Aug. 24-25

I got a new digital camera to replace my Sony Cyber-shot P9, a Ricoh Caplio R4. The selling point for me is the 28-200mm equivalent zoom lens. That's the same as the zoom lens for my Pentax ZX-5n! But my first day using it was a social occasion celebrating the end of the semester with my old classmates. Even though I was in a different class, I pretty much exclusively hung out with them all semester, making no new friends in my own class.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 24, 6:00 p.m. - Coffee shop in Taipei Main Station where a few us were meeting before going to dinner. Classes were over but the Japanese goth chick was still scribbling out her last assignment.

6:03 p.m. - Somehow my brand new camera got into Hyun Ae's hands. I was having some intense (not) discussion with the cool Japanese guy.

7:58 p.m. - We're already at dinner but the Japanese goth chick finally finished her assignment. This is that moment.

9:15 p.m. - Barbecue restaurant. The woman in pink was new to their class and I don't remember her at all. She didn't hang out with us.

9:17 p.m. - Cute teacher on the left and the cool Japanese guy, someone else's flash.

The problem with digital cameras is you can shoot as many pictures as you want and just delete them if you don't like them. Indeed, these are a select few pics out of several dozen images I (and Hyun Ae) shot on my first day with the camera. With film photography, you have to be selective in the shooting.

Pentax ZX-5n, Ilford XP2 Super:

Da'an Park bus stop across the street from my apartment. All CD-R. 

FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 10:50 a.m. - National Theater at what is now Liberty Plaza.

11:13 a.m. - Han-Bo (Hankou-Boai) area of the downtown (old city) where photography shops are concentrated.

11:22-11:23 a.m. - Out-of-place architecture. Land Bank Exhibition Hall of the National Taiwan Museum. It's on a corner with the top pic of the western side and the bottom of the southern. The landmark Shin Kong Mitsukoshi building is just visible in the top pic.

1:51 p.m. - Intersection at Zhongxiao and Zhongshan Rds. The government Control Yuan right of center. Taipei 101 in the distance at the left.

1:56 p.m. - It's Liberty Plaza now, but when this was taken it was still named after Taiwan's original dictator. In following years of reckoning, dozens of things named after him have been re-named and statues of him around the country have been removed. The centerpiece of the area of this pic is still his memorial hall, and I don't mind it remaining as such. He was a dictator and some consider him a butcher, but he also led the country through hard and tense times after losing the Chinese Civil War to the Communists on the mainland and relocating to Taiwan.