Just because you see the sign for the business you want to visit the next day does not mean that said sign will be there when you go back the next day.
I walked up and down the street looking for this gym. I asked people and they pointed me in all the wrong directions. Finally the following day I see the tattered remains of the sign I had seen earlier.
It’s been a while. I really don’t have a great excuse for why I have not updated in almost a month except I have not had reliable internet. I am still fighting with companies to get a connection in my apartment. On the other hand the positive side of not having internet is I’ve almost got my living room painted. I doubt that would have happened had I had internet. I will give more detailed updates soon. I am doing well. I am leaving for Bali, Indonesia next Wednesday and will be back October 1st. I just got a waterproof case for my Canon G10 camera…excited to use it in Indonesia.
Cheers.
I have been wanting to play around with a fashion shoot for a long time. As soon as I met Cynthia a while back I asked her if I could use her for a photoshoot. We scheduled to shoot this past Saturday without have a definitely plan. I had some ideas but had a hard time vocalizing them to her. We met up in the afternoon at a shopping center. She had brought some traditional clothes, but I wanted something quite a bit more edgy. So we went shopping. I picked out a dress thingy that we both liked and eventually made it back to my place where I had planned to use a beautiful white wall as the backdrop.
This shoot was a lot of fun despite the destruction of equipment involved. Many of these images are too small to see on here. They can be seen larger on my Behance Network portfolio.
Sandbags. This is why people use sandbags. And assistants. Yesterday was a rough day on my equipment. I did a four location shoot with the band, Sounds of the Nations. The first location was an amazing partially dried up lake bed that I had spotted while driving to Karimnagar a couple of times. The band has six members, and they brought their lighting guy to assist me. It was quite windy at the lake, and even though I didn’t use any umbrellas or modifiers, the lights were not stable in the wind. While I was busy catching another stand that was falling, my Whitelightning x1600 crashed to the ground, smashing the plug in the back. The destruction of the plug most likely saved the majority of the unit from receiving damage, but the unit’s overheating warning kept me from using the light the rest of the day. Not 15 minutes later, my Speedlite 430EX placed on my lightweight tripod toppled over onto the rock, smashing the LCD screen. The flash still works fine, but I cannot see what mode or ratio the flash is on. Both of these incidents exemplify the need for both sandbags and real assistants. Note: I surprised myself with how calmly I reacted to my equipment breaking. For some reason, it really didn’t faze me.
Pictures will come soon. Or soon enough. Moving to Mumbai might delay that.
Last week I did a photoshoot with my friend Arpitha. We chose to go to Necklace road around Hussain Sagar. The lighting was great, and Arpitha’s brother came along to assist me. The shots with her in a blue traditional top are lit with only the sun and a single reflector. The shots in the pink top are lit with a single speedlite on a light stand held by John, Arpitha’s brother. For most of these I used a brollybox to diffuse the light. These were just some experimenting. Tomorrow I’m doing a shoot for a band. Hopefully more experimenting and fun results.
K. So we started with the flash, but it was two windy and there was too much light to ignore the potential of the reflector
I live in India. I have my US cell phone here, but I don’t use it and I have had it off basically since I’ve been here except to find some friends’ phone numbers. The other day a friend in the US asked for another friend’s number – as it turns out, I don’t have his number – so I turn on the phone. I have a new voicemail. I pull up skype and check my messages remotely so I don’t incur the $2.50 per minute charge for calling from India on my cell phone.
“Hello Scott, this is David from Focus Fine Art Photography Magazine. Can you give me a call at ___________?”
After several unsuccessful attempts to get a hold of each other I finally connect with David.
“I’m looking at one of the series you have in your personal work, the one of the red head and the plant.(Its a series of my friend Kami Baergen) I am the editor for the magazine and I know my readers. They will be interested in this work.”
Alright, I’m super excited.
“I would like you to buy an add in our magazine featuring this series.”
Less excited.
“We’re having a sale right now on 4 page spreads, they are normally $6,000, but for this issue they will be $3,000, plus you get two free one page ads in the next two issues.”
