Worldcrunch
Hive hustlers stung a beekeeping club in Australia when they stole 12 hives that contained more than 480 kilos of honey, not to mention the 240,000 bees inside them. The haul potentially netted the thieves more than $1,800, but the theft has left the Ipswich and West Moreton Beekeepers’ Association devastated, as they use their […]
These conical hats, or capirotes, and white robes were worn by Spanish penitents during Easter celebrations long before the white supremacist Ku Kux Klan began donning them. But they’re still spooky.
In 1965, Istanbul’s Galata Bridge, which spans the Golden Horn, was still a floating bridge. And the cars and street signs made the whole scene look like we were on U.S. Route 66. Istanbul was just an impromptu part of our trip to Romania and Bulgaria with our 6-year-old daughter Cécile. In the lobby of […]
In another context, it might simply seem like diplomatic business-as-usual. But in Tehran, with potential game-changing nuclear talks in the balance, visits by the Austrian Foreign Minister and a key official of the British Foreign Office are being viewed as further proof that Iran want to move toward rapprochement with the West. In particular, the […]
SEOUL — Kim Ju-hwan is headed toward an uncertain future. The 24-year old university student was sentenced to a year in jail for refusing to serve in South Korea’s military. As a Jehovah’s Witness, Kim says he’s morally opposed to war. “Based on what I learned in the Bible, I’m a conscientious objector. There’s a verse that says love your enemy. That’s my belief, and it’s how I’m trying to lead my life.” All able-bodied South Korean are required to serve in the armed forces for about two years. But for conscientious objectors like Kim Ju-hwan, there is no alternative […]
If you ever wanted to be friends with Timon from The Lion King, Will Burrad-Lucas will make you jealous.
The city of Sukhothai in central Thailand, which used to be the capital of the ancient Siam Empire, is now in ruins. I went digging for this slide a couple weeks ago after I saw an image of this same buddha’s head being “swallowed” by a banyan tree on a French television reportage about Thai […]
KERMANSHAH — It looks like a bank heist that took a very bad turn. Police of the Kermanshah province in western Iran suspect that a unidentified man’s body found in a bank ventilation shaft belonged to a would-be thief who suffocated there overnight. Employees of a branch of the Bank Saderat (the Exports Bank) called […]
“Restaurant,” “haute couture,” “cuisine,” “raison d”être…” There are many examples of the linguistic prestige of the French language worldwide. But in Denmark, the perfectly acceptable Danish word for urinal, “pissoir,” is also tacky French slang for the john.
An accusation, later withdrawn, by French cosmetics giant Yves Rocher stands at the center of the case of against celebrated anti-Kremlin blogger Alexei Navalny. Who’s pulling the strings?
The Toulouse Museum took part in a project that allows viewers to spend a few hours with a female Slovenian bear named Tolosa. A video camera was placed around the animal’s neck for 20 days. The uniquely European project called “Inside the Eyes of the Bear” is linked to an exhibit and has provided valuable […]
The Taj Mahal mausoleum is, to me, the most harmonious building man has ever designed, which is why I have a large version of this photo framed in my home. The shape of the domes, the colors of the marble ornaments, and the views through the refined archways make it second to none.
A smile, a chuckle, a LOL, a full-throated guffaw: getting yourself laughing is good for the soul, good for your health.
MUNICH — Audiences mostly find the sex-obsessed protagonists of Steve McQueen’s movie Shame and Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac bizarre and alien, or at the very least irritating. But there really are people like that in real life. Take, for example, this 58-year-old man somewhere in the eastern part of Germany sitting by his phone. He’s […]
It’s no wonder Pretoria is known as The Jacaranda City. The streets lined with thousands of jacaranda trees are definitely a sight worth seeing. The beautiful purple blooms tend to coincide with year-end exams at the University of Pretoria, and legend has it that if a flower drops on a student’s head, it’s a sign […]
Up until we went on a cruise on the Volga, the very name of the river brought images of iciness, Czars, snow, and tales of folklore. But on this hot summer day along “Russia’s main street,” as they call it, babushkas had given way to bikinis.
Some “two million fish” were found dead and floating in a water reserve outside Tehran, possibly poisoned by untreated sewage that had been seeping in for months, the semi-official ISNA agency reported Wednesday. Mohsen Showkati, head of the environmental office of the district of Reyy where the Fashafuyeh dam was located, blamed waste waters from […]
The best weapon against insects is often other insects.
If you’re here searching for the secret to eternal life forget it, we’re not there yet. But in the meantime, here’s some supercentenarians from around the world with their own secrets to a long life. Some might surprise you!
Strong foreground, nice depth of field, striking colors, llamas … What more could you ask for in a picture?
