After digging out my scanner to lend to someone and testing it to make sure it still worked, I decided to scan a few photos while it was plugged in to my computer. I do not recommend doing something like this when you’ve got lots of worked piled up, because it’s an inevitable time-sink. The ultimate distraction. You get sucked into looking at old photos and the next you know, hours have passed. Yikes! But I can think of much worse ways to spend time.
Anyway, the photo above was taken in Glasgow in the summer of 1999. (That trip was legendary — oh, the stories! In fact, it came up again when I was in England in November. Remind me to tell you in person one day, I can’t write about it on the internet.) My godson Joe was a year old in this picture, and this is him now, more than a dozen years later…
England, November 2011
One thing I noticed while looking at my old point-and-shoot photos is how terrible they are in so many ways: bad composition, poor lighting, out-of-focus, no focal point, colours washed out, the list goes on. Most of them are not even worth scanning, I just like to look at them. But that’s the reason why I let my clients pick the photos they want to print — because people choose photos for emotional value not for technical value, while a photographer can’t help but see the technical merits or mistakes (unless it’s their own photos, in which case the emotional values kick in).
It’s also interesting to see how time marches on for technology, since digital cameras weren’t around when my godson was a baby — everyone was shooting with film cameras. Now everyone is shooting with digital cameras and film is getting rare to the point of near extinction.
I actually had a New Year’s Resolution for 2011, just one: to go on a date. My first thought was that I blew it, I don’t remember any dates, but after some thought I would say it was open to interpretation. My second thought is that if *I* am not aware that it’s a date, then it’s not a date…
Moving right along…
On my way to Montreal for New Year’s, I started digitally jotting down a bunch of notes for a Year in Review for 2011, which got me to thinking about things I’ve been doing in 2011 that I want to continue into 2012… which I promptly forgot about until the other day when I read the same over at Chookooloonks, and there Karen links to Erin doing the same. I’m sure there are others.
There are goals and then there are things you want to maintain, the non-goals, but still rather important — after all, they were once goals, and if you drop them, then they end up in the goals list again. We’ve all said it before, with a pang: “I used to do such-and-such…”
Anyway. I resolve to continue in 2012:
Walking home at least four days per week. I adhered to that average from June 29 until mid-November when I went to England and it became inconsistent due to travel and then a compromised immune system in mid-December and then more travel. Since last week, I’m back to my walking routine. My newest route is 7kms.
Reserving the word ‘awesome’ for when it truly is, which is not every other sentence.
Not owning a TV, microwave, coffee pot, or dishwasher. Why not? Because it means I cook instead of nuke, drink less coffee, take a time-out to hand-wash dishes and listen to the news instead of reading it, and if I owned a TV I would watch it mindlessly. It’s also the same reason my futon couch is never in a couch position. My apartment only has beds. I’m much more productive this way.
Keeping up the trip average. (At least one overnight stay is the criteria of a trip.) Until last year I maintained an annual trip average of 12-14, and in 2011 I dipped slightly below with 11 trips. (I just counted 15 trips in 2010, so maybe I should adjust that average.) The hardest part was working every single day from September 6 to November 15 without a break and feeling like I was losing my mind, reaching nearly the end of the year with only seven trips, but then I caught up by going on four in six weeks. I know some people think this trip average is crazy, but it was never a conscious goal. These numbers became the average over the course of years and knowing what keeps me happy and motivated and inspired. Travel (the process, not just the destination) plays a huge role in my worldview and perspective on life. I would never give that up completely, not even for a photography business. There are currently 79 photo albums in my travel collection on Flickr.
Meeting new folk in new places. Travelling solo means I make conversation with the ordinary citizen on the street, on the bus, waiting in line somewhere, and it’s no big deal. It opens up a cultural exchange, without an agenda.
