A letter from Fiji...

Giving up Chocolate....

I typed a post a few days ago, saved and programmed it to post today and well.... it's gone... I'll wait another day to see if it appears back from cyberspace tomorrow (incase it's posting on US time, which is pretty ironic given all the jokes about Fiji time), then I'll give up and retype it. Probably on monday or tuesday.... aaaaarrrrgh the frustration!

In the meantime this is actually on topic to the "lost post" which was already about having to give up chocolate (amongst other things). Here's a very real reason, and shudder..... this would certainly put you off eating the stuff anyway (fairly gory content). 

When will big businesses realise they can't use palm oil or palm waste products (yes YOU Fonterra) if they are causing ecological damage such as deforestation? 

It's a bit dark isn't it?

I wrote this post, then lost it... which of course meant it was another 3-4 days before I could be bothered having another go. So this time I won't waffle and will keep it short and sweet. and throw in a couple of clips...

So we had earth hour again, like last year, and again it was a lot of fun. There is always some worry that it will clash with the Hong Kong Sevens, as it did; however this year the radio stations stressed that it was all about turning off lights (and the TV could stay on). I was never sure about this light bulb business, despite the fact that Treasure changed all it's light bulbs to the eco friendly ones several years ago, but it made sense after watching this clip (below). Sadly it also exposed some short givings in NZ's prime minister...oh man! I voted for him! But then again what is a "blue-green" to do? basically I want to vote for someone who lowers taxes except for polluters...

Anyway so I popped some of the photos from earth hour, taken in candle light, into the above story board (thanks to "dress it up" for the action) for Katrina to post on the Treasure Blog... and the GM said "er it's a bit dark isn't it?' (hulloooooo? it was dark?). I told him it's nothing the D700 won't fix...

In the meantime here's one more related video. enjoy. remember on the slower connections press play, then press pause and wait for it to load. Then you can watch straight through...

Making it Meaningful

 

Well we're back from New Zealand, my computer is back from the computer doctors (logic board) and my camera (and SB800) is back from Nikon with it's speedlight issues resolved; so slowly we're getting back to normal... and blogging! 

While away we met a whole lot of exceptional photographers (more about that later), which really set me to thinking about meaningful images. Sure I can now get most stuff in focus and reasonably composed, but what's it all about? 

One photographer who I admire immensely online is Scott Strazzante. Not only did he take arguably the finest photo seen of Michael Phelps while at the Olympics for the Chicago Tribune, but he also has an attitude about photography I find truly admirable. Recently he came and generously participated on a private photography message board I hang out at, and shared fantastic images and wisdom. I have a list of favourite quotes tucked away in my documents folder, and I added this one from his blog:-

 "My other photographic passion is long-term documentary work. Photographing simple moments of simple people that reveal universal truths. That is what I truly love to do."

You can see some of this passion in his personal project (which I really love)  "Common Ground" where his series of diptychs explore the comparisons between a new housing development and the farm it replaced. Follow the link and go and see the podcast about the project, it's great. I downloaded the podcast from i-tunes (there's a link to buy: it cost $0.0)...Here's one of the diptychs here: (note this photograph is copyright property of Scott Strazzante  -not mine!). Look at the little ears on that hat!

The problem with seeing a whole lot of amazing photography, as I seem to have over the past 6 weeks, is it makes taking one shot of a young guy in Nadi seem just a little lame (yes that first photo in the post is mine, he's collecting $$ for his medical treatment). I just wonder if while I'm not working, I should really be looking at some sort of personal project.... We flew back on the Air NZ 777 from Auckland last week, and had a choice of 83 movies. 83!!! While I did probably spend an hour trying to choose I ended up watching another movie of a personal project: "Rain of the Children" by Vincent Ward. As the NZ Herald says:

"Part-documentary, part-drama, Rain follows on from Ward's 1978 observational film In Spring One Plants Alone about Puhi, an elderly woman caring for her mentally ill adult son Niki in the remote Urewera Ranges. Ward lived with the pair for 18 months in his early 20s to make the film, and the unanswered questions that arose during this time spawned his 30 years of interest in Puhi and her back story" 

-and what a story! But myself, what I really liked most was the premise of taking a personal project, and going back with all the life experience of another 30 years to look again at the story and see it with different eyes. Oh and the fabulous cinematography too of course! Check out the trailer:

Anyway in a similar vein here's quite an interesting series from Robert Knoth for Greenpeace. I will never look at a store full of rows of shiney new computers quite the same again! I'll post some pretty pics of fishies and sunshine next. Just to balance all this seriousness!

