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Actually this pooch was in the sea but if he had of been here yesterday he could easily have been swimming around in all the floods we had. The rain came down so hard I had it coming through the ceiling in my office - lol.
Anyway the weekend is nearly upon us again - so hoorah!!
Happy Furry Friday everyone
Hope you all have a fabulous weekend:-)
Actually.. to be honest, I have almost cheated to day as I went out shooting as we say in Denmark ”Før fanden fik sko på” - Which directly translated to english mean -> VERY early.
I really didn't mean to look out the window going to bed very late in the morning, but I did and looked at a beautiful sky... I suddenly realized my camera was fully loaded and was staring at me with those begging lenses and then my triggerfinger started to itch. So I got an early start to day.
When finally later to day, I DID get out again, I ventured in another direction than usual and a short way from home I took a picture of a plant outside a house. A woman came out of the house, smiled and asked in a friendly way if I liked taking photos of plants. Very much I answered and then she insisted on showing me her MARVELOUS garden. It was (to say the least) and it actually turned out (MUCH to my surprise) that she was not only a professional photographer teaching photography but also was writing a book about ecological gardening.
She gave me a red and yellow flower (which name silly me of course have forgotten). But I can assure you it was so bright in colour I would NEVER have dared even put it into my mouth. Taste it, she said, and I did. It tasted.. just splendid, as nature's candy. I was astonished.
Try rubbing these to leafs between your fingers and smell. I did.. and I couldn't get my fingers away from my nose for the next ½ minute. I stayed for coffee and homemade elderberry juice, we talked about photography and I was allowed to shoot all I wanted in her lively garden :o) I did (of course it is me) tell her the quite honest truth and said she could find my pictures by googling ”Ninja Transvestite”
I have friends that are transvestites she said and quite a lot of gay friends as well. - I guess even I am allowed a little luck sometimes it would seem :o) – So all the beautiful flower-shots are taking in her garden.. or in this case rather ”tribute to nature”, is a more precise definition of the piece of land behind her house :o)
So I got lucky twice, first by a sunset and then by a lady with a kind heart and a garden well cared for.
Almost cheating.. not really, but almost ;o)
EDIT: I am told by Cori that much of the below is wrong. Just goes to show how complicated this nonsense is.
This photo is actually playing triple duty. It's a thank-you to my mother, who made the gorgeous quilt you see. It's my daily picture of Nora. And it's a thank-you to Alison , who graciously gave us a whole host of cloth diaper goodies.
We had started with a small set of BumGenius pocket diapers (intended for night time and babysitter use), a set of Thirsties-brand shells, Thirsties-brand liners, and Flip (child brand of BumGenius) prefolds.
Alison, the wife of my lead at work, someone that I have met only a handful of times at company parties, took it upon herself to give us a large set of cloth diaper goodies that expanded our initial set and gave us the opportunity to explore a larger portion of the cloth diaper world than we would have been able to otherwise.
Some cloth diaper background. Cloth diapers are gadgets for babies. It took Cori a while to get me into this but, yeah, here I am.
There are two major pieces to a diaper: The absorbancy layer and the waterproof layer. Unless you are a madman, you want both.
How these layers are delivered is pretty varied and is made needlessly complex by the advent of billions of terms that serve only to confuse (i.e., they do not greatly reduce complexity in communication even after you are familiar with them).
For cloth diapers, the outer waterproof shell is made out of a special plastic that has basically revolutionized the whole cloth diaper thing. It's PUL, or polyurethane laminate, but you don't even care. All you would care about is that if your diaper isn't made from this stuff, it probably isn't worth your time.
If your diaper has the absorbency layer attached to this outer shell, it's called an "all in one." These diapers are expensive and take forever to dry, but they are as easy to use as disposibles. If your diaper has a liner but also has a piece that is removable, it's probably a Pocket diaper, where you stuff the absorbancy layer inside a pocket. (This is one place the terminology is dumb: Some Pocket diapers are marketed as All In Ones.) If your diaper and liner are separate items, it is called an All In Two (and again, some Pockets are marketed as All In Twos).
Pretty much every other kind of diaper is some variation on the above.
Classic cloth diapers, called "prefolds" usually, are just an All In Two, since they are useful only as liners. "Prefolds" are also mis-named because they are not, in fact, pre-folded: They are just squares of cotton. If you get a pre-fold that's actually pre-folded, you are probably buying a Fitted diaper, which again is a misnomer since they are not fitted like a suit nor fitted like a baseball cap.
The diaper in the picture above is a Thirsties-brand All In Two. The shell is by far the best stand-alone shell we found. There are two main sizes of this shell -- one for infant to 18lb and one for above that.
The absorbancy layers we have available at home are myriad. There are two major aspects that you worry about with an absorbancy layer: Speed of absorbtion and wicking action.
The former is important to prevent spills. Go grab a kitchen towel and just pour a quarter cup of water on it. I'll wager it will absorb less than half of the water before the rest just spills off the side. Wicking action is important because it contributes to the feeling of "dryness," which is important to prevent diaper rash but also because it keeps baby comfortable when wearing a diaper for a long period. In other words, wicking ability allows baby to sleep for longer periods with a change.
I could provide reviews of all the liners and diapers we've used, and maybe I will at some point, but for now I'll leave it at the above. I have this great infographic in my head describing the whole cloth diaper world, but alas I'm sure it is never going to come to light.
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Vietnam was our original choice for a touring holiday back in 2015, mainly to see Halong Bay, but we got sidetracked by the gorgeous pictures of Myanmar in the brochures and ended up going there instead. Myanmar, and probably touring holidays in general, was hard work, we are both in our sixties and do not really travel that well after having a lot of pampered holidays in the Maldives, so after the final three hour wait in another airport lounge we said 'never again'. But three months later after sitting back and looking at the best set of holiday photo's we have ever taken, we realised what wonderful people we had met and amazing places we had seen and that you have to put up with airport lounges, train stations and car journeys to get that. So the next thing we knew we were booking another touring holiday to Vietnam with Mango Journeys based in Cambodia! Warren the owner of Mango, actually an Aussie guy, sorted out our itinerary, click to view, we booked a couple of flights and it was done. Vietnam has a lot of Buddhist tradition like Myanmar so we figured that the people would be similar to the lovely people of Myanmar we met last year. Plus the landscape and scenery looked so green and lush so it all boded well.
However when we arrived in Saigon, all the Vietnamese still call it Saigon, in mid December it turned out that it was still the rainy season. So it was quite cloudy, foggy and rainy.....and it stayed like that for most of the holiday actually. We hadn't quite bargained for that, Myanmar was dry and sunny at the same time last year so this was quite a dramatic change. We were also in their winter so no crops were growing, hence all the lovely green and golden paddy fields you see in the brochures were mostly brown and muddy. Vietnam is big and very busy, there were a huge amount of Chinese tourists here, especially at Ankor Wat in Cambodia. A lot of the local people traditionally come home from all over the world at this time of year to see their families, so the place is buzzing. The Vietnamese people are also a lot more 'tourist savvy' here compared with the totally charming Burmese people we met last year, they seem to have that air of indifference you get in developed western countries towards tourists.
It's all sounding a bit disappointing and I'm afraid that is how it felt quite a lot of the time. We were in Saigon for 2 days....way too busy for us. Then a boat trip to the Mekong Delta, sounds idyllic but actually just a big busy river, we never really got far enough into the smaller tributaries where it might be more like you imagine the Mekong Delta to look like. A flight to Siem Reap then a couple of days around Ankor Wat. This was undoubtedly the highlight of the holiday. The Angkor Archaeological Park is mind boggingly massive! It took us 45 minutes by car to reach the pink sandstone temple of Banteay Srei in one corner of the park! The distances involved when moving between the various temples are all the same.....huge! Ankor Wat itself covers an enormous area but hugely impressive. It shows the power of this place when you get to the entrance at 5:00am to watch the sunrise and there are already hundreds of people there! And it happens every day of the year apparently. Although hordes of people can bug you sometimes, the collective enjoyment factor seems to override that here, the place is just so awe inspiring.
We really enjoyed Cambodia, we wished we had spent more time there, we only met a few people but they all seemed to have more of that charm of the Burmese people. Cambodia has had an extremely troubled past, the war didn't end until 1998 and everybody appears to have been tainted by it. Our guide lost 15 of his immediate relatives to it, and a lot of people seem to have similar horrific tales to tell. The landmine museum we visited was a poignant reminder of those days and our guide was obviously quite emotional in his rendering of the museum's history and the people involved in it. As a result of the regime's slaughter of all the ruling elite including politicians, teachers, scholars and intellectuals Cambodia was left backward in the rapidly growing economy of south east Asia. They are moving in the right direction now, albeit slowly, and we both felt we should have spent more time there and given them more of the benefit of our tourist dollar.
Of all the other places we visited, Da Nang, Hoi An, Hue, Tam Coc, Mai Chau Valley, Hanoi and Halong Bay, Mai Chau Valley was like an oasis in a sea of traffic, busy people and tourists. When you look down at the valley from the main photo vantage point it has the look of the promised land, a lush green place nestling in the surrounding mountains.
We had a couple of lovely walks around here over two days enjoying the beatiful landscape and meeting a few of the local people. We realised afterwards that we should have stayed away from the cities and done more of this sort of stuff. We stopped and spoke to a lovely 68 year old lady in Mau Chau vilage, there was nothing to her she looked so thin and frail. She told us, interpreted by our guide, that her husband left when she was 36 years old and because of the culture she was never allowed to be with another man after that. Her only daughter was married at around the same time and again the culture dictates that she moved to the husband's village which was in south Vietnam. Her daughter is extremely poor and travel for local people is so expensive that it is extremely unlikely she will ever see her mother again. A small story but one that is probably played out a lot in this country. This amazing lady took us back to the one room brick built house with a small garden no bigger than your average shed that she now lives in. She managed to build it with help from the villagers who all seem to look after each other extremely well, so at least she now has somewhere dry to live. She was so welcoming though and showed us how she cooks, where she sleeps and the small garden she tends, it was without doubt the most touching moment of our holiday and one we will always remember.
