Wandering Jon

Jon Brown's take on travel, photography, technology and WordPress.

StackExchange Activity

profile for jb510 on Stack Exchange, a network of free, community-driven Q&A sites

Powered by Genesis

Home » Journal » Page 4

Big news from Bali

May 6, 2014 by Jon Brown 6 Comments

Some of our friends have now received these love notes we sent from Bali. We wanted to wait for a few to be surprised but it’s time to bring everyone in on it.

bali-announcement-envelope

The note we sent from Bali reads:

Just a love note to let you know
that on April 2nd, 2014, in Ubud, Bali
we,

Jon & Elena

became engaged
to be married!

Actual wedding date and other details
to be decided.

For now, we’re happy to step into this new place
of our love and wanted to share
the joy with you all.

Blessings,
Jon & Elena

bali-announcement

Elena’s story:

Jon proposed in the middle of our 3 weeks in Bali, the very end of our 4 months of travel together. It was intimate, romantic and perfectly us.

We wanted to send out hand written, hand made paper announcements from Bali, like we had seen in India or Thailand. Almost 10 days into searching for what we needed and wanted, it turns out that hand calligraphed announcements and invites aren’t at all common or even done on the island.

So we decided to go with what was typically used, which is what you see here. We sent out quite a few announcements, hoping all would make it to their destinations. We’re still crossing our fingers as there are many unaccounted for as of yet.

But here it is, our announcement and our joy!

photoOh and there has been question about the ring! Having schemed to get me to the jewelry expo in Bangkok to buy a ring there, Jon was a bit surprised to find that the ring he thought I wanted wasn’t that ring at all, and in the end, unbeknownst to me, couldn’t buy the ring there.

Instead, and this is Elena writing now, what he got me was so spot on I’m still swooning over it.

A month and a half prior, on our first trip to Bali, we had been to a shop that sold old statues and ceremonial Balinese pieces of jewelry, sculptures etc. I had fallen in love with something that was way out of our casual shopping range, and though it was heartbreaking to walk away from, it made sense to.

On our second trip back to Bali, it was this that he spent an afternoon sneaking off to get and then surprise me with that night when he proposed. It’s gorgeous, will eventually get hung on our bedroom wall, and I’m strongly considering wearing it for our wedding. Gorgeous.

Jon’s Story:

As Elena alluded to above… I’d had plans to propose for a while. In fact I had only told Elena about the Bangkok Gem and Jewelry show because it was part of my sly plan. That original plan had us being engaged before we attended the gem fair, and us buying a ring there together.  I just told her about it ahead of time because I needed it on our travel schedule and I needed her to be the one that wanted to have it on the schedule so she had no idea it was me that wanted to go. That was an easy deception really.

Unfortunately, as seems to often be the case, the bride to be unknowingly thwarted my first two attempts. First on New Year’s when she and I were both still getting over being sick and she didn’t want to go out.  So much for the New Year’s eve khom loi lantern proposal plan…  I did finally drag her out that night to float a lantern, but it was so forced and so rushed I’d decided to try again another time.   The second attempt was on our first great road trip of Bali.  The plan had been to find somewhere beautiful in Ahmed, a beach and dive resort at the far north eastern end of Bali.  Literally a few minutes before we’d reached the turnaround point on our trip and the place I’d planned to propose… she lost her iPhone!  The resulting 36 hours is an amazing story you have to hear which I will not detail here other than that it didn’t include a proposal.

Regardless, it all worked out for the best though as it always does!

When and Where?

The few that have gotten their letters have already asked “when and where?”. For now all we’re saying is somewhere between Italy and Bali and sometime in the next year or two. More to come.

bali-announcement-quote

Filed Under: Journal, Travel

Why I don’t post my photos online anymore

January 11, 2014 by Jon Brown 7 Comments

My first trip through Thailand and Asia I was a prolific photo taker. I love those photos and that trip. Some of those photos we’re really good and I still reference back to them. At the time I posted a most of my best photos to Flickr so friends, family and strangers could enjoy them along with me. That experience was priceless and I wouldn’t take it back.

