Photography, Travel, and Freedom

So, day two and a half in Sydney. I feel like absolute shit. I stayed up the past two nights to watch the matches. Very disappointed in Team USA. They better get themselves together to bring the pain in 2014. One day we’ll be able to hang with seventh world banana republics like Ghana. Until then…

Tada!

You’ve seen it a trillion times, and now here is 1,000,000,000,001.

I hired a car for the morning and took my own little tour of Sydney with a great driver named Vladimir from Belgrade. He took me to all the local points of interest and stuff off the normal routes. I don’t like exploring cities – they’re all the same. Especially Western cities. Sydney is a mix of SF, LA, and Brooklyn rolled into one. It’s a cute city – probably great to raise a family here except for the dreadful taxes.

Ugh, I feel like utter crap – I don’t know if it is from not sleeping for two days (probably) or jet lag (less probable, but equally likely – make sense?). I’m drinking water like its my job with no relief. I’m going to bed – later…

David :: Jun.27.2010 :: Photography, holiday, journal entry :: No Comments »

I’ll make some posts soon about my time in Madagascar and the fragile political climate there, to put it mildly.

However, I wanted to get a note up about Mauritius, since it will be my only one. Read on for a very funny/tragic story…

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David :: Jun.20.2010 :: holiday, journal entry, recklessness, travel :: No Comments »

A weird thing happened last night. I found myself rooting on North Korea…err, Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea. It’s a very similar feeling that I had when I visited the country. I find it quite difficult to separate the people from the government, especially when the star player of DPRK is really South Korean, born, bred, lives/works in Japan but plays for DPRK because his mother ‘feels’ like a North Korean. What that means, who knows. It’s a very odd thing for me, to be honest. It’s a bias, yes. But I know I’m not the only one.

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David :: Jun.18.2010 :: World Cup, journal entry, liberty :: No Comments »

People have been concerned with South Africa playing host to the biggest sporting event in the world. For years the knocks have come loud and hard. The criticism is not baseless.  Security, of course, has been the big worry, and in the days leading up to the opener, those fears were not put to rest. A Chinese camera crew was ambushed on a road by brigands and a Portuguese photographer was held up in his hotel room outside of Joburg by armed gunman. What has changed is that within the week, not only were the Portuguese cameras, badges, etc recovered, the criminals were captured, tried, convicted, and sentenced! Within a week! I’m actually a little surprised that they weren’t taken out back and executed by now, but there can only be so much progress. One day when these backwater nobodies are more civilized and progressive, that process will stretch out for a few years.

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David :: Jun.18.2010 :: World Cup, journal entry, liberty, travel :: No Comments »

After four flights from New York, Frankfurt, Dubai and Nairobi I arrived FINALLY in Joburg. Not the longest (time wise) trip I’ve done in one burst (that still belongs to Goa to New York at 73 hours on the move). It actually wasn’t that bad and I only “missed” one flight. I quote ‘missed’ because the lazy Kenyans at the airport didn’t want to hustle their asses to get my bags from one flight to the next in 65 minutes, which is five minutes more than is required for international connecting flights. Only a 90 minute delay, so no big deal (see? I’m loosening up – it worked in my favor, anyway). I met the Fonz in the Continental lounge in Newark.

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David :: Jun.17.2010 :: journal entry, travel :: No Comments »

So, it has been a long time since I’ve updated my blog and my website. And I have good reason.

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David :: Jan.17.2010 :: journal entry, liberty, power trippin' :: No Comments »

Alright, here’s the deal. I left Le Caire (Cairo for all you nancy English speakers) yesterday morning around 7am to begin my voyage to Bamako, Mali. The trip would take me to Casablanca with an 11 hour layover before my 11pm flight to Bamako. Before the night was over, I would have my visa yanked from Morocco after accumulating god knows how many dollars in fines via customs.

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David :: Mar.25.2009 :: assholes, journal entry, liberty, travel :: No Comments »

Zanzibar – Day 2 (minus the gory stuff…executive decision)

So, early in the morning I had set off with a new driver to go back into Stone Town to do more of what I did the previous day. I met a lot of the same people, and some of the people who were too shy or for whatever reason didn’t want me to talk with them or photograph them, were eager to meet me. That happens a lot. I don’t visit one place just once. I go back as many times as I can. It ingratiates you, however briefly, into the community, people talk about the crazy American with the tattoos (Tattoos are surprisingly uncommon in Tanzania – though Henna is popular) who was here yesterday, or this morning, or whenever. Going back allows you more access than you would normally have. People always ask me how I get the photos I get – the fleeting connection, the intimacy, whatever. I won’t give away all of my tactics, but returning over and over is a good place to start.

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David :: Mar.19.2009 :: Photography, journal entry, travel :: No Comments »