Vegan World

Here is a collection of images I have taken of plants and landscapes the past days as winter descends and the first frost arrives.

IMG_0481

Winter descends. Previously we had snow only 2000 meters elevation and above. Last night, I fell asleep listening to the slow and peaceful pitter patter of rain falling softly on the roof. I woke up this morning to find the snow had snuck down to 700 meters elevation.

IMG_0492

After this tree’s branches and trunk have built barns, built and heated homes, the remnants have become the nourishment for how many other living entities? Everything gets eaten in the end.

IMG_0503

Frost bite, frost burn, yet there is some beauty in this image. Is there a lesson to be learned?

IMG_0509

The frost is not the end but a tell that the end is near. In the background, the babbling brook runs away from that truth.

Free Beer

Most of the time I take photos of plants, gardens or landscapes where I attempt to share something beyond sense perception. That is my fun.

The other day, not far away, I found this sign. Tomorrow is when? Tomorrow never comes. Now isn’t that the funny truth?

And after all, it is not a stretch to say beer is the ideal people and plants linkage. Ethnobotany at its finest.

IMG_0373

See you there tomorrow for free beer.

Sneaking In

It happened last night.

Woke up this morning and winter had snuck in. Winter! And I had not yet even finished the requisite autumnal post.

WinterArrives (1)

Snow down to 3,000 meters. Above image shows in the foreground two valleys at 600 meters. The valleys drain the north side of the Jungfrau Massif, part of the Berner Oberland in the Swiss Alps. If you magnify, you can see Jungfrau, Monch and Eiger in the left center background.

Envy

If I could…and then the fairy appeared before me. Yeah, in my dreams!

IMG_0282 (1)

If I could write with the emotion and mystery of these clouds moving ever so slowly but always with magnificent beauty, incredible balance.

And challenges. These clouds offer visual, emotional and intellectual challenges that encourage science to escape Pandora’s box, something I’ve never done.

Weeds or Wild Flowers?

IMG_0237

Weeds or Wild Flowers?

This is a discussion, a debate, an argument that never fades away. 

Today, on a walk, I came across these beautifully flowering plants on the edge of a parking lot. Made me think. Made me remember all the discussions, debates and arguments with colleagues and government authorities.

But then I thought that any time someone plants seeds or ‘makes’ a garden, it is a statement that says yes, I have free time. Yes, I have disposable income. We could easily infer that such a person is ‘well-off’. Nice place to be…well-off in a garden, isn’t it?

Too much thinking for me. I’ll go back to my walk.

Railing

Railing about what?

Once upon a time…and then it was yesterday…and you are reading this today.

In a land of mountain trains–funiculars, cable cars and narrow gauge cogwheel trains. They are slow and they get you high.

Why? Why get high?

I’ll let the following photos tell the story. You will be in the Bernese Highlands of the Jungfrau Region, the northern pre-mountains, above 2,000 meters in the Swiss Alps. Why build these mechanical contraptions to get high?

Here are the trains that get you high.

IMG_0079

Passenger cars–note narrow gauge and cogwheel. Start at 600 meters, finish at 2,300 meters.

IMG_0081

Passenger cars and engine–small and strong–electric power. 

IMG_0080

Engine close up–attached in front of the engine is a cart for transporting goods and construction materials.

IMG_0055

Once you are high…the air is thin, fresh, cool and the distances…magical.

IMG_0056

Mountains–Eiger, Monch, Junfrau with the Mannlichen gipfel amidst the clouds in the foreground.

IMG_0061

Paths to explore, paths for discovering.

IMG_0066

Discoveries.

IMG_0064

Going deep in.

IMG_0071

Can’t get enough.

‘Lovers’ Caught

…something completely different…speaks for itself…

From a newspaper,

‘A livestock owner, who staked out his pen in a bid to apprehend the thief responsible for his regularly ‘disappearing’ milk, stumbled upon a couple in a compromising position instead.

Unable to pinpoint the reason his goat’s milk vanished everyday, the owner deduced it could be the handiwork of a thief. Crouched in a corner inside the pen, the owner made sure he could clearly watch the entrance and pounce on the thief when needed.

An hour later, a GMC Suburban vehicle stopped near the entrance. Stepping out of the vehicle, an Asian driver and a woman entered the pen and hastened into a room located on the far side.

Waiting awhile, the owner tiptoed towards the room expecting to catch the couple pilfering his goat’s milk. He found no thief and as he barged into the room he froze in his tracks.

Right in front of him, the couple were engaged in a sex session. Shocked to see an uninvited stranger they jumped up in surprise and tried to flee.

Refusing to budge without an explanation, the owner demanded they produce their identity cards that revealed their respective nationalities. The amorous couple further disclosed that they used his pen as a regular rendezvous for their animated meetings and also helped themselves to the available goat milk.

When the owner insisted on producing them at a police station, the woman burst into tears pleading to be forgiven. The Asian too followed suit. Not wanting to blow the issue into scandalous proportions, the owner let the couple off the hook.

*end of story*

My comment–happened in Kuwait twenty some odd years ago, when reporters just told a good story without trying to take a political position or without trying to change the world. I found the story fun to read and without heartburn. Can’t remember the last news story I’ve read this year that came without heartburn. 🙂

I did some landscape stuff while in Kuwait.

KuwaitUniversityMPFurnishings

Not far from Basra, and with a whole lot of Iranian, Iraqi and Palestinian influence.

KuwaitUniversityCentralFountainPlan

And then time passed.