Aapa

When I was growing up, I was never really a part of my father’s life. We were close, yet distant living side by side but never truly connected. When I left for Kathmandu to study, the silence between us only grew.

Everything changed when he was diagnosed with cancer. As life slowed down, I finally began to see him not just as my father, but as a gentle, fragile man. In that stillness, we built a bond that was both beautiful and heartbreaking, knowing our time was running out.

After he was gone, I searched for him everywhere in the empty rooms, the scent of his clothes, the air that still felt like him. Through my camera, I tried to hold on, capturing traces of his presence and my longing.

I also wrote letters he would never read filled with love, regret, and the ache of lost time. Each word was a way to reach for him, even in his absence.

Now, I still find him in small things in light, in memory, in the quiet moments that linger. In every image and every word, a part of him lives on.