Jakarta Hotel

The day before yesterday we photographed the aftermath of this. So tragic. Yesterday we followed rangers who were busting illegal loggers and burning their camps down in the jungle. Today I'm quite satisfied to be fiddling around on the internet in a hotel room in Jakartawhile we wait for our visas to be extended.

Jambi Roads

Errands

River to Berbak

Medan Airport

I have absolutely no desire to see what my carbon footprint is right now.

Visitors

We spent an afternoon in this beautiful mountain village that had success with tiger proof enclosures for their cattle. Its humorous the crowds we draw who come to gawk and find out what we're up to with our big cameras and foreign faces. Without a shared language, we stare at one another, using our imaginations to connect the dots of our novel appearances.

Most of the children in the village would chatter to and about us in Indonesian, not really expecting to communicate, but for entertainment. But this child below approached me in this very deliberate manner, speaking slowly and looking right into my eyes. I felt on the cusp of comprehending his meaning without understanding his words. His presence was strong enough to express something on its own. Whats strange is that my co worker Gabe (videographer) had the same reaction to him. "He's speaking a different language then the other kids," he exclaimed. And I guess he was...

A Visit to the Village Head

This picture is from a meeting with the head of a village in his home to discuss recent tiger related conflict. His two daughters were eavesdropping on us from the kitchen.

Sumatran Road Trips

Been doing a whole lot of driving all over the island over the last couple of weeks following leads, so its given me a chance to continue shooting from the passenger window. I like being able to freeze these very transient moments that would normally pass by my window, and probably slip quickly from memory.

Forest Rangers

We spent a couple hours at the forestry police department before heading out to shoot pictures of loggers the other day. There was this hilariously modern moment where we were taking pictures of each other taking pictures of each other. So few (western) tourists visit this particular town, that we literally had people stopping us in the grocery store, to pose for a cell phone picture with us.

Still Not in the Jungle

But if all goes well, we'll be heading there tomorrow. Although we've gotten a couple of chances to photograph human/animal conflict related situations so far, we've yet to really get out into the tigers natural environment to do some work. So far we've gotten caught in one bureaucratic entanglement after another in order to get access to key tiger locations on the island. Steve keeps reminding me, this is why no one has done this story yet. I'm learning more and more that probably about %90 of this job (depending on the story) does not involve taking pictures. Its behind the scenes research and networking that allows you to take the pictures. Although certainly challenging, its all interesting and new to me, so I'm happy to be along for the ride, even if I had to spend three hours in the Medan police department today to walk out with a slip of paper, stamped and signed, that may or may not help us do work in a region somewhat autonomous from the rest of Sumatra.

Drive around Medan

Photographing from a moving car is not typically something that I find very effective or satisfying. I prefer to spend some time with my subjects or at least have some sort of brief interaction. But somehow driving through the chaotic and unfamiliar streets of Medan, this approach seems like a fitting way to express the sort of cultural distance inherent to traveling to a place like this. I can get physically closer to my subjects; I can talk with them and get a feel for who they are, but ultimately (at this point) what I have are my very limited observations as a foreigner of what this culture looks like. Here's an example of what I've got so far: Sumatrans crouch and sit back on their heels for long periods of time without showing discomfort. This ability I envy, as it allows one to sit nearly anywhere without having anything in particular to sit on. The universal unchair. I'll definitely have to pursue 'the crouch' as a photo investigation. I'll post my findings here...

Repose

Here are some of the WCS Medan workers that we are involved with for the story (including our new driver at the bottom left). Without furniture, this crew still knows how to relax in a way that seems uncommon in the states.

In and Out of Bangkok

Bangkok Traffic Cops with Face Masks

Since its clearly high time that someone did a project on bangkok traffic cops wearing facemasks, I decided to start my own. No, not really….but I suppose I could. But seriously, I must revisit this city and certainly this country. Really dug it.

So Many Flights

Celebrating Aceh

These hotel workers were preparing a banner for a local festival in Aceh yesterday morning.

Durian!!!

We were expecting the truck to be empty so we could load our luggage and head back to the hotel after a long day of convening with scientists and conservation workers. Instead we got Durian. “Whats durian?” you ask. Well as I learned yesterday, Durian is a local fruit, resembling a pineapple, that has mysterious power to effect sheer joy from every Sumatran in its vicinity. Moments after the truck arrived people started emerging from the house, most of whom I had no idea were inside, to get a taste of this strange happy fruit. In no time the driveway was full of laughter, smiles and the type of unabashed joviality that you might see in a coca-cola commercial in the early 90’s. Some workers could be seen slyly stowing durian fruits away for later; others lined up for instant gratification, while we were left to wonder is Durian drugs? One scientist later giddily admitted that he was drunk off Durian, which only deepened our suspicion. We’ll have to do some good sound empirical testing on this one…

The Calm before the Tiger

A couple weeks into our trip, and I hardly know where to start. We just got back to Sumatra after a week long tiger conference in Thailand, and it looks like we’re finally ready to move on from hotel buffet’s, airport lounges and debates about the best ways to count tigers (scat, tracks, or camera traps?) and we’re ready to get out into the field and take some pictures. We’ve definitely witnessed some exciting (and definitely tragic) moments so far as we’ve chased the tiger’s tail. But since those photos aren’t mine to share, I’m gonna go ahead and post pictures from the many moments that take place between those which will end up on the pages of nat geo sometime in early 2011.
The busy days and constant movement has held back my blogging, but I’ve got plenty of pictures to share, so I’ll start from today and trace backward. These first pictures are from the airport in Bonda Aceh today.