Wooo thats a lot of money right now. He gave me the option of a 2page spread which is more likely and half as much. But despite this ‘salesman’ trying to sell me ad space, it would be crazy good exposure. Two full pages featuring my work, seen by galleries and art collectors across the nation. I wrote to friends and mentors and most advised me to proceed, but with caution. It would be a good move, if not only for the exposure, but also if I sell anything or get any job because of this, it is worth it.
The image.
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I spent two days redesigning my menus on my website last week, using rollover jpg images. I had to code for each individual link on every page. It took forever and was tedious. I just spent 2 and half days re-redesigning the menus on my website in Flash. Its simpler, cleaner, and does exactly what I want it to. I had to create a different flash SWF file for each page, but the menus are more streamlined. Guh, I wish website maintenance did not take so long. www.scottclarkphotography.net
I don’t know how to prepare your this one…its long.
French girl with her boyfriend from Ireland on the train to Mumbai.
The views through the mountains were spectacular.
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The set from the Bollywood film, Kabse Sambhalle Rakha Hai Dill
The stars, I don’t know their names, are in the bath robes.
Dobe Ghats, where they wash a lot of laundry. Apparently the beginning of Slumbdog Millionaire was filmed here – where the mother dies.
I might have taken this picture despite the man saying he didn’t want his picture taken…I just could not resist. Click the image to see larger.
This is one of those instances that I’d love to say I planned, but you can’t plan something like this. Click image to see larger.
Riddhima. I talked with her and her group of friends for some time and they let me take some “fashionesque” photos of them. She exclaimed after I showed her some of the shots, “Wow, I never thought I was photogenic.”
“Mumbai’s highest tide in 100 years!” The headlines read. Its the day after the total solar eclipse that was totally blocked by rain clouds.
Boys and young men took advantage of the high tide to show off their diving skills by jumping and flipping into the swollen and terribly dirty sea water.
I decided to take the “short walk” from one side of the peninsula to the other. It was a little bit longer than I expected.
Love the graphic nature of this illustration.
Men are shooting up in full view in the street.
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Love this guy. Click on image to enlarge.
The dirty sea water.
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The infamous Mumbai Public Transit, famous for being terribly over crowded. This particular trip was not too bad.
I have officially taken the Weddings section off of my website in light of the fact that I no longer wish to photograph weddings. I am retiring from Wedding photography. I have had some good times, and some really bad experiences. I am not passionate about wedding photography. So now my website no longer betrays that fact by advertising my wedding photography. I made new menus that took too much time to create and code, adding Travel & Documentary. I moved most of the work from “Personal” to “Travel & Documentary” and added some new pages in there. I hope the updates are viewed as favorable. Let me know if you have any thoughts.
This post has been waiting to be posted since before I left for Mumbai, but hey, I’m “busy”.
I went again with Harvest Ministries to a village in the Karimnagar district where they were facilitating a medical clinic for victims of HIV/AIDS and passing out medications. I explored a bit on my own then with Acsha and Erica, went to a small village away from the main road and took some photos with the girls acting as my light stands. I used my speedlight 580EXII and a translucent light disc to defuse the light.
This ladies eyes in this image either scare me or crack me up. The poses some people take when you ask to take their photos are comical. I would love to catch or be able to convince these people to act comfortably, but language barrier prevents that.
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I love love this one.
A shepherd and his goats.
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Kittens Inspired by Kittens!
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Monday I meet my friend Kari for lunch at her favorite veg restaurant. I like the veg restaurants, but I prefer having meat. I somehow don’t think the veg restaurants are any healthier than non-veg, since their curries and sauces are so hearty.
I decide to walk to Fort to meet with the editor of the magazine, Auto India, but I seem to underestimate the distance and the effects of humidity. By the time I arrive I am thoroughly soaked with sweat. I got this meeting through a contact my friend and photographer Jeremiah Wilson gave me, a photo retoucher in Mumbai who in turn gave me a contact of photographer Makarand Baokar who works in-house for Auto India.
Bob the editor. I meet Bob. He is bald and wears thick-rimmed glasses. His posture says he is someone who holds his position not because of who he knows but because of what he has done. He greets me with a warmer smile than I’m used to receiving from men in his position in the U.S. and begins to ask me about my story. We look through my portfolio, and everyone in the office at least feigns being impressed. Bob starts calling his colleagues, trying to set up meetings for me. World Wide Media. Top Gear India. Inside Outside. He tells me to let him know when I am back in Mumbai permanently.
