Memorabilia

Last September I spent a very memorable weekend at the Montreal Tattoo Convention (till this day, I don’t think I have ever partied that hard). Spending nearly 72 hours with your close friends, meeting new people who, from that moment on, also become your close friends – I couldn’t have asked for more. I could write about all kinds of crazy stories that happened during those three days, but one thing in particular got thrown back at me last week:

On the Saturday of the convention my girl-soul-mate Kalven and I were checking out magazines and books at one of the kiosks, completely exhausted from the night we just had… and from the night before that. All of a sudden some man taps me on the shoulder and tries explaining to me in a very broken English that he would like to take a photograph of me. I figure it’s a tattoo convention so there's nothing abnormal about that. Kalven tells me she’ll wait for me at the kiosk and so I follow the Spanish photographer. He brings to this place draped in black curtains at the very back and my eyes fall upon a wooden bench in the center of his set up. He pulls out his portfolio and starts showing me all these photos of naked dames then motions to the bench and asks me to remove my top. At this point I messaged Kalven to tell her to get her ass in here because this didn’t seem legit at all. Finally K. walks in as I’m telling the guy he can take his photograph, but the top has to stay on. He settled. I never thought about this moment again until last week when a staff member from one of the stores I take care of in Toronto called me up to tell me that they bought a Spanish tattoo magazine and… I’m in it. I guess getting naked isn’t always a prerequisite.


the cover


me

NB. I am all for nude photography, but it has to be done with taste; therefore I don’t leave that up to just anybody.