面孔摄影

Nuannuan was the first girl we photographed.

She was also the first person to join our QQ group and ask for photographing. We met her in an afternoon of early June. I was late for the appointment. She already there and met another photographer of our group, Trolley Man. We took photos in Rending Lake. She insisted on taking photos there. She was sorry for that we couldn’t photograph in her room because her room was in disorder.

Nuannuan has been in Beijing for just a year. Like most stories, she came to Beijing with her lover after graduation, who was also her schoolmate. They went to college in Wuhan. Her major was law. Her story sounds just like most stories. They broke up after they came to Beijing. However, she said breaking up with her boyfriend was the happiest thing. She told us this story with smile, but stopped talking after that.

She said the reason they broke up was that they were incompatible in character. She also said the boy wouldn’t change his cell phone number and would wait for her call. We replied with a cruel reality that all men were unbelievable. Hearing this, she was more resolute in that the boy wouldn’t change his number. Fortunately, we didn’t ask her to call the boy’s cell phone, although we were not sure about what was going to happen. Nuannuan pointed to her head and said , I deleted his cell phone number, but it remains sharply engraved on my mind.

Nuannuan lost her job at that time, for she had a new boss but got on bad with him. So she quit the job. She thought this was a trouble. But she was happy that she was an optimist. “The manager Mr. Ma who interviewed me this morning said he’s never seen someone so optimistic before”, she said with laugh, “A negative mind doesn’t change anything. A watched kettle never boils.”

Luoyang was her home state. Nothing was so sad as to see off her father and sister who came to visit her in Beijing. She felt very sorry to say goodbye. When talking about this, she was going to cry. She felt very lonely in Beijing. She caressed obsidian bracelet round her wrist and said this was from her ex-boyfriend. It was got from a temple. They gave parents to each other then. She hoped that her ex would also wear the bracelet and not take it away.

During our photographing, she was a little bit nervous. She had a big vesicle round her lips. She thought that’s because she had a hot pot with her colleagues. She also wanted to lose some weight, for her mother didn’t think she is pretty. When we went to an internet bar to take photos from MP3, she said she fought for a toy with her friend. She thought that’s pleasing and laughed like a baby. She was pretty at that moment.

Time:  June 9, 2007

Place: Rending Lake park

Photograher: A San

Writer: A san

Translator: Lucia Zhou