In May of 1992, I joined my ICARDA colleagues, including my mate Ben Wedman on a journey to visit a Bedouin group in the eastern Steppe of Syria.
The Bedouin are known for their hospitality to strangers and our visit was no exception. In this photo Ben joins our Bedouin hosts for breakfast and has his mouth stuffed with bread and yoghurt or cheese made from goat milk. Ben speaks fluent Arabic and had a very special rapport with the Syrians who admired and instantly liked the foreigner who could speak Arabic better than they could.
I’m a bit pedantic when it comes to technical perfection in my photos. I edit heavily and throw out images which have poor lighting, bad focus or lousy composition. Yet despite its technical imperfections I kept these images in the files because to me it evokes strong memories.
The sun was setting and the Bedouin were frantically trying to round up the flock for the night. There was shouting and laughing and sheep and goats going this way and that. It was frenetic and I was frustrated because I couldn’t get my shot – nothing was staying still long enough and the light was changing by the second. There were so many things to sort out – the balance between the ambient light and the flash, the focus, the composition – but it was all happening too fast and that bit of luck I needed wasn’t there. With today’s digital cameras with autofocus you can review and alter within seconds, but in those days we did things manually and waited a few weeks – or months if you lived in Syria and shot Kodachrome – to get the results back. I wasn’t thrilled with the images I got on our Bedouin trip but the memories I did manage to preserve are priceless.
Milking the flock. The Bedouin tether the flock and interlock them for easy access to the udders. There are over one million Bedouin in Syria living off their sheep and goats.
The Bedouin guest room. The Bedouin made up beds for us in one of their tents and the four of us had a very peaceful sleep side by side out in the middle of nowhere in the Syrian steppe. No need to strip the beds of sheets here. Just shake the blankets of the sand and roll them up ready for the next visitors.
A car battery comes in handy in the middle of the Syrian steppe.
I always carried a Polaroid camera so I could give those who posed for me an instant gift. I like to think that somewhere in some tent in the Syrian steppe this Bedouin man pulls out this Polaroid and admires himself when he was 20 years younger.
Just like kids anywhere, these Bedouin boys liked to sleep in even though the morning sun was streaming through the open walls of their tent.
A Bedouin boy still half asleep as the sun rises on the Syrian steppe.