Meeting new folk in my own city. I’ve done pretty well last year to maintain a social life, considering I have two jobs. Still, I meet new people all the time at weddings, events, through volunteering, circles of friends, shooting assistants, other photographers, scouting locations, with clients, patients, musicians, you name it. Sometimes it all becomes a blur, so I review my Toronto collection in Flickr (currently 101 photo sets), to remind myself that yes, I didn’t just work!
Keeping my cat healthy and happy. I’m down to one pet now, after a horrible 2011 of losing Beano and having both cats go through the discomfort and expense of veterinary treatments. We were at the clinic far too much last year. Don’t ask me how much I spent. Now that Xena’s on daily heart meds and only has five teeth left, hopefully she (we) will sail through 2012 without seeing the vet.
Driving cancer patients for the Canadian Cancer Society. Even though I don’t like waking up early, I’ll do it for patients. They are always very grateful.
Keeping up my four websites. Most people don’t have a website, but I have four under my name (actually, there’s a fifth but it’s kind of a portal to the others and I don’t count the Tumblr), and even with major time constraints I have somehow managed to keep them all updated, although one is rather static and informational (ImageLegacy.com), and two are photoblogs (gailatlarge.net and ImageNation). But gailatlarge.com will be 10 years old this year, of which I am most proud because I never thought I would be able to maintain it this long! I’m also webmaster for another two websites, one for income and the other for charity. The capitalism and socialism balance each other out nicely, ha. I would link to the former but I have to revamp the site (I just found out today there’s new management). Believe me, even *I* don’t know how I manage to maintain SIX WEBSITES.
Maintaining my sanity. It was a bit touch-and-go at times but I managed not to lose it in 2011, let’s keep it that way for 2012.
I picked up my car from the shop this evening, where the mechanics are Portuguese. To my surprise, the grumpy old guy emerged from the back of the shop with a bottle of wine and wished me a merry Christmas.
He: “Do you like Portuguese wine?” Me: “Um, I don’t know. But I’ll try it and let you know.” He: “Now you’re in training… enjoy our wine.”
I think it’s hilarious that the mechanics also have their own wine label.
This is my third bottle of gifted wine in a week, and I have no plans to drink any of them, just re-gift them to other people.
… is over for now. I’ve been living in Toronto for nearly six years and hadn’t found a single stylist who uses this technique which I find works best for my hair, so I gave up asking.
Recently, a new salon opened up in my neighbourhood and I thought I’d try again. I went in last week to inquire and found only one person uses a straight blade (of course, he would be the most expensive), so I got it done today. It usually takes a week after a cut for my hair to calm down again — until then maybe I’ll wear a hat — and then we’ll see how it behaves.
I was digging around for something and came across my stash of documents, which got me thinking of the travel meme I did last week, which got me to dig out my passports. You know how it goes.
Some mugshots over the years, beginning with the first one from the Philippines (with the name I stopped using after leaving Winnipeg), which I only have a photocopy of because (if I recall correctly), I left it at my friend’s house in Germany way back in 1994 and that was the end of the trail. They moved out of that house in Leverkusen to their weekend house in Aachen when my friend’s mum fell off a horse, had a stroke, and his dad took early retirement to take care of her. I lost contact with my friend while he was preoccupied with his PhD in veterinary science. Maybe one day he’ll find this blog and tell me he found my childhood passport amongst his stuff! (The internet’s good for nostalgia.)
Maybe you can still make out that it’s me. In my brother’s passport, he is wearing an identical outfit. We look like little matching prisoners. My dad wrote that my occupation was a minor. Let me tell you, being a minor is tough work. So is writing out my place of birth.
