VIDEO

Just last weekend, local Shanghainese instagram user @sgm900_shanghai (Andy) organized a Shanghai instagram meetup at Sinan Mansions – from there we would take a photo walk down to Taikang Lu and have a fun photographic afternoon.

@sgm900_shanghai’s photo of our group. It was a lot of fun meeting up with people you’ve only seen through photos

@irene_wang with a panda

@teakolo’s red converse

@jerjerchickenpot (on my Nikon)

Sticker for my iPhone made by @sgm900_shanghai

@sgm900_shanghai and @jerjerchickenpot

And a couple of the shots I took with my Nikon during that day

If you get a bunch of people with iPhones out – this is what happens

What’s that? You can’t see? Try this:

[It would be cliched and trite to use the Dead Kennedys song title for this post - besides I used all those references on Twitter and Facebook when I was actually there.]

About 1.5 years ago, my friend Brian emailed me – Southeast Asia. May 2011. Be There.

So through some not-so-careful planning, I ended up flying to down to meet him and Ashley for what was supposed to be dinner and breakfast, but ended up just being breakfast, but I was in Siem Reap!

Spoiler alert: Siem Reap is now my favorite chill little backpacker town in South East Asia. For some reason the parade of backpackers looking ridiculous in their white-guy dreadlocks or Thai fisherman pants didn’t annoy me like they usually do. For some reason the streets full of urchins trying to sell you cold drinks, postcards, magnets or Khmer scarves weren’t so annoying. I think its because the town was so charming – but I think also the temples were the greatest thing I’ve seen.

So, temples. Siem Reap is rife with them. Angkor Wat, everyone has heard of. The largest religious complex in the world. Next to that is the royal city of Angkor Thom, the jungle complex of Ta Prohm (featured in the Tomb Raider movie with Angelina Jolie), Pre Rup – let’s just say there are a lot of temples. Surprisingly, despite the abundance of temple hopping, I did not get temple’d out.

Here are some photos:

Bayon:

Ta Prohm (which was my favorite temple)

Angkor Wat:

Beng Mealea

Preah Kahn

Pre Rup

There are over 350 photos here.

Still to come, your humble author talks about Cambodia food (thumbs down) and taking a helicopter ride (thumbs way up)

Planning to break this out in Cambodia at Angkor Wat.

Dynamic Light he says.

So I bought it. Installed it. Wow, are the filters FUN!

Here’s UC Berkeley’s Wheeler Hall processed through the Comic Filter

And The Dude, Donny and Walter Sobchek processed through the HDR filter

Here’s some examples:

Shibuya is famous for its scramble crossing. It is located in front of the Shibuya Station Hachiko exit and stops vehicles in all directions to allow pedestrians to inundate the entire intersection. Three large TV screens mounted on nearby buildings overlook the crossing. The Starbucks store overlooking the crossing is also one of the busiest in the world

Here’s the crossing from ground level:

It’s nice to be reminded of that occasionally.

These were taken from Vue Bar, atop the Hyatt on the Bund back in August.

See the set here