19 Jul 2009 |
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Nigerian men are very confident. She walks out elegantly clad in a stylishly designed Ankara gown that not only complements her white skin but gives her an African Queen appearance; her hair braided in tiny stands adores the smile which she flashes before saying hello in an opera kind of voice that plays back in your mind; you may start wondering what exploits that voice would have made in a studio with the many albums being dished out by wannabe singers whose delivery leaves much to be desired. The first though that comes to your mind when you behold Sinem is that she is a model who must have graced the covers of international magazines like Hello, Maxim or Pretty Woman but you get a shocker when she reveals her three-in-one profession; a writer, photographer and proud wife. “ As a white lady married to a Nigerian man, this is her first visit to Nigeria and already she is loving the experience especially the hustle and bustle of Lagos which, though stressful to everyday Lagosians, she finds quite fascinating despite the many incredible reports she had been fed with about the city. “Yes I have seen a little bit of the Lagos Mainland; I got to see a little bit of the mainland though I did not get the chance to see the markets as much I would have loved to see them. I also went to the Island and had an experience of the night life in Lagos; the much talked about Lagos party style. I also had a first hand experience of the traffic; I got stuck in traffic for several hours. I will say those were my experience of Lagos and I will say it strikes me as a city with a lot of potentials especially in the area of tourism but unfortunately Nigeria is not really designated a place of tourism as such but It was amazing; I really loved it and obviously many things that I got warned about by family and friends never happened. I was told to make sure I was safe, make sure you are secured, don’t go out late at night, the traffic is horrible; the heat is gonna make you melt at night and in all, there was nothing like that instead the experience was awesome and I was in my element,” she recalls with a giggle. Originally from Turkey where she lived 21 years of her life before relocating to the United Kingdom to further her studies in English and Literature of which she has a doctorate degree to show for it, Sinem is married to her Nigerian Sweetheart, Suby (coined from Sobowale) whom she has an admirable respect and love for but she became romantically involved with Nigeria way back in her native Turkey, around the famous Nigerian footballer, Jay Jay Okocha who once plied his trade in her country. “Actually this will sound so funny; I actually wanted to meet Jay Jay Okocha during this trip because he is like my first impression about this country; he used to play for the team I support in Turkey and I used to sit in front of the television and watch him the whole time. Basically I knew Nigeria through football and also there were Nigerian students in school back then though it they weren’t common as we see them now so maybe one or two students you see now and then,” she confesses. If the dribbling skills of Jay Jay got made an impression of Africa’s most populous country on her then her long time friend and heartthrob, Suby, consolidated her art of writing and introduced her into creating expressions on images through the lens. “I like writing and have written since the age of 10 and I got into photography through my husband only three years ago; I just picked up the camera one day and thought that I was actually enjoying it. I went for a Landscape shoot and disappeared for the whole day; went out around 8am and drove around the British countryside so to speak for almost the whole day and came back with 300 frames and came back to edit them.” Today, Suby is not only a published writer who has plied her trade on freelance basis on reputable magazines like True Love (West Africa), Made Magazine and a number of African or Black magazine across the world, she and her husband have become a formidable team in fashion photography, covering fashion shows all over the world as well as having their pictures being published in many fashion publications including BHF, the current publication which shares their same passion of showcasing African fashion for the beauty of Africa and imagery . Their website and blog, www.suby.shutterchance.com showcases photographs that not only captures your imagination and hurls you to that realm where admiration is guaranteed, professionalism in delivery is obvious and perfection is undiluted, you would certainly be transported through a visionary journey through pictures where you would be on the threshold of reality and imagination leaving the optical part of your mind illuminated with the stories behind the images. Their inspiration Sinem reveals is drawn from their normal everyday activities fine tuned with an organized creative and visionary team. “It could be when I am looking at a fashion magazine and I see one image or colour and the idea comes or sometime you can be watching the television and get inspirations from there. Recently we did a vintage shoot for a magazine that showcased different styles from the 50’s, 60’s, 80’s and 90’s; those specific styles that people recognize like the Polka dot dresses or they recognize the 90’s style or Grace Jones look. It could be a music video, it could be a movie and so on and they inspire me in terms of location and with locations ideas start flooding in. We work more as a team; whatever I don’t see, he does see and vice-versa.” The couple also brings in versatility in their style of photography; a virtue Sinem developed in her writing skills that have seen her doing feature articles in different genres of writing about African fashion, features stories, plastic surgery as well as writing on charity for the Down Syndrome Association of Nigeria and Africa, a charity based in the UK against with child trafficking and I also do a lot of travel writing. I tend to diversify on different subjects. But in photography, they look out for that moment in their subject’s life to capture their images and give it a kind of life and story with their Canon cameras. Being a white girl married to a Nigerian, the humility and pride with which Sinem attributes every of her endeavours to her husband is remarkable; she never pronounces what she does in the singular, to her, “we” is the word that makes them tick. A little probe into the attraction that got her saying ‘I do’ to her Nigerian Prince Charming opens up a romantic chapter, “He was my best friend before we ended up together and I will say he was honest. I think what attracted me to him was that we shared similar values and even as friends we used to talk about many important things in a relationship like love, honesty, trust and respect.” In a society where a number of Nigerian ladies may have misgivings about their buddies, Sinem revealed the quality in Nigerian men that make white girls go crazy about them. “Nigerian men are very confident; they have swagger and know what they are all about and that kind of gives the woman confidence as well knowing that she is with a strong man. Another thing that many women mention, myself inclusive, is that Nigerian men have drive; they know what they want and they go for it.” Asked to advice some of her fellow white girls that might have phobia Nigerian men comes the revelation; “Honestly I have never seen that phobia in white girls over Nigerian men because they keep throwing themselves all over them. It’s like Nigerian men are the best.” With plans to work more closely with Nigerian fashion designers in showcasing their works to the world as well as holding a workshop to teach aspiring fashion photographers in Nigeria on how to become successful fashion photographers, Sinem is more Nigerian that you may think especially after disclosing her love for Nigerian dishes. “I have been enjoying Nigerian dishes way before I came here and this is going to shock many people and I haven’t had the chance to eat it; I love eating Ikokore which is from the Ijebu region of Nigerian and I am an Ijebu wife.” ___________________________
THE INTERVIEW WITH SINEM ONABANJO BY AHAOMA KANU This is your first time in Nigeria, how was your experience? It was amazing; I really loved it and obviously many things that I got warned about by family and friends never happened. I was told to make sure I was safe, make sure you are secured, don’t go out late at night, the traffic is horrible; the heat is gonna make you melt at night and in all, there was nothing like that instead the experience was awesome and I was in my element. You are married to a Nigerian but I will like to ask you what views you had about Nigeria before you met your spouse? Actually this will sound so funny; I actually wanted to meet Jay Jay Okocha during this trip because he is like my first impression about this country; he used to play for the team I support in Turkey and I used to sit in front of the television and watch him the whole time. Basically I knew Nigeria through football and also there were Nigerian students in school back then though it they weren’t common as we see them now so maybe one or two students you see now and then. You are originally from Turkey which is predominantly a Muslim country; can you describe how it was growing up? I grew up in Turkey till I was 21; I was from a middle class family and just went to high school in an American International High School and I left Turkey at the age of 21 and came to the United kingdom to do my Masters degree after which I stayed back for my PhD and then met my other half and ended up making the UK my home. But I travel to Turkey at least once a year because I like the heat. Turkey is a mixed bag because it is in the middle of Asia and Europe so it has got the European and Asia cultures embedded in a 2000 years of history. Turkey is a times chaotic and noisy and maybe sometimes polluted as Lagos so that is why I feel like I am at home. What will you have to say about Lagos which is the state you had the opportunity of being in since your visit? Yes I saw a little bit of the Lagos Mainland; I got to see a little bit of the mainland though I did not get the chance to see the markets as much I would have loved to see them. I also went to the Island and had an experience of the night life in Lagos; the much talked about Lagos party style. I also had a first hand experience of the traffic; I got stuck in traffic for several hours. I will say those were my experience of Lagos and I will say it strikes me as a city with a lot of potentials especially in the area of tourism but unfortunately Nigeria is not really designated a place of tourism as such but there are so much to see. Over two days I had the chance to go to a private beach here in Lagos and I could see the tropical forest on the coast and the beauty of the sea and the sky and I thought that this should be shown to people, to the world what Lagos is all about; it’s not all about not being safe, it has too much traffic and all that, we have to show the positives as well and I think Lagos has a lot of potentials. The first time I saw you, I felt I was looking at a face and a person that should be in the fashion industry as a model but you are into the Arts so I wonder, what inspired you into the Arts? I think I studying English Language and Literature for my first degree and Masters as well as my PhD; I like writing and have written since the age of 10 and I got into photography through my husband only three years ago; I just picked up the camera one day and thought that I was actually enjoying it. I went for a Landscape shoot and disappeared for the whole day; went out around 8am and drove around the British countryside so to speak for almost the whole day and came back with 300 frames and came back to edit them. I think writing has always been there but photography came later. What was that attraction coming from the literary scene and which Nigerian authors were you familiar with? Coming from the old school I would say Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart was a beautiful book; from maybe the younger generation I will say Chimamanda Adichie; I was actually looking for her new short stories that just came out and couldn’t find it but I know when I go back to London I would get it. I read Half of a Yellow Sun, all 400 pages over a weekend and felt very emotional about the