Shady Enbashi Photoblog

Blog Has Moved

2009-11-05T17:41:00.003+04:00

I am not updating this blog anymore, all posts will remain though.

The new blog URL is: http://juxtapoza.com/blog

WOMAD '09

2009-05-09T23:13:00.008+04:00

A couple of weeks ago WOMAD took a place in Abu Dhabi, I put some effort to make it and to meet up a couple of my good friends. . and it was so damn worth it..

We were in the front line, and there was this dude between us and the stage.. he did not look like a security guard nor like an organizer.. he was just put there to confuse people maybe?

Kamal Musallam, a Jordanian guitarist based in Dubai, and his band were the first to launch the festival (I guess?) .. I arrived in the middle of their show. They had a local band featured with them, it's called Sokoor Al Magabeel. Both bands mixed some nice music actually.. I found this rehearsal clip on youtube. Checkout it out ;)

nice juxtaposition by a young lady who was standing next to me..

he got really excited through the show..

The only okay frame I managed to get of Kamal Musallam.. not too bad I guess for it was my first time to shoot in a concert.. and i only had my 50mm lens, and no flash.

and I wasn't as lucky as some who got media access.. closer to the stage.

The show was a good warm up.. for the real thing next. Souad Massi, and if you don't know who Souad Massi is then go and do your homework (I must admit I did not know about her until shortly before the festival). We were in the front line when she first came out for the setup..

along with her band..

and then she was presented to kick off her show..

The music.. the performance.. the everything.. was awesome..

he played some fantastic tunes too..

but our dude here had to keep reminding us he is around..

Souad got so much into her music she managed to turn his head..

and the chaps met Souad and took typical fans photos with her too ;)

she is someone worth being a fan of.. for real

we weren't that close to each other physically

Across Europa

2009-04-22T17:29:00.029+04:00

back to Bochum.. with my 5D this time, quite fascinating to travel with this fullframe monster.. too bulky for street photography, but a tool is a tool..

We travelled last month like mad between Germany, Italy, Slovenia and Holland with a total of 11 cities visited in three weeks.. There is over 150 photos in this post, which is not quite user friendly but its the only way to cover most of the trip with not too boring photos.. I hope?

I was in Bochum last November, nothing much has changed since then, except there was no snow this time: [link]

it was still cold despite the lack of snow..

after a couple of days, we flew to north-eastern Italy. Duino was our first stop for four nights in a cosy hotel with a nice view of the Adriatic.

the main piazza of Dunio has nothing but the United World College (right) and bus stop in front our favorite dining place, the Mickey Mouse bar (left).

and then to Grado..

Diving Highly Dangerous in Grado..

knock knock..

WALL-E?

a typical touristy staged photo of nice young lady..

and then back to Duino..

a bench, a flipped boat and a cat starring at me

and a photo of me that i like since a long time..

the following photos are of sunset on the Adriatic in Dunio.. not a single shot was put through post processing in photoshop or any other editor.. pure raw shots from the camera. It's all about capturing the right moment.

i think this was in Monfalcone..

and then to Trieste..

too much map reading..

Italian pigeons are real slackers.. they walk down the stairs instead of flying..

Trieste had a Roman Theatre too

some street photos in Trieste.. photos of people..

Italian laundry..

inside El tram de Opcina..

funky italian graffiti..

he shared the seat with us, didn't speak any english but he was very young in the heart despite the look.. he is a grandfather of a few.. he offered us some sugar-free caramel candies..

The Matrix..

ridiculous number of scooters.. i was told in the hotel renting scooters in there is very difficult.. how ironic

this is how you should name your business to attract attention these days..

very italian..

mister james joyce..

and more scooters..

I think these signs were too many to read..

a view from the Rilke path in Dunio.. I wished we discovered this place earlier than our last evening.. it was heavenly..

and this is how my sigma 10-20mm lens spool photos on a 5D full frame body.. funny

we visited "tetka" Gordana, Deni's aunt, and her lovely family in Slovenia.. this railway was the separator between Italy and Slovenia.. we technically walked from Italy to Slovenia.

we went for a short walk and i saw this chainsaw, the first thing came to my mind seeing this whilst being in Slovenia was the movie Hostel.. and human body parts ;)

and slovenian laundry..

some uber wicked sculpture..

