Life as we live it

City of Love

2011-08-25T09:03:00.003+01:00

After much thought over our choice of holiday destinations which included Galapogos, Amazon and South Africa, we decided to venture to the City of Lights, mainly due to the zillion ‘Oh you must go to Paris’ responses we got.

Rest assured that Paris is still an European city and one of the main tourist destinations in the world, though you might not think so after reading the rest of the blog.

The train ride from London to Paris was lovely. The arrival at Gare du Nord, considered to be the busiest railway station in Europe, was a SHOCK! The unbearable smell of urine was overwhelming, the bird poo, the cigarette butts, the dirty stained glass, the little food outlets which offered seats covered in bird poo, the lack of information and the lack of proper sign posts, was not what I expected to see in Paris.

Transport

Though old, dirty and smelling of pee, the Metro in Paris is still better than the Underground in London. The Metro runs on time and is regular and costs less than half the price for what seemed like a much better service. However, all signage was in French and there was no clear indication on how to use or buy tickets.There are a few sign boards in English placed at random intervals which I am sure an Englishman planted on the sly and the French would remove if they ever discovered them! Also God help you if you are obese or even slightly chubby because you will not get through some of the Metro gates, which seemed to have been designed for stick insects. Any kind of luggage, dogs, goats or cattle will most definitely have to be left out as not all stations provide luggage exits!

Food

The very picky DH (Dear Husband) booked a lovely hotel in what seemed like a nice part of town. With kids dropping their ice creams in wonder at the sight of me clinging to what must have seemed a crossbreed of a Frenchman in his hat, I wandered the streets looking for a café that had an impressive menu. Cafes were aplenty; food was not. All cafes seem to serve the same 5 main courses. Very little choice, very bland food and yes, they speak only French in France.

Maybe it was our choice of location (about 500m from the Eiffel Tower) but we could not find anything nice to eat - burghers, steak, pasta and salmon were the main dishes, mostly served in what seemed to a bed of lettuce the farmer had thrown directly onto the plates from his truck. In what seemed to be this "very French "area, we found "very French" food and "very French" abrupt service. This did not stop us from relaxing in these cafes enjoying the bland food and for once we sat and had a leisurely meal.

Eiffel Tower

Well known fact is that it is one of the seven wonders. The unknown fact is that the eighth wonder lies right below the Eiffel. The endless, chaotic, disorganised, jumbled together queues of people waiting to get in with absolutely no shelter from the rain or sun and no facilities for the disabled, the pregnant or children. It seemed to be a normal thing to queue for up to 3 hours. No staff or information at any accessible level or approachable distance. The worse thing is those who book via the web go past the ones queuing for hours and it seemed like there was no allocation or indications to how many of these booking were accommodated for each slot. So if you queued up for 2 hours and a group of 50 people come with online bookings then you just got to wait an extra 2 hours until they are done. There is no time limit for people to be in the actual tower so some spend the day there while a good 500 people wait from morning till noon to get on it. After 3 hours of queuing in the hot sun and looking like four pieces of toast, a British family was turned away with two wailing girls because one lift just closed with no prior indication. There was no attempt to get them on another queue or give them a token to come at a later time/date which would have been the case in London.

Eiffel Tower at night! from Riyazi Muzammil on Vimeo.

The absence of systems to deal with the crowds it attracts and lifts being closed for maintenance during a busy weekend was not what I expected when I decided to see one of the seven wonders of the world. DH went twice because he was able to get up in the morning and I joined for another attempt that same night. After 3 hours of queuing and further standing around we were able to go only to the second floor as the top floor was closed. I only saw what damage we humans had done to planet earth, the so called breathtaking view comprised of buildings on every inch of land I could see!

The area surrounding the Eiffel Tower was not very well maintained. There were open patches with no grass or pavement and very soon our shoes were covered in dust.

Louvre museum

This, out of the few places we went to, seemed to be the cleanest and most organised. It would have taken days to venture into all the areas so we decide to stick to what we thought might interest us. We walked what must have been a couple of miles inside the museum. We managed to find Mona Lisa aunty hidden in one of the corners. I think the day we visited was when Mona aunties entire family had come to see her and they were all posing next to her for shots. After struggling and pushing and insisting that DH takes a shot of her I managed to take a quick glimpse of aunties face and crept out of what seemed like a ocean of bums in my face. I must say it looks very different to the copies we had seen.

Notre Dame

This was the main place of interest for me. Again very interesting except for the mile long queue to get in. After convincing DH with a million ‘it will be worth it’ statements (I said long and loud enough for those around us also joining in telling him the same), we finally got in. It was a beautiful place - the stained glass was the nicest I had seen, surprisingly they allowed photographs and here are some of the shots.

Boat ride

A total waste of money! Nothing much to see. French blah blah on the little we did see. No eye pleasing sights at all.

Arc de Triomphe

Ok so another very long walk through Champs-Élysées which had all the branded shops in Paris – alas due to the public holiday all were closed (I am sure DH was very happy about that!!). After insisting that DH can stand right in the middle of the main road, next to a traffic light, along with his very big tripod and me guarding him while cars went whizzing past on both sides, DH spent what seemed like a good hour taking his shots. Yes it seemed in Paris anything was possible unlike in London where you cant park, stand, look or even take the camera out at half the locations.

Notre Dame

After shooting the Arc in all the possible angles and me still not understanding the fascination with it we ventured under the Arc to the now welcoming smell of pee. We then had dinner in what seemed to be a pizza café where sharing of food was not permitted. Basically you order a plate a head and each plate was a tray with a family size pizza on it. 'Eat if you can or leave but pay' seemed to be their policy. Leaving anything on the plate in our case for a definite ‘no, no’ so I ate a thin slice and DH ate two whole family size pizzas but nothing to worry cos I am pretty sure we walked off everything we had ever eaten in our entire lives while in Paris.

Sacré-Cœur Basilica

I think, during the three days we spent in Paris, we walked more than we had ever walked during an entire year in London. Exhausted and dreaming of biriyani and wattalapam but having only a long, tasteless hard loaf of bread to eat all the time, DH suggested we go to the church on the hill! Hmm another building!! Well anyway walk up the hill we did. Quite a nice view and the Sri Lankan system was at work here. There was no queuing - we all just barge in and somehow creep into the church. Photos were not allowed. But the most interesting thing was the guy who was doing his bit with a football just outside the church. Totally awesome and some really great moves including climbing up a lamp post and balancing the ball on one foot!

Yes this is a bit of a moany blog but this was our first hand experience whilst there. I am surprised that not many people talk about or any review mentioned this side of Paris. I am sure outside Paris, the little villages with the cobbled paths and cafes do offer the kind of experience France is also about. If we had time maybe we would have gotten used to the total "laid back, do what you please, walk wherever you want, shoot whatever you need, pee smelling, not too tasty food" life Paris offered – I wouldn’t know because I, for one, will not venture to Paris again even on a free deal!

Once upon a time...

2010-12-27T02:02:00.006Z

The 26th of December is a memorable day for both of us.....

If ever there was a true story that was stranger than fiction, we think you will find this is it. From the bride’s dress to the groom’s shoes, from the facial to the flowers ... it seemed like everything that could go wrong WOULD go wrong … but as all of you who attended our wedding would know … we made it ... and yes, we loved every minute of it!

The Decision…

After contemplating over it for many many months and going through what seemed like a million arguments, we decided to celebrate our love in front of family and friends. We both agreed we wanted a small but very special wedding where we could just have fun with our loved ones. Little did we know that planning the dream wedding … especially planning one in Sri Lanka, while you are in the UK is much easier said than done.

The Dress…

So in June 2007, the extremely fussy Bride to be (hereon known as B2B) checked out over 975 dresses in shops and online in the UK. After countless nights, she short-listed four and sent them to the bridal dresser for her approval. The dresser picked one dress – and the B2B realised she could not remember where she found it! B2B posts a message on a wedding blog asking for help to locate the dress and spends the next couple of weeks looking for the dress. She finally gets a response but the suggested shop did not have her size!

So in October 2007, the search began for the ‘perfect’ tailor to make the 'perfect' dress a reality. Of course B2B found someone a thousand miles away! Detailed descriptions including the very important fact that the dress should be in pure white -sugar white to be exact- were sent to the tailor. Another 4 weeks down the line, B2B takes a day off work -on the day the dress was due to arrive - and found to her surprise that the dress was in Ivory and not White. The groom made the huge mistake of wondering out loud if it was a ‘big deal’ if the bride wore ivory instead of white… resulting in argument number million and one.

Thankfully, the tailor agreed to make another dress – and 2 weeks before the couple flew back to Sri Lanka; the perfect white wedding dress was in B2B’s hands.

The invitation…

The quest for a ‘simple’ invitation was not so simple. B2B began her quest in January 2007. At various times from Jan to Oct 2007, B2B decides to make the cards by hand, order from department stores, order from catalogues and finally 2 months before the wedding, decided to design her own card and get it printed.

Pimples!!!

The Ivory Dress

Her cousin, little knowing what she was getting her self into, happily agreed to be the one in charge of the invitation. B2B and groom spent more sleepless nights pouring over paper samples; ribbon samples; deciding whether the ribbon should go through slots or slits, etc. A good 50 samples were scrutinised. Even though it was made clear, once again, that the invitation had to be WHITE, at one point, we received a multi coloured "sample" with a purple cover, cream card and red ribbons but thankfully , the card you received did get done just the way B2B wanted.

