Category: love

The gift that keeps on giving~

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date February 28, 2018
4 Comments on The gift that keeps on giving~

When you have your first child you become privy to the most well guarded secret: you have just signed on for the most important and permanent job of your life. It looks so easy. Everyone does it. Our parents did it. Our friends and neighbors seem to do it. And then your child arrives! I used to hold important job after job before having my child, each with a heavy series of responsibilities, but I dove into them armed with the knowing in the back of my mind that I can just quit when I choose to. Then came the parenting job, and I realized that this is one job I can never quit!

I would not exchange this job for any other in the world because it is the gift that keeps on giving.

Day 58 of 365~

Image taken of my 8 year old daughter overlooking the valley of the saints in Lebanon, 2012

Tags black and white, cedars, child, daughter, gift, hair, job, lebanon, love, parenting, photography, valley of the saints, wind

life love Photography

The Day my Most Important Life Project was Born

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date December 5, 2014
16 Comments on The Day my Most Important Life Project was Born

No matter what books you read, what stories you hear, and what preconceptions you may have, nothing ever prepares you for the moment when your child is born.

Everyone has their story from the magical to the confronting and mine was a mixture of both. For years before, I had been chasing and building my career in a very aggressive manner and I looked at jobs as something to conquer and when one did not suit me, to have to the confidence to just drop it and move to the next. With this state of mind I waltzed into my pregnancy thinking it was just another task to win at. And then she was born.

All my preconceived ideas came crumbling in one big heap. I realized that nothing is as I thought. This job will be for life. There are no options for quitting, no turning back, no chance at slacking, and the responsibility of it was just mind-boggling. It was like joining a secret parent cult that no one warns you about.

If there is magic in life, then this is where it lives where I am concerned. Watching a life grow, evolve, develop and become the human it is meant to be.

The honor of being entrusted with the care of another human is the greatest honor of all.

Today, with this post, I begin my third 365 photography and writing project.

Tags birth, child, china, girl, life, mother, parenting, photography, shanghai

children life love parenting Photography

Holding on to innocence~

As my little girl grows up, I watch with quiet desperation how her innocence begins to recede to the background. The old simple jokes that made her laugh again and again are now silly, the complete freedom with which she skipped all over the world and its problems is beginning to allow bits of worry into her magical world. Questions about the state of the world arise causing a frown to form on her previously every radiant and smiling face. Nothing prepares a parent for the inevitable letting go of their child’s innocence. We hold on to it desperately, we pray that the hugs will last longer, that the laughter will ring louder and that worry will keep its fangs away from our babies.

Tags black and white, child, children, daughter, family, girl, growing up, innocence, love, mobile, parenting, photography, portrait, world, worry

human rights inspiration lebanon life love refugees Travel war

Love you~

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date July 21, 2013
29 Comments on Love you~

أحبك “I love you”

Reem is 9 years old. She is a Syrian refugee living in a camp in North Lebanon. I learned today that she lost both her parents in the recent conflicts. The only message written on her hand is : I love you

Tags arabic, beautiful, child, color, conflict, eyes, girl, i love you, lebanon, love, mimo khair, orphan, photography, portrait, syria, syrian, war

children inspiration life love Paris Photography street

Souls that soar

To dance when you are so moved, to sing when you are so driven, to laugh when you are tickled, to scream if passion compels you, is to be truly free…

Tags blur, child, color, dance, dancing, france, free, freedom, girl, human, inspiration, life, lights, mimo khair, moving, night, paris, photography, river, seine

children CHINA Guilin inspiration love old age old people parenting Photography street

Day11~ December 11th~ Guilin

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date December 12, 2012
9 Comments on Day11~ December 11th~ Guilin

It is so endearing in Asia to see how grandparents create a living womb for their grandchildren and how they care for them tirelessly, carrying them on their old backs, feeding them, singing hymns to them, and carrying them into adulthood on a fluffy cloud of love.

How strengthening it must be for the children and how infusing with confidence.

Tags asia, black and white, boy, care, china, confidence, feeding, food, grandchild, grandfather, growht, guilin, help, love, monochrome, noodles, parenting, portrait, tradition, yangshuo

CHINA Guilin inspiration love Photography street Travel

Day 7~ December 7th~ Guilin

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date December 9, 2012
8 Comments on Day 7~ December 7th~ Guilin

I do, I love people, I love photographing them, I love learning their stories, seeing their smiles, laughing at their jokes, feeling human with them…

Tags black and white, china, food, guilin, humanity, look, mimo khair, people, photography, point, smile, street

inspiration life love New York Photography street

Day 29~ November 29th~ New York

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date November 30, 2012
20 Comments on Day 29~ November 29th~ New York

Spring goes so well with New York City I think! Newness, freshness, color, crispness, high energy, vibrancy, originality, creativity, Spring, are certainly words that go with it. I love New York in every season, but in the spring, I love it passionately!

Tags america, color, fence, love, manhattan, new york city, park, people, shadow, spring, sun, trees, usa, walking, woman

children inspiration love parenting Photography

You are the reason…

You are the reason I love to live more

you are the reason I love to wake up in the morning more

you are the reason I am now more scared of flying

you are the reason I smile so much more

you are the reason I bake so much more

you are the reason I play so much more

you are the reason I feel younger

you are the reason I am not too eager to die early

you are the reason I am filled with hope

you are the reason I am so thankful for life and its gifts

I love you and cannot imagine a life without your joyful and playful energy

Tags child, children, eye, girl, inspiration, love, mimo khair, parenting

art children children's rights history inspiration love Photography Travel

First love: It is the one that haunts us till the end.

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date September 12, 2010
7 Comments on First love: It is the one that haunts us till the end.

It is always most powerful the first time. The first time we feel our hearts racing and fluttering, the first time we feel our breath shortening and escaping us, the first time we feel that a look can lift us off the ground and the first time we feel haunted day and night with thoughts of our love and with their presence inside of our skin at all moment of our waking and sleeping. It is powerful, passionate, wonderful, unreasonable and it scars us for life.

Egypt, 1996 is where I fell in love with photography. I had just gotten my first Pentax manual camera while living in New York (that is a whole other story), learned the basics very quickly, went to B&H photo when is still was downtown on 18th street and bought 35 rolls of film and slide film. Off I went to Egypt on the most memorable trip of my life. And like a first love this trip still lives in me and beckons me to go back and revisit it. We have to meet again.

We will…

Photo 75 of 95 — a boy selling trinkets in Egypt, January 1996

Photo 89 of 95 — girls baking and selling bread near Luxor, Egypt, 1996

Tags egypt, first love, luxor, mimo khair, photography