Penelope was there too..

a foreign object got stuck in his eye..

in Luka and Mirko's school..

bird view of the Solkan Bridge

bungee jumping must be a fantastic experience off this bridge..

it was really nice to spend time in Nova Gorica with tetka and her family.. next we had to take a train from Gorizia..

to Quarto d'Altino.. our next destination..

and there was our next hotel.. 20minutes outside Venice

Venezia-Mestre station.. the most crowded station i've ever stopped at in europe..

and here comes Venice, a city like no other.. a floating collective masterpiece of art..

it's fascinating how are transportation means are water based in this city.. even the cops float..

we arrived to Venice around 4pm the first day, it was a bit late so we decided to take the vaporetto (water bus) all the way to San Marco square.. a fantastic cruise in the main converted S shaped canal of the city, upon arrival we entered the maze of narrow paths behind the main piazza until we stopped at one of the restaurant to grab a bite.. we had this sign next to our table, it was a but confusing.. and there were no waitresses

and then it got too late.. the street scenes were saying so..

and back to the hotel stopping by Venezia-Mestre station once again..

the next morning, we decided to "catch the day from its beginning" so we arrived to Venice around 9am. and we decided to go San Marco square again.. walking this time tho..

Venetian laundry..

a venetian point of view

its funny how boats are parked underneath houses, just like cars anywhere else..

strawberries weren't very expensive.. unlike everything else in this city..

we found a huge antique and second hand market whilst walking thro the city.. they had awesome stuff.. we bought a lot of cool junk from these two nice folks..

this old man was sitting and the doorsteps of some hospital building (yes, this was a hospital and not some church or museum) and was reading whatever he was reading for over an hour..

and the we found the most beautiful bookstore in the world..

seemed to me more like a military walk..

needless to say the quantity of pizza we had in those days..

and even in Venice, there must be some irish pub.. with some dude smoking at the door with pine in his hand..

from san marco bell tower..

San Mark's Basilica.. wanted to enter this place but the queue was too long.. and at end of the day, you can't do and see everything in Venice in less than two days..

wearing the tourist hat.. feeding pigeons in the square.. and having my photo taken too - what an experience..wohoo!

Venetian masks..

and the last scene of San Marco square.. San Marco and San Teodoro Columns

a postcard-style Venice shot..

Venice was our last stop in Italy, the next day we had to take a train to Monflacone and a taxi to the airport from there.. Deni wanted to purchase the tickets and use her rusty italian.. she manged to throw out the first line in italian asking for tickets to Monflacone, and when the officer asked her something back, she unconsciously answered in German.. the dude managed to respond in German which was very confusing for Deni so she responded in English.. you can see it wasn't so much fun for her ;)

back to gloomy Bochum.. already missed the sun from our first day back..

it must've been very tempting..

in our favorite glass cafe downtown.. their chicken and spinach dish was very good. Deni.. hungry..waiting..

a couple of days later, we took the train to our next destination.. Amsterdam

we spent four days in one of my favorite cities in the world.. the trip was a very heavy dose of pure art starting with Rembrandt's house..

this is where the masterpieces were born..

he was quite a collector..

part of the house museum.. it was a good warm up to visit the house before spending over three hours at the Rijksmuseum the next day.. The Night Watch might have been the most famous drawing of Rembrandt, but both the Jewish Pride and Jurmaia paintings were somehow more appealing to my taste.. the museum is highly recommended (duh) and never estimate the audio guide in such places..

trying out iso3200 late at night.. low street light, actually i think this shot is over exposed, i was amazed by the focusing in low light..

and we discovered La Place restaurant just off Spui stop in Amsterdam.. it became our destination for breakfast, lunch and dinner.. and we always preferred the just under street level seating next to the window.. the following street photos were all taken from the same spot inside the restaurant..

and then i turned the camera to capture a bored face..

which pretended to be perky for a moment

we visited Richard, my friend and colleague, and his family in their hometown Bodegraven.. it was nice to meet them all again and we all had some typical dutch dinner prepared by Els, Richard's wife after we went for a walk in typical dutch countryside.. and in one of the fields we met this little puppy which was looking for some attention..

it was quite thrilling to see photos of Luuk, Richard's son, a couple of months earlier skating on this lake!

We went back to Amsterdam early evening.. it was that night when Scotland and Hollands national football teams had their game which resulted in the dutch winning 3-0 or so.. Amsterdam was packed with them scotsmen in skirts that week..

we watched Milk in Tuschinski theatre that evening.. it was our last evening before heading back to Germany.

Great if you have made it to this line, tried to post as less photos as possible.

Ciao, Shady

Winter in Bochum..

2009-02-08T22:22:00.000+04:00

It has been a while since my last post, been busy with work and busy with some little project after hours.. a website for a starting advertising agency: inkuae.com

This post goes back to November 2008. 10 days in Bochum, Gremany.

