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frangipani | photoblog (83 unread)

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Perambulations is a delightful word, don't you think?

Posted: October 4th, 2008, 9:23am PDT

78/365: Sept 29. This is where my office is. Well, actually, it's kinda around the corner. Love Hotel Hill, Dogenzaka.

79/365: Sept 30. A pretty cool day. I had been working for weeks on an event close to my heart: Photo Nite. It was all pretty frenetic, the day full of the usual stress and running around involved when you have an event on. It was a great night, around 170 people turned out despite pouring rain and everyone seemed to have a fun time. Earlier in the day I successfully jammed my hand in the train doors of the Toyoko Line and watched it swell up like blue sausage over the next few days. And on the train on the way home with Nathan (he lives a few stations away on the Chuo), I finally got the chance to check my g-mails on my phone and found the nicest job rejection I've ever received for a dream job I had applied for months ago. Needless to say I was pretty bummed. Nathan suggested we hit a bar and get drunk. Which we did. Till 4 am. The trip home is a little foggy. I vaguely remember dropping my umbrella 478 times.

80/365: Oct 1. I don't actually spend as much time in the park as the 365 project suggests - I just tend to pass through it to get to work. But it is such a happy 15 minutes, I thank the gods every day that I found such a beautiful, natural part of Tokyo to live in.

81/365: Oct 2. Jake and Darin arrived at Starbucks just as I was wrapping up a lesson. Yay. Love these chance encounters.

82/365: Oct 3. Despite the loveliness of Kichijoji, this is my reality actually. I'm in Shibuya every day, working, often till last train. Tokyo is ugly, smelly, overcrowded and I want to leave soon. Had a shitty day today. Over-worked, not doing enough photography. And so on and so forth.

83/365: Oct 4. After a morning of classes I met Kat, Darin and Jake for lunch at Peppa Forest and then a perambulation around the park enjoying the incredible weather. Then back to the house to... yep, you guessed it, work. Depressing.

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(gleek on Oct 5, 2008 7:38 AM) jake twice in one week! that's one lucky auntie martine! :)

(frangipani on Oct 5, 2008 10:57 AM) Actually, it's Aunty Marty, honey, - it just flows off the tongue so nicely, and yes I am a lucky Aunty Marty! Can't believe he's almost a year old already.
Chasing dragonflies

Posted: October 4th, 2008, 8:29am PDT

71/365: Sept 22. Keiko. Again. Cause she brightens my day so.

72/365: Sept 23. I've been working late a lot, this is the joyful sight that greets me every time I get to Shibuya station for those last few trains of the night. Sardine-can express.

73/365: Sept 24. Another fabulous episode of Dr Sketchy's Tokyo, this time starring the incredible burlesque/belly dancer Safi who is - by far - the most powerful and sexy Japanese woman I have ever had the chance to photograph. I picked this pick to share in the 365 project because of the expressions on the sketchers in the background. Priceless. There are a ton more which I am gonna try to finish editing tonight, but in the meantime you can catch a few more over at my photography blog.

74/365: Sept 25. My landlord Takesho lives in Okinanawa while his wife Eiko and kids live on the floor above us. He's awesome fun. Speaks great English and keeps this vintage little yellow honda sports car which he tinkers with for hours on end. He comes back once every six weeks and there is a wild flurry of activity around the house and garden. They own the only electric lawnmower I have ever seen.

75/365: Sept 26. Spent the day working in the Shibuya office, and Dj James came by to get some work done too. This is the software he uses to do live MP3 mixing when he's doing a set at a party. Scratch. Yo.

