When I Was A Photographer - Reclaim The Streets

Back in the days when I was an idealistic youngster, I suppose I was something of a hippy. Even though I was born in the 70s and not the 60s, I still felt like I embodied the spirit of that decade.

The spirit of free love, marijuana and righteous protest was instilled in me between the ages of around 16 and 25. Even though my parents were not of that generation either, I identified with those that were.

As such I found myself on various marches and protests, often not even really aware of what I was marching for or protesting against, I just knew I was right and the reason I was there for was just, even if it was completely obscure.

One such protest was Reclaim The Streets, me and my friends went on a few of these, and to be honest I'm not sure what we were trying to achieve or say.

I still look back on these pictures with fondness because there was a kind of sweet innocence to our protesting. There were others there that day that simply wanted to cause trouble, they ran around with masks covering their faces while looking for anything to smash.

We stayed away from all that, and these pictures remind me of the fun of it all. One of my favourites is of the 'naked protester' (pictured below). Seeing this picture reminded me that I used to see this guy at pretty much every march and rally. I have no idea what he was protesting against, or why he felt the need to be naked whilst doing it, but he seemed harmless enough and always made me smile when I saw him.

I like this picture below as well because while we were protesting god-know's-what, there were still people trying to get to work and go about their busy days. I felt the message on the back of her jacket was quite poignant at the time, now I merely find it amusing.

It's a shame that I can't find more of these, there were various Reclaim The Streets marches that I went on and took lots of photos at, however these are the only ones I can locate, hopefully one day I'll rediscover the rest.

Cryptogee