And here's the second and third day.Click here for the album.
Click here for the total index.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Saturday, August 8, 2009
In the meantime...
Something I forgot to mention, but I got my sensor cleaned, before the trip to Cambodia.
And for people who don't know what I'm talking about, see this post and this post.
I flashed Tha Professional card in their (Canon Malaysia Headquarters) faces and that got me a 'please sit down and wait 15 minutes', whilst other less fortunate people could pick up their camera the next day. I'm not one for special treatment, but in this case I felt I payed Canon enough to deserve it.
A bit apprehensive I tested the camera at home. Afraid they might have made it worse. The hair I already removed myself, but in that process I messed up the sensor even more, so I was really hoping for an improvement. And indeed there was. Almost spotless, not enough spots left to be bothered about, you'd never see them on a regular picture. They really cleaned up the mess I made of it.
I also ordered two new focusing screens. Turned out that replacing those, although technically easy, isn't that simple, because no shop has them in stock. Even Canon Malaysia didn't, they had to order them in Japan. Guess the model camera isn't that popular here, which is not a total surprise if you look at the price of the thing.
And for people wondering, a focusing screen is a small piece of glass that hangs directly under the viewfinder inside the camera. It disperses the light and you really cannot do without. I tried the camera without it, but apart from a very distorted image in the viewfinder, exposure gets all mixed up. Sensors in the camera clearly expect this thing to be there. Apparently ít's engraved with laser, not just an ordinary piece of glass.
And the final issue, the 70-200mm lens making some shaky noises after a small drop on the tiles of my apartment turned out to be normal. Something I suspected, but wasn't sure of, cause I didn't know if the sound had always been there when shaking the thing. It's the image stabilizer rattling around a bit. Wasn't too concerned about that anyway, cause the lens worked fine after the drop, but it's nice to know for sure.
So, all issues surrounding the camera resolved, waiting now for a phone call on the arrival of the focusing screens. I ordered two, the regular one, to replace the present scratched one, and an extra, with a grid on it. I tend to make shifted pictures sometimes, where the verticals or the horizontals are not completely straight, and the screen with the grid on it is supposed to help you prevent that. It's easily corrected in any editing software, but it saves time if the photos don't have the problem to begin with.
And for people who don't know what I'm talking about, see this post and this post.
I flashed Tha Professional card in their (Canon Malaysia Headquarters) faces and that got me a 'please sit down and wait 15 minutes', whilst other less fortunate people could pick up their camera the next day. I'm not one for special treatment, but in this case I felt I payed Canon enough to deserve it.
A bit apprehensive I tested the camera at home. Afraid they might have made it worse. The hair I already removed myself, but in that process I messed up the sensor even more, so I was really hoping for an improvement. And indeed there was. Almost spotless, not enough spots left to be bothered about, you'd never see them on a regular picture. They really cleaned up the mess I made of it.
I also ordered two new focusing screens. Turned out that replacing those, although technically easy, isn't that simple, because no shop has them in stock. Even Canon Malaysia didn't, they had to order them in Japan. Guess the model camera isn't that popular here, which is not a total surprise if you look at the price of the thing.
And for people wondering, a focusing screen is a small piece of glass that hangs directly under the viewfinder inside the camera. It disperses the light and you really cannot do without. I tried the camera without it, but apart from a very distorted image in the viewfinder, exposure gets all mixed up. Sensors in the camera clearly expect this thing to be there. Apparently ít's engraved with laser, not just an ordinary piece of glass.
And the final issue, the 70-200mm lens making some shaky noises after a small drop on the tiles of my apartment turned out to be normal. Something I suspected, but wasn't sure of, cause I didn't know if the sound had always been there when shaking the thing. It's the image stabilizer rattling around a bit. Wasn't too concerned about that anyway, cause the lens worked fine after the drop, but it's nice to know for sure.
So, all issues surrounding the camera resolved, waiting now for a phone call on the arrival of the focusing screens. I ordered two, the regular one, to replace the present scratched one, and an extra, with a grid on it. I tend to make shifted pictures sometimes, where the verticals or the horizontals are not completely straight, and the screen with the grid on it is supposed to help you prevent that. It's easily corrected in any editing software, but it saves time if the photos don't have the problem to begin with.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Scroll
It's something I bought in Beijing.
I don't buy a lot of souvenirs. Small stuff sometimes. Problem is that it just stacks up, and my life is a bit unclear location wise. Don't feel like dragging along too much stuff if I need or decide to move, either within Malaysia or forcibly back to The Netherlands. The suitcase I arrived with is already too small.
