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“Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.Life is beauty, admire it.Life is a dream, realize it.Life is a challenge, meet it.Life is a duty, complete it.Life is a game, play it.Life is a promise, fulfill it.Life is sorrow, overcome it.Life is a song, sing it.Life is a struggle, accept it.Life is a tragedy, confront it.Life is an adventure, dare it.Life is luck, make it.Life is too precious, do not destroy it.Life is life, fight for it.”― Mother Teresa
Don't you love how with photography you can choose to see life in a way that doesn't mirror the reality of others? It makes life more interesting and fun to live. :)
The Thai boys have just become little monks. Together they dress up in ornate clothing and jewelry with bright make up to celebrate this special occasion. Today they will spend the day parading through their town celebrating with friends and family. But for now they are relaxing in the cool monastery before they go out to meet the Thai sun.
Poor kid, he came in with a nice head of beautiful hair and then he left all bald. He was one of dozens of new little monks that joined the Buddhist monastery for the summer. I guess that summer camp in Thailand is a bit different than that of the West.
“Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.”― L. Frank Baum
A few weeks back, Juan and I sitting in a university cafeteria, and we stumbled upon these girls filming a dance and a song for a singing competition to go to Japan. These pictures remind me to try to always bring my camera with me. Where ever you go there is always a picture. The trick is that you have to be open to seeing the picture.
I went out to do some location scouting and saw these pictures in my path. :)
A Bus Ride in Daejeon, South Korea.. A pretty Korean woman glances up from a lively conversation with her friend.
An afternoon nap in the subway.... Seoul, South Korea
MaeLoeGyi Vegetarian Restaurant and Guesthouse in Mae Sariang, Thailand is a place that I could hang-out in all day long eating, listening to ukulele tunes and enjoying the sweet company of Net, her family and all the other guests who pop in for a taste of her delicious food. :) If you ever find yourself in Thailand, Mae Sariang is worth the trek just to try a bowl of her delicious green curry or grilled tofu salad. Yum!
With the weather reaching a slightly breezy -13C in Korea.....or 8 F depending on what weather language you speak, it is perfect light sweater weather, though somedays I prefer to wear just a light T-shirt. This gives me a nice sunburn and it is fantastically quick too! In 10 minutes flat, I'm red all over! There is no need to spend hours flipping from back to front, back to front, at the beach like a steak on the grill. Just come to Korea, and in 10 minutes you'll be rosy red and starting your base tan before all of the competition even thinks about summer's golden tan! :) Well I'm off to go get my umbrella drink, there is much suntanning left to do. Don't be Jealous!
“You have no responsibility to live up to what other people think you ought to accomplish. I have no responsibility to be like they expect me to be. It's their mistake, not my failing.”― Richard P. Feynman
Ever inpatient to know the future? Yeah..me too! Super inpatient at times...,but I want to learn to live in the now. In this very moment, I want to always try to think about what I can be grateful for and excited about in the present second- things big and small and live them patiently and happily. This is difficult... Or at least for me it is. I need the gift of Patience for Christmas Dear Saint Nick, And I need it now, Sir! ;)
Though I am still a firm believer in a healthy addiction to planning and list making. - Yes, it's true! I make lists for fun. - But I want to turn my focus on living the now and celebrating the moments as they come and truly soaking in life and the beautiful people that live in it.
Below is one of my favorite quotes of all time, such beautiful words.
“Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.” ― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet
A little while ago, I worked in SouthEast Asia with a incredible group of young women teaching them English. I only spent 2 months with them, but the relationships that I built with these students impacted me more than any of my students that I taught in the 2 years that I was in Korea. Crazy, I know. -But these women were so thoughtful and strong. One, who was secretly my favorite - or perhaps I wasn't so good at keeping my favorites a secret, wrote an incredible paper about growth of a dream that I'll never forget.She wrote...That growing at first is difficult, everything about it is hard, even just coming out of your seed and pushing through the ground hurts, and as you grow other plants try to choke you, yet slowly as you keep growing your seed takes root and you begin to sprout and grow strong until you become a beautiful rose that others enjoy.Great right? So keep pursuing your big dream because in the end your fulfilled dream will be the beautiful rose which others can enjoy as they walk through life.
Imagine this being the residence of your queenly crib. Right smack dab in the middle of your submissive subjects -- dead, raw, delicious chicken. She looks a bit like royalty amongst the chickens. Her mom works at this chicken booth in the market. Can you imagine all the different things that she sees everyday? An interesting childhood, not like most of us in the West experienced. That is one of the things that I love the most about traveling it gives me a glimpse of just how many different ways you can live life. Normal for her is nothing like my normal, but neither normal is necessarily bad or better than the other, just different.It is the funniest/saddest thing when a person goes to a foreign country and they try to change the customs to their own in order to 'save' the people and bring 'civilization' to their land. They don't realize that maybe that this country is just is different not worse or better. And that the people are more comfortable eating on the floor, and using a squatty potty, instead of tables and chairs and a sit down toilet <--- actually enjoying a squat toilet is a concept that I still struggling to comprehend.. But it is actually true! Astonishing, I know!But everyone is just different. Some people like cream in their coffee and others like sugar, no big deal. -- So stop worrying, there is no need to revolutionize the world by shipping tables and chairs with a few toilets to the jungles of Laos or Myanmar, it is much better to join their madness and get your squat muscles stronger. Besides the people will like you much better in the end. :)
Quote of the Day:
“When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.” ― Clifton Fadiman
Picture note: This day my good photography friend Dave Smith and I went to the Vientiane market in with our massive cameras, looking for a good cup of coffee - with cream AND sugar, fresh vegetables and good light. We had a 100% success rate.
