Yes the Turtlejacket Tri-Eye is heavy, but it is super cool and useful I have no reason not to carry it everyday, so instead of just customizing it with masking tapes and eraser, I made a holster for it in the name of manliness. Yup, the jean looks cool too, tell me what you think. I wish I had a Bond girl model to take this photo to get that extra sexy thigh holster look.
I planned the holster on my Traveler's Notebook for a week, it went from minimalist design to complicated snaps and buckles, but eventually I decided to make it as simple as possible coz Tri-Eye is cool by itself already.
The result is a simple holster made from one piece of leather, featuring a metal hook and a belt loop. Took me just an hour to make, but the planning was 10 times longer.
The first time I saw Turtleback's Turtlejacket Tri-Eye I couldn't make out what it was. It looked like a combination of multi-lens 8mm camera and old movie reel, I immediately fell in love with the look, just that it was too expensive as an iPhone case. I kept coming back to look at it and wondered how it works, I mean I couldn't make the purchase by looking at its online shop, I had to touch and feel if it was right for me.
Smartphone photography is unstoppable, the technology convenience and convergence only means more and more people will take the advantage of improving smartphone sensors and social network connectivity, leaving behind their digital camera. We took a lot more (crap) photos when the digital camera age came, now we take and *share* photos like crazy. One major movement is that, with smartphone photography, we seem to take it more slowly and enjoy the process of tweaking photos with dozens of apps before posting with nice captions.
Turtleback was probably overwhelmed by orders so they were out of stock for a while, Tri-Eye is now back in stock and I'm happy to have gotten one. You know me, I like to customize things (one reporter said 'you are the type who wouldn't carry a thing not being customized by yourself' and I agreed). Well it was simple, I just used masking tapes from MT and Cavallini and I was happy.
(dinner with boss)
Tri-Eye has a full aluminium body, the rotating wheel allows you to carry 3 different lenses at the same time. I found myself playing with fisheye (x0.33) mostly, because of the dramatic effect it creates. Wide angle (x0.7) allows you to capture more in compact spaces, Tele (x1.5) I don't use much, so I plan to get a macro lens somewhere to replace it.
Yesterday I took a Korean friend to Mido cafe in Yau Ma Tei, we had a nice sharing there after lunch hour. A beautiful old place to visit, nice Hong Kong dishes, but don't expect smiles from the staff over there, which is one thing they need to improve a lot.
(Staircase, Mido cafe, Hong Kong)
Switching to fisheye on my Turtlejacket, I was able to capture this narrow and steep staircase with details and patterns I couldn't see.
(Old cashier, Mido cafe, Hong Kong)
I guess staff over there are still not used to being photographed despite it being a popular tourist spot, whenever I pulled out my iPhone, they'd either look away or flocked. A little more courtship may help, but I was there just for a short while, perhaps next time.
(Star Ferry, Hong Kong)
One of the reason why I love Tri-Eye is that you get to play with different lenses inexpensively and portable. Yes it is full metal and relatively heavy but it is still a great bargain for me because of all the fun it provides. Yup, fisheye photography is a thing I will explore more, my aim is not to make you bored by my twitter/Instagram fisheye images :)
One thing I think Turtleback must improve is the accessibility of the iPhone on/off button. The hole is so narrow and deep, you will need a flat finger tip or long nail to turn on/off the phone. My solution is to steal my son's eraser, cut off a 10mm width x 4mm depth x 3mm height block, tape it to the iPhone on/off button before inserting it to the jacket. It works perfectly and I can even feel the eraser's cushioning effect. My son found out the missing corner of his eraser, I would be the only one in the house doing that, he drew a question mark on the eraser and gave me a note :)
Here's one more customization I'll do on my Tri-Eye: a two-tone leather holster with cool looking flap. Well, you can use straps to carry Tri-Eye on your neck, but it is way too heavy for my neck. I prefer a holster, perhaps it is a man thing I like, to pull and shoot. A few ideas of the cutting is drawn on my notebook, just need to steal a few hours to experiment and make it happen. I already feel happy about it, will tell you more. In the mean time, enjoy an interview with famous Instagramer @Zirosou Mr. Sohjirou Yamagata from Hong Kong.
