Riding on the bus, as I look out of the window, I quickly take out my digital camera.
"I have to capture this moment", I think to myself.
Turning the camera on, zooming in and aiming at the target, click.
I look at the image on the camera, yes! Perfect.
I can't wait to show my family and friends back home who await these images.
I then look at the image outside of the window.
It is more than an image, it is a person.
They are people.
I continue my journey to capture everything I see.
My supporters back home gave me one main duty and that is to "take many pictures" and I must fulfill this duty!
Ah ha! A lightbulb moment.
As the bus is moving, record the activities that happen outside of the window!
Yes! Perfect. That way, I will not miss a moment!
With joy in my heart from this new found idea, I quickly take out my camera, pressing the record button and pointing my camera outside of the window. I look at my camera's screen as it captures all of the movements of the busy people at work, play, and school. As the bus rounds a corner, my camera catches a group of people who are sitting down. As my camera makes direct contact with the peoples' eyes, I take my eyes off of the camera's screen and into the peoples' eyes. With disbelief written on their faces, I read a girl's lips as she says the word, "camera". As she says it again, she looks toward the moving bus as the others follow her gaze. They all look at me as the bus continues on its way with me continuing to film. I feel almost frozen in time.
After realizing what happened, I pressed the stop button and turned off my camera. That was enough filming for now. I felt as though I had violated them, violated their right as humans to privacy and their right to say no to being filmed or photographed.
Had my desire to "capture it all", duty to "take many pictures", and inclination to capture "everyday people doing everyday activities" overcome my own knowledge of respect for other people? As I sat on the bus, saddened by what I had done, I thought about my own people's past - about my ancestor's history. How African women, like Saartjie Baartman - who they named Hottentot Venus - were put on display for Europeans...treated like animals at a zoo...put on a platform for white Europeans to be amazed and to see the "freak show"...the abnormality of the African woman...for them to look and record what they had seen. They were amazed, "Wow, look at this creature..."
I felt as though I had exploited them...
It's so hard to figure out what to capture, and what you just have to take in mentally. I felt the same way in Germany. There were some things you just couldn't capture out of respect, like the concentration camps. and even then, I still had to take a some form of image.
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