A morning on the Ganges at Varanasi, India



© Gunther Deichmann - Sadhu, Varanasi India

Thanks again to Jamie who has taken the writing burden of me for the moment, our few days in Varanasi have been very interesting to say the least.
Strolling around the Banks of the Ganges yesterday afternoon a very excited Bebet came running over to me...hey GD do you you know who this guy is over there? Oh man it is Steve McCurry! Well, why I am not surprised...Steve does some Photo Workshops in India and has travelled this part of the world a lot.
I said...wow cool and before we know we where standing at the shorelines of the Ganges and having a quick chat with Steve before we departed in different wind direction doing what we all do best creating images.
Thanks to Bebet insistency and before we parted ways we had a quick photo taken of the three of us, indeed a small world even for indian standards.
GD

A brief encounter with Steve Mc Curry, at the banks of the Ganges
River in Varanasi India, March 2010

Gunther Deichmann - Steve McCurry - Bebet Gaudinez,

Tomorrow we 're leaving via land to our next destination Nepal with a stop over at Lumbini, located in Nepal and is considered the birthplace of Gautam Buddha., after Lumbini we continue on to Kathmandu where we spend another 5 days or so.

© Gunther Deichmann - Varanasi view from the Ganges,

BTW...if you have not done so download the latest Version of Aperture 3 (Version 3.01). I am getting close to some 8000 images and Aperture has been performing just fine, no major glitches. FYI...I am working exclusive with Reference files stored on my external Rugged Lacie 360 Gig Hard drive plus I am using an identical hard drive for backup.

See below excerpts on Lumbini from Wikipedia:
Lumbini is a Buddhist pilgrimage site in the Rupandehi district of Nepal, near the Indian border. It is the place where Queen Mayadevi is said to have given birth to Siddhartha Gautama, who as the Buddha Gautama founded the Buddhist tradition. The Buddha lived between roughly 563 and 483 BCE. Lumbini is one of four magnets for pilgrimage that sprang up in places pivotal to the life of the Buddha, the others being at Kushinagar, Bodh Gaya, and Sarnath.

© Gunther Deichmann - Varanasi India



© Gunther Deichmann - early morning bathers Varanasi India

Varanasi: Holy land of spiritual rites and rituals, cultural and religious centre, renowned learning hub, home to 4 universities and centuries old architecture. Up till now, I’d always secretly thought of Varanasi or ‘Benares’ as Florence and Venice put together. Perhaps I was swayed when I read that Mark Twain said: “Benares is older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend and looks twice as old as all of them put together.”
But Varanasi is no Venice. Nowhere else do I feel able to say that that today is yesterday, tomorrow is today, and yesterday will be tomorrow. (GD will say that I’m tending towards the inclinations of becoming a sadhu..). Like many places of worship, Varanasi has given me great insight, but short of turning GD’s photography blog into a book on metaphysical musings, he has kindly asked me only to write of the essence of our experience here so far. (and not with-holding the fact that the tailor is also waiting for me to try on my superbly handmade silk Indian Alibabá pants: in all 10 colors!)
The highlight of our 3-day stay here was centered on the famed River Ganges, which true to its good standing is rich with daily rituals of life and death, myth and legend.

© Gunther Deichmann - colors of Varanasi India

We left the Radisson hotel promptly at 5:30am this morning glad of the chill in the moist air (the afternoon humidity accentuates the acid pong of omnipresent urine) and arrived at the bank of the river in less than 20mins. The driver was not a bit surprised to be battling giant busloads of tourists on the narrow dust-lined streets: We had passed the harmonious phase of the lull before the storm, which we were told was meant to crack at daybreak, when the frenzy of yesterday takes place all over again.
There was already a flurry of activity as we edged towards the bank of the Ganga: sadhus painting their weathered faces into cracked mirrors, flower sellers mulling about while mendicants braced themselves for another day, and shop keepers literally shifting the dust from one place to another with feather-dusters.
A shout and our boat arrived as a sudden scuffle between two boys over a piece of naan bread begun. Most of the out-of-towners like us were here to go boating on the river at sunrise; with the only difference being that GD had specifically requested a motorized vessel instead of the usual row-boat, not that there was any speed to the finish but riding against the current was not going to be easy without technology, even on holy waters.