If you like busy cities then Hanoi is probably a better option than Saigon, it has an old quarter that is strangely quaint for a big city, is a lot more photogenic and a nicer place to be. We were never taken to new Hanoi so I guess it's probably just like Saigon.
Halong Bay was the main inspiration to visit Vietnam in the first place. I saw photo's of this place back in 2014 when searching for more of the limestone karst scenery we had seen in Thailand's Phang Nga Bay on a previous holiday. The boat trip with an overnight stay was the holiday finale and supposed to be one of the highlights. I mistakenly thought we would be touring around Halong Bay the whole time....a foolish assumption! We sailed for about 30 minutes, during which time we had a briefing and some food, then we dropped anchor and that was it! It turned out to be more of a booze cruise, with kayaking, happy hour, games, karaoke and Tai Chi in the morning! Oh my God, what a waste! This place is massive and to just sail into it for half an hour seemed ridiculous to us. I know a lot of it looks the same but as a photographer you are looking for those subtle differences in composition and quality of light that make great photographs. You can't get that when you are sat in the same spot. I managed to get some reasonable photographs but overall, disappointing.....again!
As I write this back in the UK, I've just finshed post processing our holiday photo's after around four weeks work. Originally, because of the dull weather we had, I thought they were not going to be a patch on the photo's from Myanmar last year, but I have been pleasantly surprised. I am constantly amazed at what you can pull out of seemingly dull photographs with the help of Lightroom, Topaz Labs and Photomatix for HDR. Back in the days of film I used to love the punchy colours you could get on a sunny day with the help of a polarizing filter and Kodachrome 25! Nowadays with the help of modern software it's possible to get so much colour into photographs almost out of nowhere! I love making 'impression' type of pictures where the photo is transformed into a sort of painting....used judiciously they conjure up more of the feeling of a place than a straight photo. Those plus the power of HDR photography and Topaz Labs give our holiday snaps a warmth and colour that maybe isn't true to life but always makes them look amazing! No wonder we got suckered into doing another touring holiday.....the photo's just look so good!
A word about Mango Journeys, they were amazing. All the guides were there to greet us and look after us wherever we went and they all seemed to enjoy their work, which always helps. Everything on the itenerary worked out OK.....in the end! We had one hiccup where we missed our flight from Cambodia back into Vietnam but Warren stepped in at 9:00pm at night and got us on another flight and into a hotel without too much bother and no extra charge. As it was our first visit to Vietnam Mango tried to give us a bit of everything I guess, stuff that most tourists want to see. In hindsight and learning from our Burma trip last year we should have really studied the itinerary and made sure it included what WE wanted to do, especially staying away from big cities! We are quite new to touring so it's a learning process.
Our next holiday? As soon as we got home we knew we 'needed a holiday' it had been so busy with a lot of travelling. We booked a week on Veligandu in the Maldives at Easter! Back to our favourite place in the world! Not only that we decided to put touring on hold for a while and booked two weeks on Filitheyo for Christmas. Back to just sunbathing, snorkelling, scuba diving and chilling! Heaven!
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To view the rest of my Photography Collection click on Link below:
www.flickr.com/photos/nevillewootton/albums
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Photography & Equipment sponsored by my web business:
We are UK's leading Filter Specialists, selling online to the Plant, Agricultural, Commercial Vehicle and Marine Industries.
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PLEASE NOTE: I take Photographs purely as a hobby these days so am happy to share them with anyone who enjoys them or has a use for them. If you do use them an accreditation would be nice and if you benefit from them financially a donation to www.sightsavers.org would be really nice.
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Actually not a house at all, though it could be a temple. I actually don't remember, except that it was within the amazing Buddha park where the gigantic siting Buddha resides.
Taken in Leshan, China.
Actually, I took this from our small porch just outside the window. My wife and I stayed at the Skyline lodge in Shenandoah National Park, Virginia, for a short holiday trip. This was the view from our room/porch.
You can see some of the Blue Ridge Mountains in the background. This was an exceptionally clear day for this area, as usually the mountains are shrouded in a bluish haze.
Tintin is a fictional character in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé. Tintin is the protagonist of the series, a reporter and adventurer who travels around the world with his dog Snowy.
Tintin debuted in Le Petit Vingtième on 10 January 1929. Tintin was largely based on an earlier character created by Hergé, a chubby boy-scout named Totor. The comics starring Totor, Les aventures de Totor, chef de patrouille des Hannetons (The Adventures of Totor, Leader of the Cockchafer Patrol), appeared in the magazine Le Boy-Scout Belge between 1926 and 1929.
In the later comic book series, Tintin is a young reporter who is drawn to dangerous international intrigues in which his quick thinking, bravery and chronic good luck save the day. Almost every adventure features Tintin sent off to investigate an assignment, but rarely does he actually turn in a story without first getting caught up in an adventure.[1] Although the strip was Belgian, Hergé was inconsistent or vague about assigning Tintin a nationality, depicting him instead as broadly European. In some of the early books, like Tintin in the Congo or The Black Island, a Belgian identity is fairly explicit. In The Secret of the Unicorn, the reader can unmistakably recognise the streets of Brussels at the beginning of the story. In the television series, Tintin states that he and Snowy are from Brussels in the episode of The Crab with the Golden Claws. Brussels is also explicitly mentioned as Tintin's home address in Tintin in the Land of the Soviets. In later adventures, as with other aspects of his character's history and family, Tintin's nationality is usually not directly stated, although some of the street scenes in The Red Sea Sharks have been identified as happening in Brussels.
Readers and critics have described Tintin as a well-rounded, yet open-ended character, noting that his rather neutral personality—sometimes labelled as bland—permits a balanced reflection of the evil, folly and foolhardiness which surrounds him. His boy-scout ideals, which represent Hergé's own, are never compromised by the character, and his status allows the reader to assume his position within the story, rather than merely following the adventures of a strong protagonist.Tintin's iconic representation enhances this aspect, with Scott McCloud noting that it "allows readers to mask themselves in a character and safely enter a sensually stimulating world."
Tintin is an intelligent and imaginative character with good powers of deduction. However, while in deep thought, he tends to be absent-minded and fails to notice things around him. He seems to know multiple foreign languages and reads extensively on a variety of subjects. He is skilled at driving automobiles (including a tank), riding horses or motorcycles, and flying aeroplanes and helicopters. Despite his generally delicate and unassuming appearance, Tintin is quite athletic and possesses great physical strength, often getting into fights where he is able to knock out enemies much larger than himself with a single blow. Although he is small as opposed to the other characters, he is an excellent swimmer, has been shown to be a skilled mountaineer, has been shown to do yoga,[4] and can survive falls that would normally cause serious injuries.
Tintin's age is never accurately revealed. Other characters treat him as a worldly young adult, as shown by the absence of concerns like parents or school, as well as by his wide solo travels all over the globe. He's old enough to enter a pub and drink a beer (The Black Island) and old enough to live alone with his dog in his own apartment. However, he is still referred to as a "young boy", and a "puppy" in The Crab with the Golden Claws. A 1979 television interview with Hergé settled the matter, when Hergé stated that when he first thought about Tintin he was 14 or 15 years old, "but now, let's say that he is 17." In one shot in the television series episode The Secret of the Unicorn, Tintin's passport states his birth year as 1929 (the year of his print debut).
Tintin has no family members: any mention of a mother, father or siblings is noticeably absent. He makes no mention of his family throughout the series. Nowhere is it implied that he is an orphan; it could be argued that he meets his family between adventures. Tintin's lack of relatives is irrelevant to his adventuring; it is the adopted family of friends he makes through his exploits that makes up his family unit.
Unlike other characters such as Captain Haddock or Professor Calculus, Tintin has no discernible past prior to the beginning of the series. Whereas Haddock can recall a particularly fierce storm at sea or Calculus can boast of his athletic past, Tintin's roots prior to Land of the Soviets are never discussed. His companions encounter old friends like Captain Chester or Hercule Tarragon, yet Tintin only meets friends or enemies whom he met in previous adventures.
Even the name "Tintin" remains a mystery. Whether it is a first name or a surname is unknown. A possibility is that it is not actually the reporter's real name, but rather a pseudonym that the character uses to protect his identity while writing columns for his newspaper: Le Petit Vingtième. At the time when the stories first came out, journalists' usage of pseudonyms was commonplace. The possibility that it may not be his real name is also hinted in Cigars of the Pharaoh when Tintin is accused of poisoning one of a notable sheik's servants. Having been captured and brought to his tent, the enraged sheik demands Tintin's name. Tintin's characteristically placid answer is: "My name? It won't mean a thing to you... but at home they call me Tintin." A simpler theory for his name is the fact that Franco-Belgian comics at the time generally had heroes with eccentric, memorable single names that could pass off as first names or surnames. Many people tend to think of "Tintin" as a surname, but it is likely that Hergé meant to keep it a mystery. Hergé was a great admirer of Benjamin Rabier and may have derived the name (and hairstyle) from Rabier's Tintin lutin (1897). There also have been theories that Tintin is a nickname for Martin or Augustin. One last theory holds that the name "Tintin" signifies nothing, pointing to the character's cipherous nature. As Paul LaFarge writes,
Tintin was a word before it was a name; it means 'nothing,' and the phrase faire tintin loosely means "to go without." Hergé's boy reporter does not bear the name by accident.
Throughout much of the series, Tintin's attitude is characterised by inquisitive tendencies and a noble, forgiving nature. While his idealism earns him the admiration of many people he meets, it also places him in danger on occasion and serves as a foil to the more sceptical demeanour of other characters such as Captain Haddock. And unlike nearly every other character he meets, Tintin can be relied upon to remain calm and cool-headed, even in the worst of circumstances. Only on very rare occasions, such as after Haddock's drunken antics threatened his friend's lives (Explorers on the Moon), could Tintin actually lose his temper.
