St Pauls Cathedral re-opens, London, 28th October 2011

St. Pauls Cathedral re-opened the doors to the public 28/10/2011 after many days of closure due to the anti-capitalist protestors camping on their doorstep. Full series at below link:

http://www.demotix.com/news/899987/st-pauls-cathedral-re-opens

Anti-Capitalist Protest at St. Pauls, London, 24/10/2011

 

 I returned to the St Pauls Churchyard 9 days after the first day. Now the organization of all the areas including full kitchen, Library, University tent and more. Click link below for full series of images and a bit more text.

http://www.demotix.com/news/894784/occupy-london-st-pauls-churchyard

Anti-Capitalist Protest, Finsbury Sq. London, 24/10/2011

Following the initial rally at St Pauls churchyard, the following Saturday some protesters moved to set up another camp in Finsbury Sq.
http://www.demotix.com/news/894674/occupy-london-finsbury-square-camp

Anti-Cuts Rally, London, October 2011

Anti-Austerity Rally, St. Paul's Churchyard, London 15th October 2011
Around 2000 protesters gathered on the stpes and in the church yard of St. Paul's Cathedral for the anti-cuts rally. Tents were set up for the overnight protest and say they will stay until moved on. Road blocks were in place later on in the evening and passers by were caught up in the minor trouble.
Full article at below link:
http://www.demotix.com/news/876903/anti-cuts-rally-st-pauls

UK Uncut demonstration, Westminster Bridge

Sunday 9/10. UK Uncut stage a protest against the possible changes happening to the structure of the NHS. Westminster Bridge was taken over by the protesters at 1pm and carried on until about 5pm when the police moved them on. above some shots during and the aftermath. For full article click link below.
http://www.demotix.com/news/866648/uk-uncut-protest-save-nhs-blocks-westminster-bridge

Bull run, near Valencia, Spain

Every July in this Spanish town on the Mediterranean coast the locals set up a makeshift bull ring on the quay of the port and twice each evening for four days bring several bulls in trucks and let them loose one by one into the ring to be taunted by the people who choose to enter. Occasionally the bulls get the upper hand if they can build up enough energy after being cattle prodded  before they get entered in the ring, or having fallen in the sea after chasing the guys. Very traditional.....and it's good when the bull wins, otherwise it all seems a bit unnecessary.

New Image Hair Studio, Wolstanton, Staffs

I had contacted Caroline, the owner of this salon, some months ago as i wanted to include some shots from here in the hair series of images i have been doing over the years. The project is ongoing and i will try to include barbers and hairdressers from home and abroad. Above are a few selected from today which was my first meeting with the ladies. Tuesday and Thursday mornings are the busiest times there and Caroline has told this is when the characters come in. I wanted to ask permission from the customers before starting and the elderly ladies using the big dryers couldn't hear me for the hum of the machine on their heads, but i eventually got their okay. Polite as always. No blue rinses today, but we wait in hope.

Poker, Dominos and Burslem Locals

 

Thursday night at the pub is full of games and characters. I had no idea about the domino night happening as it must be a new feature there but took the new fuji x100 with me just in case, as this particular pub can always spring surprises. All the regular card players were there plus the regular characters from around Burslem.
An hour after these images were taken i was screamed at by a local that i know fairly well. He said he'd ram the camera down my throat. I have sat at the bar in this pub for the last year or more, and he always seemed pretty reasonable. He ended up walking out but i tried to explain that I wasn't there to take his picture. Anyway no problem.

Wembley semi-final FA Cup Stoke v Bolton

So stoke got through to the semi final of the FA Cup and it has been a while, so i jumped on the metropolitan line to Wembley to get some images and meet some Stokies (where I reside during the week).
After the game I e-mailed some images to the local Staffordshire rag, The Sentinel. They printed about 6 of them in tuesdays issue but in the readers photos! Not exactly what i was after.....

USA 2010

A few shots from the road trip in USA. Lone Pine, Ca (top) like a shot from Twin Peaks, we stayed there one night in the motel in photo. The mountain range is the Sierra Nevada, and Mount Whitney is the highest peak of the range and in the contiguous US. Great little frontier town and was the first place we arrived after driving up from Death Valley which is the lowest land in the States (middle photo).
The last image is of the Big Sur on Highway 1, the coast road we took from LA to Monterey. The fog was hanging on the sea all the way up and most of the time we couldn't see much more than 10 metres in front. Pretty unfortunate with the weather, but i have an issue with heights so at least i couldn't see the bottom. They drive like lunatics on that road, so its nothing like the Clint Eastwood movie when he is cruising along, its more like Dual, with pick up trucks right up against your bumper.

Bar Anton, Luqa, Malta

This bar is like a clubhouse for the local guys that are into hunting and shooting. They told me there has been a ban put on hunting in certain months of the year to reserve wildlife.
There are several different types of these clubhouses/ bars around the town and each one is for different sports or activities.

The Leopard, Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent

Monday nights at the Leopard, squeeze box, harmonicas, the spoons and Roy on vocals. I doubt there are many pubs in the country where somebody gets out an accordion. The pub dates back over two hundred years and the history of the place is full of tales. The pub is written about, although the name is changed to the Tiger, in the Arnold Bennet stories. see link that follows for a BBC article:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/stoke/content/articles/2007/05/25/leopard_history_feature.shtml

London's East End

I arranged a shoot in a notable West Ham supporters pub during an England match in the World Cup. The landlord warned me that the guys in there probably wouldn't like any attention and he was quite right. I took this shot for the uncle of the boy, but was one of the only images i came away from the game with.

Street kids of Marrakesh

Whilst taking pot shots in the Medina, these three or four lads started on me. Taking  pictures over there is a little difficult as it's frowned upon it seems.  The people generally don't like being in pictures, something to do with the soul being taken from them, but they will allow for a couple of coins. These kids didn't ask for any cash, they were just practicing being heavies for the future.

Club Tropicana, Havana, Cuba

We went off to see this show, 80 bucks each, seats at the front of stage and a bottle of Havana Club thrown in (it was just a half bottle). Plenty of tourists and a few of the rich black market guys from the city; In fact we saw the tour guide from the cigar factory....makes you wonder! The club was opened in 1939, twenty years before the change over.