Oh boy, am I so glad to be back blogging again! So sorry as I got caught up with some demanding issues lately at work and had an unfortunate and unforgettable experience with the authorities recently where me and another friend of mine (name withheld) were seized by civilian clothed police authorities while we were out taking some photos in the street and by the shore.

It sure was a scary experience for the reason that I can barely understand what they were trying to say about us. We were still lucky though as one of the officer on duty was fluent enough to translate to us and to his co-officers our answers to their queries. He also said that he was once a photography enthusiast when he was about our age which is really good and just in time as his co-officers had doubts already as to why I had to go down to the pile of rocks near the shore and shoot from there. They probably had it known the way I was shooting as we saw a coastguard interceptor boat and a helicopter hovering above to the scene where we were shooting from.

As I was trying to explain to them that I needed to have a nice reflection of the water and those rocks on the sea-shore are distracting my frame, I could see their faces cringed as they were trying to picture what I was saying then this officer from another room heard us and gladly came and helped us translate everything on why we are in such a place that is currently restricted which by the way we were totally unaware of.

Sadly, I wasn’t able to get the name of the officer who have helped us but I was able to say how grateful we were having him there and helping us with the translation. I could still even remember him saying in between the interrogation proceedings that his SLR camera was placed into an auction by his son somewhere on the internet for a couple of hundred dollars. He shoots film and does this while he travels which he does a lot on cruises back in the day. He was even proud to say how he enjoyed and loved seeing our country the Philippines about 20 years ago and as he fondly recalls some historic places and hotels where he stayed, I just couldn’t help but only wonder on how these places looked like as I’m not familiar with them but my friend does and lives close by to these places…

Now, the question is, what was I really doing in a place that most photographers even seasoned one’s wouldn’t even dare going to? Here it is, the main reason why we got into this trouble in the first place…

Weeks before we were held in custody, my dear wife saw some ads on Facebook about a photography contest. Little did I know she had the whole website printed already in an A4 size paper and carefully placed them on my desk where I saw them the next morning while I was having my coffee.

I just smiled… but it wasn’t about the contest but more of the sweet sticky note that came with it that my wife wrote 😉

While I was reading the details of the contest I already knew that it was going to be a landscape kind of work which I have not been doing for quite some time now, as I’m more into portraiture these days. And besides, I already had my share of bad experiences in the past doing landscape work and so it kind of didn’t appeal to me much in joining 😦

If it weren’t for that sticky note that my wife made I wouldn’t have given this a second thought. And so I came up with a mindset that if I were going to do this, then I might as well do this in an approach that would be more appealing to me. Since I’m into portraiture, I need to have some actual people in my frame and probably shoot in a way what a photojournalist would do. To me, this sounds like fun and it sure did boosted my willingness to join!

However, given with the situation this country is currently been facing and the heightened security imposed on almost everywhere. I realized that it would be an impossible thing to do and since I can’t do the kind of vision I had in mind, I again lost interest in joining.

And so, that’s what I thought…

With just a week left before the submission of the contest entry ends, I personally saw the ads on Facebook and followed their Facebook page. I even read some streams on their Twitter too but even if I kept reading their posts and streams I just couldn’t find an inspiration to do it anymore… Then it finally came to me that my wife’s birthday is coming soon and so I thought that the 1st prize which is a BD500 (US$1,300) shopping voucher is more than enough to buy her the iPhone which she really liked 🙂 That’s if, if I do win of course.

As the end date of submission drew closer each day, I’ve learned that some of the country’s top and well-known photographers locally and internationally was selected to judge the contest entries. I personally like Mr. Ali Rifai’s work in some of the billboards that I saw scattered all over this country. And when I saw the Twitter feed of the contest that Mr. Ali Rifai is indeed one of the chosen judges and another well-known Italian photographer Loredana Montello. I got into this thinking that this would be a great tool in my opinion of having my photo/s get to be critique by these well-known panel of judges, that even being included in the shortlisted category should be an honor already.

On that same day and after a day’s work, me and my friend went off to find the perfect spot to shoot for the contest. We basically have no idea where to go as most of the places we found are heavily secured by security personnel. Simply put, we just couldn’t find a place where there isn’t any security forces around. Be it on sea, land and air. That’s how the current situation here looks like.

After much persistence, we eventually found a place to shoot but unfortunately we were caught when we were about to leave the scene. Next thing we knew we are already being escorted on our way to a nearby precinct.

