giggle girl

I approached this lady today to be part of my 100 strangers project. Completely bewildered, she pointed to the 3 friends she was with and asked if I meant all 4 of them. No, I said , just you - at which point she creased up with laughter and said yes, ok, what shall i do? Great, I thought - this is going to be easy. I told her where to stand and said, right - all you need to do is look straight at the camera, but don't smile.

I hadn't reckoned on the 'no smiling' request giving her a giggle attack of such epic proportions though.

I've never met anyone who wrestled so much with keeping a straight face. She made several valiant efforts, but the odds were stacked against her really. I'd barely switched the camera on before we got surrounded by a noisy crowd of bemused onlookers - her friends were standing just out of shot in a state of hysteria, waving their iphones around trying to film everything - we could see people straining their necks in the cafe opposite trying to figure out what was happening...it was just ridiculous.

My poor victim volunteer just couldn't get it together, however hard she tried. I have about 15 shots that are blurred, wibbly and totally out of focus because both of us were laughing so much. Her expression here is one of comical anguish - her cheeks are red because she kept pinching them in an effort to stop smiling. It really was very funny.

Even though this isn't a great photograph I do like it. I feel awful because I've forgotten her name, so I've had to christen her the giggle girl.

Whoever she was, she really brightened up my day!