We had a great time with Pony Brown's president, illustrator and the translator when they visited our Korean Stationery fair and met their fans in Hong Kong. I was particularly happy to be able to chat with as many fans as possible, they all love the postive messages and cuteness of the main character. One of the fan was upsetted by something this very morning, but when she found out Pony Brown's presence and came, she felt way better. That's why we love to bring positive energy and pleasure through these events.
Contrary to many's perception, the person behind this cute character is a tall handsome hard-bodied guy Mr. Oh. You can pretty much see the similarity of him and the character, cool from the outside, bright and positive but sometimes shy within. We were expecting him to just give out signatures on postcards but for each of the fans whom came, he drew something special and worked very hard in details to make every stroke counts. I believe fans were not disappointed, at all!
After the event today, we've brought the Pony Brown team to a seafood restaurant in Lei Yue Mun (鯉魚門) tonight and enjoyed a great time chit chatting. What a lovely evening, nice weather too.
Last year when I visited Seoul, I found out their project with a Korean music instrument brand called Countess. Upon Countess' request they made these lovely Ukulele prototypes! They are finally available in music instrument stores in Korea now. Excited about this cross over with music, Mr. Oh brought along 2 Ukulele so that we can gift them to Pony Brown fans through a small competition.
So far, Pony Brown is the most successful Korean brand we've brought to Hong Kong, I hope in the future we will have a lot more collaborations and bring more happiness, no matter how tiny, to many.
Realizing the hard work Mr. Oh and the team went through.... you know what, for the past few weeks they've only slept for 2 hours every single day, working hard on projects, so we admire a lot of the Korean speed and dedication really..... last night I decided to make personal gift to them, leather jackets for Cricket lighters, embossed with "PONY BROWN" and "city'super stationery" on them. Took me hours to design and made, until 4am, but I'm happy that it was a perfect gift for them. Looking forward to more PONY BROWN stuffs!
Tomorrow our friends from Korea will come to help out on a Korean Stationery Fair in our shops. I'm especially happy that Pony Brown's designer Mr. Oh and president Ms. Lee will come and meet our customers and press.
The significance of this fair to me is that it was foresaw 4 years ago and it became a reality finally. At that time, I asked myself why we had no sourcing from Korea at all, nothing. They have great products and reasonable price and why nobody ever built a network to get those great stuffs for our customers. Since then a chain of events happened, many failed attempts and empty promises, poor communication due to language and culture differences, nothing worked for one and a half year.
I remember thinking, "it is impossible we cannot do it, it will work especially when everybody says it won't, I will get enough good stuffs and make a Korean Stationery Fair happen." Well, thanks to those who care and those who don't care enough, they put in efforts afterall, this is happening now, not as elaborated as I imagined but it has come true and I appreciate all the small moves. So what happened between nothing and now has a lot to do with tenacity and working out of ones boundaries, which I will share in a talk I will give to a university in Taiwan this year.
If you are in Hong Kong, come meet Pony Brown people this Friday evening and Saturday afternoon where I will also be there in Festival Walk LOG-ON store. There are these 3 rubber stamps for you to stamp on your notebook, they are made specially for this event and for these 2 days only. Don't miss it.
BTW, last Saturday was a great and efficient day I spent with my kid. Bought him a pair of cheapest possible shoes, painted in color he loves, I'm yet to paint a crazy chicken on it though. It was a creative day too, we explored different media for his homework. I even had time to clean up my fountain pens and made a few sketches on my Traveler's Notebook.
I was enjoying a research evening walk in Shanghai a few months ago, in an area called Shanghai Old Street (上海老街). Carrying a Canon F1 was painfully heavy, I brought along a 85mm f1.2 lens and that added weight, my body screamed "What the fxxk, you are carrying this weight for the whole day and you haven't shoot a thing".