© Gunther Deichmann - early morning bathers Varanasi India

Taking in the length of the river, GD was unruffled by the bustle (that’s cos he hadn’t had his coffee yet! haha), while Bebet and I prepared our cameras, all of us waiting for first light to awake to a slice of river life and an abundance of prayers. The silence was broken only by the motor’s humming, GD’s occasional observation about the light, Bebet’s anthropological reflections and one particularly curious devotee, sashaying on a lone rock a foot at a time and crooning at the top of his lungs. Kumar our guide, explained that he was praying for himself, for success and good health, to which I thought: fair enough, at least he knew he didn’t have the slightest prayer to make it to Bollywood, if that was remotely on his wish list.

© Gunther Deichmann - cleaning the small temples along the
Ganges in the morning, Varanasi India

© Gunther Deichmann - an early morning head shave in Varanasi India

In no time the sun was up and out. We clicked our cameras like drum beats in symphony to the chattering motor. Throngs of men and women were standing on the steps and bathing in the river, soaping themselves and brushing their teeth just a stone’s throw away from where some others were squat, depositing their breakfast or dinners on the starched soil. Naked children shivered on the banks with frowns on their faces, uncertain whether this was altogether fun or not. The townsfolk scrubbed their laundry in the greenish waters and beat them against the rocks. Women rung out their multi-colored saris and draped them upon the ground. We noticed others crouching higher up on the steps in the distance shaping cow dung into flat patties to sun bake them for later use. Yoga enthusiasts and sadhus sat crossed-legged in meditation upon higher ground.

© Gunther Deichmann - colors of Varanasi India

The sun continued her journey while the people offered their prayers to the morning, cleansing their minds and spirits along the holy river until we arrived back to the ghat where we begun our morning and disembarked. With one backward glance at the blurred hubbub against the sandstone walls I left the river Ganges with one thought: this was yesterday and this is tomorrow.
Jamie

The Incredible Colors of India...



© Gunther Deichmann - Jaipur Rajasthan, India Feb. 2010

We just arrived back in Delhi from Rajasthan and Agra...now I am fighting with the connection and I am very tiered, some of the Photo Workshop participants have to catch the plane back home about right now, they just had enough time for a quick shower in our Hotel.
Hey we're going to miss you guys!
I am leaving with Jamie and Bebet tomorrow afternoon for Varanasi and then overland back to Nepal, another 12 or so days to go before hitting back home.

© Gunther Deichmann - Jaipur Rajasthan, street vendor selling
colorful powder, India Feb. 2010



© Gunther Deichmann - Jaipur Rajasthan, India Feb. 2010

The colors of Incredible India; only a few images today need to do a lot more editing when time permits, but many more to come in due time, plus I put up a nice Gallery when I am back home.

© Gunther Deichmann - Holi Festival Jaipur Rajasthan,
India Feb. 2010

© Gunther Deichmann - Holi Festival...the roads are covered with
colorful powder,Jaipur Rajasthan, India Feb. 2010



© Gunther Deichmann - Jaipur Rajasthan, amazing colors
during the Elephant festival India Feb. 2010

Gunther Deichmann - Jaipur Rajasthan, amazing colors
during the Elephant festival India Feb. 2010

In the next few days I have no internet connection but try my best to stay in touch once I get to Kathmandu in Nepal, until then enjoy the images.
GD

Happy Holi from Jaipur in Rajasthan India...

© Gunther Deichmann - Happy Holi in Jaipur

The GD Photo Workshop Gang or better known now as "Baba G and the Shutter Bugs"... thanks to Tony who took out the copyright on the spot for this new tagline.