Airport station..

this is what it's called.. very German Bochum.. not sure about wild
i like..
Amelie Poulain? ;)

and three days before I leave..

this is what I call.. pure mental relaxation..

Edge of the World

2008-10-01T02:02:00.005+04:00

September 23rd is the national day of The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.. on the same day this year, we were at Edge of the World. (click on the images for fullview)
Aman, Steve, Mohamed and myself made the move at 7am to a place some of us researched on the Web about 180km north-east of Riyadh called the Edge of the World. Not too much information can be found on the web, but the few photos posted were stunning, I myself couldn't imagine a place like this exists in Saudi.

I did not have my camera with me in that trip, luckily though Aman had his 450D.

A photo from the rear window of our 4x4 showing the long way we crossed, before stepping off road..
We passed by some creepy deserted places and villages..
and ruins..
the GPS map did not cover that area, Aman had the coordinates of the place but that wasn't enough..
after asking many of the locals in the areas nearby about the place, we almost lost hope as no one had a clue what we were talking about. some online articles on the place put some directions on how to get to the Edge but that wasn't helpful either.. another rear window shot as we went off road into the wild..
desert life..

we stopped for some rest, Steve tempted to make a jump.
our sweet sweet powerful ride..

Steve made it!

weird to see such signs in the middle of no where..
We drove for hours in the desert, not much of luck.. we barely passed by any signs of life.. on the contrary, we came across this..

oh! someone was here before us..

more dead goats, I took some good portraits that are not good art for weak hearts, so I will keep them away from the blog.
we didn't do it..
this image can make a cool desktop wallpaper.. I have to admit it was a bit creepy to step out of the car and get close to them.. the silence was so damn creepy, I couldn't hear anything but our car's engine and the wind.
we almost lost hope locating the Edge, until we saw three 4x4 cars driving towards us..hope! We thought they were on the way back from the Edge, but they were actually heading to the Edge.. nice, the Edge was behind us.
After nearly 45minutes of driving between the hills following tracks of other cars been to the Edge before us.. we stopped.. and there we were, at the Edge of the World..
the following two images clearly show why one should stop where the tracks stop..
we were literally at a cliff's edge..
a view of the path we crossed to the Edge..
the view was heavenly.. thousands of feet below sea level were just meters away from us. The sun was strong, a polarizing filter would have made these photos turn magical..

trying to convince Aman to come over..
fullview is a must for the following photo, note the people at the edge of the cliff to have an idea about perspectives..

the view was awesome.. makes one feel like really being at Edge of the World..
Steve and Mo..
I am sure we would do it again.. sitting on that edge was great, I will make sure I am better prepared the next time though..
on the way back.. before losing most of my energy that day on the way back..
we left after spending around an hour at the Edge.. Steve trying to get this car to work
giving up and preferring the sweet ride..

the place is highly recommended to check out.. not being very popular has its pros of not becoming another human circus. this is how the Edge of the World looks like on google maps: [link]

Dorota and Steve's Wedding Reception

2008-09-13T08:14:00.011+04:00

Dorota and Steve got married in Cuba, August 2008. During my visit to Canada, they had a wedding reception party in a very nice Italian restaurant to share their happiness with the ones who couldn't make it to Cuba..

Dorota and her mother, Mila..

Steve , the groom, and Cathrine.. Steve Sr. (the father) and Majed previewing the video and slideshow that Majed prepared to play during the reception.. a collection of photos and videos from Cuba, with Majed's special touches..

Magda with some of the people who attended the reception..

Alicia and Amer were there too..

Tim and Amanda..

Leah..
food was really good..
nice things were said..

some speeches were too long ;)

Alicia.. chilled

some staged group shooting..

the groom..

the bride.. the sister..

and the mother.. Steve Sr. was the DJ of the event.. he did great job, everyone was enjoying the music..
Can be a good profile photo..

and then bootie shakin' started..

Rachel..
mother and son..
i like this shot..
Ruth, she did psychology grad school with Dorota. We had some interesting chit chat..
some club next door..
Tim and Amanda showed some impressive dancing skills ;)

everyone was dancing..

Rachel and Leah..

Amanda.. a drink can definitely help ;)

she knows how to pose..

and finally back to the newly married couple.. Dorota..
and Steve!

Canada.. Cities, Streets, Falls, etc.

