I am no photographer

Weeks ago I met a college classmate who is also into photography. He introduced me to his coworkers that I went to college with him eight years ago and emphasized that Zuo is also a photographer.

I feel ashamed.

Not the way he introduced me, but the way I regard being a photographer.
In college, we didn’t talk much, but now we meet again and happy about it. He told me after his father passed away, photography is a way to forget sadness and courage to move on.

We agreed to catch up someday, grab a beer and reminisce the old days.

You see, I am also working 9 to 5, the so-called, “white collar”. Maybe? After spending years in glass towers and endless routines, I slowly lost touch of what is happiness, or why I live?

This May, I went to Taiwan, a place that I only studied in Chinese textbooks, a place that I always imagined but afraid to chat about due to history conflict. This trip plays as a trigger that I picked up a camera to shoot - moments around me.

I used to walk very fast to work and home. Now I walk very slowly - being present.

Two people once said something influenced me.

Cartier-Bresson said:

To proceed fast, one must walk slowly.

David Foster Wallace’s speech, This is water, the older fish asked the two young fish:

How’s the water?

The book, This is water, is easy to read, but it takes time to really think of the question - what the heck is water?

I reckon “the water” is everything around us - to feel, understand, perceive, notice, look, care, and try best to think of others, and accept that you are not the centre of the universe.

From the lens of humanity, we are connected as one.

Days ago I met a photographer on the street - David Eisenberg, a portrait photographer from Toronto.

I want to end by quoting his words,

Nothing like capturing today’s moments for the history of tomorrow.