Hello everyone,

As you all knew I have been collecting donations for the IDP’s of Swat.  I managed to send $1,000 because of all your support and generosity.  A friend of mine was going there himself to go and distribute food and necessary items.  He just sent me an email with details on what he saw, did and achieved along with pictures. I would like to share these with you.

Murtaza wrote:

It was on this Monday that I was able to go to the IDP camp in Charsada. When I came to Islamabad on Friday last a friend of mine who is professor in Peshawar University asked me to accompany his brother to the camp and see for myself what are the requirements over there. He also said that there is lots of supply of food items in the camps but
non-food items are in little shortage. One thing I wanted to tell you is that only 9% of the IDPs are living in the camps. The other 91% are in schools empty factory buildings and are guests in homes of people
in Mardan, Sawabi etc.

When I went to the camp with Ehsan Ullah Sahib (the guy with blue hat) I noticed amazing ghurbat(poverty). The Swaty people are hard working ones. They are always working and they never beg or wait for someone to give them food. Now such people are stuck in tents or camps. You look at their faces and you hate yourself. You just can’t help them.

There is nothing that can you can do for them to get them out of this depressing situation. You can give them food. You can provide them medicine shelter anything but cant give them any thing to do. I hated
my self there.

When I was in the camp the people in charge there had a list of recent widows. I, with the advise of Ehsan Ullah sahib decided that we will distribute cash to these widows directly. So we took the list and with help of lady in black burqa (her self an IDP) went to each widow and gave them cash that they can use directly.  The following pictures show how we went to each tent and gave the widows cash. In almost all pictures you cant see the widow herself as they don’t like being photographed.

We also gave each child in the camp Rs.5 to get some smiles on their face. we got many =)

These pictures show  the camp sites and how people are living in them.

These pictures show all the different Aid agencies/people that are there to help.

Our whole process ended with the prayer that the IDPs can go back to their homes. Aameen. .

But the pictures that sums my whole day is this one….

When I was coming back the black burqa lady gave me a list of female hygiene products that I will buy on Sunday and send to the camp. Also in the list are soap and dettole which some one is helping me to buy and send to the camp.

Before I go one thing more. if you think that it is possible to collect more donations, do it. I am here in this area of  the country, at least till 15th of July and if you can send me more donations, I’ll either send the money or if possible I’ll make the trip to the camp again.

Thanks for all the help

Murtaza

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For more information on the IDP’s of Swat, Click here

For my initial post on fundraising for Swat, Click here

Hi guys - I’ve been so busy lately trying to juggle everything that I really haven’t been getting time to blog in detail - I shot a beautiful wedding in Toronto last week and I’m going back again this weekend for another one. Yes, I’ve been doing a lot of travelling - soon life will slow down a little and I will get on top of blogging once again.

In the meanwhile, have a look at some pictures I took when I recently visted a Boardwalk over a  Bog in Ottawa.   

Hi guys! I know I’ve totally been out of the loop for the last few days - I’m in Toronto shooting a very old friend’s Wedding.  The Mehendi and Shaadi events were just lovely, their Valima is tomorrow night - I can’t wait to see the bride and groom, I know they are going to look stunning.  Photographing this wedding has been a total pleasure, the family members have been so welcoming and super helpful so a special thanks to them..thank you so much for making all the events a total treat to photograph.

You guys will have to wait to see pictures from the wedding…in the meantime I have a portrait session to share with you.  Hina, Gautam and Suhaan are the 3 most sweetest people I’ve met!  I did their portraits at the University of Toronto downtown campus - I just love the architecture and all the lovely gardens that campus has.   10 minutes into the session and I discovered that Hina and Gautam went to McMaster University the same time I was there - I can’t believe I never had the opportunity to meet them before…but anyone who knows me is aware of my love for Mac and anything connected with mac so obviously I knew we were going to hit it off - but as we spent more time together I realized what wonderful people Hina and Gautam are and their cutie pie son Suhaan is just precious! He’s sooooo CUTE and just such a sweetheart! He’s all smiles all the time and has the most gorgeous eyes!

Oh and a little secret I get to share with you all…..I’m going to be photographing Suhaan turning 1….YAYYYY! I know it’s going to be a lot of fun!

So I leave you with pictures from their shoot. Enjoy!

A few weeks ago there was an Ikebana display at the Museum of Nature called ‘Retrosepctive’. For those of you who don’t know.. Ikebana is the Japanese art of Flower arranging.   So I’ve been dying to enroll in an Ikebana class for a while now..but something always takes presedence and I end up putting it off.   But when I heard about this display, I knew I had to make it a point to go have a look.  I’m so glad I went becuase each arrangment was so unique and creative and just amazing!  Each display was sooooo different and so well presented, I had a little fun with my camera and got some shots of my favs.

If you would like more information on anything related to Ikebana, please visit:   http://ikebanaottawa.ca/

Photographing in rainy weather can be such a nightmare - not only for your camera gear, but it totally throws off your plans for the shoot.  I chose the Ottawa City Hall because I knew we could stay outdoors but if it starts raining we could move indoors and still get some great shots. 

Chamika contacted me becuase she wanted to get some headshots done.  When we started the day, the weather was nice but 15 minutes into the shoot it started raining so we moved inside the City hall.  There is a lot to work with in the City Hall, lots of textures and colours.   I especially loved the different coloured tops Chamika had brought - I couldn’t choose a favourite..but I found each colour just lit up her eyes!  

Enjoy!