The People

I was totally fascinated by the attendees and decided if they are always asking to photograph Samara then it was my turn for some payback. They didn't seem to mind. Steve McCurry, a photographer whom I love, had an exhibit here this summer. I attended a little seminar he gave. He took the famous Afghan Girl photo on the cover of National Geographic. India is one of his favorite places to shoot and it is easy to see why. The people are fascinating. Their culture is so rich and colorful.

The older people especially loved being photographed and seemed quite flattered when Debbie or I would ask them if we could take their photo.



I learned on my walk that you can tell if the person is from the south or the north, which are apparently very different from one another, by the way they wear their saris and their jewelry. I also learned in their culture it is immodest to have legs showing but not midriffs, which makes sense since their saris show off the midriffs and fully cover their legs.

I think the way they mark their foreheads also indicates where they are from.

They were so much easier to photograph than busy kids. I didn't even need to pose them. They were already posed perfectly.

I loved the colors in her clothes.

I went up into the stands to get a photo of the whole fire pit and was in front of this gentleman. When I was leaving he asked if I was going to take his photo so I did, of course. Sometimes when an Indian will ask to take Samara's photo he/she will ask if I want it emailed to me to which I think, "why on earth would I want your camera phone picture of her glaring at you?" Anyway, he wanted to see it after I took it so I said I'd email it to him. Maybe he didn't have an email address but he had the same reaction I do and did not want me to email it to him.

This cute lady turned and posed for us when we came up. We had wanted to get a photo of the pretty flowers in her hair so we asked if we could take one of her hair too. She and her friends then started to giggle and they teased her, "they wanted a photo of your flowers and you turned and posed." It was quite funny. Of course, things have a way of seeming funny at 4 AM.
I would love to photograph them during daylight hours. I'm not sure what I'd do with all the photos though but I know Debbie and I sure had a lot of fun snapping away. I think we exemplified Singapore's tolerance for differences that night. One Nikon and one Canon user getting along beautifully.