the underwater city of darkness

Medan is boring, ok i know that is barely news for anyone. So boring that its been over 2 months since i last blog. And now i just get back home from spending almost 2 hour on the road, no i'm not coming back from out of town or anything, just your normal "from sun plaza and back trip". What took me so long you asked?? its the bloody flood!!!

since its raining like every goddamn day in this hell hole city with a non existent sewer system it will only took 30 minutes of rain to magically turn Medan into Atlantis. It didn't help by the fact that it was the 5pm rush hour period, its depressing enough to be on the road at that time without the flood and all.

at one point it actually took me 38 minutes to cover less than 600 meter of asphalt!!! (yes, i read the speedometer). Well, in between boredom and severe depressing i manage to find to spirit to stick my mobile phone out the window and took a few shots. enjoy.

Floating pizza hut?? only at Medan

some of the water were actually so high that it covered the entire wheels of a sedan, unsurprisingly lots of sedan broke down. You cant see those picture as i was trying to keep my car alive and in control, you don't mess around when you are driving in water that high.

Heaven right at my backyard

well not exactly literally at the back of my house....but at the backyard of North Sumatera, 3hours drive from Medan, Tongging to be precise, the famous (but still very underated Sipiso piso water fall).

So, it was the first hunting session with my newly born photography club TPC- Toba Photographers Club. Get there early morning on time to capture sunrise, but the geographical position didn't allow us to get any frontal shot of the sun.

Anyway...nuff crap, i know most of you won't bother reading and go straight to the pictures anyway...so ladies and gentlemen, The magnificent Sipiso-piso water fall...............

Sunrise at Tongging, cant exactly get the sun itself as it was blocked by a hill

Th sun was playing with the tress, they are good buddies

Still playing

The path we must get trough to get to the water fall

The star of the show

For these shots where I'm almost right under the waterfall i have to crossed the pretty wild river to get to it. it was a crossable river, but carrying a back pack full of expensive and not exactly water friendly gears didn't help make it easier. And as it stands i was the only one crazy enough to do it. But i was the only one with pictures from this angle too.


Down there, even though you i was still some 50 meters aways at the very least from the waterfall itself but water was spraying everywhere, but it was gentle, the kind that coming out from a water sprayer bottle at a hair saloon. Grass and little red flower blossom everywhere, it literally feels like a little heaven, it was so refresing, the way the water hit ur entire body. Too bad i cant really enjoy it as i need to protect my camera. Im dying to go back without a camera and just suck in all the atmosphere in there.

Here you can see the water spraying everywhere

Look....rainbow!!!

Plus an amazing cobalt blue sky, and perfect clouds. Absolutely perfect

The guy is preparing our lunch. oh wait, you don't care bout what i did there, just the beauty shots please, coming rite up.....

Fantastic sky

Who here want to do base jumping from the top of the water fall??

More amazing sky

Shot from the car when we were heading to some village down there near the lake. An almost Infra Red tone.

Another version

breath.....ughh...taking...............ughhh can't....breathhh......

One of the more abstract shot

Look at that cloud!! i mean, LOOK AT THAT!!!

Thats it folks. If you wish to see more pictures from amazing location, or if you got a specific places that you want me to go and take pictures of, even if its overseas, please don't hesitate.....to wire me some funds so i can travel.


'till next place and next shot

P.S bank account number will be provided if you ask for it

Vroom Vroom...

The days of pre-booking a car and can't go anywhere because all cars is taken is over. Coz i finally manage to get myself my own car (though it's only a 2nd hand tin-can) .

So what kind of wheel am i handling now you ask, well lets start with the kind of wheel you gonna see me behind it if i got all the money in the world, if money is no issue at all then i would be driving one of these.....

ASTON MARTIN

Don't mind the Casino Royale thingy, i've been in love with it since forever, whether or not a certain Mr.Bond been driving it or not.

Then for the moment when i want to flex my macho muscle i will drive this....

