Marianne has challenged me to find a photo of something pink this month. I wasn’t keen because I’ve had three sons so I’ve never had to buy pink stuff, and I almost never wear pink myself (give me red or turquoise). However, this afternoon I drove past this line of trees near my house which have recently burst into bloom, looking spectacular in straight masses. They’re minutes from my house, so I stopped and snapped them. When I moved closer to the flowers (go to the subject, don’t zoom in – that’s what I’ve been told) I was tickled to see red stalks and centres. Check out the photo in the header.
Flowering prunus, Canberra, today
Marianne requests we spread news about great blogs we’ve read. One I’ve commented on recently is Wholeyjeans, where Jean has a very interesting look at environmental destruction and adds a poem that I had to read twice; it was meaningful and not beyond me (as much poetry is…).
I also commented on Ici & Là Nature Pictures, a blog about the beauty of France seen by biking and walking. I commented simply because I love France almost as much as I love Australia.
When I was 19 and foolish I went swimming alone in an unpatrolled sea. A rip caught me and dragged me out of my depth, where waves dumped and submerged me three times. There was nothing beneath me but water. The fourth wave dumped me on the shore.
These days there are instructive signs at beach entries. Clearly, large numbers of beachgoers were not washed ashore as I was, were not given a second chance. Now lifesavers are trying to warn and educate poor swimmers:
Instructions for battling a rip current, Jervis Bay, NSW
Since then I’ve respected the power of the sea and have retreated from its depths. But I’ve learned a lot by observing it from the edge.
Late one October afternoon, I was returning from the Louvre when an orchestra began to set up in the square I was passing through. I stopped to see what they would play; as they began Danse hongroise by Brahms I nearly floated with love for Paris. And that was despite my swollen and aching feet; moments before, I had been desperate to return to my apartment to take my shoes off. (The Louvre is immense and I’d walked miles viewing its exhibits.) But I didn’t want to forget these musicians playing me live classical music for the price of a coin donation, so I snapped them and responded eagerly to their proposal that I buy their CD of pieces by Brahms, Dvořák, Bizet and Albeniz.
The CD cover says simply “Classique Metropolitain” without naming the musicians. Pity. I’ve played it frequently since that day and never tire of it. It’s particularly good when I’m translating, when I don’t want to hear the words of songs sung.
Impromptu orchestra, Paris
Ailsa proposed this travel theme of ‘Play’ after seeing some people play football waiting for a traffic jam to clear! Take a look.
Think ‘big’. Now think ‘Egypt’. Perhaps you’re having visions of big protests in the streets, and as I’ve just heard five minutes ago on the evening news: ‘Another day of rage and bloodshed’.
Perhaps you’re thinking of other big Egyptian things: pyramids, massive pharaonic statues, or the sphinx. But here’s something else that’s big in Egypt: the citadel in Cairo, a 12th-century fortification against the Crusaders, and the mosque on its summit built centuries later by Muhammad Ali between 1824 and 1848.
In 1801, Muhammad Ali was appointed by the Ottoman Sultan in Constantinople to be governor in Egypt. But he had bigger plans.
In 1805 he began eliminating the Mamluks, his main competition, a warrior group who for centuries had worked for the Ottoman Empire and the Sultan. In 1811, Muhammad Ali invited the Mamluk leaders to a ceremony in his palace in the citadel, and as they were leaving he had them massacred. In the following days large numbers of Mamluks were killed in the city. Years later, in 1824, he razed the Mamluk buildings in the citadel and in 1830 began building his mosque in the style of the Ottomans in Turkey. The building, with its one main cupola, four smaller and four half-cupolas, resembles the Turkish Blue Mosque. On his death in 1849 Muhammad Ali was buried under it.
Next to it in this photo is one of the Mamluk mosques that remained in the citadel, the Mosque of Mahmud Pasha built in 1567 in the Mamluk architectural tradition, with a pencil-shaped minaret characteristic of Ottoman mosques.
Muhammad Ali Mosque and Mosque of Mahmud Pasha on the Citadel, Cairo
The painting below by David Roberts in 1839 shows the citadel before Muhammad Ali’s mosque was built; it looks quite different from the photo, but the title on the painting tells us it’s the same place:
Image: medinaarts.com
Even the painting evokes something big! We can see the grandeur of the citadel viewed from above a parapet and also a sense of the size of the structures when compared with the Arab groups dotted in the foreground.
