New site, new blog

Wandering Light has come to a close. Shut down. No longer at this address at least. Please join me on the new Luceo Images web site: www.luceoimages.com There are a ton of new and exciting features. You will be able to access the blogs of all the Luceo photographers. But if you would like to go directly to the new Wandering Light page you can find it here: http://www.luceoimages.com/blog/kevin-german/ There are already a few fresh posts and much more to come including a post on my recent trip to Mt. Everest Base Camp.

Thank you for following my journeys through the years ... I promise there will be many more to come!

- Kevin German

Current Location: Vietnam

Local number: +84.948.757.223

The blue and purple tint

Staring at a safety card barely poking up between the barf bag and the inflight magazine. I've seen the flight attendant perform the safety ritual countless times before. But this time I wonder if I would really remember any of it facing an emergency.

The cabin lights soon dim as we climb high into the clouds. A window seat is rare as I usually prefer the isle, but tonight I am too tired to care. Thoughts of past and memories of what is to come steal my attention.

Blue and purple tints break my concentration and I turn my head. Mangled lines of light forced into the shape of a child's drawing of a mountain. Every flash shows the reflection of myself in the window. I notice 29 years of lines around my eyes mimicking the forked lighting.

When did I grow up?

A childhood photograph of myself presents itself in my mind. I know the photograph well but I do not know myself at that time. I lay on my stomach next to a card house made from my mother's recipe cards. I am smiling.

I wish I knew what I was thinking at that moment. It's after a school day because I am still wearing the reminants of a Catholic school uniform. Gray cords and a white polo shirt. The same wardrobe for 8 years of my life.

I distinctly remember shopping for school clothes with my family every year. The event would take place in the school gymnasium I once thought was so large. Rows of folding tables would form geometric isles. The same items on every table just in different sizes. White polo shirts, gray cords, gray pleated skirts that landed well below the knee and the dreaded navy blue sweater vest.

Another flash brings my mind back to present. What was the point of that thought?

I continue to stare out this window fixating my eyes on the point where the next light will form. I am always wrong. I live in a world where I'm always anticipating and manipulating the light. But this is beyond my comprehension. It fascinates me.

The sound of a doorbell rings and a reddish hue glows through the symbol of a seatbelt being fastened. I feel my body fighting to find balance as the plane is turbulent. But my mind is elsewhere.

The man to my left clinches my side of the arm rest. He accidentally presses my seat recline button and I drift in reverse. He turns to me and awkwardly motions an apologetic movement. I nod.

I wonder where this man is from. He is not Vietnamese nor Cambodian. My eyes search for signs. The first three letters of his Vietnam entry card under nationality read "Fil", and I smile. My first time leaving the United States was to the Philippines. The new found excitement for traveling I once had seems to have faded a bit in recent happenings.

The plane finds itself once again and the man releases a heavy breathe from his lips. The blue and purple tints grow dimmer now. I miss them already. The journey home is faster than I remembered. Or perhaps I was just lost for most of it.

Current Location: Cambodia

On assignment in Siem Reap, Cambodia. I can be reached on my US number: +1.360.450.5810 or by email: kevin@kevingerman.com

Bali leftovers

Sid and Lisa

Current Location: Bali, Indonesia

On assignment in Bali. I can be reached on my US number or my local number: +6287860821548

Gina

I had a wonderful visit with a good friend in Sacramento last week. She is always missed while I am abroad. Thank you for everything!

Recap

I'm not even certain what day it is. My trip back to the States came and went within a 9-day span that included two trips to San Francisco and Sacramento and one trip to Virginia. Eleven airports and 45 hours of flying. But it was all worth it. And more importantly I got the chance to meet up with the members of Luceo Images for our biannual meeting.

The gathering came at the tail end of an inspirational LOOK3 festival in Charlottesville, VA. Two 14-hour days excitement and frustration. What direction should we take this cooperative? I've often wondered what went through the minds of the founding members of Magnum Photos. The four photographers - Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, George Rodger and David "Chim" Seymour. I know what they wrote but it would have been wonderful to have been able to listen in on their discussions.

Bresson wrote a politically correct mission statement of Magnum, "Magnum is a community of thought, a shared human quality, a curiosity about what is going on in the world, a respect for what is going on and a desire to transcribe it visually." But the unspoken, unwritten, is what I am in search of.

So on day two when we were all tired-stricken from hours of planning, I asked why everyone agreed to meet in Atlanta a year and a half ago when David Banks called each of us.

Watching as Matt Slaby searched for his words and listening as David Banks spoke about being a part of something bigger than himself. We jumbled down words and incomplete sentences as fast as they were blurted out.

Community of photogs that fosters growth, pool resources, support each other's work, project, standards, fosters growth, strength in numbers, being part of something bigger than myself, community, set the bar for each other, actively involved in your own destination, passion, outcome less important, breathe easier/dream bigger, nontraditional, evolve, sustainable, authenticity, authorship, see beauty in everything, complete control.

Maybe it's something that words really can not describe. But for the first time I do feel a part of some thing important. Some thing that will put photography and story telling first. Untainted by politics and money ... only by our own souls. The decline of a medium is leaving so many wandering aimlessly. Photographers that once changed thoughts, lives. The profession, the world has changed and we as story tellers must change with the movement. Lead it.

Bike in a box and John Trotter

On my connection flight from Charlotte, NC to Charlottesville, VA I was pleased to run into my friend John Trotter. He looked about as bad as I felt after traveling for the past 27 hours straight. He is doing back to back seminars, just having taken a redeye from Las Vegas attending the NPPA multimedia workshop.

When we landed, I asked if he wanted to share a taxi. He grinned and pulled this hard shell suitcase off of the conveyor. I watched for the next 30 minutes as he put together his bicycle and then rode off. How cool is that?