On New Year’s Eve I spent some time downtown with friends, and while it was really crowded, it was good to walk around and see stuff.
We even ran into a ska band doing a show on the street. Spontaneous ska is always a nice surprise, though it just made me miss the shows in Korea.
On New Year’s Day I went to the local aquarium with Kyle and his dad, who was visiting for the holiday.
Shooting in an aquarium is pretty challenging, since it is very dark and there are lots of colors, not to mention glass to shoot through. It’s a fun challenge though, and I hadn’t been to one since October 2010 in Busan. Lots of these photos are shot at ISO 3200, which is camera nerd speak for “attempting to shoot in the dark.” Once again I loved my camera I got a year ago as it did alright.
It was a really cool aquarium and I had a lot of fun hanging out with Kyle and his dad. Soon it is back to work…
Yesterday was the inaugural Australian Baseball League All-Star Game, hosted here in Perth. It was a giant project we had been working on for the last month and it was great to see it come together. Broadcast to over 400 million households in over 50 countries, it was the biggest Australian baseball event in history.
When I wasn’t working like crazy, I managed to take some pictures.
The game featured the best international imports in the ABL (dubbed the World All-Stars) vs the Australian National Team. Here is Graeme Lloyd, acting as pitching coach for Team Australia.
Before the game we had a celebrity tee-ball match. Lloyd hit a fly ball to center.
Heat manager Brooke Knight coached the World All-Stars.
Rinku Singh, winner of an Indian reality TV show called “The Million Dollar Arm” in 2008 where he beat 37,000 other contestants in a pitching contest despite having never heard of baseball. He won a bunch of money and a contract with the Pittsburgh Pirates. By now he has learned to be a pretty good pitcher.
At one point I took some other photographers up to the centre field scaffolding.
The event went great and I was glad to be a part of it. Now I am excited for Christmas break so I can catch up on sleep.
I’ve been back from Taiwan for a while but just finally had time to get all of my photos (and a video!) together.
Our team unfortunately went 0-3 in the tournament, but we still held well against some of the best teams on this side of the planet. For example, the SoftBank Hawks, champions of Nippon Professional Baseball, have a payroll around $50 million, so it was a great challenge and an awesome experience for the team. The tournament itself was great and we were treated very well.
Taiwan itself was a great country. Everyone was super friendly and I was reminded how much I miss Asia.
This was Hong Kong airport, during our layover.
The team got an amazing welcome from the media in Taiwan and cameras followed us everywhere.
Fans greeted us at the airport too.
Our manager giving interviews at the airport before getting on the bus.
Two-time World Series Winner Graeme Lloyd. Also our pitching coach.
Our manager at a press conference with the representatives from the Japanese, Korean, and Taiwanese leagues.
The team at the stadium.
More media.
We had a welcoming banquet before the game started.
Graeme with a random gang of groupies that were hanging out outside of our hotel.
When we weren’t playing I got to take pictures of the other teams’ games. This is the Korean champions, the Samsung Lions (whose games I used to go to when I lived in Korea) vs the Japanese champions, the SoftBank Hawks.
On Monday we actually got the day off, so I took a break from all the work I was doing and went to Taipei for the day with my coworkers Owen and Yasunori, as well as our translator Martin. We took the speed train.
I saw this little girl sitting two rows in front of me and we engaged in a game of peekaboo. Make sure to check the video at the bottom of this post for more.
We saw some armed forces guards, who do not move. They do a changing of the guard every hour, which can also be seen in the video I took.
Taiwan, like many Asian countries, is full of mopeds.
We stopped for lunch at a nice hole-in-the-wall.
We then went to Taipei 101, which was absolutely jaw-dropping. It was the tallest building the world from 2004 to 2010. I stood at the bottom and just stared up at it for a while in awe.
Inside, on the way up.
Saw this kid inside. Huh.
89 stories up.
91 stories up.
The observation deck had WiFi.
The tower from a nearby plaza.
Our group again.
That night we went back to Taichung and the night markets. You find some weird things in the night markets.
(That’s exactly what you think it is.)
On our last day I got to shoot the Asia Series championship, and it was a rematch between Korea and Japan. Having media credentials is great as I got to sit in the photographer’s pit, and was reminded again of how fun it is to shoot baseball. This was definitely the biggest game I had shot.
After losing to the Hawks when they first met in the tournament, the Samsung Lions defeated them in the championship to win the Asia Series. It was pretty exciting to watch, and the entire week was an amazing experience.
When I returned to Perth we had a series just two days later, so it was right back to work. In two weeks we will be hosting the Australian Baseball League All-Star Game, which will be broadcast all over the world, including on MLB Network. It will be a huge event and a big job, but another great experience.
Here is a ten-minute video of my day in Taipei, which gives you a better feeling of some of the areas and monuments I saw, as well as the interaction with Owen, Yasunori and Martin.
