Cakes story

The yellow envelope and its contents were donated by Anonymous to The Atlas Group in 2003.  The donation was accompanied by the following note:

At 17, and as a budding photographer, I was asked by a cousin who owned my favorite Beirut patisserie to take pictures of his cakes. I did so gladly, hoping to be compensated with the eclairs and tarts I fancied there.

After weeks on the job, I came to realize that this patisserie was also the favorite of Lebanon’s warlords and politicians. I came to this conclusion when I organized the order dates and first names on the cakes and then realized they coincided with the warlords’ birthdays: October 25 and “Samir,” for Samir Geagea; January 22 and “Amine,” for Amine Gemayel; August 7 and “Walid,” for Walid Jumblatt; September 7 and “Omar,” for Omar Karami, and so on.

Weeks later, I started to fantasize about poisoning the cakes.

But unfortunately (or fortunately), I was let go before I could implement my plan because my staging and photographic skills were clearly not up to par.