Category: Middle East
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No fire, no smoke
No fire, no smoke No smoke curling up out of the kitchen chimneys.The sultans have long gone,their palace has become a museum.And the tree, delighted at having been saved,happily twists its branches this way and that. Photo of the week: Chimneys on Sultan’s kitchen, Topkapi palace, Istanbul, Turkey 2003
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Light upon light
Light upon light Rays of the setting sunilluminating spacewithout and within.Light …Space …Peace … Photo of the week: Sultan Ahmet Camii, Blue Mosque, Istanbul, Turkey 2003
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The near and the far
The near and the far The Temple of Athena at Priene was built in the Ionic order, which is clearly recognisable by the shape of the capitals with their two volutes (curls). Over time, the entire temple had collapsed or been destroyed. All the columns lay on the ground and their discs were scattered about.…
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The past and the present
The past and the present In the foreground are the columns of the Temple of Athena in the ancient Greek city of Priene, in Turkey. In the background lie the neatly laid-out fields of the plain below. Archaic Priene had a seaport, but the mouth of the River Meander silted up over time, during the…
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Gerasa-Jerash
Gerasa-Jerash Only a stone’s throw away: Walk down the South Decumanus road of Roman Gerasa into present day Jerash – or vice versa – and you bridge a time span of two thousand years in just a few minutes. Actually this switching in time is nothing extraordinary. It happens with every visit to historical monuments…
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Attractive simplicity
Attractive simplicity Happiness is hard to find when living in abject poverty. Or at the other end of the line where one bathes in abject luxury. Fortunately there is a middle ground where true happiness can be found. Running into a rudimental little terrace after a hike around a lake. Listening to a man playing…
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Migrating birds
Migrating birds The play of reeds, water and light in last week’s photo pleased me because of its abstract nature. In the same way Devrim Erbil must have been pleased by the sight of a chaotic swarm of migrating birds and took it up as the subject of his painting. Abstraction inspired by nature. Photo…
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And her name is Freedom
And her name is Freedom She noticed that I was looking closely at the reliefs on a wall at Persepolis. She asked if I liked them. She was sitting on a bench and offered me some nuts. I sat down next to her and we got talking – about art, about my country, about hers.…
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V for Victory
V for Victory 1979 – …. They are waiting for the moment when the second date can be filled in – and the chapter of the Islamic Revolution in Iran can be brought to a close. The younger generation seems ready for it. For them, a new chapter begins tomorrow. The chapter of a free…
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Learn young …
Learn young … Growing up in the 1950s in the catholic south of the Netherlands, my primary school was run by friars. For girls there was a convent school. Seeing these white-hooded, charmingly looking girls I get visions of hundreds of schools full of them, condemned by the Mullahs to become budding little nuns in…
καιρός remembered 