On Assignment: St. Barths II

Thanks very much for all of the notes of good wishes and birthday salutations. It was a busy but overall good day down here in paradise... I'm not sure that's an apt name, but its what the cabbie told me when I arrived from the airport. St. Barths really is an interesting spot, and is notable within the Caribbean not only for its fabulous wealth, restaurants, beaches, and boutiques, but because the island is very white. Unlike any other Caribbean island, St. Barths has a huge caucasian population (relative to its tiny actual population of somewhere between six to eight thousand. For those of you who may have traveled a lot in the tropics, you'll know what I mean when I say its weird to not see any black faces. I don't mean weird/good or weird/bad... just weird.

I spent most of yesterday walking around Gustavia, the largest town on the very small island, and stopping by shops and restaurants. Some of them had been called ahead of time and were expecting a somewhat pasty, white dude who probably speaks little to no French to nudge in their door and ask to take pictures. Several others had not, and I spent a lot of my birthday "lost in translation." Having to resort to hand signals, facial expressions, and the like is actually something that ends up making me happy. When I'm actually on vacation, getting lost and wandering about in a place where I don't know the language is one of my favorite things to do. It's only after you are truly, monumentally lost somewhere do you begin to feel like you know a bit about it. But anyway, I never got lost in Gustavia due to a combination of a lot of friendly help from the Charles, the general manager at the Hotel St. Barths Isle de France, where I'm staying, and the fact that Gustavia isn't big enough to be lost in.

By the days end I had crossed off more than half of my grocery list of travel shooting and enjoyed some good food and very nice views. I narrowly avoided 3 giant downpours, and passed time between each talking with locals who told me some great stories about the St. Barths days before ultra posh hotels and boutiques lined the quaint streets. I ended the birthday on an ugly note, however, when late last night I got pretty sick from something I had eaten most likely at dinner. Not fun. Puking never is. I feel better this morning after some rest and a lot of water.

The girlfriend accused me of "whining" in my last post -- oh woe is me, I have to spend my birthday on a tropical island filled with beautiful French women (I didn't actually add that part before but I think I will now) and get paid for it -- and in response let me be a little more up beat to round out part 2 (not that I think I was that whiny). The battery problem has been one at all. I was 99% sure it wouldn't be, but I don't like to leave things to chance. Getting around the island has been a total pain, but I've figured out how to group things together and am just about down with the rest of the list, including some items that I found on my own. Due to the periodic rain storms, I've been able to begin editing through what will be 1000+ frames on this assignment, and will be transmitting my work back to The New York Times Magazine before I even leave the island.

Lastly, my friend Brian exclaimed to me yesterday after reading part 1 of this post, "the whole world knows you forgot your battery charger to a shoot on a remote island." Yeah, I guess; or at least the 15 bored people who read that post do. I just wanted to reiterate that this blog, especially now that it may be getting more eyes on it, was never meant to be anything but a document for myself about what I'm doing, and what I'm trying to do to work and shoot better. I forget shit all of the time. I have bad shoots. I accept work that I'm not interested in just for the money. I do all of that shit... just like pretty much everyone else I know. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm hoping to create this blog as a place for me to be real with myself about my work. Good, bad, ugly, this is freelance photography, or at least this is my version. I hope that I can continue to write about things in that spirit. And on that note, its just about time for me to shoot at the spa.

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