2008-09-11T07:34:00.018+04:00

Two weeks ago, I returned from my first trip to .. Canada.. I went to visit Majed and Magdalena.. and met their young.. Husky I came back with no major injuries, except a crooked nose that still makes some funny sound sometimes.. it happened in my third day whilst whitewater rafting in Ottawa river.. I slammed my face into the boat whilst going down one shaft.. that was funny, I thought of putting the video of the hit in this blog but I find it more painful that artistic ;) Went to the hospital using Majed's ID, we kinda look a like and the bag of ice on my face helped.. It was bleeding on and off for a couple of days and I am now left with some funny sound..

Saw the flags of all provinces, but didn't get to visit all provinces, it was almost a three week vacation only. Ottawa, Montreal, Quebec City, Toronto and Niagara are the places I visited during this first trip.. Them places were good enough to give me an initial impression on what living in Canada is like.. sort of. In Canada.. people walk.. both ways.. with big steps sometimes.. or smaller steps when holding maps.. gently.. trendy ..
leaving Yesterday behind.. and there is always someone who walks to the right when everyone else walks to the left.. some have been together for too long that they sync even whilst walking.. some have been walking for a long time that it shows.. some walk with grumpy faces.. oi! not sure if it was her or myself who turned his head. some walk like champions.. and when in a rush.. Canadians run! some prefer to sit down.. alone.. with a long term friend.. or partner.. to read.. or to eat.. Can be considered sitting.. Majed got accepted in a teaching position in Canterbury during my visit and he is lovin' it , we went to a fine pizza place to celebrate with Dorota and Steve.. Majed is an Art and Media Technology teacher now.. teaching cool stuff to future artists..
Dorota and Steve got married right before I arrived.. their wedding was in Cuba, a lovely couple.. they had a wedding reception party in town during my visit.. a separate blog entry goes for that evening..
Dorota is Magda's twin sister.. If you're interested in knowing what's behind his door, google: 487, Lewis St, Ottawa, ON
Paul, M&M's neighbor, a nice guy with a cool tattoo that is a piece of art in process still.. got a little dog who becomes furious when Majed is around.. VIP GILL? Canadians don't only walk and sit.. they stand too.. matching orange.. Go Dutch! as if she was posing for me.. awesome dogs.. some gave me 'the look' some can't find coins.. the image.. the person.. some urban scapes form Ottawa.. the national archive.. missed Word Press Photo '08 Exhibition in Rotterdam, NL last month, so I managed to catch the one Ottawa's War Museum.. some impressive photos, some not. Old Montreal.. it seems like a european pitch in Canada.. not so european though, speaking some french with weird accent in not enough ;) Quebecian garbage.. some funny car plate.. not sure if it a plate.. I think the front plate is not mandatory in some places.. water lines.. art Magda got herself a Tuna sub.. cute pet.. poor dog.. what were they thinking when they dressed the little dog in pink? compact bus.. we were heading to back to the car when we stopped to get some sangria and other cold drinks, it was sunny but windy a bit, so I got some annoying stomach burn for around 15minutes.. I was sweating and in pain. We passed by this scene, it seemed like some serious accident, I couldn't take more photos or get closer, my stomach bugged me.. look at the front window of the car.. i felt better in the car, or maybe when i heard that we're going to have some poutine. Majed approaching with the yummy poutine. we met Amer.. I haven't seen him since graduation, he graduated one batch earlier than us..
we met in Montreal's little Italy.. back to Ottawa.. the Fairmont Château Laurier hotel in the horizon.. this is what you get if you're so into north american junk food.. we have some Vietnamese food here once, very tasty but too damn spicy.. graffiti on the walls of downtown basketball court in ottawa.. Canadians don't only walk, sit and stand.. they ride bicycles too! not all Canadian like to cycle on bicycle routes.. some are too ambitious they go beyond their limits.. and they park their bicycles in creative ways.. So Husky and I became friends.. and we had some interesting shooting sessions.. interesting for me, not for him when I wake him up.. 50mm f/1.4 We went to Niagara falls and Toronto in the last two days of my visit, it was a weekend and Niagara Falls were not on the top of my list.. but I was stunned by the falls and how beautiful the scene is from the Canadian side.. despite the fact that it was a human circus in there.. like someone told me. the difference in shooting with and without a polarizer.. I didn't get this part.. Kosher Hot Dogs.. with Falls mist and blessings.. getting too close to this side was my favorite, the rapid was too fast I so felt like jumping! the higher the better? spirits of the falls ;) a photo to remember.. nice shoes.. intimate moments inspired by the falls.. we had some good dinner in Casino Niagara and then went back to Toronto.. we stayed at Anna and Jeff's place.. awesome guys.. i met some very nice people during this visit. The next day was my last day, my flight was in the evening and it happened to be the last day of the EX or CNE
Can you find me in this shot? no I am not on the rooftop, I took this shot myself. It was a beautiful sunny day, maybe too sunny they had to park in the shed.. Anna, Magda, Majed and Jeff.. on the way to the Ex this kid did well.. made his gradpa proud.. Doritos! it sucks to be the one carrying the bag and prizes in the Ex.. it sucks to have the elder one going like: hmm.. let me try it to see if it tastes good! Majed standing in line to get me a corndog.. there was a funky air show too.. lots of people were out enjoying the last days of the sun before the weather gets cold.. during the day, Anna was talking a lot about the best burritos place in Toronto.. we were running out of time but Anna was so keen on taking us there.. so we squeezed time and we went there all hungry after a long day of walking.. only to find the Burrito Boyz closed.. it was the Labor Day, a public holiday =) the last meal I had before I got on the place was some kick ass burgers at the airport from some place called Coyote Jack's Grill. The return flight was an endless nightmare, it took forever.