© Gunther Deichmann - Happy Holi in Jaipur

© Gunther Deichmann - Bebet is really
in the Mood... our onboard Sadhu.

After spending "2 hours" in the shower and trying to get all those beautiful colors off my body...never mind the clothes I have found the Time to wish everybody a very Happy Holi... India's most colorful Festival...& where everything goes.
The whole Gang... except for two using now Aperture 3, we installed it a few days ago in New Delhi, the performance is great and I had no complaints so far. But now back to Holi...an amazing festival as Jamie will explain below, thanks Jamie that you volunteered to do the main write up tonight...giving me a welcome hand and break.

© Gunther Deichmann - Some of the Gang Members...

Bonfires, twigs, pyres and leaves
Evil spirits burn as Holi proceeds!

With a shake, a nod and cheery Happy Holi! greetings from everyone to anyone who was anyone and ‘no-one’, it would appear that the Indian caste system literally dissolved into a puff of rainbow powdered dyes and colored water today.
Rajasthan was alive with a different spice and we daren’t say we weren’t pre-warned. We were told that on Holi, everything and anything goes. And they weren’t joking either.

Jaipur was vibrating with wild celebrations, drum beats of Indian rock and roll ala Shankar and its stimulating sisterly companions, raving bashes not only of the carnivalesque kind but apparently even veiled beatings and the none too unusual vengeance murders that ‘happen’, but as we were reassured, those only ‘happened in other cities and very rarely in Jaipur so not to worry Ma’am and Sir’. Well homicides or not, I’d secretly pocketed my pepper spray under my white cotton shirtdress, just in case the crowd got a little too piquant for my taste.

© Gunther Deichmann - Jamie is getting her "Make up"
applied by a local



© Gunther Deichmann - the Boys having fun in the streets of Jaipur

The crew was ready and itching to go shoot some color. Truth be told we’d been primed the night before, armed with hair oils, super skin moisturizers, caps, camera “condoms” in all shapes and sizes, throwaway t-shirts, shorts and the lot.

Ok, ok I confess I was the only one with the excessive concern for hair oils, cream based moisturizers, shower caps, disposable cotton underclothes, emergency eye drops, SPF 50 lip balm and goodness knows what else I had stashed in my sling bag. Another one bites the advertising dust! Newspapers (and Tony) had been playing up the dehydrating effects of the dyes on skin and hair, and GI Jane as I may be, I’d certainly had no wish to walk around Incredible India with post-Holi skin lesions or a kerosene scrubbed frizz.

© Gunther Deichmann - Tony is getting his picture taken
by a 150 year old Camera



© Gunther Deichmann - Amazing, old meets new...
the "shutter bugs" & the local street photographer

The glow of the warm afternoon sun didn’t let us down, and neither did Bebet’s smooth cone shaped crown – fondly Pink city’s extremely popular pink duomo of the day! Luis was busy keeping out of trouble while GD, his usual monkey self, got the children squealing around him, unable to decide whether they thought he was funny or scary or both.
I didn’t blame them – a seriously hot magenta, violet and salmon colored faced GD is quite a hair-raising sight! The rest of the crew stayed on track, a yellow-green Joerg staying cool and entertaining the locals with amusing conversation (or was it the other way around) while a blushing red Tony kept the beggars from pulling our clothes and cameras. Hubert was cool as a cucumber sauntering back and forth across the streets, side stepping the cows like a weathered local.

© Gunther Deichmann - 150 years later...but still in use,
the processing is done right on the street.



© Gunther Deichmann - Jamie's turn in front of the
old Plate camera...but please don't move...

And suddenly “150 rupees only, 150 rupees just you look Sir top quality photograph black and white please you look only”. No thank you no thank you no thank you no no no no no and then we stopped. We’d gotten so used to the mendicants following us around for the past 2 hours, pushcarts, trolleys, gypsy children and all across town that literally the replies (as polite as we attempted to remain) just came out of us naturally.

