Literally shit was what this shoot was about, and the theme kept popping up. Up in Zarqa, about 25 miles north of Amman, there is a waste water treatment facility paid for in part by US tax dollars. They recycle Amman's shit water and send it down the Jordan valley where it is used to irrigate crops. Obtaining the "privilege" of photographing this facility took two hours. Efficiency is almost non-existent in Jordan. No is almost always the first response to any request here. Persistence is the only way, and to get what you want, you have to take it to its extreme. After two hours of waiting, I was taken into a classroom and given a safety orientation in Arabic. If I understood it right, I wasn't supposed to drink or swim in the shit water. The instructor then issued me a helmet, mask, and special safety shoes to wear. Once inside, I was extremely limited as to what I could shoot. If I got to close to a concrete pillar or a dirt embankment, my escort would quickly whisk me out of harms way.
After about an hour I had what I needed and we left and headed back to the magazine office. Immediately after stepping out of the elevator, the head of the magazine, Dr. Mustafa Hamarneh, asked to see my photos. I showed him each one, and to each he would reply, "this is shit", and he wasn't being humorous. I found out later that he and the designer of the magazine had had a huge fight just before I got back. Later when things had calmed down and the designer had the photos laid out on the computer, the Doctor nodded when I asked if he thought it looked ok. Honeymoon over.
Was your Nike shoot a success? or was it Ni-Kee, the knockoff Jordanian brand that can't come up with anything original?
ReplyDeleteNike is great! I'll talk with them and see if they want to take out an ad in the Asheville Quarterly. They are always trying to tap into those small rural markets.
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