I had planned on going to visit a few marketing firms in central Mumbai, but I decide it is too late in the day, and I want to say goodbye to James and Ben who are leaving to Diu in the evening. I stop by a photography shop and get my portfolio transferred to CD so I can drop it off at the office of the Photography Guild of India. My portfolio has to be accepted before I’m allowed to become a member. Annual fees are 2,000/- or roughly $40, compared to the $260 some I paid to join the Advertising Photographers of America. In September they are having an exhibition I should try and some work in.
Tuesday. My last day in Mumbai. I am somewhat anxious to get back to Hyderabad. I still haven’t come to a definitive conclusion about Mumbai.
I scheduled a meeting with photographer and PGI board member Jaideep Oberoi for 10am. I had planned on taking the train, but the taxi driver insisted on taking me all the way there. I find the industrial building after asking a few different men and going the wrong direction. Jaideep is full of information, contacts, and encouragement. We talk for almost two hours.
After leaving Jaideep’s studio I meet with a studio and high quality print shop that is on the ground floor of the same building. The studio is available for rent along with medium format digital backs and lighting accessories. The printshop does high quality short-run offset printing. I can make a book to leave at a marketing firm. I decide to again forego my visit to the marketing firms, but this time until I have a decent book to give them. I will concentrate on magazines now.
I am famished and I ask around for a good non-veg restaurant. Several people tell me about the same restaurant on the other side of the train station. I have no idea what they are saying so I look on the opposite side of the train station and see nothing of what they were describing. I stop in a place called The King of Iran. Needless to say I get a lot of stares. I order something that is on special for the day. No idea what it is. The broth is good, but the mutton is sketchy. I am not a fan of the method they take in putting meet in their food. They just chop it up, bone and all, and stick whatever pieces in the dish. Would be so much easier to eat if they gave you recognizable sections. (this is every where, not just this restaurant) I cautiously order “Spacial Curd” or special yoghurt with a typo. There’s a yellow film across the top I remove then half-heartedly enjoy the rest of the cup.
I ride the train back to Mumbai CST and catch the 111 bus to Gateway. I remember the magazine on the 5th floor of the building opposite to where I met Ritam Banerjee on Sunday and I go to introduce myself. When I get off the elevator and face the door to the magazine, I realize I’ve come to the wrong place. In the entrance stands a large poster for Verve Magazine , a women’s fashion magazine. The photograph on the cover is of very high caliber, much higher than any of my “fashion” work. I go in and introduce myself to the secretary and ask to see the photo editor or a creative director. She informs me that the photo editor is out of the country and asks me to leave a card. I give her the leave behind I had printed and she asks me to sit and disappears. A young lady comes around the corner and asks if I called before I came. I did not. She is a creative director expecting to meet another foreign photographer. She asks to see my book, and I ask if a thumb drive is alright. She has trouble seeing the Powerpoint presentation on her computer so I direct her to my website. She says she’s impressed with my work and will pass it on to the photo editor. Please, she says, let her know when I am back in Mumbai. That went much better than expected.
I walk back to the hostel and meet a British guy I went to dinner with the night before. He says he’s going to meet two people from Singapore at a kabob place and asks if I want to join. We meet up with his two new friends, one a university student originally from India but has spent the last several years growing up in Singapore, the other a 23 year old female photographer and travel blogger that decided to travel around Yemen on her own. They are good company and I hope they keep in touch.
All that is left of my trip to Mumbai is getting on the train and falling asleep. I wake up eight hours closer to Hyderabad. Now I must decide…is Mumbai where I need to be for the next few years? Such a scary decision to make. I haven’t spent more than 1 year in a single place since I was 17.
Sunday. Despite the night going till 3:30 I awake somewhat early to attend church. I ask Captain, the manager of the hostel (His rank in the Salvation Army may be Captain, I don’t know), what churches are nearby. The closest is a Wesleyan church at the end of the street.