Well, when the moment was right, I saw a lovely socializing chess game going on in a public area and I pulled out my camera. They were so happy laughing, one guy lost and another guy jumped in to the game, so I took photos of the scene and everything around it. Happy moment for me, got to remember how they enjoyed their game and how I should enjoy my own gameS.
I've been using Wotancraft's Ranger bag for 25 days and it is only now suitable to give you this review from my personal experience. My Ranger was with me all the time during my business trip to Taipei and Shanghai, as well as daily uses after I came back to Hong Kong, in rainy days, hiking and beach side BBQ, etc.
The soul behind Wotancraft is James, whom started researching about 5 years ago to create a camera bag he would use. I had a great time visiting James and chatted about his creation for about an hour. The name and logo of the company bears a resemblance of the Warcraft role-playing game logo, but James never knew about it when he named the company. Wotancraft means in every sense a desire to achieve perfection in craftsmanship. "Wotan" the old high German form of "Odin", is a major god in Norse mythology who is associated with battle, victory, wisdom and magic. James would like his company to be a powerful one almost achieving a mythical status through highest possible quality standard. He believes careful craftsmanship is better than mass production. Let's see how much details are being put in this US$449 all purpose bag.
Ranger's distressed and nomadic look is not only defined by its unique navy grey canvas and dark brown leather mix, but also the carefully aging processes done to the material. For example, to achieve the effect, the canvas was washed, wrinkled, brushed and stained before a final wax coating was put on it. Although this aging thing sounds a bit superficial, but the minute you start to use it, you literally skip the honeymoon period trying to use the bag carefully, it feels like you've been using it for a while and it is part of you. I mean it, not to worry a bit about scratches on leather, nor to spend time intentionally distressing it heavily in order to feel a personal ownership.
The look is just one of the many carefully planned features of a Ranger. A lot of the satchels you see in the market have those two straps coming down from the top over the flap, they are there mostly for decorative purpose and not designed to function. Ranger's straps are there because James wanted to solve one problem, to carry a jacket when you don't have an extra hand. I'm sure many of you have the same problem, the places we go to take photos can have huge temperature differences, nobody wants to carry a larger volume bag just to take care of the jacket. These straps became very handy because they are extra long yet adjustable, I could tie my scarf or slide my leather jacket beneath them with zero efforts during business trips. On rainy days, I also carry a retractable umbrella like that for quick access.
Two additional straps fixed to the bottom of Ranger can also be used to carry your jacket or tripod.
Let's talk about external pockets. There are two side pockets for small stuffs, I wish they were big enough to put my iPhone though. The two front pockets are large enough for small cameras like my Natura Classica or Olympus EP-3 with pancake lens. One problem with these front pockets is that there is no flap to secure the contents inside, I might have to stitch a leather flap with snaps by myself someday so that I can feel safer to put camera or keychains in them. This is obviously a point for improvement.
Behind the front pockets is a zip pocket large enough to put your iPad, this became my quick access pocket to important things like my Traveler's Notebook. Now these three pockets are behind the bag's leather flap, but you don't need to unfasten the snaps to access them, just quickly pull over the flap to reveal and retrieve, very handy and speedy!
Gear protection. Heavily inspired by WWII aesthetics, Wotancraft highlights Ranger with aluminum buckles and brass snaps on the outside, but gets serious with gear protection on the inside. The removable MK.I pouch, using the same material as military hovercraft's air cushion on the surface, sealed by YKK water-repellent zipper, is almost 100% waterproof. According to James, he is planning a MK.II version which is completely seamless with even better waterproof features. Well, waterproofing is not what I'm looking for, but you can see how dedicated he is to the details.
On both the MK.I pouch and the external bag, there are hidden velcros. They are there to make sure your MK.I pouch is fixed firmly inside the bag, but when they are not needed, the velcros are hidden to prevent scratching on your equipments. The inside of MK.I pouch is made from high density foam covered with very smooth micro fiber cloth, making camera retrieval a low friction effort in addition to the heavy duty protection. Four dividers are provided so that you can create your own suitable compartments. I can put 3 cameras inside: Canon F1 with 85mm f1.2 lens, Voigtlander R4A with Nokton 35mm f1.2 lens, Olympus EP-3 with 12mm f2.0 lens.