The wedding dresser…

An initial down payment was made to Ramani Fernando – but B2B dropped her like a hot pan of oil when she realised that Ramani wanted to do everything her way and not the way the B2B wanted! Savanthi helped locate Lou Ching – who really is the sweetest man on earth!! He is one of those people who manage to give you what you want without acting like it is a major hassle. Superb HIGHLY recommended!

The Best Man

The groom had his heart set on getting Cissa to be his Best man - but since Cissa was running around the world on a ship, it was going to be difficult to co-ordinate for suit fittings, rehearsals, etc. However, when plans were being made to overcome these difficulties, the news came that Cissa's ship might be delayed and the he might miss the wedding altogether. Thankfully, the Groom's brother got time off from work for the wedding so Fayaz stepped in to Cissa's shoes. The sad part is that after all that hassle Cissa's ship came in 2 days before the wedding and it actually would have been possible for him to be the Best Man!!! But the sailor just being there made all the difference.

The facial…

B2B and the bridesmaid bridesmaid went to Anoma's as recommend by many for the facials, 2 days before the wedding. What they found was that the service was unprofessional to say the least. The next day, both the B2B and the bridesmaids got a face full of pimples and bumps on their faces which had been a result of the facial. 25th December being a holiday, the beauticians were closed and nothing could be done, except to drink an allergy pill which, coupled with red bulls and Jack Daniels, had a major effect on the B2B's energy levels throughout the night.

The jewellery…

This was to be bought from the UK, but surprise surprise B2B could not find anything she liked. Result – two weeks before the wedding day – B2B, groom, best man and the bridesmaid marched in to several Jewellers, spending an entire day terrorising sales reps and designers into showing us what was in their showcases, cupboards, storage and every other possible hiding place. B2B, of course did not like any of the designs -what a surprise.

On top of this it was a rainy day and B2B, who insisted she wanted to get wet in the rain, started tying knots on the string which was on the umbrella handle – and then… eureka - decided she wanted her jewellery to be in a knotted design just like the umbrella knot. The other 3 exhausted souls happily agree that it is indeed the best design in the world – and B2B explained to the weary designer at Raja Jewellers exactly what she wanted. She demanded that the jewellery be designed and made before the wedding and the Jewellers agreed to complete everything 3 days before the wedding.

So, 3 days before the wedding (mind you this is just before the xmas holiday), we go to collect the jewellery and Lo and Behold, the design was not done according to the drawing that was agreed with B2B. This infuriated the B2B, who further terrorized the jewellers in to reworking the design within a day to perfection.

Socks & Shoes…

Yes, even the shoes were an issue – but this time it was the groom who could not find a single pair of shoes he liked in the whole of London and Colombo. On the big day, his beloved brother gives his new pair of shoes to the groom. When walking out of the hotel on the day of the wedding, B2B caught the best man sneaking out to get socks for the groom who had forgotten his!! Thank goodness for the Rs.10/- pair under the Bo tree in Pettah !

The service…

We found out very late in life that god - somewhere down the line - whispered to all priests that a blessing should be done ONLY TO THOSE WHO ARE CATHOLIC!! In the whole of Sri Lanka there was not one priest who was willing to ‘bless’ (not marry) just bless this already registered couple - because the groom was a Muslim. We finally managed to find a pastor who was willing to conduct a blessing service for us.

In retrospect, we wish the church service, which was done mainly to keep B2B’s mom happy was not done at all. At one point the Bride was nudging the groom in the middle of the service saying that we should leave! The priest managed to pronounce the groom’s name incorrectly numerous times, mix up the order of hymns and crack several old, dry and boring internet jokes about marriage. Thankfully, God did intervene to save us by making sure that the priest skipped one of the hymns and made the already short 30 minute service a 20 minute one!

The photo shoot…

We were very keen not to keep our guests waiting like at many other weddings – the idea was to rush out of church, stop at the beach for 15 minutes take a few photos and rush out. Well, what a surprise that the President decided he wants to go out for a leak and the one and only main road in SL is closed. In the 1920 vintage car with a maximum speed of 15 km per hour, it took us an hour to get from the church to the Hilton (this should have been a 10 minute drive maximum).

The Lousy Toast

Fayaz forgot to take his drink, lost the lines but managed to mumble a few words and complete the toast. Luckily for him, people “thought” he was a cute guy and he managed to get away with it.

The first dance…

Chandimal was highly recommended to us - a definite NO NO - he is just all talk! We were promised a DJ, lights and songs of our choice. But you find on your wedding day that the actual band plays only a maximum of 5 songs! None of the songs we chose were played. For the first dance, - we had to sway painfully to an old song we had never heard before in our entire lives. This is after we gave him a choice of THREE songs for our first dance which he promised to play.

The pappara band…

Thankfully, B2B was happy and stayed that way as long as the surprise pappara band kept playing. The band, which was a surprise gift for the groom arranged by Savanthi, turned out to be a more appropriate gift for the bride. It must have been the first time in history, where a pappara band was offered Rs. 20,000 an hour to play till the bride stopped dancing but they refused because the trumpet blower could not blow any more!!!

Two red bulls and a sip of JD kept the bride on her toes till 6.00 a.m. the following morning.

The Rag

Again, for the first time in history, the couple ragged the remaining guests, by prolonging the party until 6.00 am - insisting everyone stayed to follow them to RnB since Hilton had to prepare the hall for a morning wedding!!

The photographer – Rohan Herath

The best in the world – lovely guy –easy going – superb ideas and true to his word – very very good – nothing went wrong and he tried to de-stress B2B and some how managed to get some good shots – highly recommended fully worth it.

Savanthi De Silva – Wedding Organiser Extraordinaire

If you are looking for someone to make every whim of the Bride to come true, try her out. She is the one and only reason our wedding was possible and we are eternally grateful to her.

And the drama continued

When the bride insisted that she wanted photos in her bridal dress in the middle of Sinharaja rain forest and as always her wishes were granted. Note the unique flower bouquet

Wedding photos..... of the things that went right!

Amboseli National Park, Kenya

2010-10-10T21:57:00.001+01:00

There are several great national parks in Kenya but we didn’t want to spend too much time on the road going from park to park. However, we decided that we HAD to go to Amboseli just to get some shots of Elephants against a Mount Kilimanjaro background. But being the “lucky” couple that we are, we found the mountain engulfed in thick dark clouds from the time we got there. For the whole 2 days that we were doing safaris, the clouds opened up only for 15 mts!!! Yes, just 15 mts! Fortunately, we were around some elephants when that happened and were able to get a few shots. Not the composition I wanted but at least it was better than nothing.

We saw lots of elephants and at one point were surrounded by a large herd.

One of the elephants actually looked like a mammoth!!!

Even though the mammoth looked like the oldest of the herd, the matriarch was this one.

After a while she was not happy that we were near her wards and she did a mock charge at us!

We saw several species of birds

Marabou Stork

Grey Crowned Cranes

Long tailed Fiscal Shrike

Little Bee-Eater

A mean looking Superb Starling

A cheetah who was tracking a herd of gazelle for her evening meal. We were hoping to see a kill but the cheetah didn’t seem very hungry cos she did a very lazy attempt to catch her prey! Needless to say the gazelle got away but we were treated to a superb exhibition of speed. I tried to do a panning shot of the hunt and this was the best I got

We were able to see some nice sunsets as well. A great end to a fantastic safari experience.

A slide show of all the shots

Petting Rhinos and Cheetahs

2010-09-21T14:45:00.014+01:00

Our next destination, after our 4 days at Masai Mara (2 days at Nyumbu Camp and 2 days at Serena Lodge), was Amboseli. It would have been too tiring to drive there directly so we decided to do a stay-over in Nairobi.

On our way out of Masai Mara, we came across this Southern Ground Hornbill who seemed very willing to pose for us. I swear she batted her eyelids at me as well but when she saw Michelle, she backed off!

Since it was a black bird being shot against a very bright background with very harsh lighting (mid day sun), it was difficult to get the full dynamic range in camera. So, for the first image I created 3 images from a single raw file to create an HDR image. The 2nd image is a single shot and you can see the colour and impact is much less than the first one - though there was quite a bit of dodge/burn to bring out the details in that one.

I always try to keep my HDRs as real to the scene as possible only using to show the dynamic range that is impossible to capture in camera with a single frame. However, I decided to experiment and do one of those extreme HDRs which has become an art form in itself.

Once we got in to Nairobi, we explored some of its other attractions.

We were able to pet this Rhino – what an experience. Its incredible to see such power and magnificence up close and be able to touch it.

During our safaris at Lake Nakuru and Masai Mara, disappointingly, we didn’t see any leopards in the wild (we were not that lucky in Sri Lanka as well). So, one of the first enclosures we went to was to see this beautiful animal. However, he was not in a good mood and was not too pleased to see us.

These were shot through a cage so it was a bit difficult getting a proper shot without the chain fence showing.

The monkeys were not afraid of humans and this guy was bold enough to take some apples from our hand.

