One of the songs ringing through my head at the moment is 'Gone Away' by Rich Robinson. For me, this tune just has a nice kind of laid-back rhythm juxtaposed with a gorgeous melody.
Looking forward to seeing the Rich Robinson Band at Warsaw Klub Progresja on Sunday.
In the picture above, Dieter Uchtdorf (the Second Counsellor to President Monson in the LDS First Presidency) and his wife behind him are almost being 'mobbed', as they shake hands with and sometimes embrace mainly Polish and American well-wishers after an LDS (Mormon) Conference at the Marriott Hotel in Warsaw yesterday.
I'm not LDS, but I'm interested in the sociology of religion, in particular, LDS conversion process in the local context of Warsaw, Poland. Regarding this, my three main areas of interest concern how pre-LDS (non-) religious experience; and LDS religious and socio-cultural attractions may prompt Polish converts (recruits) towards joining the LDS. Tied in with this, I'm interested in how convert (recruit) rational agency; local LDS branch influence; and the wider Polish socio-cultural background may impact on LDS recruitment to baptism.
However, yesterday, all that I was after capturing with my photographs was the flux of excitement that some Polish LDS members (mainly from the Warsaw Wolska and Racławicka branches in my pictures) felt during their post-Conference contact with President Uchtdorf, who for them as LDS, is an Apostle of the Lord.
Of course, in LDS culture, great emphasis is placed on the nurturing of family life, and LDS leaders are always happy to see LDS families with young children:
In the picture below, President Uchtdorf seems to have stopped to have an animated discussion with someone, as other people listen attentively:
Again, you can see the smiles of intense excitement on LDS member faces in the background on the picture below:
As far as was humanly possible, Dieter Uchtdorf and his wife tried to greet more or less everybody individually on their way out of the Conference Hall, no mean achievement given that they'd just been two of the main speakers at a 2-hour Conference:
The picture below shows the general flux of things after the Conference, to get the shots I did, I had to stand on one of the Conference room chairs:
The final pictures below focus on Mrs Uchtdorf interacting with some Polish female LDS converts:
With this kind of pictorial ethnography, I was trying to visually capture, at a deep emotional level, what this occasion meant for Polish LDS converts.
Strange (but nonetheless interesting) concert at the massively peculiar Sała Kongresowa, last night. First, no matter how I tried, I just got blurred surrealist (but nonetheless, for me, interesting) pictures of the gig:
What I like about these pictures is that they almost deify Ms. Amos in her long white gown-type outfit, especially the one below:
Just exploring possibilities with the camera of a new mobile at the moment, and I guess the results clearly show this:
Now, what about the concert itself? Well, out of curiosity, I'd been intending to see her for years, and last night, I finally got round to doing this. Really glad that some good person videod 'A Sorta Fairytale' as some pleb stopped me doing this (not that mine would've turned out okay, anyway). Yes, you can see that Tori nailed this tune:
However, what was perhaps the most anthropologically interesting part of the evening's entertainment came when Ms. Amos gave a kind of passionate speech about the need to nurture 'gay pride' in of all places, Warsaw itself. From here, she then took an expletive swipe at the patriots who burnt the rainbow-coloured arch at Plac Zbawiciela about a year or so ago. This all kind of fed into her own take/version of 'Nights in White Satin':
Really well done to whoever has caught this, as it's a real golden moment of ethnography: on one hand, from the recording itself, someone seems to be weeping with emotion, so the leftist-type ideological message may be deeply felt and meaningful for him/her (or maybe it's the song itself that prompts this response). However, on another hand, Plac Zbawiciela translates as something like the 'Square of the Saviour', and the rainbow arch (with all its politically 'correct' gay fashion symbolism) is incredibly insulting for many Poles, especially as it faces one of Warsaw's most beautiful churches in the 'Saviour's Square'. Thus, in view of the fact that many Poles still profess to be Catholic and associate this with their national identity, poor Ms. Amos may've been (hopefully unwittingly) engaging in what is commonly referred to as cultural imperialism while preaching her Western politically 'correct' ideology to an Eastern (maybe Central) European audience. Still, I guess that some of the young Poles were there for this kind of thing, and it's maybe this kind of thing that makes Ms. Amos a bit of a character as well as being an incredibly talented musician.
Back with the music, what was my favourite tune of the night? Well, that would have to be 'Pretty Good Year':
Again, well done to whoever filmed this, helping others to remember an interesting evening's entertainment, although Tori Amos is not exactly my cup of tea (but well worth seeing all the same).
Saw this picture of a goldfish bowl in a lawyers' office today, and, at first, I was inclined to like it. However, after someone had pointed out how sad the goldfish looked, I started to think twice about the picture.
Guess this is an 'almost picture', as I tried to catch this crow (I think??) standing like royalty on top of this streetlight near metro Gdanski in Warsaw. Still, I was pretty pleased with the outcome of getting the crow flying off the streetlight.
On our way back from Innisfallen Island and Ross Castle towards county Cork, my friend Dave Dealy told me to get out of the car to take a picture of the famous Lakes in county Kerry (above). Unfortunately, it was fast approaching sundown so the place looks a bit bleak rather than spectacular (as I'm sure it would've looked great during the sunny afternoon).
This mobile shot was taken after the Yes concert at Warsaw Sała Kongresowa last Monday, as I was heading towards the central metro (underground) station at about 10.20pm. I think the picture shows that there's still a bit going on in Warsaw at this time, even on weekdays. But what drew me to take a shot of this was the bearded guy on the billboard in the background, as his image just seemed to illuminate the whole scene.
