Sunset
by: Nitin Sawhney :)And here is the rest of it.
Boy Meets Gurl
Say hi! to boy :) or Zulhelmi (not sure about the spelling) a friend of mine from the GMI days. Met him in Augsburg, at a Raya gathering organized for MARA students in Germany. A little bit about the event, it was held at the FH Augsburg's cafeteria by the good Malaysian students there - have to say, me first time being in their FH, it was beautiful - honestly! Especially now during Autumn, with the yellow/red leaves all over the places. Plus, they even have a river flowing through the FH. Argh! what a great FH with multiple choice of places for me take pictures :) The person who designed the place must be a really artistic one.
With all the great spots for a photoshoot that FH Augsburg has to offer - i really can't afford to miss the opportunity - i mean, it has been only what, twice, the number on times i came to Augsburg in 2 years plus? Definitely not planning to wait for the next time to come. Since boy was a photographer himself, it didn't took a lot to convince him to stand in front of the camera :) and while i was at it, i even dragged his fiancee to join in the fun :) but most the time, it was boy who was posing for me :)
Tried doing some engagement style photography, not sure if i achieved what i want, but i would say, i most definitely improved a little in a few corners - if not in the shooting skill, then in the PP section :)
I began by shooting a few portrait shots of boy and then,later continued taking some shots of them as a couple :) wanted to take some portrait shots of his fiancee too, but she was kinda, hurm, let say, busy posing for another 'photographer' who also around at the time :)
That's all, eight pieces all together, nothing grand,nothing much, but i am kinda excited, cause it seems like, i am probably deviating a little from my normal way of photographing people, either that or i am simply excited cause i finally get to take some serious pictures in weeks :)
Raya
A bit late into the party, but i guess, it's better late than never :) Just wanna share some raya pics that i took while in Malaysia. There were suppose to be two parts to this post. First chapter for the time i celebrated raya with the family on my father's side in Seremban and Part Deux for the pics i took while celebrating raya with my family on my mother's side in Kedah. But unfortunately, there wasn't much celebration mood in the pics i took during my time in Kedah - probably because, the climax of Aidilfitri is indeed on the first day of it - and the days that follow after that, the celebration mood declines exponentially (i celebrated first day of Aidilfitri in Seremban)
Coming from a multiracial country, it shouldn't be much of a surprise, if i am myself in fact from a multiracial family :) My mom is of Chinese plus Malay descend and my father, he is a Malayalee Muslim, or Indian in General :) That may explain why i may look different from other members of my family, but don't be fooled :) that's just the appearance, optical illusion if you may. I am just as chinese, just as malay and just as Malayalee as any members of my family :)
Now that you guys have been briefly educated about my family, it's time to get to know some of them :) All the shots in this post were taken in Seremban, so you are only seeing my father's side of the big family :)
As any other average Muslim family that i know, we also kicked off the first day of Raya (after completing the Aidilfitri Prayer of course) with the children asking forgiveness from their parents. Being in my parents house, i have to start first, asking my parents to forgive all the sins i have made to them the past year and promise to be a better person in the future (such a good boy i am) - then it was followed by my brother and little sis.
The atmosphere during that short period of time, was intensely emotional - not that i cried or anything, though both of my mom and little sis did shed a few drops of tears - but emotional nonetheless. Through the simple act of being on your knees, holding your parents hands and trying to be as honest as possible when you are asking for their forgiveness - makes you appreciate for having a family. Not everyone have the privilege being embraced in a family, moreover to still being able to hold and kiss their parents hands :) A stone age ritual for some, but a priceless one for me.
After me and my siblings were done, came one of my cousins, who was somehow 'lost' in my house. He, after seeing what my siblings and i did, decided join us, and repeated the same thing, except he was smiling all along :) funny little guy
As soon as we were finished at our home, the all of us immediately drove to my granny's house. There i met the remainder of my family - all the uncles,aunts and long-time-no-see cousins :) not forgetting my grandma too :)
We ate, we talked, served food to all of the invited guess - it was fun, especially the food part. I can't tell you how much i enjoyed the food, it was delicious. The enjoyment i had was being catalyzed even further by the fact that it has been almost a whole year since i last devoured perfectly cooked Indian dishes. Was too busy eating, totally forgot where i left my camera, plus my hand were, well, occupied :) so, no pics of the foods, sorry.
In the picture above, that's Shania, my 7 years old cousin sister, and below here is her 1 years old little sis :)
in the two double pics below, the first is Nurul and below her, is her elder brother, Rahul
In between time that i had a plate full of food in front of me, i will give my stomach a rest and snaps some pics - all the little kids you see in here, they are all my cousins, small little devils :) My father is the eldest son, so, it make sense that his children are the oldest, biggest, strongest and fairest among them all :) That leaves only the 'Cutest' title to be shared among the others, hehe.
above are my bro, my little cousin sister and my father, below are my aunt and her husband :)
And finally, a picture of the whole family :) it is not every year that we get a chance to gather like this, thank God that i had and opportunity to capture it :)
Awesomeness, i guess that would be all. Before i stop and make myself a cup of latte caramel, i just wanna take this opportunity to wish all of the Muslim that i know or reading this entry right now, a belated Happy Hari Raya Aidilfitri :) raya pon de belated skrg :)
My Mom's Birthday
Last friday was my mom's birthday, and it has been a family tradition to celebrate one's birthday during midnight the day before. Since it was a rare occasion that we, one whole family get to celebrate birthdays together, my father thought it would be a good idea to make it a little out of the ordinary (for us at least).
