Around Sydney

Yesterday I decided to spend the day in sydney, trying to bring out some of that skill with a camera I pretend to have. I started at Wynyard station, generally taking photos of anything and everything I could see that looked interesting.
This photo I thought kinda made a funny combination of olden innovation and modern necessity.

Moving on, I wandered towards the westpac bank, where i was quickly asked to move on by the security guard. Evidently the tree pictured below was my secret way into the bank.

After taking more deep and meaningful photos I ended up in Hyde park, watching tourists taking photos of the fountain. I tried several times through the day to take decent photos of people, and i ended up making a funny observation – as soon as I began using a flash again, people became defensive, and clearly didnt want to be photographed. This lead to me turning it off, which made people relax – I only got a few worried “Is he a pervert” stares without the flash. I caught this nice photo in the boulevard in Hyde Park.

Walking from the Sydney Hospital towards wynyard again, I came across a war memorial with some flowers left for soldiers who had recently been killed in action. Only one set had a card with it, which I have added below.


After this, I ended up walking through George St Mall for a moment, bought a copy of the big issue off a man on a street corner, who was obviously trying to make a go of his situation. I’ve not got a lot of money myself at the moment, but what I do have left these days increasingly goes towards things that are probably more worthy than random computer junk.
From here, i went to Mountain Designs (not to be confused with ‘mountain equipment’ a few doors down) and visited Luke, whom I’ll be moving in with in jindabyne. After looking at all the goodies I could blow my next pay on, I wandered in the direction of Darling Harbour, where the Greek festival was on. Gorgeous girls and handsome guys all dressed in immaculate blue and white were all over the place, and having a great time of it clearly.
I’ll include some photos here of the parade I managed to catch.

This guy was obviously keen enough to have his photo taken, he waved earlier to get my attention, and as I lined up the shot, he flashed me a quick thumbs up.

After another short walk, I ended back up at the inverted fountain – something which has captivated me for some time.
I stood here a while, and ended up watching some little children play ‘king of the hill’ on the dome in the center.

There was another performer blowing HUGE bubbles with many kids clustered around. At first they were trying to pop them, but soon the game changed to ‘avoid the bubbles’ when he started blowing bubbles almost two meters long, snaking in the air towards the crowd.

After watching this for a few minutes, I went to visit Scott who works in EB Games at Darling Harbour. After watching him get swamped by customers, I bought lunch, which was $17, and paid in 50c pieces. Poor cashier girl kinda had a ‘what the eff’ look on her face when I poured them on the counter. Afterwards I walked back over the other side, past the aquarium and up past the piers, back towards sydney, and came across this fantastic building. I love the design here, and this photo kinda struck me as one of the ‘artist impressions’ you find in architecture firms. I think there must have been a very happy architect at the end of all this, the building looks fantastic, and definitely the sort of place I’d want to put a business office.

Across the street from this building was another similarly artistic building, in tones of grey and black, with vivid orange highlights. I really liked this building, mainly because its a simple and clever way of bringing together these clashing colours and putting brightness and light back into a dark structure.

I really liked this courtyard, it looked like it had been built from a scrambled lego box, with alternating patterns and colours.

Further into the city again now, nearing wynyard station for the second time, I wandered past an alleyway, and of course, alleyways being the backstreets of the city, I thought I’d be adventurous and wander down to see what i could see.

I found this photo while stepping over a dead rat which had been crushed by a passing car, while holding my breath from the stench of urine.
So, I thought, this is it, the peak of my photograpic career. Standing in rat guts, in an alleyway stinking of piss, taking photos of bricks and windows.
The subject itself interests me – its an old building which has been overgrown by a modern building, a brick and mortar original dwarfed by a cement facaded monster.
The lighting here was also very interesting. Being the afternoon, the sun was coming from the west, so this wall (on the easterly side of the building) was only lit by dappled reflections which had bounced from window to window to come to rest at the bottom of the alleyway.

From here I walked back to circular quay, watching street performers along the way, people playing didgeridoo to a dance beat, an infectious, catchy tune, to a young boy playing fantastic guitar and softly singing, who had a pile of coins in front of him (which I ended up adding to – he was that good), to my favourite act of the day, a performer swallowing a balloon, then a sword, all while juggling flaming torches five meters up in the air. Extraordinary stuff, and looking at his donations bag at the end of the show he cleaned up the crowds wallets too by the look of it! Another young man playing classical guitar – very serious, very careful and very very skilled. From here I dared not to head to the Rocks, because although its one of sydneys oldest areas, I also find it a little too overdone. I knew that I’d be pushing my imagination here to take good photos, so I preferred to come back another day with the express purpose of shooting the area.
Back to the Queen Victoria Building to bludge more internet off McDonalds, before catching a train home late in the afternoon.
I’ll Upload the entire set of photos here in a while as a gallery, each has its own story, but too many and to long to talk about each here.

For now
– Keeping the hollow promises -
Pip