Page 18 - Seniors Today -Volume no1

First Person

Finding

Myself in the Wild

River crossing during the wildebeest migration

Urvi Piramal on her romance with the camera, her love for travel and how spending time in nature
had a deep and nurturing impact on her soul.

When I hit 60, a lens shifted. My bond with photography was an old one

As I entered my seventh decade, I pondered – one which brought back memories of my
my life. Where had it gone? What had I father bundled over his prized Rolleiflex.
achieved? What did I have to show for my Due to my love of travelling, something my
sixty years on earth? And most importantly, children and grandchildren often make fun of,
what really mattered? I was able to fully develop an appreciation for
I felt like I had tumbled out of my life and the camera and my passion for photography.
tumbled into someone else’s. I thought of Through my lens I like to capture photos of
my life – my trials, my tribulations, my joys, vast landscapes, old monuments, unusual
my happiness. I could see myself, clearly, in birds, colourful streets. In fact I like to
all my different forms – a girl to two caring capture anything beautiful that will take me
and loving parents, middle sibling to an back to those places and help me share those
older sister and a younger brother, a young moments with my family and friends.
bashful bride, soon mother of three, single
mother, a cancer survivor, a businesswoman, My Wild Side
a grandmother of six … But above all, my favourite thing to shoot is

It was me and yet it wasn’t me. I was all of that
and more. The parts of the sum were greater
than the sum. It was like a lens readjusting
from this side of sixty …

A different view

And it was around then that I literally decide
to look through a different perspective: that
of an observer, silent, reflecting – not just
through my eyes, but through the lens of a
camera.

SENIORS TODAY | Volume 1 | Issue 1
Majestic sand dunes of Namibia