Travel Photography | Children of Himalaya | Kashmir

© 2012 Wazari Wazir | Kashmiri Children Wearing a Phiren (The Kashmiri Cloak)  | Photograph Taken With 24mm Prime Lens

To some people this photograph is messy, cluttered with messy background but to me each and everything in this photograph give context to the photograph, they tell the real story about the subject, photographers usually called this an environmental portrait because it does not only shows the person in the photographs, they also tell where this picture is taking, the mountain and the snow shows that this photograph were taken during cold winter.

During my recent visit to Kashmir on February 2012, I take a lot of environmental portrait more than head and shoulder shots, even though I do like portrait photography but in this case I wanted to show the viewers how the environment look like, I want to inspire people to come and visit this beautiful place and meet with this great looking Himalayan Children and you know what, they did not ask me anything to be photographed, in fact some of them came to me and ask me to take their picture and they just walk away after they saw their picture appear on my camera LCD.

From my short experience at the Sonamarg there, the children and their family are friendly, I don’t know about other people experience but to me they are great people, maybe because not many photographers came over here during winter or they just pass through this road without stopping by. Just to let you know this road will take you to Kargil and Ladakh, yes the same road that you seen here. This is the main road, truly a highway but as you can see there is not many vehicle coming through, in fact you can play around here.

From Boulevard Road of Srinagar, where my hotel is located, it will only took around two hours to reach this area, and maybe more if the snow is quite heavy and the road need to be cleared first. We pay Rs2000 per vehicle for the return trip, I wish I can stay overnight here, I did not expect that this place is full with photo opportunity, I thought that not many people living on this area and I was wrong, so if I have a chance to visit this area again, I will make sure that I will be staying here for at least few days to really get to know the people here better and blend with the environment. They are quite friendly and lots of activities taking place here to keep you busy.