Daryl Hawk

3/10/16

Daryl Hawk, renowned photographer and adventurer showed photos of his trip to Ladakh, India one of the world’s most isolated areas.  Mr. Hawk travels alone and has a goal of photo documenting cultures and environments before they are irrevocably changed.

Mr. Hawk avoids areas that have an active conflict as he is interested not only in the scenery, but the people as well and enjoys mingling with them and learning their ways.  Ladakh is predominantly Buddhist so the people are very peaceful and welcoming while living in spectacular surroundings with exotic and colorful architecture.

Q&A

Q.  Did you see many soldiers in Ladakh?

A.  There were some because it is so close to Pakistan, but most of the soldiers were near the borders with Tibet and China because that’s where most of the disturbances have taken place.

Q.  Were most of the buildings constructed during the British rule years?

A.  Yes.

Q. What do you do when people want to give you food?

A.  This is a very important issue because you don’t want to get sick in an isolated area so I am very careful about food and drink and usually don’t eat or drink much in these kinds of areas.

Q.  What is the education level for nomads?

A.  Education is very important for these people because about 50%  leave to get some job that will pay them something and to get these jobs they have to be educated.

Q.  Where are the filling stations?

A.  We traveled over 3000 miles on this trip by car and I never saw my driver fill up the car.  I don’t know where he got the gas.

Q.  Are you interested in going to Bhutan?  

A.  I traversed Bhutan in 1999.  It was a very memorable trip.

Q.  Why were all the signs in English?

A.  English tends to be the universal language especially in India.

Q.  What is your rule of thumb for photo processing?

A.  I do very little processing only a little tweaking from time to time.  People are getting away from processing photos, which I think is a good thing.