76/365: Sept 27. My friends Jane and Daisuke had their Japanese wedding today. They've actually been married a year now, the first little ceremony in Melbourne. His J-family really wanted a real wedding ceremony here in Tokyo so they went all out and Jane got all dolled up in a traditional kimono and wig and head scarfy thing and we all took taxi's out to a shrine where their union was blessed by the Buddhist priests. I was the official photographer for the day and am absolutely delighted with the photos. It was a beautiful day, and the nijikai led to some fairly epic debauchery with more nihonshu than I have done in quite some time. Oh my head the next day! Anyway, I've been stupidly busy so haven't actually gotten around to editing them yet (just this little rush job here for the 365 project) - that's the next task this evening, hope to be finished them in a few days - will share some results on my photography blog... and may post something here too.

77/365: Sept 28. Chasing dragonflies.

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James Nachtway highlights Extreme Drug Resistant TB

Posted: October 3rd, 2008, 11:07pm PDT

I love James Nachtway, he's such an amazing photographer. These are his photos.

Powerful stuff. I have had a lot of personal dealings with TB this year, with one friend (young, fit, healthy 25-ish year old German fella) very sick with it and confined to a quarantine floor in a special ward in Shinjuku for many months and his also quite healthy British girlfriend contracting it - but not actively sick with it - and under such strong meds that her liver is in a seriously sick state. They had to take her off the meds this week because her liver was reacting so badly. You are supposed to take them for 12 months.... The Germans bandmate also contracted it too. Another healthy young man.

I have heard a lot of startling facts about this seemingly ancient disease that show that it is indeed experiencing a major revival. Here are some facts:

* As of 2006, approximately 30,000 people have TB in Japan, with around 3,000 people dying yearly (WHO statistics)
* Britain's figures, with a population about half of Japan, are about 10,000 & 1,000 respectively.
* Approximately one third of the world's population has TB (Scary fact!)
* However, tuberculosis is only infectious when it is active (ie reaches the lungs)
* And only 5~10% of people with tuberculosis become sick or infectious.
* Symptoms of active TB are coughing for more than 2 weeks; phlegm; fatigue & chest pain

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End of summer

Posted: September 21st, 2008, 10:00am PDT

64/365: Sept 14. A deep sense of foreboding fell upon me this day.... look at all those yellow leaves in the water and all around. And I got invited to my first "fall" BBQ. Crap. The end of summer. NOOOOO

64/365: Sept 15. Met with Lisa & Tomo to hand over their wedding photos, and it happened to be Tomo's birthday so we went to Peppa Forest for a delightful dinner and surprise birthday cake & song for Tomo. They were so happy with my work that they gave me a massive bonus on top of the initial payment. I think I like wedding photography. I'm shooting another one next weekend for my friends Jane and Daisuke, really looking forward to it.

65/365: Sept 16. Oh joy of joys, look who I ran into down at my local station at lunch time. Widdle Jakey-Taiga and his poppa dawg.

66/365: Sept 17. Tony's Pizza. A tiny little hole on the wall under the train tracks away from Kichijoji Station. I ride past here at night a lot and it smells divine. One day I'll stop and go in. I hear from the locals that he's been there for years and the pizza is awesome.
This day was particularly special as I had a job interview for the dream adventure job of a lifetime. I find out at the end of the month. Keep everything crossed!

67/ 365: Sept 18. Most days I get home after a crazy day of crowds and people, and I just wanna settle in to my beautiful room and look at all the pretty things and listen to great music and drink a glass of wine and stare off into space.

68/365: Sept 19. The toilets at the Mainichi newspaper building are identical on every floor. They are all curved, like the elevator bay, and extremely sci-fi. After our meeting there finished (late, around 8 pm) Jon and I went downstairs and found a cheap restaurant and drank a bunch of celebratory beers (the meeting went really well and it had been a good week), then went into Golden Gai to meet Tommy Oshima, my photo hero. He's agreed to do a presentation at Photo Nite next week (what a great line-up it's shaping up to be!) and I couldn't be more chuffed. He has an exhibition on now at Golden Gai. Go check it out, the man is going to be a legend.

