Do you have any idea how many photos you took your first year?
SPEAKER_05Yes, I do actually know the number. I passed thirty-two thousand five hundred photos.
SPEAKER_02And compare that to what you did before you moved to Hong Kong.
SPEAKER_05Maybe not even more than five thousand. Max.
SPEAKER_02Welcome to the Expat Rewind. My name is Stephanie and I will be your host in this experience. What we're doing in this podcast is reaching back into the first year of an expat or geopath's existence, into something they put online, whether it was via a blog, Facebook, Instagram, any sort of social media feed, or an email that they sent to a group of people that they knew. And we're going to reach back into that post where they told the world about their experience as an expat geopath. And then the expated geopath will reflect on what they're what they think of, what they wrote, what they've learned since then, and anything else that comes up as they're reading that online experience that they posted all those years ago. Thomas, thank you so much for joining me on the Expat Rewind podcast.
SPEAKER_05Thank you very much. Nice to be here. After one week back and forward email.
SPEAKER_02Hey, that's quick scheduling.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, that's that's what I that's what that's the new world. That's the 2018 right there. So no problem.
SPEAKER_02Well, I don't see anybody on. If we have people starting to hop on, we'll probably do a little bit about the podcast itself.
SPEAKER_05Oh yeah, no worries, no worries.
SPEAKER_02But for the for the podcast that'll come out next, I believe next Tuesday, can you tell our audience a little bit about yourself?
SPEAKER_05Yes, uh, my name is Thomas Sandfield. I am a photographer from Norway who is based in Hong Kong. Um, I work uh like in the fashion industry and basically anywhere with has anything doing commercial or portraits, street photography, and stuff like that. That's a super quick introduction introduction from who I am. Um yeah, doing this full time.
SPEAKER_02Season one, we mostly focused on the written word. We did a lot of blogs and one email, so people were like reading stuff that they had posted in their first year in a new country, and then they reflected on it. And you're going to be our first visual person who's going to talk about photographs that first year in a new country. So can you give us some context about the photographs that you're gonna discuss today?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So I'm from Norway, uh in Norway, it's basically the one thing you can do in Norway is landscape photography. That is like the big thing, right? So there is mountains, fjords, lakes, trees, sunset, sunrise, that's it. You know, so there's not much to go on. Uh yes, you can do street photography and portraits and stuff like that, but uh, you have to do it in studio because we have five months of winter in Norway. So that was the big thing I realized when I came to Hong Kong that the weather is great. Yes, we have those times with typhoons and stuff like that, but we do have quite good weather, and uh the city is such alive that you cannot. There's like a new moment after new moment, a new moment. It's like a forever going uh studio. So I got very inspired to shoot landscape, a lot of street photography, people, portraits, and stuff like that. And for a person who is not used to that, that was a huge explosion in my head. Like, wow, this is what I want to do. This is my this is what I'm gonna change to. So it was like uh a sudden change uh in my photography perspective, right? I coming from a like landscape country and suddenly having this opportunity to take pictures of um people, you know, and and they don't care. They don't they're absolutely too busy to care.
SPEAKER_02Is that why the uh people photography wasn't as popular there? Is because there were like a lot of security issues or privacy issues in uh Norway, you mean?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, it is. Uh, because people are more uh intimidated by seeing a camera or they go like, oh, don't take a photo. And the rules are different in Europe and America than Asia. Right. Of course, you cannot you don't want to take like a really a bad picture of someone to post online and make it look like an idiot, but uh it's that constant refreshment. You can just stand in one place and you can probably get 10 to 15 very good pictures of people having a good day, bad day, love story, breakups, just by standing in one place in 30 minutes. Yes, yes, it's like you get everything, you see everything, you can tell a story in their face, and you cannot do that in Europe because the streets are too wide, there's too less people, and and if Hong Kong has 8 million people in a city, right? It's absolutely crazy compared to where I come from. With Oslo, we have like 800,000 in a city, and of course we we walk around, we have the entire, we have space, we can use our arms, we can stretch them out, and no problem, right? But in Norway, and in Hong Kong, it's like MTR or the the subway is a baffle. It's like, oh I need to get this one, yeah. And that is that is a huge change for me too, because I'm coming from a city, country, when the train is going every 30 to 40 minutes. Uh so Norwegians have managed to develop like a very patient atmosphere. But in Hong Kong, the train goes every third minute, uh third minutes. So if you cannot reach it, the next one will come in three minutes. So, no problem, right? So for me, when I see people get upset on the train station because they cannot get the train, right? I'm thinking like, well, the next one is in three minutes. Why are you upset? Come to my country and maybe need to wait 40 minutes or an hour to the next one.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_05That will make you that will make you upset. That then you have the rights to be upset.
SPEAKER_02I I cannot relate any more to you. I I grew up on the east coast of the US and then I moved to California starting at Los Angeles, the land with probably one of the worst transportation systems in the world. Like everybody has a car. Actually, everybody. It's just ridiculous. Where if the if the bus came within an hour, you were lucky. So to places in Asia where you don't even need to know the bus or train schedule, you just go and you know there's going to be one soon is just pan, they apologize publicly if the train is 13 seconds late.
SPEAKER_05You know, it's like, wow, in Norway, they don't care if the train is three hours late. They're just like, take the bus, we don't care. Yeah, you pay anyway. Yeah, it's totally opposite. It's like, what's happened where the honor system doesn't work.
SPEAKER_02I do want to take one second. We have a couple of folks watching. Hi Ronald, nice to see you again. Uh and profitable polyglot. Arthur! Hey Arthur! He's on my he's in my language learning group online, yeah. And I think that's it for now. So they're waving, and I don't know how to do that on Instagram, so I'm gonna rave wave IRL at them. Awesome. All right, so so a little bit of context. So you moved, you said February 2012 is when you first moved to Hong Kong, right?
SPEAKER_05Exactly.
SPEAKER_02How'd you end up in Hong Kong?
SPEAKER_05Uh, you know, I had like a multiple choices. I had I can go to Japan, Thailand, Philippines. I knew I want to go to Asia. I was thinking in Vietnam, I really want to go into Vietnam, but then I was thinking, okay, the language problem. It's gonna be a challenge for me to speak English in because Thailand is good, but not that much taking photos of, and I wanted to go to a big city. And Bangkok, yes, is a great city, but everyone has been there. There's no extraordinary, there's nothing wow, it's nothing uh does didn't have to have a factor. So I just said, okay, go to Hong Kong for two weeks. Let's see what happens. And the crazy part is I I arrive on a uh on a Sunday afternoon or something like that, and um, and I walk down and I uh going to get something to eat. So I go down and I go to the restaurant, and you are so scared the first time you go in Asia or Hong Kong, Chinese, because you don't know what you're gonna eat, right? You you you are terrified, you you see just a lot of Chinese symbols, and you don't know what it says. You have no clue, and just like, oh my god, don't be eating, I don't want to eat a rat or something. Uh and so I just ended up going to a restaurant, and the funny part on the restaurant on the wall, it was uh the Chinese constellations, like uh the horse, the ox, the any like the rabbit. And I actually thought that maybe it's the menu, right? So I just like wow, but then I saw the dragon, I realized, oh, this is this is normal. This is not you're so terrified, right? You're so scared. So that was kind of fun. So I ended up uh eating something called uh that's the first Chinese word I learned that was ta siu fang. That means like uh pork and rice. Right, and uh, so that was uh that was like my favorite dish. It was like barbecue pork with rice. That was like, yes, that's my go-to food, that's something I can eat all the time, and I'm not gonna get sick of it. I thought I thought, but over eating this for like a couple of days, I realized that I'm actually allergic to honey. Oh no, so they then they using honey to to barbecue it, and I started like itch all over my body. Like, what is this? What is this? And then then, of course, some people told me that hey, this is barbecue. So I was like, honey. I like ah, great. Okay, stopped eating that, and I switched to soup instead, and that was tasio tomfan. So I switched to uh eating uh soup instead, but tastes the same, tastes good. So the story goes like that. That was day number one. Day two was I was like on an adventure. I want because the day I arrived, I bought a few magazines to see the photography level in Hong Kong. I wanted to see what they are doing in Hong Kong compared to Europe and stuff like that. So I went through the magazines and I see, I realized this is in 2012, and I realized that the photography uh has not changed the last seven years. It's like time has standstill in Hong Kong, they haven't evolved, it's like they're living in a bubble and they don't want to break out of it. So I realized that I might have a spot here, and because I have my skills, I can put that in Hong Kong. So I start to think about that the first day already. But day number two, I go out, I go to a place called Chim Chai Choi, and uh short for TST, and I take the MTR, uh the subway, I take down the escalator up, and it's a long escalator, and and um coming up one of the exits, it's like a big road, cars, taxis, big buses, double bus size, like double bus, you know, double deckers. And in front of me, there's a big sign, a lot of photos, like big billboards of photo, model, fashion all over it, right? And and I'm thinking, I want to have my photo there. I really want to have my photo there. Wow, yeah, and the and and that is the crazy part because three years later, yeah, I'm working for that company, and my photos are there. So that was like the turning point was that. But then I went there, I saw it, and I thought to myself, I will get there in in three years, I'll I'll do it. And wow, somehow I managed to know someone, meet someone that knew that one, that one, and I somehow managed to get to the right people and and got uh of course it's a little bit luck, but it's also skill. Preparation equals luck, uh, means you become successful, right? And I was just ready for the right timing.
SPEAKER_04Wow, wow.
SPEAKER_05So uh yeah, it's absolutely amazing that the uh just going through some of my photos.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, let's let's uh think I was thinking to show you this one. Give me two seconds here.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, sure. Uh so for the folks that are just joining us now, uh um this is for the expat rewind podcast, yeah, where we look at what's uh an expat put online their first year, and then we reflect on what's changed since then.
