stairs...Wooden creaky stairs. Someone had gone into the nearby town from here. The air was excited. I hadn’t figured which town, who it was and whatever happened …until.
Scene 3
7.30pm:
Running across a road, dodging behind the milk truck and going straight across to the embankment, then using my arms to clamor over the top, running down the dusty slope, I had to make it fast before they clamped curfew. It was the result of two weeks of research, pouring over maps of the area. I had devised my plan. It was now six pieces of paper sitting in my pockets. I ran.
I heard gunfire as I ran towards the city. I was going straight into it. There was no other alternative. This brick kiln was the only way I could enter undetected, alive.
7.45:
30 mins left for closure. I had to meet her, get her belongings, an automobile was out of the question, we’d have to run all the way back and pray we’d not be seen. It had to be precise. I had just about enough food stashed in my pockets for a day, but this cold was going to create a problem I knew.
7.46:
The kiln wall was about 8ft high. Got in easily. I was in Kalashnikov country.
God!! Am I mad? If it wasn’t for the news I’d watched on TV, I’d never had wanted to smuggle her out. She was safer here. Or so I thought. Anyways it was too late to do anything…even go back.
I wasn’t against these people, not against the war. I was timid. Too scared to take sides. But one thought about someone hurting Reze was enough reason for me to attempt running across the street to the other side.
There was a truck, some poles from the scaffolding and tones of debris from fallen buildings.
7.48:
I ran quickly to the truck and hid, then dodged the poles and got into the building. Nothing happened, I walked through the rubble and froze.
A soldier was muffling the cries of a young girl as he tried to rape her. I shut my eyes instinctively…and took a step back, and then another…I was scared. I took a right and slowly sneaked past the maze of scaffolding along the building’s rubble filled interiors. This was not part of my plan. I could hear and sense soldiers, mercenaries, guns and a few billions other sounds. I was breathing too loudly, so I stopped. It was dark , but yet quite enough light to get shot in the face. I shouldn’t have come here. It soon sunk into me that I might not live through this. I was scared.
Everything went by in a flash. I had just peered at my watch went a siren went off. It was exactly 7.49pm. Three people walked into the room at the same time. Soldiers with gray clothes, grayer faces…guns. All was quiet. They saw me. I saw them. We were very quiet. My legs froze. One of them pulled out a cigarette and lit it. I moved to the corner facing the street. They sat.
I’d be dead in three seconds if only they knew who I was I prayed. Two of them left. The smoker remained. I dint engage eye contact, just checked my watch and looked tense. He came over. Gave me his cigarette. I puffed feverishly. …Coughed. I could have had a heart attack when he began to talk about some about some bastard shooting his brother on the bridge in the outskirts. He asked me if I was going anywhere. I said no, just caught in the wrong place. He asked me “Student”? I said, “Yes”. He slapped my head laughing. He’d never kill me I seconded in my mind. A second siren. I wasn’t going to make it. If I stayed , one whole night was too long to keep quiet. Then there were more soldiers too. I had to make plans. I slowly peered out and decided to leave. He asked me “where?” siren’s out. You’ll be shot. I nodded and moved. Maybe he’d found out, maybe he’d not. I was their enemy. I was among them.
8.15pm:
Cold, scary.. I slowly left the dilapidated house and ran into another. I was very lost. More soldiers were everywhere. I could not shut out the possibility of a stray bullet from the hundreds of snipers who kept watch. I COULD GET SHOT.
8.17pm:
I was at least 2 blocks away sideways from Reze’s house. So close yet so far. She was not going to be waiting for me today; it was too tormenting to think of both of us enduring what I was going through now.
8.25pm:
The soldiers were talking about someone who had sneaked in through the gap in the kiln wall, earlier that day… Me.
Someone had seen me? Why was I so important? I was here for her. I wasn’t here to kill anybody I was here for someone I love. I wanted a nice life, I was going to be caught and killed just two blocks away from her house. She wasn’t even going to know.
8.30pm:
it was well past the time I had to smuggle her out and she must have gone back in. My palms felt numb. I was going mad. More vans, soldiers, and sirens. I huddled…Unsure of what I was going to do.
8.40pm:
three soldiers baring their guns, tease me out of the building. We walk. They look pale yet with purpose. I am jabbed with the tip of a gun to head into a narrow alley…and into an enclosure.
I saw people, normal people. Preparing food, nursing wounds.
I was kicked in the calves. I fell.
He said” Is this the fellow? Someone came running and said “Gate” “Heavy firing”. The soldiers cursed and screamed out instructions before running out to the north side of town. I sat in the dust.
8.45pm:
I remember reading “Gaizka” on a t-shirt in fading blue, before this guy walked upto me and asked me a few questions to which I remained silent and tried to sound hurt. He ignored my pain. I looked healthy and he had no respect for me and slapped my face.
He made fun of me, slapped me again asking me the same questions, `Who was I here to meet? I broke down and pleaded, I was a student. More ruffians joined in amidst screams of “dog” “Enemy” Scum”,
I felt pain giving way to misery when the four youths took to me. I must have taken eight straight kicks to the face, when my eyes started to swell up and I attempted to crawl away. There was a fountain, and a huge gaping hole under the base.. a large dog could fit in. I crawled toward it as a huge mob went crazy around me hitting me with anything they could find. My clothes were torn, my watch taken, my shoes too. I could feel every part of my body hurt. My leg surely was broken at the ankle. It limply lay towards me. I was going to die.
Every now and then, I’d be kicked, until I had no more blood to cheer their cause. I was dismissed. My hands were good. I dragged myself to the fountain and slowly but steadily inched into the gap under it, my body soaked in the gray murky liquid sending needles of pain all over my battered frame. My senses of things around me were gone as I tried to go deeper and deeper under the crevice. Away from everything human.
