Arriving at the wind swept coastal town of Rausu, we had emerged from the shrouded overland traverse across Mount Rausu on the Shiretoko Peninsula and stumbled upon a small community that faces the Kurile islands. We drove up to the Rausu Kunashiri Observatory Tower and confronted an exhibition that reflected the remorseful regret of kinship,…
In this dreamscape image at the American Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, hikers stand on the shore of Dream Lake and admire the traverse between Hallet’s Peak and Flat Top Mountain to the west. Dream Lake is accessible from the popular Bear Lake trail head, on an fairly easy hike through fresh snow tracks…
Jesus said to Nicodemus: ‘Do not be surprised when I say: You must be born from above. The wind blows wherever it pleases; you hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. That is how it is with all who are born of the Spirit.’ How sweet…
As dawn beckons on the streets of Yangon, I saw the ubiquitous dish of Myanmar, the Mohinga, a blend of vermicilli, in thick fish stock, and layered with the flavours of Indochinese condiments – witness to subtle hues and variations around a common theme. Here, in the morning informality of the railway stop beneath the…
In the planting season when the padi fields are left to fallow before they are flooded and the new saplings planted, the Balinese ducks get to partake of the fallen grains, when the stalks of rice are cut and the grains threshed and winnowed by hand. The rice stalks themselves, once de-grained, get fed to…
Traveling through rural Japan, in the island of Kyushu, one is reminded of the fate of the Christian missionaries who were mercilessly persecuted by the then Shogunate of the Edo era. The fate of those who ministered to the Way, and their proselytes have been dramatized in the 2016 Martin Scorsese’s period portrayal of Shūsaku Endō’s…
If you were traveling to the northern island of Hokkaido, Japan, to witness a summer blazing with flowers and colors, early June would be too early, as season travelers would tell you. ‘Green and nothing much else’ they would say. Yet, in the right places, deep in nature’s own backyard, when the man-made entreaties of…
Ninety hours in the pilgrim town of Assisi brought me from the milieu of an interesting cultural experience, to the dissonance of attempting a meditative journey amidst the life-line and highway of a major tourist town, and thence to a more balanced reflection on the 800 years that had since passed from the austere beginnings…
In a scene reminiscent of the Kafkaesque landscape that the 20th century author had painted in his books, we trudged through this vast fog-bound lava plain, along with a horde of humanity, some on horse-back, others on motor-bikes, and still more like us, led by a determination to reach the end of the stretch…
The bright red flowers of the South American Costaceae species Costus woodsonii (Red Button Ginger), competes with the Heliconias in the garden for the Sunbird, with its nectar-feeding beaks, to pollinate its flowers. In their native America homeland, it is the Hummingbirds that does the work. (Lumix GX85; M.Zuiko 40-150 mm) (Convergence evolution) …