There is a tiny town called Labu near Nilai. Labu is pumpkin in the Malay language. Not surprisingly, the town’s entrance is graced with a big pumpkin. Photographed this earlier in the rainy evening, on the way back from KLIA. I carved the Jack-O’-Lantern with the tablet-powered Photoshop Touch. Happy Halloween!
New Paris Saloon and Klinik Kasut Osman in Ipoh Garden, Ipoh, Perak (circa 2008).
Traditional shops everywhere are being phased out by changing trends and diminishing demand. The neighbourhood barber, the family-run grocer, the ‘hole-in-the-wall’ newspaper vendor, the medical hall, the roadside cobbler; to name a few.
Many such entities have already vanished silently, without a visual record. While we can’t stop change, we can do one thing. We can document the remaining ones for future generations.
“Be the change that you wish to see in the world” ~ Mahatma Gandhi
Street photography need not be about people alone. If you are uncomfortable photographing uncomfortable humans, there is a wonderful world of inanimate things. Be it urban decay, graffiti or urbex (urban exploration), visually-interesting objects are to be found at every turn.
One of my favourite subjects are the various wares sold on the streets in the capitals of South-East Asia. While exploring Jakarta (Indonesia) on foot, I came across a street with several shanty tyre shops. Some were in rickety huts, many under trees. I like how this open-air vendor arranged his tyres and rims like a racing pit stop.