SPEAKER_05So the first photo I took when I arrived was this photo was this photo. It's I don't want to tell anything, I just want to let you guys see the photo and what's tell me what you think.
SPEAKER_02Okay, okay, okay. Oh, there it is. Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_05So this is the first photo I took, and it's so funny. This is like I saw this guy sitting and sleeping, and I was thinking I managed to catch his dream over his head. It's like you can tell like he's sleeping, and his dream is over his head. Yeah, and that made me laugh so much because that the photo you can that is you know what's the odds to get that shot? You know, the person is dreaming, and that's the picture of his dream. So funny, right?
SPEAKER_02So funny. Oh my gosh, that's so much. Do you remember where that photo was taken?
SPEAKER_05That photo is actually taken in Shenzhen train station, uh right when you arrived at Shenzhen.
SPEAKER_03Really? Yes.
SPEAKER_05So that is that's the first photo I took. Nah, I was so excited when I got back to the hotel, and that this is the first photo I edited, and this is the first photo I posted from Hong Kong's China. So wait, so that in the train station?
SPEAKER_02Oh no, no, no, can you stay on that one for a minute? Yeah, I look so that was in the train station.
SPEAKER_05Inside the train station.
SPEAKER_02Inside the train station. Oh is that what like on the bottom left, is that like the train station like wall that we can see that white area?
SPEAKER_05Exactly. Okay, exactly. This is just uh uh piece of the the train station. Um and this is probably an advertisement or in China they have like uh photos of like oh look at our fantastic country, so you can feel a bit positive about it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05But that's like so. When I took the photo, I just thought to myself, wow, I'm lucky. Oh because this is like a one of a million photo. It's just like you can tell this is a story about a guy, he's sleeping, and above his head is probably what he's dreaming. Uh very self-explainable, and uh, I like that, it makes it interesting.
SPEAKER_02So interesting. Okay, in the top photo, the advertisement, what have you, on the right hand side, there's it looks like there's some sort of script or scribble that sort of yeah, you see.
SPEAKER_05It's probably yeah, it's probably a reflection of uh some dirt because it's probably a glass in front of it.
SPEAKER_02Oh, okay, okay.
SPEAKER_05So uh, but uh yeah, this is uh absolutely one of my top photos, uh, even today, so many years later, because it's it's just you cannot do this kind of photo without asking people to sit down and pretend to sleep. You have to have to actually take them while they sleep.
SPEAKER_02Sure, sure.
SPEAKER_05And uh yeah, this is one of them I absolutely like.
SPEAKER_02That's wonderful.
SPEAKER_05Oh my gosh, uh funny one right there. Yeah, wow, okay and I have a lot, but this is uh when I was in uh Shenzhen, I saw some local uh dancers, and and instead of just having a photo of the guy dancing in the middle of the street, I wanted to wait to the lady in the background who did not care. So this photo is actually kind of funny because that day I uh I arrived, I saw these dancers. I haven't actually unpacked my camera equipment yet, even when I when this photo is taken. So I'm standing there with a backpack and uh really uh travel, you know how it is when you have like everything in a bag, your suitcase, and you just see this happening in front of you, and I'm like, oh okay, let's do this, right? Uh unpacking in the middle of the road in Shansen. I don't care where I am, I just want to take the photo, and so I see a lot of people don't care, they just walk by, they don't care, and I was thinking that will be interesting because you have this guy doing his uh magic dancing and all that things, but they don't care, right? And I want that is a little bit the world we're living in now, yeah.
SPEAKER_02And um yeah, because they're so used to it because they might see him do that in that same spot often.
SPEAKER_05Could be, could be, but it's also represent like why uh how to say it, it's just the the way we are become. We don't we don't appreciate art like we did before. Uh if you understand what I mean. We before when we uh it was somehow um it was somehow we lost the way to appreciate uh someone else's art on the screen. If you understand what I mean. Uh I see I seen some incredible talented photographers who's posting the most amazing things, and and they don't get uh recognized. And uh, this is like one of the things I see. People are talented but getting ignored. And dancers are the same. They uh people just look at them as simple performers and blah blah blah, and that's it. But they are yeah, they are absolutely artists, and uh they don't get enough enough recognition. And I actually wanted to capture that. Sure, just him alone would be fantastic. Yeah, just him alone is no problem. I can I can probably get that, but I wanted that person who ignored that person in the middle. That'll be more, it tells more story. And I sent you another one that I absolutely photo from the first day in Hong Kong. This photo is I also again uh so lucky. Um but also I saw him and I wanted to take a photo of him. Yeah, he was my only target, but for some reason I have this lady coming in from the right, and she actually connected the photo beautifully. We have this young person, uh the old person, and I have this young person meeting each other almost in the middle. They almost look photoshopped, but it's absolutely not, it's uh shot like that. Become one of my photos I use on galleries and stuff like that. This is the one photo I take up, and this is basically two minutes out of my leaving my hotel room with day number one in Hong Kong 2012. So this is what I shot right away, and and to not be um used to taking pictures of people and people's faces and stuff, this was like boom, explosion. It's like an idea right there. This is what I want to do, and that's what I did. So that's uh really cool. So it's like um one of the things I absolutely appreciate.
SPEAKER_02Where where was this one taken?
SPEAKER_05This is taken in in Mongkok, uh in Hong Kong. It's I would say the old Hong Kong Kowloon side. So this is yeah, the old, old I like I like old, I don't like the Hong Kong Island.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Uh yeah. Have you been to Hong Kong before?
SPEAKER_02I have, yeah, yeah. Let's try the island. And I was so excited to have more space. And then, like a day into being on the island instead of Kowloon, I was like, I really like Kowloon better. The energy's more frenetic, and it just feels more lively and exactly fun, yeah.
SPEAKER_05And that is that and that is the issue.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, for sure. What was it about the man that initially drew you to him?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, he was story, story. It's supposed to story right away. I wanted to get the story, and I and I saw he had an old face, very charistic face, and I wanted to catch that right away. I wanted to so right when I was about to take the picture, I the lady just walked straight on it and actually eyelined the same light uh between each other. And I was like, wow, you cannot make that, you cannot replicate that. It's just once in a lifetime chance, and bang, you got it. Yeah, and that's what I like about it. And her she's so soft and so yeah, she's just a blurred person, and that's that that's the point that makes it even more interesting because uh you know it's all everyone can tell that this is a beautiful lady, but it's not the most important in the story, right? The old person is, uh, so that is just this is what life is all about. It just youth, and it's uh we grow older, we tell stories, we we get more life experience, and that is the basically what I started to like about Hong Kong, and actually that was the ignite part of me just like I wanna stay. That's basically how it happened. I wanna stay, and uh so a two-week uh vacation became one month, and one month became three months, and then three months became six months, and then uh Hong Kong ID card came, and then it became like five and six years, and I'm still here.
SPEAKER_02That is simply amazing. Now there's one more that you selected, right?
SPEAKER_05Yeah. This is this is uh because as Europeans or Westerners. We never see this. We this is something I wanted to tell this. This is like in 2012. Of course, my photography has changed. The cropping is wrong, everything is wrong. But it doesn't matter because I wanted to tell a story that's something we never see where we come from. I've never seen this before. This is the first time I see a man pushing a wagon with five half barrel with trash inside.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_05And it was just bizarre, just a bizarre thing to see. It's like that is something I've never seen. I want to take a photo of it. I want to tell this story to the other people. And this is the result of that.
SPEAKER_02That's amazing. Where was this one taken?
SPEAKER_05This is shot in, I think it's Jordan. It's still in Kabloom, but in a Jordan area. And um, yeah, I remember that. It was uh rainy day that time, but rain doesn't stop me. No, rain uh is just an element.
SPEAKER_03I love element.
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh. I think absolutely, yeah, it's the most his his uh umbrella hat is wonderful. It was one of the first things that my eyes went to, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05It's just like it's a funny thing, and we don't see it in uh Europe.
SPEAKER_02I don't see that in America, I don't see that in England, I don't see it in Norway brief period in the late 80s when umbrella hats were jokingly cool for like two minutes, two minutes, but I had a true yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05It's a practical, it's a great thing for using both hands, but uh fantastic practical, yeah. So this is like uh for me uh a revelation like wow, this is a really different culture, and that is another thing is yeah, culture. We from Westerner, we're thinking like one thing, and the Chinese uh and Hong Kong Asians thinking a totally different thing. For two, three years I took people of picture of people in the street a lot. I became more uh daring, I just went up in the face and took the picture and I got the personality and stuff like that. But after staying here for almost two, three years, I changed. I felt sympathy for their struggle because I became one of them, right? I became one of the Hong Kong people, and then I realized that they sh I should not do that. So now I'm when I'm shooting now. I have all this maybe they have a tougher life, maybe they haven't got all the good things they're supposed to have. So the western part of me disappeared. The that that mind I had before about didn't care about what so long as I got the photo, I was happy, but now I can let go and think I'm not gonna bother them. Just like that. It was just like that.
SPEAKER_02Anyway, and I realized that three years in you said that you that Twitch happened?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, three years.
SPEAKER_02Wow, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Just uh one day I just walk around thinking, wow, I should not do this. So that was like a really turning point. I was like, wow, yeah, they are struggling. So I I start to uh take photos in a little bit more comical way, the more uh put the more funny story in the photos. Uh doesn't necessarily need to show the faces, but at least there's more comic in it than there is serious because um I who am I to take a picture of a serious situation and put that to the display for the world?
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_05Unless there's a war zone or something like that, right? And I totally different respect I got overnight, basically. So I decided to shoot more funny. I'm gonna try to get some examples for that, and just tells the story in a different way. It's a it's still street photography, but with a twist on that.
SPEAKER_02Let me just give a quick shout out to Chester Benning for joining us online.
SPEAKER_03Um Arthur's back.