Next, we headed out to do fulfil one of the main reasons that Michelle wanted to go to

Kenya

– to pet a Cheetah!!! Cheetahs are our favourite of the big cats. They do not display the ferocity and anger of the other wild cats and in fact are attacked by a variety of predators including wild dogs and jackals. It’s a good thing that Cheetahs are the fastest land animal (able to hit 60mph in under 3 secs – faster than some super cars!) because their prey is constantly stolen by lions, leopards, hyenas, etc.

Another great experience and a lifelong dream fulfilled :D

Masai Mara - Day 3 & 4 - Serena Lodge

2010-08-30T22:11:00.010+01:00

After two unforgettable nights at Nuyumbu Camp, we headed to the other side of the Mara. Here we were going to stay at the Mara Serena Lodge.

Located within the park, the Lodge offered great views of the plains and contained plenty of bird life, which almost made us not want to go on the game drives. We were greeted at the entrance to the lodge by this large colourful Red Headed Rock Agama

We had heard that the ‘Mara never disappoints’ and it didn’t! But we had to forgo many photo opportunities because they were “off track” and we were not allowed to stray away from the official roads. One of those missed opportunities was the only sighting of a leopard during the whole trip. We heard that a leopard and her cub were resting in a tree but since there were no pathways to it, we could not get close enough for a proper view. We parked ourselves as close to it as possible and waited very patiently for a couple of hours. However, all we could see was the tail and this is the best shot we got.

Ironically, the next day we heard that as soon after we left the spot the mother and cub had come down for a stroll and waited for awhile, right next to the vehicle that was parked there!

Of course, my husband didn’t hesitate to curse and swear at everything that moved from thereon. According to him, seeing the Lion and the Cheetah as well as a very close encounter with wild hippos and giraffes was NOTHING if you didn’t have a leopard dance in front of your lens while in Africa. Even though I tried to explain to him that we can see the leopard all we want in Sri Lanka, where we go on holiday at least once a year, and that we can’t see the lion or cheetah there. But it didn’t help...... until we heard that a pride of lions had attacked and killed a very big hippo while it was making its way back to the water. Yes, we were not mistaken.... it wasn’t a zebra or a buffalo it was indeed a hippo and yes it was supposed to be a very rare sight.

A very large and very dead hippo was surrounded by a pride of hungry lions.

Here is a video of them having their meal....

To my surprise, the man who refuses to use any public toilet no matter what the emergency, the very man who can’t stand any sort of odour – stood very, very still with only a camera to his nose and with flies buzzing about his face – for over two hours in a place where the smell of dead flesh was unbearable! Everyone was driving by quickly when the smell hit them but we sat there for a couple of hours waiting for some good opportunities for shots.

After eating their fill, they relaxed and guarded the carcass from the jackals and vultures nearby.

The male in the pride, after a very good meal, was feeling pretty "good" enough to try and impress one of the females.

My favourite animal is the Cheetah and we got some great chances to see them here. We had a great opportunity to track one who was on the hunt and she seemed to be tracking some gazelle herself. However, she attracted quite a few vehicles and was constantly disturbed by all the noises made by the people who were more interested in talking, quite loudly at that, about their Aunty’s birthday party and the leftover cake rather than look at this great wildlife event. There was a time when we felt the Cheetah was about to launch herself in to the attack and right at that time, a man from one of the other vehicles exclaimed, quite loudly, how he would have liked to have some of the cake! The noise startled the Cheetah and she started walking away, giving up the hunt. It’s terrible when people who can’t appreciate nature and it’s beauty (and are more concerned about cake) are given the opportunity to see such rare sights and yet don’t make use of them.

We really enjoyed our stay at Serena Lodge - the ambience and decor was fantastic.

We were also treated to a traditional Masai dance

Grey Crowned Crane

Saddle Billed Stork

These cute Rock Hyraxes were every where around the Lodge

A slideshow of all the shots can be seen here

Having the cake and eating it.....

2010-07-15T14:31:00.008+01:00

Another year has passed by and as I grow older, my birthdays just become better :D

You may already know how my wife makes my birthday truly special – with lots of yummy food, delicious cake and loads of prezzies – this year was no exception!

It all started out with a lot of “secret” shopping on Friday, which Mich did all by herself. On Saturday, she had to work and then we went to Pioshy/Lionel’s place for a dinner (Pioshy’s bday was on the 6th) getting back at about 11pm. Since there was a lot to do, she started prepping stuff that night itself and went to sleep at 4am! I was banned from entering the kitchen so could not help out in anyway as she wanted it to be a surprise. Sunday, she woke up at 7.00am and went straight in to the kitchen to start all the cooking for the special bday dinner – to which she had invited Pioshy/Lionel as well as Lasa/Imal.

A lot of effort and time went into preparing a fantastic Caribbean + Sri Lankan menu. Being a hot summer day we started off with a Caribbean style cantaloupe drink (bits of cantaloupe mixed with sweetened milk and topped off with pomegranate slush, almond flakes and pomegranate seeds). The starter was a ‘Coconut shredded shrimp’ with yoghurt and coriander sauce which was absolutely delicious.

The main course was special Caribbean spicy rice cooked in coconut milk with a chicken and prawn rum curry, honey roasted lamb coated in almonds served with pan roasted cherry tomatoes along with an avocado and tomato salad. She even whipped up a quick devilled potato dish to accommodate the newlywed Janisha (Shehan’s wife) who is a vegetarian.

Honey roasted lamb

Janisha tucking in

Everything was fantastic and we stuffed ourselves silly – especially me as I could hardly move after eating so much.

But the highlight of the night was a brilliant, absolutely delicious Crème brûlée. These deserts are hard to get right but Mich turned them out perfectly. We all enjoyed every bit of it.

It was also the World Cup final day so Lionel and I were glued to the screen most of the time while we watched a relatively boring match, which Spain won during the last few minutes of extra time – we wanted Netherlands to win!

Lionel glued to the TV while a disinterested Pioshy looks away

Once it was confirmed that no one could move after stuffing themselves, Mich produces the Birthday Cake. Now, I must say that Mich is an expert at making cakes and she has a natural touch. But I was surprised by the sheer beauty of the cake she produced this time! It’s called “Death by Chocolate” (maybe there is a hint for me there :D) and it was the best cake I have ever tasted. To me, it was a work of art which I didn’t want to destroy by cutting but once I had tasted it, I wanted to eat the whole thing then and there. She used goose berries dipped in chocolate sauce to decorate it and had cantaloupe and blueberries for the base.

No Birthday Party will be complete without prezzies. Lasa presented me with a newspaper covered box which I was surprised about. It also felt very heavy and I was wondering what it was. Unable to contain my curiosity I opened the box to find a box of nappies.

But that wasn’t the joke – I was told to open the Nappy box and inside which there was a can of tinned tomatoes and a can of chickpeas! Very funny Lasa!

Hold on… wait a minute…. I moved some of the packing aside and I saw a box with a Canon logo on it – OMG! It was a Canon EF 85mm f/1.8 lens – something that I had wanted to get for a long time.

When I picked up the box though, I realised there can’t be a lens inside because it was very light. I was right – it contained a couple of adult sweets!!!! Lasa had got me again! But, at least I was sure that I was going to be sucking on boobies that night! :D

However, it got me thinking – why would Lasa have a brand new 85mm f1/.8 box with him and not the lens? It seemed obvious that a devious plan was afoot to surprise me with the lens later on! So I casually remarked that it was a shame the lens was not in the box cos it would be perfect for taking shots during the party. It worked cos 5 mts later I got a present from Mich – which contained the Lens!! WOWWY WOWWY WOW!!! I was over the moon. Mich had wanted to get a photography related gift for me so she did the research, roped in a flickr friend and used some very clever method to find out what lenses I really wanted and then got Lasa to buy the lens for her (which was why he had the box). It was a total surprise and I was gobsmacked! Never expected to get a lens – wow!

After that, the lens was used through out the night and never left the camera. It looks like a great lens and is sharp and fast – fantastic!

Some shots with the new lens

The lens is fantastic for portraits and what better subject than the very cute and adorable Navitha (Lasa & Imal's son)

Got a couple of other presents as well, which I will take shots of later. I am also waiting on another present - a framed copy of a shot from Kenya - unfortunately Mich got the dimensions of the frame wrong so need to get the right size first!

Had an absolutely great time and thanks to Ness, Pioshy, Lasa, Imal and Janisha for being part of the celebration.

But most of all thank you to my wonderful, amazing, beautiful and loving wife who makes me thank God for every day I spend with her.

A few more shots in the slideshow

Masai Mara - Day 1 & 2 - Nyumbu Camp

2010-06-30T13:26:00.009+01:00

The Masai Mara is what people say it is – a miracle! They say the Mara never disappoints and even during the off-peak season, it didn't disappoint us.

Mara is a large game reserve in south-western

Kenya

and is the northern continuation of the Serengeti National Park in

Tanzania

. It is named after the Masai people, the traditional inhabitants of the area, who we could see grazing their cattle in the outskirts of the park. It is famous for its exceptional population of Big Cats and the annual migration of zebra, Thomson's gazelle and wildebeest from the Serengeti.

