Hot Yoga & Old ideas revisited

This morning I ache. This is thanks to a session of Bikram Yoga that I was invited to yesterday morning (that is the one conducted in 40 degree heat). In a room where blinking, breathing and slight movements to adjust clothing all cause cascades of sweat, you can imagine what 90 minutes of yoga poses cause. By the end, I looked like I had spent the lesson underwater and felt like I'd done a decent length run. I did feel good for it however.

After I'd recovered sufficiently, I then went out on the hunt for something I'd seen in my RPS journal and become mildly obsessed by - the Olympus E-P1. Olympus has revisited their concept form the 60s and 70s of shrinking down camera technology into the smallest parcel possible, resulting in a high-tech tiny parcel of photographic goodness - for example the 35RC, which contained more features than cameras twice its size; the E-P1 itself is based on the micro-SLR Olympus Pen. Happily, I got my hands on one to try it instead of rushing straight to Amazon to buy.



Next to an OM-1, which is not a large film camera

And next to the tiny Olympus e-450 DSLR

So, great idea revisited; fit a fully functioning SLR into a tiny body. It feels great in the hands, is small, lightweight, balanced and has a great shutter sound (never underestimate this!). The main draw for me was manual focusing; but I was sadly disappointed by the feature. It has been so clumsily executed, it stopped me in my tracks to the cash register. In full manual mode the LCD screen (no viewfinder) zooms in to aid focus, however the screen resolution is so low it's hard to see if you've been successful. In auto-assist manual, you half depress the shutter to get an autofocus lock, then repeat the manual process to adjust. However, the screen stays zoomed in, meaning you can't see the whole frame when you take the picture - anything could have changed outside the focusing area and you wouldn't know. The only way to get the whole screen again is to release the shutter, which causes the autofocus procedure to start again. Not good. (The autofocus itself is also quite poor, not so much for its low-ish speed, but for the fact it always locked on to the wrong target for me). Things that could be easily fixed, but weren't even thought through it seems. A great idea spoilt.

The idea is fantastic, and I'd love to buy one, but I'm going to wait for Olympus to sort this out before I part with any cash.

Energy

Beach & Birds

Readjusting

I've been back in the Netherlands for two weeks now, and what an amount of readjusting it is taking. Normally I come back from holidays full of vim and vigour, but this time my trip has had the opposite effect. Having a taste of my old life in HK and seeing my friends again has made me miss it more. Quite a lot of distracting thoughts going on - I hope I can get my focus back soon!

Last Sighted in Hong Kong

It may sound unusual, but I've really missed the heat and humidity and haven't realised it till I got back here. The instant warmth the moment you step out of the door, the hot sun, the feeling like you are walking around in an over-sized steam room - sadly conditions that Holland doesn't often offer.

It's good to be back in The Big Lychee. Let the holiday commence.

Plans

Looking back at this blog so far it seems all I've produced recently is churn out a few photographs and stories about rusty old bikes that, surprisingly, turn out to be rusty old bikes and break. My life is much richer and varied than this, but it seems I can't blog without the aid of a photograph or transport-related mishap. Can I manage to create a readable blog post without these crutches?

This week I will be going off on a long-overdue and badly needed holiday to visit my friends in Hong Kong, with a side-trip to Hanoi thrown in for good measure. I've not had a proper holiday since I moved here back in October (Christmas doesn't count, everyone knows that), and my brain would quite like some time to stop from and take a breather from all that's happened to me in the past year. I'm really hoping that this break will energise me again and bring me out of the routine trap I seem to be all-too-happily falling into (that's the trouble with comfortable places).

Gigs, old friends, nights out in SOHO (and, god forbid, Lan Kwai), beaches, more Indochine and most importantly sun and heat are the ingredients for the proposed pick-me-up. If I look in my copy of the Cultural Revolution rural medicine classic the Barefoot Doctor's Manual it suggests a remedy of 'Xiao yao wan' three times daily, three qian per dose. However, not knowing exactly what that is, and more worryingly the book not explaining it either, I think I'll stick with my own prescription.

Beach

I decided to make hay while the sun shone, and braved a trip to the seaside despite the fairly stiff North Sea breeze. Still - it was good weather for kite surfers!