Mongolia

R

RML

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Hi all! I've been away for a while now. I'm in Mongolia now. Last week I spent in Beijing.
What to tell? Not much really. It's not really holiday for me. Mongolia is my second home, and I've been busy with simple, homely things (taking my daughter to school, doing groceries, buying wood for the fire place, travelling long distances to and fro home and the city, etc.). I haven't had much time to calm down enough to focus on shooting, so not much keepers I'm afraid.

I was in Beijing for personal business but had some time to shoot a little. I'm always amazed how easy Beijing is for street photography: people usually don't complain when you take their picture, there are many interesting things happening in the streets, and when it's not dusty the light is good. I hope I shot a few keepers.

I haven't been to any of the tourist attractions or to the old hutongs. The streets around the embassy area of JiangGuoMen are pretty good "hunting" terrain.

That's all from chilly Mongolia.

Any news I missed? Anything interesting I should know about? :)
 
Re: Mongolia

RML said:
Any news I missed? Anything interesting I should know about? :)
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Well the LHSA noticed your pink M2 post and offered a reward for any information about your current location...

I tell you, I was silent as a tomb but then they showed me that hammertone MP and 35 'cron...

:p

Enjoy !!!!! And we want pictures, of course ;)
 
The LHSA doesn't have a branch here, do they? :)
I might have to move out even further into the countryside.
 
RML said:
The LHSA doesn't have a branch here, do they? :)
I might have to move out even further into the countryside.
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Watch out for any men-in-black there. Anyway they should be easy to target, probably they will stop each 10 meters to comment something on their nice cameras ;)
 
I hope you bring back a huge photo diary, I am very interested in this experience of yours. Of course, like you say, it is your second home, and for me it would be a vacation. Much different for sure.

Hey, there is a lavender M2 in the used department at B&H Photo in New York. Maybe a distant cousin to your M2?
 
Hello Remy and thanks for posting. We missed you! Looking forward to seeing some pictures of your trip... :)
 
Nice to read I'm being missed. :)

A photo diary, eh? That may be pushing it a little, I'm afraid. So far most of my shots are family shots. I haven't seen my wife and kid in a long time so it's like when you get a new-born baby: you shoot too much.

But I'm shooting more and more in the streets since a few days, and when I get the chance I'm going to climb up the mountains behind our house and take some panoramas.

I'm getting more and more ideas for my Mongolia project but so far not much is coming from it. At least I know better what I want to do in the project, and found out I need at least one but preferably two assistants: one mainly for driving and to watch my back (pickpocketing is rife in the outskirts and indutrial areas, and robbery is increasing), and one to arrange all kinds of things, translate and negotiate for me.

The outskirts of Ulaanbaatar (where I live) are the modern equivalent of the villages of the Wild West in the US in the 19th and early 20th century. Life is hard, and living is rough (no shower, an outhouse for toilet, cooking on a wood stove, water from a well, living in a log cabin). Things are fine when you get used to it but many people are worse of than I am. People are poor, surviving the cold is an everyday struggle, and work is hard to come by and often poorly paid. A "rich" white guy with photo gear is a serious target. :)

But not all is gloom and doom. People are usually distant at first but open up once you get to know them. They're friendly and generous, and have a weird sense of humor: testing a soft-skinned white guy is the ultimate fun for them. And you gain all the more respect when you show them you can keep up with them. :)

I'm quite happy here, even though the stress of everyday survival is something I find dificult to learn to live with. I'll try to put my happiness, the rough life, the fun in dire times, in my shots.
 
It sounds fantastic! I just finished teaching a discussion section on the Yuan Dynasty (Mongol led Chinese Dynasty in the 13th century)...I wish I could have used some of your photos to show them what the land looks like! I have not yet made it to Ulaanbaatar, but I lived for a year in Vladivostok which I think has a similar frontier-like feel, though it is probably to a lesser extent than Ulaanbaatar. In either case, being a complete and obvious outsider (even if you speak the language) can be both an amazing and a horrible experience. I hope for you it is more often the former!
 
Stuart, I'd love to read the transcript of the discussion.

Well, it's almost time for me to leave Mongolia again. I've shot about 30 rolls or so, and it'll take a while to get them developed and scanned. But I'll post them as they're scanned.

I've been able to verbalise (is that a word?) the project I have had in my mind for some time. I'll definitely be working on that project in the next few years.

Winter time wasn't the most fruitful of periods to go shooting here in UB. There are much fewer people in the streets, the sun is standing very low (and with 300 days of sun per year I got plenty of it), and holding a camera at -15 to -20 isn't much fun.

Oh, that pink M2... it didn't see much action. I really need that Voigtlander light meter on top of the M2. I found it very hard to constantly having to resort to my handheld light meter, especially as the contrast between light and shadow is incredible and as sunset comes early.

Anyway, I'll be back on a regular basis in a few days.
 
And I'm back!

Just landed and got the films to my trusted 1-hr lab. I haven't done any groceries yet but I'm already firing up the scanner. :) Soon the first scans will start to flood RFF threads and galleries.
 
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