The road to Mara

We were lucky to have gone with one of the best Safari companies in

Kenya

- As You Like It Safaris which is run by the charming Vivien Prince. We were not sure about staying in tented accommodation as April was supposed to be the rainy season so opted for Lodges for most of the trip. However, Vivien advised us to stay at Nyumbu Camp for the first two nights at Mara to get the real "African Experience". And we are sure glad we took her advice because that turned out to be the best place we stayed at during the whole trip!

Nyumbu Camp

Even though all the lodges we stayed at were swanky & modern places, for us, Nyumbu Camp was the best. There were no facilities like swimming pool, wifi, etc and in fact, there was only one place to get all our electronic equipment charged and in our case that was a lot (they do have laundry service though!). However, it gave us the real camping experience minus the hassle of cooking, cleaning, etc. Nyumbu (which means Wildebeest in Swahili) Camp is located on open ground just outside the official boundaries of the Masai Mara reserve but since there are no barriers, wild animals roam about through the camp during the night. Masai warriors keep guard over the tents with their spears and are available to make sure we are safe during our walk to the restaurant and back. The staff are friendly and know how to give the guests a truly unique experience of the wild.

The camp has several large and spacious safari tents with an en suite toilet and shower. Yes - a proper toilet, shower cubicle with hot water and wash basin are included WITHIN the tent! There is ample room for clothes and equipment and there are 2 beds - 1 double and 1 single - easily able to accommodate 3 adults comfortably. The tents are very secure and there is a good distance between each of them to ensure privacy. A long winding road leads to the restaurant and bar. The best thing about the tent is that it has 2 layers - the outside layer, when fully zipped up, covers the tent and offers complete privacy. You can open up the outer layer and leave the second layer made of netting, with the breeze sweeping through the netting. In the morning, when you wake up you just lie in bed staring at the sky, a sunrise and a tree full of birds just outside the tent – it is an experience worth dying for.

Click on any image for larger size. Click back button to return

The tent from outside

The tent inside - with all our mess

African sunrise

Right next to the restaurant area, there was a big tree which was full of Masked Weaver bird nests. Several of the nests had young birds inside and many of the adult Weaver birds were busy feeding them. We spent quite a bit of time viewing these birds fluttering about and it was at this time that we heard the chirps of a very young bird coming from the ground - one of them had fallen out of the nest! With the help of the staff we were able to restore it back to its nest.

The young bird which had fallen out of the nest - ugly looking yet soooo cute!

Masked Weaver Bird (not sure which kind - though, it does look very much like the Northern Masked Weaver, they are supposed to be found only in the Lake Baringo area though)

The most striking feature of the Masai Mara is how the reserve stretches out for miles and miles with just grass. We were worried that we would get lost in that stark wilderness but Camara (our driver/guide) knew the area very well.

And now for the real Mara experience

Wildebeest

Surveying prey

Peek-a-boo..... I see you!

Lone Impala

We had some good views of Giraffes

There were quite a lot of birds as well

Saddle-Back Storks building a nest

Not sure which species

This Water Thick-Knee walked very close to the vehicle

The Common Ostrich - female

The Common Ostrich - male

A very sleepy Verreaux's Eagle Owl

Spur-winged Plover

Black Kite

One of the more interesting birds that we came across was the Kori Bustard, a large terrestrial bird which stands more than 3 feet tall. They are one of the heaviest flying birds in the world and the male can weigh up to 12Kgs! They are omnivorous with a diet of insects, lizards and seeds and they nest on the ground. They have a very interesting mating display which involves inflating throat sacs or elevating their elaborate feathered crests.

We drove around a lot trying to find a Leopard or Cheetah with no luck. All of a sudden Camara turned into a road leading to a tree under which there was a herd of Elephants. You can imagine our surprise when we saw on the other side three cheetahs relaxing in the grass.

The elephant herd kept moving towards the cheetahs while grazing and at one point, one of the bigger elephants decided that the cheetahs were a threat to the little baby elephant in the group. So she made a dash and chased the cheetahs off. It was quite funny to see the cheetahs running away from the elephant. She nearly caught up with one!

The baby elephant they were protecting

More elephants

On the second day, we did a full day Safari where we got a packed lunch and did a whole day in the park. This was our picnic site on top of a hill over looking the plains.

Second day was a bit disappointing as we didn’t see much during the day as it was extremely hot. However, on our way back to camp we came across a lion family consisting of a mother and 2 cubs. They seemed to have just woken up from a long nap.

Finally we saw this Jackal just before we headed off to the Camp

A slideshow of the shots – a few more additional ones in here

Lake Nakuru, Kenya

2010-06-10T06:45:00.012+01:00

From Lake Naivasha we headed for a 2 day trip to Lake Nakuru.

Accommodation was at Nakuru Lodge which was very good. The rooms were large with a good view of the plains and there were long winding walks to the restaurant which was quiet nice at night.

Of all the parks we had been to, we liked Nakuru the best – yes even more than the Mara. This might have been because it was small and it was very, very green! Lake Nakuru National Park is a bird sanctuary. The park is situated outside Nakuru Township in Kenya, which is part of the Great Rift Valley with its alkaline and fresh water lakes, within easy reach of Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. The park comprises of a large lake which is surrounded by a beautiful landscape of sedge, marsh, vast grasslands, rocky cliffs, outcrops, stretches of yellow-barked acacia woodlands, plus a large forest of Euphorbia trees (unique on such a large scale to Kenya).

The main reason to go to Nakuru was to see the flamingos. Ideally we would have liked to get some sunset shots of them but were not allowed to be in the park at that time.

There is the constant ‘clickin’ of the birds beaks as they feed – which, strangely, is a comforting sound.

We found a pack of hyenas nearby, cooling off in the water.

It wasn’t easy trying to avoid the layer of bird poo touching our feet to get this shot - but it was worth it even though Mr spent the latter part of the night scrubbing the soles of his shoes.

FACT - Flamingos' pink or reddish feather colour comes from its diet, which is high in alpha and beta-carotene. People eat beta-carotene when they eat carrots. The typical flamingo diet consists of diatoms, seeds, blue-green algae, crustaceans, and mollusks they filter out of the water.

Marabou Stork - To the casual observer, this massive bird with a balding, scrubby head and a pendulous pink air sac, appears to be the ugliest creature in the world (next to man!). Its fondness for carrion and habit of squirting excrement onto its own legs will justify this opinion! This is a large bird standing 1.5 m tall and weighing 9 Kg and is one of the largest flying birds in the world.

Mr Personality

‘Man should learn to fight from the rhino’ is what I thought after we saw two of them going at it for hours. No showing off, flexing of muscles, making a big noise or raising hell - they were just ‘peacefully’ fighting and it had been going on for so long they were both bleeding but it was still a carefully paced out fight.

This female and her baby kept watching for a while.

One of the Rhinos was sweating profusely and we named it “sweaty”. We bet that he will win but alas he lost and “dry” one won the battle.

FACT - Rhinos main predator is MAN. It has no natural predators. The rhino is prized for its horn. Not a true horn, it is made of thickly matted hair that grows from the skull without skeletal support. The major demand for horn is in Asia, where it is used in traditional medicine and ornamental carvings.

Just when we thought we had seen it all (as we didn’t expect to see anything much in Nakuru except the flamingos), we saw the lions – our first glimpse of the African lion! The most exciting thing was the way one was hiding behind a tree spying on us. Seeing a lion on top of a tree was pretty unusual for us! You don’t realize just how well camouflage works until you see something like this.

On the second day, after a desperate and disappointing search for leopards, we were returning to the lodge when we came upon this pride just about 200m from the Lodge gates!!!! They were right by the side of the road and seemed relaxed even though there were quite a few vehicles about.

Rothschild Giraffe

Impala

Hoopoe

Blacksmith Plover

Vervet Monkey

It is hard to describe the Secretary Bird and its strange walk using a picture but it is one of the strangest birds you can see especially during its take off and landing. It’s a terrestrial bird of prey and is instantly recognizable as having an eagle-like body on crane-like legs. Don’t let the picture mislead you - the bird’s height is around 1.3 m (4 ft) tall.

Lilac breasted Roller

Helmeted Guniea Fowl

And then there is the Widow Bird. The first time I saw it, I thought it was a piece of a garbage bag floating in the wind. And then I saw the head, the red wings, the fluttering and the breath taking dance. It is truly a wonderful sight.

A video of the little guy flying about

From Lake Nakuru

Purple glossy starling

Bush Buck (female)

Favorite memory

On the first day, after a tiring morning drive, I fell asleep with the windows open (though we were advised not to). Mr was in the loo, as usual. I was fast asleep dreaming of hugging a cheetah when I was woken by some noises. In my half sleepy state, I assumed that it was ‘Mr as usual, going through the bags in an attempt to find something that we didn’t even bring! But the noise kept on going and I was getting really annoyed. I got up to give Mr a nice scolding for waking me when I saw…. looking straight at me….. a huge baboon sitting on the dresser going through my hand bag! For a minute I wondered if Mr had finally turned into this handsome fella on our dresser…. then I realised that it was not to be! I screamed and Mr. came running out of the toilet in the middle of his.…!!! When he saw Mr running in like a mad man, the baboon ran away taking our malaria tablets with him!

