The Travel Chica

Live Simple. Consume Less. Experience More.

The stupidest thing I did in 2012… and the photo to remember it

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The theme for January seems to be about looking back.  I only planned one or two posts, but I have really enjoyed bringing those memories back to the surface.

I did a lot of cool stuff during two years of travel.

 

I saw a lot of amazing places and met a lot of wonderful people.

 

I accomplished a huge goal.

 

I might have done a few not-so-smart things along the way.

 

Fortunately, I do not have photos to remind me of all of them.  But I do have a photo to remind me of the stupidest thing I did in 2012.

The stupidest thing I did in 2012 can also be called “How not to take a food photo.”

This is a delicious bowl of Sopa de Mani (peanut soup).

I took this photo from above (obviously) at a slight angle.

I decided I needed to get a shot directly above it and very close.

And then I dropped my camera in the soup.

 

And not just a little.

 

The whole front of the camera was covered in soup.

Yes, I did have the camera cord wrapped around my wrist.  But since my hand was only about three inches above the soup, it didn’t matter.  At least it was my point-and-shoot and not the D-SLR.

To this day, I still sometimes finds specks of dried soup on the lens casing when I use the zoom.

 

Have you ever done something stupid trying to get a photo?

Comments

  1. LOL! Those things happen! I was once taking pictures of my friends playing basketball… I looked around, went back to focus, and had a really REALLY close up of the ball… before it hit the lens… sad thing is, it wasn’t even MY camera. Luckily enough, nothing bad happened.

    Lesson: Do not take close up pics of amateur players 😛

    PS: Love your blog, it’s really inspirational! Hope you’re having a great time!

    Dani, from Argentina.

  2. This hurts me still. Xmas of 1984 I had taken tons of pictures of my baby niece (her first Xmas). I had even remembered to take the lens cap off, when at the end of the night everything is packed and ready to go. The husband of one of my cousins offers to carry my box of items down to the car. My new Cannon was on the top of the box. He walks towards the stairway and stumbles. BOOM down goes the camera. The lens is busted, the opening that you put the lens in is busted. There were for supports that you fitted the lenses on to. Two of them got busted in the fall. In order to keep peace in the family I had to say “Its alright, the camera still works.” Over $600.00. Dam.

  3. I’m sorry I shouldn’t laugh…. but it was better than you being ill after eating some dodgy food, which is what I expected.

    • Well, that’s not really stupid. That just happens.

      I was either extremely lucky, or I have a ridiculously strong stomach/ immune system. In fact, I only got food poisoning twice in two years. Once in El Salvador (at a very popular, regular food festival) and on the damn plane LEAVING Bolivia. I believe I may be the only person who traveled a couple months in Bolivia without getting food poisoning once (and eating at the markets and locals restaurants the whole time).
      Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..A Delicious Year: Best Food Finds of 2012

      • Stephanie,
        It is possible to do what turn out to be stupid things re food.

        “This smells a bit funny but it must be OK”, “Just because it’s out of date doesn’t mean I cannot eat it”, “I’ve paid for this so I’m not going to waste it”.

        I know someone who recently ate something from a cupboard that was 2 months old and when they were ill, realised it should have been kept in the fridge :0(

  5. Reminds me of my stupid moment… although mine involved my brand new smart phone and a 1 litre stein of beer at Oktoberfest. Took a photo then attempted to pass it to my mate to look at. Sure enough it fell straight in my beer and sunk. Managed to dry it off and get it working after 3 days in rice :)
    Cole @ FourJandals.com recently posted..The Best of Istanbul – Photo Essay

  7. Ouch! That must have hurt! I actually dont have a habit of having the camera cord across my wrist and recently when I was visiting a step well in India I too was taking a photo from above just like you. I felt for a brief moment that the camera is slipping out from my hand and I immediately put the cord across my wrist!! But we all do make stupid mistakes, makes our travels all the more worthwhile :)
    Arti recently posted..Kofukuji temple in Nara, Japan

  8. After reading this and contemplating my own camera holding technique a bit, I’m actually surprised it hasn’t happened to me yet. It surely has NEARLY happened about three thousand times, admittedly. Also, though I tend to sometimes take pictures of the food I’m about to eat (not professionally, just to remember), I never take pictures of soup. Coincidence or an in-built camera protection mode? We’ll never know…
    Vera recently posted..The street art of Barcelona

  12. Oh my goodness, we love reading these stories. It’s nice to know that there are others out there doing stupid things too. 😉 Once in Iceland on a VERY windy (we could barely keep from falling over) cliff next to the ocean, we proceeded to take off the lens cap and of course it started blowing in the direction of the edge of the cliff. Mindy, with her fast reflexes, no doubt due to her playing lots of infield softball, flung herself on the lens cap, securing it to the ground. She was only a foot away from the jagged edge. aaaahhhhh!!!!!!
    More recently, I was snapping pictures left and right at the gorgeous scenery in Vang Vieng and focused only on the shot, I backed up, fell off the walkway and into a ditch filled with water….but, the camera was ok. 😉 Mindy couldn’t stop laughing!
    And another time, while photographing a moose lying down resting in the snow in Ancorage, Alaska, I kept getting closer and closer to her and when I was rather close, she stood up right in front of me. She was HUGE and it startled me so much that I tried to back up (with snow shoes on – have you ever tried that?) and of course stumbled and fell and even ended up doing a backward summersault. Once again, the camera was ok and Mindy was laughing – probably the moose too. 😉
    Mindy and Ligeia recently posted..White Temple: World of Bizarre

    • Your story reminds me of one of mine. One day I was walking up the path to the Queen’s View near Pitlochry and this huge chap came running downhill past me to the car park. I got to the Queens View and an American woman was leaning over the railing explaining her husband had dropped his lens cap over the edge. He came back with a long tripod and was trying to grab the cap with it but couldn’t reach it. He suggested me and his wife dangled him over the railing so he could reach it. So that’s what we did holding a tree trunk thick leg each of this huge American from Memphis. We came close to dropping him as I said to his wife who started laughing and losing her grip, “On the local news tonight…. an American lady and an Englishman were killed today at Queen’s View when dangling the woman’s husband over the railing and he dragged them to their death. The husband survived”.
      All’s well that ends well He got the cap!!

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