Table for One
The host at the cafe looked as though he didn’t hear me correctly the first time, so I said it more defiantly: Table for one, please.
If I wanted to count my film camera, which never left my hands, I would have asked for a table for two. Maybe even a table for nine if you wanted to count the rolls of film I had with me. However, I decided early on that there would be no room for digital photography at the table. With digital, there’s a tendency to devote more time editing a photo than actually taking a good photograph. With film, it was the exact opposite.
When I first landed in Europe, I was probably more nervous to use a film camera than navigating my way around cities I had never been to before. There was no plan to find the most photogenic scenes in Denmark and Switzerland—I just showed up to places with my Canon AE-1. Although I distance myself from my subjects, I always look for how they interact or complement each other. Having to depend on 35 frames and natural light makes you tend to see things a little bit more differently.
Anyway, the host gestured to me and said, “Pick any seat you like.” So, I chose the table with the best view.
Exhibited in: Aspace Manila and Conception Arts and RAW Artists in New York
Published in: ArtPlus Magazine, The Philippine Daily Inquirer, and the Manila Bulletin.
A Different Kind of Holiday
Audrey Hepburn’s Princess Ann had Gregory Peck’s Joe Bradley take her around Rome on his Vespa. In Switzerland, I did not have a Joe or a scooter-- I had Karen and my hiking boots. It was there that I realized I was hopeless at multitasking: I couldn’t talk, take pictures, and listen at the same time. I successfully asked one question per one shot but for the life of me cannot remember the answers. Meanwhile, in Copenhagen, my bike helmet was my only guide and companion. While most of the area was flat, the streets were lined with cobblestones so my bike rattled its way through the city. This was a good thing because I couldn’t hear my heart pounding with anxiety as I tried to navigate my bike around Denmark. Princess Ann and I had completely different holidays but we took the road less traveled, perfectly fit for a commoner.
Scenes from a Storybook
Once upon a time, not too long ago, I realized my childhood imagination was not only a product of Lola Basyang’s tales but also of Hans Christian Andersen’s. I started out with beautifully drawn picture books of Andersen’s classics such as The Little Mermaid, The Ugly Duckling, and The Matchgirl. As I got older, the pictures from books were gradually replaced with wordier, big kid stories like Lois Lowry’s Number the Stars. The stories later evolved into Hamlet and his ghosts in Helsingør. I felt a sense of deja vu when I first set foot in Denmark. The street names and the monuments quite literally leaped out of the pages of my old books to guide me along the way. I didn’t feel the need to meet new people abroad because my old friends were already waiting for me. All I had to do was open a book to find them.
Between 7:50 & 15:55
It dawned on me just how dependent I was on natural light. The sun in Europe set as quickly as it rose, so I pretty much followed the sun wherever it went like a moth does to a candle. On some days I was lucky: the heavens opened up, and the sun came out. Then other days felt like I was in a crime novel. The fog devoured most of the scenery and the altitudes and attitudes got colder. (To my advantage, this meant fewer tourists to deal with and hotter coffee and gløgg.) Early on I decided that post-production wasn’t going to make a good photo– I was. At least, that’s what my film camera made me do.