This I couldn't resist.
Bought it at an art exhibition near the Forbidden City. The girl who sold it to me told me it was painted by her teacher, and for a 'souvenir' it wasn't very cheap. She was a student at the Beijing Art Academy. It was one out of four, depicting the seasons, but this one was clearly the best.
The real deal is about two meters tall and I photographed it in three pieces. Had some trouble stitching it all together without the seams showing up, but worked out ok. Not fully sure about the coloring yet, need to compare it a bit better in daylight. The original blossoms are a bit more pinkish.
Click on it for the real big one. It's big though, about 2mb, so give it some time to load if you're interested.
Phnom Penh
It's poor, it's underdeveloped compared to any standards, there's kids begging and the poverty is striking. But they're friendly, they seem curious, they like to make contact and their smile is appealing.
They were also easy targets to photograph. Either a friendly smile, a big laugh, a wave or a shy looking away, but never an objection. They actually seemed to like the attention.
Big smile and laughing when they spot the camera...
A lot of them literally live on the streets. I'm not sure if they have homes or live in one of the slum areas I saw, and just venture out to the city during the day, but they eat, pee, play, sleep, get their hair cut and dry their clothes on the streets, as some of the photos show. In fact, I caught them sleeping everywhere. On trucks, on benches, in tuk tuks, on seats at a funeral, they clearly like to sleep. My kind of people :-)
Kid playing near Phnom Wat...
'They' is of course not everybody, but the street life is in your face. It makes parts of Phnom Penh a very lively mess, especially around the market area.
Knowing a little bit of the history of Cambodia and the horrors that went on there - first by the Americans, then by Pol Pot slaughtering his own people - the resilience of the people seems amazing.
I don't want to romanticise it though. Life there seems also harsh. They might smile and some might seem genuinely happy with the little they have, a few days isn't enough to get a sense of what these people are thinking or feeling or how they experience their daily life. Think it's safe to assume that everyone would prefer a normal house over a slum, and a clean bed over a bench in the park. And the smiling might look friendly, but I remembered a book about the Pol Pot regime, in which Cambodians are described as friendly but also as spiteful. I'm quoting here freely, but in the book they're called 'the most spiteful Asians of the whole of Asia'. In short, don't piss off a Cambodian, because he might seek revenge in a less pleasant manner. How true it is, I don't know, it's second hand knowledge, but it's not unwise to keep such knowledge in mind when visiting there :-)
One tip worked out quite well, the street kids begging. In stead of giving them money - which is either spent wrong or possibly given to other people for whom they work - I bought a big bag of candy, and we just handed that out whenever the occasion arose. And it works, they leave you alone after that, with quite a happy face.
I also handed out money to disabled, landmine victims and other unfortunates, but you quickly realise it's impossible. They keep coming. It's one of the nasty aspects of these places: the confrontation with your own luck, the fact you have and they don't, and how to deal with that if they rub that almost literally in your face, with missing limbs, in wheelchairs and with other deformities. The Dutch suffer from guilt quite easily - I wrote about that in another post about Calvinism - and it's also a part of my nature. I haven't found a convincing way yet for myself. I give some, I reject some, but it still lingers in the back of my mind without a resolution, because there is none. This is the way it is, this is their life. You visit, you leave. Most you get out of it is the feeling of being lucky and a sense of admiration for this nation and its people.
Another striking thing, of which some Cambodian artists make fun themselves in paintings I saw, is the number of people they carry around on trucks, buses and motorbikes. Five people on one motor cycle wasn't an exception, and some seem to carry their whole material existence on their motor cycle. Furniture, stoves, bags, appliances, hardware, tools, you name it, you can find someone driving around with it, stacked, stuffed or folded onto a bike or truck, usually with people on top, also quite visible on some of the photos.
Two motor cycles and a lot of other stuff in a truck, with people on top...
Took me quite some time and trials to get some photos of the people on motor cycles, visible in the first album, but luckily they don't drive faster than about 30km per hour. Traffic is very chaotic, but because of the low speed it doesn't seem to go wrong often. Five on a motor cycle is quite acceptable if you don't go fast.
The weather was so so. It's the rain season now, and the first few days we had on and off drizzle and a grey sky. Dry enough between the drizzle to walk around though. The place is also quite windy, and as sandy and dusty as Siem Reap. Completely flat land, no mountains, so the wind can do its thing undisturbed, bit like The Netherlands, where a day without wind is quite rare.