Slideshow of Lake Nakuru

Kenya - Lake Naivasha

2010-05-26T01:51:00.051+01:00

The Trip

Even though we are clearly blessed in many ways, my husband and I always feel we are equally cursed in other ways. There is not a single thing we have done together without having to overcome a catastrophic event or two. After all these years, we have now learnt to prepare for the inevitable and expect the worse.

So when we decided to go to Kenya, we did expect bad things to happen – to get sick, get malaria, purge every day, rain, lose camera, get kidnapped etc. Well none of those things happened – but something worse did – we got to fly KENYA AIRLINES!!!

Why Kenya?

Well other than for the fact that we met two wonderfully helpful people, Raabia and Abdul through FB– Kenya had always intrigued us. Contrary to what most people think –

Kenya

is NOT a dry barren land with no water and poor people running about. Even though Nairobi is a bit chaotic the rest of the areas are full of greenery and wonderfully polite, well clothed, well educated people.

The planning

Health - We needed to get four jabs for seven different diseases + take malaria tablets – and yes they are VERY IMPORTANT

Safety - The most important thing is not to attempt to do the whole backpacker thing on your own – the country is too big, the facilities are few and there are far too many scams going on to attempt this. It is best to go with a reputed travel agent and we cannot recommend ‘As you Like it Safaris Ltd’ enough. It also seems like a lot of crime takes place in the city. Driving is chaotic and dangerous.

Accommodation - The lodges are similar to our Habarana Lodge but most are maintained at a higher quality. They offer Wifi, laundry, extensive buffets, comfortable, clean, spacious rooms and pool (listed in order of importance).

We stayed mainly in lodges and the only tented accommodation was at Nyumbu camp – which for me, was the best experience. Details and pictures are to follow. When you say ‘tents’ in Kenya it does not mean little ones we put up and creep into – they are massive tents which are divided with cloth screens, have their own shower cubicle and toilet with hot water, double beds, clean linen and clothes storage. The wind sweeps through the tent at night and the birds wake you in the morning – it is an experience in itself.

Attire - Cotton, Cotton, Cotton – no, it is not hot its actually chilly in the morning and evening but cotton will keep you comfortable and a sweater or light jacket is a must for the early mornings or late evenings.

We don’t want to go on and on as there is far too much information here already so if you are thinking of going to

Kenya

– get in touch and we will share all our information with you.

Now for more interesting things…

Day 1 – was spent in Nairobi with wonderful Raabia and her family. We were too tired to take shots but had a good time going to the Masai Market and just chilling with her and her cats.

Day 2 of 12 – Lake Naivasha

From Nairobi we were headed to Lake Nakuru with a one day stop over at Lake Naivasha. Accommodation – Naivasha Country Club.

Rating – Average.

Lovely garden, small rooms, good food but bad service.

On the way - The Rift Valley

The main thing to do in Naivasha is the boat trip to see the Hippos. So with visions of hippos walking, eating, mating, feeding their young and doing ‘Fouetté en tournant’ we headed to the lake. After a 10 minute interesting but quite muddy walk, we arrived at the lake.

Pied Kingfisher

A butterfly - need identification

The Lake is a beautiful place similar to our Muthurajawwela Marsh. It’s a fresh water lake where over 400 birds have been recorded. There is a certain quality to the quietness you feel when you are there and it seems to make one feel sublime.

Great Egret

White breasted Cormorant

Egyptian Goose

Once in, the boatman told us we can buy fish to see the eagles hunt! Even though we sensed a hitch, my imagination (as usual) got the better of me – I was expecting to see 5 foot eagles sweeping down all over - so we jumped at the idea of buying some fish on a lovely lake in

Kenya

–after all, how much can it cost?

Buy fish we did!! There were dry old Tilapias and it cost us £5/- for THREE, yes three which were smaller than our palms. We could have bought a nice fresh kilo of fish in

for that money!

With the fish bought, we set out take the award wining shot of the eagle hunt. Alas! Alas! Even with three attempts we could not get the perfect shot! With new regard for wildlife photographers and their patience we set out to find more interesting things.

African Fish Eagle

The mistake

Later, we realised it was wrong to feed the birds. It is true the boatman just throws the fish in the water and they are dry so they float which makes the eagles sweep down and get it. This is not the right thing to do as it might have some sort of interference with them not hunting naturally as they are fed this way. We are also not sure where the fish are from and what the fish contained!

Hunting

The bonus

There were no hippos out of the water. Even though that was obvious as the sun was up I still kept looking around expecting one to come rolling down the grassy plains. The hippos were all immersed in the water and one might think this made it less exciting. To get the perfect shot – YES! But for the experience – NO!

It was thrilling to see them in the wild. There were five families with up to 10 individuals in each one. What was really nice was the fact that Naivasha lake did not seem to be this remote far away place. There was plenty of human activity around it and in the middle of all this were the hippos. The feeling was a happy one – a few yards away there were kids bathing and here were groups of hippos - perhaps it is because we have only seen them in captivity with our hearts longing for their freedom. It was an experience worth the trip and the day!

This one was not too happy with us

Here is a slideshow of all the pictures from Lake Naivasha

More details and photos of the other parks we visited to be posted in the near future

Learning to see creatively - book review

2009-11-11T14:29:00.012Z

A friend recently told my wife that creativity is not something that could be learnt, it’s something that’s within you and that you are born with! (unfortunately, I was not around at that time). The ironic thing is that the statement was made about the book “Learning to See Creatively” by Bryan Peterson – the very book that has dispelled this misconception quite effectively. In his own words, the reason he first wrote the book was “to dispel the myth that the art of image making was for the chosen few”. After selling hundreds of thousand copies, the book being in existence for the past 20 years (original version was published in 1988) and going through so many reprints and revised editions, we can safely assume that he has been successful in doing this at least for those capable of grasping it.

Whilst I can admit that people are born with talent and creativity, to say that another person cannot “learn” to see creativity is very…. well…. silly! Do all those who are successful in art, fashion, design, etc inbuilt with talent only? Do they not go and “learn” their craft from schools, institutes and colleges? Even those who claim to have made it on their own talent are actually “self-taught” – they look at their idols and mentors, “learn” from their style and keep improving based on the feedback they get. This is true for any of the art forms out there. Yes there are people born creative – but the majority of the successful artists (be it art, photography, design, etc) have “learnt” to be creative. The fact is that in order to make a “creative” composition of a painting or photograph, you need to follow several rules (or you need to break the rules…. and to do that you need to know what the rules are…). These rules have been developed over centuries and even artists like Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo have used these rules in their paintings – does that mean that “they” were not creative?

Well having got that out of the way, let’s get down to the review. For those who do not know who Bryan Peterson is (and if you are photographer you surely should know him) – he is a very successful photographer with a highly profitable image stock library, some of which have been sold for thousands of dollars on a repetitive basis. He has been photographing for over 30 years and has been teaching photography for over 20 years. He is also the author of several highly successful books including “Understanding Exposure”, which many consider to be the “bible” of photography (I have this book as well but it does not need a separate review – just a single sentence – “If you want to understand photography, just get Understanding Exposure”).

“Learning to see creatively” has the very laid back and easy to understand style that Bryan used in “Understanding Exposure”. He quickly puts us at ease that we CAN learn to see creatively and then explains how to do this by changing the way we see things around us and expanding our vision. He then discusses the elements of design (line, shape, form, texture, pattern and colour) in detail and then goes on to give the rules like the Golden section, rule of thirds, etc and explains how all these elements come together to make a creative composition. Photography is all about light and a separate chapter has been dedicated to show how light affects composition.

The book is an excellent read and I highly recommend it. Its easy to understand and you quickly grasp the essentials. Design and rules of composition can be highly technical (as shown in Michael Freeman’s book The Photographer’s Eye) but Bryan has kept it all simple so that any beginner or amateur photographer reading it is able to understand. He uses a lot of examples and his own images to illustrate the point. To me, Bryan is like the cool high school teacher who makes things very interesting without trying too hard, so you end up learning without really knowing it.

Dancing Damsels

2009-11-09T13:51:00.007Z

Some of the pictures from this shoot were featured in the Sunday Observer Magazine on 1^st November 2009 (online version here and here).

One of our dear friends, Chathu, is a dancer of extra ordinary talent and experience. She has been dancing professionally for more than 14 years and has performed in over 20 countries worldwide. She has her own dance troupe, Ethnic Dance Studio, who perform at corporate events and shows but this year she wanted to do her own show to showcase the troupe’s talents.

As part of the promotional material for the event, she wanted a few shots to be taken of troupe and herself and as luck would have it, I was in Sri Lanka at that time to help out. I was quite nervous about doing a “professional” shoot – it would be the first time that I will be “directing” live models (other than for my wife) and I had to ensure that I had at least a few “winners” that they can use for their newspaper articles, promotional leaflets, souvenirs and website. So the pressure was on - I was not sure whether I was going to be able to do it but I was sure going to try.

The shoot was challenging for me on many fronts

1) There were 5 dancers for the group shots and I had to ensure that ALL their faces could be seen properly. This was a bit difficult with all the arms and heads twisting around the frame while they went in to their dance poses! More often then not, by the time I had positioned them and taken a shot, the models would have moved ever so slightly to a position where the face was in shadow or was covered by another hand. So I had to take several frames quite quickly and I had to keep moving around or moving them around to get the proper shot

2) As you can see from the pictures, the poses were not the “run of the mill” ones you get in normal portraits. In order to show them in their element, they had to be in certain dance poses which required quite an effort on their part. It was quite difficult for them to stand still when they were half bent or had one leg in the air and I had to take my shots quickly before the moment was lost or one of the dancers moved.