So literally you have 3 layers of protections. Waterproof anti-shock MK.I, external waxed canvas bag with zipper and the leather flap. For my daily use, I actually don't need the MK.I pouch, I usually put a slimmer Artisan & Artist inner pouch to carry 1 camera, the Ranger immediately shrinks into a transit friendly casual bag.
Here's some more smart features of the Ranger. For a large bag like this, it takes time to unzip all the way and resistance at the two corners is inevitable. If you are not a zipper person like me, you can leave the canvas cover half zipped half opened, this can be achieved by folding the cover in half, it snaps in place by itself because of the built in magnets, it makes cameras accessible yet secure inside, very smart design. If you are an insecure person and always want to zip up everything, speedy access is still possible because there is a small leather tab you can leave dangling outside, with just one quick pull of the tab, both zipper heads fly open in split seconds! James nailed it, satisfying men's desire to access their tools with speed, imagine this design on a pair of jeans :)
A final note on features. There is a laptop compartment inside the canvas bag, suitable for my 13" Macbook Air or 15" models. There are small pockets for pen and accessories sitting behind the laptop compartment as well, although I don't use them that much.
I have to mention the weight, which is important to photographers. My Saddleback briefcase medium size is a heavy 2.95 kg monster, I love the bag but I just can't use it to carry cameras, it is killing my shoulders and spine. Wotancraft's Ranger is 1.72 kg without the MK.I pouch (which is 0.52 kg by itself). The reason why it is slightly heavier than a typical canvas bag is that wax was not only coated but actually soaked thoroughly into the canvas, you can see I had no hesitation to leave my Ranger on a wet football field in one of the photos. The softness of cushioned canvas also makes it more comfortable to body than hard thick leather used on the Saddleback briefcase (well I know, Saddleback's was never designed for photographers anyway).
The shoulder strap. Beautiful piece of craftsmanship, it feels very comfortable hanging down the shoulder or diagonally crossing the body. Even though its length is adjustable, I still found it a bit too long coz I like to carry weight close to my center of gravity (I'm 5'8" last time I checked 20 years ago). So I did a little modification to suit my need. There are two small built in D-rings near each end of the shoulder pad, I stitched safety hooks on them with scrap leather, giving me an option to shorten or quick releasing the strap in 5 possible lengths. Now I can carry my Ranger comfortably as a messenger bag or as a clutch bag.
If you are new to Wontancraft's Ranger, I must remind you to use sand paper to blunt the buckle pins coz they are very sharp. I also found that some of the leather edge finishing paint may fall off, I have no problem with that because it helps to give the distressed look I like about Ranger. In any case, Wotancraft is serious about quality, according to Wotancraft and both distributors I know (one from Hong Kong (Annie Barton), one from Netherlands (Vintage 217)), they are fully committed to give Wotancraft users complete satisfaction, just shoot them an email if you need support, they are all decent and nice people as far as I know. Again, Wotancraft is not a corporation but just a few artisans behind doing what they enjoy most, you can expect friendly services and dedication to details. I would give Ranger a 9.5 out of 10 score as a cool stylish and function rich camera/casual bag.
During my discussion with James in their Taipei showroom, he told me that he is designing a future add-on to the Ranger bag, a strap to convert Ranger into a backpack! I need that James! Especially in a long day I need it to be a backpack, then it is perfect!
Our job to find great stuffs from all over the world doesn't stop at product level, I believe understanding the concept and stories behind is far more important than product features. Only through digging deeper will I be able to bring true benefits to end users, in the process of doing this I learned a lot and makes my job an adventurous one. It is exactly this practice which sets us apart from a typical retail chain store.
This review is separated into two parts. Part 1 is a story in this post, Part 2 is a product review in the next post.