Otherwise, apart from observing the life going on, there's really not much to do in Phnom Penh. There's a few sites to visit and there's some nice restaurants and cafes around the river area, but that's about it. My initial guess that a few days would be enough turned out to be true.
I did enjoy it though. Not sure if I will return there soon, but I think it was a worth while trip.
(Click on the photos for the bigger version)
They were also easy targets to photograph. Either a friendly smile, a big laugh, a wave or a shy looking away, but never an objection. They actually seemed to like the attention.
Big smile and laughing when they spot the camera...A lot of them literally live on the streets. I'm not sure if they have homes or live in one of the slum areas I saw, and just venture out to the city during the day, but they eat, pee, play, sleep, get their hair cut and dry their clothes on the streets, as some of the photos show. In fact, I caught them sleeping everywhere. On trucks, on benches, in tuk tuks, on seats at a funeral, they clearly like to sleep. My kind of people :-)
Kid playing near Phnom Wat...'They' is of course not everybody, but the street life is in your face. It makes parts of Phnom Penh a very lively mess, especially around the market area.
Knowing a little bit of the history of Cambodia and the horrors that went on there - first by the Americans, then by Pol Pot slaughtering his own people - the resilience of the people seems amazing.
I don't want to romanticise it though. Life there seems also harsh. They might smile and some might seem genuinely happy with the little they have, a few days isn't enough to get a sense of what these people are thinking or feeling or how they experience their daily life. Think it's safe to assume that everyone would prefer a normal house over a slum, and a clean bed over a bench in the park. And the smiling might look friendly, but I remembered a book about the Pol Pot regime, in which Cambodians are described as friendly but also as spiteful. I'm quoting here freely, but in the book they're called 'the most spiteful Asians of the whole of Asia'. In short, don't piss off a Cambodian, because he might seek revenge in a less pleasant manner. How true it is, I don't know, it's second hand knowledge, but it's not unwise to keep such knowledge in mind when visiting there :-)
One tip worked out quite well, the street kids begging. In stead of giving them money - which is either spent wrong or possibly given to other people for whom they work - I bought a big bag of candy, and we just handed that out whenever the occasion arose. And it works, they leave you alone after that, with quite a happy face.
I also handed out money to disabled, landmine victims and other unfortunates, but you quickly realise it's impossible. They keep coming. It's one of the nasty aspects of these places: the confrontation with your own luck, the fact you have and they don't, and how to deal with that if they rub that almost literally in your face, with missing limbs, in wheelchairs and with other deformities. The Dutch suffer from guilt quite easily - I wrote about that in another post about Calvinism - and it's also a part of my nature. I haven't found a convincing way yet for myself. I give some, I reject some, but it still lingers in the back of my mind without a resolution, because there is none. This is the way it is, this is their life. You visit, you leave. Most you get out of it is the feeling of being lucky and a sense of admiration for this nation and its people.
Another striking thing, of which some Cambodian artists make fun themselves in paintings I saw, is the number of people they carry around on trucks, buses and motorbikes. Five people on one motor cycle wasn't an exception, and some seem to carry their whole material existence on their motor cycle. Furniture, stoves, bags, appliances, hardware, tools, you name it, you can find someone driving around with it, stacked, stuffed or folded onto a bike or truck, usually with people on top, also quite visible on some of the photos.
Two motor cycles and a lot of other stuff in a truck, with people on top...Took me quite some time and trials to get some photos of the people on motor cycles, visible in the first album, but luckily they don't drive faster than about 30km per hour. Traffic is very chaotic, but because of the low speed it doesn't seem to go wrong often. Five on a motor cycle is quite acceptable if you don't go fast.
The weather was so so. It's the rain season now, and the first few days we had on and off drizzle and a grey sky. Dry enough between the drizzle to walk around though. The place is also quite windy, and as sandy and dusty as Siem Reap. Completely flat land, no mountains, so the wind can do its thing undisturbed, bit like The Netherlands, where a day without wind is quite rare.
Otherwise, apart from observing the life going on, there's really not much to do in Phnom Penh. There's a few sites to visit and there's some nice restaurants and cafes around the river area, but that's about it. My initial guess that a few days would be enough turned out to be true.
I did enjoy it though. Not sure if I will return there soon, but I think it was a worth while trip.
(Click on the photos for the bigger version)
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Phnom Penh, album I
Yes I'm back, and already done with the first album. Was quite happy with the photos I took, so I'll plunge you right into it. Coming days more about Phnom Penh, also in writing.
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