Low-income women are targets for an alarming rate of violence in Guatemala. The Interior Ministry of Guatemala reports that more than 700 women were murdered in Guatemala last year.
Below the news brief published by the Latin American Herald Tribune:
GUATEMALA CITY – Some 708 women were killed in Guatemala in 2009, based on Interior Ministry figures [...]
Giramonda.com
“spirtually and passionately alive”
Urban Funk Photography in KC
I caught up with a couple friends in Kansas City yesterday. We all ventured out in the frigid winter air to take some photos around downtown KC… Click...
More Samples of My Work…
Antigua Guatemala Blog: Craving Corn: Elote Art in La Antigua Guatemala Pilas: An Antigueño Tradition Escape to Monterrico Mangroves in Monterrico Antigua...
Spotting the Swiss in Guate
I was camped out at La Esquina completely absorbed in working on my new project, www.arteantigua.com, when Yves Maurer’s remarks could no longer...
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More than 700 Guatemalan Women Murdered in 2009
Spotting the Swiss in Guate
I was camped out at La Esquina completely absorbed in working on my new project, www.arteantigua.com, when Yves Maurer’s remarks could no longer be ignored. I’m glad I pulled myself out of the computer/internet swamp to engage the young Swiss traveler as he proved to be most interesting.
Yves was delighting in the wonderful pleasures of [...]
Barcelona Chronicles: The Spanish Circus…
Continued from Enlivened by the Underground…
(Note: My camera became terminally ill at the beginning of my stay in Barcelona. Thus, my photos of the city and my experiences are uncharacteristically sparse.)
Barcelona. Barcelona. Barcelona. She is ruthless. She is fiery. She is an enchantress that has both charmed me and ravaged me. Her perfumes linger on [...]
Floods Devastate SE Asia
It’s a bit crazy to imagine that countries I was discovering two years ago in SE Asia are now swamped from a typhoon. The following excerpt is from the Radio Australia:
The Philippines is bracing for two more typhoons which are expected to hit the flood-ravaged country over the next two days. Emergency teams have been [...]
Urban Funk Photography in KC
I caught up with a couple friends in Kansas City yesterday. We all ventured out in the frigid winter air to take some photos around downtown KC…
Click here to see the entire photo set.
Urban Funk Photography in KC
I caught up with a couple friends in Kansas City yesterday. We all ventured out in the frigid winter air to take some photos around downtown KC…
Click here to see the entire photo set.
Start Slide Show with PicLens Lite
Trendy Tights
Bold and sassy. These tights make a statement! Lost at E Minor can be credited for finding and featuring these little must-haves from Le Queues de Sardines:
The Warrior of Light and His World
The Warrior of Light and His World
by Paulo Coelho
The Warrior of Light is always trying to improve.
Each blow of his sword carries with it centuries of wisdom and meditation. Each blow has to have the force and the skill of all the warriors of the past, who still continue to bless the combat. Each movement of the fight honors the movements that previous generations have tried to transmit through tradition.
The Warrior of Light enhances the beauty of his blows. Although he behaves like a child.
People are shocked, because they forget that children need to enjoy themselves, play, be a little irreverent, ask inconvenient and immature questions, say silly things.
And they ask, horrified: “And this is the spiritual path? He isn’t even mature!”
The warrior feels proud at that comment. He keeps in contact with God through his innocence and joy, and acts in this way because at the beginning of his fight he affirms to himself:
“I have dreams.” Read more »
Paulo Coelho’s The Pencil
Simple yet complex. Impersonal yet speaks directly to the heart. Motivates you to become your best self.
Paulo Coelho is good at that isn’t he. Speaking not to your mind or ego… but directly to your heart!
A short story from Paulo Coelho:
source: “Like the Flowing River” by Paulo Coelho
A boy was watching his grandmother write a letter. At one point he asked:
‘Are you writing a story about what we’ve done? Is it a story about me?’
His grandmother stopped writing her letter and said to her grandson:
I am writing about you, actually, but more important than the words is the pencil I’m using. I hope you will be like this pencil when you grow up.’
Intrigued, the boy looked at the pencil. It didn’t seem very special.
‘But it’s just like any other pencil I’ve ever seen!’
‘That depends on how you look at things. It has five qualities which, if you manage to hang on them, will make you a person who is always at peace with the world.’
‘First quality: you are capable of great things, but you must never forget that there is a hand guiding your steps. We call that hand God, and He always guides us according to His will.’
‘Second quality: now and then, I have to stop writing and use a sharpner. That makes the pencil suffer a little, but afterwards, he’s much sharper. So you, too, must learn to bear certain pains and sorrows, because they will make you a better person.
‘Third quality: the pencil always allows us to use an eraser to rub out any mistakes. This means that correcting something we did is not necessarily a bad thing; it helps to keep us on the road to justice.’
‘Fourth quality: what really matters in a pencil is not its wooden exterior, but the graphite inside. So always pay attention to what is happening inside you.’
