Basantapur photo series--Daishain Ayo! I

I Love taking photos from my Canon S90, the best point-and-shoot there is. The following I took after 5 painful hours of standing up and crouching on my legs at Basantapur last Friday. I have a LOT more, but these I processed first. Each one has its own story.

 This I call my Babaji photo. I was standing still at Basantapur main square, looking at the screen when I realized that the babaji was peeking at the screen too over my shoulder. So I left some space for him, and talked to him. Despite not wanting to, I had to take his picture, and he willingly(too willingly?) posed. I should have taken a few more shots, but I thought this was just perfect as my first babaji shot, so I did not bother him after that. Perhaps he was looking to give me prasad for dakshina, but I didn't dare inquire, with all the tourist police and regular police patrolling around. I wouldn't have known what to do it anyway.









The saddest (and the most powerful) photo I have ever taken. All three kids are somewhere between ten and fourteen; one is smoking(weed or ciggs I dunno) and the other one is sniffing. I have no idea what the third kid is doing, but it looks pretty illegal too. And there were police all around. Sad.

Part 1 of 3-picture series. I had already taken pictures of the two gals when they were going to the Square(I realized that while reviewing the images in the computer). Here, they don't see me, so they are teasing/playing/WTF are they doing with the beggar kid who was buggering absolutely everyone(specially fair-skinned people) for money.

Part 2 of 3 images of the series
They see me here, and recognize me. Both of them try to escape the camera, but realise there is no escape. Either that, or they are hiding from the beggar kid, who''s now getting verry irritating now. They smile and whatever, and come ahead bravely. The beggar kid looks slightly befuddled, but he still goes about his usual business of begging shamelessly.

Part 3 of 3
Since there is absolutely no way of escaping the camera, they come to terms with it. And apparently the beggar kid too. The kid looks even more confused than I was. The girl with the gray thing on is either shaking hands with the kid(for the camera) or giving him something. Since it does not look like he's getting something(he'd at least look towards the giver then), there's definitely something else going on here. And that is WTF is going on here?









The last photo at the bottom was a last-minute decision. I was taking pictures like crazy in the dark, and it was only very late that I realized that despite its strengths, my camera was not built to take viewable pictures at such dark conditions(ISO 1600, 2400, 3200; noisy as hell). Since I had already taken so many pictures that would otherwise have gone wasted, I decided to make them useful by taking a panoramic sweep during some religious family involving the Bhairavs and fires there. The people in the photo are the locals who were there to worship and watch the Bhairavs. The final picture turned out much better than I expected.