They must look good and know how to…shop.
Tag: travel
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A Transylvanian Burial
When you’re in Transylvania, you really can’t help but think about vampires. So you can imagine how it felt to suddenly see a funeral procession approach…
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Another Kind Of Fly Fishing
Fishing often makes for nice pictures, no matter where in the world you may be. Here in Southern China we learned about the ancestral and peculiar art of cormorant fishing, where the “rod” stays in place and birds are cast off to do the work.
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Who Built That Bridge?
My wife Claudine was asking our daughter Cécile to guess which architect built the Garabit viaduct we were looking over, in France’s Massif Central region. Does the wrought iron structure look familiar? It should: The railway bridge was constructed by Gustave Eiffel, 10 years before a certain Parisian tower made him famous worldwide.
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300,000 Miles Without A Scratch
I find it amazing, in hindsight, that over the 300,000 miles or so I’ve driven during my lifetime, I’ve only had two flat tires — one in France and one in Czechoslovakia. That’s it. No accident, no bumping into a hippo in South Africa or a camel in Algeria.
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Very Old Habits
I don’t remember what the lady in the foreground was doing, in front of Teotihuacan’s majestic Pyramid of the Sun. Maybe she had come up with an early version of the e-cigarette, trying to break free from her Mayan ancestors’ tradition of smoking tobacco …
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Ancestral Shade
Fellow travelers from our organized tour were catching some rest in the shade of the tongkonan, the ancestral houses of the Toraja people in southern Sulawesi (the Indonesian island formerly know as Celebes). This was one of the first package holiday tours we went on, after having started to experiment with this form of group […]
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An Oasis Of Tradition
At Ouargla’s traditional market in southern Algeria, this merchant was selling wooden bowls carved from single blocks of wood. Even though palm trees are ubiquitous in the several oases surrounding Ouargla, Saharan craftsmen prefer to use Atlas Cedars, found in the nearby Algerian mountain range of the same name.
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It Doesn’t Get More Irish Than This
A pint of Guinness maybe?
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A Forest Without A Tree
Fires caused by people are thankfully still relatively infrequent in the vast Yellowstone National Park, with just six to 10 per year. Most wildfires, such as the 1988 blazes that destroyed almost 40% of the park, are instead caused by lightning. In 1994, driving through a recently burned patch, we could only imagine what that […]
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Fishing Through The Ages
Among the most beautiful countries I’ve explored is my own. This is what we call la France profonde, literally “deep France” — the heartland. Aptly enough, the Château de la Bussière in the background is nicknamed the Fishermen Castle and features a collection of works of art related to freshwater fishing. There is still a […]
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Stairway To Heaven
This is the famous Dashashwamedh Ghat in Varanasi — the city also known as Benares, the holiest of the seven sacred cities in Hinduism and Jainism. “Ghats” are a series of steps leading pilgrims to the Ganges River to perform ritual ablutions (while tourists on a moving boat try to take non-blurry pictures).
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Portuguese Passersby
Going through all my slides, I’ve noticed some recurring themes in the thousands of photos I’ve snapped. One of them is “women carrying things on their heads” — like in this Portugal street scene in 1958, when the country was still under the authoritarian rule of Prime Minister Antonio de Oliveira Salazar.
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The Llama Guarantee
There are llamas and alpacas everywhere in Peru. Contrary to what people may think, they are very docile creatures and their infamous bouts of spitting are apparently quite rare. More to the point, both animals produce high-quality wool, which I can attest to: The bedspread I bought in Peru on this trip is still as […]
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Parthenon Like It’s 1961
In 1961, my wife Claudine could still walk freely inside the Parthenon — the world-famous temple on the Athenian Acropolis. Actually, we didn’t even have to pay an entrance fee. The government didn’t begin restoration efforts, at which point it limited tourist access, until 1975. Up until then, there were no fences around most ruins […]
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When Poverty Is ‘Picturesque’
Brazil’s Nordeste was written about in the 1990s as one of the poorest regions in the world. What travelers find out is that photographs in the middle of poverty risk looking “quaint” and “charming,” losing that feeling of desolation that we felt there. That seems to be the case looking at this shot 22 years […]
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Two Plus Two
Three are gone.
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Waiting For The Changing Of The Guard
Amalienborg, the winter home of the Danish royal family, consists of four identical palaces situated around an octagonal square. Looking at more recent photos from Wikipedia, it’s unclear whether the same guard is still standing watch nearly five decades later!
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A Different Kind Of Opera
“Peking Opera” bears little resemblance to the works of Verdi and Wagner. Though this traditional Chinese art form does feature music and singing, it combines them with dance, acrobatics, and mime. As you can see, it is a very lively and colorful performance, which draws from deep within the country’s myths and folklore – and […]
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The Village Of My Ancestors
I was 19 when I took this picture of my mother, father and younger cousin enjoying a sunny day in Chaignay, Bourgogne — my ancestors’ village, in eastern France. One year later, I would take (and pass) my driver’s license test in that Peugeot 201 you see in the background. I had nicknamed the car […]
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Where They Eat Bats
On the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, this kid was helping his street-vendor dad to sell fruit bats — to be eaten as a supposed cure for asthma. The bats are now on the endangered species list, and the government has recently taken steps to put an end to their sale.