‘Finally, the pencil’s fifth quality: it always leaves a mark. in just the same way, you should know that everything you do in life will leave a mark, so try to be conscious of that in your every action’
Click here to leave your thoughts about this prose on Paulo Coelho’s blog.
Obsessed with Projects: Introducing Dual Blogging
Ladies and gents… I’ve started yet another project. It’s an experiment of a new concept that I came up with (at least I think I did) called dual blogging.
Basically, it’s a blog that features two main contributors that blog in a conversation-like, back-and-forth manner: A remark and its retort. Often, a friend, Justin Mayfield, and I would get into long debates on Facebook over certain topics about which he or I posted information. My idea for dual blogging was inspired by these online banters… and the rest is history. Please, support our experiment by visiting the world’s first-ever dual blog: Mentally Rertorted. An excerpt below:
You know, possessing a strong imagination has been more-or-less upheld as a prized virtue by society… and, most admittedly, by me. But, in light of all this virtual obsession and Second Life illusion, I can’t help but wonder: Could it be that imagination can go too far? Can imagination lead to virtual (pun so intended) mummification?
Explore more of my personal projects:
ArteAntigua.com
TheCocoaProject.org
ChromaCollective.com
The Reporter and Nicholas Kristof
A new film about roving reporter Nicholas Kristof will be released soon. Looks exciting. This man does exactly what I aspire to do… and have already begun doing on a smaller-scale.
View the trailer: The Reporter
Learn more about Kristof by clicking here.
Visit his NYTimes blog by clicking here.
Start Slide Show with PicLens Lite The Vast and the Finite
I posted this on Facebook and it sparked some interesting feedback. So I figured it would post it here as well:
The Content
National Park Portraits
by Teresa Barry
“We need wilderness,” claimed the America writer Edward Abbey, “whether or now we ever set foot in it. We need a refuge even though we may never need to go there.”
On a wintry afternoon some years ago, I definitely needed to go there – or, more specifically, to get there. My family had driven hundreds of miles on unfamiliar highways, heading for a national park we’d long dreamed of visiting. On and on we pushed that final day, hour after hour, mountain after snowy mountain, looking for an open pass that would take us across the Sierra Nevada to Yosemite. After the third or fourth sign announcing yet another closed route, I began to doubt whether the park’s landscapes could possibly be so splendid as to make this trip worthwhile. Crossing the countless mountains just to reach a park with… more mountains? And then, in the warm light of the near-setting sun, we entered Yosemite Valley. I gasped at its matchless beauty. Each waterfall and pinnacle seemed more stunning thatn the las, and the snow, so worrisome on the journey, now enhanced the sparkle of this jewel of a park. Exquisite portraits form that day are forever imprinted in my mind.
Everyone lucky enough to have fallen in love wiht a national park can recall similar scenes. Whether caught on film or cherished in the “keep forever” recesses of memory…
“No temple made with hands can compare with Yosemite,” wrote John Muir, the naturalist whose crusading led to the creation of Yosemite National Park in 1890. Although the park is almost the size of Rhode Island, many visitors see only the valley with views of Bridalveil Fall and El Capitan. (Derek Von Briesen) Read more »
Start Slide Show with PicLens Lite Resolutions…
I haven’t really thought about my resolutions would be for 2010 yet. I’m actually quite content with how I live life and view life. I’m already doing much of what I have a burning passion to do. I embrace change, so I’m often making changes I wish to make. But, here are four just to throw out there. Number:
1) Travel even more than I already do.
2) Completely delve into learning yoga and meditation, making both become a part of my daily routine. (and learn poses pictured!)
3) Stay financially stable (i.e. get self-sustaining projects going so I don’t have to rely purely on reporting and photography.)
4) More solidly establish my photography identity and sales.
Borrowed the pics from: http://www.seanecorn.com/. Go to Seane’s site. Beautiful music!!
- Urban Funk Photography in KC
- Trendy Tights
- The Warrior of Light and His World
- Paulo Coelho’s The Pencil
- Obsessed with Projects: Introducing Dual Blogging
- The Reporter and Nicholas Kristof
- The Vast and the Finite
- Resolutions…
- More than 700 Guatemalan Women Murdered in 2009
- Celebrating Thanksgiving with Red Rapture
Now Reading
Planned books:
None
Current books:
-
Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East (5 Volume Set) by Baird T. Spalding
-
Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman’s Soul by John Eldredge
Recent books:
- A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS by Khaled Hosseini
- House of Sand and Fog (Oprah’s Book Club) (Vintage Contemporaries) by Andre Dubus III
- Steppenwolf: A Novel by Hermann Hesse
- Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Italy, India and Indonesia by Elizabeth Gilbert
- Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis
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- Urban Funk Photography in KC
- Trendy Tights
- The Warrior of Light and His World
- Paulo Coelho’s The Pencil
- Obsessed with Projects: Introducing Dual Blogging
- The Reporter and Nicholas Kristof
- The Vast and the Finite
- Resolutions…
- More than 700 Guatemalan Women Murdered in 2009
- Celebrating Thanksgiving with Red Rapture