Sunsets on the South China Sea

Photographs taken from Miri. Miri is in Northern Sarawak, a state within the Malaysian island of Borneo.


I'm starting to feel like an actual photographer! (This is kind of reminiscent of the days when I started to feel like an actual writer!) I know this because I can't seem to put my camera down.

As I was watching the sunset, I thought, "sunsets are the most inspiring of events!" a thought I have had often. Sunsets are a sight that I simply can't resist, especially sunsets on the sea. And here I am in Northern Borneo, watching the sun set on the South China Sea.

I can't help but want to photograph sunsets, because they're such magical moments. And I thought, here is a source of hope in the world, because if sunsets are so incredibly inspiring, and I'm inspired by them often, here's something AMAZING in the world that happens EVERY SINGLE DAY! Every day a sun sets and every day it is beautiful, and inspiring, and magical somewhere in the world.

And I thought about how when I watch the sunset, I cant let go of my camera, and I just keep snapping and snapping and snapping, because that's the amazing thing about a sunset: every moment is a new moment, a new sight. It's like a photo that keeps shifting, and it gets more and more spectacular until it's gone. No two sunsets are the same, and no two moments in any given sunset match another. But a sunset builds in oohs and ahhs, which is perhaps what makes them so inspiring. And I can't help but want to capture and preserve inspiring moments! Because, in a photograph, it's eternal inspiration.

But ah! That brings me to the question I always ask myself. If there is something so incredibly remarkable going on in front of you, shouldn't you be taking it all in? Enjoying it, experiencing it, absorbing it? The real moment. Are you missing a part of the magic by photographing it? I guess for me, part of the joy is photographing it and that's how I absorb it, because I absorb it in a memory which will last longer because I have physical reminders of that memory. But also, I think I am aware enough, that I allow myself to do both, and if there were ever something that I felt as though I had to choose (you can experience this first hand 100% but not have the photo to remember by, or you can experience this 20% and have the photo)...if it were something so incredible/once in a lifetime, I'd probably choose the former. but who knows, I had a hard time putting my camera down for this sunset, and it was pretty darn spectacular.

I sat on the rocks and soaked in the cool breeze, the quiet calm and the diminishing hues of the sunset. I was alone with my thoughts. Just me and my camera.