Photos and stories from Lebanon

A friend of mine, a 19-year old man named Johnny Simon, recently returned from a month-long trip to visit his extended family in northern Lebanon. He gave me permission to publish the following photos, all of them taken along the Qadisha Valley. 48-qadisha-valleyBased on Johnny's stories and photos, this area is a magic and peaceful place populated by a highly religous group of people. As I viewed his entire slide show, I couldn't help but notice the lack of commercialization. Johnny described how many of the people obtain significant amounts of their daily food by going out and picking the fruit fresh from trees. 111-mighty-cedars [The five photos included in this post were taken by Johnny, and he has provided the brief comments for each photo] Top, Inset: A view of Bsharre, birthplace of Khalil Gibran. [top right: The Qadisha Valley, or valley of the saints, served as refuge for Lebanese Christians for hundreds of years. Even today, one cannot look upon the valley and still not be in awe. Here it is seen from a surrounding village. ] Johnny indicated that there are approximately 30,000 churches along the Qadisha Valley, many of them small and carved into the cliffs. Above: The mighty cedars of lebanon have stood for thousands of years. This cedar rests in the forest of God near the Qadisha valley. A bit of background: After a long period of peace, Lebanon suffered a terrible civil war from 1975-1990. My friend is a Maronite Catholic--40% of the country is Christian, while 60% is Muslim. Many of the Christians left Lebanon as a result. Then, after another long period of relative peace, Lebanon was the site of the one month long 2006 Lebanon War between the Israeli military and Hezbollah. Johnny was told by his relatives that during this attack, the Israelis intentionally destroyed large sections of the cedar forests, knowing that the cedar tree is a national symbol of Lebanon.

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Extraordinary ordinary things

I've been having fun taking photos with my Canon SD1100SI, as usual. I carry it almost everywhere. I especially enjoy when an ordinary thing looks extraordinary. While driving yesterday, I noticed a beautiful sunset. I handed my camera to my 11-year old daughter JuJu, who was sitting in the back seat, and asked her whether she would be willing to take a photo of the sunset (see below). The shape of the sun is what intrigues me. Now, really. What's going on? Was the sun starting to take the shape of the Virgin Mary? Image by JuJu Vieth I've noticed many other extraordinary ordinary things lately. That was actually my purpose for carrying around a small camera--the camera reminds me to actually look at the many amazing ordinary things surrounding me (and you). Things like this bumble bee at work in my neighbor's yard. bumblebee Insects are especially fun and easy to photograph. All you need is a "macro" feature on your digital camera, and most cameras have that feature. I do love the macro feature, because it reveals things you simply can't see in person. spiderLooking at insects makes me wonder whether they are complicated robots or simple animals. And what are we, for that matter, given that we are confirmed cousins of these insects? To the right is another recent subject: a spider I noticed on a screen on my back porch. To give you an idea, this critter was merely 1/3 of an inch in width. Here are a few more things I'd like to share. First of all, a backyard snail, a gastropod. It snailis a close cousin of cephalopods (mollusks). That's all for now, except for this dragon kite flying high in this exceptionally blue sky over Forest Park in St. Louis, Missouri. kite

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Orange Fish at Shedd

My daughters and I just returned from a long weekend in Chicago, where we visited the Shedd Aquarium. Flash photography is not allowed, so it's always a challenge to get good existing light photos. For this photo, I couldn't get a sharp image of the moving fish, even with a high ISO setting. Therefore, I tried to pan the camera slowly with the moving fish, guaranteeing a blurred background.The fish is not in perfect focus but the image intrigues me; it's almost like the fish is floating in air. I call this image "floating orange fish" because I forgot to read the sign to actually know what this species is. Click for larger version. Image by Erich Vieth Here's another shot from the Shedd, from a delightful display of jelly fish, and below that a variety of other stunning images from Shedd: Image by Erich Vieth For a gallery of a dozen more photos, click on the title to this post.

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Two Seater Synchronicity

This morning I found that I appeared in the lead paragraphs of a Suburban Journal article about someone else entirely. They even had a photo of us with our tandem behind the object of the subject (bike rack, artist). It was just an accident that we happened to ride to coffee at the time when the Journal photographer was looking to illustrate the art as bike rack. It's almost a pity that this journal is no longer delivered annoyingly and inevitably every Wednesday to form the bulk of our recycled paper. I should find a store that has the tree-based copy to show me mum. Anyway, yesterday I posted a video of my experience this weekend in another kind of un-motorized two seater. That's the synchronicity part.

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Fly

This is another in the series of "backyard bug" photographs several of us are publishing from time to time at DI. I use a consumer grade cameras (Canon's SD1100SI), and I simply try to have fun finding the extraordinary in the ordinary. This fly photo turned out especially nicely (I think it enjoyed the attention), thanks to a perfectly diffuse batch of sun pouring through a modest layer of clouds outdoors. For this shot, the lens was about 1 inch from the fly. Here's two more thoughts. This little animal is on the same phylogenetic tree as human animals. This fly is my cousin. Hello, cousin! It puts this fly in such a different light to remember that. Second, how in the hell can a fly fly? I'm reminded of the conclusion reached in 1934 by French entomologist August Magnan, who calculated [albeit thinking of bees] that their flight was aerodynamically impossible. But they somehow can fly (and eat, poop, compete for mates and--oh my--mate). Utterly fantastic. OK, this is an aside: scientists have found that fruit flies compete by "displacement and incapacitation of a previous male’s sperm." Highly sophisticated stuff. Image by Erich Vieth

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