these days

My lovely nephews nagged me today about my blog absence! Oh they are so right - it's so easy to get carried away by life and neglect my beloved blog. 

Life has been great around here, spring has come (and actually gone - please spring come back again!), I've been studying hard and enjoying it (Geeeek!), I've been shooting film and enjoying magnolias blossom. We've been to Paris last week and had a blast (I'll post about that later).

This weekend my amazing girl friends visited from Lisbon and my heart was filled with friendship, love and fun. We walked, shopped (they had to buy extra bags - I behaved), saw some great exhibitons (including the most recent at Tate from Damien Hirst), had fun with stickers and stamps and had endless talks like always! They have left already but I am happy!

Here's some pictures: 

We visited the amazing "War Cabinets" created during WWII from where Churchill commanded. Highly recommended. In the above picture you can see a small sign used to tell people living underground how the weather above was.

There you can also visit The Churchill Museum. So incredible interesting - Churchill was an amazing person.

Although these are all from the same day we had really nice food everyday and I got to eat my first fish and chips.

Hope you had a lovely weekend too. Happy Easter everyone!

swap

i met mary louise when she made this and this and this and this treasuries featuring my photos - i was so flattered that she liked my images so much. i always visit the shops of people that feature my photos in their treasuries and when i popped into mlmxoxo i was delighted to find a really nice shop with cute wood felt cases for iPhone and iPads (amongst other goodies). so then it strucked me: why don't we make a swap? lovely felt case for your print of choice? she kindly agreed (yupi!) and international mail did the rest.

now I am a proud owner of this lovely case. it works really well and my iPhone is now safe and cool.

i send her these two small prints:

 and was really touched by her reply:


Sara - the photos just arrived and they are even more striking in person. The red torii reminds me of Cristo's project in Central Park which I visited on a very cold day.
www.christojeanneclaude.net/major_gates.shtml
And the rickshaw transports me not just to a different place, but a different time. Like Memoirs of a Geisha. I love it. 


thanks mary louise.
i really like swaps.

london on film

lately i've been obsessing about film again. it's a conscious decision to ruin my bank account and make me an extremely happy person at the same time. shooting film is a kind of therapy - you learn to be patient and selective. it's also an act of faith; you just have to trust that it will come out ok (in some years i'll know when they'll come out ok). sometimes they don't but that just makes me go back again and try harder.

above images: pentax me super + kodak elite chrome cross-processed (don't really like how greenish it turnout)

today

A day that woke up empty and got filled with friendship, sun, beautiful light and love.
Wish you a lovely week!

 all images from instagram.

11 march

I took the above image in Tokyo in March 11th 2008, 3 years before the horrible disaster that has changed Japan forever. 1 year now. Still no words.

Some random interesting links:

Children of the Tsunami : http://hellosandwich.blogspot.com/2012/03/children-of-tsunami.html
Inside the Meltdown: http://hellosandwich.blogspot.com/2012/03/inside-meltdown.html
A project to support: http://www.swiss-miss.com/2012/03/kasama-yaki-made-in-kasama.html
A life change (brazilian sorry): http://shigues.wordpress.com/2012/01/30/voluntariado-parte-1/

the art of portrait

 

I feel so many limitations when it comes to portraits. I hate asking people to take their portrait and doing it without they noticing makes me feel like a thief. Very often my "subject" will understand that it's being observed and I always feel so bad for doing it. But it costs me even more to go and talk to someone and ask "can i get your portrait?"
The above pictures was a rare event. I actually asked the man in the top image if I could take his picture and he reluctantly agree. I was with a group of photographers so somehow I felt more brave. He was at the entrance of his shop and after the portrait fuss I heard his wife from the inside of the shop saying "you can take my portrait, I don't mind! and she looked so decisively to the came. She has a tought look but a gentle smile, must be a strong woman.

So I felt very jealous when I found this project by dannish photographer Jonas Normann called "Sidewalk Talk". His portraits are very simple yet very engaging and they are really beautiful.
Also he made a beautiful video about this project that you should see:


A tribute to the people of Vejle from sidewalktalk.dk on Vimeo.

Well it's good to know that you have still so much to learn.
And you, do you like shooting portraits? Do you ask people?

another sunny day

a sunny walk in the neighbourhood today with a warm hint of spring.

instagram

i have joined the instagram fever. it's addictive and fun to capture little details of my everyday life. you can follow my daily bits here @moshimoshiii (ha!). are you on instagram?

bolo de arroz

today i ate a portuguese muffin a.k.a. bolo de arroz. and for a moment i was instantly in my childhood.

back bone

it takes back bone to lead the life you want

all is full of love

snow in london - part 3

ah! thought i've had enough? nooooo! here's more snow pictures! i know you're all "come on sara, we're so tired of winter, bring us something to long for spring!" but you want to know something? i like the cold. it's nice and cosy and makes you appreciate wonderful things like scarfs, or central heating, god bless who invented central heating, that makes coming home such a happy moment (and a special person does it too).
so here's some black and white very cliche pictures of the snowfall! hope you enjoy :) i'll stop now. promise.

snow in london - part 2

i couldn't help it! more pictures of snow! after the big snowfall on saturday night, sunday woke up in a beautiful white world. we walked through regent's canal to primrose hill to enjoy good snow fun with lots of londoners. we found a big plastic bag and used it to slide down the hill as it was a real sled.

and as i said... it snowed on saturday! and it was a-m-a-z-i-n-g! no matter how much snow i see i still have a childish happinness about it... we laughed, we jumped, had snow ball fights and even slided on a hill.
snow is so beautiful!

light and shadow

yesterday i spent the morning in bed. london is freezing these days (they even say it might snow tomorrow or sunday) and i caught a cold. nothing too serious but felt much better after some rest.

when i was in highschool i did the drawing course at "sociedade nacional de belas artes". one of the exercises i loved most was to draw a hanging white sheet trying to capture all the subtleties of light and shadow only with pencil. challenging!

yesterdays sun entering the room reminded me of this exercise. even freezing london is sunny!