69/365: Sept 20. Mt Takao. My good mate Sarah had her birthday celebration up at the Mt Takao Beer Garden. To get there, we hiked almost 2 hours. A wonderful day. I swear, it only takes a day out in nature to feel fully recharged again. Afterwards we came back into to Shinjuku and I found myself at Golden Gai a second night in a row, spending a couple of beers with Tommy Oshima again before returning to the birthday party madness around the corner. More pics at Sarah's Flickr Bday Album. I took this pic above at the mountain top shrine, it's so pretty up there - it's been a while since I've visited, it was nice to say hi.

70/365: Sept 21. I had my Sunday morning cuppa skype with my brother, sister in law and niece this morning. Here they are watching a slideshow on the computer of the kids party from yesterday - they completely forgot I was watching them and they were so happily lost in the pictures on their screen that I just had to pull my camera out to shoot a pic. My brother has launched his new real estate business in North Queensland called Port Douglas Real Estate. He already has 20 properties listed and he is SOOO happy and inspired. And would you check out the fancy website? Lordy. Impressive.
And that was my week in pictures.
Tomorrow night I'm off to see the magical IDA play at Shibuya's DUO MUSIC EXCHANGE with Christian and Yuiko. So excited, we have all loved this band for many years - when I saw their name pop up at Tokyo Gig Guide, I did a little dance.

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Yearbook Yourself

Posted: September 17th, 2008, 7:31pm PDT

1952

1958

1962

1964

1966

1972

1974

1984

1988
Thanks to Tracey for the silliness. Yearbook yourself - go on, I promise you you'll waste at least an hour of your valuable work time. Personally I think 1966 is a good look for me.... ;) (oh all that hairspray!)

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9 days and we're all up to date now.

Posted: September 13th, 2008, 11:25pm PDT

55/365: Sept 4. Note the little cherub up in the field with his butterfly net. Why would you live anywhere else in Tokyo?

56/365: Sept 5. The view from my train platform in the afternoon light. A mellow place, to be sure. Lucky me.

57/365: Sept 6. Awesome organic vegetarian lunch at my local station.

58/365: Sept 8. The more astute among you will notice that Sept 7 is missing. That's coz I didn't leave the house. But Sept 8, now that was a fun day. Australia Flavour Biz Nite. I bored everyone senseless with a presentation about my new website. Had high hopes that some famous photo agency rep would sweep me off my feet and offer me a lucrative photo job that night but alas, I was sorely disappointed and ended up wading in the fountain with Tracey, Helen and Kirsten. Actually, I did get one job - Nathan from TRACE asked me if I'd be interested in taking photos for his band as we trained home together. Of course, of course.

59/365: Sept 9. A smile from Jake can just make my day. Darin, Tyler and Jake were sitting outside Starbucks as I finished my lessons this morning. Yay.

60/365: Sept 10. They stand waiting at the station, run on with their stools and bags of posters and race down the train carriage swapping the train ad posters then jump off at the next station and do it again on the next train....

61/365: Sept 11. Me and Haruka made a crossword puzzle today after she thrashed me at speed alphabet bingo. Brat. Smarty pants brat. Adorable brat.

62/365: Sept 12. Christians dad asked him to meet up with these 3 lovely young girls from Brisbane on their first big trip to Tokyo, we we took them out to an izakaya in Shibuya. The bitter old cynic in me usually don't have a lot of time for 23 year olds these days but these girls were a pleasant surprise. It was a great night out. Turns out they knew my friend Jack (from Brisbane

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frangipani | photoblog (83 unread)

Perambulations is a delightful word, don't you think?

Posted: October 4th, 2008, 9:23am PDT

Chasing dragonflies

Posted: October 4th, 2008, 8:29am PDT

James Nachtway highlights Extreme Drug Resistant TB

Posted: October 3rd, 2008, 11:07pm PDT

End of summer

Posted: September 21st, 2008, 10:00am PDT

Yearbook Yourself

Posted: September 17th, 2008, 7:31pm PDT

9 days and we're all up to date now.

Posted: September 13th, 2008, 11:25pm PDT