If you ever saw my birth certificate from the Philippines, you would think I was at least a hundred years old. It looks like it belongs in a museum, with old-fashioned typeface on onion skin paper. I’m surprised it hasn’t disintegrated yet. For my parents’ race, they are both listed as “Brown”. I’m not kidding! What on earth is the “Brown” race? Box #23 is “Legitimate” Yes or No. The entire back of the birth certificate is “Affadavit To Be Accomplished In Case Of An Illegitimate Child”. One day I’ll scan it, for now I’m just shaking my head.
my first passport
So here we have all the passports since then, the latest one expiring next year. The first one looks like I just came from a squash match, but I probably did — I played squash almost every day at work. Looks like 1997 was the only time I paid attention to my hair. Apparently my eyebrows were attacked by a pair of tweezers in 2002 and I probably hadn’t had a haircut in over a year. By 2007 new passport regs had kicked in and as a nation we slid back to photo technology circa 1999. Note the funky new maple leaf by the words ‘passport’, though.
The current one also has a really fake-looking picture, ironically, despite all the newfangled security measures — including the one where the passport holder is not allowed to smile.
Personally, I like starting a fresh book every five years and renewing my picture. After all, my address has changed with every passport, but my next passport will be the very first one with the same address as the previous. Amazing!
Below is an old International Driver’s License, which I’ve only ever used once when some young (and crazy) Italians demanded I show it after my rental car bumper touched their bumper in Geneva and they wanted to make a claim against my insurance company. They wouldn’t accept that my rental car was covered under fleet insurance rather than an individual policy number and took it upon themselves to write down every single number of every single document I had. My theory is that one of them borrowed her mum’s car without asking, went joyriding in Switzerland with a couple of friends and now had to explain why there was a chip in the bumper paint. Meanwhile, every 14th car in Geneva has a side mirror held together by tape, scratches on the door or a dented bumper. (In Italy that would be every other car.)
international driver's license and citizenship card
The photo below the International Driver’s License photo is my citizenship card. I had this picture taken ducking inside during a snowstorm and it was so blustery my hair was out of control. I even look like I have a widow’s peak. Of course, this would be the picture for a card that doesn’t expire, so I’m stuck with it. Typical.
I also had to wait three months for the appointment to get the citizenship certificate renewed, and I was going to make that appointment by hell or high water! Consequently, I guard it even more closely than my passport since it is the ONLY document that shows I’m a Canadian citizen if my passport ever gets lost or stolen. I can’t get another passport without it. Two cards previous to this one was replaced in Calgary in 1991, where I had to borrow my friend’s car to drive from Banff to take the oath of citizenship again! Long story…
A: Age you went on your first international trip: 2 years old, when my family moved to Canada.
B: Best (foreign) beer you’ve had and where: I used to drink really dark English ale, the darker the better. Newcastle Brown sort of dark. But then I discovered the local versions of the wheat/white beers like Hoegaarden from The Netherlands and Germany’s Hefeweisen. Belgium has witbier. I like the fruity, summer beers — more refreshing.
Beer Bistro, Toronto
C: Cuisine (favorite): It’s probably a tie between Thai and Indian, but I love sushi, too.
D: Destinations, favorite, least favorite and why: Favourite — I am pretty fond of Switzerland, visually and gastronomically. Say what you will, the whole country is one big postcard. You could say the same for New Zealand, too, although they have more variety of climate. Least favourite — ?
Gandria, on Lake Lugano, Switzerland
E: Event you experienced abroad that made you say “wow”: Everyone knows about Oktoberfest, but “Silvester” (New Year) in Germany is pretty crazy! Especially along the Reeperbahn in Hamburg, the city’s red light district. But if you’re at all spooked by large-scale fireworks, I highly recommend you do not go.
F: Favorite mode of transportation: I love to mix my modes of transportation — too long on anything makes me restless. I never get motion sickness, which helps, so bus, train, boat, motorcycle, taxi, camel, anything goes. I’ve gone horseback riding a bunch of times, but I’m a little scared of horses.
G: Greatest feeling while traveling: when people make an assumption about where I’m from by how I look, and I completely shock them when I open my mouth and speak. Canada is an immigrant country, and many people either forget that or simply aren’t aware. I believe I’m a good ambassador for Canada, however, and am always looking for opportunities to up-end stereotypes and racial biases.
