Mistress Hrin's Granado Espada Blog

[Sidenote: I was looking through an old diary of mine and found this entry. Thought I would share it with you guys to further encourage the community service efforts. (: ]

The One About Their World Through The Lens

A picture paints a thousand words.

I've always believed in the power of a camera. What super powers does a camera have? It grants an insight into someone's mind. When I want to know more about a person, I casually give them my camera and ask them to take as many photos as they like. The way a person takes a photograph says a lot about a person. It takes you deeper into their minds, their subconcious even. The subjects they choose to photograph, the angle, the moments they choose to press that trigger. All these are decisions. And in every decision we make, even the most minor and seemingly insignificant ones, like that of taking a photograph - it reflects a part of our personality.

A close friend of mine was dating this guy recently and so I was absolutely dying with curiosity to meet this guy since I had never seen her glowing and so alive ever since she started dating him. But he was a rather quiet guy so it was not easy to get a good feel about what he was really like, despite my bubbly attempts to dig information about him. Oh well. I guess not everyone is like me who will tell their life stories to people they have met for the first time...

So when the night droned on and I still couldn't get a feel of what he was like, I decided that time was running out and it was time for drastic measures. So I innocently gave him my camera and asked him to take some photos. And when he gave me back my camera and I scrolled to the first photo he took (first photo is most important since it reflects the most importance. Or so I say.), I immediately shuddered with goosebumps.

The photo he took was of the woman he was crazy about. The angle and moment he chose to take the picture was when she was not aware of it. To me, that photo reflected his quiet affections for her, his quiet observation of her as she laughed and talked with the people around her. It reminded me of the strong, silent type of romance novel hero who watched over his woman from afar.







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One of those days when I was on leave and playing teacher at Katong Special School.

And I look at this kids and wonder to myself, What is the world like inside their minds?

Yet, regretfully, I do not have that enlightened state of mind to understand them or communicate with them on such an artistic level as theirs. Which leaves me with only one option. To attempt, in my own way, to see through their eyes... via the lens of my camera. So during recess time, I give some of them my camera and teach them how to take photos. And I am proud to present their world, through their eyes:







These 2 photos are my all-time favourites. There is something just so artistic and fetching about them:





I felt a little emotional after scrolling through those photos. Suddenly, it made me feel ashamed and immature. To even think that I could decipher their psychology by looking through their eyes in those brief moments. What I saw was beauty without aesthetics. Beauty in its most innocent, naive and pure form. Aesthetics is but a man-made concept, the 1/3 'rules' and conventions we abide by that a picture may look complete. We make use of certain guidelines and principles to get that perfect shot. Yet in those aesthetically 'beautiful' photos we take, lacks a certain sense of genuinity and sincerity.

I switched off my camera and smiled to myself. Perhaps there are some things in this world that are not meant to be analyzed and concluded. Because that would be trivializing it down to a simple scientific experiment. There are some things in this world that are meant to be admired from afar, respecting its distance, just as it is, without any agenda.

And this is one of them.