Air.

When I was little, I was denied that seemingly best feeling in the world. My mother and aunt had their seats right at one of the rounded glass/plastic apertures, and as a disciplined child that I was, I was afraid I might get into trouble running along the passages on the plane. My mother switched seat with me so I can get a glimpse of what was below. But a goddam attendant came and told me the seats were gender divided, I was like "I didn't know that there is discrimination against certain people in seating schedule on the plane." I cried and thought flight attendants were evil creatures.


Preventing a child from sitting in the rear seat next to the windows on an airplane should be made a crime. Curiosity is human nature. The earth is round, and how far does a normal person come close to witness that one simple fact? Only at an altitude of 43,000 feet aboard an airplane. Higher than the Everest. Above the land, the sea, the mountains, the skyscrapers, people. So small under, mingled in the terrain of what we all call home. Far on the horizon, earth meets the sky, the color spectrum shifting from a telluric brown to a muddled white which dispersed into various tones of blue upward. No longer on the ground, I felt like I was a separate entity and so was the earth, and a sense of belonging materialized from within. It was a bit of loneliness with a nip of pride, of courage with a sip of unspecified sorrow.

Grain.

When I picked up my first camera ever, my dad told me not to. I said “Why?” and he said “You’d become too absorbed in taking photos,” he paused, “just like I used to.” I didn’t understand. I thought it was simple: hold the camera still, click the shutter button and you’re done. “Once I lived on photos,” my dad said as he pulled out chunks of old grainy photos from the attic, “these were for customers that never returned to pick up their pictures.” Pretty ladies in blouses and gentlemen in suits with hair combed back standing by Hoan Kiem Lake took me into a wormhole. This was here. This was right here. This was part of what we are, what I am. I guess I will never feel guilty of taking what was a part of me with my existence.