La Nina

  As a youth I was an intrepid traveler. Often times lighting out without a cent in my pocket. An army jacket,tennis shoes and a sleepingbag,and of course my thumb. It was not uncommon for me to ‘sing for my supper’ in a mission, a drunk on each arm. Mexico was a favorite destination for me . In   1973 I was traveling in the mountains near Tepic  on a second class bus, the only way in to Barre de Navidad (Christmas Reef) . Here I found this young lady ,fascinated with a ‘not seen often’ Gringo with a funny looking device  in his hands.  She was quite obliging of the moment,   all the while her mother keeping a close eye on the proceedings , not wanting to seem   to concerned.. This is not a sepia filtered. It is the original light inside the bus.

  Before the trip I had purchased an ‘antique’ 35 mm  camera at a junk shop for 5 dollars.Probably made in the 40’s I would say. It was ‘semi-automatic’  probably  one of the earliest of its kind. I bought some film for it and took it along to record my adventure.  I really didn’t know how to use it.  In ‘automatic ‘mode you had to adjust the f-stops So I cut the flap off the film box and taped it to the back of the camera. 

 The flap had  a coded  diagram that inluded a sun,a cloud over the sun, a moon..etc…etc,  this is how I new how to set the exposure for the shots.

  I scanned this in a professional  scanner at 400 dpi.and pp in CS3.

 

 

5 thoughts on “La Nina

  1. You managed to capture what you said about yourself perfectly in her face. What you did with a $5 camera would have taken hours in Photoshop and not look as ‘real’. The effort you went to here was rewarded with a beautiful shot!

  2. Wow, eddie! This is a raw emotion photo and the story about your travels that you wrote with it reminded me a lot of myself. I loved reading about this time of your life.
    The little girl’s expression is so loaded with a dozen emotions; curiosity, fear, stress, hardship, acceptance, pleading, and more. And the mother is as you described her, guarded, keeping an eye on things, but trying to ignore you.
    This is a truly profound and evocative photo. One that is “alive”. It doesn’t immediately settle into a “nice neat slot” in the brain, but keeps elusively moving around due to it’s intensity and loaded emotions. It would take a lot of viewing for me to fully feel ALL the emotions and thoughts going on in it. The lighting in the bus along with the slightly grainy quality add to it’s drama.
    So much “knowing” in such a young face. A piercing and intent look at you and the camera. Wow, she would be in her 30s now, almost 40. I wonder what happened to her and how her life went?
    Thank you eddie for sharing this. Both story and photo touched me very much. Hugs, Robin

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *