Thursday, 3rd September 2020

11:00PM in my room, Hotel G, Bugis, Singapore.

Staying at Hotel G. From 31st Aug to 5th Sep. Met Jo today.

Spontaneously staying five nights back at Hotel G again. Had unused ‘credits’ from the 2 weeks that I was supposed to stay when I first returned from Amsterdam in late March to do the ‘isolation’ from my family. The hotel called me to inform me that I still had 5 nights unused—and I thought, why not? A nice change of pace and environment. Enjoying it so far. Felt funny at first when I first entered my room on Monday as it was a bit of a déjà vu.

Met Jo today for the breakfast at the lobby. Just last week, we ‘reunited’ when she finished her 14-day Stay Home Notice (SHN)—went to Tai Seng to select her frame for her print order and walked around Clarke Quay afterwards. Today, we went to the old estate of Tiong Bahru and Tanjong Pagar for an exploration and photography day!

Really happy and grateful to have a friend from the Netherlands all the way here during this time. With Jo, I feel ‘close’ to Amsterdam; as if the energy and vibe of the city is still with me! Sounds lame but that’s the best way to put it. We agreed to create more images together. (We managed to take a nice portrait today while walking around Tanjong Pagar too!) Wanted to take more at Tiong Bahru but it started to rain, so we left that for another day.

Wednesday, 7th October 2020

Met Jo at Holland Village for Dutch food.

Spent a really nice afternoon with Jo at Holland Village! She recommended Martin Zweert’s fries – weirdly haven’t heard of it before. An interesting day spent with a Dutchie in Dutchie-land eating Dutch food, how cool! We went to Arabica (%) coffee after for a mandatory cup of caffeine and sat there for quite a while talking and learning Dutch (a little). Again, really happy to have her here in Singapore to keep that part of Amsterdam ‘intact’, let’s put it that way. Our random conversations in Dutch and about Dutch things/people/culture are what I enjoy most.

Jo also wrote in the next page! Her entry was a surprisingly descriptive one that took almost 20mins to write at the cafe, and described me so flatteringly. I’m super encouraged.

Jo’s entry in my journal (her first!):

Zelden ontmoet je mensen die zo puur, gedreven, autenthiek en creatief zijn als David. David z’n fotografie raakt me, al sinds de eerste keer dat ik het zag. En al snel kwam ik erachter waarom het werk van David zo goed is.

David maakt contact met een stukje van je ziel waar je zelf niet vaak bij komt, zijn foto’s geven een reeeler beeld dan je eigen spiegel beeld. David gaf me een stukje van mezelf terug in zijn fotografie. Niet langer hoefde mijn haar en make-up perfect te zijn, maar ging de foto echt helemaal om mij en om wat we samen op beeld konden zetten. Ik hoop dat David zijn visie op fotografie en z’n kijk op de wereld vast houdt. Er zijn nog te veel mensen die geinspireerd moeten worden door zijn beelden.

Ik weet zeker, dat wanneer hij autenthiek blijft hij heel veel mooie en inspirerende dingen gaat doen.

Ik ben trots dat ik David mijn vriend mag noemen, en kan niet wachten om mer van zijn werk te gaan zien.

Veel liefs, Jo