Tintin's political views are generally ambiguous in many of the books and specific expression of his opinions are rare. While in earlier books such as Tintin in the Land of the Soviets and Tintin in the Congo Tintin is characterised as a proud Belgian Catholic, later books avoid specific mention of his views (see Ideology of Tintin). His opinions appear to change over time, though in many situations he can be classified as a pacifist, reflecting a dislike of war. At the beginning of Tintin and the Picaros, he is seen wearing a motorcycle helmet with a Peace symbol on it.
Readers of Tintin books have speculated about his sexuality. Marcel Wilmet, spokesperson of Studios Hergé, has confirmed that Tintin is not gay and, while he has many male friends, they are not boyfriends. However, many still question his ambiguous sexuality.
Towards the end of the series, Tintin's character changes to a degree. In later stories, Tintin no longer actively seeks out adventure but is rather forced into a situation by events beyond his control (such as being kidnapped[10] or motivated to rescue a friend). This is especially evident in Flight 714 and Tintin and the Picaros, where Tintin's loss of enthusiasm for adventure is apparent, and his youthful idealism appears to have been replaced by a somewhat more cynical outlook. There has been much debate among readers and critics about this shift in characterisation, as these final adventures have received varying and sometimes negative responses. Critics argue that these books represent either a late period of eccentricity, or puzzling disappointments, while others claim that Tintin's shift represents a more complex depiction of his character. Hergé commented upon this change, noting that in the late phases of his career, "Tintin has lost control, he is not on top of events anymore, he is subjected to them." However, in the unfinished album Tintin and Alph-Art, Tintin regained much of his old adventurous personality, actively investigating suspicious events and murder threats.
The earlier version of Tintin was apparently inspired, at least in part, by Hergé's younger brother, Paul Remi, a career soldier. Tired of being referred to as "Major Tintin" by his colleagues, Paul later shaved his hair and adopted a more Erich von Stroheim look. Hergé subsequently used Paul's appearance as a model for the villainous Colonel Sponsz in The Calculus Affair. Tintin and Sponsz, although physically very different, have actually quite similar hair spikes.
Hergé may have also been inspired by a Danish boy scout and later actor Palle Huld who was 15 years old when he travelled around the world and wrote Around the World in 44 days by Palle. In the book he describes his tour to Soviet, America, China, Africa etc. and about his dramatic adventures. It was translated into 11 languages and it was read by Hergé. Palle Huld died in 2010 at the age of 98.
However, the inspiration for the clothing Hergé dressed Tintin in lay elsewhere. A fellow student of Hergé's from St Boniface, named Charles, had adopted a similar style of plus fours and argyle socks, which caused him to be the subject of no little ridicule. Harry Thompson notes the inspiration may be tinged slightly, suggesting that if "Hergé had been one of the laughers, an element of guilt was involved."
The first 3 adventures of Tintin visit places visited by photographer-reporter Robert Sexé, recorded in the Belgian press from the mid to late 1920s. Sexé was born in 1890 in La Roche-sur-Yon in Vendée in Western France. Janpol Schulz wrote a biography of Robert Sexé titled "Sexé au pays des Soviets" (Sexé in the Land of the Soviets) to mimic the name of the first Tintin Adventure. This was published in 1996.
Robert Sexé has been noted to have a similar appearance to Tintin, and the Hergé Foundation in Belgium has admitted that it is not too hard to imagine how Hergé could have been influenced by the exploits of Sexé.[16] At that time Sexé had been round the world on a motorcycle made by Gillet of Herstal. René Milhoux was a Grand-Prix champion and motorcycle record holder of the era, and in 1928, while Sexé was in Herstal speaking with Léon Gillet about his future projects, Mr. Gillet put him in contact with his new champion, Milhoux, who had just left Ready motorcycles for Gillet of Herstal. The two men quickly struck up a friendship, and spent hours talking about motorcycles and voyages, Sexé explaining his needs and Milhoux giving his knowledge on mechanics and motorbikes pushed beyond their limits.
Thanks to this union of knowledge and experience, Robert Sexé would head off on numerous trips throughout the world, writing countless press accounts. The General Secretary of the Hergé Foundation in Belgium has admitted that it is not too hard to imagine how a young George Rémi, better known as Hergé, could have been inspired by the well-publicized exploits of these two friends, Sexé with his trips and documentaries and Milhoux with his triumphs and records, to create the characters of Tintin the famous travelling reporter, and his faithful companion Milou (Snowy).
Hergé himself has noted that Tintin existed as his personal expression, and although he recorded in 1947 that he knew "Tintin is no longer me, that, if he is to go on living, it will be by a sort of artificial respiration that I will have to practice constantly and which exhausts me, and will exhaust me more and more",[17] he was also fond of stating "Tintin, c'est moi!" ("Tintin, that's me!").
Shortly before his death, former Belgian Nazi collaborator Léon Degrelle created controversy by stating that the Tintin character was originally based on himself. Degrelle had indeed known Hergé during his early career as a journalist, but this allegation is generally considered a fabrication of the notorious self-booster Degrelle
Actually, I was trying to get some sort of flight shot of a Bluebird. Right idea, wrong color.
This male has been hanging around the yard for a couple of years. He has been a good friend for a long time. He is pretty easy to pick out by his bad left foot. Only one claw, and pretty useless for supporting his weight. None the less, he has raised a bunch of baby Cardinals and carries on like a trouper. I guess, since he's old, he flies really slow, so he's easier to photograph :-)
© Steve Byland 2013 all rights reserved
Unauthorized use or reproduction for any reason is prohibited.
Please do not link to or blog this without contacting me first.
Cincinnati (actually Blue Ash), Ohio. From their site "Pandoracon is a brand new convention in Cincinnati, Ohio for fans of science fiction, fantasy, anime, LARP, comics, gaming, cosplay, and various other flights of imagination. . . . The programming of Pandoracon is built around genre fans gathering together to celebrate their joy of all aspects of the Dork Side of the Farce." Now you know as much as I do.
We saw an ad for the event in a local news and entertainment weekly paper, but really didn't understand what this three day gathering was all about and so weren't about to plunk down the registration fee for the unknown. On Friday we went to the motel where things were being set up to see what we could find out. I was more confused after talking to a few of the folks than I was before. The next day we were eating lunch at a nearby restaurant when a couple of the attendees came in dressed in full costume. I struck up a conversation with them and then decided we should go to the motel on the chance we could get some shots of some of the costumed participants. We weren't disappointed although my shots would probably have been better if I was more familiar with my new camera and the conditions had been more conducive to getting a good shot. We plan to return next year and hope to be better prepared.
I have no idea who this guy is supposed to be, but I loved his costume. Perhaps someone in the know will be able to help.
... I guess a few people have wondered where I've been the past few days and so I'll confess. When I tell you about movies or anything else, I do it for me as much as for you, knowing you have every right to delete me and move on. You should do whatever you're moved to do and that's exactly what I'm doing. If you're going to love your neighbor, for which your neighbor will be eternally grateful, it's high time you settled in and learned to love yourself, so you'll have some guidelines for future neighborly action. I make no apologies for my Flickrsite being all about me ... that's what the word ME means. Without the ME you couldn't even make the word MEANING. Surely that means something, then again, maybe not.
I set out to give you a review of the movie LOVE ACTUALLY and what a movie it is. Wikipedia will tell you, it's the incorporation of ten different stories involving love of all sorts, but involving people who are all connected, even if loosely. I got carried away researching the film and here's what I've been doing the past week.
I watched the movie and fell in love with it. I went back and watched the bonus materials, the deleted scenes, the documentary on music, and then I re-watched the movie with the director and several of the leading performers doing a commentary as the movie moved along. That was exciting and I learned a lot of trivia. Trivia always captures my fancy and my fancy is very difficult to capture. Then, of course I picked up trivia of my own.
The first piece of trivia I picked up on was in one of the stories involving an unsuccessful young English stud who believes he'll be much more appreciated by American girls, so flies to Milwaukee where girls in a local bar go gaga over him and his brittle English accent. Three girls take him into their apartment and then go back to England with him at the end of his vacation. Here's the little gem of trivia ... one of those girls is Betty Draper, remember Don Draper, star of Mad Men? What a trollop that lady has turned into. You fans of Mad Men will want to look for her. As she talks she does that magic thing with her eyes, shutting them at key words in her sentencing and looking down and then back up at her subject. In the commentary, the director even told the others to watch what she does with her eyes. It's s small world, I never expected to see Betty in Wisconsin.
Then the big trivia popped up in the form of Heike Makatsch, Harry's secretary who makes passes at him around Christmas time. She is a doppleganger for my granddaughter, Ashley. I may be a month doing this review, at this rate. After watching the reviewed movie, I went back and watched it again to get the sequences straight in my mind. This image is two pictures of Ashley on the left and two of Heike on the right and me in the center, since I'm a part of this transaction also. I've explained that already...Love your neighbor, include yourself remember? I'm anxious to hear what Ashley thinks about this look-a-like who turned up in Love Actually and if my daughter and sons will agree they are phenomenally similar in appearance, or is it just me seeing some vision of my own ... More later.
This from Wikipedia ...
Harry, Karen, and Mia ... Harry (Alan Rickman) is the managing director of a design agency. Mia (Heike Makatsch), his new secretary, clearly has sexual feelings for him. His nascent mid-life crisis allows him tentatively to welcome her attention, and for Christmas he buys her an expensive necklace from jewellery salesman Rufus (Rowan Atkinson), who takes a very long time adding ever more elaborate wrapping while Harry becomes increasingly nervous with the fear of detection. Meanwhile, Harry's wife Karen (Emma Thompson) is busy dealing with their children, Daisy (Lulu Popplewell) and Bernard (William Wadham), who are appearing in the school Nativity, her brother David, a politician who just became the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and her friend Daniel, who has just lost his wife. Karen discovers the necklace in Harry's coat pocket and assumes it is a gift for her, only to be given the CD Joni Mitchell's Both Sides Now to "continue [Karen's] emotional education", as Harry puts it, instead. She then believes Harry is having an affair with Mia (having earlier noticed how closely they were dancing together at their office party), and briefly breaks down alone in her bedroom before composing herself to attend the children's play with her husband. Following the play, Karen confronts Harry over the necklace, who admits, "I am so in the wrong - a classic fool", to which Karen replies: "Yes, but you've also made a fool out of me - you've made the life I lead foolish too", before blinking back tears and enthusiastically congratulating their children. As for Mia, she is shown smiling while trying on the necklace.
