Magical Mystery Tour

Accidental Winner

22 Jan 2009 1 Comment

by Miftahudin in Catatan Anak Manusia, My Stories Tags: foto, lomba, winner

Passion at the Wrong Place

I was on the way to work on my motorcycle.I had to be there by 9 a.m. As a teacher or I prefer to call myself an instructor, I mustn’t be late to the class. It’s not the same if it is the students who are late. A teacher mustn’t do anything wrong, must he? Never mind. I’m not going to talk about a profession of a teacher, anyway.

I usually took mouse ways (read: short cuts) to avoid jams. It usually worked until then. In front of me was a local people’s wedding party. As usual, you maybe don’t include in this generalization, the wedding party took the entire street and blocked it, and made it reception area where invited guests had drinks and meals. It might be not the best place to have drinks and meals but they didn’t seem to have another choice, did they? I didn’t think they didn’t realize that the motorists and motorcycle riders, and also the passengers in the angkots were unhappy with the situation. They might be late to work.

Grumbling inaudibly, I took another way directed by Hansips—or should I call them Defense of Civilians?  Of course it took longer time to reach my work place. It was about 8.15 and I should arrive as soon as possible for I had to have some coffee to refresh my body and browse the internet in the office to warm my head before the class. No, the browsing was not for the class preparation but to fill my hungry head with the latest news. And you know, I wasn’t and still am not connected with the internet at home yet.

Damn! I took a wrong turn so I had to turn around again. To make it worse, now I was at Pal Merah traditional market. The smell gave my head a heavy headache.

Thank Gods; I could get out of the smelly hell. But Man! It was a completely terrible jam. Cars and other vehicles moved very slowly, and sometimes couldn’t even move for some time. The sharply shining dry season sun made it worse. The fake leather jacket I wore burned and bathed my body at the same time. Soaking wet!

I was getting closer to the T-junction and when there I turned left. The jam got worse. Getting further, I saw a lot of motorcycles parked beside the street touching the pavement. Other vehicles move very slowly to make the drivers, riders, and passengers able to witness an “attractive” car accident. I believe all car accidents attract people to spend some time to watch but I usually don’t bother to stop by. But this time it was really unique, a real art work, or an engineer-made-formation.  You don’t believe it? Take a look at the picture I captured. What do you say?

A lot of people took the pictures, and I thought it was too bad if I let this unusual happening go just like that. I took the pictures and took a look at the accident for several more seconds.  Then I went on to the office. I couldn’t wait to show my colleagues the pictures I just had taken.

In the office I tried to astonish my colleagues with my pictures. But it wasn’t a complete success. Yes, some colleagues thought that I just had witnessed a history of the world, an event that only happened once in life time and the pictures I took were worth keeping in the museum. Do you think it was an exaggeration? Ups, I agree with you.

Some others didn’t think it was something special.

Hell. It doesn’t matter what people think about it. In fact, I don’t need them to agree with me. Whatever they think wouldn’t change anything.

One evening after a class I opened my e-mail and some e-mails were in my inbox. What attracted me was an email informing a photo competition, LOMBA FOTO KOTAKU, held by Warta Kota. After I read I found out that my pictures met the qualification to compete in the event. I promptly sent one picture to the committee by e-mail since it was three days before the closing was due.

Several days after my sending my picture I got a call from the committee telling that my picture with other 99 pictures would be displayed in a “Pameran Foto”  (read: photograph exhibit) in Margo City Depok. I couldn’t believe it; my picture was in best 100 of 1042 pictures received by the committee, and would be seen by a lot of people in the mall. The committee also invited me to the exhibit and Photograph workshop they were going to hold on 13 December 2008.  My God! It was probably nothing for others, but for me it was a miracle. I was so excited that I told about the news to my colleagues and family. My wife even told the news to her colleagues in her office too.

On the D-day of the exhibit and work shop I arrived there late because I had to work in the office in the morning. Firstly, I walked around in the Photo exhibit and try to find out about people’s reaction to my picture.  Well, most people seeing my picture always took a close look at it to make sure that it was real, and they didn’t want to miss the details of it.  Almost all of them were amazed at it.  Do you think it is another exaggeration? Probably! Probably not!

Ok! Now I went to the work shop. It was close to an end actually, but the committee allowed me to join the workshop.  And…it was the time for the committee to announce the winners of the competition. There would be five winners. I was sure that my picture was unique but I don’t know anything about photography. My picture might be photographically poor. In that case, I wouldn’t be too unhappy if I didn’t win. I had been in the best 100. It was possibly the best that I could expect.

The host started to announce the winners. He started with the fifth winner. A name and his picture were announced as the fifth winner. Actually I was rather disappointed because the fifth place could have been my best chance. I couldn’t have hoped better. But who knows probably the fourth winner was mine. Now I tried to focus on the host, in case my name and my picture’s title were mentioned. Well, it wasn’t my name. It’s ok. It’s not the end of the world. I had proved that my picture was among other 99 pictures as best 100 and I could share my picture with other people. That had been more that I expected. I didn’t hope any more. The first, second, and third place were unlikely mine. And I began to relax. No burden, expectation, nothing.

But…something bothered my ears when the host said that the second winner’s picture’s title was in English.  I have seen all the displayed pictures. And there were only two pictures entitled in English, mine and the other one. And then, he mentioned the title which was…my picture’s and followed by…my name. Gods, I got the second winner. I didn’t believe it. I was full of happiness and excitement but I didn’t show people. I keep the feelings with myself. I was too excited that I didn’t pay attention to who won third and first. Man! Finally I became a winner, a winner by accident. But I feel like I have won the entire world!