a visit at karwaan bazaar

It was 8th feb, 2008. We all promised to meet within 6.30 am in front of Prothom-alo Building. My clock alarmed me in time but as I woke I found the sky quite dark. It was quite cold outside and my room was really a cozy one. I thought several times to leave the assignment, but than I thought about my 1000 taka and kept awake. Thanks to Ferdouse, His call at 6.15 finally worked as the stimulator and fetched me out of the warm blanket. I started at 6.30 and reached Karwaan Bazaar at 6.50.

I was still one of the first 6 or 7 early comers. We were doing a Photo Story Telling Workshop, a kind of private arrangement and we were 18 in number. While we were waiting for others and walking capriciously we found lots of families sleeping on the footpath. They were yet to vacant the path for us. We found lots of children there. The following one was just having his 'morning crawl' on the footpath. He or she looked cute and happy; didn't mind to give pose. Along with others I took his photo enthusiastically but now often I wonder why did I take his photo. He was not a part of activities of Karwaan Bazaar. Was it our so called social consciousness or simply a pipeline formula for becoming a 'real photographer'? Nowadays this child keeps staring at me, often makes me feel uneasy as I have returned to my cozy room after my assignment and the child is still probably there, helping someone else to learn photography!



I was not prepared for that. The day before, I was little bit disturbed by the thought that I had to hold camera in front of unknown faces and if they reject rudely take that calmly or professionally. So I was already nervous. As I entered the bazaar I found its crowd enormous enough to make me more confused and clumsy. I took Karwaan bazaar as any other bazaars. I had no idea about its wideness and wildness.



It was chaotic, gauche and of course blundering. It was tough to walk among so many people. I hesitated a lot at first but necessity knows no bounds. I had to finish at least 2 rolls. So soon I learned to communicate and to feel free. But at my surprise I found people very helpful and very enthusiastic. Nobody rejected to be photographed, rather a lot many requested themselves. Our people are so simple and so happy! They even do not calculate whether they will ever see a copy of the photo. They just want to give a pose in front of a camera! so colorful a mind they have!



I really tried my best to capture some best images to build a story of my own. I tried to go for the general aspects of any Bangladeshi bazaar. (which i should not choose and which i understood after my presentation) I went through the fish markets, worked beside the crappy and nasty rail lines. Most of the customers were resellers or wayfarers. They were buying in retails. Their dresses were simple, a white lungi, some sponge sandals and a shirt. Their faces were tanned and hard. But to be honest, they offered me nothing new.







I found lots of children there, a lot under 6 or 7 which drew my attention. I really felt sorry for them. Most of them lived in the slums beside the rail lines. I have seen these slums several times through the window of a train. But it was totally a different experience to be there and to spend sometime in that muddy and nasty area. I think only after watching their condition through one's own eye, one can really have some idea about their lives. They were indifferent to us and they too didn’t mind if we took their photos, or asked their names. They were accustomed to photographers and at being photographed. They were too young to understand the concept of privileged and non-privileged, too young to understand their unchanging fates in our capitalist society. We were lucky that they were too young to give us a scornful back-look.



Karwaan Bazaar was full of every food items. Spices, green vegetables and fresh fishes were available there. But above everything to my inexperienced eye I found our economic poverty in abundance in the bazaar. It is not that it was my first visit to any bazaar. But probably my first one without any to-buy list and of course first formal one to observe everything closely. So the vender-boy who was just a vender before, then became a human child deserving equal privileges with others.



By 9 golden time for the photographers was over. It was more than 9am. We were walking back to our meeting point. The roads became full of office goers and traffics. Our skyscrapers were shining in pride to return to life..



My assignment was a poor one. I failed to ensure basic technical qualities in my photos. I failed to shoot more than 1 roll and finally was the the second last man out of 15 participants. Unintentionally I captured the following photo, which was finally selected as my only 'not-poor' one.



Numbers and newspaper photos desensitize our senses. What we can feel on spot can never be felt through news. By 9 am when the bazaar was almost over and we were returning, I found the silence and the vacuum annoying. To my utter surprise I missed the crowd then. At early morning it was people, people, people everywhere. I missed the spontaneous overflow of sounds in my ear and everything around seemed simply lifeless!

To me, my experience is my trophy. I understood that first-hand experience has no alternative. A quote I found in wikiquote says
"(photography)..is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera" -- Dorothea Lange.

And about story telling? I don't have any. But you may download and have a slide-show of my photos. Out of the 3 child photos take the 3rd and keep the given order as it is. Do you find any?

Thanks..