“I have noticed that the people who are late are often so much jollier than the people who have to wait for them.”― E.V. Lucas
It was my first time there.Europe : the land of history and class or so everyone said...I was going there to photograph my dear friend My-Van's wedding. She's an American who I met while teaching in South Korea. We met in the immigration office just a few days after I arrived in Korea. The first time we met we looked each other over scrupulously and decided that the other was worth chatting up to make the day less painful.. Low and behold we ended up talking for the 2 hours as we waited to get our foreigner ID card. (Because I, of course, look so Asian that I need a card to prove my foreign status. That is sarcasm for all of those who don't know that I have a very Caucasian face. That makes me fit into Asia as much as a polar bear in blends into the Caribbean).Despite my un-Asian features, MyVan overlooked my flaws, and we became instant friends. Fast forward about 2 years later, and I am on a plane flying to France to photograph her lovely Southern French wedding and spend a lovely week with the newly weds and their closest friends.After living and traveling for almost 3 years in Asia (mostly in South Korea and parts of Thailand), this was my first taste of Europe. It was incredible and so unique from traveling Asia. Let me explain.Thailand is a beautifully, tropical inexpensive life. There I lived in Mae Hong Son, a mountainous region in N.W. Thailand with S'gaw Karen (an ethnic people from Myanmar living in Thailand). Their culture left an impression on me. They are so real, genuine, generous. They are willing to share and give everything they have to their friends and family even when they don't have much of anything. Their lives are centered in community, in sharing.While I was there, I was almost never left alone, people surrounded me constantly, always by my side, looking over my shoulder as I typed emails to friends or read books. This was not rude, but normal. We were a community without secrets or personal space, but I must admit this was an adjustment coming from my individualistic 'I love personal space/time' culture of the West., ha!
above: Saturday afternoon weaving with my Beautiful friends.
Here I slept on bamboo mats in a room full of students and friends, I learned that good relationships go before to-do list, I went forging for food in the forest, ate with my hands, I learned to never walk alone - not because it was dangerous but because it was lonely, my classes were canceled classes so that we could go the hospital with my sick students, and we shared everything, everything - down the one bowl of soup and one spoon for the whole dinner table - (which sometimes resulted in a community with the common cold or worse- ha!) - but the value of having a whole community taking care of me certainly made a few days of the sniffles worth it.
above: my bedroom
above: Crossing the Homemade Bridge - "The most terrifying 10 minutes of my life - swing, swing, creek, crack. "
After Thailand, I packed my bags to see what Europe offered... One thing I appreciated immediately? The bridges there have a little more steel and little less DIY quality. :)
above: Gourds, France
I can't say that I've experienced too much of Europe. I know Asia better. but because I have have European blood.. - i'm a bit of a mutt, I have about 7 or 8 European countries running in this blood-- please don't judge, you know mutts have strong genes :D or at least that is what my parents told me to boost my self-esteem - .- So perhaps this blood makes me more of an expert on Europe than I think? I do know that I share a common pointy nose and eating utensils with the Europeans., - yes this definitely make me an expert. ;)I stayed in Europe for about a month - one week in France and 3-4 in Spain.. I traveled Europe a bit unconventionally - meaning I didn't really go anywhere, because I found the best place in Europe, didn't feel the need to move... By divinity, I ended up staying in the seaside town of Sant Feliu de Guixols, Spain, - an hour from Barcelona - where a Catalonian family took me under their wing, gave me a bed and the most delicious cheese, Spanish ham, wine, and Spanish experiences a girl could dream of. So I willingly parked myself there for 3 full weeks.I did however venture outside of the nest to take one trip to Barcelona to visit the Perfume Museum - A museum full of old perfume bottles dating back to ancient Greece, and they even displayed one of Marie Antoinette's bottles... after this then I went to the MIBA:Ideas museum. - full fascinating modern day inventions. I almost made it to the Chocolate Museum too, but time wouldn't allow for this. - Next time, perhaps.. :)Other then these 3 days in Barcelona, I stayed in Sant Feliu sailing, swimming in the Mediterranean sea, learning to steer a boat, practicing my Spanish and drinking my weight in Spanish olive oil. yum :)My main impression of Europe? One word. Refined. The first night in Sant Feliu, Spain, I learned how to peel a plum with a knife and fork. Really, is that level of refinement really necessary in the human race; Do Europeans just do this to show off their mad skills? Or do you peel a plum with a knife and fork every night at dinner too?
above: European Forks and and Knives....
Europe vs Asia? Where should you go with your hard-earned travel cash and passport? It just depends on which lesson you seek to learn first, Dear Grasshopper.... Do you wish to master the art of peeling a plum with a knife and fork without breaking a sweat, or sharing your precious imported chocolate bar with 5 of your best friends? The choice is all yours. Choose wisely :)A few helpful European Links :)A lovely Hostel/Pension in Sant Feliu, Spain Hostel NorayTravel by Air: http://www.ryanair.com/enTravel by Train: http://www.raileurope.com/european-trains/tgv/index.html
The Bride and talented designer My-Van designed all of this amazingness that you see in these picture.. I think that she might even have ordered the lavender especially for her wedding day...Take a look at more of her handy work here ---> http://redesignedbym.wordpress.com/
After months and months of meticulous planning and preparation for their Southern France wedding, Talent Designer My-Van and Teacher Ken's day finally arrived. It was a day full of unimaginable beauty. A smashing success. :) Thank-you My-Van and Ken for having me there to share this special occasion with you and all of your thousands of unexpected guests. Here is a peek. and be sure to check out My-Van's DIY blog that shares her amazing design secrets. --> http://redesignedbym.wordpress.com
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