So, we went to have supper (midnight remember) at our favourite hotel, it was a buffet - but the food was not very hotel material in my opinion, it is understandable though, because there weren't a lot of crowd at the place. That particular night, we were the only ones there for the buffet, not sure how the hotel could make any profit from the supper buffet. Anyhow, i did enjoy the mutton/beef curry and teh tarik in a tank.
Because there weren't much crowd around, i wasn't too shy to take out my cam and snap some family photos. I have to say, my little sis was the one excited the most to see the camera. So we took turn to camwhore during the time span we were there. The pics turned out to be better than i would expect, despite the whole place being lit only by some breed of tungsten light, really yellow and dim.
In the picture above is my mom and brother and below is my mom with my father :)
Yes, resemblance wise, i am more like my mom and my other two sibling are like my father - owh that reminds me, i haven't introduce my little sis yet, there she is below, cuddling me at my neck while i am checking out the chick at the front desk (kidding)
Don't be fooled by the serious face put on by my brother, he is anything but serious - always know how to make me laugh. Anyway, after the supper at the hotel, we went back to our home sweet home and had our mom blew up some candles, cut the cake and feed it to all of us :) Due to the occasion being in our house, most of the pics were personal in nature, so i couldn't possibly show all of them to you guys, except the the few below, which managed to pass my super strict censorship :p
That's my bro again, fooling around with the cake, before we present it to our mom, told ya he wasn't the serious type :)
And that's the super delicious cheese cake, official cake of the family - there weren't any typos, we call our mom 'mak rose' :) legend has it that i came up with the name - can't really confirm that. I really wish i could share more of the pics, but i really can't, restricted for family members only :)
These were probably, the best pics i took during my 6 weeks stay in Malaysia. Most probably due to its sentimental value :)
Welcome Back to Me
Hello everybahdy! :) (my little sis likes to say that). It's been quite a while since i last updated. Not that i have lost interest in photography or gave up the 'tiring' job of updating the blog. I was just busy spending my summer holidays in Malaysia with my family. This summer break was super special than normal, because i got to spent a whole month fasting with my family and on top of that, my family and i got to celebrate hari raya aidilfitri as whole for the first time in 3 years. Super awesome, super fun and i was so super happy, that i gained a few kilograms on the way :) Look kinda plump right now to be honest.
So, being in Malaysia for almost 6 weeks, i have quite a few stories/pictures to share, not a lot though, i was spending most of my time in my parents house - but one could expect around 3 new entries in the coming days, not including this one :)
For your info, i just arrived in Aalen about 13 hours ago, after a mixed feeling +-26 hours journey from Kuala Lumpur - 13 hours in plane, 10 hours transit time in bahrain & 3 hours in the train. Why mixed? well, it was pretty sad to leave my family yet again - after spending such a good time together, could still hear the sound of their tears lingering my ears, sob3x.
But then, felt happy for a while, cause, for some unknown reason(more like didn't bother to know), my flight got promoted to business class for the kuala lumpur-bahrain journey (wished it was for the whole journey). it's my first time flying in business class. So, what would u guess a guy, first time being in a business class with a camera in his hand luggage,would do? hurm.
Because it was my first time, i tried to document the experience a little - don't really know when will the next time be, if there will be any next time to get an opportunity like that again :). While i wanted to capture the experience, i also didn't want to appear like some kampung boy - u know, one needs to keep his cool :)
Therefore, i decided to only take pictures of the food, since food could portray levels of luxury pretty well in my opinion. For example, in the economy class, we normal people, will have our main course served in an aluminum pack - while people in the business class seems to enjoy their food on a heavy clay plates :). You get the picture. So, please allow me to start with the appetizers :)
I ordered mushroom soup, but kinda got a piece of satay as well, probably a complimentary of the house. The mushroom soup was kinda weird, cause it had french beans in it as well (the floating green things) - still, it was yummy nonetheless.
Next, for the entree, i got a beef tenderloin in black peppercorn sauce (probably my first time savouring a beef tenderloin, that piece of meat ain't cheap i tell ya)
Then, for dessert, i had mixed fruits as well as pineapple pie - the pie, to describe it in words, was a pineapple jam filled pastry topped with custard sugar (i am sure there is a different name for it, but it's still basically just a lump of sugar). highly NOT recommended for diabetes patients.
After that, about one and a half hour before the plane landed in bahrain, i also ate a turkey sandwich, but unfortunately, didn't take any shots of it, was eating in the dark.
There you go, a few pics of the food from the business class, which hopefully could propagate the luxurious feeling of flying in one. As you can see in couple of the pics, i only had water and juice for drinks - but for the non-Muslims, they were also offered champagne and wine. And, there were a couple who asked for ice cream, and they got two small tubes of Häagen Dazs - i don't think i even got ice cream in the economy class, though you could probably ask for it :)
