An Introduction

This is my first steemit post. I thought I’d go through my old photos and write some stories to go with them.

Here I was, a million miles away from home on my first adventure. I had a change of clothes, a bed roll and my camera equipment. My extra money was safely stored under the insole of my left shoe and a laminated copy of my passport which made it look like an official document was in my camera bag, for easy access.

I spent the previous evening in the house of a stranger whom I’d met through another stranger. Waking to the smell of gunpowder was my first introduction to war. I was young and felt immortal, war was nothing but an adventure and a story to tell. Nablus was on curfew because of a bombing in Tel Aviv a few days earlier. As an “international” I was above that law. So were the children. Of course I was a target, but not they way you might think. I was a break in the monotony of war. “Whats your name whats your name whats your name…” they would shout while running after me as I wandered the streets. We would clumsily communicate with gestures and they would urge me to follow along. It was all a grand adventure for me, and for them a short break from their war torn world. We played football in alleyways while tanks moved though parallel streets, visited the hospital to see a friend who had been caught in a firefight (I don’t know if the boy ever made it out of the hospital), then off we’d go to a shop or market and get some treats. At no time was I allowed to pay, it was always insisted that I was their guest. Always.

This was their world and I tried my best to tell their story, but some how it was always my story which unfolded. They saw their world as a big game, and though the stakes were much greater than the games of my childhood, they had just as much fun. Many of them ended up injured or dead, but most of them learned the value of life years before I ever did, or even, ever will. Those were naive times, I was young and, honestly, belligerent with my camera. In my younger-self’s defence, I believed that by telling these stories I could do my part to make the world better. Almost 15 years later and with children of my own these memories have formed and shaped me more than I shaped the world. Maybe those two things aren’t mutually exclusive.