I Do - A Japanese Wedding

Sometimes, all I want is pretty.

No deep thinking, no intense philosophies.

Just visual delight in the world around me.

That's the kind of head space I was in yesterday when I went out photographing.

No continuing visual themes - just snaps of whatever caught my attention

And so it was that I tagged this Japanese couple around Cathedral Square Japanese weddings are a common sight in Christchurch and I always enjoy watching the way they approach compiling their photographic record of the event. It often involves a team of half a dozen, as they rush about various (predictable) landmarks, arranging themselves in smiling poses, before moving on to the next. There's often a shallow, business-like quality to the whole business, as if they've read that this is how it's done in the West, so this is what must be done - preferably in record time with minimum fuss.

But if you hang about on the edges, you sometimes see small, poignant moments, subdued gestures of love, telling looks, the lean of one body into another. They're the moments many photographers, so caught up in the big event, the frenetic gallop between locations and the arrangement of silks and veils, seem to miss. Overt, public expressions of love of course, are not the Japanese way. But sometimes, a smile, a respectful bow, a shy kiss on the forehead say far more.

Thinking of Japan

Last weekend when I was cycling around the inner city, I took a side track down Poplar Lane and was delighted to find this Japanese chef at work outside a new 'hole-in-the-wall' Japanese restaurant and sushi bar. A number of people, including me, stopped to ask him what he was making - cheese balls as it turns out, which seems decidedly un-Japanese to me but who am I to quibble? I was just delighted to find something new and interesting in the area. For all the good that Poplar and SOL Lanes have done to invigorate the city by night, they are, more often than not, empty, cold and uninviting by day. I've never seen a crowd in there yet....well.....maybe in summer but that's only at the bars; retail foot traffic is virtually negligable. In the end, I forgot to note the name of this little Japanese place, which is a perfectly good excuse for me to go back there today to sample the food. It reminded me of the cute little eateries that filled the back lanes in Japanese cities. No matter where I went, I was never far from a tiny restaurant or sushi bar where I could almost guarantee tasty food and attentive service.