SPEAKER_02I accidentally lost some folks when my phone overheated go somewhere in Shanghai. So welcome back, Arthur, and hello to Chester Benning. So yeah, if you're watching this, please feel free to type in your questions for Thomas in the uh in the chat. I'll bring them into the conversation. So I often, as I'm doing that, I need to I need to talk to you because I I struggle with this too, because in in Asia, there's there definitely is a different level of privacy, I've noticed. Not so much in places in Japan where they have a much more introverted or or polite structure in place, but in places like China and Thailand and Vietnam, it appears that they're much more forgiving of taking pictures anytime. Like you can literally walk up to people or just be like across the street, or I've had in China just walk up and and and stare at me and not say anything. Um, and again, not not in a bad way, just it's it's much more of a you're out in public, so you are public kind of feel to it.
SPEAKER_05Exactly. And they and they think they can say whatever they want. It's funny. This is more like a funny way.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So I just I I I struggle with should I because I I like you said before, I can I can walk down the street in Shanghai and take a million photos in five minutes because there's so many interesting things happen things happening.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02And I but I wonder the same thing you were you were thinking about, is this okay to take? Is this mine to take? Is it safe to take? Am I disrespecting anybody by taking this photo? That kind of thing. I wonder about that.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, so so this is when I figure it out. If if it's a storytelling, if it's uh it could be positive or anything, but it's all how far or deep you want to go. If you want to tell a story that this is a bad thing happened, blah blah. Uh of course, if a person has a skin disease or cancer or in his face, of course, you don't want to show that to the public. I would feel very embarrassed if I was that person. Sure. If the person has uh you can tell the person's age, you can tell that this guy or this lady has a story to tell, then take the photo. And uh, and if the person says oh no photo, no photo, delete the photo or something like that. Okay, you respect that. You can just but if you take the photo and you just okay, so that's basically it. And this is more funny, like let's settle this as adults. It's funny.
SPEAKER_02What is that? Is that sign language on the on the rest of the shirt?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, it's like uh let's settle this as an adult. This is like paper, sis rock, right? This is funny.
SPEAKER_02Oh, right, paper, right, right, right. Yeah, okay.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, let's settle this like the adults. So it's funny. It's so this is something I want to catch that. But if you go down to the the uh the the last photo, you see uh just scroll uh to the not the next this one, but another one.
SPEAKER_03This one?
SPEAKER_05This one. Okay, this one has a funny story behind. Can you blow it up? Like so the story with this photo is I'm walking down. This is in uh Shimshai Choi in uh in Hong Kong, and I see this gentleman I'm walking up the street, and I see him on my left side. He's sitting down and talking to his friends, and I see this poster on my right side of the street, and I'm in my head thinking how funny it will be if this guy got up, stand right under it, uh-huh, because they look like the ladies laughing at him, right? And holy behold, I should maybe ask for a million instead. This guy's getting up, walks around and stand there like I just imagined it would be funny. Yeah, and I take the photo, and that's the result. I after I took this photo, I knew that nothing was gonna beat this photo that day. So I just walked straight home, edited it, and I posted it because I nothing can beat this photo, it's just that funny. And we have this guy, like his guy from Pakistan or wherever his country is from, especially in this age we are in, where like the females don't have any equal rights. I think it was just so hilarious. And it's it's not like he's just standing from the poster, but the poster makes it funny.
SPEAKER_02So funny, yeah. Oh my gosh, that's just uh Do you know it's cracking me up? Her her dress almost looks like popcorn, too. I know that's a weird expression, but it's a very frilly, very texture-driven thing that they have her dressed in.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, it's so funny. And I and I well I sent this to my uh brother in Norway, he's also a photographer, he said, Wow, this is like a one of a million photo. One of a million. You can replicate it. This is just too perfect. And of course, the guy didn't want me to take the photo. He was like, Wow, don't take photo, but and I just walk away. And this is from the first year in Hong Kong. And let me see which one I asked.
SPEAKER_02How far into the first year was this photo? How far into the first year? Like how many months in were you when you took this one?
SPEAKER_05I think the second month. I think the second month.
SPEAKER_02Still pretty early on, yeah.
SPEAKER_05So I uh I started super early with taking photos.
SPEAKER_02Do you have any idea how many photos you took your first year? I know that's a crazy big question.
SPEAKER_05Yes, I do actually know the number. Uh I took because I uh I remember because I replaced my photo at my um in that time. Uh uh to back up, I passed 32,500 photos.
SPEAKER_02I'm sorry, could you say that again?
SPEAKER_0532 to 32,500 photos I passed.
SPEAKER_02Oh my goodness. Okay, and compare that to what you did before you moved to Hong Kong.
SPEAKER_05How does that I maybe not even more than 5,000 max in Norway?
unknownWow.
SPEAKER_05Because uh in Norway there is landscape, right? There's landscape and landscape and landscape.
SPEAKER_02So there's a lot of the same, which is beautiful, but it is yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05So everyone has seen a tree in some point, and you started to see the same thing again and again and again and again, and you get tired of it. So this is a funny one. It looks like a gangster mob from China, right? It looks like it's like these people are here too. It looks like uh uh Quentin Tarantino cover. I remember this because this is a photo I took from basically from my hip. I saw this guy was coming, and I'm actually not holding the camera up to my face. I take this photo from my chest, hide from my chest, and I just hope I get the shot. I just hope I get the photo.
SPEAKER_02And and you so did. Oh my god, that's a brilliant angle.
SPEAKER_05Wow, and uh this guy just yeah, so this is like one one of my most commented photos on Instagram. Wow, and uh I I recently re-reposted it because I wanted people to just to see this one and it went crazy. So it's like uh one of those uh lucky shots you get just once in a lifetime. Uh, because the guy on the left uh on he is a butcher, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05They have the lady that maybe like it could be like the the person with the controls the money, and we have her like assistant on the right side. It's like an entire action cover, yeah. The mafia photo right there. Who can do whatever?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the look on her face makes me think that she might be on to what you're doing.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that could be right.
SPEAKER_02I'm not sure if he's at the same time. What's up?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, he didn't because I shot so fast. It's like uh I just shot it from my chest. Yeah, I was not sure if I got the photo before I actually checked the photo a few meters away of when they passed me. But when of course I saw the photo, I just knew how good it was. So I just walked home right away because nothing will beat that photo that day. Nothing. Because that photo will be the one you're gonna remember the rest of the day. So why take more photos when you have that photo? So it's like the fish to get the yeah, so it's like now.
SPEAKER_02Did you at that point is this a digital photo? Like, could you see that you had that you had gotten the shot that you wanted, or was it something you had to do?
SPEAKER_05This is uh digital. This is a digital shot. This is shot with a Canon Mark, Canon 5D Mark II with a 50 millimeter. No, this is shot with a 16 to 35 with uh 35mm. So uh yeah, I reply. So uh Canon is this obviously with the Canon. Many people ask me what I'm shooting with, but uh I'm shooting with many different cameras. So it could be Canon, it could be hustleblau, it could be it's very different from where what I'm doing, but for outdoor I prefer Canon.
SPEAKER_02Okay, cool, cool, cool. So which one do you want to do next?
SPEAKER_05This is what I can go back, back one uh two back.
SPEAKER_03Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_05From have it all to not have it at all, just to have it all and not have it at all, and I think that is so funny.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god. So funny. Okay, is that what this is saying here?
SPEAKER_05In the um no, it's probably a commercial for something, but the guy to the right is the real person, of course, and so you see the illusion on the left side, what he could have had before, and now he doesn't have it anymore because the faces look a little bit the same, yeah. So it's very funny and uh yeah, absolutely uh a great shot. It's this is like still the first year I was in Hong Kong the first year, and uh, if you go one to the left, the one back, yes, can you see it? I call it the Hong Kong T-Rex, yeah, because he has a weird way to walk, and yeah, you don't only have like a few seconds to shoot these kind of photos, but he had a weird, weird way to walk, so I shot it, and he has the as I call it the photo of the Hong Kong T-Rex. It's funny, but uh but I don't make fun of him, I just make fun of the situation he was walking in.
SPEAKER_03Sure, sure, sure, sure.
SPEAKER_05And uh so that is totally normal. It's more like a funny story to it.
SPEAKER_02So uh if you go his facial expression makes it even funnier because he looks so serious and like he's he looks like a dinosaur who actually saw you, like uh that uh Jurassic Park. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05And I think that's so funny. So I had to shoot it when I saw this guy. I was like, oh my god, I can't believe I got this guy. Uh again, one of those days you just go home early and just laughing because it's just so funny.
SPEAKER_02Wow.
SPEAKER_05Uh you don't get these photos easily.
SPEAKER_02No. So do you did you walk around with your camera just kind of ready for these moments?
SPEAKER_05Like so you could just You know, I I do. Yes, I do. Uh I uh when I go out, I have camera ready, I had lens cap off, cameras on, and everything is set to shoot right away. And I had the hand ready on the trigger. If I see something, I wait, I don't wait, I shoot right away. Yeah, and and just because you never know. But in Hong Kong, you have a moment and then the next second it's gone. You can never do it again. But if you miss it, you will um it will annoy you the rest of the day. Yeah, I'll be so upset if I miss a great shot. I'll be like, oh, maybe the camera didn't start or something happened, the focus is like, oh, I missed that, and yeah. Yeah, then it's just uh nothing you can do.
SPEAKER_02So okay, I'm still I'm still in awe at your 35,000 photos in that first year, second year and the pre the years after that.
SPEAKER_05It just got to more and more. It just got more and more. Uh yeah, yeah. Because uh you come to the point that you're just uh shooting now, you just see things, you shoot it, you shoot maybe seven photos of the same person, but maybe two of them are in in in focus, right? And and then you just see the counter on your camera just going sky high, right? And but you like it. So but the funny part is when I stopped the little bit like going down after the third year, yeah, then it went more down because I got more jobs internationally as working for this clothing brand. Then I don't have so much time to do this that time uh time frame. But in recently I started again.