“That’s all I could think of today, I’ll be better tomorrow.”
Scene 4
My cameras were finally cleaned; it’s been a very uneventful week now except for some shots of sniper victims I clicked down the road near the level crossing. But now even that area is barricaded with cars, drums, trucks and sandbags, I’m told that there has been a series of talks going on and I could use it to get into the next town. I jumped at the idea. It was a full 2 days since I had been holed up in this place. I was a pro. I needed action. I was going back to where the heat was on.
8.50 am:
From the outside, this place dint have much to offer, no spectacularly thrashed landscape, no bullet riddled barebones buildings, no amputees, in fact it could be termed a boring place.
My truck dropped me at the edge and I made sure I had in open view of all, my cameras and my other journo equipment. No sniper worth his salt would want to shoot at me. Especially since I was here to cover his city, his wronged people, his kin.
8.55 am:
Some soldiers led me into a building and I had my papers checked. A pair of dirty-bandaged hands rummaged thru my equipment. I was asked what I was going to shoot? How long I was planning to stay? I was sternly asked to keep it apolitical, no shooting flags, no shooting religious places, and no shooting politicians and army equipment.. I have sat through the standard briefings before…I did the same thing here. Nodding my head. I was suggested a place where some severe mortar shelling had caused a house to cave down on its hapless victims. A lieutenant of sorts offered to take me in his jeep there. The driver dint have an ear…Eerie I thought.
9.55am:
What did I expect to see, I planned out a well-tried sequence I often used, burning trucks and children nearby was my signature piece. The people loved it. It won each time. I was never the “severed limb”, man. I wanted drama. Perhaps I could “fix” up a scene. Maybe my man Friday here could hustle me an award winning shot. I enquired about kids with broken limbs and got a curt “No”. So I tried the “RED CROSS” trick. Offered to pay for the kid’s medication if he got me an injured crying child. He simply said “I’ll take you to right place”. After all he owned the war; the “others” were the enemy. He was a Messiah; I was on his side.
11.10am:
The roads has been opened up but yet we were going in circles, the residents had themselves put up barricades and roadblocks which had to be cleared for the jeep. The going was slow and things were yet ugly in some parts of the city.
We were the friendlies, yet our jeep invited an occasional hand thrown missile from the streets. Why does war make men so jumpy? I thought. I took war well. Almost too well. Why was I unaffected. I had never felt any hurt, any remorse, any pain, my fingers caressed the camera’s button just once and the world I opened up to the “others” brought forth tears. People took out parades holding up pictures I’d taken of Cambodian kids running for cover. I was never shaken… I was never hurt.
Am I a product of the war? There is no war within me. I didn’t have an opinion; I couldn’t take a side. I was interrupted.
We’d passed by a rather peaceful section of people near what looked to me like a market place. It had a small narrow alley leading into a more broad flat ground, surrounded by buildings. It was a dead end and there was this metaphorical visual in front of me.
My mind raced as always, while I signaled the driver to stop. STOP! Someone in front seconded my wish. It took me more than a moment longer to scramble out of the jeep. Yacud came over and stood beside me. I signaled to him saying “Quiet!” He seconded it.
1.00pm:
I sensed excitement within me. This didn’t happen too often. I could sense a story, but my blood curdled in a strange way as I walked into the debris filled marketplace. These people had seen the worst and I was strangely unwelcome…I retaliated equally. I wasn’t on their side, I knew that instantly. I walked among them. I was busy composing imaginary shots, planning in quick succession the number of subjects, the slowly diminishing light and the impending curfew.
I clicked a murky panoramic shot of the marketplace entrance. The composition felt evil, devilish I thought. The marketplace was like the present state of affairs in the war torn city….a complete standstill…DEAD.
I clicked a piece of what was once a SONY walkman cover, as it lay in the black gutter the yellow piece of plastic still gleaming from below. I clicked a few kids as they tugged on a shirt. I began to feel a strange disturbance right from the time I’d landed. Something about what I’d seen elsewhere came back to me. The crowd had cleared and I could work with some more freedom and then I saw it.
Bang! Right in the middle of this gray and black world stood this ancient looking watering hole
---A fountain.
I walked toward it.
I thought it would make a complete centerpiece balanced on either side by buildings that had once housed a lot of happy families. There were a few people around the fountain talking about someone and I dint like the tone of their voices I clicked. I kept clicking.
The late afternoons had rendered a lovely top light to the buildings and I decided to balance its brilliance with the dark shadow under the fountain. It was going to be a great picture. I knew. I decided to go lower on the angle.
Our eyes met.
I deciphered quickly what were once a man’s limbs, after I made out what his position was. It was piteous. I dint want to click him but I did. I inched close…scared.
Peering into the small gap I saw him. He was alive. The crowd was getting furious. Yakud asked me to leave quickly. We got into the jeep and left. The crowd hurled abuses. I was quiet on my way back. Yakud told me “ He was enemy”, ”All they are liars,” “ Maybe brother, war is bad, It make people kill brothers.”
I wasn’t listening; my mind raced back and forth trying to piece up a connection.
And then I knew where I had seen those young eyes.
Back at the office where I had worked for 14 years, I leaned forward to pick up the photograph that had won me the Alfred Eisenstaedt Award for Magazine Photography.
In small type at the bottom the title read:
“The Young Croat” - Black and white - 15”x 11”.
Scene 5
8.30 am :
I sit up. Shocked and moved by the strange dream. Like a zombie i switch on the computer and sit down to write a story.
The end
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