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Sunday, March 14, 2010

As We Digress: Photograph at the Studio


This experience never ceases to revolt me each time I'm at a studio for a personal photograph; this time, it's a graduation photo. Those trips depersonalize the whole beauty of a portrait of you. You're there with a complete stranger who wants to make you look good the way he/she wants. A beautiful photograph should capture the essence of you, not capture the way the photographer thinks is beautiful.

A photograph is the still you, that's why the photographer should know you personally, and that's why the most beautiful photographs are those taken by people who know you intimately, or by someone who knows what you're like. At least that's the case with me.

So, since there's graduation-photo traffic (because the university only gives the graduation gowns to one specific studio) I had to leave a studio-full of students yesterday (a minimum of 75 students) and come back first thing in the morning. 8 in the morning is not the best timing to have your photograph taken, because not only have you just woken up, but interaction with a complete stranger with a camera just wouldn't get you anywhere.

So there I am, with make up on (the very least possible, only enough to define the sleepy eyes) at 8 in the morning, sitting in a dark room, with the photographer asking me to change about 3 different gowns because none of them zip well, and I ran out of patience trying to fix the stupid zipper when it finally works. I sit on a stool, and the photographer holds the camera and says: "okay, now smile" without one drop of emotion spilling out of his voice, and I throw in my very shy smile, and he takes 8 other shots, asking me to tilt my head to the right, then to the left, then give him a bigger smile, to which I obliged hatefully (it completely showed on my face as I viewed the shots later). After he finishes he asks me if I need to throw in other poses or props, to which I hastily replied with a sharp no. Ok, it was sharp in my head, but came out nicer. The reason I'm against the whole photo thing is the following story.

These graduation pictures are supposed to go on the year book, which I wouldn't really mind had not this thing taken place. A friend of mine had her picture on there too, and on a summer day her mother got a call from a lady claiming to have pulled out their number from the directory. The reason of this call was that the lady's son wanted to propose to my friend. A complete stranger wanted to visit her in her own home with his mother tagging along so they can ask for her hand, out of nowhere. This, my friends, is the reason I don't want my photo on there; not because I'm afraid people would call me up and ask for my hand, as freaky as that might be alone, but it's the mentalities of those people viewing this year book, which is supposed to be a book with the main events of the academic year of 2009/2010.

Eventually, I went for the very first shot the photographer took of me. I wonder how it's going to turn out.

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

As We Digress: The Weaver's Anniversary


Yes folks, it’s been a year since I started this blog. It was a very interesting year, lots of emotion and intensity, but lots of successes and minor failures. But today, like every day, we will digress.

Work ethic in this country seems to be ever-deteriorating. Thinking that you might be working, or training in my case, at one of the country’s best “Global Professional Services” companies, whatever that may be, you would assume people are more motivated, more carefully-picked and much more professional. Not people who spend endless hours in meaningless talk, calling gynecologists, cutting their nails, or showering themselves with cheap perfume before heading out to a meeting, leaving the rest to suffocate.

It's a shame that no one really cares about whether or not they do their jobs right, or whether or not they do their jobs at all, and even if they do them, they wouldn't be doing so wholeheartedly. I know, as people get older they get sick of their jobs, they get bored, it's not the same for them anymore, but it's different if they feel that way and still like what they do. I mean after you've been doing what you're doing for 5 years, working in the same place and seeing pretty much the same people, you are bound to get bored, but at least you get bored doing something you know you're good at, someone else perhaps may benefit from it, you never know. The problem is I am certain that those people I've seen work are not bored because they've been doing their job for a long time, but because that's how it's been for them ever since they started, that's because it's all about the money they take at the end of each month. It's wrong. Yes, we all want money, but we don't have to die getting money. This kind of attitude can absolutely kill you, suck out all the life from your soul.

Boredom is one aspect, ethics are another. People have no proper work ethic around here, the less they do the more they want to get paid, the less the get paid the worse they do their job. It will never end for them. Thinking that something may come easily to you is down right foolish. And to those for whom this actually worked, well, I hope you're happy, I know I am because I finally found my nemesis. People who lack ethics, morals, and do not take responsibility of failures they brought on themselves are my personal enemies.

The upside to all this is that people who think they have so much time on their hands while they're at something their employers call a "job", there's a lot of room for jokes and laughs. Today a couple of hilarious ladies wanted to marry off the tiniest girl in the office to the morbidly obese accountant in the neighboring cubicle. The morbidly obese accountant then refuses to help out the lady that cracked the joke with one problem or another. And all the while I was so cracked up I couldn't breathe, tears came streaming from my eyes, and this all doesn't sound so funny because it can't be without their faces.

On a lighter note, vanilla is one of nature's greatest, most valued gifts to the world. It's fragrant, and it makes things like ice-cream taste a lot better. I wish I could add a little vanilla and brown sugar to my life. I'd like to see my mind paint a picture of that...