Adil's e-travelogues

Between then and now..

2009-06-02T13:31:00.005+05:30

A lot has happened since my last blog posting, which was approximately 2 years back. I've spent an incredibly fun, and challenging year in Sydney, and have subsequently returned to Bombay to make my foray into cinema - as a director!

I continue to reel from the sights and smells that this city thrusts upon me. Still coming to terms with it all. And some part of my mind is doing somersaults as I subconsciously compare my lovely little apt in Sydney with my well located, but smelly little apt in Mumbai.

The story thus far -

Shortly after the two man show in Mumbai, my paperwork for immigration to Australia came through. I packed up my life in Mumbai, spent a couple of months with family in New Delhi, and then moved to Sydney in Aug 2007. Within a week I had found myself an unfurnished apt. ..
my parent's made a flying visit a month later
the year has gone by in a blur- I did not feel there was anything to 'write home about' - nothing out of the ordinary, nothing astounding - just the everyday existence of a young immigrant.
wonderful friends, bit of travel, most of the time spent working or looking for work

The return -

I write this in the shadow of the recent violence against Indians in Australia. It's a dark time... I have various long drawn theories about what I think of the incredibly fragile Aussie economy. It took them close to 15 years to shed the image of being a racist nation - and now they've gone and done it again. Rhetoric like - "low IQ, inbred, jobless sons of convicts.." is in the air. All they need now is a 6 month drought in their one food growing basin, and a couple of massive bush fires - and the country will be ready to declare bankruptcy, since they've been bleeding with the US on the finance markets, and tourism and education will be impacted severely because of this violence!! It was back in July 2008 that I was probably amongst the first of my friends to say that Oz was in full blown recession.

The Show - "v/s"

2007-04-29T14:18:00.001+05:30

Rio de Janiero - March 1st - April 15th, 2006

2007-02-13T09:19:00.000+05:30

Welton do carmo Ferreira

2007-02-13T09:12:00.000+05:30

Roberta Felipe

2007-02-13T09:06:00.000+05:30

2007-02-13T08:59:00.000+05:30

Old is new

2007-02-13T08:41:00.000+05:30

Oribi Gorge and Park

2006-09-30T17:24:00.000+05:30

tired of boring travelogues...? Jul 9th, 2006

2006-09-18T21:59:00.000+05:30

I apologise for the mundane ramblings about the food and the weather and the desert in exotic countries. . .

Here's something you can sink your teeth into -

I JUMPED FROM A PLANE !! ...at 10,000 feet. (with a tall German strapped to my back!!!)

The jump was, without a doubt, the most exhilarating experience of my life.

30 seconds of free fall, and 4 minutes of parachute.

Will write about it in detail later, for now - here are some stills grabbed from the video.

Cheers,

Adil

the saga in the sage brush, Jul 5th, 2006

2006-09-18T21:54:00.000+05:30

Ongiini !!

(for those of you who don't speak Owambo, that's a big HELLO to everybody.)

Chapter 5

Swakopmund is a tiny town, a short drive from Walvis Bay. It looks
like a set from Hollywood - with boutique shops, and brick paved
side-walks and mutant stunted palm trees that max out at a height of 8
or 10 feet. (apparently genetically modified by request of the city
council)

And in this tiny town the shops all close at 5. There isn't much
violence or crime; for that matter, there isn't much of anything going
on. There are some very fine dining options though - and my research
has been thorough. Ah, last night's giant fillet of fish and fresh
salad comes to mind.

I had jotted down a few thoughts about the landscape while on location -
"An unending, straight dirt road stretches out almost north-south,
till the horizon. On one side are wooden poles with electric wires,
some flat land, and then thousands of beautiful undulating hill-sized
sand dunes that stretch westward for miles. On the other side of the
road is a rail track running parallel to the road and then NOTHING.
It's flat parched land as far as the eye can see. Not a tree or bush
anywhere in a 360 deg view, no sign of life, no vegetation....."

Having made these notes - I noticed on the way home that evening, that
my observation was not entirely accurate. Sure, there was no
vegetation around where we were shooting - but a few miles down the
road there were thousands of little bushes - that looked like over
sized brocolli heads - scattered across the land on both sides. They
are called the ink-bush. Very hardy desert scrub. Thorny. And they
grow at the incredible rate of 1 millimetre per year !! So if you
drive over them, well it's just cruel.

