It’s never the differences between people that surprise us. It’s the things that, against all odds, we have in common. ― Jodi Picoult
Thank you to Amy of The World is a Book, for hosting this week’s interesting challenge. She asks us to explore, East Meets West or North Meets South. Read her creative post here to inspire your thoughts. Remember to link to her post and add the Lens-Artists tag so we can find you.
I must declare this was a difficult task for me – how to? I hope my solution is OK with you.
Because, I have focused on North meets South, and two very different countries with much in common. Just like we humans, wherever we come from – we have got so many things in common.
I guess you already know from the first images which the two countries are…
Both have got spectacular natural phenomena as volcanoes and hot springs, and ice and snow in beautiful nature.
They have got similar houses too…(!) even if one of them only is from some famous films made here.
So, how do we use their natural resources, the hotsprings? We can bathe in them…
cook in them…
or maybe just love the sight of them as a tourist. For energi they are outstanding and sustainable resources.
Both countries also boast spectacular natural layers of stone.
In one of the two countries, there are no forests – in the other one the jungle lives side by side with the glaciers.
If you follow me, you know how close to my heart these two countries are. They carry the clear light of a natural world less spoilt. One of them is called the land of the long white cloud, while the other one, if you look at the images above, maybe is the land of the short white cloud…
A special thank you to Patti as she made us look at Shadows and Reflections in Monochrome last week. Once again, the interpretations to the challenge were creative, fun and inspiring. This way, we also learned something about what photos work best in monochrome. Next week, we welcome Bren as our guest host. She challenges us with: ”Lowering That Clarity To Bring Softness.” We look forward to more learning next week!
Interested in joining the Lens-Artists Challenges? Click here for more information.
John leads this week’s challenge, and it is no surprise it involves a ”flight”…
I was a little bookworm, a girl with my head full of dreams. Many dreams of foreign countries I read about in books and saw fascinating pictures of. Mostly special places in these books, not so much whole countries. I never thought they would be more than dreams, but then I met a young man as eager as myself to see the world. We started travelling together when I was 16 and he was 21. And we never stopped. Today I am very grateful that so many ”flights of fancy” from my childhood really came to fruition. Of course I have many dreams left, but in fact there is only one more great travel dream, and that is to see the cherry blossom and the wisteria tunnels in Japan. Somehow I don’t think that dream will come true – but it feels good to still have dreams!
Please go to John’s site for more inspiration!
I have picked three different ”flights”… big and small, and in two out of three there is a real flight involved.
One of my first ”flights of fancy” was this house. As a young girl I used to spend every summer in the public swimming pool of our village. And on my way to the pool, every day I passed this white house, surrounded by a big garden with lots of birches, apple trees, plum trees and pear trees. It was built on a bit higher ground than the other houses, and I also knew that one of the most handsome young boys in my little village happened to live there…
Little did I know that my boyfriend and I would buy this house when I was only 21 – and we have lived here since then, for 44 years now. And, it is still my dream house!
This image is from quite some years ago, when we had both Mille and Totti waiting for us to come home.
Another ”flight of fancy” was going to New Zealand. I had a pen friend when I was 11 (one of many…), and this girl sent me a calender with photos from both islands, North and South. I was so mezmerised, so in love with these extraordinary nature sceneries, that I started dreaming of getting there one day. In my mind, no other country could literally have ”everything” I loved: high mountains and glaciers, volcanoes and hot springs, magical forests and jungle, unimaginable animals…yes, everything. A dream which of course sounded absolutely impossible…NZ was at the the other end of the world – the New Zealanders are our antipodes.
Then there is another ”flight of fancy” involved too. I had always loved the novels of JRR Tolkien, and especially Lord of the Rings. Our children loved it too…so, finally we arrived in NZ, North Island around Christmas 2011. We travelled the islands for a month, and of course we had to visit Hobbiton! And do you know what – it looked just like in my dreams.
Yet another ”flight of fancy” started with a novel, James Hilton’s Lost Horizon. I dreamt of the magical Himalayas and mystical Tibet, but realised I would never get there. This was literally another world. But, in 2009 my family took the train from Beijing over permafrost and the Tibetan Plateau to Lhasa. It is the world’s highest railway, 5,068 meters at Tanggula. The cars are equipped with oxygen supply to avoid altitude sickness. Still today, we all think this was one of our greatest adventures.