I enter twenty minutes after the service began finding the pews filled with only a spattering of people. I can barely hear the man making announcements over the blaring of horns in the street and the hum of the fans making it bearable to breathe in this city of humidity. Intermittently they break into hymns led by a pipe organ and a violin, or into a responsive reading from a raggedy blue book. The pastor speaks with a commanding voice overpowering the external racket. I find myself suprisingly moved while singing the hymns played on the pipe organ in spite of my usual dislike of traditional music, though I get a bit antsy during the rest of the service.
Documentary photographer Ritam Banerjee calls and asks to meet me at Café Mondegar. I later realized he made a major effort to come to meet me even without seeing my portfolio, coming by cab from all the way across the city. He came simply because I requested a meeting with him about his photography.
We meet for lunch and talk about his work and his travels around India, how he got started, etc. He has such an incredible story, over coming extreme depression that left him penniless and homeless for two years. Starting over from nothing with incredible drive he has become internationally recognized and published, represented by Getty Images and others. His work in Ladakh, a beautifully mountainous region in the northeast with very East Asian looking inhabitants, makes me want to travel there so much.
We spoke about how the spreading of ideas helps everyone, how the competition between photographers doesn’t truly exist – you only compete with yourself. How Ritam captures Ladakh and how I would capture are completely different. Ritam offers to help me in any way he can; he’ll give me any advice or contacts he can. He points out the window at the building next door. “There on the 5th floor is a fashion magazine called Verve. You should go in there and try to speak with their photo editor.”
On the street I meet up with a girl from Taiwan I had befriended in the hostel. She is in Mumbai with a large group representing the International Volunteers [Association?] from the Taiwan University (or something close to that). She splits with her group and asks if I want to go to the Prince of Wales museum. Sure, why not.
I tend to not be interested in museums. They are all the same – art, history, or whatever – they all make me tired. We walk and talk, I’m not sure if she’s paying attention to anything. I tell her about how two Muslim men somehow were trying to convince me that the Bible prophecies about Mohammad in Song of Solomon and that Jesus was only a prophet, just like every other prophet. She asks me if I am a Christian. “I am.” “I used to be,” she says. Her dad is a Christian and she through high school went to church with him, but found that all the religion was about was telling her what should could not do and making her feel guilty.
She asks me, “Why are you a Christian? Have you really thought it through?” I spent probably the next forty-five minutes describing to her and especially myself why I believe what I do, how my believes have been challenged and have changed. I told her the questions I still have and struggle through. She asked a few, well thought out questions. Its obvious she has thought about it and is searching for something, but she wants nothing to do with the Christianity she experienced growing up.
I love when I am ‘forced’ to evaluate my faith vocally. It is just as much for me as anyone else. I struggle so much and question constantly, but every time I run into a seemingly impossibly huge brick wall of a question or problem I receive an even bigger answer that makes me want to believe so much more. Several times recently this has happened. And these answers make it so much clearer for me why someone else would want to believe such things. For so long I struggled with why anyone not born into Christianity would want to follow all the stupid rules and go to boring services. Why would anyone want what I have? What the hell do I have? Repeatedly I find the answer to be freedom. FREEDOM! I am free from everything: my own selfishness and brokenness, my guilt, stupid rules, my need to control everything, slavery, and even boring condemning services. Jesus takes away all of that and calls us to something must greater, a life lived in service of others. I have no strength of my own and I am so dependent on other people; how can I possibly care only for myself? And my selfish self can only accomplish this with the help of someone much bigger and greater than I.
Anywho……
I ask the ‘Captain’ at the Red Shield House how to get to the Salvation Army church, which is quite far. I take a cab, expecting to meet Shweta at the church. The cab drops me down a somewhat seedy alley; I step over garbage and broken glass to enter the gate marked with the Salvation Army logo. Inside the muddy courtyard I ask where is the church and an elderly woman politely points behind me.
White uniformed ‘Soldiers’ sparsely fill the slatted wooden pews. I never imagined the Salvation Army was actually a uniformed army, that the great majority of the members wore identical white military uniforms, their rank the only difference. Most of the congregation, probably no more than 30 people, is elderly with the members of the band the exception. A few youth and a couple very elderly women come in wearing traditional brightly colored clothes, a stark contrast to the homogenous white of the uniformed.