3) Even though I had read up quite a bit on lighting, it’s altogether a different ball game when it comes to doing it for real!!! The shoot was done at the Hilton Hotel and balancing the lighting in some of the indoor shots was a pretty big challenge. Even trying to get the out door lighting, especially the ones against the sun, were quite difficult.

As stated above lighting was a pretty big challenge and even though I was using a shoot through umbrella and a voice activated light stand (my wife Michelle) it was quite difficult to get some of the shots without hard shadows which I really hated doing.

The final part of the shoot was this particular dancer in a peacock costume. After taking some shots to be used for the promotion, I used a nearby chair to give a bit of a different “fashion shoot” look to the image.

With all the challenges, the whole shoot turned out to be quite fun. Highlight for my wife was when I lay down on the ground near the stairs to try and get a shot with a different view point – she found that quite hilarious. We had a few strange looks from the guests and one of the guests actually wanted to take a shot with the dancers :D We also came across another photographer (together with 3 – yes three – voice activated stands and full bridal retinue) doing a wedding shoot.

Had good fun doing it and it was a good learning experience.

These and a few other pics of the shoot can be found here

Yala Safari – everything other than the leopard

2009-11-04T12:36:00.012Z

The previous post was all about our primary objective in going to Yala - to photograph leopards. In pursuing this objective, we saw a lot of other interesting sights and had a few "adventures" along the way.

The first “adventure” was trying to do two things in one trip with two completely different people

1) to have a serious educational wildlife trip - with Jerome, our wildlife expert and guru

2) to have fun - with Damith, our dear friend and clown whom we always take on our trips

Having these two conflicting personalities in the same vehicle was not pleasant at the best of times even though they got on better than we expected. Right in the middle was the calm, reflective personality of Rajive, providing a balance between the two.

We made use of a Montero to make the trip as we did not want to hire open vehicles to go in to the park. The Montero was quite comfortable and there was an endless stream of banter and jokes from Jerome and Damith until we got to our destination. One eventful incident on the way was when we were overtaken by a TATA jeep which was going at breakneck speed around the curved roads (quite a considerable speed as we were going pretty fast as well). After overtaking us, the jeep stopped quite suddenly by the side of the road a hundred metres ahead of us. Without warning, out popped a skinny guy with long hair from the driver’s side and without looking to check for any vehicles, crossed the main Kataragama road quite casually. I had to brake quite hard to avoid hitting him but what was more shocking was that he jumped from my side of the road to the path of an oncoming bus which barely missed him. It was amazing that he didn’t get knocked down by either the bus or our vehicle. He quickly disappeared inside a house and even though we felt like giving the guy a good talking to, we continued our journey without any further incident.

Yala is a hot, dry, dusty and a tiring place during the drought season. We arrived in the afternoon and settled ourselves in a little place that Rajive had booked for us. The meals were fantastic here and we thoroughly enjoyed the food. Living quarters were not great but for that price and time frame it was the best we could do. The best times to see animals and birds are at dawn (the few hours after sunrise) and dusk (the few hours before sunset). However, getting away at the “crack of dawn” was inevitably delayed as we had to get the “baby” of our group (Damith) out of bed, in to the shower and to the vehicle as he was incapable of doing it by himself.

The park, especially the main visitor center, is full of Gray Langurs. It is quite interesting to see how much they look like humans. This guy was trying to relax and tried out many positions similar to us.

One of the highlights of the trip was being able to see a bask (group) of crocodiles feasting on a buffalo carcass in the water. They were too far to capture while doing this but these were the participants of this spectacle

Pic by Rajive

Bee-eaters and deer were quite common as well and we saw plenty of these

Elephants are of course a favourite of any safari trip in Yala and we had our fair share of adventures with them. We had a good sighting of a large bull elephant which is supposedly rare in Yala. We were making our way to another leopard stop, when we saw some vehicles parked on the road and a lot of rustling noise from our left. We stopped for a couple of minutes and out walked a massive elephant with very long tusks. He walked right in front of our vehicle as he crossed the road and made his way in to the thick jungle on the other side

We also witnessed how protective elephants are of their young. We came upon a water hole where a group of elephants had come to drink. Among them was a very young one, maybe about 3 months or so who seemed to be wanting to get in to the water. The adults of the group were very protective especially when several other jeeps came to look at them. All the little one wanted to do was get in the water and play but the adults kept pushing him between their legs to keep him protected. It was quite a sight. Once they had finished drinking their fill, they left with plenty of protecting adults around the little guy, with one of the elephants turning to give a warning trumpet as if ordering us not to follow them.

We came across another family of elephants which were in the undergrowth. Our presence made the head female nervous and she made a warning charge towards us. We decided not to disturb them further and went on our way.

The best elephant “adventure” of the trip was when Jerome decided to educate our young guide on the “Elephant Graveyard” myth. The myth is that all elephants of a group go to one particular place near a water hole to die because of sentimental reasons. This is not the case – as explained by Jerome, when an elephant becomes old, he finds it harder and harder to find food which he can chew on. So he makes his way to river banks where the plants are more succulent and easier to eat. At this point, since the elephant does not travel much due to its ill health, he dies around the same area. As time goes on, other elephants do the same thing and try to find areas where there is food which is easier to eat. They are eventually led to the same place and they too pass away in that area. So it is not a matter of these elephants finding a place to die – it’s a case of them finding food and dying due to old age. Of course, Damith couldn’t keep his mouth shut while Jerome was narrating this in all seriousness and he made a joke that Jerome should tell the story properly. This angered Jerome and led to an argument. Damith as usual had to listen to a lot of harsh words.

We were also amazed by the vehicles that came to Yala - one of which was a huge, old TATA bus full of people. They complained about not seeing a single animal and this did not surprise us the animals would have run away from the park itself with all the noise the bus and the crowd in it were making. Jerome narrated the funny story of how one group which had come to Yala in a bus had stopped off in the middle of the park to plant wickets and play a game of cricket - this was right in the middle of area where wild elephants and leopards roam :D

The jeep all dusty and dirty, working its way across the rocks

The "kolla" Jerome - looking quite "elegant"

Rajive - the "normal" one of the group

I got some very funny shots of Damith bathing in his underwear - unfortunately he found out about them and was rude enough to delete them from the camera. As revenge, I am not including any of his shots here :D

This is a huge rock that we saw near the beach area

A Ruddy Mongoose drinking at the waterhole

Found a great spot for dragonflies near the lunch area - but unfortunately, even though I had the necessary patience to photograph them, I was constantly disturbed by the impatience of the others in the group who were keen to move on

A Serpent Eagle - I tracked this guy to another tree which gave me a clear shot but just as soon as I had set the camera and was about to press the shutter button he flew off

Crocodile lunch? Not really - the heron is actually a bit further away from the croc. It looks like they are very close here because of the forced perspective

And finally, a very rare sighting of the endemic Sri Lankan River Hippopotamus :D

All these shots and a few more can be found in this album

Yala

Another funny story towards the end of the trip was when I our wildlife expert and tracker was unable to "track" the route back to his own house and we had to find it for him

Overall a fun trip even though it had its moments!

Hunting Leopards

2009-10-29T15:57:00.011Z

Patience is a virtue......... especially for a wildlife photographer!

The reason I got in to photography was because of my interest in wildlife.... and the reason I got into wildlife was because of my wife. Even though I always had an interest in wildlife and nature, I never actively pursued it until I met my wife, who is a wildlife fanatic. We used to go on nature excursions in Sri Lanka - to rain forests and national nature parks - when I realised that recording these trips and the wildlife we saw, would be a good thing. Unfortunately my attempts at photography at that stage was, to put it mildly, crap. So I started researching, learning, reading and collecting equipment to become a better photographer. It was around this time that (fortunately or unfortunately) I came over to the UK which has limited my ability to do wildlife photography. But whenever, we visit Sri Lanka, we try to cram in as much of it as we can in the short time period we are there. Our holiday in August was no exception.

I had always wanted to go to Yala National Park, especially to see/photograph leopards in the wild but never got the chance to do so. Since it was the dry season in August and because there was a particularly severe drought this year, it was deemed to be ideal leopard viewing time as they would be visiting water holes quite regularly. So, together with our good friends Jerome (wildlife expert, tracker extraordinaire and general funny man), Rajive (wildlife enthusiast, vehicle expert and philosopher) and Damith (....uhmmm.... just a funny guy), we made a trip out there.

My primary reason for the trip was to photograph leopards - seeing anything else was considered a very low secondary objective. We got some reports of several sightings the weekend before we were to go there so we were very encouraged, motivated and even quite sure that we were going to have some good sightings. Inspired by the Planet Earth series and photographs by Rukshan Jayawardena, all I wanted to do was track or lie in wait at a water hole and then photograph a leopard at leisure. Very unfortunately, things don't always go according to plan.

