Who is your Mr Jeleno?
It was you Mr Jeleno, it was all you!
You stood against the wall, a smile full of missing teeth. I could see it in your eyes. I could see it in the lines on your face.
I have no idea how old you were Mr Jeleno, my guess somewhere your 60's. I cant stop to imagine the things you have seen. I look at you with admiration. The job you do. The job you might have always done. The smile on your face. I want to know more about you.
I’m standing in a 100 hundred year old Portuguese mission in the Highlands of central East Timor, its 2011. The Portuguese left in the 70's, there had recently been some repairs, but large gaps in the floor, ceiling, walls, windows remain. Cat sized rats circled above in the rafters, gamely attempting to steal food in the night. I am here to help build a bridge. A real bridge with steel and cables and wood.
By way of virtue, Mr Jeleno, you lived in the mission that I stayed, your job was to take care of the children that had travelled from all over Timor Leste to attend a school made famous by the then president José Ramos-Horta. Many of the children were orphans. Timor Leste has had a turbulent past.
In 1975 the same year Portugal granted independence to your nation, Indonesia invaded and remained in the country until 1996, when independence was officially gained. During the Indonesian occupation, Mr Jeleno, some 100,000 of your country men were killed or passed from hunger and illness. If my calculations were correct you would have been a young man of his late 20's. Where were you when this happened Mr Jeleno? What happened to your family? Did you flee to the forested highlands and move from camp to camp? How did you cope? I want to know more. I want to know more from the message etched into you skin and eyes.
I took a portrait of you Mr Jeleno, on May 5th 2011. I know that portrait is hanging on the wall in your mission. I know because I wanted to give you something back. Give you something back from the path you put me. You see Mr Jeleno, I loved story telling before. I loved photography and the way film allowed you to escape your own reality. It wasn't until I looked at digital image from my computer screen that I realised it would become an obsession that would take up all my time, money and thoughts.
As a kid I would sit and read National Geographic magazines and marvel at the places it took me, now as my 20's leaves its mark on me, I want to position myself to be the one in those places, collecting those stories, showing the world.
Will it happen? who knows! Would I have had the courage to chase a dream had you not stood against that white wall, with your impeccably set table and insistance that I was well feed. Mr Jeleno, I just don’t know.
All I know is.
Thank you.