Here's the link to Love Actually on Wikipedia ...
Actually, I didn't. I cut my finger on the side gate. But it might have been this too, given the amount of sharperating applied.
Actually, it's not mine, thankfully. i was walking on Sunset Blvd with luluphoto and her hubby, telling them about the new iPhone I had just ordered when Lulu's hubby looks down and says, "Someone need an iPhone?" Crazy. It was just sitting on the curb. I think they're going to return it to Apple to see if they can locate the rightful owner. I only had time for a quick snap-- maybe Lulu will make some other 'art' with it. Although she was handling it with a paper towel like she had just picked up a dead mouse. ;) Germaphobe.
Megabus…:no longer brought to you by Stagecoach
Seen heading into Buchanan Bus Station is 54010 (YX69LCC). You’ll notice that although carrying Megabus livery, it says above the entrance that this Megabus service is ‘brought to you by Stagecoach’, albeit this bus was actually on the Scottish Citylink 900 service. That isn’t that uncommon, as Stagecoach tended to provide most of the vehicles for Megabus and indeed Stagecoach actually invented Megabus, creating it as a low cost carrier based around the then new concept of Internet booking. similar to low-cost airlines.
However it was announced recently that Stagecoach subsidiaries in England and Wales will cease shortly to provide buses for Megabus, with the exception of Stagecoach Busway’s Walkergate Depot in Tyne & Wear. The Scottish depots which run Megabus services are unaffected but for the rest of the United Kingdom, Stagecoach will no longer operate services for a company it created. So what happened?
Well this tale begins with the sale of Scottish Citylink to Comfort Delgro, owners of Metroline Travel in London. Stagecoach had been a contractor for Scottish Citylink, but when it purchased the M8 Motivator service, an independent service between Glasgow and Edinburgh, it withdrew the Megabus service between the two cities and instead offered seats on the Motivator service between the two locations instead through the Megabus website. This seemed to upset Citylink who felt Stagecoach was being gamekeeper turned poacher and cancelled Stagecoach’s contracts. This led to the two competing on the route.
It ended in cooperation. A joint venture between Scottish Citylink and Megabus led to co-ordination of services in Scotland. On 21 November 2005, the 900 Motorvator service was replaced by an enhanced Citylink service, with the facility to buy seats through the Megabus website was retained. The next week, most of the faster Citylink services between Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth and Glasgow, and Inverness, Perth and Edinburgh were replaced by a more frequent, combined Megabus/Citylink service. Tickets for the combined Megabus/Citylink services became available through both companies' websites. Although this was announced as a joint-venture, it was clear to all that Stagecoach was in control and indeed, the coach that Citylink owned, to satisfy licensing requirements, moved to be a coach in the Western Buses fleet. Frequently, it wasn’t uncommon to see Citylink buses on Megabus services down south and vice versa. Stagecoach subsidiaries became significant contractors for Citylink/Megabus services although not exclusively.,
The situation remained until 2022. In August 2022, as part of the Stagecoach Group sale to DWS, it was agreed that Megabus' retail activities (the sale and marketing of tickets) would be sold to Scottish Citylink, basically Comfort Delgro. An earlier proposed sale of Stagecoach to National Express would have seen Megabus sold in its entirety to ComfortDelGro. Also sold was tte Falcon services to Bristol Airport. Since that time, several independent operators have appeared on Megabus services and it would appear that this is an extension of this.
I’ve always wondered whether Comfort Delgro will eventually get rid of the Megabus name. It runs services already in the Republic of Ireland under the Citylink brand and the Citylink brand overall would be a better fit I feel. Megabus has a cheap and cheerful image and with renewed competition with FLiXBUS perhaps it is time to retire the Megabus brand in favour of Citylink maybe? Also a lot of Stagecoach subsidiaries will have a lot of coaches to move on that they no longer need.
She actually caught the reflection, but I caught the light leaks. I can't decide whose catch was better...
Taken with Yashica Electro 35 GSN camera on a DM Paradies 100 film. Scanned with Canon CanoScan 8800F. Yashica is in an inoperable state, battery terminals are corroded, so camera works in unpowered mode, without the light meter, with fixed 1/500 shutter speed. This photo was probably taken with lens wide-open, at ƒ/1.7 - light conditions were rather poor.
(been scanning some almost-forgotten film from spring 2009...)
From the autumn 2016 trip to Vietnam:
Touchdown brings me ‘round again to find…solid ground. Though I sometimes do feel like a rocket man. Including layovers, this trip to Vietnam consisted of 8 separate flights. The third one brought me to tiny Phu Quoc Island, a tropical island 40 kilometers west of the southern tip of Vietnam (and less than 5 kilometers from Cambodia on the mainland). The island, then, is actually west of the southern tip of Vietnam, and less than an hour flight from Saigon. The flight goes something like this: “Ladies and gentlemen, please be seated as it’s time for take…and now we’re landing.”
There are actually two tropical islands off the southern coast of Vietnam that I would have liked visiting, Phu Quoc being the more appealing of the two. (The other, for those curious, are the Con Dao Islands which actually are south of the mainland…but there doesn’t seem to be daily flights to/from there, which took it out of this trip’s consideration.)
Compared with Thailand, you would probably never think of coming to Vietnam for a tropical island experience – mainly because it’s not developed – and you’d be correct. I can easily name a handful of islands in Thailand (or Malaysia) that I would prefer to visit from an island standpoint.
However, that’s not to say that I was disappointed by Phu Quoc. On the contrary, I love the island. I found myself thinking, many times, “If I were an investor interested in developing a tourist resort, this would almost be at the top of my list.” (So, any investors reading this…feel free to take a slightly closer look at this island.)
It’s an easily accessible island with many daily flights to Saigon, and also flights to Hanoi. It claims to be an international airport, so I assume there are flights from Cambodia, as well, though I can’t say for certain. I can only say…it’s easy to get here.
Once you get here, you’ll find Vietnam’s largest island (though not large in comparison with many others). It’s 50 kilometers from north to south and 25 kilometers at its widest. It’s triangular in shape and, poetically speaking, can be said to look like a tear drop. Located in the Gulf of Thailand, the island also includes smaller neighboring islands as well.
Phu Quoc has slightly over 100,000 full-time residents, mostly living in Duong Dong, the island’s main town on the midpoint of the west coast of the island. Other than tourism, the economy here is driven, obviously, by the sea. Fishing, seafood, and so on are the staple here. Phu Quoc is the producer of the most famous fish sauce coming out of Vietnam. (Phu Quoc’s fish sauce can be found on grocery store shelves around the world.)
It’s also an island of hills. Our tour guide claimed that Phu Quoc has 99 mountains and, while I can’t (or won’t) dispute that, it struck me as a curious claim. There are hilly parts, though, and they include two waterfalls, one of which we visited on a day trip.
I mention that Phu Quoc struck me as being somewhat underdeveloped. I’ll elaborate by saying that they have a solid foundation – lots of restaurants (catered to foreigners; western food, pizza joints, etc., in addition to local/Vietnamese cuisine) – and hotels ranging from budget to top end. The basic utilities on the island (electricity, internet, etc.) are also completely stable and reliable. Where they could develop more is in the following: infrastructure and the actual amenities of tourism.
The roads weren’t shoddy, by many standards, though there’s still a lot of room for development. Once this is improved, it’ll make getting around more comfortable for anyone who wants to be completely insulated from “natural.”
The other thing that struck us as a little odd is that there doesn’t seem to be much going on at night (unless you’re a fisherman). It’s still a very quiet island and there weren’t many options for bars, clubs, live music, for example. (This is a huge difference between here and, say, Koh Chang in Thailand; the only other nearby island I have for comparison.) There aren’t convenience stores here that are open 24 hours a day and they don’t have much to offer after dark…besides the Night Market. Perhaps that’s the way they want to keep it, but there’s certainly potential here.
During the daytime, though, there’s plenty for tourists. As a photographer not equipped with waterproof gear, I was much more limited, but for the typical tourist you have options of fishing, diving, snorkeling, and swimming. The beaches were, in my opinion, a little dirty, but there are others on the island that are better, I think. (All in all, it would be nice to see things cleaned up a bit…)
In addition to water pursuits, there’s Phu Quoc National Park (that we didn’t visit; apparently better other times of the year) and – though the crux of the economy is tied to the sea – there are also other aspects of the economy that they represent well: pearl farms, pepper farms, cashew plantations, fish sauce factories, and local wine (wine aficionados, don’t get your hopes up).
For the land-loving folks, this is far from a crowded island. There are a number of beaches, the national park in the northern part of the island, and a few small waterfalls (one a classic, the other more of a rapids where you can swim). In short, there’s not a lack of things to do during the day.
With the long-winded generalities about the island out of the way, time to carry on with our experience. We took an early flight out of Saigon, around 9 or 10 o’clock. Flying into the airport, in the heart of the island (on the south side), my first impressions were “green” and “hilly.”
Naturally, it’s a small airport – everything here is small – which made it easy to get our things and be on our way to the hotel. I paid about $5 for the ride into Duong Dong. Our hotel, the Sea Breeze, had very friendly staff. (I can actually say that about every hotel we stayed at, with the New Moon in Danang being the least friendly…and they weren’t bad by any means at all.)
Anyway, the Sea Breeze was a fine place to sleep, though the Cat Huy was slightly nicer. But, for three nights, this hotel was perfect. Comfortable bed…and they did same day laundry service. I don’t remember the cost, but it was probably between $20-30 USD/night.