Yala, especially during the drought season, is a burning hot, dry and dusty land which takes a lot of your energy. We were allocated a young guide (part of the regulations) who, even though new at the game, seemed knowledgeable and competent enough and assured us that he will do his best to show us leopards. He was particularly impressed with the DSLR and the (relatively massive) 150-500mm lens and wanted to ensure that we get some good close up photos of the elusive animal. Unfortunately, in his endeavour to please us, he became over enthusiastic in his efforts...

My idea of leopard spotting was to spend hours at a water hole and lie in wait for the animal. The guide had different ideas. Yala is quite a large park and there are about 5-6 spots that were supposed to be popular with the leopards. The problem was that these spots are quite far apart and required a lot of very tedious driving on hard, rocky and unpaved roads. In his efforts to show us the leopard, our guide made us run around these spots quite a lot. We would go to one spot, wait for 10-15mts and when nothing turned up, he would make us go to the next spot. And the cycle continued, for the next 3 days, during the first couple of hours in the morning and last few hours before sunset which are the times when leopards come out.

Our first day was almost coming to a close with disappointment in the air because we had not spotted even one leopard when we suddenly came upon a procession of trucks parked in the middle of the road. There were some whispers that a leopard was crossing the road ahead. In my excitement, I actually got out of the vehicle - which is strictly forbidden and might even be fined - to see the animal but was only treated to a brief glimpse of it in the undergrowth. The shot below is just a random click I took while getting out of the vehicle - from the hip - didn't even put the eye to the viewfinder.

From Yala

The next day we did more of the "running around" and I was becoming increasingly irritated. I tried to suggest that we lie in wait at a water hole but was quickly shot down as the guide felt that we might be missing an opportunity elsewhere. Even though we came upon a sighting that day, the leopard was so well hidden in the forest growth that we hardly could spot him let alone photograph him.

The 3rd and final day dawned and we piled in to the vehicle in high spirits hoping that today was going to be the lucky day. Being the final day, I wanted to adopt my "patiently wait in one spot" strategy but the guide was a bit apprehensive that we still had not got a good sighting and wanted to maximise the time running from one spot to another even more faster than we did the last 2 days. I did not over ride him on this because I was not sure whether my strategy would have worked, especially we had only 1 day, as numerous other guides/visitors were also not having any luck with sightings near the water holes. But that didn't stop my mood from going bad to worse and the guide was becoming very anxious about this. Even though I knew it was not his fault nor blamed him for our bad luck, he took the lack of sightings as a personal failure which only increased his determination. After a disappointing morning session and a tiring lunch, we set off on the evening rounds. Even though we saw several other animals and birds, there were no leopards - disappointment being expressed by a lot of the visitors/guides who were out that day. Several vehicles had been parked at some water holes for hours and they had not seen anything either nor had we, with all our running around.

With just a couple more hours to the park closing time, things were becoming desperate and I was about to put my foot down and insist that we stay in one place, when our guide suggested one last attempt at a spot which was a bit difficult to get at so might not be crowded with vehicles. He sounded quite keen and his own disappointment at our failure so far made me relent and we followed his directions. I had already given up and didn't even have my camera on "stand by mode" to take a shot. We were making our way slowly across some rocks when our guide gave an exclamation and asked the vehicle be stopped immediately.

I craned and twisted my neck and looked ahead to get my first proper glimpse of leopard, who was sitting quite strong and proud and looking at us quite curiously. But my "un-readiness" was costing me dearly cos it took me a few seconds to get the camera up to my eye and the lens through the window to compose the shot. Unfortunately, just as I had lined up the perfect shot, Rajive (who as driving at that time) thinking that I had no clear view of the animal because of the delay in me taking the shot, moved the vehicle slightly forward. The guide was horrified at this cos he immediately ordered, quite strongly, not to move the vehicle. But too late! The vehicle movement threw off my perfect shot and also alerted the leopard, who turned his back on us and started walking away and all I got was this shot.

Exhilaration at the sighting and disappointment at the missed photo opportunity, filled me at the same time, in equally strong proportions. The guide was more optimistic - he had been so anxious that he would not be able to show us a leopard that the first thing he did was put his hands to the air and give praise to the Gods!!! After this, he ordered us to drive around the rocks very slowly, expecting the leopard to be on the rocks where (s)he disappeared to. (S)he wasn't there so we stopped the vehicle and waited a few minutes. The sharp eyed guide gave another shout - even though the leopard was not on the rock he had expected it to be on, it had gone over to another rock a bit further off and we were able to see it clearly. However, our positioning was not great as there were several trees right in front of the animal and there was no way I could avoid them in my shots.

The best shot that I could get, and the only one with the leopard's eyes in them was this one - unfortunately it has a twig going right in front of its face which takes away a lot from the picture. And the twig is positioned in such a way that it is going to be difficult to clone it out.

The leopard slunk away soon after and even though we did try a couple of other spots we did not get to see another one.

After all the excitement died down, we realised we were quite lucky to have had that sighting, cos even though not great, we were one of the few that had a sighting at all that day. The guide was relieved and also happy with the big tip he got (which he would have got even if we didn't see a leopard). I would have preferred to have had used patience and a wait strategy but there are no guarantees when hunting leopards - you win some and you lose some.

Even though I realise that having had that small sighting is much better than having had no sighting at all, it really pained me when the guide phoned us a couple of days later to tell us that he had had several sightings of leopards since then and that there was one which waited at a water hole for a full 2 hours, drinking and playing, whilst it got its photograph taken by a lot of people. Talk about being unlucky! Maybe the leopards were just hiding from me!!!

PS. In recent times the knife has been twisted even harder when I see that Amila and Imran have had such great luck viewing and photographing these beautiful animals.

Raving at the beach

2009-10-13T15:21:00.005+01:00

The original idea was to do a running update of our holiday to

Sri Lanka

with weekly updates to this blog as well as twitter feeds. Unfortunately, plans are always supposed to go wrong and this was no exception due to the inability to get a PAYG internet connection and our busier than expected schedule.

As soon as she heard we were coming down in July, the first thing that my wife’s cousin did was to beg (yes beg) us to take her to the Hikkaduwa Beach Fesitval. The festival was organised by Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau and was a 4 day event with a Drum Festival on the 1^st night, a Beach rave on the 2^nd and themed parties on the 3^rd and 4^th nights.

So a week after we landed, together with the cousin Natashaaaaaaaaaa, and our dear friend Damith, we made our way to the south of the Island to the tourist beach paradise that is Hikkaduwa. Needless to say we had many adventures – the 1^st of which was trying to find accommodation. Natasha, in her brilliantly organised way, had arranged for 2 rooms in 2 different hotels and that had to be changed for the 2 nights we were going to be there. Confused? So were we. After much discussion with hotel staff, numerous calls to Natasha’s “friends” and a few trips up and down between hotels, we were able to secure 2 rooms, next to each other, in the same hotel for both the nights (better?).

Natasha and Michelle

After settling down in our rooms and relaxing with a drink, we set out in the evening to take a walk on the beach before went on to the Drum Festival. It had been quite a while since Mich and myself had walked on soft beach sand and we found it quite relaxing. Half way through the walk, we realised we were hungry and decided to take Natasha’s advise to sample some “Chicken Rotti” which was supposed to be a speciality down there with one particular shop doing a really tasty dish. According to Natasha, the way to find the shop was to look out for a board which said “Chicken Rotti” on the side – unfortunately, every shop we looked into had a board like this and after a bit of a walk we settled on a way side shop with a friendly enough shop owner. However, we fell in to the much dreaded “tourist” trap – we went in, ordered and had eaten without checking the price first – big mistake. We ended up paying a relatively big amount for something that really didn’t taste all that good and could have got for a fraction of the cost in Colombo.

After the meal we headed back to the beach to catch the sunset. I had wanted to photograph a proper sunset for a long time and I struggled a bit with setting up the tripod to the angle that I wanted. I also took my time to check the shots, use ND filters and even position a branch I found on the beach to a pleasing angle. All this preparation was a cause of great amusement and laughter for the others – including my wife – who were joking about the time that I took to take a simple sunset shot and that all the camera equipment I was carrying was actually a burden if I was going to take so long to take a shot. Well, all I can say is good photography takes time and now that the result is posted below, they can all eat their words!! Ha!

The Drum Festival, which started 1½ hours later than scheduled, had its ups and downs. We were quite excited about one particular group (can't remember their name) who we had seen live before and considered them to be quite good. They were one of the first to play. They are quite a young group and they quickly got the crowd on their feet with some excellent rhythmic beats.

This guy is the leader (I think) and is extremely talented

Here are a couple of videos of them performing – image quality is not great but the sound should give you an idea of what they are capable of

After they finished, the night went in to a slow decline in terms of entertainment. After such a high octane performance, the last thing we expected was a traditional drum performance. These guys were accompanied by dancers wearing traditional masks depicting devils and though entertaining, was inherently slow and down beat.

We were also treated to some "Brazillian Dancing" by some dancers brought in from the UK, which got the crowd going for obvious reasons.

(Picture by Damith de Silva)

Several other drum groups performed and some of them were good, but none of them could get us or the crowd as excited as the first group did.

One of the drummer really got in to the "swing"....

