alt.street The Transition

This Kiev, Ukrainian street art vendor is stuck somewhere in the

nether world between the beauty of her very recent youth and quickly

approaching old age. (Please do NOT rate on her perceived 'beauty'

or lack thereof. Your ratings and critiques are requested and most

welcome. If you rate hashly or very critically, please attach a

helpful and constructive comment/Please share your superior

knowledge to help improve my photography. Thanks! Enjoy! John

I like her expression, it tells her story and she looks disappointed she isn't a beauty. Some ppl convey that when a lens is pointed at them. I'd also like to see this in b/w ...just my two cents. Nice job!

Actually, it may be more complex than you know.

 

This woman IS or recently WAS a beauty -- probably a head-turner.

 

She is probably in her early to mid '30s in a country where some of the world's most beautiful young women walk the streets -- many of them slim and gorgeous.

 

But poor job prospects, 12-hour days, 6-day work weeks, hard lives, men who play around (and die early), a male-dominated culture in which everything is women's work, and a poor diet encourage these women to 'let go' sometime after they have fulfilled their 'life duty' and had children.

 

After all, they are not regarded as 'legitimate' if they are not married in their mid '20s, and have children soon after, even if they are doctors, lawyers, etc. The men die young, leaving a surfeit of widows, but the men 'play around' on their women, leading the women to 'let themselves go' and also giving the men an excuse to 'play around' in a vicious cycle of blame.

 

Some prospects, hunh?

 

Russia also is/was like that. Moscow has vastly changed and wealth from oil is creeping through Russian society -- Moscow with a vengeance so much they are hard up for workers, and the rest of Russia may not be far behind.

 

Soon Russia today may catch up to the Russia of the 1980s, when everybody had meat in their refrigerator (I know from experience), but then Capitalism will propel them far into the 21st centry, I think.

 

Things are far more problematic for the Ukrainians, with a divided government, half split toward the Russians on their border and half split toward the West and democratization. (and the Russians putting their foot on the Ukrainians' throat -- they cut off their supply of natural gas for heating on Jan. 1 after raising prices 400%.)

 

But I like the Russians and the Ukrainians and am only an observer -- and have no fish to fry in any outcome. Just a trenchant observer.

 

John (Crosley)

John this reminds me of something that bothers me so much about the U.S.. So many people here feel they have it so hard and some do, but this is the land of opportunity as opposed to a place like the Russia or the Ukrain. Drives me off the edge somtime because they don't realize how good life is for them compared to other places.

 

Are you on assignment there and if so for who, or shooting personal projects? Sounds and looks like a land with endless photo opps...very interesting!

 

Like your work,

Bob

I go there from time to time, as it presents great photo opportunities, (plus it's cheap living for those of us without that 'silver spoon' and people aren't full of artifice); oft-times people are without that patina of social being that is so frequently found in the U.S. which so often says 'you can't say this or that', and they say or 'are' things that are forbidden in the U.S.

 

A bus driver says to me 'I love everybody (except Hebes)' thinking nothing of it but carelessly slandering Jews everywhere -- a case of blatant discrimination of the kind that many Americans think, but hide because to say it is socially and legally forbidden.

 

Since there's no social pressure not to say that sort of thing, he just says it out loud and is surprised when I object strenuously, then asks 'You aren't Hebe, are you?' and when I say 'No' he wonders why I defend 'them'.

 

He's a nice guy otherwise, but he has no idea of the institutionalized racism/nationalism that is ingrained in him/he's lower class -- the upper class don't express feelings that way at all and don't speak that way.

 

Women are the same way -- the money grubbers are seen quickly enough while those who wouldn't grub for money are quickly enough seen and wouldn't take money if their life depended on it, and that literally means 'if their life depended on it.'

 

I've spent considerable time in that country because I like the people, and though I like Russia next door, the crime there scares me, but I can walk the streets of Ukraine cities at midnight without too much fear even with thousands of dollars of equipment (but I met a guy who was robbed twice in two days -- so it may be my street smarts as well as anything).

 

You gotta be smart if you walk alone with expensive gear, and I've had people try to rob me in Paris, and it's more hostile in Paris to a photographer (in summer) than in most of Ukraine, except by the hooligan kids who have no families who will steal anybody blind in major Ukraine city downtowns -- best to treat them like the plague, as they have no fear of anything and will rob anybody blind -- hit and run. Same with gypsies -- in Moscow or Florence, Italy, I've found.

 

Someday, I may get hit, but it helps never to drink and walk the streets.

 

And, as a 'street photographer' I'm always aware of what's going on around me.

 

Maybe that's the trick.

 

John (Crosley)