I remember praying so hard that night while we were heading over to the precinct they are bringing us. I remember to have been praying and praying every time I couldn’t understand anymore what they were saying about us. I didn’t know what else should I do as I can hardly speak their language and so I just kept praying. Soon enough, my prayers were answered! There’s the officer who came and have helped us with the translation, my boss and my friend’s boss too came later on. With our bosses arriving to the scene, we were temporary released after signing some release forms. It’s just that our camera gears and our car stays until the investigation is over. Technically, we could be in jail for the next 10 days until our case gets it verdict and if we were found guilty of a crime then we could be there for a much longer time…

Days passed and another officer from the precinct handling our case called me and informing me that we can already pick up our cameras as our case was dropped! I won’t get into further details anymore of how we were able to resolve our “case” but a LOT of people (and literally they were a LOT!) whom I have never met before have helped us get through with it. Through our families and friends, we were able to approach these people and they gladly lend their help to us strangers.

I’m just so grateful to our dear Lord that it is over by now and I thank Him more that He never ceases to listen to our prayers and kept us far from harm while we were in this ordeal. To all of my families, friends and the people whom we have sought help, thank you so much for all the help you have extended and the prayers you have given to us.

That basically ends the agony that I’ve been through recently and the main reason why I was in the loop for a while without shooting.

Up to this moment, I still couldn’t help but just wonder God’s work bringing all of these people to us together that even with our differences in religion, culture and beliefs and aside from the fact they were perfect strangers they still did everything they can in helping us. Whilst, most of them I haven’t even met personally and yet they were all doing these great things for us without asking anything in return. I don’t know how am I supposed to pay these guys back for what they did for us and I truly am grateful for all the acts of kindness and the experiences that these guys showed us, it truly changed the person I am today…

In summary, I won the contest although I didn’t get the 1st prize, I was able to take home the 2nd prize which is an Ipad 2! Yipee! 🙂

I didn’t get to shoot again after the incident… I didn’t even bother sending that photo I made that night that got me into this trouble. And so, how was I able to win then?

A day before the submission ends I was frantically thinking on how should I get the chance of joining still as I was on home arrest 😦

Then I remember in one of the guidelines. It says, images of entries can be from the year dates of 2010 up to the present. hmm… 🙂

I then kept thinking of any images that I have probably made in the past which I think qualifies. I smiled like having a day-dream as I recalled having a handful of images that I have made in the past which I think would fit the contest theme. Now, all I need to do is to run them down into just 3 which I know reflects my style. Unfortunately, I was able to find only one. Although we were allowed to send 3 entries, I went to the less traveled road that most contestants wouldn’t go and just gladly submitted a single photo entry.

Here’s my winning PHOTO:

Most of you might have seen this already but this is actually not the same as the one you’ve seen before (technically) as the one you saw before have a bit of post-processing work done into it. But this one doesn’t have any edits and it’s one of the shooting style that I mostly do and which I really love doing. This photo came straight out of my camera. Although post-processing was allowed in the contest to some extent. I didn’t go with that one since it just doesn’t reflect much of my style. Just to add, I saw this view while I’m on my way home from work. It was just before the bridge coming from Hidd. I came back to this place and brought along 2 of my fellows from GPN (Gulf Photographers Network) Kim and Red to shoot the view that I saw.

Here’s some of the images I took from the exhibit wherein our works were showcased in Seef Mall along with the other winning entries. Boy, I was so glad seeing that one of my co-fellow from GPN to have bagged the first prize! Congrats Ferdi 🙂

– My surname was erroneously replaced by my middle name. LOL. It’s ok, my mom would surely be so proud! 😉

My wife was more than happy to have the Ipad 3G that I’ve won as her birthday present instead of the iPhone which she originally liked 🙂 So I gladly gave it to her the very same day it was awarded to us. As she’s mostly into novels and after finding out that reading eBooks on the iPad is more convenient because of it’s larger screen size compared to an iPhone, she fell in-love with it at first sight! She loves it more these days after I installed the apps she mostly use on the PC and now all of them can be found and be accessed with just a simple touch of her fingers while she’s crumpled on a couch or in the bed.

1 lucky winner, 1 happy birthday celebrant and most importantly, case closed!

and our little bonus from our prize:

Izzie loves it too! 🙂

To my surprise, I just found out that our winning entries was published in yesterday’s newspaper! It’s actually one of my first! *blush

I’ve just known that there are about 500 entries that joined, it was then narrowed down to 100, down to 29 and finally, only nine of us was left as Gulf Weekly said.

Here’s some photos from my phone that I took while reading yesterday’s publication of Gulf Weekly 🙂

—chriscarinophotography.wordpress.com—