In all the time I’ve been shooting street photography in Cambridge I’ve maybe seen 3 protests. They are rare in the city, this past Saturday I came across a few hundred Chinese students protesting about Wolfson College’s decision to keep Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam as an Honorary Fellow.
I’m not one for shooting protests however, like I said its rare that you see a protest in Cambridge, so I made the decision to shoot it. I was shooting with my Fujifilm X-T2 and 56mm as I was looking to focus in on one subject and try to isolate this subject in the crowd. I had my Ricoh GR with me just incase I needed a wider focal length or I wanted to shoot with the flash, but I didn’t use it.
There were 2 sides to the protest, you had the group protesting the college, most of these protesters had their faces covered. I was told that this was because they feared about the safety of their families back in Hong Kong. Their was also a second group of protesters counter-protesting and showing their support for the police in Hong Kong. The crowd with their faces covered carried signs and flags reading things like “Shame of Wolfson College” and shouting “Ga yao” which I was told was a Cantonese phrase to boost morale, while the other group waved Chinese flags while shouting back at the others.
It was an interesting hour and I hope the photos capture the emotion of the protest.
