I left school when I was fifteen, and when I was fourteen there was this very wonderful teacher who covered his classroom in maps, and he always said when he retired from school, he would go to certain places on these maps. This poem is called “The Geography Lesson”.

Our teacher told us one day he would leave
And sail across a warm blue sea
To places he had only known from maps,
And all his life had longed to be.

The house he lived in was narrow and grey
But in his mind’s eye he could see
Sweet-scented jasmine clinging to the walls,
And green leaves burning on an orange tree.

He spoke of the lands he longed to visit,
Where it was never drab or cold.
I couldn’t understand why he never left,
And shook off the school’s stranglehold.

Then halfway through his final term
He took ill and never returned.
He never got to that place on the map
Where the green leaves of the orange trees burned.

The maps were redrawn on the classroom wall;
His name forgotten, he faded away.
But a lesson he never knew he taught
Is with me to this day.

I travel to where the green leaves burn,
To where the ocean’s glass-clear and blue,
To places our teacher taught me to love –
And which he never knew.

– by Brian Patten

Don’t you wish you can see like Sandrine Estrade Ball too? Life would be so much funnier.

And to read light like Kumi Yamashita, wow..

respect the jungle,
the cadre tells me.
say a little prayer
before you pee.

trust the contours,
terrain doesn’t lie.
follow the waters,
it’ll keep you alive!

seemingly placid
the jungle may seem
stay still for a moment -
now think otherwise

move in the light
sleep when it’s night
one is not so alone;
revere the jungle’s might.

“What is the Rainforest World Music Festival without any rain?” questioned the emcee screamingly on stage on the last night of the three-day event.

And so in the thunderstorm, nobody paid heed to textbook lessons of avoiding shelter under tall objects during a storm. Everybody continued to dance the night away, with lightning masquerading as disco lights.

More pictures here.

Fong & Rach Pre-Wedding Documentary from Little Red Ants on Vimeo.

I knew Fong Xiongkun during Officer Cadet School. I remember the first encounter with him. I had accidentally stepped on his polished boots and was terribly apologetic about it. He looked at me and said: “I will only forgive you on one condition, that you tell me your name.” And that was how we first talked. We went on to be platoon mates for 10 months before being posted to the same active battalion. He as a Mortar platoon commander and me as a Scout platoon commander, which meant another one year together in the same building (of Support Company 1 Guards Battalion). Fong remains one of my best friends through till today and the reason I hung on to him so dearly as a friend is because he is possibly the most flawless person I even knew, or will ever know.

You need to hear about the story of how he saved his rations during Jungle Confidence Course so that others could bank on his food in case theirs didn’t suffice. Or how he petitioned for the canteen auntie during Junior College years to leave the cucumbers in a self-serve bowl so that they don’t get wasted because people didn’t eat them when dished together with the main ingredients they ordered. Or how he would lent his hard-saved money to needy friends (up to thousands at a time) but scrimp on himself (by using a foldable bicycle to get to almost everywhere). Or how he just take home the combat rations that soldiers usually discard so that he doesn’t have to spend unnecessarily on food. Tennis captain of VJC, NUS soccer team player, vocalist of an a-capella group, first class honours in social work, ex-OC support 747 Guards (he has since signed on)…. Fong is amazing.

It is my honour and privilege to create this documentary for him and Rachel. I am goddamn sure both of them will go on to many blissful years ahead and I hope he realises how important he is as an influence in my life. I can’t wait to start work on his wedding day photographs. Yes, I teared on his wedding day. I couldn’t help it after he broke down himself while saying a prayer for all those who have gone through the journey with him.

I got my first break shooting for a lovely couple who are friends of Tristan, a dear photographer friend of mine. Tristan said they were looking for someone with a photojournalistic style and he thought it would be so sexy to get a real photojournalist. Anyway, despite my apprehension, I could not say no to them because that would have put Tristan to shame. When I met the couple, Mary and Presley, they proved to be a dream couple to shoot for. Simply because they were quite OK with the idea of not directing the photographer. Basically, I had the licence to roam.

And I must say it was really fun. So my apprehension has been uncalled for. In fact, there are so many climaxes that it is impossible not to get decent shots, unless of course you are totally switched off.

Then I move into the realm of pre-wedding shoots, something I tried to avoid in the past because it deals with one thing that I felt I was never very good at – posing people. As a photojournalist, I never had to worry about shifting people. “Sir, please tilt your head this way, now smile. Good, now smile again, without the teeth.” And I never had to worry about making people look good. But for pre-wedding shoots, that would have been suicidal. I have noticed that when a bride first picks up a picture, the first spot she zooms in on is her looks and whether she looks thin enough. It doesn’t really matter if it was shot against the backdrop of Alaska, the Grand Canyon or the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. “Geez, my arms are fat.” That’s it, the picture is going into the recycle bin. Nothing wrong with that of course. In fact, it is incredibly important. It’s just that this requires a skill that doesn’t come instinctively for me.

But when Fong and Rachel approached me for their pre-wedding shoot, I again couldn’t say no. Fong is like one of my best buddies during National Service and he has character so pure and untainted and I find it difficult to describe him without using superlatives. I would have shot pro-bono for someone like him, for the many ways he has inspired me and helped shape my behaviour. So I said yes and we started conceptualizing about the shoot, because unlike an actual wedding day, we have to make things happen for ourselves on a pre-wedding shoot. His wedding will be running on a theme of “All Things Above”, a line from the bible, which they have also adopted as their love mantra because, in their own words, “it conveys our hearts’ desire – not to be waylaid by the many earthly matters that can serve to distract us from our true purpose of loving God, and through that, loving each other.” And so we planned for a series of pictures that will hopefully convey that when put together in an album, designed by Shu Yun, my lovely companion. It is still in the works, so I will give an update about it when it is ready nearer to their important day on July 3. Even though I cannot post any pictures here because Fong and Rachel really wanted it to be a surprise offering, I am very optimistic about its eventual look, the way the pre-edits have come out.

And of course, one week after Fong and Rachel’s shoot, I have another pre-wedding shoot of Jih Shin and Kelvin, a couple who has approached the multimedia studio which I co-run with my friends. In fact, Jih Shin and Kelvin approached us long before Fong and Rachel did. No one was really assigned to photograph for them. Even though all the people at the studio photographed professionally before, the job just came naturally to me for some strange reason (most probably because I was had more prior involvement with commercial photography). This shoot was not as ambitious as Fong’s and we kept it to basic. Three-four locations through the day with ample resting time between the sessions. I ended up with many shots I really like as well.

I guess wedding shoots are about experience. The more you do it, the better you get at it. I realised two things after the two shoots. The best moments are those where the couples were just into themselves after being asked to carry out some lame poses by the lousy few-ideas photographer that is me. Posing helps, but not in its immediate effect. It is useful because it gives the couple a situation to laugh about, especially when the poses suggested are corny as hell.

And I also realise that I cannot do too much of it, because when it becomes a routine, it becomes unenjoyable and I think that will show in the pictures. If I were a full-time wedding photographer, I would be racking my brain everyday trying to think of new ways of conveying love in pictures. But I ain’t one.

Frankenstein

Captain Hook

T-Rex

Human