whacky holidays

A market in Mexico DF hawking mostly holiday wares the week before Christmas.

the basics

We found ourselves in the historic center of Mexico City just days before Christmas. It was so crowded with people that sometimes it was hard to move. Because I find photography to be extremely difficult in crowded, overwhelming places, I focused on the few things that I normally shoot. Like Volkswagen Beetles.



Many of the taxis in Mexico City are Volkswagen Beetles. But aside from that, the city is just teeming with them. It seemed like every tenth car I saw was a Beetle.

just pick me up some sausage

happy thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is the one family event that is non-negotiable, more so than Christmas. It's kind of funny, though, because in our family, every day is like Thanksgiving. We loves to eat! This is on New Year's Day, 2009, in Malaysia.

thursday duo

Post office boxes in Sea Ranch (Sonoma):


And mailboxes at the harbor in Sausalito:

thursday vertical

i need a job

Or just this bike.

Richard Serra

I ended up seeing a lot of Richard Serra this past year--his work, not the man himself. I am consistently surprised at how much I love his work. I saw his wood sculptures at both the MoMA in New York and the Guggenheim in Bilbao, and both times I was overwhelmed by a sense of reverence for space, time, and nature. And I am not usually into "stuff like that."

This is a piece of his that I saw at the Reina Sofia in Madrid. Again, completely in awe of it. Why? I don't really have a vocabulary to talk about sculpture. All I can say is that I went back to see it after I was done looking at the Guernica.



Here is a detail of the metal:

ah, ze french

The beach in Biarritz, France.

august to autumn

The leaves are starting to change colors in Illinois.

alamo square

I can't really tell you why I like this photo so much.

more swimmers

Here's another image from Biarritz. What? It's a very picturesque town.

i heart my neighborhood, part iv

Along with the many mechanics of my neighborhood, we have a plethora of rusting cars all over the streets. It is one of the reasons why I moved into this neighborhood. I have a thing for rusting cars. These three cars sat at the end of my street for the first month I was there, missing seats and innards but looking as pretty as could be. And then one day all three of them simply vanished.



The city is mysterious like that.

urban rainbow

I was shivering my way through Palermo the other day when I passed through this:



The light is changing here so quickly. Buenos Aires is about 35 degrees south of the equator, as far south as Capetown in South Africa. It makes for some nice photography in the early afternoon.

fleximart

This is the covered San Telmo market. During the day it's mostly a tourist destination for antiques, but in the evening the antique stalls close and it is filled with fruit and meat merchants.



The porteños are very orderly when it comes to waiting in line. They don't even grumble too much about it. I've seen lines for who-knows-what wrapping around multiple city blocks. They are especially good at queueing for buses.

view of a room

I love the architecture of Buenos Aires. It is a little bit of this, and a little bit of that, and you never know what you're going to see from neighborhood to neighborhood.



I'm not in love with this photo since the perspective looks all weird (tried to correct it with the vanishing point filter in Photoshop but I guess I have to screw around with it a bit more). Don't you just love these colors, though? And the idea of living in that warm orange glow, overlooking Avenida Independencia.

munchies

Sunday we had a 3 p.m. asado, and on Monday I had a 3 a.m. hamburger at this 24-hour joint.



So yeah, you can get a basic burger for 5 pesos and 50 centavos (about US$1.50). But, if you're a gourmand like me, you get it "completa," with cheese, ham, and a fried egg...for 11 pesos. That's a lot of cholesterol for three bucks.

i heart my neighborhood III

We had the ultimate find the other night, a restaurant just two blocks from our apartment! It is only open on the weekends, so that could possibly explain why I've never noticed it before. It's called Il Vero Mangiare, and when you walk in one of the sons (family-owned) is standing at a station by the door, making pasta.



What's even more incredible is that this restaurant is actually in this other photo from the blackouts. It's the corner storefront directly to the right of the trashfires in the intersection.

laundry day

I'm not sure what is more work: doing the wash myself in the sink upstairs, or walking the four blocks to the lavanderia, and then having to pick it up later. I will say that doing the wash myself is more satisfying and somewhat relaxing (and saves me 10 pesos), but having it done means that my clothes seem cleaner.



That's why I do both.

Beetle Series I

There are an incredible amount of Volkswagen Beetles in South America. I first began shooting them when Suze and I were in Uruguay. I have a whole collection. Because I haven't been shooting much lately, I'll share some Beetles with you this week.



I shot this mustard-colored one in Ollantaytambo, Peru, just after getting off the helicopter.