Folks, for now, as you may  have noticed, I’m not doing a lot over here at frangipani 2.0 now that I’m living in such a slow and quiet part of the world. I did have high hopes but you know, facebook makes it so easy to stay in touch with people and so I find myself there more than here.

I’m not going to discontinue this blog by any means, and certainly if things get more exciting in my life then I will have reason to post pics and stories, but for now I’d suggest – if you wanna stay in touch – that you visit me at www.martinecotton.com (my official photography site) or at the Martine Cotton Photography Facebook Page. Things are a lot more active over there.

Oh, and people who arrived here looking for my old manholes of Japan galleries, I’m sorry but I deleted the gallery some time back. Seems I get truckloads of referrals from other sites linking to the old manholes gallery. I’m sorry to disappoint you but you were sucking up way too much of my bandwidth.

Hope you’re all well, my friends!

2010 is almost upon us. So it’s time to look back at the year that was and reflect. Or so I’m told.

I like that life is gently guided through cycles and stages by seasons, lunar cycles, calendar months, changing years….. I’ve always loved December in Australia. Didn’t mind it in Japan either, but it was never the same being COLD! December in Australia is full of that vibe – the shimmering potential of the summer holiday season and the coming new year. Heat, watermelon, mango’s, school summer holidays, parties, BBQ’s, going down the creek, secret santa gifts, surfing santa….. it’s a lot of fun.

Anyways, it’s been 10 months since my return to the Lucky Country, and yes, it’s been quite a trip (in every possible sense of the word). I am currently the healthiest and resultingly the happiest I’ve been in years, and (in an interesting juxtaposition), also the heaviest I have ever been. Ha.

So what’s been going on since my last editorial visit to Frangipani 2.0?

Well, Sigsy & Keisuke came for a visit from Tokyo and we got all arty in the park under a full moon….

and we visited a croc farm… AMAZING place.

We wandered around the lovely gorge on a DREAMTIME tour with a member of the KukuYalanji as he explained the rainforest to us.

We ground up ochre and painted ourselves…..

We visited beaches in other places and dined at great restaurants and soaked up the full moon some more.

When they left, I got back to work. I love being a photographer, so many unexpected experiences present themselves. One day I found out at 9 am that I would be going up in a microlight at 11 am to photograph another microlight. It was really quite special – once the initial fear wore off, and here I show you some of the unadjusted out-takes.

Interesting challenge, trying to photograph from one of these hang-gliding motorbikes… I couldn’t wear a helmet because the space was so constrictive I wouldn’t have been able to get to my viewfinder.

I have been getting some great photo work. Various magazines and whatnot. Below is a shot I took for a green mag in Sydney. There are some incredible properties around this region that specialise in rare and endangered tropical edible plants. This was a selection that a property owner gathered from around his rainforest that morning. Permaculture and plant/animal biodiversity-themed farming are in widespread practice here.

Been meeting some great people. I don’t get out much so it’s been slow-going in the meeting people stakes. This lovely fella is a multi-talented artist who recently opened his own cafe-gallery in the main street. I took this picture for the newspaper and he liked it so much that he is making me of of his funky signature bangles. Yay. I visit the cafe most days for some coffee and company. Tres chic, tres cool, tres oasis of inspiration and counter-pubculture-redneckism. Much needed in this part of the world.

Oh. And I turned 42. Loved the return to a SUMMERTIME birthday. We kept it simple. A late afternoon picnic in the park with family and a few friends, a dusk BBQ, barefoot cricket, kids, cake & candles and beer. Check out the view. Spesh. Truly.

Here are some of the new peeps in my life. The lovely Upasana and Kimmy. Me in the middle looking excited that anyone showed up at all.

Night fell. Candles were lit.

Kids were excited.

It was a lovely, lovely day.

I plan to spend Christmas with my bro’s family, then get up at 6 am the next morning for a big roadtrip south to attend the Woodford Folk Festival. After that I’ll float around Brisbane a bit, the fly to Adelaide for Tracey and Ash’s wedding (I’ll be photographing), then FINALLY visit the Melbourne crew for a few days before flying back to Brisbane, jumping back in the car and driving north again. Hopefully when I return I will have formulated an exit strategy.

Folks, I hope that all is well with you and yours, and I wish you an awesome Christmas and a fantastic New Year. 2010, bring it on.

