Congee Wong is a 15-minute walk from K’s place. We ended up taking the bus though since it was raining.

It is a clean Chinese restaurant. If you’ve been to several restaurants you know what I’m talking about.

K and his family.

Food! Food was awesome, especially the Congee.

I take that back. This was the highlight of the food fiesta (everything’s good actually).

Some photos taken using K’s Olympus mju II (Stylus Epic). I didn’t get the chance to shoot a lot when the leaves were still yellow in the city (I did, but the weather was bad) so I was glad that I did when I went to Toronto.

Day 4 was jam-packed. I didn’t go out on Monday the 24th mainly because K had work again, so I stayed home, chilled with his parents. I also made a local dessert which didn’t work as well as it’s supposed to because of… circumstances.

Anyway, busy day ahead. The concrete says it all.

I love Toronto’s subway stations. I might change my mind once I visit New York or Tokyo but regardless Toronto’s subway system is close to my heart.

Shooting from the hip. Yep.

I love trains. They combine the elements of travel, movement and speed and make it all romantic and not boring.

We had a very quick, inexpensive but filling lunch at Ginger and then headed to our first destination.

Yes, more trains.

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Second to my “romantic” mode of transportation has to be the train cars.

Yonge is very photogenic.

Details! Patterns! This time I’m breathing the city and observing what’s around me.

We went to Distillery District. Probably a very photographed place in the city.

I find the whole place to be warm and romantic.

We walked around and sure enough people around there take a lot of photos.

Chasing pigeons. He he.

I don’t understand this. I find this figure to be out of place.

It was raining hard when we left the Distillery. I still insisted to go to Harbourfront for some shots.

It was raining but it’s all worth it. Thanks for your patience, K.

K and I went for dinner with our friend C. Marsche is awesome, despite the long wait for my pizza.

My Day 2 is a laid-back day. K has a work shift that day so the game plan was for me to go for dinner with his friends. I met the gang the day before.

It was my first time to commute alone from K’s new place to the train station so I got a bunch of instructions from K and K’s mom.

Also, it was my Colorsplash’s maiden voyage with me. K got a unit for $14.00! Sweet.

I arrived at the station safely.

I met up with S at the Sheppard station (and accidentally elbowed her because I am clumsy). We both arrived at Bathurst station and waited for M.

We walked around Bathurst, Toronto’s Koreatown (or a section of it, at least). We had dinner at Guu, a Japanese Izakaya format restaurant/tapas bar.

A, the glorious city sunset. I hardly see this, and I love it.

Dinner at Guu with M, S, and E. The food and experience were awesome. Also, a good time to get to know K’s friends. I had a lovely time.

We then hung out at Paldo Gangsan since M’s brother R wanted to go for dinner and drinks. Soju overload. We then visited a Korean grocery, walked more and called it a night.

So, where to start? I went on holidays to end off my October. K and I booked my ticket, and on October 22nd off I went to Toronto.

This also happens to be my last flight inside this airport building because Winnipeg got a new airport building. How’s that for an experience.

Also, the machine ate my $1 so I can’t take an ID photo.

Morning flights are fast. I think I spent more time waiting inside the airport as supposed to the actual flight. Next thing I know I was already at Pearson’s.

The luggages took longer than I expected, thus Kelvin and I missed our planned Zombie Walk shoot for the day. We ended up just having take-out lunch at his home, rested and went outside for dinner and drinks with his friends.

This guy, together with his companions are skateboarding inside the subway/bus station. I suppose that they know that it’s not allowed. I got this photo, without him knowing maybe because, a.) I’m a ninja or b.) he was too pre-occupied. One of them is correct.

This is a question that I often get asked by friends who realize that I don’t just lug around my digital SLR or my trusty (but badly beaten up) point and shoot. What is the point then, when there’s digital? Why do I even waste time and money going to my local photo processing store (which gladly we still have in the city), scan the negatives and go through all the inconvenience of it?

I think the answer is because I never really left it. Sure, I was caught up with the digital craze in 2004 when I received my small digital point and shoot. It did help me update my blog then, and the ease of sharing photos assisted me as I update my friends back home. It was easy to operate and digital satisfied my desire to take photos easily.

But in 2008 I proved myself wrong as I decided to pick up film again and realized that it never ceased to become amazing and interesting to use. It was fun, experimental yet challenging. Up to now film helps me to play around with my photos–do I compose or let things “roll” (pun intended)? Am I going to experiment and wait or do I use each frame seriously, as if my life depended on it? With digital I was able to shoot and share quickly, and noticed that while people (friends, families and co-workers) liked the photos I took, they quickly lost their interest on them. The magic fades as fast as I pressed the shutter and looked at the LCD screen.

With film, things are different. I worked hard to make each frame look the way I envisioned it, and each photo created was born purely from hard work. What could be sweeter than that? I appreciated this medium more when I worked on my exhibit early this year. I had to be careful and be calculated and make sure I’m doing things the right way. When the exhibit was launched, everyone was not just supportive of the event, but they also commented how the stories of my subjects and the result of the actual photos blended together and create this unique atmosphere and delivered the show’s message. As my exhibit’s curator commented there was just something about the film photography that you cannot capture in digital. One can certainly imitate its physical characteristics but never its aura.

Because of these factors, I decided to continue use film as my tool when creating photos. Whenever possible I encourage friends to try it too, and would be more than happy to use my blog to help others try this medium in the near future. I would like to show that film photography is not just for taking unplanned photographs like what most younger people perceive it now. It’s a well-respected art medium that should be restored and not to be dismissed.

My name is Angela, and I still use and believe in film.

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Please visit Old School Photolab and Believe in Film to satisfy your love for film photography.

Looking for the rest of my film-related entries? CLICK HERE!

I went to Kenora two weeks ago to get some work and relaxing done. It’s actually more of work, since I believe that visiting there will actually help me do my work better for the next summer.

Anyway here are the photos. My only regret is that I forgot to bring my Rollei 35S loaded with slide film. I brought that on my first visit and intended to bring it again but totally didn’t remember it.

Last week, my cousin and friends from UPAA-MB (with their families) went to check out Morden’s Corn and Apple Festival. It was approximately 1.5-2.00 drive from Winnipeg. We drove a bit slower because we had a convoy.

We never had the angus meat. I did have bison burger though.

It was definitely a good day to visit a small town, eat, have fun and take photos.

The highlight is basically free apple juice and free corn. Plus if you’d like to buy more corn you can do so as well.

There was also a small carnival fair at the event. It was one street covered with busy kiosks full of accessories, foodstuff, etc.

This reminded me of my childhood! I had a toy version of this one.

I took his photo as soon as he waved at me to say hello. Thanks for making this photo with me!

Then my cousin and I departed from the group after being dispersed (we had a bus tour of the city), and we decided to line up for the free corn. The line was epic. Not to mention long.

Twins!

You’ll be seeing a lot of backlogs as I slowly start rummaging through my hard drive. A lot of photos haven’t been posted for the past summer due to my busy schedule. Most of the time I’d rather go home after work and not hang around like what I usually do. I hardly go out on the weekends too.

(There was an exception though.)

I headed to Camp Stephens for a quick tour (this is considered as a business trip). I wasn’t really planning to post these since I’m headed there again next week but I thought it never hurts to share a couple of photos. I’m obviously going to take more.

The place is lovely during the summer. I think Stephens is a very special place for kids to be themselves, to have fun, play, and to learn how to respect fellow kids and other people. Also to deal with some setbacks and to learn how to settle them in the most democratic way possible. While I never regretted anything from my childhood, I think it would make a big difference if I went to camp. I wasn’t born here in Canada though.