Category: Uncategorized

San Antonio Express News
West Side Section
circa 1995?

As a budding photographer I had to take many jobs I would never consider taking now but sometimes cutting teeth is more important than making a decent living. The San Antonio Express News community section hired me as one of their freelancers to shoot stuff around town their staff wouldn’t touch as it was community work. You know all real photojournalist only shoot pro sports, fires, and press conferences. Never do they dip into the community section. Hence that was my opportunity to get published in a big daily. Little did I know images like this mean so much more than the said real journalism. Pride and prejudice get in the way of making good judgements and make us not realize how important photography is…not just to the hardcore element who have to sit in mud up to their necks in Africa but to the viewer who’s life is so much better than they get a chance to see themselves in the pages of the city paper.

I imagine this shot is still saved somewhere in someone’s scrapbook…yellowed and all. I am glad to have made that memory a good one.

The Alamo at sunset…

Thanks to Tracey W and Essence Magazine, I was able to escape to Texas for a long weekend for work (shot a feature for the mag) and see my parents who are still alive and kicking in San Antonio.

I’ve not been in SA since 2005 or so and every time I go back something has changed yet nothing is really that different. More corn tortillas are served over flour, there are spidery arms of highway stretching all over the city (HONOLULU TAKE NOTE!) and the city is a bit more browner than before.

I stuffed myself with Mexican food, BBQ and sadly not enough Shiner. The Mexican food, something that just doesn’t exist in its proper form in Honolulu, is just fantastic. We went to the usual haunts like Blanco Cafe and Pico de Gallo, but the winner of the trip was the dirty little cafe at the Michoacana Grocery store at North West Center on Fredericksburg Rd. Unbelievable lengua tacos. UNBELIEVABLE!!!! I mean its like the stuff we ate near the Zocalo in DF. The lime, onion, and cliantro do the trick. What a surprise to snack on that…something you probably are going to find more and more around the US.

The BBQ is always fantastic. You just can’t go wrong. And everything else about San Antonio makes it a wonderful place but a hard place to go back to after living abroad for so long. I mean, Texas is a great place and all Texans seem to know this and we all tend to be proud of who we are. Hugh the Giant once asked me…How do you know someone is from Texas? They tell you…sorry Hugh, no one cares if you are from North or South Carolilna, or is it Tennessee? Maybe Georgia? I can’t remember…nor do I care…cause you ain’t from Texas…but like I said, and as he said, Texas is pretty proud.

I just don’t think I could go back. The weather was way too hot, photo work might be limiting, and life in general might be as tough as the scrub brush. Its not like life in pricey Honolulu is easy…but being a photographer might keep me away from the place I once proudly call home but who knows. And then having a Japanese wife…well, ,if she can’t have her ramen…well…there is hell to pay.

Life is what you make of it…nah thats too much of a cliche…

I wrote a few weeks ago about a “…the only thing I can share with you while I am so far away is the moon… as it will always be the same… no matter where you are…the moon is always the same…” I think what all that means is that we are always the same no matter where we go or live our lives. I am still defined by where I was born, what I grew up eating, who raised me, what culture surrounded me…all to some extent mind you.

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One of the projects my Mom set out for me while I visiting was to throw away lots of old stuff that was cluttering my parents closet and garage. My Dad and brother have laid siege to the empty spaces of my parent’s home with stuff that should just be thrown away. What good are old memories when they are gone? The present is sometimes much more pleasant that the distant past. Why hold on to a match book from a long gone date? Or a photo of someone I can’t even remember? Even old awards and swimming medals are hardly something anyone would have a strong interest in seeing other than a sad me. Oh longing for youth and simpledom…

I trashed old love notes, letters, books, reports, and junk that needed to be tossed. I would like to be nostalgic but its just not practical. I can’t drag 20 years plus of old stuff with me where ever I go…I threw away old school projects, creative writing, some old photos of people who don’t exist anymore for me, and thoughts from a long time ago. I did save old photos of times I hardly remembered. I shipped those back and hopefully I will spend some time scanning some faded dirty negs and remind myself of what I’ve become.

Like I said, its not so much of where and how I am, its more of who I am and where I came from…no?