Over the last years, our home has become a ”flight of fancy” for birds and insects, plants and hedgehogs. I try to make it my own Shangri-La, a hidden paradise behind birches, bird cherry and lilacs. I cannot save the planet, but I know I can be of great help to make this little piece of Earth thrive.
According to John, and to Dictionary.com, the idiom “flight of fancy” refers to “an unrealistic idea or fantastic notion, a pipe dream. For example, ‘She engaged in flights of fancy, such as owning a million‐dollar house.’ This idiom uses flight in the sense of ‘a soaring of the imagination,’ a usage dating from the mid‐1600s.”
I believe we all need imagination and flights of fancy to survive in this unruly world, so, keep dreaming…
A big thank you to Amy for a spectacular mountain challenge – and to you all for your fabulous entries! Now we are looking forward to seeing what was your flight of fancy (or someone else’s) that came to fruition? Please link to John’s original post and tag Lens-Artists.
Next week, Sofia hosts challenge #224 – Exposure. Be sure to visit her beautiful site for inspiration. Until next, stay calm and kind.
First of all – thank you for so many inventive, creative and fun interpretations of last week’s challenge – Pick a Word! Fabulous!
Rusha Sams of Oh the Places We See is our host this week, and she has chosen to highlight all those people who work for a better society and a better world. A Labor of Love.
As so many of us do these days, I think of the health care workers, police and firefighters – all those brave people helping us in this unruly world. But my thoughts also go to all those who work for a sustainable world and helping vulnerable species to survive – because biodiversity is essential to us all. Without biodiversity we will all perish and our planet is lost. Even if we are living in a pandemic now, we know that other problems will not go away – we have to fight them all, simultaneously. Tough. But, the pandemic is also a result of how humans have abused and misused Nature and our only home, planet Earth.
In the header, the dotterel beach in Coromandel.
My daughter voluntered in New Zealand in 2011, working in a Nature preserving program. She worked mostly with inventory of traps and keeping the forest open. All voluntary work is of course unpaid (monetarily…) work – A Labour of Love for the planet.
Saving the NZ Dotterel was/is a project involving many volunteers. During hatching time there was a time table for those watching the birds 24/7. We saw some Dotterels running on the beach, but also some little ones dead. A big threat to all endemic animals, maybe especially the NZ flightless birds (the kiwi is only one of them) are the invasive possums. Emma brought home several skulls and bones from roadkills.
In 2016 we went to Ecuador, the Amazon Basin and the Galapagos Islands. Threatened already then by the oil industry and new settlers burning down the rainforest, but little did we know of the many fires that would arrive through mismanagement and the pandemic.
A vast piece of jungle was once bought by a man from the Netherlands who wanted to save it from getting destroyed. We stayed at his eco-lodge with local people guiding and lecturing about herb medicine and Amazon plants and animals. These people were born and raised here, lived here and knew the jungle like the back of their hand.
They took us out on crystal clear waters……silent canoe days…and if not out on the waters – then bird watching high above the Amazon jungle.Luis was one of our skilled guides, helping us find essential plants for cuisine and health. This was certainly a Labour of Love for him – a way of helping his people, animals and plants survive. He could also recognize and identify several hundreds of different bird sounds.For Andi, his Labor of Love meant that several villages could survive – and thrive.This journey is the most highly treasured one of all my journeys through 47 years. To see these people’s loving faces in preserving and teaching about their natural environment was a great joy and to learn how deep their knowledge is of Nature’s secrets was truly humbling. Knowledge and skills of this kind can only be yours if you are born and raised here. I am forever grateful to have met them all.
”We hope you’ll join us in sharing your interpretations of “A Labor of Love” whether you showcase a person or a group or an object notable for the labor or laborer involved.” Publish your post and add your link to the Comments section at the bottom of Rusha’s post. Please don’t forget to add the tag Lens-Artists so you can be found in the Reader.
Next week we will be back on schedule, and Amy will be our host for challenge #114. Until then – stay well and be kind. To yourself as well.
