Thursday, November 18, 2010

Meet the Sikhs

My heart rate was still up from the confrontation with the little man and his west coast gang when I walked around to the top of the circle and saw a squad of armed Sikhs standing along side a neon green dune buggy.  The trim bearded one in a blue turban with a stern look on his round face took one step towards me.  "Namaste", I blurted out truly trying to express peace from my soul to his.  A huge smile replaced his scowl and he responded, "Namaste" back to me.  Two others from the squad of vigilant UN soldiers walked over to check me out.   "Welcome to Petion Ville", the tall lanky soldier said as he twisted the left side of his long growth mustache in between his thumb and skinny wrinkled dark pointer. I told him that his mustache was fantastic and asked him what he thought of mine.   He laughed a soldier's laugh, amused at the reality before him.  One of the Sikhs pulled out a pocket sized camera from his cargo pocket, and motioned for an impromptu photo session.

So, I grabbed mine.
This is the fellow that welcomed me to town. He is a long way from home and the culture that he was born to.  
Serious business.
 7.62mm, locked and loaded. 
Holgen took this picture of me and my fearless protectors.  We were posing for another Indian Sikh photographer off camera to the left. 

2 comments:

Junk said...

Great pics. The dude on the right looks like he showed up to the 6 a.m. PT run after a long night of quarters.

the original big ring said...

wicked trip and wicked photos Bill

cheers