aiming the camera / dogs in Mexico

 I took pics of dogs in Mexico. Dogs don't mind when you aim the camera at them. 

They look right back at you. Or they ignore you. They stay asleep. 

Sometimes they pose for you.  

People don't want to have their pic taken, especially by a foreigner. I could see they didn't like it, so I didn't. 

But then I bought a hat from a woman who was sitting on a doorstep crocheting with her wares spread on a blanket around her. R clowned for her, pretending to be on a skateboard in his new funky hat, and she laughed, maybe, maybe not understanding. When I asked if I could take her picture, she lifted a hand before her face, got up and turned around, not even trusting that I wouldn't take the picture after she said no. I told her I wasn't going to but she wouldn't turn around again. I'd ruined the moment. 

Who cares? I care. 

Mind you, I couldn't help when I took pics of dogs and parts of humans ended up in the frame. 

While in Mexico City, we went to an astounding photography exhibit by Graciela Iturbide who spent fifty years travelling around Mexico, taking pictures of people. That's fifty years of bearing witness to how people lived, who they were, their customs, their culture, their lives. Invaluable documentation.
If you're curious, here's a link:

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/feb/23/gabriela-iturbide-mexico-photographs-book-interview

My inclination (compulsion?) as a writer is to "bear witness" but we lose that when instead we choose to respect people's privacy by not taking their pictures. 

Of course, I'm no Graciela Iturbide. I've only got a little snap camera. 

So I took pics of dogs who weren't so fussy about their privacy--and you know what? Dogs show you a lot about the world they live in. The rag rug to wipe your feet before you step inside a store. The cheerfully painted railing and quilted jacket. The dog sprawled asleep in the market, trusting that no one would step on him, as no one did. I have dozens of pics of dogs sleeping on sidewalks and in the streets. That alone tells me VOLUMES about Mexican society,

Less obliging were the roof dogs who did not appreciate having their picture taken. They let me know to get lost fast.

Mexico

We got on a bus in Mexico City and the driver said we couldn't pay cash. We needed a card that was charged with trips.

Oh.

We turned to get off and a man hallooed from a few seats back, lifting his card.

The driver said, There you go.

I paid the man for our two trips plus a bit extra for his trouble. He tried to hand back the extra coin. No, no, I said, not a mistake. Gracias.



Would that have happened in Montreal? In Toronto? In Vancouver? I'm naming big cities because Mexico City is big--over 20 million. Maybe someone might have helped two strangers with different coloured skin, but would that person have handed over their transit card for the strangers to use? Hey, what if we'd jumped off the bus and run away with it? Maybe it was a scam?

Dear Ebay

Dear Ebay,
You may think I'm looking for a deal. Otherwise I'd go to a store and buy a new camera. Everything new is better, right?
But listen, I bought a new camera and I don't like it. It takes pictures with all the texture flattened.
I understand a picture is 2-D: technically flat. I don't understand the physics or the optics or whatever it's called, but there should still be some sense of what's closer, what's velvet, what's concrete. With this new camera, a woman at a cafe table looks like a cutout doll stuck onto the flowers behind her. She isn't sitting in sunlight but the colours are bleached.
I want a camera like the one I had stolen last spring in Mexico City. That camera took this picture.

You can tell who's 93 and who's 56. The colours haven't been doctored. It wasn't an expensive camera with fancy lenses. It was a simple snapshot camera that cost $125 in 2011 and it took pictures that had depth and texture. That's what I want in a camera.
Small enough, too, that I can slip it in my pocket. I'm not a photographer. I only take snapshots--but I want them to be snapshots worth looking at again or I wouldn't bother taking a picture.
There are ever less decent snapshot cameras available because people use their phones. So, okay, I'm behind the times. I have a phone that stays at home and takes messages.
I also want a viewfinder. Remember that little eye that you look through? I don't like taking pictures with a display screen. In fact, you can't use the display screen if you're outside or in the sun--all those times when you might want to take a picture. Sure, I can do what everyone else does, point my device and take a picture. Who cares if it's in the frame or not? Take a few pix and pick the best.
I still want a viewfinder where I can... get a view.
At the moment there's only one inexpensive snapshot camera on the market with a viewfinder. It's a Canon. Canon used to make a good camera too. That's the camera I had that was stolen.
The model currently in the stores is the A1400. It is shit. Plastic shit. From one to ten, with one on the lower end of the scale, I would give it a two because it does actually take pictures. However, it's been so simplified it should be marketed as a toy, not a camera. WTF, Canon???
So that brings me to you, Ebay. I have reasons for not trusting you. I don't like having to pay duty for a secondhand item that is supposed to be exempt under NAFTA. I don't like gambling that the item might be shipped by UPS and I'll have to pay UPS a sum at the door for some trumped-up UPS charges. Blah-blah-blah...Customs...blah-blah...fill out a form and get a reimbursement...blah-blah-blah. Is it worth it?
But at this point you're my best bet. I'm looking for a camera like the one I used to have. It could even be the one I had stolen in Mexico City that--who knows?--made it to some enterprising person in West Virginia who wants to sell it on Ebay.
Wouldn't it be funny to buy a camera that has all the pictures I took in Mexico City still on the SD card?
Ever hopeful.
Rapunzel.

diego rivera's judas figures

Here's me and a Judas head in Mexico City. Where else would that blue wall be but at Frida Kahlo's Casa Azul?

Judas figures belong to an old Catholic custom of making papier-mâché figures, representing Satan and Judas, which are burned, exploded, or flogged on the Saturday before Easter. 

I'm thinking of them now because I was leafing through an old notebook and came across the drawings I did in Diego Rivera's studio. I wasn't allowed to take pictures inside the building, though no one stopped me from sketching--which, admittedly, is not one of my fortes. Still, you get the sense. 

The bodies were about 10'/3m high, made of papier-mâché, adorned with buttons, bones, horns, stones and teeth, brightly painted and propped before a window of many panes. Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo collected them. I suppose it was a way of never being alone in a room if you don't mind the company of demons. 
I sketched this fellow too. I liked his metal-hoop ribs. I couldn't tell if his limbs were made of bone or wood. I didn't forget his eyes and nose. He didn't have any. Or maybe it was a she.