Again I find myself singing and enjoying hymns, now with the accompaniment of an eight-piece brass band and drum set playing all the songs in a march. But I have a hard time devoting my attention to the ‘Bishop’ speaking with a thick accent. Its amazing to me how my brain can just shut down because it is having to work to understand.
Through all of this I continue looking for Shweta, but she never comes in. As I exit, she comes running up, apologizing for missing my call and the service. She takes me to her home, just in the courtyard of the Salvation Army compound. Her mother, after telling her my plan to move to Mumbai, says she will help set me up with a family that will rent out a room with separate bathroom and kitchen and such. It will be much cheaper than renting a studio apartment. Sounds good to me and would be a great way to work on my Hindi.
The last four days have been a bit of a blur. It’s been quite good, spending a lot of time with a group of British guys. Most of them did not know each other before coming to the Salvation Army Hostel, or the Red Shield House. This place has been such an amazing place for meeting very interesting characters from around the world. Some are finishing up a month or so of travels, others are traveling a bit before settling down for a month of volunteer work in various places, and one guy is just starting his year-long journey around the world here. An older Brit, an ex-military type, cynical against the world, seems to have been traveling non-stop for years. I don’t know that it has a purpose other than just wandering. Also in the hostel I’ve met so many other European travelers and a group from Taiwan that is here to perform for Mumbai University, an impressive series of structures.
After waking up for breakfast on Thursday and paying for my bed, I wind up falling asleep till around 11:30. James, one of the Brits, says he wants to go out for a walk and I ask if I can join him. He recruits another Brit, Ben, who’s traveled to over 70 countries somehow in his 38 years. We decide to take a taxi to Dhobi Ghats, an amazing sight of thousands of people doing laundry in what looks like chaos, but is quite an organized industry. I wish I could show you pictures now, but I can’t upload here.
Before going to Dhobi Ghats we stop and eat lunch at Leopolds and I meet a “war Photographer” from Australia named Warren. We talk for a while about equipment and what he does and why he’s here, and then he asks if I noticed the bullet holes in the wall. I had not. Makes me realize how unaware I am a lot of the time. The terrorists on 26/11 had come in and shot the place up with machine gun fire and even thrown a grenade. It was a direct attack on foreigners who mostly frequent the restaurant. After Warren pointed this out I started seeing bullet holes all over the place. Next to where the Brits and I had sat was a window riddled with bullet holes, and we had noticed in the least.
After Dhobi Ghats we walked around the area of the city then decided to take a bus back to the hostel. We wait and wait and after some forty-five minutes we give in to paying a cab. The driver is crazy and hilarious. He tells us he tried to go to the UK, but at customs they turned him away because they thought he was “a bad man. I’m a bad man [insert crazy laugh].” I recorded a video of him talking.
We meet up with two young Brits, who are traveling together for a bit before going off to two separate volunteer projects, and grab some dinner at a locals’ watering hole. Quite cheap, good atmosphere, then we head back to Leopold’s bar for some drinks. In the bar we notice more reminders of the terrorist attacks. Scars from the bullets that came from the restaurant below tore through the windows, the walls and the memories of the bartenders. We ask them what had happened up here. One waiter reenacts how he reacted when the shooting started, and he tells us about the two waiters that died where we sit. One was quite old, the other young and engaged to be married, was shot between the eyes. So real and sobering. These guys have to live and relive the memories every day.
Despite sleeping at close to 2am, I wake at 6am and find myself at the India Gate, a structure somewhat resembling the Arc de Triumph in Paris with a definitely Indian style. I shoot around for a while, playing with pigeons and children till I meet a group of attractive Indians, two girls and two guys. We start with the usual small talk, then the main conversationalist, Shweta, invites me to her church, the Salvation Army. I have never been to a service at the Salvation Army, might be interesting. Any way, this girl knows a lot about the advertising firms and magazine industry and she makes some recommendations for me. I ask if I can take their pictures and they start modeling for me, some needed more persuasion than others. One guy was such a natural at it I wonder how he hadn’t modeled before.