piece. I think that those two inspire me a lot in Nigeria literature. You said you started photography from capturing landscape pictures, what kind of photography are you into now? Obviously I started with the country side because, due to the nature of my job, I am a very private person; I enjoy long drives through the countryside and love to network. I then got into Street Photography which is about just capturing that moment in time from men walking down the street which to me is like one moment in his life history. That is how I like to think that sometimes photography and literature go hand in hand because they tell stories. I did get quite a lot of street photographs while in Nigeria that I can’t wait to go back and edit them; I took pictures of people in Okada. And then with my husband’s passion for fashion photography, we also do street shots in fashion photography. Talking about street photography, what do you look out for in a picture that makes you click and get the shots? I look out for the move maybe a young girl walking down Greenwich Park running around the park with her dog at full speed; that to me is one moment for me and that captures my attention and tells my audience a story. It may be a man waiting at a bus stop with an expression on his face; maybe a sense of frustration, bewilderment on his face. For me that tells a story about him at that particular time. I look out for that moment that tell the story of that person. What is it that you do that you want the world to know about? That is a pretty difficult question; I will say I am a 31 year old woman who likes writing with a passion, who likes photography with a passion and who believes the story on her photograph and that of her husband as well has got stories to tell with her writings also. I have got stories to tell through my photography and my stories; my stories is very focussed about Africa and I have got stories to tell about inspirational people and I hope that whatever I leave behind will affect people. I don’t want to leave behind a monument or theatre halls or something like that, I just want to leave behind photographs and a piece of writings that somebody will read and remember as inspiring and which will have a story to tell and a beauty that will inspire for decades to come. There is this particular virtue in artistes which make them able to develop a style and this is not limited to artistes alone, it does occur to photographers as well in that somebody sees a picture and recognizes who took it, have you and your husband developed a style in your photography? My husband and I have a blog and we used to put names on them to distinguish which was taken by my husband or myself but it got to a stage that we started working more as a team; whatever I don’t see, he does see and vice-versa. Sometimes he is the brain and I do more of the creative thinking and a times the reverse occurs but we stopped doing that because we don’t want people to look at our pictures and want to guess whether it was taken by Sinem or Suby. We just generally want to strike people but having said that doesn’t mean that we don’t have a style; we have things that we are particular about when we are taking our pictures. Suby has got this half face shot style that in every shoot he must get that kind of shot, if he hasn’t got that shot then something must have been wrong with the shoot and I have shots taken from different angles though I use more high angle shots. I do like climbing on top of a ladder or a chair and look down at the model. There is certain things that will make you think that our shots may have been taken by Sinem or Suby but on the whole we want to strike people. What kind of cameras do you use? We use Canon; we are trusted Canon fans. We have our studio and our equipments; I will say that we have everything we need. You said you are into fashion photography; do you create your kind of fashion photography or take shots to specifications as requested by your clients? We create ideas and have an amazing creative team. Some of body painting shots we have was done by a young girl in a small town in Wales and she is too desperately passionate about her work; I call her a visionary because she can wake up one morning and have an idea and go straight to doing it. We also have wonderful wardrobe stylist who comes up with brilliant ideas. Sometimes when we are doing the shoot the idea comes up. I will say we have this organisation and interaction with the whole team. What inspires the pictures you take and the collection you have? Honestly it could be when I am looking at a fashion magazine and I see one image or colour and the idea comes or sometime you can be watching the television and get inspirations from there. Recently we did a vintage shoot for a magazine that showcased different styles from the 50’s, 60’s, 80’s and 90’s; those specific styles that people recognize like the Polka dot dresses or they recognize the 90’s style or Grace Jones look. It could be a music video, it could be a movie and so on and they inspire me in terms of location and with locations ideas start flooding in. Concerning your picture collection before BHF, what were you doing with your pictures? We had already been published with my writings as well; I am a published writer and still write for a couple of magazines including True Love (West Africa), Made Magazine and I have done works with a number of African or Black magazines in the UK. With photography we likewise did shoot for True Love and other magazines based in the UK. With BHF we saw something, a product we really believed had the same passion we had for African fashion for the beauty of African fashion and imagery and we wanted to come on board and see what we can do together with BHF. Concerning your writing what genre do you tend to write about? It could be anything; I write on a freelance basis for a lot of magazines and it could be fashion, African fashion, features stories; recently I did one on plastic surgery that will soon be out on True Love magazine; I have done something on breast cancer and also do a lot of writing on charity, I did one on Down Syndrome Association of Nigeria (DSAN), I have done a piece on Africa, a charity based in the UK against with child