Right on the yellow powdered street hung a few carpets on a stairway which acted as a backdrop in front of (lo and behold) a 150 year-old plate camera, impressive in size as well as quality and sharpness . We later found out that the owner and his brother had inherited it from his ancestors and they have been in the photography business since ‘a very long time Ma’am’. Old meets new!!

Thousands of dollars of equipment strapped to our necks, I found it oxymoronic that for 150 rupees ($3 USD), each of us were as excited as kids on Christmas morn and happy as pie with our old fashioned black and white photos that were washed and developed in a pail of water on the street, ready in less than 10 minutes, and hey, it came with a negative too. Now since the digital age, we haven’t been that pleased with a self-portrait in a long time! What better way to end a picture-perfect day?
Holi Hai!

© Gunther Deichmann - back at the Hotel for some cold
Beers before the "two hour" shower.

Happy Holi...



© Gunther Deichmann - the start of Holi a priest during last nights
Pre Holi event blessing everybody with multi colors.

I am in a bit of a rush today...need to get out in the street again with my students to celebrate the Holi Festival the most colorful of all Indian Festivals in Jaipur Rajasthan India.

© Gunther Deichmann - Holi has started...

So please forgive me if this will be a very short Blog today, we're having a great time and the highlight will be later tonight, yesterday we went crazy at the Elephant festival which was so fantastic. Today we're going to get covered in color from top to bottom and last night we participated at a Temple the pre Holi event, with huge fires lit up all over town.

© Gunther Deichmann - the night before Holi

Sorry have to run now...but so much more later, thanks also to Aperture 3 uploading has been easy and fast, I am already at some 4000 images.

© Gunther Deichmann - it is going to get a lot worst today...

GD

A new Journey begins....


© Gunther Deichmann - Incredible India

In a few hours another Journey begins...leaving first for Thailand and Nepal then to India for the start of my GD PhotoWorkshop. Meeting everybody in New Delhi before leaving for Rajasthan to celebrate the Holi Festival. After the Workshop back to Delhi, I then continue my Journey to Varanasi one of the holiest places in India and travel over land back to Nepal.
I try to update my Blogs as much as possible but that depends on the internet connection and if I am not to tired in the evenings.
I am all packed now, Aperture 3 is prepared and ready for the Road show, I am really looking forward to see my students in Delhi very soon for an exciting Photo Workshop in Incredible India.

© Gunther Deichmann - the colors of India...

I guess that is it for the time being, I try to report along the way, but that depends on the connection.
Thanks to the staff from Shroff International Travel for making all the arrangements, specially Arjun & Sheena who have been fantastic.
GD

© Gunther Deichmann - Pushkar, India 2009

So here we are back into Photography, Aperture 3 is certainly going to make our workflow more easy and more fun, GPS and Places, the new Curves, put back from the Trash, Chromatic Aberrations the list goes on and on.
We have also color coding which some of us find very useful for on the road editing, however I have a slight grin on my face and you might ask why. Very simple, some of our Underwater Photographer recently complained and nagged non stop about updates being to slow from Apple.

Some even went as far and switched to Lightroom, again my magic word is patience...are they going back to Aperture 3 now, it looks that way.
My advise as an Aperture user from day one and as a Certified Trainer, get to know one software real well and stick with it, in due time and it is happening right now changes will happen, remember “Rome was also not build in one day” have patience, good things take time. And The Time is NOW.
Thanks to the Apple Aperture Team for a Job well done!

As for my travel photography, I am more then excited, but then again I need to get those images first. You all know I am leaving very soon and if all goes well I have Aperture 3 running and give it a real good and realistic Road test for some 4 weeks in the field trying to post images with the new Facebook function , Locations via Places, the new video function and for sure I am going to work with the new Curves.

Please stay tuned and I try my very best connection permitting to file real reports from the field, or you might say Aperture 3 straight out of the Box.

