2008 November | Kyle Hepp

November 30, 2008

Warning: Long post ahead, but I think it’s worth reading.

We shot a double wedding pro-bono for our nana, Mila’s two daughters two weekends ago. I’ve been wanting to blog about it, literally, since we arrived on the scene. The first thing I thought as soon as the festivities got underway was, “Oh my gosh, this is so cool, I can’t wait to write about it!”

But then, as started to write the post in my head, like crazy people tend to do, I realized, words really cannot do the feeling I had at that wedding justice. I knew it didn’t matter how much I went over this post, I would probably never get it exactly right. So I mentally erased everything I had “written,” and now what you’re getting is straight up word-vomit.

We headed out to Mila’s house in the evening. She got a grant a few years ago to build a small house on a plot of land that she owns in Los Noviciados, a rural and not well-off area. So S. had never been to her new house and didn’t have a clue where it was. She gave us directions out past the airport and then told us to wait at the first colegio we saw — she would call at 7pm to double check that we had arrived and then send her son out on foot to come get us. 7pm came and went pretty darn quickly so we started getting nervous at about 20 to 8. The wedding was scheduled to start at 8pm, and while we knew this was Chile, meaning it probably wouldn’t started until at least 8:30pm, we didn’t know how much further we had to drive to get to her house or anything. We couldn’t call because Mila doesn’t have a phone. Finally we called the one comunal phone and waited forever while someone ran through town to try and find Mila and bring her back to talk to us. She had completely forgotten to call us. But, even once we got in touch with her, her directions went a little something like this, “It’s just a little further. You know, just keep going straight, way straight, and then when you come to a little bump in the road….yeah, don’t turn there, pass that…and then you’re going to come to a speed bump, ok wait, maybe it’s the third speed bump…umm, don’t turn there either. Just keep going. And then right around the corner is my house. Don’t worry, you’ll see, there’s a tent outside.”

“Just a little further,” ended up being at least another 20 minutes driving. Mila’s idea of right around the corner is seriously skewed. That might be because her house is so far away that if we hadn’t gotten lost it would have taken us 45 minutes — driving. She gets to Santiago every day by first riding a bike, then hitchhiking, then taking a bus and then the metro. I didn’t ask how long that takes her but I would assume at least 2 hours. Go ahead, ask me if the woman has every taken a sick day.

Getting back to the wedding — as soon as we pulled up a group of old men standing outside the house stared a little bit in confusion at the foreigners pulling up in their neighborhood (S. and I were with another friend who came along to shoot with us who’s also an extranjero living in Chile). But, Mila came out and greeted us and everything clicked into place.

“AAAH! She’s la Kyle!!! You’re la Kyle? [to nobody in particular] Does she speak Spanish?”

Once it was established that yes, I am the infamous la Kyle, from where Mila works, and that yes, I do speak Spanish, the family/friends/neighbors received us with open arms. They already knew so much about me and my life that we skipped right past that awkward stage of, “You’re a Gringa so I’m not sure if I should treat you differently.” I was already part of the community.

In case you’re wondering why S. wasn’t the one being reacted to, since he’s the one Mila’s known for the past 15 years, I think there’s a few reasons for this. Mila loves S. to death. When he’s not around she refers to him affectionately as, “Mi ninito,” listens raptly when I talk about him, and then tells me how “lindo,” he is. But, she’s afraid of men. When S. or S.’s dad come around, she clams up instantly. I can’t tell if this, in part is due to her religion. Mila is an evangelical Christian, and extremely conservative, so I would guess that she probably believes in women honoring and respecting the men, although she’s never said as much to me. And secondly, she’s told me that she’s lived through some pretty horrific experiences with her own dad.

Anyways, we arrived and started getting our gear ready. At no point in time did anybody warn us to be careful with our cameras or not leave anything unattended because it might get stolen. And to be honest with you, this was the first time that I can remember, since I’ve lived in Chile, that I completely let my guard down. Not once did I look over my shoulder to see if anyone was running up behind, not once did I go back into the room where we left our extra equipment to make sure it was still there. I could tell we were safe because, like I said, at that moment, we were part of the community.