Oh, and go and see AVATAR 3D. Tomorrow. Seriously.

Not sure I ever shared the video that Irish filmmaker Richard Grehan made to accompany the photobook I made with the outstandingly creative whirling dervish Kate E Deeming last year in Shibuya. (I wrote about it a little last year) That was such an amazing night.

Filmed by Richard Grehan, Music Douglas Lee.

In April 2008 Performance Artist/Filmmaker Kate E. Deeming created the character “Body Earth”, as a physical representation of Mother Earth. She then crawled on hands and knees in Shibuya, at Hachiko Crossing, Tokyo, (the busiest crossing in the world) in between the pedestrians as a way of drawing attention to the missing consideration of the physical human dimension in all of our chats about “this environmental crisis”. Martine Cotton, photographer and Richard Grehan, filmmaker, joined her on this exploration to document the ‘performance’. The photos contained in this volume were not staged, but taken documentary style over the course of the Saturday evening. They serve as a potent reminder to our personal responsibility towards the nurturance of the planet. Created in response to Earth Day.

The book is available for purchase at BLURB. You know you wanna….

**A percentage of the proceeds of this book will be donated to the Glasgow Women’s Library

]]> http://martinecotton.com/frangipani/2009/09/17/the-body-of-earth/feed/ 3 http://martinecotton.com/frangipani/2009/09/14/my-not-so-new-home/ http://martinecotton.com/frangipani/2009/09/14/my-not-so-new-home/#comments Mon, 14 Sep 2009 12:15:09 +0000 Martine http://martinecotton.com/frangipani/?p=876

This is the little town I moved to. It’s a pretty place. I’m not going to say its name because half the town run google vanity notifications for whenever there is a mention of the place and I don’t want my personal blog to pop up on office monitors all over town.

It’s a funny little boutique resort town and there is this hilarious idea that it’s a millionaires playground, and that everyone around here is loaded. That, unfortunately, couldn’t be any further from the truth. Unless you’re in hospitality or boats, it’s no easy task to find a decent job. The average pay – regardless of your education or experience – is between 35 – 50 000. Even for managers. Locals say that it’s the price you pay for living in paradise.

It’s a pretty typical small town in most ways. There is a strong, lively and political community here. The barflies hold court at either one of the two local pubs and talk about everything and everyone and get all fired up about stuff. It seems barflies rule the roost here. There is an insane amount of gossip. And no such thing as six degrees of separation, naturally. Here it’s one or two. I think that’s why I love True Blood so much – it’s set in a tiny town where everyone knows everyone else’s business and everyone is a little nutty. Same as here. And while it can get mighty bitchy at times, there is also a lovely sense of family and protectiveness when things go really bad for someone. Touchingly so.

As an antidote to Tokyo, I couldn’t have picked a more perfect place. I live a quiet, peaceful, hermetic existence – I walk on the beach most mornings and evenings, hang out with my nephews and niece when they are free – visit the odd friend every so often. It’s a great place to sort my health and my head out. Money has been an ongoing problem, the work comes and goes like the tides. Being a freelance photographer /event organiser / online marketer is fraught with uncertainty. But it’s the price you pay for freedom .

As my health & energy levels return, so do my motivation and inspiration. I reckon the ongoing rapid rise of these two integral elements will do wonders to improve my work opportunities. It’s all good. Well, it’s all GOING TO be good.

People have been requesting pictures of the apartment. So here they are. Enjoy.

The site is – at this point – still full of bugs, which is to be expected with the import of such a massive database from one system to another…. I’m working on it, but in the meantime, let me know if you find anything askew.

Looks like the green light in my personal recharge monitor is finally showing again. Awesome.

8 months since I left Tokyo. I think I can say they have been the weirdest 8 months of my life.

Culture shock. Lifestyle shock. Health shock. Woah.

And to be frank, I haven’t been handling it real well. Things have been quite bleak though I was determined to keep up a brave, positive face to family and the alter-universe at facebook. Naturally, I haven’t wanted to blog at all. But that’s all changing. I guess all this healthy living is finally paying off and I can feel the fire in my belly coming back.

Part of the reboot includes the import of 6 years worth of blog posts from frangipani.info (and the now completely unfamiliar and unusable Movable Type software) into the nice and friendly new home at martinecotton.com and a very cool wordpress format using the fabulous themes at Graph Paper Press. I plan to start blogging a couple of times a week again, get the personal creative juices flowing again.

