two steps behind

I wonder, where would this entrance lead us to? Perhaps it was to the secret hide out of “The Man With the Golden Gun”! I didn’t have the chance to find out because I wasn’t sure if I would made it out of there. Well, I actually was too busy checking out the shops on the island and also taking pictures as much as I could on this island, Phang Nga bay, Thailand, because we only had about 30 minutes for this stop.

So… swoofff, off to take more pictures.

Who would have known that googling the phrase “tying the knot” would bring so many interesting articles to read. The very first link that was provided by google was a link to a wedding photography service.

Tying The Knot

-One of the Top 10 Wedding Photographers in the World.
www.tyingtheknot.net

So, I started to wonder, what does “tying the knot” have to do with “marriage” so I again… Googled for “tying the knot meaning” and was lead to a website explaining how nowadays wedding have their customs and traditions traced all the way back to ancient Egyptians!

Wedding Traditions & Their Origins

- Tying The Knot. This comes from the days of the Roman empire when the Bride wore a girdle that was tied in knots.
The Groom untied the knots prior to the consummation of their marriage.
www.pibweddings.com/traditionsorigins.html

What was I thinking that made me took the picture when I saw the rope tied on the boat?

I guess the message was “commitment” because when tying the rope together it meant to have one “attached” to the other, to add length, to extend, to go beyond… what one rope can do. Meanwhile, there are tension that pulling the ropes away from the knot in opposite direction, proven by Newton’s 3rd law of motion “Whenever a first body exerts a force F on a second body, the second body exerts a force −F on the first body. F and −F are equal in magnitude and opposite in direction”, therefore the only thing that will hold 2 ropes together is how strong would each rope would be able to withhold the tension that is being created with surrounding force.

The knot would never untied the itself, but the strength of the ropes is the key that hold them together… Maybe this is the reason why the phrase “tying the knot” has so many related article with wedding and marriage because it take 2 people’s commitment that the will provide a lifetime of support and cherish each other, as long as they can withhold the pressure from the surrounding and that one rope doesn’t snap before the other.

*a moment of photo taken on the rooftop of the long boat that was taking me and my family to the Nail Island, Phang Nga, Thailand.

In celebration of the 1 year anniversary of TwoStepsBehind… I chose this Panorama that was taken in Phang Nga Bay, Thailand. The island also known as the Nail Island. The picture was taken on Christmas of 2009; the same day that I was reunited and met many of my long lost family members. It was the family trip that I must have mentioned on previous posts.

Looking back a year to date…  there are many changes in the way I process pictures, which hopefully have improved greatly. A year ago, I believed that there would be a day that I could take a nice landscape shot, a panorama of some sort… as my very first post at TwoStepsBehind, Hello Planet Earth, Welcome to Two Steps Behind!, was a panorama of the Vancouver Bridge, Canada. That belief… brought me to where I am today… with the photo which I am really proud of. To me it’s a really big step that was made of many small steps.

A year has passed and I couldn’t believe how much things have changed… or at least just me.

There was so much to learn in a year, and I can say for certain that life is…

to Live and Learn…
to keep going forward…
to give and to love unconditionally

and most important of it all…

to never lose hope.
because I do still believe strongly that, hope achieves the impossible.

In celebration of 1 year anniversary of TwoStepsBehind… I am going to make a slide show, when I have time, to see where has TwoStepsBehind has visited. I know that Apple has those cool programs, iMovie, iDvd… etc to make the globe spin from one place to the next. Let us see how would that turn out!

But first things first… I must thank you everyone for visiting this website…
First of all, my mother for making me realize that I should write a blog so that she could keep up with my where abouts.
Secondly, Qi for gifted me with “HALF” of the Canon Rebel XSI for my Bachelor of Architecture graduation present.

Thirdly, SCI_Arc for exposing me to the world of APPLE and MACBOOK PRO

Forth, WordPress + Flickr + Facebook + iPhoto… for making it so easy to blog.
Last but not least… is Trey, the god of HDR for sharing his tutorial at www.StuckInCustoms.com which became a great inspiration for me. Thank you to all of my reader to continuing reading many if not most of my non-sense posts!

THANK YOU!!!

Cheers… on to the next and many more year to come!

Photos taken at Phang Nga Bay, Nail Island, Thailand on December 25, 2009

A year ago…

Koh Panyee, what an interesting name but what does it really mean? According to our tour guide Koh Panyee means “the Island of the Flag”. Getting interesting isn’t? What flag? We didn’t see any flag!

The story goes something like this… according our tour guide

A family from Indonesia was looking for a new beginning, a new home, a new place to start their new life. The family lead by Toh Baboo, along with 2 more families who had joined Toh Baboo on the quest. This new place they were searching for has a little requirement which is that it shall has full of fish and a place that everyone could live together. The 3 families promised to each other that once such place is found then they would raise a flag as high as possible so that the others could see and join them.

Later, Toh Baboo found the island and… to no surprise – raised the flag!

And that was how the Island got it name Koh Panyee – the Island of the Flag!