I decide not to do the Bollywood voice over and take a nap for a bit. Around 2pm Mumbai is supposedly going to experience the highest tide in 100 years. I assume it has something to do with the solar eclipse the day before. People were very excited about it and thousands gather around India gate to see waves crashing against the retaining walls. The police had set up a barrier keeping people away from the walls, but professional photographers were crossing the barrier to get better pictures of the crashing waves. I join their ranks, surprised the intimidating policemen do not say a thing about it. After maybe ten minutes I hear people shouting behind me, and the thousands of people are rushing through the police barrier to watch from the walls. There goes my ‘professional advantage’.
Young men start climbing on a gatepost, diving and flipping into the swollen and terribly dirty sea. The gate of India made for a dramatic backdrop for these images. An Indian man asks me to hold his coat, shirt, shoes, money and bag while he jumps in. I guess he things a white man with a huge camera isn’t just going to run off with his crap.
My jeans got soaked up to just below my pockets by a stray wave that wandered up the access ramp. Walking with wet jeans is not pleasant, but I decide to walk to the opposite side of the peninsula to see the ‘real ocean’ on the west coast. I enjoy some quiet streets shaded by huge trees with signs that say, “No Horn.” Being somewhere where there is no horns blaring is quite nice. I walk past Mumbai University and huge cricket and football pitches. Then the area starts looking sketchy, but the people are still very nice. Some refuse pictures while others ask me insistently to take their portrait. It took me an hour and half to walk some 3 or 4 km. Finally with the direction of kind people I find myself at Chowpatti beach.
I have found something very peaceful about looking off into an endless horizon, something like the end of the world. I guess that is one reason the beach is so alluring. For once something in life just ends and there are no worries beyond that point. You lose yourself in the waves, and either lose yourself in peaceful tranquility or thought – not mutually exclusive. I have debated with many and myself which is better, the beach or the mountains. I do not think I have turned my back on the mountains, and maybe it’s a similar tranquility, looking off into the fog on distant peaks. It could be just that fact that there is nothing in front of you, nothing to distract. It is just something about flatland that never gives me peace, there’s always something there, something to worry about. And as I contemplate this all I can see are faces, not particular faces, but a sea of faces somehow all with problems and anxieties. It is only when I look over an endless view that this disappears and I’m filled with familiar tranquility.
A group of teenage boys begin following me around the beach, asking me questions, asking if we can be friends. “We are good guys; we are not cheaters.” Then after sometime, they change their emotional state and one boy begins looking quite sad and another comforts him. The main talker among them tells me the other boy’s mother is quite sick and if I could give them some money they could get her medicine. After much insisting I tell them that I simply cannot help them. I do not have cash, which is mostly true – I am down to the bare minimum I should be carrying. It was obvious it was a show, was the buggered off they were back to the jolly emotional state they were in before.
I catch a bus back to Colaba, where I stay, and wait for the Brits to get back from their Bollywood voiceover debuts. That evening we go out with a girl from Chicago that for now does Bollywood backup acting as her sole source of income, 500/- here, 1000/- there ($10-$20 a day). Many of the guys are cautious eating meat from local joints so they stick to the Veg menu. I could not do that. I love meat too much. Kari, the girl, takes us to a local pub where we hang out the rest of the night.
Saturday morning I catch breakfast just as they are closing up shop. I call up two of the photographers here in Mumbai and one tells me to come over to his studio around 11:30. I catch an overpriced cab and eventually find the studio, surprisingly small for the photographer’s ability and client list. www.vikrambawa.com. I am incredibly impressed by his work. For some reason I am being drawn more and more towards fashion work. It is something I want to experiment more with, but I’m not entirely sure why. It never really interested me before. He gives me a lot of information and encourages me to come to Mumbai and sell myself as an Architectural photographer, because there is a lot of work in that field. He tells me with my portfolio I will definitely get work here, which is great to hear. He also tells me to put work in a PGI show in September, Photography Guild India. Would be a good way to get my name around.
