I was delighted to be invited to take official photographs for the Beatson Cancer Charity's first annual fun walk on Saturday. http://www.beatsoncancercharity.org/
The charity has been founded quite recently to devote funds specifically for the Beatson Hospital. The hospital itself is an impressive place, and is the busiest cancer centre in the UK in terms of both clinical activity and patient numbers, seeing more than 8,000 new patients a year.
The cause is close to my heart, as I have been being treated for thyroid cancer at the Western General, St John's and Edinburgh Royal Infirmary since February. The shoot was therefore a much more emotionally charged event than any of my other jobs to date. I met many other cancer patients, not a single one with the same type of cancer as the next. I found myself thinking just how lucky I am, for there were plenty of people in attendance who were much, much sicker than I.
The day was full of positivity, and had an incredibly friendly, warm and supportive atmosphere. There was such a lot of laughter and fun, which was great news for the charity as this had indeed been their primary goal for the event. Well, that and fundraising! There was a beach complete with deck chairs and buckets, bands, and plenty of donated food and drink to hand out with the goody bags afterwards. There were three times more the amount of people than they had initially predicted the event would draw. For a first time event 1500 participants is just excellent, and we predict numbers to at least double for next year, perhaps triple again. It really was a fun day out and a great way to make money for this brilliant and very necessary charity. I'll see you there next year!
