" All the SAME"

Soul Searching.
Bits of my soul wander and live in people and places far and wide. Airports, hotels, beaches, mountains, airplanes, some war zones,  some places scary, some eternally beautiful, with friends across borders, some lost, some that will never be found again,  bits of me just live for me everywhere...

  

I am such a sucker for OST's these days, it kinda surprises me, but lately i have discovered particular tracks from OST's which are pretty darn awesome.
Just this afternoon i fell in love with 'Finale' by David Elfman from the OST of The Kingdom. Awesome!!!

So after not having worked out for almost two months, i finally started working out again, and this time with a friend who drives all the way to my place. Guess Brian and Nikhil are also joining me on Monday.
Yea its awesome, operation  'Last 15 kilos is underway'. Come May and i am hoping i dont fit into anything i own right now.

Ok so i am obsessed with cricket, its a rather well known and greatly documented fact. Its another thing i have not written about cricket for quite a while, and the reason for the same is , i am soo nervous about the upcoming world cup that even the thought of it aggravates my IBS.
Yes we have a great team, but then its all about performing under pressure and one bad day can throw india out of the Cup.
I was 3 years old when we last won the World Cup and now i am 31, for 28 long years i have waited for this moment, but i have a feeling that the wait shall continue....
In light of the above i am not looking forward to the Cup...

The news has always had a history of depressing me no end. The past few days have been an overdose of how the BJP wants to raise the National Flag in Kashmir, all good i say, but whats the need? Its already so fucked up, and politically motivated?
Why not instead stand up against corruption?, against the spiraling inflation?
Its all so shyte i say!!

Spent the entire weekend doing pretty much nothing, except building shelves for the loos and a light box.
Also trying my hand at building a new couch with the carpenter at home, a lot of work but its fun nonetheless,
I did have a shoot on Sunday but the guy backed out coz he thought i was wayyy over priced. Ridiculous i say!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqZ_WiwJntA

Suspended animation, stuck in time, in a vortex of nothingness, spinning slowly as the world around me hangs without a destination. Lightning bolts chase me very existence, shades of blue grey and orange mate to streak the sky. Shadows and light dance to the tune of darkness, beautiful yet painful, i spin helplessly, enjoying every bit of it.

Choices o choices i hate you. With the blackberry broken yet again, i am wondering, should it be another blackberry or should i finally plunge into the iphone? Considering i am such a 'mac guy' its only obvious that iphone should be the next step up, but i am so used to the bb that it might be a wee bit hard.

Then comes the second option, a new tv or a new couch, i wish i could afford both right now but as things stand i cant! So it has to be either one of the two, honestly i need both, a nice  new lazy couch for the lounge and a new flat screen for the bed room.
Arghh 

Honestly i am a wee bit nervous about the upcoming project, its pretty much make or break time, way too much pressure. But to my advantage i am working on something that i pretty much consider my strength, shooting people  and places in their natural environment, using natural light.
10 shots - and i already have two in my head. Need to figure out the other 8

Am still shaken, slightly out of things, guess i need to sync back with reality.

Earthqaukes and me just dont go together, honestly i have a phobia towards earthquakes since 91 and its never really improved.
Just last night delhi was shaken and slightly stirred by one and since then i have just not been right, its quite a shyte state of affairs .

In search for the perfect Monet Sky..

Finally landed the biggest project of my life so far. Bombay trip fully successful.

Forgotten faces at Toto's

Thanks to this government, hens have finally started laying golden eggs and buying onions is as arduous a task as buying diamonds.

Was watching the T 20 match between England and Australia last evening, when i saw the cricketers walking around the stadium collecting money for the flood victims, its pretty sad how things are turning out in Brisbane, i used to have a close friend studying there, glad the person aint there no more.
Hope things get better soon.

I just had to do it, despite telling my self a million times  i had to put my self in harmsway. All while the riots ensued, with teargas shells going off around me, i tried taking some shots of the entire situation.
And just before i could get trigger happy i was chased by cops and almost had my camera snatched from me.
Damn!!, but atleast i tried.

Strange things happen around here, sometimes i wonder about Delhi, a city i used to hate and now i call it home.
Just last night the cops demolished a mosque in Nizammudin, the outcome is just what you can expect, riots in the name of God, people injured, establishments shut et al.
When will people stop killing in the name of God?

There is no greater joy than watching your puppies open their eyes. Finally on day 15 Zulu opened his eyes for a few seconds.
The other two still havent showed any signs of doing so, but i am sure its going to happen in a day or so.

Every now and then you rediscover a song, a song which brings back memories from a once forgotten past.

Sitting by the fire, in the cold of the winter, surrounded by books, the greyness of the clouds brightened by the lyrics.

All so beautiful.

A new week, and back to performing an old role. Gullible as i might be, i am old enough to say no, but like always i guess ill never learn to say no.
Thanks to the shoot on Sunday with the ex boss, i am back to being a human rights lawyer this week. Not too sure if i am going to enjoy this. At a lot of levels i am convinced that i am completely incapable of doing anything which could even remotely be construed as intellectually simulating.
See this is the problem when you live in a flux, a different cape for everyday, human rights lawyer, corporate fuck the other, freelance photographer the next and every now and then an editor for a legal magazine.
Why cant i ever stick to doing one thing? But i guess that aint me, or is it?
Anyways for a change i am sitting in an office after quite a while and honestly it feels all alien to me.

Spent the Sunday shooting a high profile lunch at the ex -boss's posh Bunglow on a cold and grey sunday afternoon.
Pretty decent shots despite the light etc, also landed a few more shoots for March and April.
Anyways work on the hand book goes on, spent a lot of thought on the coffee table book i have been thinking about for a while now, just happy i am penning down what i might want in it. the problem is i am living in Monochrome these days, color just doesnt do it for me ( atleast for now), so am looking and thinking everything in black & white.
The issue then being, that it would be impossible to come up with a 150 varied subjects in monochrome.

Ever since I got back, I haven’t really touched my cameras, I guess it’s much needed, I feel every now and then you need to walk away from what you do, and the break refreshes everything.

Photography like pretty much everything is all about perceptions and imaginations thrown into a cauldron of productivity, which almost definitely needs some time out.

I have instead concentrated on giving classes and putting together a hand-book (for my personal use) of going about things.

Amongst the millions of things I need to improve on, the one thing that’s high on my agenda is shooting macro in bright light. At some levels I guess I have always screwed my DOF with over exposure, a classic example was the red tentacle spider I shot in the dense forests of Nepal. I used two different lenses to shoot it, the 100mm macro, and 24-70mm both f/s2.8.

The results were very similar yet it lacked the punch. I guess its time I hit the drawing board and relook at shooting macro.

This Government makes me feel like I am stuck in the Arsehole of the World !!!

Where is the accountability?

Winter Mayhem

And we thought last year was cold, who were we kidding? This year takes the cake and how, I have never seen Delhi this cold.

Woke up this morning and found my car covered in frost!!

All this is great coz I love the winters, but spare a thought to the homeless, who languish on the streets braving the cold. Sorry yet sad state of affairs, hurts me no ends.

Discovering and loving the Band of Horses, very decent music, especially their album titled " cease to begin",

127 hours, an incredible yet really tough movie to watch...

2011, hmm, I need to get used to it I guess, honestly its been a bang already, back from my long yet rather fruitful trip (have already got orders for 20 prints- phew can pay some more bills).

Though I have hardly slept the past 12 days, especially the last 4, thanks to zara and the zuppies, who insist on keeping me up all night, fun? Maybe not but an experience nonetheless.