The hotel wasn’t one that had a restaurant or breakfast included (Saigon, Hoi An, Hue, and Hanoi all did), but there was a restaurant attached and a few feet away. I had breakfast there two of the three mornings and, while not the best western breakfast I’ve had, the staff were exceptionally friendly. I think that’s a Vietnamese quality…be really cordial to folks.
We had most of Friday on the island, plus the entire weekend, with a Monday morning flight to Danang (via Saigon) around 10:00 in the morning. Friday, then, was a completely unplanned day. So we spent Friday toddling around Duong Dong.
The first place we went (besides the hotel, obviously), was to find something to eat. We ended up going with was a decidedly non-Vietnamese restaurant named Buddy’s, walking there via the Night Market street. For me, I loved ‘em because they had milkshakes with real ice cream. Didn’t matter what else they had. That was enough to get me to go back 2-3 times.
After lunch and sitting around Buddy’s for a while, we walked across the street and followed the river out to its mouth in the Gulf of Thailand. (The river is why the main town was built at this spot.)
At the river’s head is a curiously named spot called Dinh Cau Castle. There is nothing about this place that shouts out “castle” if you were to just chance upon it. It’s actually a combination lighthouse-temple. The temple aspect is just a small room with a statue dedicated to the Goddess of the Sea. The lighthouse, obviously, has its practical purposes. It’s more a light station, though; there’s no house for a keeper.
However, this was a very enjoyable spot (much nicer than the Thien Hau “Pagoda” in Saigon) and would end up being the spot where we watched the sunset on Friday and Saturday. The lighthouse-station-temple was built in 1937. There are a few tables benches on an upper platform to sit and enjoy the view of the sea (or the river mouth with its fishing fleet behind you) and there’s also a jetty going out into the sea that gives some nice perspectives. I can only say that I was surprisingly pleased with both Friday and Saturday’s sunsets.
Staying at Dinh Cau well past sunset, we strolled back towards the Sea Breeze via the Night Market, which is rather clean as far as Asian markets go. (I mention this to contrast it with Phu Quoc’s Day Market, mentioned below.)
Before getting back to the hotel, we stopped at the recently (2015) established Crab House (Nha Ghe Phu Quoc) on the main road at the south end of the market. The owner was – as all seem to be – very friendly and talkative. I was curious to know why the interior had banners from a handful of SEC schools (US folks will know what this is) along with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Turns out, the guy used to live in Muskegon, Michigan, which isn’t terribly far from where I was born (and a town I’ll be passing near in about 3-4 weeks’ time).
Junebug & I split the Crab House battered garlic pepper fries (65,000 VND); miniature crab cakes with sweet mango coulis (175,000 VND); and com ghe: hot, steamy jasmine rice with fresh, sweet crab meat, julienne cucumber, and nuoc mam cay (Phu Quoc fish sauce) for 175,000 VND. Add in two cans of Sprite at 20,000 VND a pop and that’s a happy stomach. (The exchange rate, while we were there, was around 21,000-22,000 VND to the US dollar, so we’re looking at…$20-25 for a fresh seafood dinner for two.) With a thoroughly happy stomach, it was time to call it a night, even though it was barely 8:00.
Saturday brought with it another day trip with a small group. This was similar to the Saigon trip with Bao in terms of time and what we did, though I think Bao was a better guide than the girl here. She seemed disinterested half the time, though was never rude or mean, per se. Anyway, at $11/person, it wasn’t a bad way to spend the day.
Since the one part of this tour I was looking forward to most was a waterfall, I was grateful that it was overcast almost the entire day. For parts of it, rain was pretty heavy. (It even made me mildly – albeit very mildly concerned about the flight out on Monday as it was the first of two for the day.)
First up, though, was a pearl farm where I found it interesting to see them pulling pearls out of oysters. That thrill lasted for about a minute or two. However, we were scheduled to be here for close to an hour. (They were hoping that people would buy pearl jewelry.) Given that we were in a fairly heavy rain, I was surprised that there were so many people here. It made me think the entire day would be like this with overcrowded spots. (Forunately, that didn’t come to pass.)
With no interest in buying jewelry, I spent the hour on the back patio looking out at the very rough and stormy sea, and a few of these shots are from there. Finally ready to go, we were waiting on two Vietnamese women from the group (a recurring theme for the day) before we headed off to the next stop: a pepper farm.
To call it a pepper farm would be to stretch one’s imagination to its utmost. It was about 5 rows of pepper trees with each row being no more than 10 meters long. (I’d like to hope this is just the “sample” section they show us dopey tourists.) Much more attractive was the attached shop where they hoped you’d buy pepper. This time around, I pulled out my wallet. There’s one of us born every minute, you know. I bought four separate jars of pepper, one of which wasn’t a powder (and was subsequently confiscated in Guangzhou as I rarely check luggage and this trip was no exception). At about a dollar a jar, it wasn’t a bad deal.
From the pepper farm we were off to the wine shop. This tour was beginning to feel like just going from one spot to another to buy local goods. This wasn’t grape wine, but was a berry wine and was, for the most part very sweet. Don’t think port or sherry, though. It wasn’t quite that sweet, but it was close. Certainly not bad, but also something I could’ve done without. However, they seemed proud of their wine, and I don’t blame them. (It’s better than most of what I had in Korea.) Once again being held up by the Vietnamese ladies, we finally all settled back into the van and went off to Suoi Tranh.
The waterfall was actually much nicer than I expected. Apparently, half the year, it’s dry, so it worked out well that we came at the end of the rainy season. The fall is a classic cascade in a very nice, wooded setting. (Even if it were sunny, it probably would’ve photographed rather well because it had enough cover to give it shade.) We were given 45 minutes to walk the 600 meters up to the falls and back, which meant a bit of a rush for me, but…fortunately, the Vietnamese ladies were even slower than I was.
The creek leading up to the falls had some nice rapids, too, but it also had some unfortunate eyesores: a manmade fall at the entrance (why would you need that when you have the real thing a few minutes away?) and, worse, some fake animal statuary. Count my lucky stars, but these all disappeared after the first 100-200 meters, and you were left with a tasteful and well-made natural path leading up to the falls.
After this – it was around 12:00 or 12:30 by this point – we hopped in the van and headed to Sao Beach at the southern tip of the island. To get here required driving down a very bumpy road for a few minutes at the end. (As I said…they can still do a little infrastructure work here unless one of the unstated tourist goals is to make people feel like they’re bouncing around in a bag of popcorn.)
The beach was…pleasant, I guess I can say. It wasn’t a large beach. In length, it covered a small cove, so it had a nice setting. It also isn’t a wide beach; only about 30 meters from the restaurant to the water, and maybe even less than 20 meters. I saw a little too much trash around which disheartened me, though we aren’t talking dirty to levels that I’m accustomed to seeing in China. I didn’t go swimming, and the lunch at the restaurant here – though Vietnamese – was among the most unimpressive meals we had in the entire two weeks here. The best part of the time at the beach is that the weather cleared up from overcast and rainy to mostly cloudy. So it wasn’t crowded here, nor was it raining.
We left the beach at 2:00 and drove to a nearby fish sauce factory. This was a lot like the pearl farm, pepper farm, and wine shop. “We make this here. Please buy it.” Of the four of these places, the pearl farm is the only one who actually had some kind of “demonstration,” and that lasted about a minute.
If it seems I’m being critical of the roped in commercialism of these types of tours, perhaps I am a little jaded. The spots in and of themselves are actually quite interesting and I just accept this as an unnecessary evil. They need to survive somehow, and for that, I guess I’m grateful that they do this. Back to the actual tour, the fish sauce factory was quick and interesting. (Though I don’t like seafood that much, I do like fish sauce to add flavor.)
The last “scheduled” stop was Nha Tu Phu Quoc – Coconut Tree Prison – right across the street. This isn’t a place that I would otherwise go out of my way to visit, though in conjunction with the beach and the fish sauce factory, it was perfect. (Individually, none of the three spots amazed me, but as a whole, they were quite pleasing.)
The prison was built by the French in the 1940s and this was one of the ARVN’s POW camps during the Vietnam War. Apparently, prisoner treatment here was quite inhumane, as detailed by the signs around the barracks. The recreations of people, though, aren’t the most lifelike I’ve ever seen and seem kind of cheap. There aren’t any period photographs, so there’s a little “oomph” missing here, but it’s still a good effort all around.
Our last stop before being dropped off back in Duong Dong was at Ham Ninh, a small fishing village on the east coast of the island (almost directly across the island from Duong Dong. We didn’t do anything here except have 15-20 minutes to walk to the end of the pier and come back. As uneventful as that may sound, I enjoyed it a lot because the surrounding scenery and seeing the fishing fleet up close (along with a lot of small floating restaurants) made it unique and worthwhile to me.
When we got dropped off, we went right back to Buddy’s and repeated the same thing from Friday night (minus eating at the Crab House). I can’t recall what we ate for dinner on Saturday night and perhaps we didn’t. Lunch at Buddy’s was late enough that I doubt we were terribly hungry by evening except for some snacks.
The only difference between Friday & Saturday was my positioning to photograph the sunset. Friday night was from up near the lighthouse, and Saturday was a little ways out on the jetty. Skies were equally moody both nights.
I’m easy like Sunday morning. No rush to wake up since there was absolutely nothing whatsoever on the agenda. Brunch, around 9:00 or 10:00, after stopping by the post office to send off some postcards, was at Buddy’s. From there, we crossed the river to the day market and spent about an hour or so wandering up and down the street photographing a variety of things.
Going back to the west side of the river, we spent a little while at Dinh Cau, but decided not to watch the sunset there for the third night in a row. We had a late (and small) lunch of a wood-fired pizza, which was surprisingly delicious – so much so that I considered going back for dinner.
