Mekong Memory

My interest in photography started as a means of documenting my boyhood dream to see the world. The experience was more important than the photograph but as I became more serious about it, the pursuit of finding my photographs pushed me into places and situations I wouldn’t have otherwise gone and made for much more interesting and intense travel experiences. When I review my photos, oftentimes I can recall the circumstances under which they were made, and through some I can see the image over the viewfinder and outside of the frame, and recall the instant the exposure was made.

“Mekong Delta Dawn” Andy House 20??

The importance of this photograph is the experience it provided me as I waited to make it. While sitting in a small skiff, waiting for the sun to rise over a tiny Mekong Delta hamlet, we listened to the sounds of the waking village. With the first sliver of sunlight on the horizon, the sounds made by the cicadas built into a low roar. Then roosters joined the cacophony. Before long, the crowing was joined by barking dogs and finally, over it all, over a tinny P.A. system, the voice of a local apparatchik announced the schedule for the day’s activities. The voice announced a regimen I have never lived under and although it was a chilling experience, it was a rich experience. It is not a particularly good photograph, but the memories it provides are as vivid and rich as those from any photo I have made. If I hadn’t been chasing a sunrise photograph on the Mekong River, it is an experience I wouldn’t have had.