Returning to the hostel I pick up a pirated copy of the book, The Kite Runner, and spent the afternoon reading. I quickly read through 100 pages. One of the guys in the hostel had encouraged me to read as much as possible here, not a bad challenge to take on. I’m still rereading Blue Like Jazz, but it is good to branch out. I have not seemed to read very many novels lately. I think I’ll enjoy changing that…but it helps not having constant internet access. All afternoon the internet at the hostel was down.
Saturday evening we meet up with Kari again and go to an all veg restaurant and I get a Veg Saagwala. I write this just so I remember what it was; it was incredibly good. We plan to go to a “Bollywood” club called Play in Lower Parel with the Bollywood recruiter Amjad. He informs us that single guys are not allowed in, you must have a girl with you. We search through a local bar and find three young girls from Holland that are keen on the experience. I do not want to go because I am not in the mood to drink alcohol and there is a 1500/- cover charge for each couple, but that charge is used for “free drinks”. But if I do not go, I screw up all the numbers and the others would somehow have to pay more. Amjad said he can get Kari, me and one other girl in for free, which effectively solves the problem. I am quite tired at this point, but once we reach the club and the music starts pumping, I suddenly get the energy and wind up dancing the rest of the night. The club is full of beautiful people. If I need models for a shoot, this would definitely be a great place to pick them up.
C’est tout. Sorry for the rambling and no pictures.
Sebastian, my current roommate from Germany that has a British accent, and I wake up around seven under the pretense that we are both going to be in a Bollywood film. After breakfast we wait in line to reserve our room for the following day and then wait for the “Talent Agent” to arrive. Upon his arrival he informs Sebastian that he does not need him for the day and sends me off with one of his men. I feel bad for Sebastian but he seemed to be fine with it.
They had promised me transportation to and from the shoot, which they provided, but I somehow expected a car or automobile of some sort. We walked through the streets in the rain till we found a taxi to take us to a train station. The train packs out with jostling business men, constantly joking with each other, slapping and jabbing each other. The man across from me asks me several things very quickly in Hindi then at my blank look, yells back to his friends, I assume telling them I don’t understand. At the Goregoan station we have trouble finding an Auto that is willing to take us the rest of the way to the studio. At last we reach.
The studio is five stories and the pseudo nice that a lot of places here tend to be, a mixture of nice touches amongst shoddy architecture. We enter the set, a very nice house with living room, kitchen, and bedrooms. The veranda is covered by tarps keeping the constant rain from falling on us, but everything is still wet. The crew ask me, “Did you bring a costume?” Umm, no. So they rush me downstairs in put me in a very Indian ‘nice’ youthful button up shirt. They serve me some breakfast, then I sit. I sit and sit. I wait for several hours in an uncomfortable wooden chair not knowing what was going on, but sitting next to Ravin, a regular background actor who was playing “a gay.” Eventually I get tired of sitting and wonder into the set and watch them filming. My contact is lounged comfortably on a couch on a landing above the set. I then spend my next few hours waiting there. After lunch and some more waiting they finally tell me its time for my shot.
Despite being told I would be a businessman and needed to be clean-shaven, I am a “foreign journalist making a documentary” in the young man’s hotel about the owner and his wife. For some reason the wife’s father yells at me. I have for lines, “Faltu? (crap?)” ”I do not want any public in here!” “ Great shot!” “Backup (which I think is like, that’s a wrap).” They even do a shot just of me saying the lines…ha. They seemed to like me, and after I did my lines the crew seemed to open up to me. I got to talk to the director of photography a bit and gave him my card. I hope some of the connections here come through.
The movie is set to be called Kabse Sambhalle Rakha Hai Dill, something about how the heart is not ready? I’m not sure who the actors are in it.
I wait around the set for a couple more hours until about 8pm. With the Amjad’s man, we head back to the Salvation Army. At the station I ignore a man in passing but he is insistent on getting my attention. I didn’t recognize him as Amjad. He puts me in taxi who drops me a couple blocks from the hostel for reasons I don’t know. It’s only about 10 but I am tired and quickly fall asleep. Around 12 I awake to Sebastian coming in and rummaging around. He’s going back out for a drink and invites me to go along. We go to this apparently famous bar just around the corner called Leopold’s and talk about our travels over a couple of tall Carlsberg’s. Good day.