Before we got started shooting, I asked to use the bathroom. Mila’s son Mitchel took me out back. The day of the wedding, they had constructed a particle-board type shelter and installed a toilet and sink. Mitchel was so thrilled about this luxury that I take for granted every single day of my life…not only that, that Mila sees me taking for granted every single day. Well, not literally, she doesn’t sit there and watch me pee or anything, but you know what I mean.

The cement around the base of the sink was still wet and after I came out three more neighbors went back in to hammer away and put on the finishing touches. While they were doing that, there were at least 15 women running about putting silverware and plates at the long tables that had been set up for the reception. 5 others were going back and forth between the two brides, sharing makeup and a curling iron, trying to get them ready. And there must have been an army of people cooking, because they just kept bringing over more and more food to store until the party got started. Others were decorating the getaway car, and some were hanging up white balloons and ribbons outside the house. Keep in mind Mila’s house, which has 4 tiny bedrooms, is maybe 60 square meters. With this many people everywhere, it was chaotic, but nobody was pulling their hair out. The brides were relaxed and happy and just kept screaming not to let any men see them. The atmosphere was festive.

Finally, around 9:00pm, the brides emerged from their respective rooms and got in a car to be driven to the church which was about a mile away. Almost everyone else walked, following behind. Outside the church on a dusty field, a pick up game of soccer was being played. The physical building looked more like a house than a place of worship, but inside the place was packed. The pastor was in the middle of a sermon, which seemingly stopped for the brides to walk down the aisle and quickly get married. There were so many people we could barely move to get photos! The actual marriage part lasted maybe 10 minutes and then the bride, groom and the 100 or so people who had came to bear witness all walked out, and the sermon continued on for the people who were already in the church.

As the newlyweds got into their white cars and started to drive away they began honking. The huge crowd of people was standing outside cheering them on, when a cloud of dust rose up. We could hear the horses hooves before we actually saw the huasos (Chilean cowboys). The huasos arrived, rode up in front of the two bridal cars and begin making their horses rear up, jump and neigh loudly. It was seriously one of the coolest things I have ever seen. Chills rose up on my arms as they began to gallop away and as I looked at S. he said, “Tengo escalofrios.”

Before the party really got underway, we went over to Mila to inform her that we had to hit the road. Her face got very serious and for a split second I thought she was mad at us. But, then she burst into tears and hugged me burying her face in my shoulder. Note: Mila is the most stoic person on the face of the planet. She does not show emotions, good or bad, nor does she voice her feelings. She’s basically the female version of my husband. (Total joke, playing off of male stereotypes, S. is actually surprisingly expressive if you know him well. Mila is not). She told us how happy she was that we came and that she loves us. My soul fell off the stairs we were standing on and died of shock, then came back to life at that very moment.

Mila is so well-respected in her community. You can tell that people look up to her, and that this wedding not only was a big deal because girls from the neighborhood were getting married, but because they were Mila’s daughters. It was interesting to see her in a different light, outside of her role as the nana (that’s maid for you non-Chilean speaking readers).

But, the funniest thing that I could not get out of my head all night long, was how comfortable I felt. In a little village, where saying no gringa has gone before is probably a safe bet, I should have been more conspicuous than ever. But in Los Noviciados, the only blond girl within miles, with my giant camera hanging around my neck, I felt so much more at home than I EVER do walking down the streets of Santiago. Nobody stared, nobody treated me like a stupid tourist, and not one single man so much as looked at me disrepectfully. It would not be any sort of an exaggeration to say that this one big group singlehandledly restored my faith in the Chilean people.

11 Comments

November 26, 2008

Shameless bragging below. You’ve been warned.

I’m accidentally awake about an hour before I have to be. It’s not enough time to fall back asleep but not really enough time to start working on anything else before I have to start writing for the afternoon. So I thought I’d aprovechar and write a little blog post.

No, I haven’t fallen off the face of the planet. It’s just that I’ve had a TON of photography-related business to take care of in these past couple days. 1 wedding + 3 boudoir sessions + 2 family sessions next weekend = an insane amount of photo editing for Kyle to do before she leaves on her trip to the U.S. Every day these are things on my to-do list.