Instead, we went to one of the few access points for Long Beach (the beach nearest the hotel) to watch the least spectacular of the three sunsets in my opinion. Sunday night’s was cloudier than Friday and Saturday’s. However, there are still some interesting pictures. It’s just the most muted of the three, by far, and there’s simply less to work with.
After sundown, we walked the few hundred meters north up the main road, passing the Sea Breeze, and stopped at a local restaurant. (I suggested it not because it was local, but because they proudly talked of the ice cream that they have.) The food was not terribly great. I had fish and chips that didn’t have enough tartar and was a bit bland. I also ordered some smoked cheese that, when they brought it, they didn’t say what it was and, since it looked more like noodles than cheese, didn’t eat it. The ice cream, however, was sorbet, and it was wonderful.
All in all, Phu Quoc was about as good as I wished it would be, and I was lucky enough to have three reasonably good sunsets and decent weather for the weekend. Also, the waterfall was actually nicer than I had expected, we ate well (for the most part), and it was a relaxing weekend. Not a bad way to spend life.
After breakfast Monday morning, we grabbed our bags and headed to the airport at 9:00 for the first of two flights on the day.
As always, thanks for dropping by and viewing these pictures. Please feel free to leave any questions or comments and I’ll answer as I have time.
Actually, I want to attempt to sew a dress for summer. Never been good at sewing though. In fact, 9 times out of 10 the thread knots up and I need someone to bail me out by putting the thread right again... so might be a "bit" of a challenge!
I'm starting small though... tonight I made a sunglass case. Nice and rectangular :)
...actually I forgot to add my Lumix DMC-TZ70 camera, so there is one camera missing and I had to use my Nikon D90 for the shot ;)
From left;
Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 12-50mm f/3,5-6,3 EZ
Sigma 60mm f/2,8 DN
Sigma 30mm f/2,8 EX DN
Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 45mm f/1,8
Lumix G Vario 14-140mm f/3,5-5,6
Lumix G Vario 7-14mm f/4
Olympus OM-D E-M5 body
Lumix DMC-G5 body
Lumix DMC-GM1 with Lumix G Vario 12-32mm f/3,5-5,6 and grip
Lumix DMC-GH3 body
Lumix DMC-GM5 with Lumix G Vario 12-32mm f/3,5-5,6 and grip
Lumix DMC-GX7 body
Lumix G Vario 45-200mm f/4-5,6
Lumix G X Vario 35-100mm f/2,8
Lumix G X Vario 12-35mm f/2,8
Lumix G Vario 100-300mm f/4-5,6
Lumix G 20mm f/1,7 II
Lumix G 14mm f/2,5
Lumix G Fisheye 8mm f/3,5 (missing in the photo)
Lumix G Macro 30mm f/2,8 (missing in the photo)
Lumix G 42,5mm f1,7 (missing in the photo)
Actually.. to be honest, I have almost cheated to day as I went out shooting as we say in Denmark ”Før fanden fik sko på” - Which directly translated to english mean -> VERY early.
I really didn't mean to look out the window going to bed very late in the morning, but I did and looked at a beautiful sky... I suddenly realized my camera was fully loaded and was staring at me with those begging lenses and then my triggerfinger started to itch. So I got an early start to day.
When finally later to day, I DID get out again, I ventured in another direction than usual and a short way from home I took a picture of a plant outside a house. A woman came out of the house, smiled and asked in a friendly way if I liked taking photos of plants. Very much I answered and then she insisted on showing me her MARVELOUS garden. It was (to say the least) and it actually turned out (MUCH to my surprise) that she was not only a professional photographer teaching photography but also was writing a book about ecological gardening.
She gave me a red and yellow flower (which name silly me of course have forgotten). But I can assure you it was so bright in colour I would NEVER have dared even put it into my mouth. Taste it, she said, and I did. It tasted.. just splendid, as nature's candy. I was astonished.
Try rubbing these to leafs between your fingers and smell. I did.. and I couldn't get my fingers away from my nose for the next ½ minute. I stayed for coffee and homemade elderberry juice, we talked about photography and I was allowed to shoot all I wanted in her lively garden :o) I did (of course it is me) tell her the quite honest truth and said she could find my pictures by googling ”Ninja Transvestite”
I have friends that are transvestites she said and quite a lot of gay friends as well. - I guess even I am allowed a little luck sometimes it would seem :o) – So all the beautiful flower-shots are taking in her garden.. or in this case rather ”tribute to nature”, is a more precise definition of the piece of land behind her house :o)
So I got lucky twice, first by a sunset and then by a lady with a kind heart and a garden well cared for.
Almost cheating.. not really, but almost ;o)
Well, this was a nice accident, actually. My so-called “smart-phone” was not very smart, and occasionally led me astray. On my way to Cardiff from St. David’s in Wales, I ended up South of Swansea (the birthplace of Dylan Thomas) in a hamlet known as “The Mumbles”. Overlooking the village is this, Oystermouth Castle. By the time I got there, the interior was not open. So, I simply took these shots (#752 thru #757). Following is the history of this castle, from Wikipedia. Amazing.
(From Wikipedia, edited):
Oystermouth Castle is a Norman stone castle in Wales, overlooking Swansea Bay on the east side of the Gower Peninsula near the village of The Mumbles.
The first castle was founded by William de Londres of Ogmore Castle soon after 1106 following the capture of Gower by the Normans. In 1116 the Welsh of Deheubarth retook the Gower Peninsula and forced William to flee his castle which was put to the torch. The castle was rebuilt soon afterwards, but was probably destroyed again in 1137 when Gower was once more retaken by the princes of Deheubarth. The Londres or London family finally died out in 1215 when Gower was again taken by the Welsh under the leadership of Llywelyn the Great. In 1220 the Welsh were expelled from the peninsula and the government of Henry III of England returned the barony of Gower to John de Braose who rebuilt both Swansea Castle and Oystermouth.
In the 13th century the Braose family were Lords of Gower and held the castle as part of their extensive land holdings and titles, including other castles on Gower and in the Welsh Marches. The de Braose dynasty could afford to rebuild Oystermouth castle in stone. A high curtain wall was built, internal buildings added, a chapel, basements, three-story residential buildings with fireplaces and garderobes on each floor. The castle had every residential feature necessary for living in some comfort and was also refortified cleverly. Towards the end of the century Oystermouth rather than Swansea Castle became their principal residence. Edward I paid a brief visit here in December 1284.
By 1331 the Lords of Gower were living elsewhere and the castle declined in importance in the 14th century.
The daughter of the last de Breos Lord, Aline de Breos, who improved the chapel making it one of the finest in any castle in south Wales, later married John de Mowbray, and the Lordship of Gower including the castle at Oystermouth passed to the de Mowbrays through this marriage, and then to the Herbert family, and finally the Somersets, who became successive Marquis of Worcester and finally Dukes of Beaufort.
After the Middle Ages, the castle gradually fell into ruin. A survey of Gower made in 1650 describes Oystermouth Castle as [a]n old decayed castle of no use, but of a very pleasant situation. It was portrayed in art in the 18th century as a picturesque ruin, and was restored by George Grant Francis in the 1840s while the castle was owned by the then Duke of Beaufort.
In 1927 the Duke of Beaufort gave the castle to Swansea Corporation; today, the castle is maintained under the responsibility of the City and County of Swansea council.
In 2009 the National Assembly for Wales announced it was investing £19 million in the country's heritage sites in an attempt to boost tourism. As part of the programme Oystermouth Castle closed in 2010 while it underwent a £1 m refurbishment; it reopened to the public in July the following year.
-Iona, which actually is a small archipelago of three islands located near Doodletown, a former hamlet in Stony Point that was purchased in the 1960s by the Palisades Interstate Parks Commission to become part of Bear Mountain State Park -a closed-to-the-public preserve.
That history begins at least 3,500 years ago, when Native Americans spent the summers fishing from the island’s shores. (“There were seven-pound oysters back then” ) Native rock shelters still dot what came to be called Rock Island, which joined Salisbury and Round islands, tidal marshes, and mud flats to make up the bedrock spit of land.
In 1683, members of the Van Cortlandt family purchased the land from the natives. Dutch ancestors lived there for nearly 200 years, during which time Salisbury Island was also known as Weygant’s Island (for a local family named Weygant or Weiant). In 1849, a man named John Beveridge bought property for his great-son-in-law, Dr. E.W. Grant. “When he got the land, he told people, ‘I own a island,’ ” : “That’s how it got the name.”
Actually, this is what I'm calling bumper art: abstracts on vehicle bumpers created by deterioration of sorts. Camarillo, California
Secretary of State John Kerry And Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio de Aguiar Patriota - After Their Meeting
FOREIGN MINISTER PATRIOTA: (Via interpreter) I was mentioning that he has a good knowledge of Portuguese in function of Mrs. Teresa Kerry. She’s also Portuguese.
But I would like to say that we had a meeting, a working meeting, this morning in this, which is the first visit of Secretary of State John Kerry to Brazil, to South America actually. He had a stopover at Bogota, which we consider to be very positive. It is our second meeting. I have kept a meeting with the Secretary of State in D.C. the past 20th of May. And moreover, the – aside from the meeting we had, we will receive him now for lunch in a short while, in which we will have also representatives from the legislative, the presidents of the foreign relation committees, as Senator Kerry has been, himself part of, also journalists, representatives from the civil society, and as all of you know, Secretary of State will be received by President Rousseff later this afternoon at the Planalto Palace.
Secretary of State John Kerry requires no presentation. He’s a known character to Brazil, a former candidate to the U.S. presidency, a senator of – from 1985-2013, president of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate between 2009-2013. And when he came to be the Secretary of State in the second term of President Obama, he is bringing with himself a commitment but several causes, which are extremely valued throughout Brazil: a commitment to sustainable development, all the agenda related to climate change, also a decisive support to the retaking of peace efforts in the Middle East, and we would like to congratulate the Secretary of State for his own efforts, which shall take us to a process within nine months’ time to be producing results.
