2kiwis

On the weekend we did our irregular monthly shopping at Sainsbury’s in Brentwood. It was a busy day at the supermarket so we weren’t looking forward to queuing for ages to get out. Turns out we did have to queue for a long time but this was because the power failed for all the tills, which was strange as the lights were still on, all the fridge’s were working and the pharmacy till was still working ok. This did mean that they had no way of scanning all our goods so the managers decided to shut the doors and then processed everyone’s shopping using the trusty ‘guess’ method. Our trolley-load of stuff earned us a bill of £20, I’m sure it was worth at least three times that but we weren’t arguing and they just wanted to get everyone out. All the customers were first annoyed at the wait, then bemused as they saw people on the tills making random guesses at prices and then happy when they got their underestimated request for payment.

In other news another of my photos has been stolen. Compare the photo of Dave Dobbyn from the gallery with the small photo at the top of this promo for NZ T-Shirt company H for Home. I’ve emailed them asking for an apology, we’ll see what they say.

We saw Dave Dobbyn at Dingwalls in Camden last night and it was a proper Kiwi experience. Dave was funny and enjoying himself and everyone (wall to wall Kiwi expats) had a blast. Not only did I win tickets to the concert and get a free CD but I also got thrown a t-shirt by Dave after he searched the front row for a large man… I argue that everyone else at the front was short and small. Dave gave out t-shirts and also distributed lots of Kiwi tucker like pineapple lumps and peanut slabs, one of which nearly clocked Keryn in the face as he threw it into the crowd! As usual we had arrived early and sat on the stage waiting for the bands to play. It was a lot cooler inside the underground cavern of Dingwalls than the 30 degrees plus outside. I got talking to a photographer while we waited and spurred on by his shooting took a load of photos, some of which I’ll upload to the gallery later. The only pity was the lateness of our arrival home, sleep not coming till after 1am.

Dave Dobbyn at Dingwalls.

The photographer I was speaking to has a website and he takes rather good shots. He spent 9 months on one contract travelling through Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda last year and next year he gets to photograph all the All Blacks games at the World Cup, followed by a contract in Namibia and then he’s off to the Caribbean to photograph the NZ Cricket team taking part in the Cricket World Cup. I am insanely jealous of Scottie.

Shoot London Lite was an event organised by the people at Shoot Experience. On the Saturday an event was held called Shoot London and involved teams of up to four people meeting in the morning at the Tate Modern Museum and getting their clues before heading our to take photographs. They all had a time limit to be back at the Tate for a Champagne reception where all the photos would be downloaded and prizes awarded for the best interpretations of the clues. Shoot London Lite was the same thing except there was no meet up before and after, it was basically a re-run of the Saturday event without time limits and with no reception.

Our clues were emailed to us at Midnight and I got up early on Sunday to start figuring our what it was we were to find. We ended up heading into London around 11am and didn’t get home until 9pm, a long day wandering the streets finding our treasures. For those that don’t know it has been rather hot in London of late but thankfully while it was around the 30 degree mark it was a dry heat and there was also a nice breeze throughout the day.

As usual I was over-prepared and carried around our tripod and big bag of camera gear – I guess our experiences in Petra prepared me for long days walking with heavy gear. Keryn helped out as well, carrying stuff for long periods. We found most of our locations easily enough, thorough Google searching helping to unravel the clues. Along the way we bumped in to lots of other people also taking photos for the event, most friendly but guarded as well as we all protected our ideas for photos.

Next time (and I do want to do it again) we’ll definitely take other people with us as Keryn and I are good at the clue deciphering, walking and photo taking bits but no so good at the inventive and zany ideas required for the best looking photos. There are plenty more events coming up though I don’t think we’ll be able to take part in any more until after we’ve been and come back from NZ and Paris. It was an enjoyable day, helped no doubt by the great weather. Photos from both Saturdays and Sundays events will be up on the Shoot Experience Gallery so have a look to see what some of the more adventurous and creative people in London were doing this past weekend.