SPEAKER_02So now I just realized something because I uh full confession, I ran across your Instagram a few months ago, and it was the photos of like apartment buildings and just really colorful buildings and different viewpoints of different parts of the city, and I was just instantly mesmerized. And so I know you said you move from people photos to other kinds of photos, but I've noticed all of these are outside. Do you ever shoot anything inside places?
SPEAKER_05Almost never. Almost never I hate it, it's just studio, it's just so boring. You know, we are living in a in indoors. Uh I don't know, it's just you. Of course, I can shoot indoor with a tripod and stuff like that. It's very hard to shoot handheld and shoot models inside. It's never good enough lighting. Sure. And uh and it's always it doesn't give the natural light as I wanted in it. You can stand it, you can ask a person to stand in there in the window and get the natural light and stuff like that. That's not the problem.
SPEAKER_02Sure, sure, sure, sure.
SPEAKER_05This one.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_05I call this photo, dear God, give me a sign.
SPEAKER_03Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_05It's funny, it tells the story right away. It's like you tell the guys like everyone else is looking in the direction of the old guys look up and thinking, like, oh my god, dear guy, just give me a sign. It's funny, it doesn't make fun of him, we're just making fun of the situation. Sure. Um, and because like three people look in one direction, the one guy looked up, and like, please cannot just have a break now.
SPEAKER_02Were they waiting at like a bus stop, or what were the bus stop? Okay, I was like, why are they all standing there looking in opposite directions?
SPEAKER_05Except for the one guy, it's so funny, and I like that. You're telling a story right away, and you can yeah, I I like that. I think photos should be storytelling, it should be something you share from yourself, your inner feelings. I always say photographers should be in one with the emotions, they should have the photo, your emotions should be almost on top of your skin when you take the photo. You should be so connected that you just know that's um how you feel. And if you have like a dark sense of humor and stuff like that, that will show in the photos right away. And I have that kind of dark sense of humor, but I like it.
SPEAKER_02Okay, that brings up a good question. Is are the photos that you're taking, are they a reflection of how you were feeling at the time or what was happening, or both?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, it was uh it's a reflection of how I felt in that time.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Because uh I I I like to see the I'm a uh I like comedies, but I don't like the uh new modern type of comedies. I like the 80s comedies with the Chibu Chase, all those funny you have to actually use your brain to to understand the joke a little bit.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Uh but now today it's just too modern, it's just too good, it's just everything is supposed to be so perfect.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Everyone's gonna laugh at right there. But that time you can laugh a little bit when you wanted to, and uh and I like that. I like that, and I want the same feeling to come through my photos in that time period. And uh after a while, of course, you see as I changed my photographer's perspective to shoot more city buildings, neon lights, more like that kind of yeah. I had that in on my website. If you go to thomasanfield.com, you will see a hell of a lot of photos if you want to.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, um from 2012. I don't know what the hell I'm doing with the screen. From 2012 to now, how many different kinds of phases of kinds of photos do you think you've taken? Like the first year was clearly uh people.
SPEAKER_05People because it was so overwhelming and uh and so new and so fresh. So you wanted to to do it, and I can tell you if you're a new photographer and you want to be inspired, come to Hong Kong or come to big city, yeah, shoot the people around you. Try to catch that little moment, and that's it. But don't uh but if you you need to over overcome a little fear because you don't know if people are gonna get upset or angry at you. But uh but I think that's a part of it that grows on you that you just do it and you just Become better and better and better at it.
SPEAKER_02Sure, sure, sure, sure. But if you if you were to put like categories of things that you took photos on from 2012 till now, so it did like a timeline.
SPEAKER_05So it started with uh probably let's say Norway, landscape, right?
SPEAKER_03Gotcha, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Hong Kong. Yeah, so landscape became uh uh street photography, and street photography became street fashion, and street fashion became portraits, portraits became more um uh like fashion portraits, but then I using street photography from that part to to my time now. So I combine my fearless that I'm not scared to take photos outdoor with the models, and I'm mixing that together because I'm not I don't have any, I'm not afraid of going out taking photos in the middle of the street because I'm used to it already. I've done it for three years, I have no fear, and uh telling their models how to act in front of this in the big world, sure ignore it so they feel confident that no problem, right? And then we should so I combine what I learned the first three years with uh what I did the last two years, and I mix it together and bring it out.
SPEAKER_02Gotcha. God, that's so amazing. That's so amazing to see that progression. But if if I can get personal, and if you don't want to answer this, just let me know. But going with that timeline, because you said the photography is like a reflection of what you were going through.
SPEAKER_03Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02What how do we pair the progression of the things you were photographing with what you were going through with your relationship with living in Hong Kong?
SPEAKER_05So uh I came to Hong Kong um and um so how to say it, it's just um you want it's like when you're shooting landscape, you're from you're shooting from distant, you're shooting something big, you're shooting something, you can see the entire horizon, and you have like, okay, this is how it looks like. Yeah, you come into Hong Kong, you're shooting people's faces, and you're shooting street photography, shooting situations, but it's and after a while you want to shoot personal, you want to really get into knowing the person you're shooting, like really get into that, but it also has to be uh matching your own feelings, right? So I can be sad, and then I shoot a sad photo, I can be happy, uh, and then I will shoot a more happy mood photo. It could be that I'm missing my family, it could be that I am uh lost in a big city, that you feel that kind of things, and uh but if you can have that control over your emotions and you just can use it to affect you, for example, headsets are amazing tool for photography in the streets. Put on a good music from a movie, it could be Blade Runner, it could be anything, yeah, and you will get into that kind of cyber mood uh feeling right away. And then you can imagine, okay, I'm in a cyber movie now, so you just shoot the photos like you were in the movie yourself, or if you're in uh more like a gangster movie, you shoot another way. If you shoot comedy, yeah. So that's a good way to translate music into photography. So I usually have that in my lessons and I teach away. Uh I always say put the headset on, take photos, I'll do the music, and try to get that feeling in the mood out. And if you do that, you are so in the right way to do it. It can be jazz, it can be anything. So it can make it, yeah, it can be anything as long as you feel comfortable.
SPEAKER_02That's an amazing tip. I've I'm seriously going to do this on Thursday. I have the day off, and I'm going to do it. I'm gonna do it. I mean, I do listen to music and I do take photos when things happen, but I've never put on like an album and specifically just gone out and I I'm like, go take Blade Runner 2049 or the first one, put the uh headset on, full volume, ignore whatever what's going on, and it's you and the camera and your world done.
SPEAKER_05And that's it.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna mention you my Instagram feed that day. I'm I'm doing this gonna happen.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, do that because it's a good tip.
SPEAKER_02Uh and but we're getting I I heard teacher, and we're gonna come back to that in a second because I'm a teacher myself and I want to geek out for a second on that, but not yet. I'm trying to figure out if there's something we can see about Thomas in the first year. Yes, I'm referring to you in the third person. Thomas's first year in Hong Kong, or first year, second year, third year, fourth year, that kind of thing from the photos that you took. Can can we see if you had any culture shock? Can we see like your progression from new home to definitely I'm gonna stay here a while?
SPEAKER_05So so so what what happened was um the first year um I uh I was uh I was single, didn't meet anyone, didn't know anyone, and second year I met someone, we got married, we got a baby in Hong Kong. Uh of course, long story, very short. We we found out that the culture shock was just too much, so we we grew apart basically after three years, but but we're still friends and we have all a lot of that. So that emotional tilt shift changed from being a tourist in the city to just I'm here for fun, to be here to be serious, changed. So you're starting to see Hong Kong people in a different way, yeah. Or age, yeah, it's just like okay, I understand the struggle, I understand the payments or the paychecks are less and uh and so you understand that okay, that's uh that's now I understand why many people doing uh the living on the street and having a financial challenge, right? So that is uh then so you're starting to like okay, I don't want to show that to the world too much because I would not like that about myself. It's only that to me. So that respect changed after everything. Uh, me and when I was with my son and everything like that. After those three years, I just thought, okay, I will more go more to the professional world and attach the street photography into the professional world and shoot street photography in a controlled environment and still have the same feeling, but in a fashion related thank you for sharing that.
SPEAKER_02Okay, I need to I need to say this out. I I speak to think, I don't know if you're like that or not, but I like that. And I think what you just said is that because of the the struggles that you had with uh separating and and all of that, you were able to connect more to the people until you started to photograph things differently in their place.
SPEAKER_05Absolutely. That's yeah, I became one of them. I became one of them, and and one of the people in Hong Kong. And and I, of course, you're starting to respect just like okay, I'm not looking at them as strangers anymore, even I don't know them. I don't look at them as a stranger anymore, I look at them as one of me. And so when the problem now is that when I go to Norway, I have I don't feel them anymore. I don't call Norway my home anymore. Yeah, I call Hong Kong is my home. This is where I feel good, this is where I go, you know. I I I feel good, right? So that is that's the thing I'm doing. That's that's basically it. Yeah, and uh so so that shift that respect happened like overnight. Yeah, and um I never forget it because it was so it was like nope, I will do something else. Yeah, and I went to the fashion industry and shot a lot, and now I'm just doing more um uh going back to street photography, but using it a fashion way and combined it together to be my like my unique thing.
SPEAKER_02That's amazing. I can't it's funny when I have conversations like this, I can't help but relate on so many levels. I mean, I did I have never taken photography on a professional way, and my first year in Asia was in Taiwan, and my culture stock was strong, and I had a digital camera that I bought in a local store that was basically this big and fit on my keychain. So the photos that I took came out awful, but the moments I can see the bad photos and remember the moments.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And I'm photography. Yeah, well, I can but I'm almost embarrassed because the first year in Asia, that first year in Taiwan, I think I was taking photos to show how weird and different things were. And it wasn't until quite a bit later in different in a different country that I had that that switch. For me, it wasn't in the same place because I only stayed there one year, but it did it did happen where I was like, you know what? People are really weird in my own country. Going back a few times to realize we're just as weird, just we might show it a little differently.
