Tag: story

Morning Coffee Talk~14/365

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date December 14, 2021
No Comments on Morning Coffee Talk~14/365

Good Morning,

I remember as a child playing with friends on terraced hills above my village in Lebanon, and we did this crazy thing of jumping from one terrace to the next (and these were high terraces), screaming something ridiculous in Arabic like: ‘my mother threw me and the Virgin Mary caught me’. We were very devout children trained well by aunts and grandmothers to fear a god who punished bad children and saw pretty much everything were did. So we trusted that if god or any of his saints were watching, then leaping was 100% safe and we would not break any bones.

Two broken bones later, I started to doubt this theory.

That feeling of invincibility that we all have as young children is certainly something to reconnect to when needed later in life. That faith that somehow all would be well and that sometimes a blind leap is exactly what is needed despite our great fear of the unknown.

Tags 365, beach, blog, boracay, child, childhood, children, courage, daily blog, jump, leap of faith, philippines, play, story, travel

china contemplations inspiration life morning coffee talk Photography street photography

Morning Coffee Talk~ 12/365

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date December 12, 2021
No Comments on Morning Coffee Talk~ 12/365

Good Morning,

This post today is about a life changing moment, one of those that we have at a certain stage of our lives and they end up lodging themselves in our personal history, refusing to fade into the dusty halls of our memories, and maybe just maybe they were more significant than we can imagine and they were meant to be with us forever.

One such moment was for me back in Lebanon at a very young age, maybe 8 or 9 years old. I found myself spiralling into a tunnel of thought about space. I was sleeping on our rooftop under a thin canopy of grapes on a warm summer night with my family; a huge treat and a special event whenever we were allowed to do that. I remember watching the stars glimmering in total darkness and wondering what was beyond them? Were we contained in a bubble of some sort? And how can I ever comprehend the possibility of nothingness if there is one? Everything is existing in something, isn’t it? What’s at the end of that?

These questions have taken me on a life quest of search, research, questioning and wonder. From religion, to quantum physics, to wise people’s writings and mostly my own search during those moments of quiet when the mind can travel towards space, inside of space and beyond space towards the unknown.

Tags beyond, childhood, china, life, life changing, mimo khair, moment, photography, search, shanghai, space, stars, story, truth, unkown

contemplations inspiration Malaysia morning coffee talk Photography street photography

Morning Coffee Talk~ 9/365

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date December 9, 2021
2 Comments on Morning Coffee Talk~ 9/365

Good morning,

Some days like today, when the mind feels very busy like it is working overtime, thoughts flying here and there without any apparent rhyme or reason, I stop.

Stopping is not as simple as it sounds. I remember as a 21 year old, taking a trip alone to India with a the sole purpose of finding focus. Once there, I decided to take up a vow of silence for one month. I did that in the confines of an ashram in South India, and during that time, I discovered among so many things how busy the mind and the brain can be in a single moment. They are so much more complex than I ever imagined… So many lines of thought can act themselves out at the same moment and on so many levels of perception, some emotionally connected, some random, some related to past events, some future projecting, and others to do with immediate needs of the moment…

I learned to quiet my thoughts down to try and focus on one or two threads at a time. And that experience was a pivotal moment in my life that I can link back to when needed as life gets hectic and chaotic.

So today felt like that and I needed to cast my net on one single thought, and that was ‘thought’ itself.

Thankful for having the gift of choice to be able to focus on one line of thought… how amazing is that? Feeling grateful for being human today.

Wishing you all a peaceful and inspired rest of the week.

Tags brain, calm, experience, focus, human, india, life, malaysia, mind, personal development, quiet, silence, story, thought

Germany Photography street street photography

Living in Deep Freeze~

It’s always a good time to restart a blog, but there is something more compelling about living through:

a global pandemic
a general breakdown of norms as we know them
an increase in conductivity (trust me on that)
incredibly strange weather patterns
varied degrees of lockdown measures
living vicariously through my photographic archived memories
becoming great friends with my teenage daughter
a complete change of domestic circumstance
a complete halt on all travel plans and viewing humans as 2 dimensional beings through Zoom.
adding a whole new set of skills to my arsenal (Motion Graphics)! (More on that soon)

Yesterday I decided to just go see what other people are doing during this almost 10 days of unusual arctic temperatures in Germany. So after spending one hour trying to remove thick ice from the car, I made it on the icy roads to Duesseldorf, to find joyful people, walking in the bright sun, on white frozen snow, next to a Rhein River in high tide, some masked, some not and I was in awe of finding out how much I missed people in general, the passing conversations with strangers and the funny smiles I get when I perform my weird acrobatics to get strange angled shots.

what have you been up to these days?

Tags animation, arctic, bridge, cold, covid 19, deutchland, drive, duesseldorf, germany, high tide, ice, icicles, life, lockdown, low temperature, pandemic, photography, Rhein, river, snow, story, street, winter

CHINA Photography portrait street photography Uncategorized

Misplaced~

the art of urban camouflage

In Hongkou, part of the old city of Shanghai, was a set of grey narrow alleys that were a maze of tiny streets containing 2 or 3 story homes stacked side by side in a most claustrophobic manner. Hundreds of tangled electric wires dangled between walls that were decorated with phone numbers advertising services for those who needed them. Water flowed down the streets and bikes and colorful laundry colored the otherwise shabby surroundings. In those sad alleys I met some very happy people. Their smiles instantly appeared when we met and stories were told that I only understood partly because of my poor grasp of Shanghainese but laughter was the largest part of the conversation. I just loved that place and I kept going back again and again to photograph until one day the residents announced that their neighborhood is condemned to demolition like so many other old Shanghai alleys. The last time I visited there were metal foundations of giant about to rise from the stories of these lovely people. I had to fight back tears seeing the ghosts of what used to be there and is no longer…