On this beautiful spring day, little did we or these two gondoliers suspect that only five months later, on Nov. 4, 1966, the most disastrous acqua alta — “high water” — would hit the city, with canals rising by almost two meters (6.5 feet).
In case you missed this gem on our homepage, check out our world tour of animals in places you wouldn’t usually expect them… Read it here. Photo: Dromedar61
BANDAR ABBAS — A “few seconds” after an Iranian man’s hanging began, his victim’s relatives called prison officials to grant a pardon, as Iranian laws allow. According to prison authorities in the south of the country on April 20, the man survived the hanging — which was on an unspecified recent date — and is […]
When we went to Thailand, we chose not to go for the usual touristy spots along the coast, exploring instead the beauty of the country’s inland regions and their adorned buddhas. Upon rediscovering that slide, I couldn’t help but think: What did this devoted sweeper do with the gold leaves he picked up from the […]
We were usually rather lucky weather-wise on our travels. But it rained so much on our 1961 trip to Denmark (as shown in the above picture of cloudy Copenhagen) that our Peugeot 203“s automatic windshield wipers broke — forcing us to use the hand-crank wipers that cars back then still featured as a backup.
KAPOOSAR — Pancho Mai is a villager in Kapoosar, located in the Tharpakar district. Today is the festival of Holi, but the 25-year-old mother is deep in mourning. Over the past three months, her three children have died. “They had fever for a few days, and then pneumonia killed each one of them,” she says numbly. Her mother-in-law, Kaplana Mai, had rushed the children to the only government hospital in the district. But it was too late. They died within days. This is not an isolated case. According to independent statistics reported by the local media, some 200 children, mostly […]
Though you can already catch of glimpse of the city in the background of the picture, in 1990 Cairo was still separated from the great pyramids of Giza. Nowadays the city almost completely surrounds them.
After pleas for help on social media to defend pro-Russians across the border, soldiers and would-be soldiers have left Russia to travel to Eastern Ukraine. On the ground in Donetsk.
Fifty kilometers (30 miles) west of Barcelona stands the beautiful Santa Maria de Montserrat Benedictine abbey. Like many holy places, it features ex-votos, or offerings — but I had never seen such a profusion of wax body parts, most of them given as a gesture of gratitude for having been cured from a disease afflicting […]
The Iranian capital of Tehran sits on a notorious seismic zone, and for years now, its residents are intermittently reminded of the potentially calamitous consequences of a large earthquake. Nobody knows for sure how resistant its building are or whether or not developpers have respected the country’s building norms during the construction frenzy of the […]
We all know how smart dolphins can be, whether they’re learning tricks or being part of the Russian navy. But, can they actually talk to each other? Dolphins have shown the ability to imitate various noises and whistles, and there has also been some research showing that they can — at least in captivity — […]
This picture is not as old as it seems. Back when I was a philosophy student at Besançon University in eastern France, we put a great deal of effort into our Carnival costumes. In 1951, the theme for the festival was “the 1900s.” That’s me on the left, in my father’s wedding suit, on my […]
Wherever my wife and I went, we always tried to bring something back for the rest of the family. We bought one of these little wooden acrobats for my grandson Bertrand in Brazil, although musical instruments were his favorite. He still has a large collection that includes a pan flute from Peru, maracas from Colombia, […]
For reals.
TEL AVIV — Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah made an official visit to Indonesia last month. While a number of economic agreements were signed on the visit, one stood out for its huge tourism potential. Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim country, has an increasing number of would-be pilgrims interested in traveling to Palestine’s religious sites. […]
A visitor from mainland China reflects on Taiwan’s love affair with the always-open, eternally stocked convenience store.
ATLANTICO — Authorities in this northern Colombia beach community were investigating the suspicious deaths of two dolphins, whose corpses were washed ashore and appeared to have been stabbed repeatedly, Bogota daily El Espectador reports. The mammals’ remains were found in the district of Playa Mendoza in the Atlántico department. They may have been killed after […]
Black-and-white photos suit the ruggedness of life in Northern Greece’s Pindus mountains. Back in 1961, it certainly didn’t occur to me that one day I would be as old as these men — and yet I have now been retired for 23 years. But it hasn’t meant bench-sitting for me!
As Iranian envoys and representatives of world powers ended their last round of talks intended to define the scope of Iran’s contested nuclear program, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told a gathering in Tehran Wednesday that Iran’s negotiators should not “give in to unjust demands.” Talks are set to resume during the first half […]
I will be going back to Turkey next month, some 46 years after I took this photo. One of my two granddaughters, Véronique, now lives near Izmir with her Turkish-born husband Mutlu and my great-granddaughter Ada.