LAMU by land, part I

Lamu, Kenya  * November 2012 * Olympus OM-1, 35mm

The oldest town in Kenya lives on Lamu Island. It tastes of gritty, salty water. And smells of donkey dung and frangipani flowers. Calls to prayer breathe heavily above its modest buildings five times daily. Too early for my taste. In the town of Lamu town.

The streets are not streets here in Lamu town. They are passageways. Too narrow for anything wider than a donkey’s ass. So people ride donkeys, big and small, transporting bricks made of sea coral, between homes made of bricks made of sea coral. Cars are not welcome here; they do not exist in Lamu town.

Fisherman work in the town of Lamu town. Women in flowing fabrics pedal their feet beside the Indian Ocean. It’s no wonder Somali pirates frequent these parts. And kidnap a muzungu. Or two.

On a particular day last November, I inherited a shadow in Lamu town. A young girl who wore a headscarf – red in the front, flowers in the back. A girl named Diana. My shadow watched me from afar while I fiddled with my camera, explored the piers and boats. My shadow crept closer and closer until I gained her trust. She politely asked me to photograph her in front of the door to her school. And she trailed me around Lamu town until it grew dusk and time to pray. She escorted me to the place she found me. And, like a shadow, left with the sun.

Bunnies, Babes and motorBikes

India * August-October 2012 * Olympus OM-1, 35mm + Canon G10

A South Indian Odyssey

I aimed to travel to India for one month. I stayed for two. From Bangalore airport to Mysore, a stranger drove me through the night, stopping only for chai. My plan was simple: I would forget about my three years of law school. I would practice the sacred Ashtanga yoga under the revered grandson of its forefather Sri K. Pattabhi Jois. And I would awake at 4:00 a.m. to do so. I would be vigilant about reading three years worth of free reading.

While I did practice diligently, I did not read much. I met a hot Swedish mom and lived in her blue house. I painted her walls marigold orange and peacock teal. I fell in love with the fierce Hindu goddess Durga. I fell in love with the hot Swedish mom’s twins, Milou and Lumi. I sipped masala chai. Endlessly.

I laughed with my spying neighbor Pragna, with her top ponytail, who noted which days I wore contact lenses and which I wore my “specs.” Befriended the lovely, lovely Lena, after she crashed her scooter in front of my house. I made her ginger tea and photographed the back tattoo she had designed and drew.

I rode on the back of a motorbike of a Native American Indian in India. Without a helmet. And thought of my unborn nephew Henry Felix every time I did. And slightly regretted not being more risk adverse, while I photographed the region’s Crayola color spectrum. I flew to Goa. Crushed on the ocean. Slept in a 17th century Portuguese Fort.

I dressed in a hundred silk saris. Accompanied the blonde yogini Shanna on her very first train ride. During which we purchased three bunnies and named them Bow, Bindi and Bhakti. We lost them all to three very clever kittens, inevitably. 

I would leave this near-perfect place. And among other, deeper things that remain from my adventure are these photographs.

Namaste