"Poor Babies"


Men laden with tea of Sichuan Province, China in the year 1908 taken by Ernest Henry Wilson immediately draws to mind when looking at this photo how exhausted the Men appear to be, and represent and show what hard work is, and how these Men have probably no other choice but to do this burdening task. These two Men seem plagued by fatigue, and overwhelmed by the duty and responsibility to make sure the goods on their back, which is carefully packaged tea makes it to its place of destination.The man that is giving at least what it appears what he can only afford to give is his grace, and his acknowledgement to the photographer, and spite his tiresome journey, he possesses the dignity to at least give the photographer that much of himself. The man to the right of the photo has his back turned to the lenses, and may have not wanted to participate in taking the photo, and may have gave his back to show purposefully, or these two Men, and the way they are positioned was the style intended.

  A little history of this photo, and its background respectively belongs to  "The Tea-Horse Route", which spanned between the years of between 700 A.D-1960 A.D, and this photo in particular which I'm examining was taken at the dawn of the 20th century in the year 1908. Clearly at the beginning of the 20th century, technology, invention, and innovation was still in its prime, and wasn't largely applied to travel and commute especially in remote villages, and minority areas like Sichuan Province, although cities and modernized areas elsewhere around the world had some new advance form of traveling established like trains for example. Taking that into consideration, walking and climbing miles upon miles was by all means the only way these Men could do which was by foot. These Men possess a slim build, and are rather very lean which may be how they are because of genetic predisposition, or the source of food that may be available to them which would have been only a variety of fruits, and vegetation which may answer why they are slim. We may not be able to fully see the full body of the man to the right of the photo, but based on the slenderness of his legs, its fair to assume his upper body is just as lean.                              
The gentlemen to the left of the photo facially appears to reveal sheer sadness, and hopelessness and facially looks drained. The weight of the goods that they are carrying looks physically heavier than them and they must be having to use every muscle, bone and ligament to support them and their mass responsibility that is on the backs which may be in pain and immense aching.                
It makes me wonder, and I may only be speaking on behalf of myself or someone reading may feel the same way, but based off of the circumstances these two Men are in with having to deliver large amounts of tea on foot following a specific route to get there, i assume these Men were forced and had no freedom to say no, and were obliged to do so, and probably were looked at as nothing worthy of but just to do a difficult and harsh job mandated by who ever had more power in the community.The benefit I see these Men getting from their journey is a really good source of cardio, but even then, was all their walking and involuntary exercise even compromised for with nourishing meals, or just a thank you when they arrived at the goods/tea's place of destination because these two Men look like they ate sparingly. Would it be fair to say that these Men were facing cruel and usual punishment that they didn't even acknowledge or know that they were facing for such 
a strenuous responsibility, or were they taking one for the team.

These men and their overwhelming responsibility puts into perspective how blessed and fortunate it is,and definitely convenient to live in present day 2014 of the 21st century where we have so many technological conveniences that come to our full advantage in traveling, communicating and a well established form of logistics where something can  be delivered from point A to point B without having to do it yourself and when we live in a time where so many labor issues have been addressed and situated to the point that no one is forced to do a job they don't want to do and we have the liberty to say yes or no and choose where we see fit as an individual.

These two men may have been handling township or community based responsibilities alongside the questionable fact that this duty was the only way which they can feed themselves, in a literal and in a fundamental sense. Perhaps their family was their main motivator, but what about considering the root of why these two men are obliged with the task of delivering kilograms of tea. It brings up the question if were there any governmental, and leader manipulation involved taking place behind China's closed doors?, and were they feeding on the socio-less fortunate?, and were feasting on the sheer reality that people like these two men in the photo were hopeless, and would rush to the responsibility of delivering tea on foot miles upon miles, because the people in charge were aware of their emotional vulnerabilities stemming from the result of their socio-status (like these two men). Aside from my description of these two men earlier in this post where I looked at the obvious disadvantages these two men appear to possess based on their appearance, and them taking on the burdening responsibility, thus clearly giving off, observable sadness, discomfort, deep fatigue, mild malnutrition, and perhaps underfed which didnt compromise with the intense labor they were enveloped by. Summing up everything I've mentioned, all of these factors are i conjunction with one another, and are the surrounding factors plaguing these two men.

Other than this we have other journeys we can consider embarking on with these two men, like how before, and after delivering tea on the horse road tea route would be to interview, and ask these men questions like "who were they?", "what is their primary reason for why they are delivering the tea?", and "what thoughts ran through their mind?" while on such a journey. I would like to in a sense conduct my very own literary profile on these two men observing the minor and major things of their core personality and existence, and provide for them a sense of relevancy, and significance as humans that were more than just delivery men once upon a time in Sichuan and in fact served a larger purpose for themselves and their family. I know its only my imagination to want to be able to interview these men, and i would need a time machine to transport me back in time, and to the place /setting of where they inhabited, but procuring an interview with these men would have been the ultimate closure on what exactly was taking place during their trip, and overall bring a level of depth to them instead of having to be left in obscurity or these two men shrouded in mystery. The only thing that can be drawn from these men are what can be analyzed from the photo, but the only thing the viewer of the photo got to see was that two men are being blanketed by the level of mystery sometimes black and white can bring can bring to a photo.

I want to at least in my imagination or wishes, resurrect more to the men in this photograph first being able to give them both individually, and respectably their own identities. Even if I could I would even want to re-establish the nature of this photo, and wish to have the frontal view of the man to the right of the photo so that the mystery as to what he looks like can be answered. I want to ( like the aspiring journalist I am), give these two men a second chance at having measurable sense of character, and a profile that goes beyond delivering tea in Sichuan on the horse tea road. As the title of this photograph is "Men laden With Tea", these Men are also laden with mystery, and never really got a chance to be known other than exporters of tea.