For years afterward though I would also get requests to use them from various entities. My stated policy was they were copyrighted and you needed to ask to use them. My unspoken policy was pretty simple, if someone wanted to use a photo for commercial use, they needed to pay for using it. If someone wanted to use it for non-profit use I’d make a decision on a case by case basis. A few did actually got permission to use photos like this one:

Fortunate are...

Which was used by: “National Council for Geographic Education (www.ncge.org), an non-profit, educational organization for geography teachers.

Today I was searching for photos and links to share with a friend about Haad Yuan, Koh Phangan, Thailand (my favorite place on earth). The first link that came up was this site:

stolen-haad-yuan-photo

Which stole my photo from here:
haad-yuan-koh-phangan-bamboo-boardwalk

That’s a photo I took in 2006/7 of my friends Andrea and MK walking onto the bamboo board walk just below Bamboo Hut Restaurant and headed toward Haad Yuan. Ironically, I’m actually headed to just that spot in 2 days to SEE that very same amazing Andrea and SparkCircus for the first time since that trip.

Obviously you can easily find a bunch of my fire dancer photography I took on that same trip appropriated without my consent all over the internet as well. Often in collection like this one (attributed at least, but linked, and not with my permission) https://wwwXfunzugXcom/index.php/artwork/captivating-fire-dancing-photos.html. I actually think the attribution here is because I a while ago I contacted a site with a collection much like this (I think Hong Kait) and they added the attribution and link. I suspect this site just copied that site and stripped the links.

So…  all this to say that, THIS, is why I stopped posting photos in mass online.  I keep saying that I’ll find a way to easily watermark them and upload them, but it’s such a hassle and keeps me from doing so.  I’d really like to retroactively watermark everything I uploaded to Flickr in the past, but I’ve never found a way short of manually replacing the photos.  It’s not that watermarked photos won’t get taken without permission, it’s that they’re less likely to be taken and even if they are taken there is “something” tying them back to me.  It’s not “control” but it is some small thread of connection to the source that makes them not feel quite so completely lost into the digital turbulence of the internet.

Do you care about repurposing of your images?  Do you have stories to share? Do you have a magically way to retroactively add watermarks to Flickr?

Filed Under: Journal, Photography, Travel, Travel Photography Tagged With: Copyright, Haad Yuan, Koh Phangan, Thailand

Kanom Krok oh how I love you

December 28, 2013 by Jon Brown 3 Comments

Once upon a time I was scootering around Chiang Mai just north of the moat (north of Chang Puak) early in the morning. I was just out exploring a neighborhood I’d never visited in my pre-scootering days. Somewhere lost in the sois I came across a local market. I love markets and dismounted the scooter to explore. It was full of the usual smells and sounds of Thai markets, some were inviting and others not so much! Dried fish and squid sat in baskets next to massive steel bowls full of non-decript curries and soups. Then along the side of the market I found a woman pouring milk into little divots in a hot metal plate. My life was about to change.

Kanom Krok at -Siri Wattana MarketIMG_4867Several Thai people stood waiting and I step forward to order. The woman nodded and I proceeded to wait… and wait… Finally after several trays full of these little white mysterious things were given to others by the half dozen I was handed box. I promptly plopped one in my mouth and was hooked.

I wouldn’t learn the name of Kanom Krok for years, but I would hunt for them high and low. Even when I finally successfully described them to a Thai person and learned the name of them they would remain extremely hard for me to find.

So now when I’m in Chiang Mai I go back to that market and find that same woman there cooking them whenever possible. They are my most favorite Thai breakfast worth hunting high and low for in the early morning hours.

Go check out Elena’s post on Food Practice for more on them including ingredients: Kanom Krok At The Morning Market

Here’s a little video of the making on Kanom Krok, gobble them up if you’re lucky enough to find them:

Filed Under: Food, Journal, Travel Tagged With: Kanom Krok, Market, Thailand

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • 6
  • …
  • 22
  • Next Page »