MUSTANG

One hell of a mean ride this Mustang, and the car you are looking at is "Eleanor" from the movie gone in 60 seconds.


then if i don't have an unlimited money flow but i'm still pretty rich then i will drive this....

MINI COOPER

As seen in the movie Italian Job, mean little sport car. Then going lower on the financial stairway, if i can't call myself rich but i got a further 50 million rupiah to blow this time around i would be driving this.....

DAIHATSU TERIOS

But sadly none of the above is affordable right now, struggling artist don't mix well with new shiny car anyway. So instead this is my new ride.............................

DAIHATSU TARUNA

Its some leap (backward) after driving my parent's Nissan X-trail for a while....oh well, beggar cant be chooser

Lunar eclipse reportage

FAHKEEN CLOUDY.........ZERO VISIBILITY!!!!!!

Total Lunar Eclipse 28th August 2007

Tuesday the 28th of August there will be a total lunar eclipse over our sky. Fortunate for my Australian mates they are in the best place on earth to catch this show.

Below i posted timeline for some city in Oz that i got a buddy in. Ignore the degree field in the bracket, thats the altitude of the moon at that given time, Which if you wanna know is as simple as the horizon will be 0 degree and right on top your head will be 90degree, so as you can see in the time of totallity the moon will be hanging nice above your head (except for Perth)

City	Penumbral Eclipse Begins	Partial Eclipse Begins	Total Eclipse Begins	Greatest Eclipse	Total Eclipse Ends	Partial Eclipse Ends	Penumbral Eclipse Ends
Sydney (EST)	17:54 (5°)	18:51 (17°)	19:52 (29°)	20:37 (38°)	21:22 (46°)	22:24 (57°)	23:21 (64°)
Brisbane (EST)	17:54 (6°)	18:51 (18°)	19:52 (31°)	20:37 (40°)	21:22 (50°)	22:24 (61°)	23:21 (70°)
Melbourne (EST)	17:54 (1°)	18:51 (12°)	19:52 (23°)	20:37 (32°)	21:22 (40°)	22:24 (50°)	23:21 (57°)
Perth (WST)	N/V	N/V	17:52 (0°)	18:37 (7°)	19:22 (17°)	20:24 (30°)	21:21 (41°)

Penumbral eclipse is when the moon move into the Earth's penumbral shadow (the outer most shadow) and the moon will started to look a bit pale, partial eclipse is when part of the moon started to move into the Earth's umbral shadow (the inner darkest shadow) and total eclipse is when the entire moon is inside the Earth's umbral shadow.

You don't need any optical help to view a lunar eclipse, all you will need is a pair of good eyes and probably a good reclining chair so that you don't hurt your neck from looking up too long.

Unlike total solar eclipse the moon won't be totally disappear as it will "only" turn into a dark orange color. This is because the Earth doesn't do a very good job in blocking the sun's light since our atmosphere will scattered a little of that sunlight off to the moon, the blue ray will be absorb by our atmosphere and the reddish/orange will be scattered away and land on the surface of the moon.

And for those medanese we won't be having a VIP seat to this nature's show since when the moon rise in Medan (6.30pm) it will be well in totality already, we won't be able to catch the start of the eclipse but we will be able to see the end of it. Our viewing time will only be slightly different from those of Perth. You can use the Perth's time as a rules of thumb. And yes, the moon too does rise from the east.

I will do some photo shoot and will post it after. But too bad can't do one of the montage of the beginning till the end thing since the moon is still below my horizon for the start of the show.

ok, thats it folk. Hope you do spend some time watching it. The universe is putting on one of it majestic show, the least we can do is show some appreciation.

Welcome to my Kampoeng

So they say Cemara Asri is like a kampoeng far away from the city lights, living there is almost like living in a jungle. They cant be more correct!!!

so early in the wee hour of friday when im still "in the office" there were this two cats going about who can make the biggest furball, they sounded like Celine Dion singing with a serious case of throat infection. Btw, how do u tell the difference between a cat's cry and scream?? well either way they are on the same spookyness level.