But return to the photo and take a moment to look at the street scene. Peace. It will come again.
Please have a look at Ailsa’s blog post because it was her BIG idea!
We went to Gundaroo today, a short drive from Canberra out into the country, where we walked past a little library that always amuses me. It is typical of pioneer architecture in Australian country towns established a hundred or more years ago. Today the sky was a perfect winter blue, a great day to be out in the street photographing in portrait and landscape.
The photo challenge is to take a photo of the same subject vertically and horizontally. I took 99 photos today, less than half of them vertical, more than half … well, horizontal. Here are two.
Gundaroo Literary Institute, NSW, 1888Gundaroo Literary Institute, NSW, 1888
My father was born 93 years ago today, so I knew I had to post some photos from his album. I found these two in his collection of images from Heliopolis, Cairo in 1941/42. They show the racecourse built as part of the plan for the model suburb of Heliopolis, designed by the Belgian industrialist, Baron Empain. The baron had the idea of raising a garden city in the desert, to be a place of luxury and leisure for mostly European visitors and residents. Heliopolis is now a part of greater Cairo. Empain began his development of Heliopolis in 1905 and continued to build it over the next couple of decades. The racecourse was built in 1910.
A colour image of the building shows its deteriorated state in 2011, though it has since become Merryland, an area of shops, cafés and gardens. However, the colour photo also shows how beautiful the detail of the architecture was.
Racecourse, track side, Heliopolis, Cairo, c1941Services Club, formally the Royal Pavilion at the Racecourse, Heliopolis, Cairo, c1941
Check out the beautiful photos of architecture on Ailsa’s blog pages.
I almost posted a photo of a big player on the German side of WWII as a response to the prompt ‘foreshadow’. But I’ve decided not to give him space.
I found the picture amongst my father’s photos, but there were others which, for the opponents of this grim man, undoutedly foreshadowed possible defeat. These two bombers would have had me worried if I were on the losing side (or possibly even if I were on the winning side and standing in the wrong place).
Under this one, the caption reads ‘Flying Fortress’, an American bomber.
Flying Fortress, Middle East, c1942
The second is captioned simply ‘Bomber’. I assume it’s British, judging by the insignia on the wings and fuselage. Without knowing what the colours of the insignia are, I can take a guess that they are, from the centre out, red, white and blue, British colours:
“Wuthering Heights is the name of Mr Heathcliff’s dwelling, ‘Wuthering’ being a significant provincial adjective, descriptive of the atmospheric tumult to which its station is exposed in stormy weather. Pure, bracing ventilation they must have up there, at all times, indeed: one may guess the power of the north wind, blowing over the edge, by the excessive slant of a few, stunted firs at the end of the house; and by a range of gaunt thorns all stretching their limbs one way, as if craving alms of the sun.”
Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
Wuthering is the word that played in my head one day in May as I walked along the cliffs beside the Mediterranean, in winds strong enough to blow me over the edge. I was alone up here for half an hour until defeated by howling gusts. The wilder the wind blew, the more scenes I recalled from Brontë novels where heroines wander in windy places. This isn’t the English moors, but these cliffs gave me nonetheless a Gothic taste of desolation with a hint of fear. At least on the moors there is no jagged edge to tumble over.
Schist cliffs, Mediterranean, between Collioure and Port-Vendres, FranceSchist cliffs between Collioure and Port-Vendres, France
Before you leave, click here to see Ailsa’s photos of places where the wild things are.
Feluccas are traditional motorless boats that have been used for transport on the Nile River since biblical times. From the photo below you’d have to agree that they are graceful whether their masts are tilted into the wind or tilted at rest on the beach. The design is simple, a small wooden boat with a few cushioned seats around the sides, a table in the middle, and sails made from cotton or other natural fibres.
Today feluccas carry tourists and locals on peaceful pleasure boat trips along the Nile. This photo is from my father’s World War two album and was taken in 1941 or 1942. Aren’t the large creamy triangular sails ideal in black and white photography!
Felucca, Egypt, c1941
Ailsa came up with this theme for a photo challenge. Check out an amazing tilted tree and other photos here.
