Travel The World

Some more pictures of the interior/exterior in this traditional village.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/08/russia_in_color_a_century_ago.html These are absolutely amazing photos!  I'd love to post some here but can only provide the link due to copyright issues.  The photographer apparently took them with certain filters that allowed later technology to recreate them as color photos.  The whole process is explained at the site.  Anyway, it's like stepping back in time without the artificiality that black and white photos usually convey. I especially like the one of T'bilisi from above circa 1910.

http://www.economist.com/node/16847798 Great article in "The Economist" about how far Georgia has come since the Rose Revolution.

Some more pictures from that village tour!

Why can't I take strolls like this in the US?

http://en.trend.az/news/politics/foreign/1735965.html Click the link to read an interesting story about the plan to adopt English as the second language for all school age children in Georgia.  I admire the ambition but question whether it can be done in four years?

I put a link in the left margin under the 'Georgian' links for an interesting tour company that has a good website with lots of pictures.  In case anyone wants to check it out, the link is http://intourizm.ge/ I haven't used them but might in the future.

I'm posting this video again!  This was my favorite church (and there were so many) in the Old City of Tbilisi.  I used to sit there for hours just watching the people walk by as I took in atmosphere.  Notice the light shining on the cross at the beginning of the video.

Just a few kilometers north of Bardejov was this traditional Slovak village with architecture from the previous century.  Can you pick ME out?

I really enjoyed this town in Eastern Slovakia and wish I'd had more time to visit again and take in the atmosphere.  These pictures show the downtown square along with the St. Aegidius church.

These pictures show a downtown market in Djibouti and the view of the port from my hotel room.  If you want to read all the stories I wrote about my experiences there, go to the left margin and click the 'Djibouti' link.  I am recycling the pictures but not the stories since they're already on the site. I will say the flies and stench were horrendous in the market area!!!

I've been brushing up on my Latin lately so felt inspired to post this picture.  I think I took it in 2000 during my last trip to Italy.

I had to vacate my Facebook account once again.  I had been having technical difficulties since the spring and just couldn't get it to work properly.  Oh well, it's probably for the best.  In the past, I wasted too much time on that site and didn't get a lot out of it.  Actually, this evening I did something that I hadn't done in a long time.  I reviewed some of my old Latin language textbooks.  Hopefully, this will stave off the mental deterioration that experts are predicting for those who use the Internet too much. Now, I wonder if some of the new friends I met on Facebook will bother to e-mail me when they realize I've left.  Or, were they just 'cyber friends?' Enjoy your week!

I particularly like the picture of the tree intertwined with the carved rock.  Once again, nature dominates any man-made object.

Here are more pics of various sites around the Angkor Wat complex.

Amazing how the ancient stone blends into the present and even serves a purpose.

I know, I know!  I keep jumping around so much that it's hard to know what country I'm talking about next.  Well, we're back at Angkor Wat in Siem Reap, Cambodia.  My favorite picture of the three is the one that shows the woman gingerly climbing down the stairs.  The reason she's doing this, and the reason I had to do this as well, is because the steps are so narrow, they're too small for your feet to fit.  Therefore, you feel like you're constantly on the verge of falling!  Not a good feeling when you're about 100 feet above the ground. By the way, 'Wat' means 'temple' and 'Siem Reap' literally means 'Thailand destroyed.'  Obviously, relations between the two countries haven't always been so good.