SPEAKER_03And then exactly.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and then I started showing more of the interesting, inspiring, wonderful things about the places I was in. But seriously, that first year I was convinced they were batshit crazy. I was like, the craziest, weirdest place. I took pictures of the horrible like chinglish t-shirts and how they would just everything they did was weird to me. And I I unfortunately I put that on the internet. And I was just like, oh my god, that's so embarrassing. But I think it's in some way part of the growth of being an expat is you go through that initial culture shock.
SPEAKER_05Like I think anyone, yeah, I I can tell you, I met so many people, not just in Hong Kong, but all over the world. They never traveled. They maybe basically maybe stayed in their own country. Maybe in America they just go to another state a few times in their life, but never fly to a different country to see actually how the world really works.
SPEAKER_03Yep, yep.
SPEAKER_05And I was lucky uh before I did photography. I've done photography. This is my 17th year in photography. Before that, I was a breakdancer for 15 years. And I uh travel around the world and and I was lucky to see the world from very young aspect. I was so that we are the Norwegians are saying we are the world's best country, we have the best finance. We we have a lot of struggle that it's not coming out in the media. Yeah, people are poor, we have people who are homeless in our country too. It's the same, but the media doesn't talk about it.
SPEAKER_04Sure.
SPEAKER_05So, same thing. There is uh, so for example, the one thing I remember the first time in Hong Kong was 7-Eleven. Same with you in Taiwan, I guess. It's open 24, it's all over the place. You can go one block and there's another one. One block, there's another one. It's a one block, and then it's a go go on and on. Yeah, and for me, that was so weird. I can go into 7-Eleven, I can buy beer. That was doesn't extend doesn't happen in my country. Yeah, you cannot. After eight no in Norway, after 5, forget to buy beer at 5 p.m.
SPEAKER_02Not even special storage, just nowhere. No, forget it.
SPEAKER_05Just nothing. Yeah, so just to go down in the middle of the night, walk down the stairs, and just go to the nearest seven and buy you a few beers and go out. No problem. And that was just so out there, just wow. Wine, you can buy whiskey, you can just uh no problem, right? So it's a total, but it's it's and I've been I've been here for six and a half, almost seven years now. I only seen two fights in my life in Hong Kong, two fights, and that is about white people, white batshit, crazy, drunk white guys in the middle of the central fighting, jumping on taxis, acting like monkeys, right? And and and I'm thinking, I'm sorry, this is not of me, part of me, my country. They are I'm not representing this kind of people. Sorry about that. But it tells that Hong Kong has probably a lot of issues, but they are doing something better than most of the other countries. They have good uh health care in Hong Kong. Yep, anyone with uh Hong Kong citizenship gets good health care, really good health care there, yeah. And um same as in Taiwan, Japan. Norway is not the only one. They say that Norway is number one. No, you're not. Norway's the greatest country. No, it's not. You have never been in Amsterdam, Holland, have you?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'm I'm really after a number of countries, uh a number of years, I'm really starting to think that every country says to its citizens, we're the best. Like literally everybody grows up thinking they're the best.
SPEAKER_05It's like it's like saying to uh uh I always make this a little bit joke, but I it's like, well, we're not the best because we're not the best in the in uh in the environment. Because if we really gonna see things in black and white when it comes down to environment, we should give the first price to North Korea who doesn't use electricity, right? It would be funny, it'll be it'll be sarcastic, but it would be funny. They deserve it because they don't they don't waste energy off.
SPEAKER_03That is true, yeah.
SPEAKER_05So you say it was politically correct, we should give it to them. Best environment country in the world who doesn't use electricity after six.
SPEAKER_02They they also imagine have the least internet addiction of any country.
SPEAKER_05Yes, there you go, they work hard, they work there, you know. So if you're gonna be so black and white on that, they deserve it. It'll be funny to give them that. They haven't started any, it's like they haven't uh it's like they are, yes, they're isolated, they have their own mentality, they have their own uh things like that. And I understand that. I understand when you've been uh pushed to the corner and everyone hates you except for Russia and China, you hate everyone. I understand that. You hate everyone, and of course, everyone is poking fingers at them. I always want to go to North Korea, but I'm scared to death because I will tell you why. If I bring one of these, you're not leaving, and I yeah, and if I somehow lose one of them, I'm a spy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I know a spy. You'd be I don't think you'd be able to go and leave, like come back with them. I think you'd be confiscated.
SPEAKER_05You have to because every one of them has a serial number. I don't know if you can get it up. Yeah, yeah. And they they on the border, they write them up, they write down the serial number on the card. So if you if they don't match when you're on the way home, you have a problem. That means that you brought some documents in and you're trying to bring some documents out, yeah, and then you're fine. So I'm not gonna take that risk, but as fair enough, when it comes down to the environment, they deserve it because they don't use any unnecessary electricity. Congratulations.
SPEAKER_03True.
SPEAKER_05So it's like uh it's so when it comes down to using natural resources and we are the greatest country. No, normally it's not. Never been, never will be. Uh America, I don't know what's going on there now. It's it's a little thick.
SPEAKER_02You know, I'm freaking terrifying what's happening.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, applying for visa to America now is just I don't want to do it. I don't want to do it. It's just it's just too much. I was invited to go to a photography event in the US. And uh so I sent an email to the Norwegian embassy. And before we had a seven-day waiver, that means we can just go, just go and just notify we're gonna be there and there at this address. Yeah, but no, not anymore. And now I need to go to the airport, and uh they're gonna pre-clearance me, like an interview, right? And they will ask me, can you get your Instagram accounts and social media, blah blah blah?
unknownWhat?
SPEAKER_05And um, oh yeah, yeah. And they're gonna check that. If so, if you if you said something hateful about America, you're just not gonna get in. And and and then if you're lucky enough to go through the entire clearance, you go to uh to America, you take the 2015-hour flight, and you arrive at LA or whatever. Yeah, they can still send you home.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_05So I'm thinking, no, I'm I'm not gonna do that. Uh I will go to Canada instead. I will go to Toronto. That would make me more okay. I can live with that.
SPEAKER_02There's actually a fair bit of folks who immigrated to the US and have now given up their green card to go to Canada because it's just getting so crazy that they're like, that's fine. I mean, they went through all the rigama world to get their green card pre-Trump, and they're just like looking at what's happening, going, that's okay, it's not worth it anymore.
SPEAKER_05It's like I'm done. Yeah, and I think and I feel the same way. Yeah, and and I and I and I'm I'm trying to be like in the middle when it comes down to all the controversy about uh the politics and stuff like that. I try to stand in the middle, I try to be very fair, yeah. But facts cannot lie. It's like me, I cannot take 10,000 photos and say my photos are the best. Yeah, you know, it will be maybe five photos, maybe hundred photos are good, maybe ten is great, but there will be five amazing in those ten thousand. Yeah, and I cannot be bold enough to say, Oh, all my photos are the best in the world. I cannot say it because there will be no defense for it. No, so when this um the guy who has so many allegations now, it's it's all about David Michael Cohen, all the politics, all that things going on now. There must be some truth into it. Like people can lie, they can come up with fake news and everything like that. Yeah, there is some truth in it, or else it will never be.
SPEAKER_02Speaking of social issues, you've mentioned your photos being a story a few times. Is it one photo's a story or a collection, or is it does it depend on what you're seeing?
SPEAKER_05I I try uh yeah, I will say one story tells everything. You can have three three photos in a series, but again, I'm a little bit divided how that is. I see a lot of people on Instagram posting three photos to tell the story to make like three and three and three. But I like one story straight on, tell the story, and finish with it. Yeah, I prefer that compared to a must-have three photos of that, or else the story is gone. Yeah, I like to keep it simplified as much as I can. If I ever gonna have a book, I'm gonna show you what the book cover is gonna be. That is my best photo. That is my absolute best photo. I'm never gonna have to this lucky again. Uh it's amazing how lucky you can be. But it's just that photo is uh is on my Google Drive because it's I'm so afraid to lose it. It's probably uh the masterpiece in my life. Uh that's gonna be the book cover.
SPEAKER_02When did you take that photo?
SPEAKER_05That photo is again accidentally. It's I was I took this photo in in Hong Kong. I was with a Danish photographer that day. I was walking around with a Danish photographer. He was living in Hong Kong at that time. So we were walking around. This is like the end of the shooting time. It was and we have been walking around for three hours, and we felt like an hour we had tired. Yeah, so we were tired. And I was about to put down my camera, take down the camera, and take in the lens cap. In my left eye, I see something that I I know I need to shoot it. I I need to shoot it, and I and I mesmerized, like I have to get it. So I'm just and take the camera. And I staring, I got two photos, one blurry, one sharp. Yes, and uh, and then then and I uh I never forget it. It was just that crazy. You never know. That's why I tell telling people when you you never you cannot prepare, you you don't know, and that you always have when you go out, take the camera, take the Landscape off, camera ready, and and um you cannot say to yourself, uh no, I will be um I'll I will be ready when I see it, but but no, you cannot. You you will never know, you will never be ready enough because you suddenly you see something and then it's too late.
SPEAKER_02And it's gone.
SPEAKER_05And it's gone, and it's gone forever, and you can never replicate it, and you will be so annoyed.
