Today I’m a hipster
July 28, 2009 | Filed Under Uncategorized | 2 Comments
Admission: Hipsters annoy me. Have ever since I briefly lived in NYC in 2005. I know I shouldn’t be annoyed by an entire group of people, but I am. So there it is. I’m sure most of them are very nice people once you get to know them.
But today I look like a hipster. While I’ve been back in the States for a coupla weeks, I bought a rather cheap-o medium format film camera. It’s purple. I’ve wanted to take medium format photos for a long time now, but I can’t afford to go off the deep end with a super-pricey camera. And since I’ve never shot with that type of film, I figured for now I could get a cute plastic camera, experiment, and then buy a nicer, more pro-version when I’ve mastered the medium. So, you know…by next Thursday.
For those of you who don’t know what medium format is, you might have the same reaction as my father..”What the hell are you doing with a dinky purple camera? What do you mean I can’t see the photo right away? Why don’t you just take the photo with your iphone?”.. I’ll explain a little. But first a caveat: I am a child of the digital age. True, the one photo-j class I had was in film, and I’m completely happy it was so that I could better master and appreciate the likes of f-stops and shutter speeds, but for the most part, I’m a digital girl. I know some photogs who started out when film was still the modus operandi, and I give them complete props. It’s hard enough to funciton in rural Senegal when you’re working with digital - I don’t know how they made such amazing breaking-news photo when they had to process their own film. I just read one NYTimes blog about a photog who processed his film in Iraq during the first Gulf War in a toilet. But I digress..
Medium format: It’s film. It’s more of a square shape. The camera has two aperture settings, and two film-speed settings. It’s a nice camera to have fun with and try to learn how to memorize light expsure settings. Wikipedia calls it a ‘toy’ camera. Never too old to play with toys… Haven’t gotten anything developed yet (and not sure if I will be able to in Dakar.. if anyone out there has any advice on this???) .. but here’s a photo of me playing hipster for the day!
Love Power
July 27, 2009 | Filed Under Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
I was in Minneapolis shooting/writing for an assignment this weekend, and I came across possibly the coolest wall mural ever. My colleague and I decided we especially liked this, because it means if you were giving someone directions, you could say something like: “Go to the stoplight, and then turn right at Jesus.”
Good eats in Bissau
July 6, 2009 | Filed Under Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Back to Bissau: We would work 12-13 hour days.. running around the small city, covering election rallies, photographing different stories and calling people to set up interviews. Late afternoon to early evening, we would set up the ‘bureau’: an outdoor restaurant area under a canopy at the hotel where a few of the other journalists we knew from Dakar were staying. We had a regular gang who would file from their laptops there, shaded from the sun as well as the one rain storm that hit. And then when 9 pm rolled around, we would all walk through the dark streets of Bissau to find a lovely, hidden restaurant. It was me, Kate (the writer whom I was working with), Fid (freelancer who was stringing for VOA and AP), Scott (VOA bureau chief), Matt (Scott’s friend from the States who was helping him out), Joe (student who was stringing for Reuters) and Adam (new New York Times bureau chief). It was a vivid assortment of people who have lived in some crazy places and reported on some colorful stories. (Matt later told us about Scott getting chased by baboons when he was bureau chief in Kenya).
Anyway, the restaurtants were quaint and small and had awesome food and good wine, and we would all eat our share of fresh fish and chilled white wine and come away with a $20 tab for each of us. At dinner I was always a little roughed up and dirty from a day rolling around trying to get a good photo, so I perhaps wasn’t the most graceful dinner company (when am I ever), but it was a GREAT time.
Here’s a shot from one of our favorite restaurants, owned by a Portuguese family… 
was at an election..
July 1, 2009 | Filed Under Uncategorized | 5 Comments
Helllooo.. Was away for a while, covering an election (and some hip hop.. and some drug stories).. in Guinea-Bissau. Bissau was amazing. Loved the little city. And now I want - very badly - to learn Portuguese. I also had a startling revelation: my childhood imaginary friend was from Guinea-Bissau. Allow me to explain:
When I was three I had an imaginary friend named Pooshki. Fast forward twenty-three years later. I’m covering the voters on Sunday casting ballots, and I swat a fly violently away from me. One of the poll workers looks and me and says, “Mooska” (pronounced Mooshka).Mooska means fly I assume, because Moosh means fly in French. Anywho, I’m walking witha another reporter a few minutes later, when I suddenly realize the similiar pronunciations between Mooska and Pooshki.
“I wonder if my imaginary friend was from GB?” I say with extreme excitment.
“Do you think Pooshki is a word in Portuguese?” She shrugged, but was willing to go with my presumption. Wanting confirmation, I turned to the Bissau-Guinean walking two feet to my right, and without ANY explanation, I just blurted out: “POOSHKI!!!”
He started giggling like a little girl, and then explained that it IS a word, albeit in Portuguese Creoloe, which is the main language of the country. It means ” Push a Chica ” or Push a Girl. Awesome. I KNEW I was I always meant to go to West Africa. Obviously, this confirms the whole destiny bit.
Annnnnd.. here’s a photo of some peeps at a rally. I’ve got a LOT more GB photos and GB stories to share, so stay tuned folks…