I haven’t been doing much photography for myself since I started doing newspaper and real estate photography – but I think that’ll start charging.

Despite having my gorgeous family here (as you can see in this entry’s photo’s), I haven’t met too many like-minded folk here and as I no longer drink (!!!) it’s been doubly hard to get out amongst it. Just call me Hermit. Anyway, plans are afoot for a move to Melbourne early next year – or sooner if I can save the cash.

In the meantime, I shall continue to LOVE the beach and the jungles and the simple, peaceful and oh-so-healthy life I am leading.

Evie

It’s nice to be blogging again.

Oh, and the comments should be working on this blog so feel free to say hi.

282/365. April 11. Time for a more regular old-skool post.

I took this photo this morning at the Combined Club where I was having a work meeting while the clouds rolled in and the boats passed by. My little Lumix is a lovely camera, though I get frustrated at not having more control. But dem’s the breaks when you choose to carry a nice light point and shoot around instead of the big SLR kit. Anyways….

Almost 2 months since I left Tokyo. Feels like a lifetime ago already. People have been asking me just what I’ve been up to, how I’m really enjoying it. I’m happy to report that I *am* happy here.

I’ve been getting up early and going for longs walks/runs – first around the mountains near my bro’s place, then the beach and headland once I moved closer to town. The weather has been incredible – magical, the kind of blue skies so blue that resort photographers don’t need to retouch their pictures, and often not more than about 30 by day and cool enough for light summer blankets at night. All this nature, big wide skies….. It makes a jaded Tokyo girls heart sing, I tell ya. It’s been good getting on top of my health – turns out I have a pretty hefty Iron & B12 deficiency and it’s nice to work on all that in an English speaking environment so I can read the support material and ask the questions and understand the answers. So many things I am enjoying about NOT BEING in Japan anymore. And yet….

I see so many Asians around here (massive Asian population here, well, actually not here – but in Cairns an hour south), and I stare and stand close to listen to them in the hope they might be Japanese. Sometimes they are, and I stalk them with a wistful, nostalgic sensibility. Amusing how much I can understand, yet when I try to open my mouth to speak with them I usually have about 3 false starts. The Japanese food on offer here – even when made by Japanese staff – is different. The onegiri’s are not as fresh or tasty and the soba and udon is very average. The tempura is made using a strange batter, heavy and tasteless. I don’t understand why. It is so sad, I truly miss the flavours.

My work is pretty crazy. I am an event coordinator for the towns annual 10 day Carnivale, it’s full of politics and local characters and history and is way more work that the 20 hours a week I signed on for. I haven’t had a lot of time for photography – but I am getting some great work, nevertheless. I am a weekend photographer for the local newspaper – The Mossman & Port Douglas Gazette which is the weekly local newspaper, part of the News Ltd conglomerate. The editor there welcomed me with open arms and loves my photography and is throwing my name to anyone who needs photos, which is why I just did a food & portrait shoot for Vogue Entertaining & Travel Australia. Cool, huh. I am also getting real estate and the odd portrait job around the joint, did a young mum and her 3 week old baby yesterday – the pic’s are for the kids’ obasan who lives in Sendai. Yep, Daddy is half-nihonjin. I am working towards building the business so that once the Carnivale is over on May 31st, I can just jump straight into being a full time photographer (yeah, I know, I may be dreaming there). There is a lot of work here for photographers: hundreds of resorts and real estate agencies, and a massive wedding & events industry, there are not enough photographers to keep up with it all in the high season (which starts in May and runs till about November). Plus I’m helping my brother out with his real estate business, and once carnivale is over I’ll be his Media/PR person to help get the properties for sale out there for buyers.

The locals up here in the north are a funny bunch, they do take some getting used to and I do feel like a fish out of water at times. Or maybe like a rabbit trapped in headlights…. Big & loud & straight-shooting & blunt & super friendly, it took me aback initially, after living in Tokyo where eye-contact is to be avoided at all costs. I haven’t made a lot of friends here yet, but they are starting to come out of the woodwork. Getting used to epithets like darlin’, bub, sweetie, sugar, honeybunch etc from complete strangers – it initially made me chuckle, now it just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. I think I like it. And I’m pretty sure I’m going to like it here.

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