Manh D. Vu

The night, the loneliness and who else…

Sometimes I go out at night and grab my camera and tripod for pictures. Do it suddenly without any plan, want to feel the nightlife, the other face of the city. Like in Venice, a crowded and buzzing city during the day becomes quiet and solitary during the night. Everything changed, and there were few people in Venice’s narrow, long alleys. You can see only some wandering tourists, drunken guys and girls, workers, and people like me who want time to think about something.

I placed the tripod and set up the camera, and I had around 20 seconds of waiting and thinking. I wasn’t thinking about the quality of the picture I would have but about where I was. After pressing the capture button, I started to look around. Few people walked through; I don’t care if they walked in front of the camera or behind. Because of the long exposure, they could only be in the picture if they stayed long enough in the frame. Only the beautiful scenery of landscape and architecture lasted. And then I started to look inside my memory. Isn’t it the same concept? Some days I meet some people and make new friends, but not everyone can stay in my mind if there wasn’t a long enough or good enough memory with those people.

The 20s seconds of the first picture were over. Usually, it is a test picture. The exposure can be darker or lighter, a bit blurry because of something touching the tripod, but always the presence of emptiness in the photos. Set up and pressed the button for another picture. Afterward, the comparison between the picture and my life started. When I kept thinking about some people, I wanted them to stay long enough to fill the frame that was emptied with just the landscape. But there weren’t many people staying at the right time and right place. And there was the feeling of loneliness when no one was around me. Living the life of a foreigner in another country, a drifter in the stranger’s world, people come and go, and I hardly find someone to be with permanently. But I don’t really want something temporary. Especially friendships or a relationship should become eternal. And then I wonder who else will come into my life, who else will be my friend, who else will be around and help me, or be around for a while, breaking the frame of my life and going away…

Wandering through the night so still
Without a purpose, without a will
Capturing life in moments fleeting
Behind each one, a story worth repeating

To be forever framed in time
Stay until the end, until the chime
Of the clock tolls its final hour
Then your presence shall have power

Stay a bit longer, hold on tight
Let the beauty of the moment take flight
And in the lens, your spirit will reside
Eternal, timeless, a love that won’t subside…

– Manh D. Vu