Category: Photo Stories
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7 Unforgettable Days With Mongolian Nomads
“The poor foreigner,’ he said, ‘has been acquainted with our grasslands but for four short days.’ ‘We must pity him,’ said the old man with feeling. ‘How hard it must be,’ commented the woman, ‘not to be born a Mongolian.’ ‘To be sure,’ said the old man, ‘the fellow is most unfortunate. But how blessed…
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I Recreated My Dad’s 37-Year-Old Photos From South Korea
In the basement of my parent’s house, buried deep beneath some old tools, a bulky laptop running Windows 95′, my mother’s childhood dolls, plastic tubs of multi-colored legos, and piles of books, was a wooden box full of Kodachrome slides. At times I would go through that box, hold the slides up to the light,…
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Kiyomizu-dera Temple Cherry Blossoms | Kyoto, Japan
Mom came for a visit here in Busan, so I took her on a short trip to Kyoto. It’s one of my favorite cities in all of Asia. We were lucky because the cherry blossoms were in bloom when we went. I heard they were going to light up Kiyomizudera Temple for the occasion. We…
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A Drop In Time | Bundi, India
There are moments in life when you realize how fragile it is. I just had one of those. Thankfully everything is fine. But in the darkness I thought of this photo I took in the small town of Bundi, India. I was sitting alone on the roof of my guesthouse at sunrise. I watched the…
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The Craziest Intersection I’ve Ever Seen | Shanghai, China
No, it’s not a scene from Blade Runner. This is the Yan’an Interchange in Shanghai, one of the wildest on the planet. During the weekend the city turns on these blueish Tron lights underneath the highway. It wasn’t easy to get this shot. We had to pay off a security guard to let us on…
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Walking on Water in Shanghai
Sometimes I sit in front of my computer and edit images all day. Today was one of those days. It was raining out. I put on some Groove Salad, “a nicely chilled plate of ambient/downtempo beats and grooves,” as their site says. Then drank coffee, lit some incense, and made this image. I got so…
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Depth of Field at The Taj Mahal
I wanted to get to the Taj early to avoid the crowds. As soon as got in I sprinted to this one spot where I knew I could catch both the Taj and the sunrise in my frame. Even though it was a distance from the entrance, there was already a small group of photographers…
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Cloud City: Rooftopping in Foggy Busan, Korea
I looked out my window and saw fog rolling in from the sea. I couldn’t believe it because it was the first week of March, and fog season here is usually from May to July. I stood there wondering if it was for real, and if I would finally get the shot I’d dreamed of. I…
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Portrait in a Rajasthan Stepwell: My Steve McCurry Moment
I came to Rajasthan to live out my own Steve McCurry fantasy, to travel to the same places and photograph the same faces that he did. So this morning I went to Dhai-Bhai Kund, a 500-year-old step well in Bundi, India. This guy was sitting nearby. I asked him if I could take a photo…
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Taj Majal Sunset River Reflection
I saw photos of the Taj from a boat on the river. As the story goes, there is a guy who will take you out on his rowboat. You just have to follow the outer wall down to the water. When we got there a guy asked, “Do you want a boat ride?” It wasn’t…
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Images of Ulleungdo Island: Korea’s Jurassic Park
Some friends told me there was this island in Korea unlike any they had seen before. They said it reminded them of something out of Jurassic Park or Lord of The Rings. I’d heard overblown comparisons before: the Hawaii of this or Santorini of that. Then the Lonely Planet included Ulleungdo in its 2012 list of…
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Images of Dubai: Cybertron of The Middle East
One of Dubai’s most overused phrases according to Time Out magazine is, “It’s just like Ibiza/Vegas/Paris/New York/London here.” It’s true there’s an endless summer vibe to Dubai, like a Balearic Calvin Harris club anthem when the bass drops. For some the city is an escapist fantasy. “What happens in Dubai stays in Dubai!” And of course there…
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Bridge to Paradise: A Korean Temple Stay at Magoksa
The sound of monks chanting echoes through the forest. Birds chirp in the trees. The humming sound of cicadas lowers and rises in waves. At the end of a tree-lined trail is a stone bridge covered in white lanterns known as Paradise Bridge. It crosses over a lazy stream where water bubbles over smooth stones.…
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Echoes of Jeju: A Photo Essay of Korean Island Life in 1979 (Part 1)
35 years ago my family moved from America to Jeju Island. We lived there for just over a year. I was six then. While we were there, my father took a bunch of photographs. But they got buried away in a pile of boxes, stored along with all the other stuff families collect.
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Echoes of Jeju: A Photo Essay of Korean Island Life in 1979 (Part 2)
In 1979, Iranian militants seized the US Embassy in Tehran, the Russians invaded Afghanistan, and Margaret Thatcher became the new Prime Minister of England. The album of the year was Saturday Night Fever by the Bee Gees. The song of the year was Just The Way You Are by Billy Joel. Apocalypse Now and The…













