travling photography

Well, my Shanghai Photo Talk is prepared and ready to go. It will include 137 photo slides, which will be accompanied by 25 pages of talking points and explanations. I timed the photo talk to take about 98 minutes excluding the live translation. Hence my absence from updating my blog for over a week. I suspect I will be unable to connect to the blog when I'm in Shanghai from March 26 to April 10. It will be held on March 31, a few days after my arrival in Shanghai. It is to be hosted by the Imaging Group 's IG Photography Art Gallery, a large building that includes IG Studio and the Shanghai Museum of Antique Cameras, founded by Mr Chen Haiwen ; a master photographer as well as a the recipient of the highest photography award in China twice in a row and Vice Chairman of the Shanghai Photography Association.

Photo � Tewfic El-Sawy | All Rights Reserved This Beyond The Frame backstory is about a bell. Not about any bell, but about the type of bell that is a constant fixture for rickshaw wallahs in Kolkata. What a horn is to a motorized vehicle driver, the bell is to the rickshaw. But let's not get ahead of ourselves...first, what do we know about the rickshaw? The rickshaw is thought to first have appeared in India, not in Kolkata but in the hill town of Shimla in 1880. However, it was made of iron not of wood as those that had appeared in Japan. It is said that it was an American who landed in Yokohama who introduced the rickshaw to the Japanese in 1869 to accommodate his wife who had difficulty walking. The rickshaw eventually made its way south and west to Korea, Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong through southeast Asia and into the Indian subcontinent, down to Sri Lanka, then found its way into Africa. The image of men (some of them emaciated) pulling wooden rickshaws in the streets of K

Photo � Tewfic El-Sawy | All Rights Reserved The H'mong, estimated at about 1 million people, constitute one of the largest ethnic group in Vietnam and one of its tribal group, known as the Black Hmong, are reputed for their handicraft and indigo blue clothes made of hemp. The women  wear long blouses over short trousers, and wrap long scarves around their legs. They wrap their long hair around their head covered by a turban. The H'mong came to Vietnam from South China some 300 years ago, during the Ming and Qing dynasties.  The majority live in northern Vietnam's Lao Cai province.  Their spoken language belongs to the H�mong�Dao language family, and although their writing was Romanized in 1961, it is not widely used. The back story on the top photograph: I was walking in a Black H'mong village (I don't recall  its name, but it was at a short drive from Sapa), and chanced upon a woman sweeping her porch. She was used to tourists, and didn't seem perturbed when I

Photo � Tewfic El-Sawy | All Rights Reserved Ca Tr� (pronounced �ka tchoo�) is a complex form of sung poetry found in the north of Viet Nam using lyrics written in traditional Vietnamese poetic forms. It flourished in the 15th century when it was popular with the royal palace, and was a favorite activity of aristocrats and scholars. It was later performed in communal houses, inns and private homes. In 2009 Ca tr� singing was inscribed on UNESCO�s Intangible Cultural Heritage �Urgent Safeguarding List.� Its performances involve at least three people: a female singer ( d�o nuong ) who both sings and plays the clappers (known as the ph�ch) , an instrumentalist (k�p) who plays the d�n d�y (three-stringed lute), and a �praise drummer� known as quan vi�n who beats the tr?ng ch?u . Historically, when spectators (usually male) entered a Ca Tr� performance, they purchased bamboo tally cards. In Chinese, Tr� means card, while Ca means song in Vietnamese, and thus Ca Tr� means tally card so