Sage of Time

Hello Uncle Paul, I miss you.

Hey buddy, I miss you too.

Ah, if it isn't my long lost brother.

Hey, sis.

We were just talking about you.

Ah, my ears must have been burning.

Where in the world are you now?

I am in the Philippines.

Philippines?

I thought you were in Thailand.

Yeah, no, I finished that gig last week.

How was it?

Well, it was soul-destroying.

But hey look, I finally got a project

that I think is worth talking about.

I'd love to run it by you if you got a sec.

Yeah, I'd love to.

Hang on Paul, it's witching out here.

Yeah, okay.

What have you done now?

Kids at it again?

I'm sorry Paul, I have to go.

Love you to the moon.

Yeah, love you too.

Paul?

You, you're so grown up!

You look very handsome.

Thank you, so do you.

Thank you.

Thank you for the handsome.

Oh, no, I mean.

You look exactly the same.

So do you, you haven't changed.

Oh yes, I assure you I have changed.

How long has it been?

I don't know, how long has it been?

16 years?

16, no way.

Wow, that's a long time.

What are you doing here?

I'm here for work.

For a conference.

I'm here on stopover for a night.

Nice, you enjoying the chaos?

Oh my god, it's like the crowd and the noise.

Why are you here?

Well I'm taking some photos.

Of course. - Yeah.

Why the Philippines?

I'm doing some shots for a magazine spread.

Very nice.

I saw you earlier.

You appeared in my lens,

like in this sea of people.

Are you some kind of stalker or something?

Yeah, sounds like it, yeah.

So a conference in the Philippines?

Yeah, I'm flying tomorrow to Cebu

and I'm gonna be at the conference for two days

and I hope the rest of the time just at the beach.

Nice.

Yeah. - Working hard.

No, I'm the key speaker so I have to behave.

You wanna grab a coffee or something?

I have to go.

I have to meet my colleague.

We have to go over the notes for the speech.

Seriously?

It's okay.

Yeah.

I'm sorry.

It's not that I don't wanna go.

It's just.

We're really unprepared.

It's okay.

I have got loads to shoot anyway.

That's a shame.

Yeah.

But it was really, really good to see you.

Shit, there is just,

there's so much I wanna say to you right now.

Dammit.

It's good to see you.

Yeah.

You really have to go?

I'm sorry.

Well.

Take care of yourself.

Anna.

What are we doing?

We just run into each other after all of these years

and we're just gonna walk away?

What time do you have to meet your friend?

Six.

That is hours away.

Come on an adventure with me.

I will get you out of the city,

we'll see some sights and I'll have you back in time

to meet your colleague, I promise.

And I definitely remember

Okay.

Yes, come on.

You've been in one of these yet?

No, not yet.

Are you gonna tell me where we're going?

It's a surprise.

I hate surprises.

I remember.

You comfy up there?

Yup.

So good catching up like this.

Great.

I've seen some of your work.

It's very good.

That is very kind of you.

You must love it?

Yeah, it's pretty good.

I mean I've just come back from Thailand

where I get paid to take people around

to these free setup locations

so they can pretend to be photographers for a little while.

It does get a little bit monotonous to be honest.

Yeah, it must be boring.

Traveling around, seeing amazing places,

getting paid for it.

Yes, okay, well played.

I mean, what I mean is that

the gig that I'm doing here

is way more in line with the kind of stuff that I love.

Enough about me, you.

Tell me about you, this talk, what you're doing.

So I'm leaving tomorrow

and the talk is the next day.

But I really don't wanna be speaking in public.

Like, I hate it.

Okay, so.

It's just, I'm not very interesting.

I'm presenting this program to work

with people with dementia.

Okay, what's the program?

So the program is we have a robot baby seal.

You have a robot baby seal?

Yes, robot baby seal.

As you do.

As you do.

And so basically it's got like facial recognition

so it helps the patients with communication

and improves the moods, that kind of stuff.

So it's essentially a smart phone.

What?

What, it's a fake relationship.

Yeah, no, not exactly like a smart phone, no.

Sorry, I don't mean to undermine what you're doing.

It's just that, I mean surely a human interaction

will be better?

Or like a dog or a cat?

No, you can't have a dog or a cat.

Because a dog or a cat, you have to feed them,

you have to look after them.

They can't be there all the time.

It wouldn't be good, trust me.

It wouldn't work.

Okay, I'm sorry.

It's okay.

I'm sure the work that you do is amazing.

And I always knew that you would end up helping people.

Are you from here?

What are you doing?

I was gonna capture the moment.

Did you have my permission?

It's kind of hard to capture a moment

if you have to ask for permission.

Well I don't give you my permission, so.

Okay.

I don't remember you being so uptight.

Uptight?

Yeah, reserved.

Uptight?

It's not about being uptight.

I just don't like my pictures being taken, that's all.

But you're sitting there and the light is perfect

and you had this beautiful smile on your face.

I just don't see what the big deal is.

I don't care, I don't like it.

I don't care about the light, blah blah blah.

Okay, fine.

I'll put the camera away then.

Why do you take it so personal?

That scared the shit out of me.

You should have seen your face.

That was really a moment worth catching.

Ah yes, hahaha.

It was.

Very funny.

Give me the camera.

So I managed to get my own place in the end.

That's super impressive.

It did make my Babbo very proud.

Hey yeah look,

I was really sorry to hear about his passing.