Dilemma: Keffiyeh or Krama?

The blogosphere (and cable news) are buzzing with the hilarious news that a bunch of ideologues forced Dunkin Donuts to pull an ad featuring a celebrity chef because she was wearing what was erroneously seen as a keffiyeh. The ideologues of course, consider the keffiyeh as a "symbol of violence and of anti-Israel sentiments".

This utter stupidity is compounded by the fact that the scarf is a traditional head gear worn by many tribal societies in the Middle East. The king of Saudi Arabia (currently our administration's best friend, our suppliers of oil and buyers of our government's Treasury Bills) wears one...the king of Jordan (another of our allies) wears one, as well as members of Jordan's elite military forces.

But setting this silliness aside...what are photographers and photojournalists to do now? Do we wear our keffiyehs (right) and risk being labeled as Arab sympathizers by xenophobes? What if we wore our krama (left) scarf instead? Would we be labeled as Khmer Rouge sympathizers? Oh my gosh, this is a "serious" dilemma, folks.

POV: Technogeek vs Luddite?

A recent email received from a photographer questioning technological advancements affecting our business made me think about how these made it so much easier for me to manage and operate my photo expeditions.

One of these tech advances is the blog, which can be harnessed, not only to tell the world of one's periodic musings, fantasies, etc, but to maintain a record of each photo expedition's experiences. This is true for me, as a photo expeditions leader, and for the expeditions' participants with their own blog journals.

For instance, while on a photo-expedition or on a solo photo assignment, I always carried a Moleskine notebook, in which I would scribble each day's events, filling it with notes, ideas, sketches and information. I still do that on occasions, but my current preferred method of maintaining a journal of my photo expeditions and assignments is in a private blog.

At the end of each day in the field, I devote an hour or so on my laptop to type up the day's main events, key points to remember, impressions and ideas, for eventual transferral to a blog. This creates a useful (and easily accessible) source of referral whenever I need it. My final verdict on each of my photo expeditions is also entered, and that allows me to refine and improve future expeditions.

I maintain yet another private blog in which I amass all sorts of useful and usable information; from affordable hotels in Delhi (difficult these days), recommended guides/fixers' names and contacts to exotic rituals and festivals. A sort of compendium that I can call on when I plan any of my photo expeditions.

Yes, it is sad that writing journals in longhand is on the wane...dusting off an old journal and reading its contents is romantic...but technological advancements are so practical and are such good time-savers that it's difficult to resist them.