(James' customized Traveler's Notebook, Panerai and Mont Blanc Meisterstruck pen)
I first found Wotancraft from random searching on the net a year or so before, then I popped into a great store in Hong Kong called Annie Barton and found their products there. Admiring the quality and aesthetics I grew interest in the brand, I was scared away by the price though. So despite having the feeling that those bags suit my needs and in styles I adore, I found myself staring at them repeatedly on the net and never got myself one. What stopped me from getting one? The price tag and lack of knowledge about Wotancraft's true attention to details. Annie Barton told me each one of the bags were made by hand by those artisans in Taiwan, I couldn't believe it, no way, the bags are so well made I thought they were produced by professional mass producing bag maker. Judging from the details, each model requires literally hundreds of manufacturing processes and it was not possible to be made by just a few persons by hands. The story turned out entirely true when I got a chance to visit Taipei 20 days ago.
(entrance of Wotancraft in a dull building)
On the day I arrived Taipei, before other business engagements I shot right away to the Wotancraft showroom/shop. It was a huge disparity between what's inside the place and everything else surrounding it! Inside a dim florescent lit office building full of local trading businesses with zero taste and style decorations, I was still assuming Wotancraft a corporation you know, but once I entered the showroom, everything changed.
(Gordy's strap, Annie Barton's strap, Wotancraft camera holster for M)
(leather camera straps corner)
(open shelves displaying products and prototypes)
Surrounded by cozy fixtures made from aged wood and pig iron, products made from leather and canvas, I immediately felt homey. One side of the store was an open shelf displaying full product range and prototypes, while the other side is a service counter full of custom made leather straps for Panerai watches. I picked up the City Explorer series of bags and started examining each one of them until a friendly staff came out of the backyard and explained to me product details.
(City Explorer 002: Ranger)
(Urban Classic 006: Desert Eagle)
Soon I was unpacking my camera bag and started trying out almost every model possible. I guess camera bag to a guy is like fashion to a girl, you can spend hours enjoying the selection process in a setting like that. The staff noticed my Traveler's Notebook and some of my leather craft stuffs like camera case and straps. "James have the same notebook! He made crazy customization of it." That's when real conversation began.
(genuinely handmade from four artisans)
(craft tools at Wotancraft)
(this corner is used to be where they make their bags, but now the production facility is in another place)
By then I realized that each one of their bags were literally made by their own hands. Four artisans made up the entire Wotancraft company, the two I met in store were among them. It was not a corporation I presumed before, just a small bunch of people doing everything by themselves. Time to leave for a business engagement, hungered for more stories, I used Paypal to pay for the City Explorer 002 Ranger bag, left the showroom and determined to contact James about his Traveler's Notebook and come back a few days later. During my initial stay at the showroom, there were constant influx of Panerai fans looking for unique leather straps, but I'm not gonna cover that part of the story here.
(Panerai watches. Straps made by Wotancraft. Most are made from new leathers, but some of them are vintage leather sourced from WWII military artifacts)
3 days later, after a few email exchanges I finally met James, the soul behind Wotancraft. The company was created out of his pure passion in photography and watches, despite working as a bio-chemist after his graduation, he started to make his first prototype camera bag 5 years ago. Not satisfied with camera bags with trivial features and ugly looks, he explored different forms and materials and came up with a bag he would use. He was kind enough to show me all the thoughts he put into this City Explorer 002 Ranger bag, comparing it to his first prototype. I will cover the details in Part 2 in the next post.
Let's talk about James' Traveler's Notebook. In a typical Traveler's Notebook show me yours and I'll show you mine fashion, we exchanged our usage patterns. His cover is not the original but one made by himself, a very thoughtful implementation. There are two layers of leathers, a thicker one forms the shape while the outer thinner one gives its distinct Wotancraft look.
The thin leather on the cover is the same material James uses in his City Explorer series of camera bags. Stitched together on 3 sides, the notebook cover has an opening on one side doubling the cover as a pocket by itself. To increase the pocket size, James relocated the elastic string attachment point from the middle of the back to the edge, creating an inner space large enough for his stationery stuffs.