Eurotrip '08 - Amsterdam, Hague, Munich, etc.

2008-08-09T11:27:00.058+04:00

This is a very long entry, nearly 175 selected photos.. Sorry I do not have the time to break it down.. Photos are posted in a chronological order.. almost.

Another trip to the Netherlands.. and Schiphol's "meeting point" still looks funny in red and white.

And this is why I went there.. It was nice to be back in NL again, this time for slightly different reasons.. and working with a new group of people.. an uber awesome bunch of guys.
I stayed in a different city, Den Haag (the Hague).. Never be to Den Haag before this trip.. Never been in a Tram before this trip (except in China), so I had to keep a copy of the tram schedule:

My first weekend arrived, and I did not feel like going outside the city.. at the same time I did not know much about it.. so I put on the tourist's hat and bought what is called The City Pass which is an absolute rip off unless you can manage to get into all the museums of the city before 6PM .. the Sculptures Museums was the best.. I like sculptures.. This was one savage piece.. I spent a lot of time enjoying the details of this one. This one was called "The Impossible".. A week passed quickly.. and next weekend's plan was to fly to Munich. Jeroen and Geoff were kind enough to give me a ride to Schiphol.. I can't remember what/who it was, but must've been otherworldly to turn heads like this ;) Flight to Munich was canceled on Friday evening.. Like I am only flying for a weekend, and delaying the flight one day doesn't really make a lot of sense. I got some stupid compensation vouchers and stayed in the airport's hotel, but the waste of time was a bugger.. anyway, I flew in the next day and delayed my return by one night to fly back to the office on Monday morning. Germany is Germany.. you still go to nice restaurants that don't have English menus.. which is not bad, makes you try to 'interpret' the menu.. I am not sure about the orange juice tho. Like I can buy around two liters of fresh orange juice back home for the price of a glass in there, which is alright.. but the confusing part was the definition of 'glass', which was worth taking a picture of.. the glass was served less than half full, and Its taste wasn't magical.. it was normal orange juice.. Some classic subway photos. .Like her reflection.. And closer.. and then to the streets.. Vid and Viola.. first time to meet them in person. Very nice people.. captured in some cozy restaurant they invited us to. It was a very short trip.. but a nice one nonetheless. I am sure I will pay Munich another visit one day. I flew back to Amsterdam on Monday morning, arrived around 8:30 and missed the train by 3minutes.. can't joke with train schedules out there.. I arrived one hour late to the office, we had some training kicking off that day. All team members from around the world were present.. some new faces to me as well. It was house full, and Lex organized Tapas dinner for the group in Gouda. Paul was the lucky man sitting opposite to me.. I'm expecting a spare camera battery from him, cheers dude! And I only had to put him out of focus when funny faces started to pop up and focus on more interesting people. Not sure what Ahmad was trying to tell Kjeld here but he didn't seem very friendly pointing his figure this way ;) Lex.. the man! And our friends from the Italian office.. I went to the little boys room, and the door was broken so I kinda had to keep holding it. I saw this note on the outside door as I was getting out.. for some reason I felt like taking a photo of it and ask what does it mean.. it said that the door is broken, so lock the outside door.. and of course if you don't know how to read dutch you will keep holding the door instead. Funny also how they put 'H' and 'D' to indicate if it's a Gents or Ladies room, makes me always try to recall train stations announcements that start with "dames en heren" so I remember that H is the door that I must chose.
Last round was for some good deserts.

