Hunger

Hunger, a photo by firoze shakir photographerno1 on Flickr.

I shot this lady and her child a lot, her beat was the stretch across the Bandra Hill Road Police Station , and she wandered from one end of this road to the other end in search of food money or nourishment.

Its been two years now since I moved away from this location , and like her there was another Muslim mother and child I shot , including a new baby she got and she begged because her husband could not make ends meet..I normally dont talk to the subjects I shoot , but sometimes I would ask them , why they did no search for a job , but I gathered begging was a tiring job , sometimes luckless but was far better than being employed , and it appeared it was too late to remove the beggary from their depleted souls.

Once a beggar always a beggar and nowadays I dont carry my camera at all, and I shoot beggars all the time with my cosmic eye and mind and improvise my imaginary shots ..

I regret not having my camera on my person when I see Dabbawalas drenched to the bone riding their bikes near Bandra Bazar Road .. but I have no feeling I have killed all my feelings for photography, it is not important , and photography is not the essence of my being , it does not make me or break me I was human much before the camera came into my hands.

I have moved away from shooting stuff ..I dont want to shoot pictures get insulted humiliated , so I stopped shooting events of my own religiosity .. I shoot Moharam in other cities I shoot a lot of Hindu events simply because people of other religiosity give you respect , give you space and shit I dont need to shoot pictures to make money or prove that I am a Shia born Muslim.. picture taking is a hobby , and will always be secondary to my life.

So I began teaching my grand kids to shoot pictures , beggars people and hope above all things , my grand daughters now see frames before they see a picture and shoot it and they are like me , not excited or kicked up about the camera..

And I titled this post hunger ..poetically metaphorically philosophically ..when the child is hungry he will cry , mother will place him on her chest and fuel his hunger , but now when the mother feels hunger pangs , she goes to the dustbin of eateries close by and empties out the left overs in her bag ...Hunger ..

Yes I shoot pictures with my cosmic eye as you see them on reading my words ..

And mind you this is not a picture but a blog.. a poets blog about the poetry of pain and the poetry of life typed by a single finger of a damaged hand ..I cut my head during Moharam.. I bleed I feel pain too but it is not hunger it is my Faith that moves Mountains within my own scarred Soul..

Today is 21 Ramzan.. I am at home .. and the camera is at home too.. I took my grand daughter Nerjis down she is not well and her parents could not calm her so I took charge ..