H: Hottest place you’ve traveled to: for both dry heat and humid heat, Australia. I prefer dry heat, though, six months in the tropical north of Queensland sapped my energy.
I: Incredible service you’ve experienced and where: I don’t actually like service, I am a self-serve sort of person. I’ve had good service everywhere, maybe it’s because people who look like me are usually the ones serving.
South Simcoe Railway
J: Journey that took the longest: it probably was not the longest single trip, but fourth-class rail in Thailand from the Malaysian border to Bangkok was overnight and took FOREVER. There is no guaranteed seating, and the toilet is literally a hole in the train floor. There was lots of mekong whiskey-fuelled drunken singing, chickens, and taking turns sleeping and standing because there were more people than seats most of the time. I don’t think fourth-class rail even exists anymore on Thai trains?
K: Keepsake from your travels: I steal airline blankets, ssshhhhh… (I use them for picnics and outdoor shoots!) Pictures are my only keepsake, and even then I have big gaping holes of time with no photos at all because I didn’t own a camera. I try and find local music to bring home, too, CDs with covers I can’t read. Music is universal.
L: Let-down sight, why and where: I remember seeing the Sydney Opera House for the first time. It was smaller than I’d expected (see how postcards can be so distorted?), and the sails didn’t look white to me. It’s the most photographed thing in the harbour, but I lost interest right away.
M: Moment where you fell in love with travel: I can’t remember a time when I chose to stay at home when I had the means (and even times when I didn’t), so I would say always.
Swiss Guard at the Vatican
N: Nicest hotel you’ve stayed in: hard to say, but the best hotel BED I’ve ever experienced was a weekend at the Grand Hyatt New York, at Grand Central Station. It was like sleeping on a cloud. I wanted to take that bed home with me!
O: Obsession—what are you obsessed with taking pictures of while traveling?: Food, street scenes (when I’m feeling brave), children and the elderly.
P: Passport stamps, how many and from where?: I’m nearly at the end of my fourth passport (since 18), and I don’t know if I can count them all. Some countries I’ve been to five times (Germany), four times (Netherlands), lots of transit-type trips, and one trip in 2003 involved 8 different airports around Europe.
Q: Quirkiest attraction you’ve visited and where: I was travelling with this English bloke north through Australia, and he managed to convince me to detour with him to find The Pub With No Beer. It was literally in the middle of nowhere (like many things in Australia are), and it took ages to get there. I probably shouldn’t tell you this but The Pub With No Beer is a lie: they have beer.
S: Splurge; something you have no problem forking over money for while traveling: the most amount of money I’ve spent at any one time on goods was in 2007 when I had two leather jackets custom made in Fez, Morocco.
T: Touristy thing you’ve done: dress up in traditional clothing and pose for a cheesy photo, in Volendam:
(Volendam) a German, a Canadian, a Dutchie, and an Englishwoman walk into a bar...
U: Unforgettable travel memory: some near-death experiences involving the ocean (before I taught myself how to tread water), river surfing on the Kawarau River in Queenstown, NZ, on a ferry boat racing to Mersing (Malaysia) because there was a man on board bleeding to death who needed to get to the hospital, the shared taxi racing to Malaka for Chinese New Year (we all thought we would perish), and other adrenaline-fuelled events like bungy jumping over the rainforest in Australia. I have a pretty good memory for moments where I felt like I was in danger!
V: Visas, how many and for where?: with a Canadian passport there aren’t many places that require visas, but my old passports have visas from Thailand, Australia, and other places. The most colourful one is from Thailand.
W: Wine, best glass of wine while traveling and where?: I don’t drink wine anymore, but I still love sangria, especially homemade with Santa Rita merlot (from Chile).