Which were gone in seconds.. It did not bother me that candle light grabbed the auto focus of the lens, this was one of my favorite shots that evening.. I even put it as my Uber's page background. And then back to the Hague.. Part of the training attendees, Euan's personal assistants.. Ernie and his new bud, the dude is specialized in Middle Eastern projects. Company lunch in the canteen.. In the tram, to the central station, to Amsterdam.. Jamal came to visit whilst I was in the Netherlands, it was so cool of him to come over.. a touristic shot for him in the Dam Square. there were lots of pigeons .. hungry pigeons.. and there is always some dude who walks into your frame.. and poses like he's taking a .... between the pigeons. more and more tourists stepped in.. but there was this cute little girl posing in front of her dad's camera (and mine too).. it was funny when a pigeon landed on her arm.. pigeons like nice little ones. A wide angle shot.. Meeting some famous people at Madame Tussauds'.. Jamal plugged himself well in Van Gogh's painting.. But after sometime, it became boring to shoot still people.. so I found this dude pausing for quite long time in front of some figures whilst people waiting for him to walk away so they can take pictures with the wax! And here he was giving Lenny Kravitz some admiring looks. some old dude touching Mon Lisa's hand in a creepy way.. and back to the streets.. This dude in red didn't like me taking a photo of him, he raised the bag and started blabbing. I was shooting graffiti, he walked into my frame.. We spent sometime in Den Haag as well, we rented some sexy bicycles and went out following maps.. they had some seriously giant sculptures by the sea.. and we reached a spot in Scheveingen (oh yeah, it's a damn difficult word to read for the first time), almost everything was not allowed in there! No wonder it was deserted..
My royal ride.. It was funny were the dump was positioned right next to the door.. the question is: was this dump produced before or after getting in the car? the two guys below looked completely wasted walking towards us, one of them saw the camera and asked me to take a picture of them.. they didn't even asked for a preview or to have a copy of the photo, they just went away after the shot.. a very important pose. How often do you see an empty McDonald's in this freaky way.. their clown must've eaten all the little kids. I saw this book in one bookstore, she looked so much like Jainita and she was surprised when I sent her the photo.. J is in Japan right now.. and I am jealous. Captured from the backseat of Geoff's car..The sun came out warm in the last couple of days after lots of rain.. everyone was out and the beach was packed. some tan for some nice legs.. and some prefer to tan their snow white bellies.. Kissing on the run.. under the sun.. but not everyone was happy..
you can tell from the shadow how I was holding the camera ;) It was so funny to see this after few days!! lots of bicycles.. typical dutch. Beautiful people on sidewalk cafes.. the waiter spotted me, I only noticed that after I looked at the photo.. This shot is my favorite, the capturing of the image was so special to me, everything was done in fractions of a second, i did not have a lot of time to think.. otherwise i would've missed the kiss within this sidewalk rhapsody, lots of details, best viewed full size.. shot from the hip, 28mm f/3.2 at 1/400sec. Converted to BW using Chennel Mixer on CS2 and few burns to emboss details. I am submitting this photo to Uber's Street Photography Contest
shooting with the lens wide open at f/1.8 28mm is actually quite wide.. I wonder how would it perform on a full frame sensor or an analogue body. Last day of the training.. Donovan (The Dark Warrior) thinks that he's not photogenic.. what do you think? ;) Prospects.. her real name is Myprospects.. and she is a very nice mate from our South African office.. Prospects and Fatima.. And Mr. Denre.. Lex is always cheerful.. high spirit and with a smile. This can be an official corporate photo ;) I like the shades in the next shot.. the rest of photos are all thanks to Fatima. We had no plans for our last evening, until I knew from Fatima that some South American Carnival was kicking off in Rotterdam. From the tram.. on the way to the central station, to Rotterdam! so long.. ;) In Rotterdam, the Carinval was actually the next day but some drums battle was taking place that evening.. some shots on the way to the main street where the event was held. hmm.. cool bike! I couldn't get too close to the stage, I wasn't expecting a stage anyway.. and I did not need to be close to the stage.. I had a lot of people around me, so I was listening to the beats whilst taking lots of photos.. it was so crowded.. the presentation was all in dutch so I didn't know why everyone was clapping.. some quite out-of-context audience were there.. white hair, and a suit.. in a drums battle?! and then it started to get darker.. and some people got bored waiting for the winners announcement.. Apparently lots of people were happy for the winners..
I thought one only does such moves in rock concerts.. check out the T-shirt ;) Dancing drunk.. like nobody's watching.. This was past midnight.. It was kinda chilly, she didn't want to take her hand outside his pocket.. We had to go back to get some sleep I still did not pack my stuff at that time and we were still in Rotterdam.. It was so damn annoying to get out of the bed the next morning.. Jamal was very emotional on the way to Schiphol airport.. he did not want to leave =) Schiphol.. where lost people walk forward and look behind them.Train tickets for the whole family.. her shot.. and my lost shot =)
Thank you if you checked out all the photos up until this line.. I will try to make my future posts shorter. I am off on vacation in less than 24 hours.. which means more photos in September.. Stay tuned and take care until then.

