Bungeeeeeeee JUMP!!!

I had never dreamt in the wildest of  my dreams that one fine day I will stand on the edge of a mountain and my legs tied to a bungee and jump off 100ft. without looking back. It was a terrific experience. In fact it was too short to call it an experience also! I was at lake Taupo (North Island) in New Zealand, with my family and friends. It scared the **** out of me when my brother refused to jump tandem and so I'd to go solo. Although later I realized good that I jumped solo!

The worst part was the no refund policy so either way I had to jump. This was one jump in my life which I'd never forget. My brother was the first one to go. very confidently he stood on the edge and dove as if the there was a huge trampoline waiting down for him to soring back. I respect his fearlessness. He jumped and I kept looking. I could not digest that it was my turn next :O

The instructor shouted Bungeeeee Jumping and I saw my brother dive fearlessly and then the rope pulling him up and down a couple of times before he came to rest!

It was terrific and unbelievable! I had goose bumps as I was next to jump.

How much ever I tried to make up my mind, the fear was too strong to actually surpassed the excitement. Now I was all set to jump and standing by the cliff, literally dint have the guts to look down (100ft). The trainer then asked me to look into the camera and capture my expression ( asked me to smile) and I frowned :P! I couldn't jump the first time and came back a couple of steps. The trained asked me to jump telling me there are people waiting behind. Without another thought I jumped (just walked off the edge). It was exciting and scary at the same time. Being light weighted I kept swaying in the middle of nowhere between two gigantic mountains upside down as if a crocodile was waiting down and I was its prey ;-).

I landed safely and was taken to the shore and the guards down there asked me if wanted to go again? and I said "Yeah sure if you let me do it for free!"

Now after pondering over that moment, I realized how attached are we to this body that we just don't want to let go off. It was the fear of death that was holding me back. The fact I was tied to the bungee dint really overcome the fear. I am an adventurer and love to do such stunts in life. I have also trekked a lot. ADRENALIN is Legal!!! 

Well to begin with, let me tell you what Fotohon is all about. Fotohon is less about photography and more about capturing thoughts at sight. It is about how well you weave a story out of five pictures in a span of 24hours without using those added effects to your pictures on a theme given.

Well the theme given at this years Fotothon were: 1)Plastic in my City and 2)Mumbai's Earth Day!

at first I was wondering what the second topic actually meant! After a while I realized it was How the city of Mumbai would (if at all) celebrate Earth day. The 1st topic could have had a number of stories weaved as plastic is a very common sight in our city. So I decided lets take the unusual one where I would have a few contenders. Now at first, I was not sure what exactly should I shoot about Mumbai celebrating Earth day. One thing was clear that the word 'celebration' here actually meant how would a fellow mumbaikar would change his attitude and consequently get a change in his daliy activities, and not celebrate it like a festival!

Well as time passed thoughts started to flow and I thought of how would I change my daily routine activities with a purpose of causing no harm to mother nature who we normally take for granted.

I started to think of all those little things which we were once thought in the Environmental Studies course. Those things which I had then taken for granted like saving water, planting trees, using eco friendly things segregating waste and things like that.

I start thinking how I would capture them in the city as it is not that easy to find people implementing such ideas on a daily basis.

I sought help from a friend who actually cleared all the mess of thoughts in my head and reinstalled the confidence in me. We started jotting down ideas which came to and thought how and where we could shoot them in real.

The first one was about saving water and for that we shot a very thought provoking picture which showed two buckets one with overflowing water and the other 3/4th filled. The conclusion was left for the observer to make. The 2nd picture was about a practice which we have always been taught of but we have rarely practiced. It was picture showing a little girl planting a tree. The 3rd picture was very rare to observe in Bombay, and since the theme was imaginative I scripted the picture. I asked a office guy to ride on a bicycle on a sunny afternoon, showing that it wont be too late before we would run out of natural resources if we did not start taking efforts to save them. The 4th picture did not come that easily. Again like the 3rd one this is also not a very common sight in our city. It was about segregating waste. The last picture was about a  Clean Up guy cleaning the roads of Mumbai.

It was a different experience all together, where we had to use pictures to put forth our ideas and weave them in a story. My theme was "Every effort counts"