Image Surgery

Terry Fox Run 2008

I arrived as a spectator, snapped a few shots, and quickly found myself as the official photographer of the annual Terry Fox Run in Doha, Qatar. In spite of being somewhat unprepared, I was thrilled at the opportunity to be able to show this event through my ‘eyes’.

In Canada, Terry Fox is a big deal. He set out on a cross-Canada ‘Marathon of Hope’ to raise money and awareness for Cancer research, a disease which took his leg. He was able to unite the nation and realise his goal of raising 1$ from every person in Canada, and is a national hero to this day, with schools and communities holding Terry Fox Runs. With no winners or losers, set distances or acceptable modes of conveyance, anyone can join in. And at this year’s run in Doha, whether young or old, dogs or dolls, in-line skates, unicycles and strange moon-boots, they all came to join the fun.

By the time I arrived at the College of the North Atlantic’s Doha beautiful campus, the event was already well under way with the fabulous team of volunteers from the Four Season’s Hotel hard at work (and busy playing) on preparing food for all. They had been there since 8 in the morning, grilling hamburgers and hot dogs over custom-made barbecues, twisting delicious shawarmas along long tables, and laying out heaping piles of fruits and other goodies.

I quickly joined the ranks of the green-shirted volunteers, and started to mingle with the folks waiting at the registration tables for people to make a donation and possibly buy a shirt before the race. Although this moved slowly in the early part of the day, as the race drew nearer larger and larger crowds just kept forming.

Soon, the field was full of people from all ages and walks of life. Indeed, although there were a lot of Canadians present, there was no shortage of other cultures present. People played football on the field, sat in the shade, talked, and walked around while waiting for the run to commence. The kids had special treats, with cotton candy and face painting being two of their favourites.

As soon as the announcement was made that the run would be starting, the kids were the first to dash to the starting line. The course was a roughly a square around the campus, with motivational messages having been written in many languages by the student volunteers. When the drop of a hat started the run, though not a race, there was a fury of energy that exploded off the starting line and started around the track.

It wasn’t long, however, before I started hearing people as as they passed, how many laps they had to do of the 1.7 km course. I was passed by people of all ages; running, walking, cycling, skating, boarding and scooting. I even saw more unusual contraptions, including two people in boots like springy stilts, a unicycle, articulated 2-wheeled skateboards, a doll in a stroller, amongst others that I surely missed.

For some, there were only laps; the finish line wasn’t for them.

See the entire photo set on flickr.