Y: Years spent traveling?: After moving to Canada, I travelled with my parents to the Philippines once but mostly regular trips to the USA. I’ve been travelling solo since I was 18. I’ve only travelled with a companion internationally on three occasions in 21+ years (Stuart, Cetin, and Tyrone).
Z: Zealous sports fans and where?: If you’re at all familiar with the sectarianism in Glasgow (Celtics vs. Rangers football clubs), it’s only a little less intense in Edinburgh, where I sat in the Protestant section wearing the “wrong” colour, i.e., something that had a bit of green on it. (Protestant colours are mostly blue and also orange.) They asked me to take off my shirt but I turned it inside-out instead.
In a few hours I’m getting on a plane, but this isn’t going to be a couchsurfing trip, or anything like my birthday trips where I meet tons of new people, sightsee, and zoom around on trains, planes, and automobiles from one city to another. I don’t even care what the weather will be like, or what we’ll eat. I’m going to visit my best friend of nearly 19 years, in England, hang out with her family, and it’s going to be a homecoming of sorts.
I was thinking all day today of our long, storied history filled with adventures, highs and lows and everything in-between. It’s enough to fill a book or two, and we’re not yet 40. We met in Edinburgh shortly after I arrived in London from Bangkok in February 1993. I was 20 and Lucy had just turned 18. I was looking all over my Flickr albums for photos of us back then, in those days when we wore mini-skirts and smoked cigarettes and watched way too much Beavis and Butthead on MTV Europe, but I have none scanned… they’re all still on film, and maybe that’s a good thing!
Lucy knows me better than anyone. She is the only person to have attended both of my weddings in Scotland (1993) and the USA (2005). I was in England for her wedding in 2004, drinking with the groom’s Belfast crew and videotaping them pranking the Best Man, who was fast asleep in his chair.
Amsterdam balcony
Lucy’s put up with all kinds of wackiness from me over the years, like the time we met up in Amsterdam in 1999 (above), after we’d been out all night and I decided to go roaming the streets in search of food at 4am and returning at dawn while she was sleeping. Or the time we met up in London a few months later when, after a full evening of dinner and wine, I decided to go to the hotel lobby for cigarettes and a friend of one of the hotel staff offered to take me to the petrol station to buy some… he then took me on an impromptu tour of the entire city for the next six or seven hours, showing me each of the nine (?) bridges that cross the Thames and I arrived back at the hotel at dawn, when Lucy woke up. I don’t think much surprises her anymore when it comes to me and my randomosity.
Over the years, our other reunion spots have included Brighton, Bergamo (Italy), Vancouver (we also did a side trip to Las Vegas), Glasgow, and Pennsylvania, with lots of reunions in London.
I moved back to Canada in 1995 after two years in the UK and we’ve had reunions in 1997, 1998, 1999, then a gap until 2002, where there was a reunion followed by an Almost Reunion. I was in Switzerland in 2002 and Lucy had a ticket to meet me in Geneva (we’d met up in London the week before), but she lost her passport the night before the flight. I had rented a car to tour around Switzerland and drove all the way from where I was staying with a friend in Neuchatel to pick up Lucy and my German friend Berit at Geneva Airport. Instead, Lucy couldn’t fly and I had to drive up to Zurich, where Berit decided to meet me at the last minute by train from her company function in Munich instead of flying to Geneva. What a malarkey!
2003 was Italy, 2004 was Lucy’s wedding in England, 2005 was my wedding in Pennsylvania, and 2006 was a really heartbreaking reunion in England, after David’s passing. The purpose of that trip was to help Berit put together her son’s memorial at Hamburg Airport. It was a tough trip. November 2007 was our last reunion, also in London, when I was enroute to Morocco.
It’s now four years later and this is the longest I’ve ever gone without a reunion with Lucy since we first met in 1993, when we were inseparable. Since then I’ve started a photography business that keeps me very busy and she’s had two babies I have yet to meet, so this trip will be happily filled with playtime and catching up on each other’s life. And in the meantime this blog will be inundated with baby and toddler faces… it’ll also be my first time-out from work since September 5 and I can’t wait!
