6: DEAD MAN

(start at post 1 on the right hand side if this appears first)

It was a hot day. People stood around in hats.



I had just been to the market to buy some flip flops and was pleased to have haggled the price down by half but not so pleased when Iwas then offered only one shoe. I didn’t want just a flip, I said, I wanted a flop too. Eventually the man relented and so I flip-flopped off, happy. Policemen shared cigarettes and talked in a strange language I did not understand: Spanish probably. The town was jolly. Then I saw a body lying under a sheet.



I wasn’t sure why everyone was so relaxed. Then again what is there to do once someone has died? Wait for the ambulance and the dead-person forms to be filled in, I suppose. I thought there might have been a gun fight and the man’s hat blown off into the dust and his soul flown off into the sky. But apparently he had been drinking meths. Like so many others here he had over done it on the supercheap alcohol. They don’t deflavour the meths over here. They keep it clear and let them drink it and turn a blind eye as they go and meet the barman in the sky. It’s a brutal modern day version of natural selection. Adios amigo. But death is not hidden. A body on the street, people walk past. There’s something upsetting but also profound in that nonchalance, I’m not sure what exactly or can’t find it in me to articulate, but death exposed here whereas its tidied away in the west, a little too much I think.

Its fair to say things were getting a little SHAKY in Guatemala. I was having a lovely time, I was eating cake and everything, but things were feeling a little shaky. I wanted to look into the problem. In a rather stupid extension of a metaphor I decide to hike to the top of one of these volcanoes, stare down into its smoking hole and see what was at the BOTTOM OF ALL OF THIS. It was a futile poetic gesture which inevitably brought me no closer to any truth but it did get me some nice views.



I booked a guide and got up at five am the next day, tied the laces on my walking boots double tight, ate some more cornchips (so cheesy!) wrapped up warm (the volcanoes reach above 3000m) and waited for the minibus to take me to the base of the climb in the chilly darkness of dawn. Brrrrr.

The minibus screeched to a halt and when I slid open the door I was greeted by a ten strong group of large bearded American missionaries from Mississippi. They were far too awake for 5am. “GOOD MORNING SIR, WHERE YOU FROM? ENGERLANND, WELL I SAY, HOWDY DO?’. They slung their greetings are me like a cold bucket of water. I shook awake. “hello”.. They were on a mission to build concrete churches around Guatemala, oh yes indeed. ‘OH YES, WE COME IN AND GET A CHURCH UP IN 2 WEEKS FLAT, YES SIR.’ I don’t know what the standard church building time is but I would say that’s pretty fast in anyone’s book. God was pleased with them and they knew it, yes sir. They carried a box of chicken wings which they all dipped into at regular intervals. I crawled into the front seat and tried to make myself small. But the conversation had started on an inevitable course.
-You been to London, Martin?
-Yes I have.
-Goodness. You know Pee-ka-deelly circus?
My entire body clenched with disappointment.
-Yes I do. It’s a wonderful part of town.
-Sure it is. I was there 20 years ago. I was wearing this exact same hat, yes sir.
Another chicken piece was eaten..
-No way. I was there 20 years ago too.
-There you go.
-You were wearing that hat?
-Yes sir, yes indeedy.
Another chicken piece.
- Wait…. No, I don’t think I saw you.
- No I don’t suppose you did. (He laughs) It’s a wonderful town. London. Picadilly circus. Phew-weee!
Another chicken piece. Loud munching.
I could no longer contain myself. From under my breath I let out a n‘Oh Jesus!’. I realised my mistake immediately but it was too late. They must have heard.
Silence followed and then another chicken piece was swallowed. This time I was sure I could hear bones being munched. I put my ipod in my ears. This is the travellers way of blocking out a world that may be a little too alien for comfort. I played a ricky gervais podcast. It was a strangely transporting experience.

The walk up the volcano was steep. Dawn had broken, the sun had come out and the ash strewn ground was slippery under foot. It was going to be a hard day. Wihtin minutes, nay seconds, the missionary zeal was replaced by heavy panting and profound sweating. Fat man sweat. Even regular dips into the chicken box could not control the effort needed to transport their Christian bulk up the slopes. The man next to me began to sweat profusely. I wondered quite what part he had played in the building of a church. He wasn’t the fittest, probably not putting the roof on or anything like that. We were closely followed by a group of opportunist children, who had immediately sensed the arrival of an easy dollar. They walked behind with horses and as soon as we started the incline shouted ‘TAXI! TAXI!’ incessantly.

I had to smile.

Within five minutes the panting man relented.
‘Alright, how much for the donkey?’ ‘What… how much did you say!!!?…OK, OK whatever, I have no shame. Not the first time I’ve been ripped off, and it won’t be the last either. Yes siree. Give me that donkey!’

You had to admire his honesty. I felt sorry for the horse though. Christian panting was replaced by horse panting. Poor beast having to lug that American up a volcano. I briefly wondered what would happen if the horse tipped its passenger into the hole at the top. Would the fat christian block it up? Would the earth rumble and give out a little belch. I banished the thought immediately as IMMORAL, UNKIND AND AMUSING.