In the last meeting this morning, we examined items in the bilateral agenda, which present, as all of you know, a robust trade and investment agenda. The U.S. are still the country with the largest stocks of investment in Brazil, the second largest partner of Brazil now with a growing deficit on the Brazilian side. We’ve also talked about that for over 30 bilateral mechanisms involving areas which go from energy to racial equality, gender equality, contact with the private sector, the universities, the civil society. Today, the United States is the largest destination of Brazilians within the Science Without Borders program. It’s 5,800 students. That is increasing every day.
Anyways, the potential of the relationship is even greater, especially now in a moment in many observers are referring to the relationship between Brazil and the U.S. as a relationship which is growing more and more. It’s getting more mature. But this maturity includes encompassing more relevant themes, especially in a moment we are about to redefine our contacts with a strategic partnership. President Obama in his letter to invite President Rousseff to visit, which will take place in October this year, referring to a strategic partnership with Brazil, President Rousseff responded with the same terminology.
At the same time, I should not forget to mention that we’re now facing a new type of challenge in our bilateral relationship. It is a challenge which has to do with wiretapping, telephone calls. And in case these challenges are not solved in a satisfactory way, we run the risk of casting a shadow of distrust on our work. We have established technical communication means, political channels are open as well. We have clarified everything that was requested. But these are not an end in themselves, so this doesn’t meet – accept the status quo. We need to discontinue practices which are an attempt to sovereignty in the relationship between the states and which can violate the individual freedoms that both of our countries are very much fond of.
Let me make it very clear that there is a broad space for us to advance. We have recently received the Secretary of Agriculture. We will receive the Secretary of Energy in a few days’ time. The mechanism with economic and commercial cooperation TECA is going to be meeting in September at the level of vice ministers. In September as well, we will have the third conference for innovation, Brazil and U.S, the working group for the scientific and technological committee. On the same theme and at the same time, we should not minimize the relevance acquired so far regarding espionage.
Within a few moments, we’ll keep on talking to Secretary Kerry in an environment which I believe is a symbol to our commitment with democracy, freedom, a good government, freedom of the press, opening with the civil society. And so this will be an occasion for us to hear a bit more of the last developments in this retaking of the peacemaking process between Israelis and Palestinians. Also, we had an opportunity to talk about Syria and other situations on my part.
As well, I shall be ready with a dispositioned and even interested of making an updated snapshot of a region, which as I have mentioned to Secretary Kerry today, I think we’re distinguished for being a space of democracy, economic growth, social justice with enough conditions which are unprecedented worldwide.
Thank you very much. Mr. Kerry.
SECRETARY KERRY: Well, bom dia. I’m happy to be here with everybody. Thank you very much. Thank you, Foreign Minister Patriota for hosting me here today. I’m very happy to be back in Brazil. I have great memories of my first trip here in 1992 to the Earth Summit in Rio, and I’m happy to be back here now and very grateful for the opportunity to continue the good dialogue that Antonio and I have had since the day we first talked on the telephone when I was appointed to this job.
Even when I came to Brazil back in 1992 for the Earth Summit, I could sense this incredible energy in Brazil, and I could feel firsthand the amazing commitment of Brazil to try to grab the future and particularly back then to address the issue, which was then even urgent, of climate change. I’m pleased to see that over the years Brazil’s commitment to environmental stewardship has continued right up until this day, and there have been very important efforts on the reduction of deforestation problems, alternative renewable energy problems, biofuels, other kinds of initiatives, but also very important, last year’s hosting of Rio+20.
And for those of us who have been involved in the challenge of climate change for all of that time, I think it was a bittersweet moment to measure 20 years, when the hopes of 20 years before we had to acknowledge had not yet been realized. So the challenge is ahead of us, for all of us, and I know that the United States has a great commitment under President Obama to take our own initiatives, not even to wait for congressional action, but to move administratively in order to do our part. I know we can continue to work with Brazil on this issue of climate, and we look forward to doing so.
Our mission is very, very clear. We need to inspire meaningful reform and action within the Major Economies Forum. We need to lead the effort to phase down hydrofluorocarbons in the Montreal Protocol. And together, Brazil and the United States need to join with other countries in an effort to negotiate a climate agreement in 2015 that is ambitious and flexible and that works for all of us.
Now, obviously we have also had some moments of disagreement, and I’m sure I’ll have an occasion in the questions to be able to address some of that with you. But the United States and Brazil – I want to emphasize, rather than focus on an area of disagreement – the United States and Brazil share a remarkable and dynamic partnership. Every single day we work together to advance economic opportunity, human rights, environment protection, regional peace and security, democracy, as well as major global challenges in the Middle East and elsewhere – Syria for instance and the question of the humanitarian challenge in Syria.
The United States respects and appreciates that Brazil is one of the world’s largest free market democracies, and our partnership is only made stronger as all of the world continues to grow. The United States recognizes and welcomes and greatly appreciates the vital leadership role, the increasing leadership role, that Brazil plays on the international stage – excuse me – and that ranges from its participation in global peace initiatives to its stability operations and promotion of human rights and its efforts to try to help either promote the peace or keep the peace in certain parts of the world.
Through the Global Peace Operations Initiative, we are working with Brazil and the United Nations to build the capacity of countries to be able to contribute themselves to peacekeeping operations. Brazil has provided more than 1,400 uniformed personnel to the stabilization mission in Haiti. We’re very grateful for that. And we’re also exploring opportunities for closer collaboration on peacekeeping in Africa.
It’s fair to say that protecting universal rights is at the very heart of the shared values between Brazil and the United States. And together, we remain committed to advancing those rights and to advancing the cause of equality for all people.
The United States also supports a very vibrant and active Organization of American States, and the OAS Charter reminds us of our responsibilities to offer our citizens liberty and to create the conditions in which all people can reach their aspirations, can live their aspirations. We believe that it is important that Brazil engage fully with the OAS and use its strong voice for a hemispheric vision of democracy and fundamental freedoms.
Now, our relationship is not only rooted in shared values, it is literally strengthened every single day by our citizens. Each year thousands of people travel between the United States and Brazil, forging new ties between our countries. Student exchanges under President Rousseff’s Scientific Mobility Program, which I had the privilege of visiting this morning and sensing firsthand the amazing energy and excitement and commitment of these young people, that’s something we share in common. And together with President Rousseff’s program and President Obama’s 100,000 Strong in the Americas Initiative, we are encouraging together approaches to address the shared concerns of our young people to include social inclusion and to work towards things like environmental sustainability.
Our exchange programs also ensure that today’s generation is going to be ready to respond to the enormous challenges of tomorrow and of the future. The vibrant and the growing connection between the United States and Brazil, between our governments and our citizens, is absolutely one of the defining partnerships of the 21st century. I said to Antonio, and I believe this and I know President Obama believes this and he communicated this when he came here recently, the future belongs to young people. Our job is to lay the groundwork for them, is to provide the opportunity for them to make the most of education and of the technologies and jobs that will define the future.
So I look forward, as President Obama does, not only to growing this partnership but to finding ways to work on our common values, our common interests, and our common hopes for our peoples. And we very much look forward to welcoming President Rousseff to Washington, D.C., for her meeting and a state visit with President Obama and our country in October. And with that, I’d be happy to answer any questions.
MODERATOR: (Inaudible.)
QUESTION: (Via interpreter) Secretary Kerry, we wanted – if you could, we wanted you to speak briefly about this issue of espionage and if by any chance Brazil – the United States will stop spying on the rest, and what guarantees the U.S. Government can give if the answer is no that you’re not going to stop spying, please what will you do? Do you think you can have deteriorated or hampered this relationship with Brazil?
SECRETARY KERRY: Well, obviously, first of all, I did not think it would be a surprise if I got a question on that subject, so I wanted to have a chance to be able to share some thoughts with you, and now I’m happy to address that and other things.
But very, very important, I ask the people of Brazil – and I will answer the question very directly. But I ask the people of Brazil to stay focused on the important realities of our relationship, the bilateral relations between our countries which continue to grow stronger and stronger. We share democratic values and we share a commitment to diversity and we share a determination to improve opportunities for our people. And the U.S.-Brazil relationship has the opportunity to provide extraordinary positive global impact if we continue to work together on these kinds of issues, on the environment and science and technology and sustainable energy, nonproliferation, on access to education, on disaster management, and our strong trade ties, our strong investment ties, our energy cooperation, our sustainable development cooperation. All of these things need to remain in the forefront of people’s minds as you consider this question of the national security revelations that have upset some people and created questions in others.
Let me be crystal clear: I can’t discuss with you operational issues, but I can tell you very definitively the Congress of the United States passed on a law after 9/11 when we were attacked by al-Qaida, and we began a process of trying to understand before they attacked us what these kinds of plots might be. The executive department of our government, after a law was passed by Congress which met our legal standards and passed the muster of law, then implemented the program with the supervision of our judiciary. So all three branches of the American Government have been involved in reviewing this particular program.
Now, we have engaged with the Brazilian Government very, very directly, and I want to express my appreciation to the Foreign Minister and to Brazilian officials who have visited with us in Washington, and we are here now and we will continue to have this dialogue. And we will have this dialogue with a view to making certain that your government is in complete understanding and complete agreement with what it is that we think we must do to provide security not just for Americans but for Brazilians and for people in the world.
Over the last years, regrettably, a number of countries – a number of groups – not countries – a number of groups in the world have individually targeted not just American interests but free interests in the world. There have been bombings in many places in the world. Innocent people have lost their lives. And what the United States has been trying to do is prevent these things from happening beforehand by knowing what others might be plotting.
So I would respectfully say to everybody that the United States, as the President said last Friday, the United States gathers foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations in order to protect their citizens, in order to protect our citizens. And our activities are firmly based on law and they are subject to oversight by all of the branches of our government. We are convinced that our intelligence collection has positively helped us to protect our nation from a variety of threats, not only protect our nation but protect other people in the world, including Brazilians.