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Battles And Bottles
The central Portugese town of Batalha was built to celebrate the Kingdom of Portugal’s victory over King John I of Castile’s army at the Battle (Batalha) of Aljubarrota in 1385. Things had calmed down 578 years later, although a different kind of “invasion” was happening, as in many other places we’d visit. The town is […]
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Barren But Bright
When we toured India almost exactly 20 years ago, we got to see some pretty desolate hamlets — especially near the Pakistan border, in Rajasthan’s Thar Desert. Despite the region’s ruthless aridity, the nomadic and sedentary tribes living there have a rich (and colorful!) culture.
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Pious Priests Or Partyers?
Even in the middle of April, when Venice is consumed with its annual carnival stravaganza, priests remained dignified and serious. Unless these two were actually Venetians in disguise, walking past the Doge’s Palace on their way to the festival?
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Perilous Pyramid
Saqqara, some 30 kilometers south of modern-day Cairo, served as the necropolis for the ancient Egyptian capital, Memphis. The burial ground features several pyramids, including the world-famous step pyramid of Djoser — the oldest stone building complex known in history, built during the 27th century BC for the burial of Pharaoh Djoser. We were lucky […]
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The Hats With A Misleading Moniker
Contrary to what the name suggests, Panama hats are actually made in Ecuador; there are several explanations for the misleading moniker. In Cuenca, in the country’s highlands, we visited a factory where they made these traditional brimmed straw hats, weaving hundreds of plaited leaves together. There are various degrees of quality, but the superfino ones, […]
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Before The Tourists
In the 1950s, the Costa Brava — northeastern Spain’s coastal region — was identified by the Spanish government and local entrepreneurs as suitable for substantial development as a holiday destination. In the 1960s, though, we were still able to catch a glimpse of how peaceful life was, before they basically covered everything in concrete.
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Hills And Humps
On the road from Batna to Laghouat, we overtook these Berbers with their camels slowly making their way through the Aurès — an eastern continuation of the Atlas Mountains — in northeastern Algeria. It was in this region that the Algerian War of Independence was started by Berber freedom fighters in 1954.
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Pond Puzzle
A bit of a mystery, this one: The pond, with its water lilies, looks nothing like a rice paddy field — which is what you would expect in southern China. So what are they all looking for, bent over like that? My back hurts just looking at this picture.
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What Women Want – From Hotels
Some hotel chains have moved beyond just adult-only accommodations to cater directly to women, including such options as man-free zones and champagne pajama parties.
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Moscow Masterpiece
I couldn’t necessarily see what this painter found so picturesque in that particular scene. But the light was nice, and it was considerably less crowded than the touristy Kremlin or Saint Basil’s Cathedral … As for my choice of when and what to shoot, I’ve always enjoyed taking photographs from both on and off the […]
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Last Stop Before Machu Picchu
The tiny estacion in Aguas Calientes was the closest you could get to the famous Machu Picchu site when you didn’t feel like walking the 80 kilometers from Cusco on the Camino Inca (the Inca Trail). With just a few trains per day, merchants would set up shop on the tracks, moving their wares temporarily […]
TURIN — There are journeys even more awful than the perilous crossings in rickety boats made by would-be immigrants trying to reach European shores. In these trips instead – made to Pakistan, Iran, Egypt or certain Eastern European countries – people sell a part of themselves: a journey of transplants, to places where the human […]
Long flight delays have a price, but the airline industry is applying serious downward pressure on European regulators.
VERONA — One honeymoon. 90,000 kilometers. 321 days. Two rules: 1) never take an airplane, and 2) never pay more than 15 euros for a meal for two. Elisa Bocca, a 32-year-old interpreter, and Alessandro Bocca, a 37-year-old photographer, are the Italian stars of this global honeymoon. They travelled through the United States, Mexico, South […]
A niggling feeling of doubt came over me. Had the school trip been educational? Was it even a school trip, i.e. was the presence of two teachers and a class of students any guarantee of learning? We had worked hard all year, I can tell you that much. We knew everything there was to know […]
IL MESSAGGERO (Italy), BBC Worldcrunch RIO DE JANEIRO – Crowds of faithful gathered in this popular Brazilian city to welcome Pope Francis, who set off from Rome on Monday morning for his first official foreign trip and preside over the 28th edition of the Roman Catholic World Youth Day. Here are five things you need […]
VALETTA – It is an inhospitable rock floating in the Mediterranean Sea. A piece of coralline limestone blown by the winds and burned by the sun with a layer of earth so thin that nothing much can grow on it. Welcome to Malta, a simple and unpretentious place. Yet, this archipelago comprising eight islands – […]
DUBAI – Beer? Of course not! Sayed Kamal looks at his guests with astonishment. Alcohol is only served in the big hotels. This is a youth hostel! It is in fact the only youth hostel in Dubai. “But I can offer you something similar,” says blue-shirted, tie-wearing Kamal as he emerges from behind the counter […]
BRUSSELS- The European Union-Russia summit taking place in Yekaterinburg has a major sticking point forming over privacy for travelers arriving — or even just passing through — Russian territory. The Russian Ministry of Transportation has decreed that airlines flying in Russian airspace, or taking off or landing in Russia, have to provide authorities in Moscow […]