Portrait

I was asked to shoot a simple, timeless black and white portrait of our CU Independent adviser for a gift, so I enlisted the help of Danielle Alberti to help with lighting, and this is what we came up with. We used one speedlight off to her left, and a desk lamp behind her and to the right. Also used a dry erase board as a reflector, but it doesn't seem like that did too much. Yay for improv with cheap lighting! I think the portrait turned out to be beautiful though. Helps that the model is so gorgeous.

Life in a new culture: Bali, part 9

Published on the CU Independent Dec. 7, 2009.
http://cuindependent.com/2009/12/07/life-in-a-new-culture-bali-part-9/

The time has come where I’m preparing to leave Bali. I’m starting to think about where I should apply for jobs at home, looking for internships and wondering how I’m going to be able to go back to a full load after having so much down time here.

I’m also trying to avoid writing a 30 page paper due this week, so it seemed like a perfect time to wrap up the semester with my last column from abroad. It seemed appropriate, as it usually does to the point of being cliché, to finish up with the 10 things I’m going to miss most about my semester abroad.

So here goes:

1. Having all the time in the world to read. I think I’ve been able to read more this semester than I have in my three-and-a-half years of college. There’s just nothing else to do in the evenings. I’ve read at least 13 books this semester for well over 4,200 pages. Too bad I never do that much reading for any of my classes. My GPA would be amazing if I did.

2. Trying to figure out how to flush some of the toilets. It really is an art form. Some you have to manually flush by pouring buckets of water into the bowl, others just don’t have enough water pressure to do the job and you have to improvise.

3. Not caring about what I look like, or how dirty my clothes are. It’s going to be strange going back and thinking about primping for a night out, or heck, even looking in a mirror before I go to school. A lot of clothing I have here is now stained or ripped, and it’s nice not having to care. Although admittedly, getting out of the hot and humid weather that leaves me feeling—and smelling—like cheese will be nice.

4. The sunsets. I’ve never seen the sky turn so many colors. There are evenings where the sky is a brilliant shade of purple, others it’s bright orange. The ones over the beach are particularly breathtaking.

5. Waking up to the sound of roosters. I’ve grown strangely attached to waking up to the sound of their crowing. I’ve also started to give the roosters in my yard personality types. I was very upset when I walked into my yard and found my favorite rooster dead on the ground.

6. Martabak. I don’t know what martabak is, or how it’s made, but it’s some sort of flat, crispy egg and spinach thing. It’s perhaps one of the most delicious fried foods I’ve ever had, and that’s saying a lot. We would eagerly wait for 5 p.m. every evening, when a man with an adorable grin would come up the street, pushing his stall to his spot on the corner. We would watch him set up and pounce as soon as we could tell he was ready to start taking orders. I think he’s become the unofficial mascot of the semester.

7. Bemo rides. I never thought I would miss being crammed into a 1970s-looking van with 15 other people who had been working all day—all of us having some sort of funky odor. I didn’t realize I would miss it either until I was riding home about a week ago. There was no more space on the seats, so I sat on the steps of the open door. The woman sitting on the bench next to me just put her arm around me for safety without saying a word.

8. All the kids saying “Hello!” really loudly, with giant grins on their faces, and ducking shyly when we say “hello” back. They’re incredibly friendly, and as much as I hate children, I think I’ll even go so far as to say it’s kind of cute. The fun thing is it doesn’t stop with the kids. It seems like everyone here is rather friendly and wants to say “hello” and ask where you’re going.

9. My ibu, or home-stay mother, serving my lunch as soon as I’ve finished my breakfast. “For later,” she would say. On a few days I knew I would be out during lunch, I would throw the rice and noodles she gave me in a sandwich bag and take it to go. If I could pack her in my suitcase and bring her home, I would. And not just for the food, but for the company in general.

10. The people I have met here. It’s going to be strange not living with a family again, or be able to joke about the silly antics of my language teacher. Most of all, though, I will miss the friends here who I wasn’t expecting to become so close to in such a short time. Especially since I wasn’t sure I liked any of them when the semester started.

It’s going to be hard to say good-bye, but it’s definitely time to come home.

Life in a new culture: Bali, part 8

Published on the CU Independent NOv 17, 2009.
http://cuindependent.com/2009/11/17/life-in-a-new-culture-bali-part-8/


There’s nothing like watching a couple roosters kill each other before eating a nice, healthy meal of grilled chicken. Especially while knowing that only a few yards away, there is still a cockfight going on.

While living in Bali, roosters have become the bane of my existence. It’s impossible to sleep in, with about eight of them crowing in my home-stay family’s yard at the crack of dawn. Five of them are kept in separate bamboo cages, and on several occasions, I’ve thought about liberating them, in hopes they would fly off, far, far away and give me the chance of sleeping in at least once.

Sadly, I know if I were to do this, my home-stay father would probably never speak to me again. This is because for the men in Bali, raising their roosters are their passions, and they’ve paid good money for a strong rooster and their food, usually a mix of rice, corn and beans. Men will sit on street corners and at local warungs (small shops that sell food and act as local hang-outs) with roosters in hand, cradling them and showing off their strength to other rooster lovers.

Eventually, these roosters will end up in the middle of a fighting arena, with thousands of men surrounding them, cheering them on to destroy their opponents.

Traditionally, cockfights in Bali had a religious purpose. The blood spilled was used to pacify spirits and no temple ceremony was complete without the cockfight.

Now, cockfights also used for entertaining up to 6,000 men as they wave around money, calling out their bets and trying to earn a few extra dollars. Three-inch-long knives are tied to the roosters’ talons, and two at a time, the roosters fly at each other as soon as they’re released. Within a matter of seconds, one or both of the roosters are staggering before dropping dead. This goes on all day.

It’s enough to make all the environmentally friendly, vegetarian, pet-loving Boulderites want to buy a ticket to Bali and hold up signs in protest.

However, as gory as the events can be, they’re very good for the local economy. Local food and drink vendors take the opportunity to sell their wares for twice as much as they usually are able to. On the outside of the arena, men (and again, I say men, because the only women there are selling food and drinks, never watching) take time during breaks to buy clothing and other household necessities.

Most importantly, the local banjars, or communities, charge an entry fee to the cockfights. Each man is charged 10.000 rupiah to enter, and the millions of rupiah raised goes back into the community. The money goes into building projects or toward temple ceremonies.

One part of me wants to be horrified at the idea of strapping knives to a fowl’s legs before setting them loose on each other, but the other part of me realizes how important these gatherings are for the community.

One thing I am sure of though is that it’s going to be strange to get a full night’s sleep when I’m back in Boulder. Maybe I’ll find an alarm clock that sounds like a rooster so I can feel like I’ve brought part of Bali with me.

Contact CU Independent Contributor Stephanie Davis at Stephanie.davis@colorado.edu