Another Conspiracy Of The Universe

"When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it"
excerpt from The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho.

It is true... over the past couple of years I've began to believe in this as I've experienced this many times. From conspiracies as complex as the Listening Library incident in Luang Phabang to the Lou Reed incident... this mantra has been holding true to me faithfully.

Today I've experience this once again. However, this time it is I who becomes part of the conspiracy.

Today I am shooting my pinhole photos but I am also burdened with the problem that I cannot leave the house til' after lunch, waiting for emails and deliveries (boring ass shit). So I decided that perhaps I can shoot one photo that is near my house. Being quite near, this place is really just a 10 minute walk... on any other day I'll just walk. Somehow today, I feel like I need to drive, which is absurd because it is absolutely unnecessary. After a 10 minute long debate with myself, my unreasonable self won resulting in me driving out for a distance that is less than 1 kilometer.

I parked my car and as I walked to the site where my pinhole photo would be shot, I stumbled into my highschool guitar hero; This old blind pakcik that plays at the corridor leading up to the Plaza Rakyat LRT station.

As a highschool student, I pass by this pakcik almost every day, never failing to stop for a couple of minutes to appreciate his amazingly dexterous guitar work. Being blind, I aways thought that seeing how his eyes are always closed, he must be really enjoying what he's doing. Guitar hero ripping the fret board as a lone pickup amplifies his riffs for the world within his proximity to hear. On days when I have extra time, I'll stay a little longer; on days when I have a little extra money, I'll put one ringgit into his cup.

So here I am face to face with my guitar hero and his son... He asks for directions to the DBKL office, there used to be one near where he lives, but apparently it no longer exists. I said 'turn left, turn right, go straight, turn around'.

They looked back at me with blank expressions.

I thought, perhaps this is why I drove. This must be the reason.

I told them to give me 5 minutes, I need to shoot this photo first.

I shot my photo.

Whilst driving them to the DBKL office, the pakcik commented about the Bob Marley CD that's playing on my stereo. He said he really likes Bob Marley but he can't find the cassettes. CDs are great, but he tells me that operating a CD player is a bitch if you're blind.

'One love... let's get together and feel alright' my stereo sings. We don't talk much, I think he'd rather appreciate the music while it lasts.

How many of us can imagine that we'd one day be granted the pleasure of offering our guitar hero a ride?