If you’ve got this far, I guess you are either reading ‘Quondam’ or are interested in doing so. Thank you for that! If you have already read it, I do hope you got more than you bargained for, and if you are about to embark into it, along the road of the journey, keep an open mind as you turn every page. It may not be what you imagine!
Again, if you have not yet turned a page, might I recommend you do so BEFORE looking at the photos. Let the words and rhythm settle in you first, before the images. I may be wrong but I believe it will be worth doing it that way – your own images are more important than my ones… but of course I understand the temptation!
The pictures you see here were all taken with a small Rollei camera. It was the only camera I had on the trip. Please forgive the graininess, the washed out colour, the at times lack of sharpness or focus or the poor ‘framing’ of some, and so on.
Trust me, at the time of clicking, I was certainly not thinking of ‘websites’. The internet had not been invented yet! Rather, I imagined that these shots would be for no one but myself…to perhaps one day take down and be reminded of a once-upon-a-time incredible and indeed, in hindsight, a seminal journey.
To help you, as you read the book, I have given each photo a page number so you can, if you so wish, refer to that image and sense the reality of that ‘clicked’ moment so long ago.
Thank you again and I do hope you enjoy the story, this first installment. I will and am doing my best with the sequel. That will take time. Be patient! Someone said of Quondam, that it seemed ‘otherworldly’? In the eyes of todays world perhaps it is, but do bear in mind, every person, every part, every high and low experience happened. It is all true.