As a master of customization, he of course couldn't settle with a bookmark without his very own Wotancraft branded charm and leather tag. On typical day, James would use two types of notebooks inside - Traveler's Notebook lightweight paper for note taking, sketch paper for sketching. Inspecting his TN, I found inspirations common to creative people, not only would he take notes in meticulous details, he sketches out architectural structures purely out of his head, perhaps this keen practice is his way of precipitating his creativity into reality.
(Urban Classic 005: Safari. This is my second choice yet an indispensable beauty, less rugged than the Explorer series, soft and gentle)
James' TN is so far the best Traveler's Notebook mod I've ever seen, functional and pleasing. I've got to make one myself someday :) Stay tuned for Part 2.
Today is the 1st anniversary gathering of our very own Instagram community in Hong Kong, the 11th meet up since a year ago and going strong. Thanks to the founding members and friendly IGers, even though I joined only 3 photo walks so far, I feel like knowing them for a long time already, probably due to the constant feeds we shared and "liked" on daily basis.
The weather today was unbelievably great, casual hiking in Cheung Chau island and BBQ was just the right thing to do. I brought along my son and we shared a great time together, I thought he was bored but at the end of the day he said he was very happy, to be able to see a pirate's cave, play at the beach and meet new friends. He was quietly enjoying the father and son outing, loving it.
My trusted combo "Polaroid 110A + Fujifilm back" often works magic, just that I failed to find more time mingling with IGers and take those "wow" shots.
What a great day to lay on a beach drinking beer watching my kid playing sand, no words can describe it :)
Don't be fooled by his look, he was tired outside but happy inside :)
Earlier the day when his schoolmate was around on the hiking part, they took pictures by the shore, each of them had a Digital Harinezumi.
Cheung Chau is a beautiful island, except for computer electronics, you can almost find everything in this tiny island, old and new, mostly very local. Here's a fishing village.
You can almost certain that sooner or later, some of these images will be hard to find due to modernization.
The day before this trip, I got a sample Digital Harinezumi 3 for review, great timing. I made a strap for my kid out of scrap leather pieces and both of us are proud of the outcome.
While everybody was having fun BBQing, we found this weirdo Ken laying on the beach in strange posture. Later my son told me his butt was entirely exposed at the back, Ken is Ken you know :)
There's been much talk in the media and social networks about rich mainland Chinese coming to Hong Kong to spend millions in luxury shopping and how their etiquettes ruin everyday life of Hong Kong people, a kind of culture clash. Fumed by emotions against the increasingly severe income disparity and developer hegemony, our society has become pretty restless.
Demonstrations after demonstrations is one way to deal with hegemony and poor government policies, it has to be done, but we can do better in other small ways too. Let's not forget that those rich Chinese are just a small portion of the entire Chinese population whom God knows where they get their money from, let them waste their money on luxury goods, there are a lot of young people who genuinely want to explore our nice city and culture, including people from other countries too.
(photo: Voigtlander 35mm, UXi200)
A few weeks ago I spent a little time taking a young couple from Shanghai to see our nice and culture rich city. It was a short day's tour but it was great fun sharing stories of our streets, I wish the government had ambassador programs to teach us how to do it properly (but I guess there is no point waiting).
(photo: Voigtlander 35mm, UXi200)
If you haven't eaten our famous street snacks like fish ball, you haven't been to Hong Kong. It can be fun to watch my tourist friend ordering snacks to fish ball ladies :) I wish they can put up a more welcoming face to foreigners though.
(photo: Canon F1 85mm, UXi200)
A stroll in the Upper Lascar Row near Hollywood Road gives you a glimpse of antique business in the old days (my Dad roamed around this area a lot!) and you can get some pretty nice reproduction (or genuine?) goods like watches, communist badges/books, old vinyl records and posters, etc.