Edit ____ photo session
Meet with client
Write stories for: Holidash, Stylelist, I’m Not Obsessed, Green Daily and sometimes TONIC.
Do my online work for my dad’s company
Run almost every day as part of my training plan for the half-marathon I’m doing in April (I’m in week 5)
See husband
Have social life (try to leave the house every once in a while)
Walk Papito
Update JMCS

So that means something’s gotta give. In this case, social life and updating JMCS were the first things to fall by the wayside. Then “See husband,” went out the door. Seriously. We live together, yet two days have gone by in which he’s arrived home while I was at the gym and was asleep by the time I got back so we haven’t even exchanged a single word, except via telephone.

While I do feel bad that I haven’t been updating as regularly, in this case I don’t have much of a choice. There just aren’t enough hours in the day. Some people critiqued me on the survey saying, “Please don’t disappear for a week at a time, I hate when you do that!” To those people, I respond, “Haven’t you ever heard of real life?” It gets in the way of online every now and again.

Anything photography related will always be a priority to me. Making my clients happy comes first because this is MY business and nobody is responsible for the success or failures except me. Yes, S. is a key player and second shoots for me frequently, plus he was the one who taught me how to use a camera and all that jazz. But, ultimately since I am the one who deals with the client, I am the one responsible for their satisfaction.

Writing blogs and getting recognition as a writer is nice. I enjoy when my posts are featured on AOL’s welcome screen. I like when I see that what I write gets lots of comments. But, it’s not the same as running my own business.

With my photography business, because I’m so freaking competitive, every time someone books a session with me I feel like:

I WIN

While I know this isn’t necessarily true, each time a client chooses me, I think of it as a smackdown on every other photographer in Chile. I like to win.

Yesterday I handed over photos to a client for her boudoir session. I had been working round the clock to get them done. When she came over and saw them her reaction was, “OH MY GOD, I look like a model!!!!!!!!” She was SO excited. Then that in turn makes me so happy and proud and I WANT TO EXPLODE. I’m doing my job well. That’s like winning and scoring the tie-breaker goal.

If you’d have asked me a year ago whether or not I thought that a person could run a profitable wedding photography business in Chile I would have told you no. But, somehow, everything has been slowly falling into place. I’ve been working steadily since last May and right now during the busy season, summer here, I have more work than I can handle. I actually had to turn two dates for weddings down because I was already booked.

That’s why Kyle Hepp Photography goes at the top of the priority list. Because I’m proud of this thing I’ve built up from nothing to what could actually be considered a reasonable Chilean monthly salary. I’m proud that I am mostly self taught in photography and that through my own hard work and dedication to the craft over the past four years, I can continue to see improvement in my work even on a month to month basis. People hire me because of my own merit and the way I see behind the camera, not because of a degree.

More and more I am convinced that this is what I am going to do with my life. If I can make it work in Chile, I can make it work anywhere.

So if I don’t blog much for the next two weeks, that’s why. Check the photography blog to see what I’ve been doing (although I still can’t post the boudoir sessions because their men haven’t even seen the photos yet!).

8 Comments

November 21, 2008

While I did write about my own Crazy Wedding, I don’t think I’ve ever really touched on Chilean wedding traditions in general in JMCS. I have weddings on the brain constantly since, you know, I’m a wedding photographer here in Chile and all that and I’ve been going to TONS of nuptials lately.

One of S.’s best friends got married last weekend. We were the first of his group of five to bite the bullet and this couple was next. I’m betting money on them announcing spermination within the first year of their marriage because that seems to be the normal for all our Santiaguino Chilean-Chilean couples that have tied the knot recently. Comparatively, in the U.S., where I’m from in Michigan, I know a lot of people that have gotten married fairly young, but more are waiting to have babies, except my friends Lindsey (Hi Nashy and Blake!) and Haley (Hi Kadzbans and Baby K.!), who is pregnant, but older than I am and has been married a little longer. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I do not know a single person who went to college with me that’s already taken the plunge. I went to school at the Most Beautiful Place On Earth, University of Tampa, for anybody who’s wondering.

So to break it down for you:

Chile: wait longer to get married, get married, have babies right away.
Michigan: get married sooner, wait longer to have babies.
Florida: don’t get married, don’t have babies, ever.