SPEAKER_02You know, I keep thinking of the photo of the dancer, and I think it's just amazing how clear his legs are because whenever I mean, granted, my equipment's about one percent as impressive as yours. I'm sure you have like the the top end of the best photography equipment that you have, and I've caught phones, but whenever I try to do movement shots like that, that there's this blurry action-y thing that happens.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, and is it because of your equipment that it takes so many I don't have a little bit, but it has to do has to do a lot because uh I was a dancer before. And so I know the settings to shoot dancing photos. So I just uh so I just uh jumped on it and made it very, I was like, there you go. So I just uh so it took my time uh as a dancer back now, so I knew what he was gonna do. So just waiting and was paying, so I was just patient, waiting, waiting, waiting. Yeah, when he did it, I just waited to the person is walking by. Yeah, uh, no need to to uh to spray shoot the photo, just wait, and then you get it. This photo is my best photo in the category street photography. This is my best photo because it's that crazy. Okay, there is nothing I can say about it. It's just uh once in a lifetime up photo, and uh if I'm gonna write a book, that's gonna be the cover of the photo for uh that that photo book.
SPEAKER_02Oh, don't say if please say one, because I would love to see that book.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_02What okay, we're gonna make that bigger. There we go. What it we what were you thinking when you saw that?
SPEAKER_05Because that's pretty much. It looks like something from Mad Max movie.
SPEAKER_02Right? Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I could not believe my eyes. And and I I said to myself, I have to shoot this guy. It was just I must. If I didn't get that shot, I had to run in front of him and shoot him again. That would be so I was that so I was just like, I need to shoot this guy. So the story about this uh guy is that he has been like this for many years. I seen him one time before, like two years before I took this photo. Then he was just sitting down on the floor, uh on the ground. But I never seen him, no, almost no one has seen him actually stand up. He always sits down around certain garbage pan bags, but no one had actually seen him walk like this. And yeah, and I can I got it. I got the shot. And and my uh friend from Denmark, he said, Yeah, you can go home now.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, wow.
SPEAKER_05We can go home now.
SPEAKER_02When you saw him before this, when he wasn't standing up, could you see the the face?
SPEAKER_05No, I only saw the jacket and a little bit of the yeah uh how it but that was like many years ago, so I thought maybe I never had the chance to see this guy.
SPEAKER_02Right, right.
SPEAKER_05So imagine us going so talking to this tall Danish guy, and I actually don't see what's going on on my left side, so but I just saw something that was interesting coming up, and I just wow, yeah, let's have aim and just hope to God I get one shot that is absolutely sharp, and just cross fingers and it came out good.
SPEAKER_02Did you keep the blurry one? Or because you said there was a blurry one, yeah.
SPEAKER_05I I had the blurry one somewhere in the hard drive, but I kept their sharp one. Yeah, the blurry one is absolute bad.
SPEAKER_03Okay, so it was just two.
SPEAKER_05That's it. It's just lucky, lucky shot. That's it. Uh lucky and prepared prepared. Wait, wait, good way to say this. I was prepared to shoot something that I didn't know, but I was lucky that this guy showed up.
SPEAKER_02Right, right. Oh my gosh. Okay. Well, Thomas, I have three quick questions to finish. I don't know how quick they are. Um three questions to wrap this up. One is you mentioned being a teacher, and two, you mentioned being a father, and I'm curious what things you pass down about photography to folks. What are the main things you tell them?
SPEAKER_05Well, as a photographer, I will say always be attached with your emotion, even if it's good or bad. If you are feeling sad, go out, shoot. If you're feeling great, go out, shoot. I try to when I when I'm teaching people photography, uh let's see, from one to ten. Don't go out taking photos if you feel like one. Because no need. Just stay home, try to recover. Yeah, don't go out when you're too happy, because you cannot know the difference between it's just too happy, too sad, it's just not gonna work. But if you can find in between number five or six, seven in those that range, yeah, you're really perfect. So if you feel like today you're just packing your cameras because you're motivated, do it. Headset on, pulp fiction music to make you go into the mood and you're shooting it. Absolutely. The photos would come by itself, and the album lasts for like one hour. So you know when you have listened to the entire album and you start it again, don't look at the time. Just let the song tell you how long you've been out shooting.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_05Because then it's more and don't care about time. Because if you look at the time, you're starting to put limitations on yourself. Yeah, you just feel like, oh, I need to go home, maybe I need to do that. If you just take the watch and take it out and just listen to the music, and that's the only thing that counts. You know you're going out at 11, and if you hear the album three, four times, you know the time will be three around three when you finish. Doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_02So, this this album idea, did was this your own idea, or did somebody else did you see it from somebody else?
SPEAKER_05Uh something I come up with, but I guarantee someone else is probably doing it. But this is something I just came up with myself because I felt if I'm uh because with you in the city, you hear a lot of noise, stuff like that. Yeah, so I found out the best thing I can do is to um I have noise cancelling on this one, but I don't know about that, but that helps a lot just to isolate your own surroundings inside your music. You just hear the music and just I'm one with myself.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So, what would you say? It sounds like this is gonna be a big answer. So, what would you be the biggest impact that Hong Kong has had on your photographer? Right? See, I told you.
SPEAKER_05This is uh this is a very great question, and I gotta answer it. When I came to Hong Kong, Norway attitude is we think we are so fast to get things done. In Norway, we are like we we could we look at sales as very fast, hardworking people, and that's our mentality. We are yeah, we are hardworking. So having a Norwegian mentality coming to Hong Kong, and you think I'm fast, I am the greatest person on earth, right? Because you had that mentality. And you see other people, maybe the first couple of months, how they operate, and you realize that you are seven times slower than they are, and that and you consider yourself as fast, and you're maybe seven times slower than the most hardworking person, and you're starting to think, oh wow, this is gonna be uh rocky ride. Because in Norway be like, oh, we'll do it tomorrow. No problem. I'll do it tomorrow. Next week, yeah, no problem. Monday, next week. You know, uh plant a tree. Well, I can dig a hole tomorrow. I'll plant the seed, next day I'll cover the hole, and next day I think water over it, and I'll watch it grow. That's that's the mentality in Europe, right? But in in Hong Kong, it'll be like we dig a hole, we put the plant, we put the seeds in, we put the over, we put the grass on top, and we guard it to make sure it grows up at the same day, right? That that's basically what the mentality is. And and I saw that comes a little story here. Um in all this, um, my first year, of course, not so much money because you you coming into a new country, you it's not easy to get jobs, you're a white guy, and they're still a little bit racial in Hong Kong, but I understand because the white guys have been idiots to Chinese people before, and I totally understand it. Yeah, so I that that is something you learn over time when you've been living here that the white guys before you, or the girls before you has been treating the Asia people bad. And uh with no respect, look down on them, made them feel like nothing. And I feel sad about that, but it's not me. I I treat people with respect and I and I as equal to myself. And uh so uh the last uh so after being here for two months, three months, not much money because I used a lot of money in my country to have equipment in Norway. One company has seen a photo I've taken, and they asked if I can come to interview, and I'm like, oh, okay. And that time, right at that time, yeah, only that is like second or third month I was here. I had 200 Hong Kong dollars in my pocket. That's it. Before I before I had to go to this is has something to your question, yeah. 200 Hong Kong dollars, that's it. And uh before I started to tap into savings account and stuff like that in Norway, but I don't want to touch it, so I'm like, oh, how am I gonna survive? Blah blah blah blah. So they added the day before I almost have nothing. Uh I get asked to come into an interview for the company and they're doing makeup. So I'm just uh okay, makeup company. What is this? Go there and I talk, then I show in my portfolio. They're like, yeah, we like it, we like your photos. Uh but we're gonna merge in with some other company, and I'm like, oh cool. They are just nearby. Do you want to visit them too? I was like, Yeah. So I go over and I uh and uh they introduced me to like a multimillionaire company uh with a Lamborghini in the front yard. Yeah, I'm like, okay, this is this is big, this is kind of big. And uh the boss is coming out and the handshake and everything like that. But for some reason, the company I was supposed to talk to, they said, okay, we need to go back because we have to do another meeting. So I just somehow I just stood around in that other location. And the boss said, Well, we are looking for photographers too. And I'm like, Oh, um, here's my portfolio. Yeah, uh, we want to hire you right now.
SPEAKER_03What? Wow, really?
SPEAKER_05Okay, that was fast. Um, okay. Uh yeah, okay. What do you demand? Well, what can you give? Well, uh, we want you to work uh five times a month in uh some events. I was like, okay, and so how much do you take for it? I was like, what do you offer? Oh well, we can give you 50,000. 50,000. It's like I was like, are you you kidding me, right? A year? No, no, uh monthly. Uh and I was like, oh well, I would need a deposit, and I keep straight face, need a deposit. Yeah, yeah, sure. They run to the safe and took the money, I signed it, and went to the MTR dancing, basically, went to the went to the subway and dancing around like a crazy maniac. So what happened is when I got to learn how they speed how fast they were in Hong Kong, because they asked me to do like pre-wedding or uh anything, yeah, and they expected to be finished the next day.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
SPEAKER_05So in my mind, I'm like, oh, next week, no problem, right? But they're like, oh no, no, we need it next tomorrow. And I'm like, well, how can I do this tomorrow? And that's basically how I adjusted the time, right? So so they imagine I'm going back to Norway with that mentality, and some people give me a job in Norway, and I'm finished the next day, and I was like, here you go. And they go, like, what? Really? Why? It's so fast.
SPEAKER_02Well, how long did they think it was going to take you?
SPEAKER_05In uh in Norway, that time?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Two weeks, but I can do it in one day because I've done it in one day, right? Because I was so used to doing and so hard that their Hong Kong mentality changed the way I'm thinking. So getting faster and uh in Hong Kong, it's very busy. They really helped me. And Norwegians are, I don't know, we are Westerners, we are like this. Oh, yeah, we can make we can I can don't I don't need to get paid now. I can do it, I can get paid in five months. It's okay, no problem. It that's that's how we're Western think. We are so polite, it's so nice.
