Saturday 13 March 2021

#MeToo - sexism and tourism

 Two little vignettes from my journal of Egypt.

An English couple in one of the temples, I think it was Karnak. The man gave his partner his mobile phone and went to stand in front of a colonnade view.

"Take the picture then."

"I don't know how your phone works."

"It's very simple. The yellow button."

"I can't see a yellow button."

"On the screen."

"I can't see it."

Angrily, he walked over, grabbed the phone, showed her, shoved it back in her hand, went back to pose in front of the colonnade.

She frowned and squinted, trying to see the screen in the bright sun. The phone clicked.

He came to look.

"Well that's bloody useless, isn't it? You should have used the zoom. Look, you can hardly see me at all. Use the bloody zoom."

Back he went. I wondered if the next photograph would satisfy. It didn't.

"Look, you've got one more try. Then we've got to get back on the bus."

"But I haven't even..."

Her words were already directed at his back. She clicked. He came back, grabbed the phone, started off towards the entrance.

I thought: for God's sake, let him go. Just let the bugger go. You're better off without him.

But she followed, and I could see the droop of her shoulders. Just how many years of this had she had to take?

***

"That one is the Red Chapel," she said, looking at the plan in the guidebook. "That is the white chapel of Senwosret, and ... yes, that one is Hatshepsut's."

"Ah," he said. "It's pretty."

"And then, if we go here," she pushed a fingertip along a line in the book, "we can see the Rameses temple, the one we missed earlier, it has Osiride statues and a barque shrine."

"OK," he said, "we have time for it all?"

"Yes, it's hardly two, we have all afternoon."

I was amazed.

A man and a woman, and the woman is reading the guidebook.

And the man is listening!

I have travelled in India, Africa, Europe, the US, South America, the Middle East. I have travelled off the beaten track and I have seen the big sights. And here was something I had never, ever, seen before.

(They were French, by the way. Vive l'égalité.)

***

In a week that's seen domestic violence and sexual harrassment hit the headlines in France, and a woman murdered in the UK, I couldn't help my thoughts turning to these two little episodes. I'd like to think they are the way of the past and the way of the new generation. I'd like to hope so.

But it's a fairly slender hope. 

I'll never forget that poor woman's slumped shoulders as she followed her partner towards the exit.

Thursday 11 March 2021

Lockdown travel: the Photo Game

 This is a game I play with myself sometimes when I'm travelling, if I'm tired, if I'm stuck waiting for a bus or a train or a plane, if I'm eating out, particularly in street cafes. It's a great game for lockdown. Or just to give yourself a challenge.

Rule One : Your backside is glued to your chair. 

Rule Two: You must keep taking interesting photos. (Choose a camera with a good zoom lens or function.)

Rule Three: There is no rule three.

I can do it today as I sit at my computer. If I were going to take photos now:

  • the sun falling across a little statue of Shiva I have on the windowsill
  • the fish on my Vietnamese blue and white mug
  • a bookshelf where all the books are leaning at twenty degrees
  • the thin fanning of pages of a book I left half-open on my desk
  • the texture of the plaster on the wall
  • some very odd patterns made by reflections and the shadow of the blinds
  • the furry texture of the top of my paintbrushes in their mug
  • a whole landscape of dust on top of a writing box (really must get round to dusting)
  • two horses going up the street outside
  • the cat looking in at the window
  • his tail disappearing
  • a scatter of pencil shavings where I knocked my pencil sharpener over
Sometimes these photos are brilliant. Sometimes you look at them later and think "Why on earth did I take that?"

But the point is not the photos. It's the looking.

Oh actually, that's rule three. You have to see the photograph before you pick the camera up. You look with your eyes, not with the lens.

In fact, if you don't have a camera, you can still play the game.

Happy looking!