Seeing the geographical trends of my own friends is really interesting because I can see people in most regions following similar paths.

When I got married, 4 days before my 23rd birthday, nobody from Michigan ever said, “Oh my god you’re so young!” But, a lot of my college friends freaked out and were like, “What the hell are you doing?!?” In Michigan I was the first of my close group of friends to get married, but a lot of girls were already engaged as well and walked down the aisle shortly after so I don’t think many people thought anything of it (aside from the fact that I always said I’d never get married, but that’s a different story for a different day). And unsurprisingly, a ton of people’s reactions in Chile were (and still are), “So you’re married, great! When are you having a baby???” It just goes to show you that our perspectives of what’s normal are heavily influenced by what’s going on around us.

Since we have a community of people from all over the world reading JMCS, I’m curious to know where you are — what’s the norm when it comes to getting married and having kids?

19 Comments

November 20, 2008

The year has been flying by. I truly can’t believe we’re almost into December, which means it’s almost time for our trip to the U.S. which in turn means we then have just ONE YEAR until we leave for our trip around the world.

This is something we have been planning and saving for, for so long now that I cannot even fathom we’re actually going to do it. Because of the amount of time that’s gone into preparations it’s always seemed like something of a pipe dream even though I know we’re slowly but surely working on making it a reality.

All of a sudden both S. and I were both hit with a jolt of reality when we realized just how soon we’ll be departing (a year may not seem soon to some of you, but we’ve already been working towards this goal financially for two years now so in my mind, just one more year is definitely soon). Because of this, we’ve really decided to buckle down on saving. Now that my tax situation is resolved, I’m trying to work harder, write more stories, say yes to all the photography jobs that come my way and just make more money in general. And we’re cutting back in every way possible.

My monthly spending limit for extras is now 50,000 pesos. “This is rough,” I think, as I sit typing away from Starbucks, even though I know that fifty thousand for entertainment is more than enough. I’m not exactly a thrifty person. And to be honest, this year, which was the first year of both S. and I’s lives in which we were making enough to be able to freely spend and buy things we wanted. We went overboard. The spend spend spend is out of my system now, but I’m not going to lie…not struggling financially for the first time ever, was so nice. We were able to afford a great lifestyle and still save up about $25,000 dollars. However, we want to buckle down in the upcoming year. So, going out to eat is being cut back and like I said, I now have a self-imposed allowance.

It’s been hard to get used to. Old habits die hard. But, the upside of it all is that I’ve lost 2.5 kilos now that I no longer eat lunch out every single day of the week. The downside is that never leaving my house is boring. Which is why I ponied up $2,500 (pesos) of my spending money to get a frappucino and come sit at Starbucks in the air conditioning. It’s worth it to me. I’m often a lot more productive when I change up the environment where I’m writing. Anyways, the plan is to save $35,000 dollars more in the next year. It amazes me that by cutting back we’ll be able to sock away and additional $10,000 bucks! I mean, I don’t love not being able to order sushi delivered to my house at my every whim, but when we’re able to travel for another couple of months because of our extra savings, I know it will all be worth it.

12 Comments

November 17, 2008

Ha. We win. We’re not being sued. The jackass was totally bluffing. Today was supposed to be the day where if we didn’t bring in checks for more months of rent the landlord would sue us. S. consulted with our lawyer, whose dad is doing better, btw, and our brilliant legal mind told him to cuss out the landlord and make it clear that we’re not fucking around and we’re not paying him another fucking peso. So S. went in to the meeting with the landlord, told him so, and the landlord shrugged his shoulders and said, “Ok.” He’s not suing us, there will be no further drama, thank goodness.

I celebrated with a glass of Frangelico and spent some time editing pictures not for work, not for other people, but for me! FUN.

Here’s a shot that a friend took of S. and I at a wedding. By the way, S. is considering doing a guest post for me. Do you guys have any questions for him?!? He wants to write but he says he needs more inspiration so if there’s something you want to ask, now’s the time.

No no, Papi isn’t cuddling with S. as he sleeps…

She’s actually attacking!

This is quite possibly my favorite picture ever taken of Papi. I LOVE her. Seriously, it takes all my willpower to restrain from blogging about her every single day.