The web is totally saturated at the moment, the talk of the Town is Aperture 3, but now I am looking forward to some cool Photography and only then I write more in details about all those new features which certainly sound all very exciting.
For the latest info on Aperture 3 and all the new features pls. go to: http://www.apple.com/aperture/whats-new.html
GD

© Gunther Deichmann - Rajasthan India 2009

Places
Now you can use GPS location data to explore your photos by the places they were taken. Better still, find them on an interactive map.
Organize your library by location, location, location.
If you’re shooting with a GPS-enabled camera, Aperture 3 uses reverse geocoding to convert location coordinates into familiar location names, then displays those locations on the Places map. If you’re using a separate GPS tracking device, the path of your photo journey appears on the map when you import a track log. You can even extract locations from iPhone tracker apps or your iPhone photos. Which means you can instantly find all your Yellowstone photos, for example, without typing the word “Yellowstone.” Photos can be organized by country, state, city, or a point of interest such as Old Faithful or the park visitor center.
Put your photos on the map.
If a photo doesn’t include GPS metadata, simply drag the photo to the spot on the map where you shot it. A pin appears. Then, when you’re searching for photos, use the map’s navigation menu to quickly find the location. When you click the pin, Aperture displays all the photos taken there.
Easy course corrections.
If you need to change the location of your shot, drag the pin on the map across the street or across the country. The GPS data associated with the photo updates automatically, so you know where your photos are at all times.More info @ http://www.apple.com/aperture/whats-new.html

I am pleased to announce the final Dates for our
GD Photo Workshop in India!

February 25 - March 04, 2010

We are currently working on the final Itinerary however our PhotoWorkshop will coincide with one of the most important Festivals in India...lets celebrate "Holi" and the Elephant festival in Jaipur Rajasthan at the same time.
New Delhi and Agra with its magnificent Taj Mahal is also part of our itinerary, more information will be available very soon.

2009 © Gunther Deichmann - Colors of Rajasthan

Please note this PhotoWorkshop is for a limited number of students only; max. 8 participants.
The Workshop is filling up fast, as of today we only have three (3) vacancies left, bookings are only on a first come basis and have to be confirmed by no later than January 10, 2010. I hope you understand that due to the complexity and logistics of this workshop we can't except anymore bookings after January 10.

2009 © Gunther Deichmann - Rajasthan

I hope you can join me on this Journey through Incredible India in 2010. Please stay tuned for more details and info soon on this Blog or you can contact me direct. For additional info and testimonials from previous workshops please go to GD PhotoWorkshops or click this LINK, thank you.

Note: You can also watch a short intro (slide show) on India on YouTube, see my prevous blog post.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBdyMR8fq0s&feature=channel
GD

© Gunther Deichmann - Sikandra Akbar Mausoleum entrance,
women & child leaving the Tomb.

The buildings are constructed mainly from a deep red sandstone, enriched with features in white marble. Decorated inlaid panels of these materials and a black slate adorn the tomb and the main gatehouse. Panel designs are geometric, floral and calligraphic, and prefigure the more complex and subtle designs later incorporated in Itmad-ud-Daulah's Tomb.

© Gunther Deichmann - the walk way outside
the Sikandra Akbar Mausoleum, I was getting ready
for an architectural shot when all of a sudden this
women appeared from nowhere.

The Tomb of Akbar the Great is an important architectural masterpiece set in 48 Ha (119 acres) of grounds in Sikandra a suburb of Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India.
The third Mughal Emperor Akbar the Great (1542 – 1605), himself commenced its construction in around 1600, according to Tartary tradition to commence the construction of one's tomb during one's lifetime. Akbar himself planned his own tomb and selected a suitable site for it, after his death, Akbar's son Jahangir completed the construction in 1605-1613.

one morning at the Taj Mahal....


© Gunther Deichmann - my first morning at the
Taj Mahal, Muslim Women at the Mosque

Click this LINK & you find a special selection from my recent trip to India, an amazing place with incredible color and people.
GD