Some time ago I found an old wiro notebook in a drawer. A scruffy wiro bound notebook with a photo of 2 men in a kayak with a bear on the front cover. In that notebook I found terrible sketches drawn in pencil made while travelling in 1991. One sketch leapt out at me. It was a rough pencil sketch of Mt Ararat from a backpacking trip to eastern Turkey. The sketch really surprised me – it was a very basic pencil sketch, drawn using a .5mm technical pencil on a cheap notepad. The sketch is just black and white… To my surprise the sounds and smells of the day came flooding back. Meeting some Kurdish goat herders and their flock near the base of Mt Ararat, about 10km from the Iranian border on a bright sunny but cool, alpine day. Along with memories of driving across the mountain steppe in an old Renault 19 and the smells of chai and coffee in a Doğubayazıt pasta solunu. It all came back come flooding back! Why did it evoke such vivid memories? I’m not really sure to be honest. Maybe t...
After a very quick trip to the Otara Markets just before Christmas to buy Taro leaves to make Palusami for a Christmas dinner, I was determined to go back soon with the sketchbook. We did that yesterday, and squeezed in a swim at Maraetai on the way back, a nice day!
Otara Market is an excellent place to find Pacific ingredients (we even saw 'banana poke' for sale), here the Taro is being trimmed for display...
Spotted this excellent old Kenworth truck being getting loaded at the end of the day...
Otara Market is an excellent place to find Pacific ingredients (we even saw 'banana poke' for sale), here the Taro is being trimmed for display...
I tried sketching the huge crowd as they walked past, with little success...
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