travel | Without an H

Posts from the ‘travel’ category

Hanoi cafe culture

140608-060-edited

Late on Sunday afternoon, I came across these two gentlemen, customer and proprietor of a Hanoi street cafe. Cafes are everywhere in Hanoi, big and small. This is one of the smaller ones.

140608-062-edited

One man and his dog (and other pictures)

140602-205-edited

These small, yappy-type dogs, as Eddie Izzard calls them, are unaccountably popular here in Hanoi.

140603-020-edited

140602-095-edited

140602-033-edited

140602-050-edited

140602-075-edited

140602-099-edited

140602-129-edited

140602-161-edited

140603-074-edited

Coffee break

140603-070-edited

In these hot and humid Hanoi afternoons, sensible folk take shelter in the shade with a cold drink. Foolish people wander about taking photographs.

140602-112-edited

Post 168, in which Jon remembers how to take photographs

140602-017-edited

Six street portraits from a walk around my Hanoi neighbourhood this afternoon. Things have been slow on this blog of late, but I’m hoping that that is starting to change.

140602-188-edited

140602-255-edited

140602-292-edited

140602-337-edited

140602-340-edited

In my idle moments – and I have a few – I often ask myself about what I was doing one year ago. Posing this question again earlier this week, I thought back to the little window of time I spent in Saigon after returning to Vietnam from the UK and before leaving on my Mekong trip. At the end of April last year, I was making plans for my upcoming travels and waiting for my Chinese visa to come through. I also took a few pictures out and about in Saigon, pictures which I had forgotten about until this week.

They’re a little different to the photographs I’ve been taking in Hanoi recently – colour rather than black and white, and taken with a standard zoom rather than my 35mm lens, so the framing is a little tighter in some of these than in my more recent shots. Right now, I’m not sure which approach I prefer, but I’m glad that I found these pictures gathering digital dust in a neglected corner of my Lightroom catalog.

130417-020-edited

130417-133-edited

130417-137-edited

130417-145-edited

130418-006-edited

130420-018-edited

130420-103-edited

130420-114-edited

130420-123-edited

130420-134-edited

130417-029-edited

130420-170-edited

130420-217-edited

130420-262-edited

130421-037-edited

Hello sunshine

140329-029-edited

After weeks of grey, drizzly weather, the sun has begun to force its way through the clouds above Hanoi this week. Not bright, blazing sunshine by any means, but a soft, hazy sunshine that’s perfect for street portraits.

140329-010-edited 140329-021-edited 140329-036-edited 140330-006-edited 140330-023-edited 140330-024-edited 140330-056-edited 140329-026-edited 140330-078-edited

Bangkok leftovers

140129-011-edited

A few more portrait and detail shots from my recent trip to Bangkok, pictures which didn’t really fit into either of my previous posts.

140129-025-edited 140129-044-edited 140129-040-edited 140201-004-edited 140201-037-edited 140201-028-edited 140201-053-edited

Amulets R Us

140205-020-edited Amulet market, Bangkok

140205-015-edited 140205-029-edited 140205-032-edited 140205-034-edited 140205-044-edited 140205-045-edited 140205-046-edited 140205-050-edited 140205-063-edited 140205-061-edited 140205-065-edited

All about the red

140129-006-edited

I spent a little time in Bangkok at the end of January and beginning of February, because of some not very interesting but still quite annoying problems with my Vietnamese visa. My visit coincided with the Lunar New Year, so I made a couple of visits to the area around Yaowarat Road, Bangkok’s Chinatown. The area was awash with red: kids’ pyjamas, lanterns, envelopes for ‘lucky money’ and, confusingly, anti-government protesters. While red has been adopted as the signature colour of the pro-government faction, the other side seemed to use the new year celebrations as an opportunity to reclaim the colour, temporarily abandoning their usual yellow shirts in favour of red.

140129-013-edited 140129-023-edited 140129-039-edited 140129-015-edited 140129-030-edited 140201-009-edited

140201-031-edited

140201-017-edited

140201-035-edited

140201-052-edited

Winter

140120-004-edited

Winter in Hanoi has been mild so far, though the pessimist in me is wary about what February and March have in store. Up until now, despite the cold of the early morning and night time, the days have been mostly bright and sunny. These pictures were taken last week, in a Hanoi neighbourhood not far from where I live.

I’ve been trying for something a bit different with my pictures since coming back from my Mekong trip, shooting only in black and white and only with a 35mm lens, and with minimal post-processing. I think this approach is quite well suited to Hanoi in the autumn and winter. But I’ve not been shooting as much as I would like. While I was travelling in the summer, I was very focused on photography, shooting nearly every day, and planning my time and my travels around my pictures. Now that I’m settled back in Hanoi, photography has taken a bit of a back seat again, something to be fitted in around my job and my everyday life. This isn’t altogether a bad thing. I’m very happy to be living in Hanoi again, and am (mostly) enjoying teaching again, but I hope to be shooting and posting more often over the coming months.

140120-011-edited 140120-018-edited 140120-025-edited 140120-035-edited 140120-038-edited 140120-041-edited 140120-045-edited 140120-050-edited