Last time I wrote about looking I was mired in reminiscing. I feel now more like a wire reporter, an anthropologist from afar - with my own armchair to show for it.
I still remember what it was like to look through my U.S. lens at a culture so defined by others, by other governments, by other treaties and wars and political lists.
I mentioned in my last post that looking is influential. Well for Cuban people, pictured in this photo, the looking of foreigners has most certainly impacted their country's history, politics, cultures, architecture, food, public spaces and private conversations. The air in Cuba smells of critical eyes, surveillance, doubt.
Imagine your neighborhood is the site of un-welcomed eyes, of un-invited visitors with pencils and cameras and books to fill with the memories and words you yourself make and live and speak. Lookers claim the objects of their vision as their own. As if seeing meant ownership.
Looking doesn't have to be so intrusive. By definition it is a harmless act of enjoyment. Relishing in the first layer of experience. Of sight. I believe in a more critical approach to touring. That is why I write about looking here - with the hope that travelers will see past the surface, past the images, when visiting Cuba or any other country that is faced with complex, controversial and intersecting affairs.
Seeing is not believing. It is the first step in understanding. The issue arises when seeing is the end and not the means.
I still remember what it was like to look through my U.S. lens at a culture so defined by others, by other governments, by other treaties and wars and political lists.
I mentioned in my last post that looking is influential. Well for Cuban people, pictured in this photo, the looking of foreigners has most certainly impacted their country's history, politics, cultures, architecture, food, public spaces and private conversations. The air in Cuba smells of critical eyes, surveillance, doubt.
Imagine your neighborhood is the site of un-welcomed eyes, of un-invited visitors with pencils and cameras and books to fill with the memories and words you yourself make and live and speak. Lookers claim the objects of their vision as their own. As if seeing meant ownership.
Looking doesn't have to be so intrusive. By definition it is a harmless act of enjoyment. Relishing in the first layer of experience. Of sight. I believe in a more critical approach to touring. That is why I write about looking here - with the hope that travelers will see past the surface, past the images, when visiting Cuba or any other country that is faced with complex, controversial and intersecting affairs.
Seeing is not believing. It is the first step in understanding. The issue arises when seeing is the end and not the means.