(photo: Leica CL, AGFA400)
In some areas, newer galleries and cafes sit right beside temples and old buildings, very romantic to write your travel journal while absorbing the contrasting atmosphere. If modern cafe is not your cup of tea, go Mido Cafe to experience Hong Kong's afternoon tea culture (Time: Hong Kong 10 Things to Do). The place is close by to Temple street, an interesting flea market often crowded late in the evening, if you are lucky you may be able to have your fortune told in a small fee. There is also another flea market just a few stations away called Apliu Street, suitable for geeks and audiophiles, often very crowded in the afternoon around 4pm. The Audio Space tube amplifier show room, made famous by the movie Infernal Affairs (American adaptation The Departed, well I suggest you watch our Hong Kong original, it is way better), is right on Apliu Street!
(photo: Voigtlander 35mm, UXi200)
Passionate about analogue photography? You must visit FilMe where you can find hundreds of 135/120/Polaroid/Fuji/etc film brands, you will love the atmosphere there. Interest to get an old but refurbished Polaroid SX-70? Well the technicians at :Mint: do hell of a great job fixing these treasures, the shop is a distributor of Impossible Project films and they designed and made their own SX-70 battery operated flash!
(photo: Voigtlander 35mm, UXi200)
If you are coming to Hong Kong and like what I'm recommending, message me and I'll see if you are worth to give out a google map for places to go, perhaps we can have tea together if you are lucky :)
Today I brought a young visiting couple from Shanghai to see my version of the world in this tiny little city of Hong Kong. They were not looking for comfort, they were not rushing, they were curious. So I had the freedom to show them around not worrying too much whether they like it or not. Imagine you had those young minds regardless of your age, you will have no shortage of teachers.
I was hauling 3 analogue cameras trying to spend all the films left in them, it was great fun, plain shooting at anything as I pleased. At the back of my mind, there was this phone call from Mom being nervous about Dad's condition, whom called my name in bed with huge discomforts in the afternoon. On my left shoulder, a camera bag from Korea I was testing, compact and light at relatively low price. Bringing friends to shops I know, chatting with owners and telling stories, finding pleasures in every turn of events. Finding tiny pleasures while I can, that's probably the single most important constant I can find in life.
Don't look down at them tiny pleasures, they always show you something beautiful. When you taste that delicious feedback loop, you will never quit. No matter how bad a trade show would look, I keep walking, and walking and telling myself "that's not it!" until I found something interesting or somebody worth chatting to. Next week it is going to be a Taiwan trip, let's see whom I'll meet or what I'll find.
The secret of a balanced life? There is no balanced life I figured, there is just constants, which ones you hold onto, it is just up to you. Again, City Slickers quote "just one thing, you stick to it and the rest don't mean shit… that's what you have to find out."
A short time to regroup your thinking (Feb, Tokyo)
A beam of warm sunlight and fresh air from outside of an airport (Feb, Tokyo)
A burst of inspirations from objects (Feb, Tokyo)
A sense of peace at your desk (Feb, Hong Kong)
A glimpse of people's lives from photos (Feb, Tokyo)
Blake Mycoskie: Start Something That Matters I don't know why I couldn't finish this book, maybe it was the tone it was being written. Gotta get back to it someday, or not. (**)
Paco Underhill: Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping--Updated and Revised for the Internet, the Global Consumer, and Beyond Read this book 10 years ago. To read this updated copy is to refresh my memory of how things were done back then and what's changed recently. Although at the beginning it is kind of boring and you may not agree with their research methods, but later in the chapters you will find hidden wisdoms. Just follow the author's logic and see what you can learn from it. (***)
Walter Isaacson: Steve Jobs Love hearing the stories all over again, some of them especially what happened in the past few years are new to me. Most importantly it is a closer portrait of Steve than all other books about him. Isaacson recorded audios during his interview with Steve, check out 60 minutes special and you will hear Steve's own voice. RIP Steve. (****)
Richard Branson: Losing My Virginity Read it like a novel coz you'll find it attractive as a story to follow through. Learn from his character through stories! (****)
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