trafficking and I also do a lot of travel writing. I tend to diversify on different subjects. Any literary writing? Yes I have done loads but most of the published ones have been back in university and some of them are in my native language which is Turkish and others are in English. I have done some poetry as well. You are married to a Nigerian man, how will you describe your relationship with your Nigerian hubby? We have been married for three years but have known each other for eight years. Funny enough I wrote a story for Made Magazine about Non-Nigerian women married to Nigerian men and one thing that came up again and again is that Nigerian men are very confident; they are confident, they have swagger and know what they are all about and that kind of gives the woman confidence as well knowing that she is with a strong man. Another thing that many women mention, myself inclusive, is that Nigerian men have drive; they know what they want and they go for it; yes, Nigerian men know what they want and they go for it. What attracted you to him? He was my best friend before we ended up together and I will say he was honest. I think what attracted me to him was that we shared similar values and even as friends we used to talk about many important things in a relationship like love, honesty, trust and respect. So if those are in place I believe that even if the relationship goes through trouble, it’s going to come out stronger in the end. For the last seven years I must confess that those virtues have never failed in our relationship. What advice would you have for other white ladies out there that have this phobia for Nigerian men based on what they hear about Nigeria? Tell them what they are missing? Honestly I have never seen that phobia in white girls over Nigerian men because they keep throwing themselves all over them. It’s like Nigerian men are the best. Are you hoping to have an exhibition of your photographs? Hopefully that’s going to work; it’s in the pipeline and we are looking at the end of this year to do that. Give me a comparison of Nigerian fashion photographers? Mostly the people I admire are not the kind of people you see mostly in magazines often because they do different kind of photography like Jide Alakija, he is just an amazing guy and has an amazing weeding photography and an amazing street photography. In my opinion, he is one of the best photo-journalist out there. He is my friend and we talk all the time. Are you planning holding a workshop to teach aspiring young Nigerian photographers about photography? Definitely, I actually was supposed to get involved in a fashion photography workshop last October but it went through some technical hitches as regards the travel arrangement and got postponed. Another idea we have in mind is to help many young people in Nigeria who don’t even have the opportunity or encouragement in their social background to go into photography, so in future we are definitely going to do a workshop for them. It is a common practice for many successful motion picture practitioners to have come from the still photography background, do you any prospects of going into motion pictures? Not at this stage although my husband feels passionately about going into motion picture at some stage but for now, we are happy with what we are doing; we don’t want to be known as a Jack of all trade in this industry though it is very rampant. Right now we are happy to be creative fashion photographers, maybe in the future we may consider it. What are your prospects in Nigeria? We want to be working with a lot of Nigerian designers both in Nigeria and in the UK and we want to offer our services on a regular basis and showcase what they do without them having to fly their products to the UK. We want to make ourselves more available in the Nigeria market because we are already working with many Nigerian designers. We definitely want to want to come back and work with as many Nigerian designers as possible. The Federal Government initiated a rebrand Nigeria project, how do you think you can use what you do to contribute to this? I think Nigeria and African fashion is up and coming and this is a very positive development coming out of Nigeria that will help the image of Nigeria. This will help to show the world that Nigeria is not a country where children are dying of diseases or being killed and that is crime on the street; we have got to change that. I think that fashion and entertainment will help in doing this and that is what we want to do. What opportunities do you see in the Nigerian Fashion industry? I see a whole lot of opportunities because there is always a new fashion designer coming out in Nigeria almost everyday and this is no exaggeration. There are plenty of opportunities in this industry for everyone and what we want to be doing is to help each other. What is your advice to aspiring fashion photographers? I will say persevere in the sense don’t expect everything to fall on your lap; you have to work for it. People ask us how we get our works published in magazines and the truth is that it didn’t happen overnight; we didn’t just wake up and it happened. We had to chase Editors; we chased people who knew editors. It involves a lot of networking and keeping your contacts. If you call me to give you my contacts, I will be thinking you got to do your study; maybe because fashion is the in thing so everybody wants to take up the camera and become fashion photographers; you have to work hard for it and have your strength. Not everybody can do everything. If you do your work very well you will definitely take you places. Which Nigerian food do you enjoy most? I have been enjoying Nigerian dishes way before I came here and this is going to shock many people and I haven’t had the chance to eat it; I love eating Ikokore which is from the Ijebu region of Nigerian and I am an Ijebu wife.
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I am a 31 year old woman who likes writing with a passion, loves photography with a passion and who believes the story her photographs and that of her husband as well has got stories to tell about inspirational people,” she replies in a rather homely Mona Lisa smile.
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