Love Letter To The Wild Steppe

Everything comes to an end. It’s inevitable.  School, eras and journeys. But sometimes the end isn’t just a date on the calendar but rather, a significant moment, thought or understanding that you are no longer who you used to be. I would like to share with you a personal moment of when I came to this kind of understanding.

At the end of 2013, I found myself sitting in an apartment in Beijing, passing my last few hours in Asia, Thinking about my four month photography journey in Mongolia. This is an email I wrote to a close friend:

"…Today is my last day in Asia. In ten hours my plane will be off to Turkey and then to Israel (that place from the news). It's hard for me that the journey has ended so quickly, I want more, but at the same time I feel the need to relax, to rest before I continue.

I've been spending the last few days of my trip in Beijing thinking about the last four months. Looking back, the only thing I would change is its ending note. I would've liked spending this last day ridden on a horseback, far away from the city, in the never ending Mongolian wilderness, unbothered with my daily thoughts. As I wish to feel once again as I've always felt in Mongolia – free.

Even while writing this, I feel as if my legs are rising in the air, trying to find their place on the heavy iron stirrups, while sounds of horseshoes and wind fill me. I can almost feel for one last moment, that freedom…

After spending so much time in Mongolia, I thought my affection to it would end. But now I understand that Mongolia's physical and spiritual freedom, is much more powerful than I could’ve ever imagined. Now I know that I'd be back to Mongolia, just like returning to an old love…"

This photo is my end-of-journey photo: 13 year old Irka Bolen, riding saddleless on a horse, surrounded by endless mountains and with no road in sight. This was my Mongolia, land of freedom and open wilderness.

If you wish to take your photography to the next level, the best advice I could give you is – find your love, find a topic which will keep you fascinated and always leave you hungry for more… for me it's Mongolia. What is it for you?