SPEAKER_02This explains the 35,000 photos that you took that first year. This is beginning to make sense now.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, took a lot of photos. So it just became a lot, it became like do it. So when this mentality just became like this work ethic came from lucky coincidence by meeting at this company, they saw one photo, they wanted me to show another, and I expect, okay, uh I can do this job easier. I can do one job a week, and I can do it. But they were like, no, need it next day, right? What? But it's like 6 p.m. Yeah, if you can need it like 9 a.m. tomorrow. Okay, but I get paid. So I was like, sit down all night, working my ass off, and of course they got it, and uh, they were like, good, see you next week.
unknownBye.
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_05So I was like, uh, so I did that for nine months, and I still have contact with them, and not because I got hired by other companies that I can do more of what I wanted, sure. Um but but it was just an amazing journey to to be a part of that, and um of course it's when I bring in this this culture, this mindset to Norway, it's just I understand why the Asia countries get things done in so much faster pace than we do it in the western because they can fix a hole in the ground from an earthquake from one day to another. That yeah, and and and and Europeans can uh we have a bump in the road, yeah, it's politics. It will take one paperwork to another car to uh to somewhere, to another word, another one, and uh maybe now no, not this year, maybe next year. And some kid is driving a car and bumps and drive off the road, then they will fix it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, okay, I have a question for you. Because do you think because I I countries and regions kind of grow and then stagnate and maybe decline and all that kind of good stuff. Do you think it's that Asia's having uh I wouldn't say a moment, because that sounds ridiculous, but do you think they're because they're they're on the rise in general and they're like an economic powerhouse right now, that that's why this mentality is there? Or do you think this has always been a part of this?
SPEAKER_05Always been there. Just but it becomes more if you look at Asia history or China history, how fast, but uh for example, great example Segway. Segway is a great example. Uh Segway is American. So Chinese made parts to Segway, right? Hi Thomas.
SPEAKER_02We have a new, it's funny that you're mentioning, sorry to stop you, Thomas, but we have Thomas Reeds, who is now in his, I believe he just started a master's program this week in France, and he's studying Chinese history and Chinese language and all that kind of good stuff. So this is a good time for him to join us. Hi Tom.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Anyway, please, please continue.
SPEAKER_05So uh I think always the it always has been their mentality to to perform. So the Segway story is like this Segway hired uh Chinese factories to make uh parts to to the yeah, the wheels, whatever to the Segways, and so Chinese developed their own type of it, not totally similar, but a little bit similar. And they got so popular that and they earned so much money on the copy version that they actually bought Segway. How funny is that? How funny is that? And that tells me a lot. All the high-tech companies are using China. Why? First of all, yes, they may be cheap, but you cannot take quality and also effective away from it. Yes, there is probably a lot of bad factories who treat the employees bad, but I have actually been in many of those factories in a project I had a few years ago. And many of the employees living at the factories with their own rooms, own bathroom, own refrigerator. They don't have it so bad as people think.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05They decide themselves. They uh the kids go to work, uh, schools study. Now the economic is blooming in Hong Kong in China, so they send their kids to study in UK, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and even US. So I think they are more hungry to learn and educate themselves now than they ever been 20 years ago. Yeah, the question is I think it's very interesting, is to see the Americans, Europeans, are not interested to go that direction. And I will say that's kind of a shame because I will say the second language we should learn at school is Mandarin. Yes, Chinese and Mandarin, it will be the ultimate trading language in the next century. Trust me, it's gonna be the Chinese. And the only way you will do big trades and get a good deal is to know how to speak Mandarin.
SPEAKER_02Sure. And I don't even think it's gonna be next century. I think it's coming a lot sooner than we think.
SPEAKER_05Oh, yeah. I I can I can tell already by staying here in Hong Kong. Yeah, more and more Mandarin talking people, more and more uh Chinese influence because the borders are getting more blurred. Sure. And and uh and I will say it's instead of learning, I think it's the most important language at this time era we are in now is Chinese. And it is because they cannot deny they are really good in technology. They're they're they are they actually the entire financial system now, they don't use physical money anymore almost. You probably know that now. They only use Apple Pay or uh QQ and VChat.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, in mainland China we use uh VChat and Ali Pay, and we feel cash, but seriously, less and less places are taking cash.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, and uh yeah, so for that is starting to become that was like China, and that was China was that started it. And the reason they started uh we westerners who are listening to this, they don't know this, but you and I we know it. VChat is the same as uh Facebook, Instagram, uh QXL or eBay, everything in one.
SPEAKER_02In one, yeah, and more because it is a lot more than all of those two.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, you can go to shopping mall, you can go to order food in a restaurant, you can pay for it, pre-pay for it. There is so much you can do with it. And the reason why that happened is because they are not allowed to have Facebook, Gmail, all that other things. So they developed their own app, but their app is so much stronger and more powerful than any other we've ever seen before. Yeah, and and they figured out how they can avoid using paper money, yeah. Because people getting sick of using these money, they have the carrying diseases, and China is a lot of people, billions of people. Yeah, and so they figure out okay, let's do let's use electronic payments instead. I think that's good. And of course, China has uh I saw this fantastic interview with this uh tech lady. She said that uh yes, Chinese government is controlling everything, basically anything. So just accept it and just play by the rules and done.
SPEAKER_02I I gotta tell you, the the difference, and I'm sure you've experienced this, the difference between what people think of China and Hong Kong versus less of Hong Kong. I think people have more of a view of Hong Kong because it's more open than mainland China right now. But what people think about life in China from the international news versus what it's like to live here is like night and day. Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_05I I remember when I came to China first time, I was thinking, oh my god, it's gonna be a horror scene. Beautiful, beautiful in China. It's beautiful, it's amazing. The the the city is beautiful, and and I've never been in Shanghai, but I from what I've seen in in mainland China, I can tell you it's not what people think. No, it's only uh they're just showing the the smoog, you know, the the bad uh haze of the city. That's the only that's the only thing that hits the news.
SPEAKER_02Which does exist. I mean, the thing is that the thing that I try to tell people outside of China is that, and not to get on a soapbox, so I'll just do this one thing, but um, it's not that the things that are in the international media don't exist. They do, but it's one side of the story, and there's so much other stuff going on, and a lot of it is really exciting.
SPEAKER_05For example, electric trains.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, oh my god, the high-speed trains are insane.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. So the current after you take the train in China. Go to Europe after take the train in China.
SPEAKER_02You'll feel like we did last year, and we were laughing so hard when we went to a train station in Spain and Germany, and we're like, wait, there's no people here. Wait, how long does the train take? I'm sorry, that's too long.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, it's like, yeah, because you get so spoiled.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, you do.
SPEAKER_05You really do, yeah, and uh and the same in Japan, China, and Japan, and in Taiwan. Same thing. And I went from Osaka to uh yeah, the Fukuhama, uh to uh Tokyo. I think it was one hour, 45 minutes. Amazing, yeah, and you don't feel it's like wow, you're there already. Yeah, coming to Europe. Uh the train is five hours delayed. Sorry about that. Take the bus.
SPEAKER_02To be fair, mainland China does have issues with their flights being delayed, especially in the evening.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, doministic, but not so often internationally, but doministic very often.
SPEAKER_02That's true, and the trains very rarely like we had snow in Nanjing last year, and that caused a delay because everybody just kind of went, What? Why are we having snow?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's funny. That's funny. Just go two weeks, don't need to be in a five-star hotel, live there for three weeks, two weeks in a three-star hotel or two, or rent an apartment on Airbnb. There's so much more possibilities now than there was like seven years ago. Yeah, and and go. And if it's it's great, then save up money again and go back and explore, feel, see, and and don't be afraid to get lost.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And Hong Kong is a super safe city, it's probably most safest cities around.
SPEAKER_02You can work around any time of day there, right?
SPEAKER_05I mean, it's just yeah, very funny you said that. I can stand in the middle of the night at three o'clock at night and taking photos, and no one bothers to talk to me. No, yeah. If I do the same in Norway, Oslo, I might get robbed. Quite a chance, big chance I get robbed.
SPEAKER_02In Norway, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05What happened? What happened? You know, I I can I can no problem, I can stand alone in the middle of the street in in Hong Kong. No one bothers me. They're just minding your own business. But when it comes to Norway, if I stand in the most places I want to take photos of, yeah. It will be gone. I'm quite sure of it. Or they will bother you, or they will talk to you, and they will be annoying because they can't.
SPEAKER_02Same thing in Shanghai. I mean, there's certain things that are prevalent, like now, pickpocketing on the subway has become rather prevalent. But honestly, I've lived in cities a large part of my life. I'm used to keeping my stuff in. Front of me when I'm around a lot of people. So it's not such a big deal for me. But that's pretty much it. There's the occasional stabbing or something like that.
SPEAKER_05But just amazing.
SPEAKER_02Generally, violence is between people that know each other and pissed each other off. It there isn't a lot of random violence, like it feels like there is in the US and Europe. In Europe, yeah.
SPEAKER_05That is growing in Europe. That is that is scary and it's out of control. And uh in Hong Kong, they're so tough to get visa. You have to have certain criteria, and the same in China. So tough to get visa in China. You know this.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. And uh it's gotten easier. Yeah, become easier.
SPEAKER_02With the right qualifications, it's gotten easier, yeah.
SPEAKER_05For Norwegians and American, English, and uh for other other countries also a few others in Europe, not that hard. Yeah, but if you're an African, forget it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, there's been a mass exodus of people from African countries for that very reason. They really started to crack down on that, which is so considering the relationship between the African countries and mainland China, it's really bizarre that that's happening. I don't know what's happening there. I think because so many Chinese folks went overseas to study and came back, they've got a glut of very qualified people and not enough jobs for them. So they're making it harder to get work visas because they have people who are bilingual, who studied overseas, who have qualifications and skills and people's skills and all that kind of stuff. They don't need us anymore.
