A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

An old english idiom that resonates through every single photographer out there. What ever the reason you first got into photography, somewhere underlying it all.. was this. A way to communicate ideas and emotion through a single picture. One that has no language barrier. One that's universally understood. 

I've decided to start a seperate blog series that I hope will complement the travel photography tutorial style blog. Every now and again, you'll snap that one image that is more than just aesthetically pleasing. A photo you have a connection with, or one there's a story behind. "Thousand Words" aims to go through the story behind the picture so everyone else can share the experience. 

This one is about a close friend. One I had known since the age of 10. A relative, he was my cousins cousin (if that makes sense). We even ended up going to high school together for a brief time. In a world corrupted by ulterior motives and deception, he was one of a handful of people I knew to be genuine. True to himself, and true to others, he had direction, and knew where he wanted to be. We could go through an entire lifetime and not know what that feels like. He was a prankster, an idiot and an absolute laugh. Always the first to see an opportunity to draw a penis on a car window or on that one weak unsuspecting drunk (this may have been me on several occasions.. can't help it, I'm a small person with a liver to match). He was creative. If you could see his work, you'd think he was an artist. 

After finishing his university degree in engineering, he took off to see the world without any regrets. Career oriented, he stationed himself in Hong Kong for about a year. Here he was well looked after. Company paid him a huge salary, rent taken care of, plenty of time to party. He saw that it was starting to change him, and wanted to get away from the casinos, get away from the alcohol and get away from the lifestyle. He visited us frequently and always voiced that he was always planning to come back and settle in Australia with a more relaxed job. 

In 2015, he noticed a persisting cough. Despite his strong exercise tolerance and administration of antibiotics, nothing seemed to help it. Later he went on to develop back pain. A scan was done to confirm what had been suspected. The cancer had spread to his lungs, kidney and spine. He came home later for chemotherapy and underwent several extensive operations. Throughout everything, there was a sense of optimism about him. He went on to buy a house with his girlfriend of 6 years. He started writing a book he hoped to get published. He even started his own business. Eventually the cancer became resistant to the chemotherapy, and in one final effort from his oncologist, he was put on a trial drug. 

I visited him a week prior to going to a friends wedding overseas in November 2017. Although I didn't know it, this was the last time I was to have a conversation with him. He told me that night that the drug was working, and he could feel his sense of energy coming back. Part of me knew he was lying, mainly because I had never seen his energy leave him. I was perplexed and confused to see someone still in this frame of mind faced with a list of exhausted options. I asked him if he knew that he could possibly die. He said "yes". 

I asked him: "Why did you buy a house when you know that it was a possibility? Wouldn't that make dying harder?"

To which he replied: "and wouldn't that be wonderful.."

Those words resonated with me, and will probably continue resonate through out my life. We were in Thailand in Khao Lak for the outdoor wedding, and halfway through it, this intense tropical storm blew through just raining on everyone. This was about the time we received a message from his brother that he had passed away moments ago. He passed away aged 29. A part of me felt that he was responsible for the storm that pissed all over the wedding, certainly seemed like something he'd do when presented with the opportunity. So I went out and set up my camera to take a picture of it. Possibly a picture of him? I don't know, I've never been superstitious or religious, but certainly at the time, when faced with questions of mortality and life after death.. you sometimes ignore logic and reason. In some way it feels disjointed from concepts of the human soul, and therefore harder to apply. This was the resulting image from the long sequence of events that put me there.

  

 

You can check out some of my full resolution photographs Here.

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