Hard to Resist

I was feeling a bit nostalgic last night while looking for an image to post today, so I peaked back into my orientation folder (we spent time the first 3 days overcoming jet lag and shock in Shakespear Regional Park). It's hard to believe that my semester at the University of Auckland will be complete in 2 exams and 4 days, and I'll be departing the land of the long white cloud in 27 days. This is when I ask myself, "wtf?" Where did all of the time go? I loved glancing at a few of the photos from the first days in New Zealand because I remember taking them and being so overwhelmed about standing on land all the way around the world (on the edge of the world as I've learned New Zealanders view it) with completely new people and knowing I was going to be here for what seemed like an extremely long time. Now I'm sitting here wondering, what the hell was I thinking? 5 months is an extremely minuscule amount of time. Thinking about everything that I still want to do is making it harder and harder to get myself into the land of hardcovers and silence (aka the library). I never actually knew what studying was until I came to AU and met some kiwis, they motivated me for a bit when classes got out, but I'm quickly losing steam; the 21 year-old American in me is saying, "who cares about studying when spring is upon us?" (Is this perhaps why we're called "lazy Americans"?) In addition, this video is highly distracting: They Just Turned Life Into A Musical

Stradbroke Silhouette

Today's image is from Stradbroke Island. While Katie was taking a nap, I managed to go exploring and find the perfect place to take photos of the sunset/stalk people playing on the beach.

Here is a brilliant short film in the spirit of Halloween: http://artisticthings.com/between-a-short-film-by-tim-bollinger/

Reflect

This photograph was also taken the weekend I went to Rakino Island. I took it while on a water taxi on the way back to Auckland (notice the Skytower and the CBD on the horizon). Last year, it was Meredith's and my goal to make a movie a block, but we never did it because we got too busy with class. Well, after reading an article about Johnny Otto, somehow I think saying "I'm busy" isn't going to cut it anymore: check out his film project here. Also, I read and interesting article today about net neutrality.... would you pay to access certain sites (think cable packages)? Click here to read the article.

Stradbroke Sunset

I had a wonderful five days at Stradbroke Island in Australia. My friend, Katie, and I happened upon it via google earth and just decided to go (the rest of our friends are taking a short trip to Fiji later). It was a great place and not the least bit touristy. Still catching up on reading emails and doing work that I missed, so it may take me a day or two to get back in the swing of things (once again). I took this photo at sunset one day, the sky had just cleared up after raining all afternoon and I enjoyed the silhouettes of people playing on the beach. I chilled on the beach for about two hours to watch the sun go down and the stars come out.

Bogan

So, the last few posts have been named with New Zealand saying that have caught on with us Americans - or, at least we've tried to get to get in the habit of saying them. All I can say for boan though is to just look it up. I took this photo at Wharariki Beach (remember my other post here). In the photo is Ben again. I took this as the sun was setting and we were headed back to the car. You can see how rough the waters were that day, which made the whole expierence of Wharariki even more profound. We literally just sat and walked around the empty beach for 2 or 3 hours - losing track of time completely. With the elements extremely strong that day, everything seemed to be against us, but the beauty and isolation of the place kept us there. It was by far one of the most spectacular places I have visited to date. As Ben said, something about that day on that beach just made us understand a little bit better how the world works.

Dodgy

Oops, I forgot to update this morning. This is yet another image that I took through the car window on my IFSA-Butler adventure weekend (I promise we didn't spend all of our time in the car). More photos from my spring break are still to come!

Ending

I took this photo while walking through on of the city parks in Rotorua. After a long day of various activities Rob and I decided to chill at the free hot springs that are fed directly from the geothermal springs all around the park (notice the steam in the background). It was a great end to a long day and I enjoyed trying to capture silhouettes of various objects in the park. This is my favorite image from that little experiment because I also got the steam in the background as well as the clouds lit up from the sun. The hot pools at the park used to be called Lobster Pools because pale people came out of the water bright red (because the water is so hot)... needless to say, after putting my legs in I completely understand where the name came from.

"Things Are Rough All Over" - a simple yet poignant blogpost.
new photos on Facebook.

Group Hug

I took this hiking back from Delicate Arch right before sunset in Arches National Park (Moab, Utah).

More on Iran: Torture In Iran & Reason to be Suspicious

Maasai Smile

This is a portrait I took of a Maasai warrior while I was on a community service trip to Tanzania a few years ago (Putney). The only photoshop I did was putting a watermark on it. It was taken unplanned and unposed (we were all just sitting around talking) in the natural light of a Tanzanian sunset. Everytime I see this photo, his eyes and smile make me light up. Though it's been a while, Tanzania is always on my mind and a place that yearn to go back to.

Peak's Sunset

I think this photograph speaks for itself. It is a sunset over part of Pike's Peak in September.