We were followed to the top by two stray dogs that apparently walk the route everyday with the first group that comes along. They don’t do it for free food, I am not sure why they do it, but they are very sweet natured and probably very dog-fit. They should bring out a video. ‘My walk to health’



A little aside about photography. Skip this if photography is of no interest.

SERIOUS BIT>>>
Look again at this picture: it’s not particularly unusual, however it illustrates something important about photography. Photography forces you to re-see the world. What we have is two dogs in front of a volcano – big deal. But what we see in the photograph is something quite different from how things appeared on the day. The dogs have become huge and the mountain tiny. In reality when I looked through the viewfinder, that is exactly how they appeared of course, big dogs, small hill, but until the image was produced that is not how I could SEE them. The dogs were just dogs, if imposing and very close, the volcano still huge, if very far away. It is only when the moment is frozen and flattened that you CAN consider the various elements in an image in new ways. Once the image is made the dogs are the force of nature and the volcano just an impotent shape in the distance.

So what? Well it gives the camera supernatural powers.

The more you take pictures the more you become aware, hazily at first and then later with more focus, of the strange mechanics of aesthetics that works inside the camera. The first and most important point is that an image is not a representation of how we see. We get caught out by that one all the time: we see a beautiful sunset and assume that if we photograph it we will have a beautiful image, but so often we are disappointed when the prints return from Boots and the beauty has been lost in the chemicals. Where has it gone? Oh its because I had a shit camera, you say. Equally an image of an ugly scene (people fighting, an old rubbish bag, someone dying, a crack in the wall) can often surprise us with its beauty. That can be equally disturbing : those photos of Sebastian Selgado of kids in Africa, should they really be so beautiful? Where has that beauty come from? From amidst the dirt and poverty? Oh its because I’m a good photographer, you say. No! Beauty in the image is dependent on but not contained in the scene you shoot. The act of taking the photo makes the beauty. And this is weird shit man.

Why don’t beautiful things make beautiful images and ugly things ugly images? There’s a very famous photo taken by William Eggleston of a dirty old ceiling fan. It’s a plain white fan against a plain white ceiling but it’s a stunningly beautiful image. Why? We’ve all seen fans like that and certainly I have never thought they were beautiful and yet here was an image of exacly WHAT I HAD SEEN before and it WAS beautiful. What had changed? The printing of the colours, the framing?? No. Neither was there anything dramatic about the composition or the colours or the lighting. What had changed was that we were looking at a photo of a fan and not a fan. The crucial point is that a photograph is not showing what the object looks like but what a photograph of the object looks like. The picture creates a new point of view. Sometimes when I photograph it feels as though I am taking a young kid around with me and showing them how things can appear. Look at that, now look at that. To photograph is to show a new eye how to see. In the immediate sense that new eye is the glassy lens of the camera, but over the long term that new eye is our own.

The second crucial point is that we do not photograph things, we photograph relationships. This is the route up the volcano. It was pretty hard going.



This is a photograph not of people or of the volcano but of people going up the volcano. Again pretty obvious but its worth thinking about. As a result of that relationship the image captures the effort of the walk. Because the slope is isolated from the background (other hills, sun, clouds) and because the people are framed small and to the very left of the image the focus is entirely on the struggle of going up. Had the photo been pulled out (or zoomed in on the people) although the objects in the photo would have been the same the photo would have been totally different because the relationship between the objects would have shifted.

Sometimes this fact can lead to strange effects. I like this photo of the bloke in front of the wall because there is so much wall and so little of him.



But really the image is entirely about him. Infact, paradoxically, the image is MORE about him than if it was cropped tight on his face. The empty wall says something about his isolation and his confusion. Each square cm of that yellow is telling us something about him and nothing about the wall or the paint or the type of yellow. The relationship between him and the wall is so potent because people are always seen and experienced in relationship to others and the world around them. To photograph a person is to photograph them in relation to their world, even if the world is a blank background. Look for relationships and not things.

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The top of the volcano was glorious. Great views over Guatemala etc etc And a smoking hole at the top! I tried to look down it to see the mystery that might be lying underneath but billows of sulferous smoke pushed me back. I am afraid I found no poetic or metaphoric answer to what LIES AT THE BOTTOM OF ALL THIS SHAKINESS, but I did jump over the hole (or near it)



And then I jumped again



….. and then he marched them down again!



What a terrifically pointless activity is climbing a volcano. What a totally excellent thing to do! Volcanoes are great! That’s my conclusion and you’ll have to accept it.

The horse with the fat man on it didn’t make it. They had to stop half an hour from the top just before the final slopes. By the time we had come back to join him I feared he might have built a church – you know, just out of frustration, ‘ahhhhhh! I’m fat and I going to take it out on the local people by building them a church…. VERY QUICKLY ahhhhhhhh!’ And then as if by magic… Kazam!

But he hadn’t. Thank God. All’s well that ends well.