New Zealand is not a small country, but a large village – Peter Jackson
There is real purity in New Zealand…It’s actually not an easy thing to find in our world anymore – Elijah Wood
Today is a very special day for us here at Lens-Artists – the one year anniversary of our Challenge. While we were all initially saddened by the discontinuation of the WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge, for us it became an opportunity to expand our blogging horizons and to create some amazing new friendships.
I feel that New Zealand is my second home. – Luke Evans
On our end, we have transitioned from four independent photography bloggers to a tightly-knit team that supports, encourages and helps each other as we develop and create our weekly challenges. We’ve also been fortunate to have expanded our follower base thanks to bloggers like you who support and inspire us.
Toitū te whenua (Leave the land undisturbed).
As a result, our challenge has become near and dear to each of our hearts. We’ve gone well beyond being individual members of a team and have become four good friends. We are tremendously thankful to you for your appreciation of our efforts; and for making us smile or feel touched by your responses. As our thank you for your support and encouragement, we’re suggesting that you respond to today’s challenge with any subject that’s near and dear to YOUR hearts, as we’ve done with our images today. If you’d prefer some guidance, choose any of the four subjects we’ve selected this week (Friendship, A country that’s special to you, Imagination and Connected).
We are a proud nation of more than 200 ethnicities, 160 languages, and amongst that diversity we share common values. – Jacinda Ardern
Each of us has included several captures that are special to us in some way.
Mine are from a country and people that occupies a special place in my heart – New Zealand. Aotearoa is the Māori name – and the most popular meaning usually given is the ”land of the long white cloud”. A strikingly diverse Nature, warm-hearted People with strong Environmental care and – an insane sense of humour! It is also the country in which JRR Tolkien’s characters so naturally belong. New Zealand opened its arms to me – and I immediately felt at home there. I would never have guessed that our blogging community could feel like ”home” too – but it does. It is a privilege to host this challenge once a month.
I’ve learned that home isn’t a place, it’s a feeling.
― Cecelia Ahern
Thank you again from the bottom of our hearts for making this such a terrific experience. If you have a subject that you feel might inspire us, please feel free to suggest it – we’d love to hear from you. Should you be new to our challenge and interested in joining us, please click here and be sure to include the Lens-Artists TAG so we can all find you. Happy Blogging to all of our loyal followers and friends, and Happy Anniversary to us!
Whatungarongaro te tangata toitū te whenua
(As man disappears from sight, the land remains) This demonstrates the holistic values of the Maori, and the utmost respect of Papatuanuku, Mother Earth.
Have you seen these
Each week on Lens-Artists, we highlight several responses from among our followers. This special week we’d like to thank ALL of our followers for their thoughtful, funny, often-feisty and always wonderful posts. We hope you enjoy them as much as we do, and will continue to join us as we move into year two of the Lens-Artists Challenge.
Leaves or trees – leaves And trees are my kindred spirits. For Cee this Tuesday, I have focused on two of my favorite countries and some of my favorite trees and leaves. In the header, autumn coloured beech by the lake near my home in Sweden.
Tree ferns of New Zealand are plants I would have loved to have in my country. They bring magic and beauty to the world.
The Kauris of NZ, here Tane Mahuta, are both majestic and endemic giants. See the people on the ground below!
When paddling through the thick, mangrove like trees, we admired all the other plants living on the tree branches and tree trunks. This is the east coast of NZ.
The Southern Beech is a very beautiful tree with rather tiny leaves, seen in enchanted forests by the road to Milford Sound. The fallen tree trunks still full of new branches.
Oh, Ailsa…where to begin…? My favourite motif and my major love – the Forest. Of course I love my own forest best…and in spring when the wild apple trees and cherries greet me when I walk across the meadows to where the forest starts. But…
Tane Mahuta
Te Matua Ngahere
Te Matua Ngahere – full view
…the Kauri forest on the North Island, New Zealand, is so impressive, dense and full of giants when you least expect it…I have never seen anything like it and I just never wanted to leave.
On the South Island, we met another type of mystical forest on our way to Milford Sound – The Enchanted Forest.
Leya 
Du måste vara inloggad för att kunna skicka en kommentar.