I’ve been here before. Twice, actually. Pre-handover 1996 Hong Kong, and then 2014-ish, airline travel contest participant Hong Kong, but this is the first time I’m actually here. This is the first time I’m seeing and feeling what it means to walk these streets. Hong Kong does not disappoint. This is made possible by the Cathay Camera Club, the organization that brought me here from Japan. I can’t thank these people enough. They are so organized, so nice, and so wildly keen on sharing what they love about their city.
And for those of you wondering, this is no average camera club. These folks are dialed. Their ranks run from working pros to advanced amateurs, and even the advanced amateurs would give most pros a run for their money. Camera clubs, at least in the United States, have a semi-slanderous reputation of old men arguing over fluoride elements, and yes, you can find plenty of those folks in VFW lounges and the Elks Lodge all across America, but CCC is a whole different beast.
Where do I come in? Books. Of course, books.
Find theme, stick with theme, edit theme, sequence, design, experiment, test, and try. Repeat. Yesterday was twelve hours of walking and eating. The city is right there, right on the surface. As my main contact said, “Before you come to Hong Kong, find your limit, otherwise the city will find it for you.” I love, love, love this description. Hong Kong is a vice city. Whatever your pleasure, it’s right there in neon. But things are changing rapidly, my friends. What’s old is new. Things are being torn down and built at a pace that ONLY China can understand.
Today is two three-hour sessions of editing, printing, making sense of the work, and then translating that to print. I also gave them an assignment that they must read in front of the group. What’s my tactic this time around? Imagination. Rediscover and tap like a main vein of crude buying since the Paleolithic. Imagination is often taught, beaten, or threatened out of us as we age. Kids have it, but we sometimes lose it, and now with the changes in technology and brain power, we are potentially on the verge of gifting our imagination to machines controlled by the freakiest of freaks. Don’t let this happen. Fight for it.
