A Ukrainian woman yelled at me while I photographed the word “forgive” on the sidewalk.
Walking down Chicago Avenue in the Ukrainian Village on a bright Sunday, I was looking for small things that I like to photograph for the “I like” project. This word “FORGIVE” was painted onto the sidewalk with what appears to be gum or something.
I wanted to write on a sticky note, “I like forgiveness” but that seemed redundant in the photo. The words FORGIVE simply speak for themselves, so I decided to photograph this outside of the “I like” project.
I set up my tripod and snapped some shots when an older Ukrainian woman with a couple other ukkie woman in her crew started yelling in my direction. I have no idea what she was yelling, because it was in Ukrainian. I looked around for someone else that she would be yelling at, but I couldn’t find anyone. I looked at her confused, looked at the ground, looked at her.
She yelled something a couple more times, and I was thinking, “Gee this is kinda ironic. This woman, who is probably going to church, is yelling at me for photographing the word FORGIVE on the sidewalk.”
Well, I suppose it’s up to me to forgive her for any misunderstanding.
Maybe she was the artist of the graffiti and was trying to tell you that you needed permission to take a photo of her work (whether she would be right or wrong) … but yes, you would think the message would usurp any yelling
and she expected you to know the Ukrainian language? That part escapes me.
Yeah! I wonder who the artist is.
I see these all over Chicago!