Day nine notes: 1435. Friday. Day nine. Been a pretty intense day. Just uploading images and backing everything up before a one hour road trip at about 1600. We were out of the house by 0515 and made the three to four hundred metre river crossing and walk to the coal fields in quick time. It pays to keep coming back, but gut feel is still so important. My gut was telling me strongly that we needed one more morning at the coking area to try and get an image I was after: a husband and wife and young daughter with a bullock cart. I didnt end up getting that image but I got some other strong images. A photographer friend once said: get there early and stay late. Ive been doing that, but moreso today because I just decided to bunker down and stay until the last person. The light was excellent. I wanted to get a photo of a kid toiling with a strong backdrop. Not necessarily an easy shot, but as it turned out, people kept wandering in and out through the morning, and the more time that passed the more kids showed up. My guide was pushing me to go back to the house for something to eat, but instead I stayed. The shots are coming through sheer willpower at the minute. Not naturally at all, but not every shoot works like a dream. Sometimes you just have to work that bit harder to compensate. The volcano came easily last year. This shoot has been a little bit the opposite, though I am loving the people, country and subject matter. At about 1000, we went underground again. That proved to be a really good decision. Id been reasonably happy with what I had gotten the other day, but today I got some really strong stuff. And the angles and shots were different. You still had to work hard and it felt intense down there, but we got some nice stuff. This underground mine is quite big. It pushes in maybe 150 metres and the entry is taken through the side of the hill. I was a little less confident entering this time than last as wed had rain overnight and thats when things can become dangerous in these places. They seem to have done the mine really well and there are plenty of pillars to guard against roof collapses. Apparently one of their friends is a mine engineer and he tells them where to put the pillars. They seem to follow the coal seam down on an angle and the roof height is less than two metres at the end of the stope or decline: stope is probably a better word. No-one has any semblance of safety gear. No helmets, glasses. Not even boots or gumboots. Most or all wear either thongs or enter with bare feet. I wondered today what would happen to us if there was a roof collapse. It would be adios amigos Im guessing. But thats life. Luck of the draw. The roof looked pretty stable. I thanked all the guys on finishing. They wanted to know if I would be coming back and asked me to please visit again. Not one ever asked for money the whole four days I have been with them. And they were grateful regardless of what I gave them. Its always a difficult thing. My instinct is to want to pay them really well for their generosity and time. The problem though with that is that you create problems for people coming behind me. You create an expectation in other words and so people just coming for a look risk being hit up for decent money to go and have a look. Pain in the bum really. These people here are so natural and unaffected by the outside world, even if it is slowly encroaching on them. Or rapidly if you think about the big coal mines planned. Western t-shirts havent really penetrated yet into these parts, though you do see the odd one. The weather is not looking great for the shots Ive planned these next few days so I will need to assess tomorrow as to how we play things. You cant always have things going your way, and difficult weather can sometimes also create opportunities you hadnt envisaged, such as this second underground shoot today. 1950. This afternoon has incorporated some interesting stuff. I took some photos of my hosts - my host and his wife and son - and then we headed off toward another location with a view to getting some shots of the manual train loading in the morning. It was a beautiful drive up over the range and through the forest, even forgetting that most of the forest is tertiary forest now and has been obliterated. The house were staying at belongs to an activist involved in the movement fighting the displacement of village people by big coal mining interests. Its pretty amazing how it works and what is happening. He has spent numerous stints in jail and you could hardly meet a more placid, non-violent and mainstream person. He was saying that those people that do receive compensation get hardly any money. Its generally 11,000Rs for one acre of land, which is a pitance when set against the fact that it costs about 500,000 - 750,000Rs to buy that same land. People receive only about 50,000Rs for having to leave their homes. Again, nothing when set against the fact that it costs about 500,000Rs to build a house, not taking into account the costs of buying the land. This part of the world - the areas we have been travelling - can be quite tricky at other levels. You just dont see any tourists. Ive seen none. Two white people - and one was a priest - in nine days of travelling thus far. I just got collared by a vehicle of six machine gun wielding police officers when I went out onto the street - a dirt track really - to get signal to make a phone call. He wanted to know where I was from and what I was doing. Assiss, my driver, came to the rescue, though Manish was doing a good job. I just go quiet in those situations and stay calm. I generally let everyone else do the talking and I tune out to what they are talking about. He asked for my passport. What can make those situations tricky is the fact that there are no tourists. Big coal is so powerful that when they find out I am a photographer the questions around what I am here for and what I am doing cut in. So Im always taking precautions around where I store my backup disks and ensuring that they are separated in different bags and even different geographical locations altogether. So Assiss got old mate the chief of police sorted by dropping the name of his grandfather who is quite important in these parts. The house I am staying in is very basic but its great to experience. Concrete floors. The front door of my bedroom opens out onto the street. There is a communal earthern area out the back and there are perhaps four small houses in this one block: all related to Sanjay. The walls are rendered with concrete and painted in the same manner that most of these third world houses are. Door frames are only about five foot high so care needed there after last years Indonesia concussion experience. People are wonderful yet again. Just awesome.
Posted on: Mon, 02 Dec 2013 11:07:41 +0000
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