The event officially opened today with an official Opening Ceremonies in the official yurt. This is my official report of the event.
Breakfast was at 7am, then a short bus ride out to the dunes where we boarded the quaint, touristy, official, open-air "ship of the desert" army surplus transport vehicle.
This adventure had all the earmarks of fun. We thought, "How fun!" and looked forward to the fun. As soon as the fun began, however, we realized the flaw in the open-air plan. You see, it was -6° F this morning with a passing breeze that was only amplified the cruising speed of our ship of the desert. Let's just say it was less fun than we thought it might have been in, say, August for example.
Upon arrival at the Art Palace yurt, we settled in for the festivities. By that, I mean we bundled up and hunkered down against the cold. You can see most of our group in the third row of this photo. Thankfully, the yurt/theater was warmer than outside. You can tell this by the fact that there is one guy in the lower right of the photo that is not wearing a goofy hat.
The opening ceremony had -- surprise! -- some speeches. Three hours' worth, almost all of which were in Chinese except the part where I distinctly heard one "arigato gozaimasu" strangely out of place to everyone except the sole Japanese photographer in attendance. Unfortunately, after the three hour immersion course in language studies, I am sorry to report I still do not understand much Mandarin beyond "Hello" and "Thank you." On the other hand, the feeling in my toes has returned now that I'm back in my hotel room.
The Master of Ceremonies duties were performed by a lovely TV-anchor-looking couple. Keeping in mind how we were all dressed, notice how lovely she looks in her lovely sleeveless evening dress. Just lovely. I hope she recovers soon. I think I'll send flowers to her room along with the get well card.
There was dance and song in the yurt, too. A couple of snaps from my seat in the audience.
Generally speaking, the costuming in these numbers was interesting and colorful. However, there was one song and dance number that I thought was lacking in costuming sophistication, although quite daring in its use of vibrant red.
It wasn't until the song was well under way that I realized the dancers were all wearing photo vests. How topical!
This was quickly surpassed, however, by what Joe afterwards referred to as the "synchronized tripod dance number."
For a couple of days now, we've had a running joke in our group about the potential of doing a film about photography along the lines of those great spoofs like Best of Show, Waiting for Guffman, or A Mighty Wind. I can see Parker Posey and Christopher Guest having a conversation about their favorite f/stop, Michel McKean's search for the perfect red photo vest, or Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara as a husband and wife team who travel around the country photographing water towers. In our film, we would definitely need to include a dance routine involving tripods. We would not, however, be the first to explore this artistic expression.
On a serious note, we were all delighted d to see Yan Li receive acknowledgement for all her hard work. She certainly deserves it.
After the ceremonies, the exhibit was opened. Here is Joe posing with some of the local Chinese photographers in his exhibition space. Having American photographers at an event like this in China is still pretty unusual, so we are often the focus of attention and lots of grip-and-grin snapshots. It's fun, but definitely an odd feeling to be in the spotlight like this.
By the end of the day, we were all pooped. This isn't one of us, but it easily could have been. One catches rest wherever one can -- particularly if it's in a spot where one can absorb a bit of warmth from a sunny window, even if it means straddling two chairs for a quick bit of shut-eye. Warmth is warmth and we'll take it where we can find it. There are electric radiant heaters in the bathrooms. Need I say more?