I take a quick break from promoting the book on Afghanistan to work on my next book. Over the summer I will be going over my dozens of hard drives to put together 100 of my favourite photos. I will add the stories to my travel and get a sense of the life I lived.
I never wanted to be a part of the story but I guess people want to hear my story. Because I came from the west. Born from the birth lottery with an Australian passport. I wasn't born into a rich family but I knew I had a safety net to fall onto if I couldn't follow my dreams. I would come home and work myself up again.
I could of been born a short Asian but my father being a Australian gave me my height and alot of facial and chest hair. This gave me the ability to be Middle Eastern, Afghan, Sth American. It was the kinda camoflage I needed to tour the world.
Of course I didn't so much fit in Africa but in Somalia they assumed me Turkish. Turkey had come to the humanitarian aid back then so I just ran with it. Call me Turkish.
I remember in my youth seeing the news, seeing the suffering. Bosnia, Rwanda, Iraq, Palestine. I couldn't make sense of it all. I had come from a religious background and these made you lose hope in humanity. In a just god.
Maybe this is what I set out to find. Humanity.
Humanity in dark places.
I am not by far a saint.
But I did what I did to survive.
And did things because I felt it was for the greater good.
I really thought I would never make it to 40. That depression or being in the wrong place and the wrong time would take me.
Maybe someone else would make my documentary or photo book after my death.
But I survived.
It is pretty much thanks to my wife Aleksandra and our daughter Alice.
So I want to write a book, compile a bunch of videos and tell my tale. Maybe I would go back out there to cover more suffering but I will use my time. To tell people to fight for humanity, call out injustice. Be good humans.
This is my favourite photo I ever took and set me deep on this path.
This boy had lost his legs to a landmine. At the time I was embeded with ICRC with Nima Elbagir doing a independent story which would be picked up by Channel 4.
I filmed the doctors operating on him. He saw the camera filming him and he was smiling. This felt odd. At the time Operation Panther Claw was in full speed and Helmand and Kandahar was a bloody warzone.
So many civilians deaths but also disease and ailments that go with war. Helmand's National hospital could barely sustain 100 patients. It is a 6-12 hour trip to Kandahar for an emergency. Wounded civilians barely survived the trip especially if the road were blocked from the fighting.
This boy had lost his legs stepping on a land mine after school and heading to sell goods. When I first met him, the doctors were amputating his legs.
A few days later I met around the ward and he still had that smile. I asked him why he was he smiling, it must of been hard for you to know you would lose his legs. He said "I can only praise Allah for being alive today, I cannot wept or be angry at myself".
Many of the people reading this have given up on the idea of God or an internal hope. But the boy was genuinely saw his disability would not sway his faith in life.
Over a few days he was trying a disability tricycle and learning to ride. In fact my ex girlfriend Samantha Page gave me the money for the tricycle and I got it made for him.
4 years on, I got to meet the boy again and he was doing well. He sold goods from his tricycle welding trays onto it. He was a part of the Kandahar disabled basketball teams . Which was a program extended from the program I worked on in Kabul. I had some tears of joy after seeing him again, to know he still had that smile on life.
If you get anything out of this pic and story, never give up on life and living. Everyone has a chance to find the sun
CNN ran it and ran the photos I took in a slide show. I remember them asking me if I had colour photos of them but they were shot on Ilford film on my Leica m6.