I shot my Dad in front of the mural at Pico de Gallo downtown. My Dad is probably singlehandedly the worst photo subject hands down. If he doesn’t have his eyes closed, he just doesn’t let us capture him. As a younger man, he peacocked his way through life with dandy clothes, slick hair, and a debonair flare that lacked substance but full of style. I am somewhat amazed that he actually came out pretty decent in this photo.

Overall, San Antonio proved to be a great trip. Lots to ponder, lots to miss, and lots to remember.

Thanks Tracey Woods!

Last week, I put a roll of color film into my camera and didn’t finish the roll before it got dark and kept the film in for next time. For that week the film lived in the camera, I was completely anxious and obsessed about seeing what I had shot. I did get about 14 images on the roll before it got too dark and left but I wanted to see it!

We’ve all forgotten (for good measure in many cases) the anticipation, and for some, the anxiety of having a half roll of film left in the camera. I didn’t want to take the film out and waist the unused half. Penny pinching is important at times and film isn’t cheap. Digital photography has taken away all this good (and bad) anticipation on waiting with excitement to see your images on the light table. You can see immediately your images on the back of the digital camera which in many ways has taken away the excitement of photography.

Imagine this…you take your film camera out, you see the shot of the day, you focus, snap, and smile. Now you got 35 more frames on that roll before it goes to the lab. Sadly, the sun goes down and you can’t shoot anymore today. Throughout the week, you take more pictures hopping to get to the end. 12 frames, 22, frames, 33, 34, 35…oh finally! The end. After six days, you finally take the film out of the camera. You pull it out, get to the lab…the lab’s machine is down until tomorrow morning. Argh! You drop it off while you curse under your breath and obsess about that first frame you shot…obsess all through the night. Its it sharp, was the exposure dead on, did she blink? On and on and on…

Next morning you get up thinking about frame one. After coffee and breakfast you are still obsessing. The lab doesn’t start their first processing till 8am. Your film won’t be ready till noon. Wait and watch the clock. Wait….wait…and finally, you get in the car and rush over to the lab. Pay your money and run home.

Rush inside, throw the film on the light table and bam! There it is…the shot!

This shot of the four teens on the wall at Waikiki struck me cause of the moment, time and place. Its really nothing special other than the moment in my eyes.

But the most important think about this image was the time waiting to see it. The simple anxiety of waiting to see your work that you took all so long ago. And like I said, looking at the back of my digital camera doesn’t offer the same fun.

Went down to Waikiki with the Leica, the 35mm, and a pocket full of film. Actually it was only three rolls of film.

I came across two women lounging in the sand when I spotted their tiny little baby wiggling on the blanket. His size, serenity and pale skin amazed me. All this stuff was going on around him and he dozed away as if nothing else mattered.

Seeing what I shot most often than not is beyond me. What I mean is sometimes, the mechanics of photography, the focus, composition, etc…just flow around me and disappear into the mist of my subconscious. Yes, yes…this sounds like a bit of bull but I can’t explain why I see and capture what I do. After getting film back from the lab and doing my edits, I find myself sometimes returning to this unique archetype of style that I see. I took an art class in University and the professor would remark at my graphical sense of composition. It was stuff I never understood or studied but opened my eyes to see what I saw.

Does that make sense?

Why I am struck by this picture of the kid crawling under the rails is not so much the starkness of the ocean, the emptiness of the beach, but the lines that all form and fall into place. I didn’t see it…it wasn’t as if I lined up the camera this way. It just happened. Something subconscious took place inside my head and I just pulled up the camera and snapped.

These two girls were watching the multitudes of swimmers swelling away in the surf near Queen’s Beach. It was a nice day and the light fell really nice on them.

Now this girl was classic…she was a bit of an odd ball and I have seen her around a few times…at least I think I have. She’s covered in a few tattoos and she was parading around in a very very tiny string bikini. Her front didn’t leave much to the imagination either. We came across her and I first thought she was completely naked. Nudity isn’t de rigueur on the beach nor are Brazilian bikinis. Most girls are a bit more modest if modesty counts on the beach and wear fairly fleshy suits but she really kicked it up a notch.

She was chatting with some guy entranced by her peep show. She must have known her g or string or what ever its called was slowly advancing to the point of no return. She couldn’t have cared less. Neither did he.

Fireworks at Ala Moana Park seen from my downtown digs…