To make matters worse, the heavens opened up and we were treated to a nice shower at which point we realised that the organisers had not arranged for any shelter even though rain was forecasted for the day. I had to protect the camera so had to squeeze in to a tiny space near the stage to get out of the rain whilst the others held the chairs over their heads!!! As soon as the rain passed and we settled back in to our seats, we had a power outage – most probably because of all that water on the equipment – which made us realise that the organisers had not actually “organised” anything properly. They actually had a big sign to say the event was “child friendly” but we had to question why a “child friendly” event would not any kind of shelter so that at least the children don’t get soaked in the rain!!! The last straw was when we were treated to a fireworks show with the fireworks being shot over the crowd. Admittedly, the effect was great but this meant that the burnt out fireworks were going to fall on to the crowd. We had quite a few of the people scrambling and screaming as the fireworks fell on them and one of them actually fell on Michelle’s arm and left a burn mark visible to this day. If this event was held in the

, the organisers would have been sued for Health & Safety violations….

Another funny incident involved the writer himself (yes, moi) – after the drink at the hotel, the long walk, dodgy food, running around a beach to avoid the rain, having ears and head constantly assaulted by the heavy and loud drum beats, I was suddenly feeling woozy and faintish. I had to take a break and we went back to the hotel to take a shower and then hit the beach again to hear some of the DJ music. We finally got some sleep at about 5am.

The next day we got up at about 9:30, had breakfast and then headed out to Unawatuna Beach – a surfers and sunbathers paradise. The sea is great for bathing here as it is quite shallow but there are quite a lot waves which meant that the surfers were out in force

It was great to be just sitting around, doing nothing but look at the sea, having good food and a nice cool drink (makes we want to cry as I think of it now….).

Dam the man

Yours truly - all cool and dapper

(Picture by Damith de Silva)

Michelle - finding it amusing being photographed

Quite a lot happened during the time we were there – a few of the guys showed off their football dribbling skills, a newly wedded couple came on to the beach for some photographs (Damith took some nice shots of them but will avoid posting here so as not to infuriate the official photographer), Damith asked for and took a picture of a very “colourful” couple, a few cute dogs ran around doing funny things which got Michelle to run around with the camera.

Damith with football dribblers in the background

A sweet couple - our only regret being not getting their email address so that we could have sent this pic

(Picture by Damith de Silva)

On our way back we decided to stop over at the Galle Fort – which was first built in the 17^th Century and is still standing even after 400 years of existence and a devastating tsunami in 2004.

The Lighthouse at Galle Fort

The clouds were rolling in and it looked like it was going to pour but there were patches of sunlight through the clouds, when I took this shot.

But the cloud passed and the sea was starting to get rough, with some of the waves crashing on these rocks with quite a bit of force

And just before we left, I tried to do some off camera flash shooting of the 2 ladies. Again they were very amused about the time it took for me to balance the ambient and flash to get the shot but hey – results speak for themselves :D

That night we went for the Beach Rave at Hikkaduwa. It was a bit confusing for us cos it looked as if we had stepped right in to a nightclub at Brighton (

UK)

. The reason was because the DJs were all from

and they were playing typical trance/techno music – and the thing that confused us was that the Sri Lankan crowd normally doesn’t like such music. Most of the nightclubs play pop/dance music as that is what is popular with the crowds. This was apparent because after a couple hours the heavy crowd that was at the main stage started moving towards the rear towards the Dialog (one of the sponsors) stall, which was playing more popular dance music. By the time we left, at about 3am, there were more people near the Dialog stall than the main stage.

(Picture by Damith de Silva)

Damith had a great time running with the camera photographing all the women – they thought he was the official event photographer (with the 40D and flash attached) and were quite keen on posing for him. He also found some very interesting characters in the crowd.

(Picture by Damith de Silva)

We also spent most of the night screaming out Natasha’s name (Natashhhaaaaaaaa) every time the music stopped – I think most of the crowd thought that we were shouting the DJ’s name and were looking out for "DJ Natasha". Or maybe they just thought we were weird.

We had to leave the next day as Natasha had to get back to Colombo so we missed out on the theme nights. The journey back was quite interesting as well cos we had to locate one of Natasha’s friends who was unable to give any form of directions or landmarks as to where he was and then 5 people squeezed into a tiny car for a 3 hour journey!!

Overall a great time – thanks Natasha and Damith!

Birthday

2009-09-29T04:31:00.009+01:00

Well... it has been a long time coming... but better late than never.

Even though my birthday was on the 12^th of July, I haven’t had time to do a write up on it all this time. No time because of our 5 week holiday to

Sri Lanka

and then taking time settle down once we came back. Plenty more to write on with details on our holiday, wildlife safaris, photo shoots and book reviews – so watch this space.

My wife usually goes overboard with my birthday celebrations and this year was no exception. When she asked me what I wanted for my birthday, I told her that all I wanted was a peaceful, relaxing day. Simple enough, right? But noooooo.... she can’t leave it just at that. I was sent out early in the morning on a ridiculous errand during which time she setup the surprise. I came back to find that she had made some fantastic stuff for lunch, baked a cake and got me some great gifts. I thought it might be difficult to top last year but she outdid herself again.

Lamb chops and salad..... yummmmmmm

Seafood Paella...... absolutely delicious

Stuffed my stomach silly....

Dessert – The Ultimate Chocolate Cake... really that’s what its called that! Just divine!

The birthday candle – Scooby Dooby Doooooooooo!

This is a wonderful gift – a photo book of all my favourite pictures from my 365 project. Brilliant!

Some photography books.... remember those book reviews I mentioned?

And finally, this is how much I liked the cake....

Needless to say, I had a fantastic time and great birthday. So, thank you, my love, for making my birthday special... you, of course, are the best.

Can’t wait for next year....

Flying high!

2009-07-15T11:27:00.010+01:00

The Biggin Hill Airshow is quite a popular event in the UK, for those interested in planes. It seems to be getting bigger and better every year and I had heard quite a lot about it on photography forums. So, when Lasa suggested that we go to see it this year, I jumped at the chance.

We went for the Sunday show (28th June - they had it on the 27th as well) and the weather was looking promising. As can be seen in previous posts, our outings are normally delayed and we never leave at the time that we had initially planned. But this time, we were reasonably well off the mark on time (slight delay but negligible). However, after about driving 20 mts towards our destination, our absent minded, clumsy professor (me) gave out a exclamation of horror. After groping around my pockets I realised I had dropped my glasses somewhere while transferring equipment between the cars (I had my shades on at the time). So, to make sure that they were still in one piece, we had to turn around and go back. Fortunately, the glasses were found - tucked away quite safely in the car (/*sheepish grin*/) but our journey had been delayed by at least an hour - the "Delay Curse" had struck again.

We got to the place by about 10AM and we could see that the crowds were already pouring in and queues were forming. On the way up, we saw a couple of boards which were advertising "park and see" slots to see the air show from the side of a hill. The cost was about a 3rd of the ticket price (which was £21) but we decided to go for the main show as we will be able to see better. The air show was to start at 11AM and we spent some time going around the ground attractions which included some classic cars and some of the planes parked nearby.

When the show was about to start, we grabbed some food (there are several stalls around) and then made our way to the viewing area. It was pretty crowded and lots of people had erected tents, boundaries and brought chairs and umbrellas (experienced and smart). The only thing we had brought was a sheet to put on the ground :) But we made our way deftly through the crowd and we were able to find a vacant spot in the front. I set up my tripod and ball head (which turned out to be quite useful in capturing the action shots) and loaded my Bigmos (150-500mm lens).

Unfortunately, most of my shots turned out to be crap for several reasons

1) I usually use a CP filter with the Bigmos and unfortunately for some reason the focus was being thrown off because of the filter. This resulted in a lot of shots going bad as I struggled with the settings to get the proper shot.

2) Sun/light levels were constantly changing because of a lot of cloud cover especially during the early part of the day - getting exposure spot on while balancing a proper shutter speed was a challenge

3) When getting shots of planes you need to be quick with regards to shutter speeds - you need to get a fast enough shutter speeds to get the image sharp (a challenge with some of them at the speeds they were zipping by) but also slow enough to get a bit of motion blur on the propellers which would give the impression that the plane is flying (otherwise it looks as if it is a model suspended in air). It was also a challenge switching between the speeds of the older planes and the newer ones.

4) Its a whole new learning experience when you are shooting planes at such close range and at such speeds as you need to be quite good at panning and focusing. This was the first time I had started to pan and using AI Servo so the learning curve was steep but it was quite a useful experience.

I ended up taking about 600-700 shot altogether but only a very small percentage came out ok. But I think the keeper percentage will be much more the next time I photograph such an event as now I know how to handle it (reasonably). Just goes to show that however much you read, the best way of learning is to actually experience it.

Anyways, some reasonably ok shots -

Apache

World War II planes

Junkers

SE5A

Fokker triplane

The famed Spitfire

The jets were a real challenge

Hunter

Loved some of the group formation stuff they did

The highlight of the show for me was when there was a special fly by of a Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 flanked by the Red Arrows team, to the Virgin Airlines theme tune. Classic!

The Red Arrows gave great display as well with some great formations and some very funny commentary as well - with bits of comments/talk directly from the pilots.

Formation

Break

And some obligatory portraits of our group - I am in there as well (if you look carefully) :)

Overall, a great day - much more fun and interesting than what I thought it was going to be. Highly recommended. Might even go again next year :D