Kashmir: A Recollection from 2012

The following essay was written intermittently between October 2012 to present. All of the photographs were taken during a trip to Kashmir on October 2012.

This piece was written in accompaniment of the Project "Kashmir: Beauty Beneath the Hostile Borders". Click here or any of the images to view all of the images.

We just spent the whole morning traveling from Dal Lake to Pahalgam and the weather was gloomy at best. According to our guide Pahalgam was supposedly the Swiss Alps of India. We came several weeks early for the tourist season but we didn't really went there for vacation. But still the weather wasn't cooperating. Gloomy and grey. Our hotel was in the middle of a valley surrounded by mountains, soon to be covered with snow. It was drizzling and cold, the rain from the past days started to form ice caps on the surrounding mountains. We checked in our things in our rooms and decided to have a walk outside the hotel. Right out in the corner was a police outpost manned by three policemen. I decided to have a chat with them, ask where the local market is, location of good food and whatnot. Then it started to drizzle more so I decided to stay a bit longer under the shed of the police outpost and continue our talks.

I have been writing a lot, but not here.

Okay, not a lot but some, at least.

It's February and it's still hot here in Santiago but fall is slowly creeping in which makes me smile. A lot has happened in the last 6 months passion, personal and career wise. Oh, my wife and I had finally visited one of the most beautiful places on earth - Patagonia. Incredible experience.

Back to the title. Yes, I've written a lot relative to the past years. And I'll share here soon (I have made it a point to actually pencil in the task to to my calendar so I don't forget - this post is testament to that).

I have also been very busy on photography having started a couple of long tenure projects and preparing the backlogs for future posts. I'm also looking into joining some agencies and sharing some galleries. Heck maybe a talk in an exhibition this year, but we'll see.

-Yel

World Press Photo 2016 Exhibition in Santiago

The yearly World Press Photo exhibition is back here in Santiago, Chile with this year's winners. The exhibit is held again at Espacio Fundación Telefónica right in front of Plaza Italia which will last from July 29 until August 28.

Every year there are some photos that really grabs my attention, and this year is Sergey Ponomarev's "Refugees arrive by boat on the Greek island of Lesbos." (http://www.worldpressphoto.org/collection/photo/2016/general-news/sergey-ponomarev) and Kevin Frayer's entry under Daily Life, Singles (http://www.worldpressphoto.org/collection/photo/2016/daily-life/kevin-frayer/101).

Exhibit Address:

Espacio Fundación Telefónica

Providencia 127. Metro Baquedano

Read more about this year's exhibit:

World Press Photo 2016 Photo Contest in context

World Press Photo Contest gallery

Exposición 2016 World Press Photo at Espacio Fundación Telefónica

August 9, 2014 (Part 4)

A couple of rounds and I decided to move on and I went ahead to La Vega (until now I'm not sure of the right word/name of [the] place). We had been to this place before. It's a 2 story market that's a bit more organized that I'd like. Crossing the bridge to the place I saw that gat most of the gates were to the building were still closed. It's past 8 now, and a market was just waking up. Weird.

I thought walked passed it and went to a street where I saw a hint of business(?). I've never been to this area and at this point I was getting frustrated. Most shots I've taken and the sun is now above the mountains. The light is now too strong, and would be hard to balance the exposure between the shadows. I still pressed on just to survey the place so that I didn't need to go back if there was nothing there.

Then the people and cars and carriages started to pickup more and more as I walked. Trucks and stalls full of fruits and laborers. I was getting giddy inside.

I wasn't shooting though. My hands were in my pockets for some reason. Then all of a sudden the place opened up. The market I was looking for. A whole plaza bustling. And I was late. I tried to shoot at this point which proved futile. Lighting was harsh. I was uncomfortable with the looks I'm getting from my camera. The unfamiliar camera I'm using. I thought I might may have lost the confidence I had back then, and this almost feels like a restart. I need to get used to this again, thicken my skin and make the camera the extension of my hand.

In less than an hour I'm back to the place where I started, reflecting and writing this.

Disappointed. Yes. Very It's a start though. I've flexed my muscles and hopefully it won't take too long for it to remember how to do this.

-

I thought it would be proper to have a reflection of myself after this entry so I took a selfie self-portrait of myself when I got back home.

Fin.

Yel

(This entry was copied from my travel log 2014)

August 9, 2014 (Part 3)

[See scan below]

Someone handed me this calling card upon entering Mercado Central. I was too lazy to use my travel log to  log the times so I used this card instead.

-

The omnipresent Andes is so long and so big that it blocks the sun for a good amount of time, giving the morning glow more time to linger. The plaza was empty. Too early for the hustle and bustle but [has] just [have] the right lighting. I decided to walk around to have some opportunity to shoot and survey the place.

By 7:50 I decided to go to Mercado Central, and maybe La Vega after that. The market has been my bread and butter and I thought my luck would be better there.

By past 8 I was there, diss almost disappointed. People [had] just started on setting up their stalls, which is weird. I used to tend to my lola's market stall when I was in college, and back then we open the stall around 3:30 to 4 in the [morning], an the market was already busy buzzing. I guess it's all about I guess people here go to the market late, hence they don't need to open early. Mercado Central is a closed-roof market with most stalls selling seafood with some restaurants. The good thing about closed-roof markets [are] that most stalls are well illuminated by bulbs, a lot of bulbs, coming from all sides that gives interesting and tricky lighting.

[to be continued]

[Click here for Part 4]