Day 67 of 365~

Image taken in the old alleys of Hongkou, 2014

Tags black and white, china, demolition, development, high rise, old alley, people, photography, portrait, progress, shanghai, story, street, tradition, urban

art CHINA inspiration Photography street Yunnan

In Street Photography Expect the Unexpected~ Yunnan

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date March 28, 2015
10 Comments on In Street Photography Expect the Unexpected~ Yunnan

After about a 4 hour flight from Shanghai to Kunming in Yunnan and sorting out the small inevitable complications like changing cars, drivers, lunch and settling everyone to a journey of unexpected events, we set off to our first stop on the workshop, the town of Shiping.

After a first night not short of adventure and discovery in the streets of the old town, we set off in the morning with the freedom one gets after leaving a questionable hotel without having to look back.

All packed, cameras charged, armed with snacks and water bottles we set off only to discover that our bus (that we grew to love) had a flat tire. We were informed that the repairs will take longer than expected. When asked why, the answer was “people in these parts are just not efficient enough”. I swallowed the answered and decided to make the best of a bad situation.

I invited everyone to use the 2 hours to explore and we found ourselves in an unforgettable market! Photo opportunities everywhere, people, children, faces, color, it was wonderful.

During the time there, I was utterly charmed by a group of children who followed me around jumping, giggling, acting silly, jumping into every frame I tried to create. It then dawned in me that the best thing to do would be to just stop trying and instead of capture life, just live it. I played with them and my students photographed them and the whole affair was effervescent and a special gift to start the journey with.

Photo of me taken by Saima with the children at the market.

It is wonderful to be reliving the adventure in Honghe through the stories and images as I busily plan the next one in Dali this coming June.

Tags adventure, documentary, ethnic minorities, honghe, kunming, market, myyunnanadventures, photography, shiping, stories, story, workshop, yunnan

art inspiration Iphone Photography

a process inside a process~ why do I edit my photos?

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date January 4, 2014
34 Comments on a process inside a process~ why do I edit my photos?

When I edit my photos, I set in motion a whole new process that allows me to see beyond the actual image. I begin to feel emotions and to imagine worlds that the image open doors to. So my initial photograph becomes a key, a starter and a catalyst to a brand new process. I leave myself open to what the moment suggests, what level of contrast it wants, what degree of clarity or blur, saturation or absence of color, and what lines to highlight, and inside of all this (which sometimes takes not longer than a few minutes), a new image is born, one that is layered with sketches of imagination and brush strokes of feeling. I attempt through that to marry the past with the now in anticipation of the art that might wish to join my future.

Wishing all my readers and subscribers a wonderful and inspired new year.

All above images were taken with an iPhone during my recent trip to New Zealand and edited with phone apps.

Tags application, apps, art, clarity, color, contrast, editing, image, imagination, iphone, manipulation, mimo khair, new zealand, photography, process, story

art CHINA contemplations inspiration life old people Photography shanghai story street

Let me spin you a tale

I was walking in an old street in Shanghai with my camera taking in all the sights, smells and noises of the crowded narrow lanes when an unusual sight drew me in. I looked inside a smoky large room packed with rickety tables, chairs, tea pots, and men in hats, so many men in hats. I walked in and after I stopped being looked at as the stranger in the village, I began to be approached by the curious of the gathered men. Each wanted to tell me stories, because this is what we humans do, we carry our his-story with us, in our minds, our hearts, etched on our faces and we long to tell them and to pass them on before we leave, so that parts of us can stay behind and make an indelible mark. I listened and tried my best to comprehend, but the best story this man can tell is written all over his face and I present it to you here in this frozen moment…

Tags asia, black and white, china, cigarette, eyes, face, hat, lane, lines, look, man, mimo khair, old, old city, people, photogrpahy, portrait, qibao, shanghai, stories, story, tea shop, wrinkles

inspiration life New York Photography story

Day 30~ November 30th~ New York

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

With the last New York post from this month, I am realizing how much of it is still in me. It has been one of the most personal months in my blog so far, so I will end it with a photo from then, from the time I was 21 and celebrating every single second I had in the city that never sleeps. We explored New York with so much openness, with inspiration, with joy, with boundless energy and that does something to you. I love photography because it captures moments that take you back, to feel, to remember to relive.

~ I am the one with the blond wig 🙂

Tags life, memories, new york city, photography, portrait, self, story, vintage, wig

New York Photography story

Day 26~ November 26th~ New York

Post author By ~mimo~
Post date November 29, 2012
4 Comments on Day 26~ November 26th~ New York

Ask anyone who rides the subway for more than one hour a day and they will be sure to have some strange stories to tell you. I have a few. I realize that with this month’s postings a lot of memories and stories keep floating by, and that is because I left them there. On the subway at the age of 20 I met the first and hopefully last flasher. It was evening and I was engrossed in my Herman Hesse book ( Narcissus and Goldmund) not realizing that I was alone in the subway car after everyone filtered out, when I felt a shadow looming in front of me. I Looked up and there was the classic open raincoat with an extraordinarily large man standing in front of me exhibiting his pride. Funny how react in expected situations, and me being totally caught off-guard, I cried. Then I ran to pull the emergency brakes which caused the train to stop, the doors to open, the giant man to run away and I was directed to another car with people in it. I was then hugged by a big bosomed African American lady who giggled and said: “relax darlin’, that was entertainment for free!”

And there were the other stories, but one is enough…