(from Friday)
Sunday, February 28, 2010
The Jungle’s Bounty
Charming and Cute
(from Thursday)
Translation Frustration
(from Wednesday)
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
When I Grow Up
(from Sunday)
I’m a working photographer this week. And I’ll be one for the next couple of weeks, and perhaps for the remainder of my six week trip here in Indonesia. It’s exciting to get paid for doing something one loves, and I’m quite stunned that I may make more money while traveling in a far off place than I do at home. But I also realize that the photography is only a very small part of why I like photography, and is not enough unto itself. Sure, I love seeing a great photograph, and I love even more making a great photograph. But photography is really only a tool for me to learn about my environment and hear cool stories, and without the stories, photography kind of feels empty. Today took me around a small Dayak village on the island of Borneo, one where people were friendly and happy to be photographed, but I don’t feel like I learned anything new. I think that this has a lot to do with the language barrier and not having a true translator, but it made me wonder about what kind of work I could have that would be sure to be chock-full of stories all the time. Something where I would meet interesting people who weren’t too interesting that they became just weird. Something that’s consistently providing new challenges but which I feel like I’m doing well. And, of course, something where I’m my own boss. Trivia master? Restaurateur? General Manager of a professional baseball team? Stand-up comedian? Can I do better than what I’m doing now? These are the questions of a mid-life crisis traveler navigating not only new cultures but also the uncertainty of my present and future.
Jakarta
I’m developing a belief that the friendliest people—outside of perhaps Mormons in Salt Lake City and anyone from Minnesota—are Moslems in Moslem countries. If I look back upon all my travels, it just seems that I’ve been consistently so much better received in places such as Kurdish Iraq, Turkey, Tanzania, Northern Mozambique, and now in the grand-daddy of them all, Indonesia (the only place that didn’t work out so well for me was Morocco, but I’m hoping to give it a second chance later this year as I was sick as a dog the first time around).
In light of this, it’s a small wonder to me that I know so little about Islam, and rather exotify it regularly. I try to fit it into tidy boxes so that I can easily make it work in my mind. Seems like I’ve met enough Moslems in my life that I shouldn’t try to oversimplify them. But I do. Last night, I went to photograph a Jakarta independent radio station where they had an outdoor Valentine’s Day concert with a handful of live performers. I expected the concert to be melodic and quite staid, being the most populous Moslem country, after all, and nothing could have been further from the truth. Hip performers rapped, crooned, covered Elvis and Brittney (the latter thankfully as a joke), and all the while, twenty somethings in the audience screamed with glee and swooned, regardless of whether they were wearing fitted t-shirts or head scarves. Not quite what I expected and most delightfully so.
I Love Talking to People
(from Thursday)
I'm just now back from a jaunt around Dubai. Well, not much of a jaunt because I didn't really know about any place to go see except for the tallest building on earth (less impressive at night). Others suggested the malls, but that had less appeal to me for obvious reasons. So I had some decent food in a hookah cafe, watched a bit of soccer on TV and strolled back and forth to the metro station. On my return back to the airport, I struck up a conversation with two women who worked at the metro station—both coming to Dubai from far away for work. Not sure how we got started, but it reminds me that I just love talking to people. And they were delightful. We talked about work here, life at home, love, freedom, travel, the like.
Dubai was fascinating that way: far more South Asians and East Asians than Arabs. I guess that gives it the feel of a very international city, but it’s clearly stratified in the jobs that people are doing. The women with whom I spoke were from Malaysia and Kenya, and told me that they came for the experience and the money, respectively. And they were making close to 10k a year with almost all of their expenses covered, and this was tax-free. That’s better money than I make, and they work that they were doing at the metro didn’t seem particularly taxing. Ninie told me that could make more in Malaysia but that it was a good life experience. Julie said that this was far more than she could make in Kenya but didn’t like the lack of freedom to be herself in Dubai. She flies back to Kenya 2-3 times a year to have enough sex and alcohol to last her another six months in Dubai.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Flying Again
A) $950 ticket on China Air, 18 hours of travel time going there, 20 hours coming back.
B) $850 ticket on Emirates going the wrong way around the globe, via Dubai, 33 hours going, 28 hours coming back.
I must say that I was a bit concerned about how I’d face a sixteen hour flight from San Francisco to Dubai. Now I’m concerned that I won’t have enough time for all the things that I’d like to do. I’d like to sleep—and have three seats for doing so—eat and then eat some more, maybe have some free drinks, and watch a whole host of movies and TV shows that I’ve wanted to see. This airline is really luxurious. You should see the seats up front: even in business class, the travelers have little pods that they can retreat into, basically making their seat into a bed (for those who don’t have three seats). First class must be even better, but that’s off limits for us little guys. But even for us, the going is quite good, and I’m not doing any complaining. The steam towels that they brought were flavored, maybe with kaffir lime leaves, the menu looks quite nice, and they just brought me a lovely little goodie bag with, among other things, the cutest toothbrush-toothpaste thingy in it. Now I might have been a little less excited if the flight were full and I were locked in for sixteen hours, or if the horribly smelly man sitting kitty corner from me were sitting a bit closer, or if they had forgotten my special meal. But for the moment, life is really good. I think I’ll try to catch up on a bit of sleep now…