Nid

Photographed Nid today for the 5th or 6th time since 2003. I met her back in 2003 when I first started the bargirl photo series. She is still working in the shortime bars 7 years later. Today she told me of a bf she has back home in Korat, I like Nid, she has kind heart, she laughed a lot during the photo session, I hope it adds another type photo to the series, a photo showing a bit of joy. Most of my Thai sex worker pictures are rather grim but life is broader than that and including a laughing photograph might be a good thing. Jock Sturges is right about photographing people multiple times. I had not seen Nid for 1 year and 6 months but it was sort of like we were long lost friends, the photos were fun and easy to take.

I also met some motorcycle taxi guys playing macrook (Thai chess). After a few sentences of Thai we were fast friends. I was offered a chair and everyone was eager to play and talk to me. Thais tend to be like that, the "Land of Smiles" advertisement is not far off the mark, and is actually quite accurate. I have grown to love this country and the people here. The language stuff has improved and I feel confident again to speak to people and to try to understand more about Thai culture. I need to work harder in Canada on my Thai language skills.

I should be finished here in about 4 days. I have enough film to photograph about 12 more people and have 4 scheduled for tomorrow with another 5 or so lined up. I want to save some film to shoot the older Nid in Bangkok when I return then I have to rush back to Klong Toey to work on some documentary 35mm shots of the slum. I have shot almost no 4x5 film I need to get my ass in gear in that direction as well. I think I can shoot the 4x5 and do outdoor portraits now, I do not feel like an outsider here anymore.