Shanghai Woman

In the summer of 2007, my family and I spend an extended period in China, based in Shanghai. Our stay was an extraordinary experience and China is an extraordinary country. We gained many fond memories and friends.

China truly is an incredible country and many of its places, people, sites, beauty, smells and sorrows will remain burned into my heart and mind. This photograph is one of those memories I will never forgot.

I took this image while walking with my family on a pleasant Sunday afternoon on the "The Bund". The Bund is a very westernized part of Shanghai along the Huangpu River with high-end retail stores and expensive, exquisite restaurants. As you walk Shanghai, you are certain to see great wealth, grand architecture, crowds of tourists, and, unfortunately, poverty to levels in which we are not accustomed to in many parts of the Western world.

This woman was asleep on the steps in the heart of The Bund. I captured the image without her knowledge, otherwise, I could have expected strong objection on her part. This image represents to me the dichotomy of Shanghai and China. On the one hand, you have a very wealthy class of people with an economy growing at a unprecedented pace. On the other hand, the image is a stark reminder the country is largely void of a prosperous middle class and exhibits extreme poverty.

It would not be uncommon to see sites as this woman about Shanghai. In fact, often the sights were far worse. There were numerous occasions where we would see an full amputee, no arms or legs, placed on a old piece of cardboard laying on a hot sidewalk in ninety plus temperatures from morning to night begging for money. These sites broke my heart and I just could not bring myself to even take a photograph of such things.

Economic times are tough and these are unprecedented times for us in the West. Many are suffering. You may be one of them. Yet, despite these times we still live in a society of great hope for the future and prosperity.

I need to remind myself that while times are hard, I have a lot to be thankful for.

How about you?

Cheers,
Dale

Watched

Have you ever felt like you were being watched? In the cool of the evening, walking your dog at dusk and you feel the chill through your senses, that someone is watching you. Or that something is watching.

We are being watched every day. That eye is watching. It watches what you type on your computer. It knows you are surfing this blog. It sees you when you enter your building every day at work. It sees you as you drive down the freeway.

What do you want this eye to know about you, about what you do, or what you think?
What are you proud of? What are you ashamed of? Do you want the eye that is watching to know about you?

Be sure to look over your shoulder, in your rear view mirror, and do not think you are ever alone. Someone is watching.

What is it that is being watched?

Cheers,
Dale