I obtained all this cool and bizarre info from Ronald, this very cool
black guy who is a sandboarding instructor - and many time competitor
- during his days - in the world championships!! Ronald has one of
those pointy "goatee only" beards - no moustache. Hey, now that I
think about it - he looks a bit like an African Abraham Lincoln!!!
Gaunt face, skinny frame. Drives a big van (the one he uses to cart
his customers around to the dunes)

Then there is Kyle - this very interesting looking (almost native
American/ islander) - 18 yr old, local sandboarding champ - who almost
broke his arm in a terrible crash yesterday flying off the ramp. (the
attending nurse on set did a terriffic job of fixing him when he
crashed. We were all a bit concerned that there might have been spinal
injury, but in the end it was just a bunch of bruises and a cut near
the elbow caused from the zip on the jacket.) (Just before he got up I
asked him to wiggle his toes.)

(not one to be detered easily - the action director went back to
shooting on the train - and had 4 men throw themselves off a moving
train into the camera!!)

Then there is Collette. The tall, skinny German/Afrikaans white chick
who is taking care of production. She's tall and busy all day -
scurrying about, like a giraffe would, if he was in production and
knew what he was doing.

I spent half the day hanging out of a train - trying to shoot some
action sequences. Over-all it's been a vague day, and I have been in
one of my vague moods.

We have 2 days left here. Lot's of work to finish. It's going to get
hectic and tempers will be flying.

Au revoir

Till we meet again - in the rarefied atmosphere that is this
cyberspace. (I'm rambling, I need to go get a chilled beer.)

adil

sand gets in your eyes, Jul 2, 2006

2006-09-18T19:38:00.000+05:30

Chapter 3 -

I've been in the desert for 5 days now. I think. Loosing track of time.

The shooting has been hectic, but it ends at sunset everyday. I've picked up a tan you could call "well done" - something like the mutton chops I ate last night.

I would hazard a guess that there are exactly 10,803 particles per cubic metre of air, of mica or silica or whatever that shiny stuff is that whirrs around everytime the sand kicks up. We are inhaling it, eating it, absorbing it in our skin, and blinking it out of our eyes all day. It's yummy.

I can say in all modesty that I have taken some stunning landscapes of the dunes already. I came home one night and cropped and downsized one image - that's it - no corrections - it is so nice I made it into my laptop's desktop image - hey - that's an oxymoron.

The weather has been hovering at about 30 deg C, with a cool breeze the last 2 days. I wouldn't mind if it became colder for a bit.

Today after we finished, I walked alone towards the town and asked for the bus to pick me up when they caught up - it was so lovely to walk along the gravel road with the twilight sky burning off on one side, and Hendrix singing gladly in my i-pod. I couldn't have walked much more than a kilometre, but it was serene. I was missing all of you.

Chapter 4 -

Two nights back a whole bunch of us went out at night to TigerReef - a shack bar by the beach - much frequented by Angelina and Brad not many weeks back. The shack is nice, but nothing extraordinary - what is great is the location - it is at a beach head with the cold Atlantic on three sides. Half an hour after that the moon which had been doing a bright shining number decided to turn almost blood red and drop into the horizon. It was unreal. A crimson-pink crescent sinking in slowmotion into a black sea. I had another beer, we sat around the bonfire and chatted with some of the locals.

Last night after my mutton chops I caught a bit of the match at the local pub then trundled across the road to the Swakop Lodge - played a game of pool, won, analysed the ethnic gene pools in the predomonantly white - mostly German and Afrikaans - gathering in the room.(aka - checked out the chicks)

Well, that's it for now folks,

Hopefully I will have some exciting news for you in a few days.

Ciao for now,

Adil

from the interminable flying fish - Fri, Jun 30th, 2006

2006-09-18T17:14:00.000+05:30

Hello hello, and welcome back. .

I'm writing in from Swakopmund, Namibia !! (you'll want to look that
up at - http://www.go2africa.com/namibia/swakopmund-coast/ )

After a relatively uneventful stay back home (India) from mid-April
till mid-June, relative to the most wonderful and glorious month and a
half in Brazil just before that - I'm back on the road, or the plane
as the case might be, once again - all expenses paid, while making
money!! This time in far flung, exotic, ancient Africa.

