26 February 2013

Thai sunsets

"When I am hurt, heal my wounds, hide their seams,
Paint my life with the colours of your dreams”
– Hakyma Omyra

A cosy warmth settles down when the heat of the afternoon has gone. A light breeze, or even the air simply becoming more breathable again, makes me feel alive. I particularly enjoy those long Summer evenings in Western Europe when the day seems to ever prolong itself, a stark contrast to most other places I visited, including Thailand where the sun sets between 6 and 7pm. The urge to savour the last few rays of sunlight becomes even more pressing there – the photo album displays some of those sunsets observed across Thailand.

It's as if I had to catch those last few rays coming from the sun (my rational mind knows that they don't actually disappear, it's just that the surface on which I am on has rotated), as if I had to force myself to realise that this day, attached to this date, would soon be gone, for ever. And it's therefore as if I had to capture the uniqueness of the day, and the scarcity of the time we spend alive, through the beauty of a sunset and the tingle of the approaching night – capturing them into the box of my camera, stealing them from the darkness. Is that why there are so many pictures taken of sunsets? I don't know.

Whenever the sunset approaches, I would frantically switch the settings of my camera to manual mode, playing with different ISO speeds and apertures, usually measuring the light by focusing on the border between the sky and the shadows. How tough it is to be satisfied with the outcome though. Well, I certainly never managed to capture that almost-magical green flash that occurs shortly after sunset but the spectrum of colours, from flamboyant reds to soothing blues, still remains a sight I can’t help but admire every time.

PS: check a previous post with 3 sunset pictures taken in Peru.