So pissed at those 2 felixes i got out my M50 Airsoft gun to teach them some lesson about keeping it down after 12. And then something caught my eyes from my neighbour's place across the street.


It was a giant Musang !!! (i have no idea what is musang in english. anyone??) roaming around their carport like a busy little mechanic.



I run up and traded my M50 for my 20D (its a Canon camera) slowly make my way toward the house and get into position (stomach flat on the ground) since Mr.Musang was kicking it under the car.

look at his size, i cant imagine if he get his way to the house that keep a pet bird (july...ur dear pollie still there??) or rabbit outside, heck even a small dog wont be his worthy opponent



I saw a raccoon running around the big wall that separate the complex and outside world in front of my room once. And we have tons of froggy running around the area, i always see some flatten out dead froggy on the street, guess frog need to learn how to cross the street properly too.

well, welcome to the jungle

Wushu national championship 2007

So here comes the photo blog about Wushu. Went there as a ticket buyer but bring along my entire photography gear i look much more like the pers than regular audience. As expected meet some of my friends who are actually pers themself. After a small talk figured out that it was actually quite easy to get a crew/pers pass from the organiser, should have make a few call before. Browsing the hall and seeing how sitting with the crowd wont be a good option for taking photograph as you cant stand up or risk being thrown object at your head by people behind you.

We end up going behind the crew only area anyway, all you need is a photographer look, which i certainly got since I AM a photographer, prob just hold your camera in front of your chest where the pass should be, and seeing that I carry a big lense they wont suspect a thing.

So, the event run late as predicted, official start time was 7.30 but not untill 8.10 that the show start rolling, so here is the reportage of the show in photos

Opening act: Traditional dancer from Nias picking up all the honorable guest to their seat

Display of the contestant starting

One of the cuter contestant

North Sumatera!!!! accompany by a roaring applauses from the entire hall (and a very sexy sign girl)

Our fighters

(my) main attraction of the night

sexy lady

Fireworks along with the opening drums played by honorable guests

The fireworks actually was a pretty stupid move from the organiser, as it filled the indoor hall with smoke, audiences fan their face with whatever they got right after the fireworks and it didnt disappear complete untill very late into the show. The smoke-and some poor lighting- gave photographers an almost nightmarish condition to shoot. So you have to pardon my lack of sharpness in the action shots.

One more look at the sexy lady

The all chinese dancer that has won some international competition and will represent indo in some int bla3 competition soon

in action


Demo from the Chinese Wushu team, very impressive

Some of the duel action was breathtaking,and funny (because they were suppose to be a comedic fight like jackie chan, not because they were stupid)

syncronised side jump

the picking up dandruff from the back of someone's head move

triple back somersault

Hyatttttttt!!!!!

The Barongsai from Malaysia, equally impressive

Misjudged the step and fall, see that the guy behind already on the ground, pretty dangerous stuff

The crowd were pretty sportive, they broke into applauses to give support after the Barongsai fell, they got up again and repeat the jump and succeded, and after that they were just showing off by doing some intentional "almost fall down" move, well, they manage to make the crowd gasp anyway.

Mr.Lion

The co-MC from china which is a singer herself put on some show for us. Unfortunately that was right after the end of the Wushu and Lion dance show, some of the crowd probably didn't realise there were going to be second session of Wushu action started to leave the hall, that probably explain the look on her face

The Wushu artist from N.Sumatera team got the honor the do some demo

they even fight with a shovel

grab the enemy by his feet and throw him over head, just like in a movie

Bye bye Medan

Yuni shara, if you dont know her then "big sis of Krisdayanti"

celebrity hogging time with Mr.Edo Kondologit (damn u ali, not sharp!!!)

Thats it folks, the competition still going on for another 3days, see if i will feel challenged and go take some more action shots or not. But with no demo from Chinese Team prob wont be much fun anymore. Now if you excuse, I m going to track down that sexy lady that hold the N.Sumatera sign............