We are in the last schedule of this movie project that has kept me
fed, housed, clothed and travelled over the last 11 months.

But let us not rush ahead too much.

Chapter 1 - The Adventure Begins -
So, there we were, the last 2 crew members to leave Mumbai for
Johannesburg enroute to Walvisbaai (Namibia). Everthing was fine, we
had an ok flight, 8 1/2 hours. I chatted up a lovely young lady
sitting in front of me. Turned out to be a photographer ... working in
India. . .in the film business ... and living 1/2 a km from my house!!
Ofcourse we bonded.

My fellow crew member and I plonk ourselves in the nicest cafe in the
Jo'burg airport on arrival the next morning: Dark wood n cane
furniture, and gorgeous life sized paper and wire sculptures of birds
and wilder-beests suspended overhead - as we chugged giant mugs of
cappuccino and I slammed a scrambled egg n bacon on toast. We then
sauntered over to the electronics shop and I drooled over some
digi-cams.

Then, at 10-40 we headed over to our gate for boarding - well in time
for our 11 o'clock boarding time, and definitely in time for our 11-30
flight to Walvis Bay. We reach the counter at 10-45, and the attendant
looks at the boarding pass and says "Please take a seat, this is not
your flight."

To cut a long story short - - the line for that flight ended after
10-15 mins, then the counter was empty for 20 mins, and when our
flight listing went off the overhead-display-monitor, we ran to find
out that we had somehow missed the bloody flight!!!! while sitting
infront of the damn gate!!!

Now, thankfully, we both had multiple entry South African visas. So we
came out through immigration, went to find out what hapened to our
bags, then went up to the SAA ticket counter, asked to be booked on
the next flight (same time, next day!!! - which added a whole new
dimension to the level of confusion and expense that lay ahead), there
was a fare difference of Rand 250 per ticket, then went and had a chat
with the manager to explain to her what had happened, and also to tell
her about the fare difference, she was of no help, went back to the
counter, the shift had changed, the new guy said the fare was 490 Rand
each!! The seat booking was confirmed, so I decided that we will
tackle this the next morning.

We came down to the main lobby of the airport, and there I had the
good sense to buy a phone sim card which came bundled with some money
on it. It also dawned on me, while I had already been mulling over the
somewhat distressing fact that no one had given us names, contact
numbers or hotel names of anyone or anything in Namibia - that one of
my dad's best friends is in Jo'burg. So a quick purchase and short
phone call later, we were suddenly sorted!! Uncle sent his chauffer,
we went home, Aunty fed us cake and tea - it was her birthday. Had a
nice hot shower, changed, watched the world-cup, had a drink, had some
home-made dinner, passed out, woke up, got dropped to the airport,
bought the damn ticket - paid R250 each - reached Walvis Bay after
flying over the flattest, dryest, beige-isht land I have ever seen. .
and found our luggage on arrival.

Chapter 2 - The Cradle of Civilisation -

We are shooting in the Namib desert. It is THE oldest desert in the
world. Arguably - mankind - was born here!! (Pls no "creation v/s
evolution" debates here - this a travelogue monologue)

This is raw desert - it's absolutely gorgeous - the sand and sky keep
changing colour all day. There is a crew of about 40+ Indians and
locals - we reach our little base camp at 6-30 am - while it is still
dark - and freezing. It is peak winter right now - southern hemisphere
and all, remember.

The dunes that surround our little camp of tents are HUGE. They block
off the incessant winds - but aren't much help when the dastardly East
wind kicks off. We are expecting a bit of East wind action tomorrow -
the sand gets everywhere!!

Just had a yummy dinner at the Swakopmund Brauhaus - one of the finest
restaurants in a 400 mile radius. Ate some wild game steak and some
sirloin steak, washed down with a local draft.

Ok - it's late - I have to sleep - 5am wake up - spend the day again
on top of a train - it's all quite exciting.

Ciao for now

Your intrepid wanderer in the desert -

Adil

Welcome

2006-09-18T17:08:00.000+05:30

Hi,

Welcome to my Blog.

I have a fairly wonderful life and you can read about it here. . .

Adil

ps- you can see some of my work on www.adiljain.com