SPEAKER_05No, they don't remember when I was when I was a kid, I uh I had friends who said to me, Oh wow, you should go to China. They love to have white people helping because they said white people, right? And I'm like, oh no, I don't want to go to China. I'm too scary, they don't speak English and and they speak Mandarin. And um and uh now, as you said, now they speak English, they understand the language, they're actually more sophisticated than we are in many ways. And they have their technology and our language in their hands, yeah. And and what do we have now? Well, we uh we have of course we do have some science in our countries and stuff like that, but I can tell you the next 10 years, China is gonna develop something. Uh they're gonna go to the moon. Guarantee the next 10 years, they will be the goal go to the moon. And the rest of us is just gonna watch it and just thinking it should be thus. Yeah, but the moon everything is flowing that direction now. Yeah, they have Taobao, they can yeah, they they basically reinvented the internet by Ta Bao, Alibaba, and the VCAP basically.
SPEAKER_02Doesn't it amazing? Yes, yeah, isn't it amazing? Because I mean, outside of China, people think, oh, the firewall, oh, it must be so restrictive, uh blah blah blah blah. But that kind of created this environment where they just made it even better than the stuff that they can't read.
SPEAKER_05So funny as you said that. Yeah, remember when uh when um I had I learned a few things now. For example, my phone. I take my phone away sometimes. I become better to leave my phone away, like two, three hours. Don't touch it, don't want to watch it, I just stay away from it. My brain has become more creative by doing that, by forcing myself to not look at the phone. And and I think it's the same thing in China. They don't look at all the stuff we're looking at. Google, Facebook, uh, Instagram. They don't, they don't, they get don't get distracted like we do, right? We are just oh, I want to see what my neighbors doing. Ah but they're like whatever. They want to focus on developing business-oriented people, and they really became successful. Yeah, Japanese was the one we when we were young, yeah, 41. When we were young, when we were young, I looked at the Japanese like oh, they know what they're doing, they are a business, but now the Chinese are faster than them. Yeah, and not like little, it's like it's huge, a lot it is huge. They have their own science, they have like their like technology, is uh there's a reason why everyone is using app uh Apple is using China, and they say, Yeah, uh we're gonna send the uh the parts from China to to US and put it together in the US just to please Trump, but it's still made in China, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah. China is uh I think it's part of that decision fatigue thing where if you have so many things to choose from, you don't have the mental space to do anything else. And I think yeah, I'm not saying I'm not saying I like the firewall, I gotta be honest. Using my VPN like I'm using now to do the live feed is sort of annoying. But I do agree with you that it does simplify things to a degree, and then people can think of mother shit.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, and it's uh a little bit um I I speak to someone locals about this firewall, and I asked them like why? Why is this existing? And they said, Well, the explanation is very simple, Thomas.
SPEAKER_02They say protection.
SPEAKER_05Imagine imagine if this uh tomorrow this firewall will go away, and they will read all the fake news that exists on the internet. Yeah, you know, even uh even Star Wars was controversial because there was a black guy who was uh one of the main characters, yeah, and that is like silly. My best friends are from Africa or they're black, Asian, Caucasian, doesn't matter, right? But they're like, no, we cannot accept that. This black character is gonna be this small in the poster, like in the background, because they don't like that. It's funny, right? It's just like this is like how their culture is. It's like wow, you know, in my country, the black guy will be like one of the biggest figures. So that's the the opposite mentality.
SPEAKER_02Sure, sure, sure.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, they're never on, yeah, but they never understood it in China. They're never on.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I don't know. I don't know what the reason is, but it doesn't seem to affect people as much as we think it does. Exactly. About it from outside. I'm not saying it's a perfect system, I'm not saying it's a perfect country. Every place has their flaws.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but panel man, I just try to get people to understand it's so different than what you think. And there's so much online now about it, and people still believe only what's in the news. Like, there's a lot of stuff coming from individuals who, even with the fireball, are printing tons of images on YouTube and in and podcasts and pictures and all over social media, like Western social media, and people are still like, Oh, it must be like this. Like, I had people asking me if everybody's still on a bicycle, and I'm like, Well, if you mean shared bikes, then yeah, but that's so not what's happening.
SPEAKER_05Like, you've got outside of an outside of another city in China, yes, you will see people on bicycles and uh those market bikes and uh free.
SPEAKER_02But you know, the images they're thinking from like the 1950s, 1960s, where they only had bicycles and they're all in the mouth costumes, yeah. Not the costumes, but the uniforms and stuff, and yeah, then that picture, and I'm like, um, no.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, the same kind of thing when I get the questions like, where are you from from Norway? And they go like, oh, they mean like the polar bears. No, no, no, no. We don't have polar bears walking down the street and go, like, hey, we don't have that. We have them, they're living normally, they are in top of Norway. We don't see them, we don't hear about some incidents with a tourist. A few months ago, it was a tourist who saw one and thought it was cute, so he went to the ice bear and, like, oh, come here, you of course the polar bear become a bear, normal bear, and there's a right. So funny. Oh, like uh so it's like uh silly, right? Because we don't have polar bears skating around our streets in Norway. We do have all reindeer and everything else, but we don't have polar bear. That's funny. But people's mind think, oh yeah, Norway, peaceful country with blonde here and crawly blonde girl. No, that's Sweden, next country. That's Sweden, go to Sweden. So funny.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, they're in they're interesting, interesting. When I first moved to Asia, all of the women that that I met asked me, it was like 2003, and they all asked me if every woman in America was like carry on sex in the city.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And I'm like, Carrie on sex in the city wouldn't even be carry from sex in the city. Like, no woman as a journalist would be in that apartment and eat all of that ice cream and heavy size too. Like, like she's not even her.
SPEAKER_05No, it's like it's just a character and based on that. Yeah, like one thing I but the one thing I just obsession about the makeup in China, uh the the Asian girls compared to the Western girls. Uh the Asian girls are really good in makeup, amazing in the makeup. I'm blown away how good they are to do. They should I I will say any girl in China that's doing makeup or Asia generally can come become a makeup artist in Europe. Like any day, they can just go into the set and just like take over, they can kick their real makeup artists out of the way and just take care. Yeah, they're that good, they're just so incredibly good.
SPEAKER_02And the products are really good, like they could they could go pick up their products in Korea, then go over to Europe and do their stuff.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, they can do a great job, they can do a living out of it. Okay. You know, I'm I'm yeah, I'm laughing when I see like they in my country they call themselves makeup artists. Like in my country, I would say we have five really good makeup artists.
SPEAKER_03Wow.
SPEAKER_05And that's like I would say that's like top notch, that's always been used by movies, TV, uh, series, like that. And we have those uh other ones who came out of school and uh like half pro, but a little bit not that known yet. Yeah, but in China or Asia generally, yeah, they are so good to take photos of themselves, and they have a total different photo culture in Asia than we have in Europe.
SPEAKER_03Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Absolutely. They they're really good to do because even they use their phones, they're so good at it, and sometimes I ask them, like, wow, you know, they really know how to do it, and that's come back to everything. They they have managed to they see what we do and they develop it, and they just make it better, just make it better, and we cannot figure it out, they're just like why and how they just do it, and I think that is in the day you know I mean everything comes time tying all this conversation up. They uh my fascination is that they doing, they learn from us, they put the style into they use our style to put it into their culture, they refined it, made it better, and we're buying it. That's it.
SPEAKER_02That that's basically my uh the only thing I would add is that they had a culture going way before European culture. I mean, they were talking about 5,000 years worth of yeah, so they had stuff and then they refined. There has definitely been uh a borrowing from the West most recently, but they definitely had stuff before that, even.
SPEAKER_05I agree. If you look at um uh if you look at America history, uh if you look at it in if you look at it as uh humans, so the old man with the long white beard with the long eyebrows, that would be like that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05You know, and uh Europeans would be like the more adult guy, like hey, shut up, you know. America has been like for 300 years, like the baby country. Shut up, stop us, you know, like uh shut up, you whiny baby. Yeah, you know, yeah, you know that that'd be funny. It's like oh you stupid crybaby, don't don't cry me in a boom. Stop it. That's funny. Because it's like uh yeah, you know, yes, you had your Indians and uh your fellowship, but they're they they got uh you know kicked out of the country in its current state, yeah.
SPEAKER_02It's very, very, very, very young, very somewhat lost. I guess we'd be going through our adolescence right now. Maybe that explains what's happening.
SPEAKER_05Oh no, we just oh my god. I love I love but I love this.
SPEAKER_02Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Every every place has good and bad. It's oh yeah, absolutely more visible than others.
SPEAKER_05Absolutely. You know, I I saw a friend of mine driving through some places in California that people are like homeless people, like living like long street. I'm like, this could be South America, Africa, could be anywhere. No one knows. It's such a sad thing to see.
SPEAKER_02You know, uh that yeah, it's it's yeah, really, really big problem right now. Well, I have to tell you before we go that Tom, who was listening to us earlier, I think he might have dropped off because he had to study. But he said he didn't have any questions, but he wanted to say that he's fascinated. He went to your website because I was scrolling over on the right hand side, left hand side here, and he said, I I'm fascinated by his work. He didn't know you before then, but he's absolutely mesmerized by your work, and he's he's scrolling through all of your photos right now. So he's that's cool to hear. That's cool to hear.
SPEAKER_05I'm glad to have this chat. Uh, you know, you can always uh write to me, contact me. I will love to talk about it.
SPEAKER_02Sorry, Tom's still there. Yeah. Oh Tom is still there. This was wonderful. This was such an interesting uh insight. Like I said, this is the first visual uh episode that we did doing this kind of retrospective reflection-y kind of thing. And thank you. That was awesome.
SPEAKER_03I love it.
SPEAKER_05So it was my pleasure.
SPEAKER_02Appreciate you coming on and doing this. I know that you're probably very, very busy, and I really appreciate the time you took to do this.
SPEAKER_05No problem at all. Problem at all.
SPEAKER_02Thank you so much. Have a wonderful evening.
SPEAKER_05You too. Thank you. Okay. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Membership feeds apply after free trial. Cancel any time.
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