Iced Espresso, Trip to Syria, Misc. April '08

2008-05-09T12:47:00.009+04:00

So back again to coffee.. don't you think coffee is a bit overrated? ;) i am sure this can piss someone off.. I like coffee.. smell and i like taking photos with coffee in it. But it's overrated still. Shot by Hamed.. This is Janaka, the executive floor supervisor at Ramada Plaza Hotel in Doha, Qatar. He's holding my passport in this shot, probably this was the last time I used my passport.. keep reading to know why. Dubai Airport Marathon.. I shot this on the way back from Doha, it was around midnight.. I arrived home, slept for a couple of hours and then woke up and packed to go to the airport again. I was planning a two week vacation to go visit hometown in Syria during Spring, for the first time, but plans canceled when my company asked if I could cancel or delay my vacation for some project work. I changed my mind after I first said no, and agreed on cancelling my vacation but the problem was in that my passport ran out of visa pages and part of my vacation plan was to renew it back there as it only takes a couple of days to do so back in Syria, whereas our lovely Syrian Embassy requires 13 friggin days to do so in Dubai. heh.. So my company decided to send me for a couple of days to renew my passport and come back.. ASAP. Shortly after my arrival to Damascus airport. Doha, Dubai and Damascus in less than 24hours.. crazy day. It's roughly a 3.5 hour ride from Damascus to Safita.. a ride not too bad, but I wasn't expecting traffic.. had enough in Doha and Dubai. This truck is a piece of art. You see this artwork quite often in Syria, a crappy truck with some poetry on it.. and the back window says: "Leave Me Alone!" Now this looks more like our part of Syria.. entering Safita.. I arrived around noon time, I actually arrived one day before my dad's flight back to the UAE so I spent a day with him.. This is dad on the roof of our place we're building still.. a family house sort of. neighborhood.. This is Ali, my uncle.. Renad's father. Now this is a very very special shot.. the file name is IMG_9999.jpg, after this shot the camera reset the counter to IMG_0001.jpg, I shot over 10,000 photos in less than two years.. damn. That's Hassan, who picked me up from the airport, heading to airport to drop my dad off. I was in the car with Danny, heading to Tartous, to renew my passport. Had some hard time renewing the passport, expected.. and wouldn't have been made without some under the table dodgy work.. will this ever change?

And then to fix Danny's car.. I've never been to this place before, and I've never met this mechanic before, but I have one kickass dad who can't keep much, like it's pointless to tell him something and ask him to keep it for himself =D So Danny was like: Bob, do you know Shady? And once Bob figured out that he knows my father he was like: "Oh! you're the one so and so.. bla bla"!! that was pretty freaky, the guys knows a lot about me!!! Super cool dad that I got. Some shots capture by Danny.. Danny's collection of keys.. Shot from the hip, not too bad for keeping the horizon.. horizontal. I wanted to take this shot of the young kid sitting in there, but he didn't seem very friendly =) Since my trip was for a couple of days only, it was mission impossible to please all friends and relatives specially that some take it seriously if you happened not to have dinner, lunch or spend and afternoon in their place. Maan! I spent over an hour calling people (who definitely knew I was coming, THANKS TO DAD!) and explaining to them the situation, why did I come and when I am leaving.. hoping to see them in the summer feeling (or pretending to feel) sorry that I won't be able to spend sometime with this in this short trip.. Dad left me a peice of paper with list of phone numbers of my beloved relatives.. ;) This is purely and truly my favorite cousin, Renad. I caught her before bedtime, she's growing but still got the wonderful young spirit. This was the last shot before I fly the next day back home.. I had two empty seats next to me, perfect trip. And then the rest of the weekend to slack.. Hanged out with Sham, my sister, and mom one early evening when the weather outdoors was still not too bad. Now, it's very bad.. and will be much worse in the coming days, months. Sham working on some of her wicked designs for school. Now i have to make a move and pack as I have to catch my flight back to Riyadh for one or two more weeks. Back to Riyadh because I just back late Wednesday night, almost a weekend.. But I am enjoying my Cabana which is 3 seconds away from the pool in the hotel, makes me feel like I am on vacation.. business vacation.. in Saudi. How pathetic.