I had to rescue my weekend from the jaws of work yesterday; Saturday was completely consumed by editing. I had hoped to make it to a couple of house parties on Saturday afternoon and evening, but alas, I was still editing at 10pm and running out of steam. I finally finished the job around 4am. It was such a relief to wake up a few hours later for brunch and know I could now move on to editing something else! (And now you know why I posted those graphs yesterday.)
After brunch I had to run a few errands around town and the last stop was the Distillery District to pick up prints from the lab. While I was there, I scouted the Thompson Landry Gallery Cooperage, where I’ll be shooting a wedding in the spring. It struck me as absurd that I’ve been to the Distillery District countless times and that was my only first time to visit the gallery.
Distillery District
Thompson Landry Gallery
Inside the Cooperage is A Taste of Quebec, which is exactly what it sounds like: a huge, huge temptation to buy and eat everything in sight. If you’ve been to Quebec, you’ll know what I’m talking about — they take food seriously in la belle province and when I’m there I’m always thinking about what I’ll eat next, even while I’m eating. I had a tough time leaving the cooperage without buying anything. I got as far as picking up jars and it took major willpower to put them back down again and step away from the cheese fridge and samples of sugar pie.
About the top photo: the quality is even worse than the other mobile phone pictures because it’s the front-facing camera on the Android, which has a lower pixel count than the rear camera. I was taking my photo to send to Tourism Toronto so they’ll donate money to the Starlight Children’s Foundation of Canada. I checked to see if my pic was posted, but the one with the pooch is hard to beat for photo of the week If you’re in the Distillery District, go look for the snow creature by the giant spider-like thing… for lack of better directions.
I’m in Heavy-Duty Editing Mode but had to duck out at 2pm to give my eyes a break from the computer screen. My neighbourhood (Roncesvalles Village) is a lovely place to escape to on the weekends, especially a sunny autumn afternoon. I had a bite at my local diner and fetched an espresso to go at my local coffee bar, who’s participating in Movember and making moustache-shaped cookies to raise money for it. I had to get one — cookies are my dessert weakness — and it sure didn’t last long. But it was very tasty!
autumn gold in my neighbourhood
These next two photos are from yesterday. I’m excited for this weekend — I got to see one friend from Vancouver last night, I see more friends tonight at a games night, then more friends at a late-night housewarming, then another Vancouver friend in town tomorrow, then interviewing a photo assistant tomorrow evening. It makes working the rest of the weekend much more palatable.
My new Moo cards arrived yesterday. Yes, I already have fancy Moo business cards, but I do like the QR code and I got these for free after setting up a profile at about.me — I only paid for shipping because I left the Moo branding intact. But people always ask where I got the cards, anyway, so I don’t mind. Also, as you can see, the branding is small. I plan to use these cards for casual purposes, since I meet new people all the time and they’re reluctant to deplete my stock of business cards. These cards have all the same information, but the QR code leads to my about.me profile and is more personal than professional.
The photo is from one of my Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome biplane rides over the Hudson River in upstate New York:
flying over the Hudson River in a 1925 New Standard biplane
In other news, if you saw a pink hunchback walking in a westerly direction from downtown in the rain this evening, that was me.
hunchback in pink plastic
“Pink?” you say? Yes, I decided to be more prepared than last week when I walked home wearing my rain jacket, which couldn’t cover both me AND my backpack so I was half-drenched. Today I was sporting one of these pink Breast Cancer Foundation tent-like things (I’m only tolerating the colour because it’s for charity!), which turned me into an oddly-shaped pink plastic blob with feet, but at least I had complete coverage, backpack and all, and drivers noticed me at the intersections!
If you’re in the Distillery District, go look for the snow creature by the giant spider-like thing… for lack of better directions.