Deep environmental comment today...

A giant moth was hanging out in our bathroom not long ago, and it was a giant, not quite as big as in the photo, but pretty big regardless, a good 8cm wingspan. And GB got to talking about stick insects with the kids. "Kids" he said "you just don't see stick insects anymore... we used to see them all the time- but not anymore". Our visitor piped in "and hedgehogs" she said "remember there were always hedgehogs squashed on the road- why aren't there hedgehogs squashed on the road anymore?". As a science graduate my reply was simple and remiscent of what Homer Simpson might say if he was a scientist "loss of biodiversity...baaaaaaad......" Timoci Nasilasila from Viseisei also was telling us when he was young turtles would graze on the seagrass outside the village. But when young Mosese who looks after the turtles came (from the same village) here to Treasure Island Resort to work as a school leaver he had never seen a turtle except in books. Its so nice too to look out the window and see the herons. One day they even walked up and tapped on my ranchslider (glass door), why I have no idea!

GB and I have allowed Greenpeace to extract a small monthly amount off my credit card for sometime now, and although we had written it off as a small thing to do to try and ensure we have a nice world to retire to, surprisingly we have seen return on our investment. The first one that amazed me was a protest, while we were still in NZ- a dancing chicken outside KFC. It seems KFC chickens had been eating GE feed- and for only a few cents more per serve KFC could change this. AND they did! I was amazed, I didn't know the GE feed thing was even happening, and now it was fixed. And those of you who know me know I LOVE KFC. I have been happily promoting them since. But the one that really amazed me was Mighty River Power giving up on recommissioning Marsden B power as a coal fired power station. The Marsden B win was not just about 1 power station, it set an important precedent that has seen off at least four other major coal station proposals; coal fired stations that would have pumped literally millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, making a mockery of New Zealand's clean green status. Greenpeace campaigned for over two years on a shoestring (lucky they have good climbers for scaling tall buildings with protest banners) up against a government state owned enterprise (which spent $4million of taxpayers $$$ by comparison) turning Marsden B into the government's own "inconvenient truth". You can read more here on Greenpeace NZ's website. Greenpeace send out updates from time to time by mail and I'm always impressed. But in the last mail the Marsden B story had already damn near bought a tear to my eye when I pulled this out of the envelope...

Like my frame? yes, I blu tacked it to a coconut palm for the pic (well as I told you guys already- scanner's not going at the moment)... What a nice gesture! It may not have been much, but I was already feeling quite proud about Marsden B even tho really I didn't do much more than listen to heatwave FM, and send a letter to my MP in NZ which came back marked 'autoreply to spam'! So I've pinned it on the wall. When I hear of friends going through crippling droughts in Australia, losing everything to hurricane Katrina like Lyndsay, or dodging tornados then at least I know that NZ'ers, the country that bravely declared themselves nuclear free all those years ago, are trying to do something about climate change. Here's the latest from Greenpeace on you tube- a paroday of an ad currently showing in NZ (if I can get this to work- Sheila makes it look so easy!).

A note for watching these on a slower connection- press play, then press pause. Go away and make a cup of tea. When you get back it should be fully loaded. press play again and watch all the way through...

Last year we had another fun example of biodiversity- at the bus stop the kids found a HUGE spider. Thankfully dead. They passed it around, but Tom was very upset by it, despite smiling for the camera, and kept wanting to stomp on it. I saved it, as I quite liked the visual effect of sitting it on the car dashboard- it looked like a giant spider was cruising around inside my car! But it only lasted until after school. Tom sneaked over to the car where it was parked at the marina, and (still acting edgy and scared) mashed it... shame...

(yes he is looking a little orange, with his tan in the morning sunlight- I could change the white balance but he looks kinda cute in an oompa loompa way)