Moving to Blogger

2008-05-04T00:25:00.011+04:00

My friend Hamed says that my JuxtBlog theme doesn't go well with my Juxtapoza site layout. I think this blogger black theme can do. Let's see if this change is worth the effort. I sort of believe in Google, so maybe it's about time to move to some ready-made content management/publishing system without applying custom changes.. I am putting my previous self-hosted WordPress based blog on hold until I figure out a way to import its content to Blogger or maybe to just leave it accessible as an ex-blog with no further updates.

Collective shots from the past.. months, year?

Shots from last March, mainly in Doha where I spent most of my time..

Weam and Suhail from our office in Bahrain happened to be in Doha during my stay there, I joined them for sheesha and tea one evening.. with my little baby Canon.

Showing Suhail how to shoot wide open.. this one came out nice.

Almost every Saturday for the past 5-6 months I used to spend time in Doha Airport before my flight back home.. Costa's cafe was the best place to hang out until departure time, and there was Liz who once asked me to take a photo of her..
And she liked the idea so she was like posing for like three Saturdays in a row.. she always was the one choosing the background, and the same pose.
I got fooled by the impression of quietness and emptiness of this terminal so many times, once I try to sleep I either get a bunch of teems yelling and playing around me, or some cleaners with their huge machines to clean the floor underneath my feet.. I chose deserted seats, and they are many like you can see.. but it never works.
Liz again!

Rafik and Mais..

Danny me friend came on vacation to the UAE for the first time last Feb. Not much of what I post here but photos are what matter the most! And some photos came out nice.. Made me feel like a tour guide and a personal photographer.. heh.

Didn't know there are such places in the UAE. On the way to Dibba Al Fujairah.
I find this shot funny.
Akram, Danny, Sham and Maya.. clockwise.
A pussycat, with the shadow if a tiger ;)

Fun with shadows.. I like shadows..

I think this building was Dubai Intercontinental, I was waiting for a friend at Dubai Festival City Waterfront and the almost perfect reflection was so tempting.. very cliche, still I like how this shot came out. Mr. Mandou, tmandou.. he works now for Microsoft and here he was trying to defend and convince that MS services can compete and be up to the level of Google's.. yeah right ;)
Hamed listening, not so convinced..
And even though we all studied together, and were in the same major.. I tend to find such talks boring sometimes. Playing around with my 28mm lens wide open at f/1.8 was more fun to me.Or creating some nice 'bokeh' out of Tarek behind this heavenly drink, until they get out of the topic.

The following were shot the day when I watched 'I Am Legend'.. what a movie. This is Khaled, the most talented guitarist I know in person, too bad his job in top-end security domains and watching too much southpark doesn't leave him time to compose more good music.
Playing around with focus, shuffling between Kahled and the blondie behind him.. she fired up her laptop and started chatting online..
This is how you know people are chatting or interacting with others online, funny facial expressions.. we all do it, you can't deny it. The 50mm would've been prefect for these shots.

I get nice upgrades in the hotels I stay at when traveling for work. I think I've stayed in this very same room like 5 times. Ramada Plaza Doha, Room 465. My managers shouldn't see these photos ;)
Andy.. my uber boss. In our office in Bahrain. He shouldn't be seeing this either.. but I have to take his permission, he's special!

Shot in December '07. We lived nearly 7 years in this building.. funny years, and it was interesting see how horrible some people painted their walls from the inside ;)

2D Front-end ;)

kittens

2008-03-15T21:02:00.002+04:00

In one of my weekend visits back home, I was about to get in the elevator of where I live before spotting a cat lying down on an old sofa at the entrace of the buillding. It seemed like she just gave birth to a number of little kittens, one day old only.. if not hours.
I am not so much into shooting pets and cats, the web is loaded with such photos but you don’t get the chance to photograph fresh ones as such everyday. Chronologically, there is a number of photos that should be posted, but one of my neighbour and her mother asked me to send her the photos I was taking so I will just post them in one go.

desert safari

2007-12-21T21:00:00.002+04:00

Bashar, our lead and kickass dunes driver.

Flatting the tyres to kickoff the ride.

Jimmy and Abood and a pre-ride pose.

Jimmy, and some serious close up look behind his shades, contemplating life after he knew that there is only one male camel in the farm we stopped by.. one male camel and tens of females. That gigolo was so skinny and muscular.

Ahmad, his wedding was early this year.. I have not seen him since then, damn marriage!

Nisreen!