The image could just as easily be titled “The Lost Art of Conversation.” Morning in this Saigon coffee shop finds almost everybody engaged with their mobile phones. Or leering at the passing photographer. Nary a word is being uttered.
During a recent visit to Ho Chi Minh City, my friend Mark introduced me to the Musulman Mosque in an up-market part of District 1 near Saigon’s old city hall (now the home of the People’s Committee of Ho Chi Minh City; aka, the municipal government). Formally named Jamia al-Muslimin Mosque, the building was completed in 1935 by Indian expatriates living in Saigon, which was then part of the French colony of Cochinchina. The small mosque with its distinctive architecture and color scheme is a quiet haven in one corner of a bustling city that is decidedly not known for tranquility.
My first visit ever to London. I emerged from the Westminster tube station shortly before noon on a heavily overcast Saturday morning. I was with two of my dearest friends from the US, a couple from Cambridge, Mass, and we were on our way to Westminster Abbey. We had decided to meet in London, because I am not inclined to visit the US while Trump and his crime family loot and destroy everything they can get their hands on, and my friends were happy to escape the US for a few days of catching up and hanging out in one of the world’s great cities. As we walked over to nearby Westminster Abbey, strolling and chatting definitely took precedence over searching for the perfect angle to get a photo of Big Ben. We all took a few shots of Parliament Square for the travel scrapbook and that was pretty much the end of it.
Big Ben and its surroundings are one of the most photographed urban landscapes anywhere in the world. Even if you arrive on a perfect day with magnificent natural lighting and have plenty of time to explore vantage points and shooting angles, your odds of coming up with an image that says something unique or new about Big Ben are very long indeed. When I visit places like Big Ben and Parliament Square in London, I am looking for sharp, properly exposed, and well-composed images that say “I’ve been there.” If one of my images has something that sets it apart from vacation scrapbook cliches; well, I can live with that.
Back home and looking through the pictures from the walk, I decided the photo above did a reasonable job of summarizing my trip to Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. Saturday tourists and a few Londoners going about their business add some motion in the foreground while a tired Churchill leans on his cane next to Big Ben, and all framed by an ominous gray sky.
When we emerged from Westminster Abbey several hours later, the clouds had gone from ominous to puffy white and the scene was bathed in warm sunshine.
Altogether a successful outcome for the day: Big Ben photos now have a place in my travel scrapbook and I have great memories of a delightful day in London.
Construction of the Gothic style (or to be more precise – the late Gothic monumental style) Bruges City Hall was begun in 1376 and completed in 1421. The building is still the seat of the city government today. Parts of the interior are open to the public, but regrettably I did not make time to go inside. There is only so much one can see during a three day visit.
Adjacent to City Hall in Burg Square there are bistros for beleaguered bureaucrats in need of sustenance of the solid or liquid variety.
Like Venice and Amsterdam, Bruges has canals that link the old parts of the city together. What role these canals played in the history and development of Bruges, I cannot say. The only activity I saw on the canals were the sightseeing boats that took visitors on water-level tours of the city.
On my first morning in Bruges, I set off at just past 7:00 am to walk to the center of the old city. I soon came upon the enormous 115.6m high tower of the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady. Construction of the Gothic church began in the 13th century and was completed in the 15th century. The brickwork tower is the second highest such structure in Europe (or the third, depending on which source one chooses to believe). Whether second or third, the massive tower dominates its surroundings.
Bruges is a small Belgian city of about 120,000 people located on the North Sea in the northwest of the country near the Dutch border. The center of Bruges is part of a sizeable UNESCO World Heritage Site of some 430 hectares. My plan was to walk from my hotel near the southern end of the oval-shaped Site to the Markt or Market Square, about 1 kilometer away in the heart of historic old Bruges.
The Belfry of Bruges is the centerpiece of the Market Square. The tower, a mere 83 meters high was built in 1240, but has been damaged by fire and repaired several times since then.
I will have more about Bruges in the days to come.
I was walking, day dreaming, along a narrow, bricked, rather non-descript Amsterdam street when I looked up and saw Chinese characters on the wall of a building. I was disoriented for a moment wondering what this place was doing in the middle of Amsterdam, realizing seconds later that I had walked into Amsterdam’s Chinatown.
In fact the name Chinatown is something of a misnomer, as this small area contains restaurants serving all kinds of East and Southeast Asian cuisines. My quick, very unscientific survey suggested there were more Ramen shops that anything else. There may have been some Asian markets as well, though to be honest the only shop I noticed was dishing up snacks laced with cannabis. My pot days are very long gone at this point, though I did try edibles a couple of times in the past. They put me to sleep.
I was not tempted to eat anything in Chinatown. Or Asiatown, call it what you will. Prices are crazy and the food served up is generally not nearly as good as what I get closer to home for a fraction of the price.
Wertheimpark, first opened to the public in 1812, is named after a prominent 19th century Jewish banker and philanthropist. Sitting by the side of a canal and near the city’s botanical garden, the park has quiet paths lined with stately, lush green trees, several notable trees (that is, trees over 100 years old), and plenty of open space for dogs to play and neighbors to meet when they are keeping an eye on their playing dogs.
Just off to one side of the open field, there is the artist Jan Wolkers’ “Never Again Auschwitz” memorial to people who died at Auschwitz and other Nazi extermination camps. The memorial is also referred to as “Broken mirrors.”