I hope to get a hold of more firms and photographers. So far meetings haven’t come together. Amjad wants me to do some voice over work on Friday which I think I’ll do. I’ve got nothing else going on, and hey…hopefully more connections.
I have not seen my clean-shaven face for over two years now. Today I went to a hair stylist shop for men and received a shave and a face massage. I did it not because numerous friends have asked me to; I did it not because of the heat; I did it because upon my arrival at the Salvation Army Hostel in Mumbai I was asked to be in a Bollywood film. The man tells me, I need your face cleanly shaven. You will be a businessman from the USA and you need to look professional. Fine. Cool. I get to be in a Bollywood film!
I did not plan on coming here. A little over a week ago I was telling a friend that I made some contacts in Mumbai, and without hesitation she tells me, “Go. Go now. Why wait? You have no work in Hyderabad. Go to where the work is.” I guess I sometimes tend to just sit and wait for things to happen. I was planning on waiting till august or September to come to Mumbai. My friend was right, I have no reason not to go, and go right now. The next day I booked train tickets to Mumbai. I did not have a full schedule of meetings or even numerous contacts, but I booked the tickets because of a much-needed kick in the pants.
Lets back track even more. On the past Tuesday I met with an advertising firm in Hyderabad. The creative director asked me two amazingly humbling questions: How will we legally pay you? Do you have a leave-behind of some sort for me? To answer the first, I have no idea. I have found no legal rules for my business visa. I do not know how their tax system works and what my responsibilities are surrounding that. I very badly need to speak with a lawyer or an accountant familiar with foreigners doing business.
Addressing the second question, I feel both naïve and big headed all at the same time. I cannot believe that I thought for a second I could just show up at these very impressing marketing firms brandishing only a thumb drive and business card thinking they would take notice of me. I already was kicking myself for what I see as major deficiencies in my portfolio, so this new quandary was doubly impactful. Sunday night I stayed up till 2 finishing designing a leave-behind to take with me to Mumbai. Monday I struggled to find a place that could print the two-sided piece. I had conceded to printing 2 single sided pieces on regular photo paper when I got a lead about a printer around 2pm across town. I called and the man said it would take 2-3 hours. Gah…I didn’t have 2-3 hours because I had to catch my train, but I found an auto and got to the printer. Within half an hour I had 20 double sided, full color cards in my hand. Thank God. Not amazing quality but for one day’s investment would have to do.
I catch my train, the Hyderabad Mumbai express, around 9pm, and find my seat in the crowded Sleeper No AC car. Across from me is a couple, the Evan from Ireland, and his girlfriend from outside of Lyon, France. Evan works for the French Government’s English Teacher Assistantship Program that I applied for and was denied. By 11 everyone is ready to sleep, so we convert the seats into the sleeping bays. With my sleeping mask and ear plugs I got a pretty respectable sleep, despite what I found out later the ear plugs leaving a disgusting amount of wax in my ears, waking up at 7am the next morning. We pass by incredible views of green mountains laden with waterfalls peaking out through the fog and lush valleys strewn amongst the attentive peaks. These awe inspiring natural views greatly contrast the man-made filth and disarray of the cities. Rubbish mindlessly tossed among the railroad track, overflowing from holes in barrier walls.
Once we arrive in Mumbai sixteen hours after departing Evan invites me to go with them to their hostel, the Salvation Army, just at the back of the infamous Taj Mahal hotel. The hotel is still closed after last fall’s terrorist attacks. I had not planned on coming here; in fact I did not know it existed. In my limited research I found and planned on staying at the YMCA, which is significantly more expensive. I love traveling this way open to anything that comes.
The hostel is full of interesting people. Charlotte, a girl from Frankfurt, Germany ending her three-month solo voyage tomorrow night. Kristen, from Paris, France traveling alone after attending a friend’s wedding. A group from Taiwan doing a dance and music presentation at a university here in Mumbai for some International Volunteer Association. A team of YWAMers beginning their DTS here in Mumbai. I love love love meeting people from all over the world.
So far, my only confirmed meeting is with my contact’s magazine editor on Thursday, but from there I will be contacting more ad firms and photographers for meetings the rest of my time there. Now…bed. I’ve got to look well rested for my film career debut!