And so we have engaged now with the Brazilian Government, we will stay very closely engaged with the Brazilian Government, and I can promise you that President Obama is determined that the United States will live up to the highest standards both of cooperation, of transparency, and accountability, in keeping with our ability to be able to protect ourselves and to protect others in the world.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, Mr. Foreign Secretary, you have said that all the South American ministers are united in condemning the alleged spying, and Brazil was asked for a formal explanation from the United States on this. What explanation have you received today? And also, you mentioned that if this situation is not resolved in a satisfactory manner that it risks perhaps more distrust in the relationship. So what are you looking for the United States to do?
FOREIGN MINISTER PATRIOTA: (Via interpreter) Well, in a summarized way I believe that you do know of the fact that ever since the first moment when these news came to be, we did get in touch with the U.S. Government by means of Ambassador Thomas Shannon here in Brasilia, and also the Embassy in D.C., and we opened dialogue channels, communication channels, both technical and political, And at the same time, there have been individual protests in Brazil and other countries in the region, as you all said, and on July 12th, a meeting by MERCOSUR adopted a decision which did instruct the countries – Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia, who had subscribed – to start with the UN Secretary General taking this to the Security Council at the UN.
These demonstrations took place. They do reflect a considerable concern, and I think it’s legitimate, by the region and the international community in general, what practices which may be an attempt to the sovereignty of the very countries and to the rights of individuals. There have been demonstrations regarding the violation of human rights, especially from the High Commissioner of the UN for Human Rights, Navi Pillay.
And as a matter of fact, this clarification process, as I have mentioned, it’s not an end in itself. What we do consider is that the United States will never find a better partner in the fight against international terrorism and several other threats to homeland security as they are taking forth in a transparent way. International partnerships, when they’re done fully transparently, they do strengthen the trust. And when there is a lack of knowledge or lack of information on the country they may weaken this trust, so what we want to avoid from happening.
SECRETARY KERRY: Can I just add, if I may, to that? We’re not surprised and we’re not upset that Brazil would ask questions. Absolutely understandable. And Brazil is owed answers with respect to those questions, and they will get them. And we will work together very positively to make certain that this question, these issues, do not get in the way of all the other things that we talked about. And we will guarantee that Brazil and other countries will understand exactly what we’re doing, why and how, and we will work together to make sure that whatever is done in a way that respects our friends and our partners, and that is what we’re going to achieve.
QUESTION: (Via interpreter) Flavia (inaudible) Sao Paulo. Let me change the subject here a little. I would like to know if the topic regarding the issue on some visas in – to Brazilians, did you two talk about it? And is there a deadline for the waiver of the visa, or exception from a visa? And if the visit – President Rousseff to D.C. in October can be decided on her trip coming October?
FOREIGN MINISTER PATRIOTA: (Via interpreter) Well, briefly I mentioned that there are several initiatives and also meetings that are programmed for the next few months, which are included within those prospective preparation of the state visit to the U.S.
In one of the works that we’re going to be developing will be exactly this issue of exempting the visas to Brazilians. As you all know, there is a proposal which is known as the Global Entry – in English – which is being discussed between the two sides, and I understand that the last counterproposal of Brazil of a language to accommodate a few of the issues we have over here is under exam right now. And a declaration can be agreed upon in September, coming September, in which we’ll then have a text during her visit. So we do consider that. In this term, progress has been encouraging, satisfactory, and we will have some results soon to come.
Now related to the elimination or the exemption of the visa itself is a more complex issue, which we’ll need more time for discussion.
SECRETARY KERRY: Let me just say that we are – is that on? Yes. We’re committed to as vast a visa application processing process as possible. And we’re very proud that we have streamlined our operations over the course of the last year. We very much want to see more Brazilians coming to the United States for business, for tourism, for study, visiting friends, relatives, and so forth. So it’s very much in our interest to facilitate this.
Last year, we processed about one million visa requests all across Brazil, and we have managed to make the appointment times – the wait for those visas is down to either five days or under – less than five days. We have spent millions of dollars to upgrade our facilities in order to try to make this happen more effectively, and we’re going to be opening new consulates in Belo Horizonte and Porto Alegre. So we’re moving as much as we can to facilitate this.
And finally, we want to continue to consult very closely with Brazil in order to make sure we have legal statutory requirements that have to be met to allow for a reciprocal free visa travel under the visitors program. And we hope to get there. I’m confident we can, but we just need to continue to work together. But I promise you, we welcome as many people to come and visit and be able to move freely back and forth as is possible, and I’m confident we’ll get to the day when we have an open visa program.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, we understand that earlier today you spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu, including presumably about the settlements, which by some counts have reached 3,100 new or advancing units appeared in recent days. What can you tell us about that conversation and your message to the Prime Minister? Have you had a similar conversation with President Abbas? Are the Palestinians still on board for the peace talks? And finally, what would you say to those who say that the Israelis are doing this – they’re playing along with their initiative – but that they’re really too divided to make the hard decisions for peace? Thank you.
SECRETARY KERRY: No. Well, I – thank you. It’s a very appropriate question. It’s timely, obviously. Yes, I did speak with Prime Minister Netanyahu this morning, and I, first of all, conveyed to him my hopes for his speedy recovery. As you know, he’s just had surgery, and he’s dealing with these issues in the middle of that, and I can tell you that’s obviously not easy.
We had a very frank and open, direct discussion about the question of settlements. Let me make it clear: The policy of the United States of America with respect to all settlements is that they are illegitimate, and we oppose settlements taking place at any time, not just the time of the peace process.
But – here’s the but – that said, Prime Minister Netanyahu was completely upfront with me and with President Abbas that he would be announcing some additional building that would take place in places that will not affect the peace map, that will not have any impact on the capacity to have a peace agreement. That means that it is building within the so-called blocs in areas that many people make a presumption – obviously not some Palestinians or others – will be part of Israel in the future. He has specifically agreed not to disturb what might be the potential for peace going forward.
Now, we still believe it would be better not to be doing it, but there are realities within life in Israel that also have to be taken into account here going forward. President Abbas understood that coming into these talks. That’s why these talks are pressed into this time period of nine months. That’s why we all understand there is urgency, as I said yesterday, to getting to the discussion of borders and security. If you resolve the borders of Israel – and you can only do that also resolving the security issues for Israel – you have resolved any questions about settlements, because then you know what is in Israel and what is not. And so the sooner we get to that discussion the better.
I will be talking to President Abbas today. We have a call scheduled for later. And he is committed to continue to come to this negotiation, because he believes the negotiation is what will ultimately resolve this issue, not a temporary decision or restraint. So we will continue to work this very, very closely with Israelis and we will continue to work it very closely with Palestinians. And our hope is that we get to the real issues on which we ought to be focusing, which are the final status settlement – the final status issues. And I’m very hopeful we will get there very, very soon.
FOREIGN MINISTER PATRIOTA: (Via interpreter) Just briefly, at the same time that we support the efforts of Secretary Kerry and we are bringing up to the table the Israeli and Palestinian negotiation, we do – we do – we are against the Palestinian settlements, which are done against the UN Security Council resolutions, and they do represent a violation of the international law. We do consider that this kind of fact will not contribute for creating a propitious environment for the understandings of the whole international community, and Brazil specifically would love to see coming at the end of this nine month period time upon which negotiators will be working.
Let me also mention that I have encouraged Secretary Kerry to give more relief to the participation of the civil society in Israel and the Palestine along this peacemaking process. I was well impressed when I visited the region last year in October and when I saw that in the – among the civil society on both ends there are voices that are quite committed to peace and they do convey messages which are a bit different from the ones we’re used to seeing. These messages are in repudiation of violence and consumed facts and the establishment of settlements, which are not favorable for the understanding for peace.
SECRETARY KERRY: That’s it. Okay.
FOREIGN MINISTER PATRIOTA: (Via interpreter) Thank you.
# # #
August 13, 2013
Itamaraty Palace
Brasilia, Brazil
i actually took some different shots today too... and i actually made it outside today...all the way to the east bay even. wow.
but figured i might as well finish up flower week properly with this. little dude made it in for the last day of school. these poppies are in some very cool planter boxes made by a parent.. out in the yard. a little bit of green for the kiddos .. which is fab. most of the yard is concrete and chain link fence.. with colorful murals here and there. pretty common for most of the public sf schools. a bit run down to say the least.
Actually, part of the card. This paper-craft Cadillac CTS is on the back of the card. The front I’ll post later. I did about five drawings working it out. Then finished it in Photoshop. The final card was done in Adobe Illustrator. Happy Holidays, y’all. Pencil drawing & color pencils.
...SONUVA BITCH! (disclaimer; that's actually the only Nazareth song I know). This is "General" Jeremy Mastiff, an old OC of mine and resident SAS badass in my Bloodfall stories. Haven't seen him in a bit but that'll change down the road, don't worry. He's actually inspired/based off of Captain John Price from the COD: Modern Warfare series. I even straight-up used a screenshot of Price to draw this pic. Say what you want about COD, the first Modern Warfare was awesome.
Actually, it is striking the giant ogre that one has to do to win anything. Just slam the hammer down and hope the metal piece goes all the way up, where you will hear a "ding!"
Well, guess what? That's what happened here. The ding took place just as I took the photo. Unfortunately, you can't see the little metal piece hit the bell up top because of the shadow, but it happened. This is also where shooting video would have helped a little.
I have photographed and shot plenty of video of this damn thing plenty of times in the past. This is, however, the first time I did so using my Canon EOS. I didn't use my polarizing filter, but the sky still looks pretty good.
Actually it's the Bavarian Inn.
Nikon F5 - AF Nikkor 35mm 1:2D - Efke KB 100 @ ASA-100
Blazinal (1+50) 10:00 @ 20C
Scanner: Epson V700
Editor: Adobe Photoshop CC (2018)
Actually took more than 2 days to get it to this state: there was more than 12 years of accumulated stuff.
Actually too close, the pilot breaks away as briefed if he becomes uncomfortable - good photo opportunity though.