Tag Archives: photography

Holidays in China, part II

Continues from part I.

Qutang Gorge

The middle of the 3 Gorges of the Yangtze River, Qutang Gorge.

Shennong Stream

Shennong Stream off Yangtze River. Before the construction of the 3 Gorges Dam, the river was so difficult to sail that to go upstream you needed to be pulled along by trackers. Clothing optional.

3 Gorges Dam Panorama

Behold the 3 Gorges Dam.

3 Gorges Dam Panorama

Another view of the 3 Gorges Dam

Yichang at night

The hotel in Yichang was nice. The city itself was not that interesting. They seemed to have ads for a local corn-based liquor everywhere.

Pudong Panorama

Pudong panorama from the Bund.

Pudong at Dusk

Pudong at dusk.

Shanghai at night from the Oriental Pearl TV Tower

Skyscrapers in the Shanghainese night

Trying to get out

Trying to get out of the vantage point of the previous picture at the Oriental Pearl TV tower. This is why we were surprised by the lack of courteousness in Chinese crowds: people would run, push and shove as much as possible in a situation that was potentially very dangerous.

Yuyuan Gardens

Tea House at the Yuyuan gardens. The bridge is built in zigzag as bad spirits can't turn corners.

Yuyuan Gardens

The area around the Yuyuan gardens is full of shops and built in traditional Chinese style.

Chinese Painting at Shanghai Museum

Chinese painting at Shanghai museum. Probably the best museum in China, the ceramic, jade, copper and painting collections are worth the visit.

Mexico at the World Expo

Mexican pavillion at the World Expo: Replica of the Bell of Independence from the church of Dolores Hidalgo, Guanajuato.

Mexico at the World Expo

The Mexican pavillion had an introduction to Mexican art & history, but my favourites where these masks where you could see different parts of Mexico through the eyes of someone living there.

Finland at the World Expo

The Finnish pavillion had an overview of Finnish design, and while there was not a lot of food on offer there was a big space for Nokia ;)

Belgium at the World Expo

The Belgian pavillion focused more than anything on science and technology (and beer and chocolate, sure). They had a video that Frank de Winne, Belgian ESA astronaut, recorded from space for the Expo.

India and Saudi Arabia at the World Expo

Many pavillions remained unseen, even if we spent there the whole day.

French Concession / Xintiandi

The former French concession at Xintiandi was a nice stop. After two weeks, we were starting to miss certain European comforts like street cafés, sandwiches or good beer.

Restaurants

Even during the night it was very hot, up to 30°C.

Route from Beijing to Helsinki

Ready to fly back from Beijing. One of the decisive factors that convinced us to go to China was that it is only a 8 hour direct flight with Finnair.

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Holidays in China, part I

We spent 2 weeks in July in China.  Our route took us to Beijing where we stayed a few days, then we took an overnight train to Chongqing from where we boarded a ferry through the Yangtze River and the 3 Gorges to Yichang.  After sleeping there the night we took another train to Shanghai, where we stayed 4 days before returning back to Finland via Beijing.  It was quite a route as you can appreciate in the map below (we spent 60 hours in trains).


View Larger Map

It was very interesting as an experience, the sights are amazing, generally very safe, the people are usually kind and I thoroughly enjoyed the food.  However, we were more than once assaulted by culture shock.  China is not renowned for being one of the cleanest places on earth and the crowds, while expected, are not nearly as polite as in Japan or even Mexico.  However, as usual, the story is better told in pictures and videos (the rest are found in my Flickr stream as before).

Tiananmen square

Tiananmen square in the rain

Who comes up with these names?

Who comes up with these names?

Temple of Heaven

Temple of Heaven

The little Emperor didn't like his new clothes

This little Emperor was ready to take off his picture-perfect disguise.

Forbidden City Panorama

Inside the Forbidden City

Foggy at the Great Wall

It was extremely foggy when we visited the Great Wall of China at Mutianyu. Somehow doesn't surprise me as I had the same luck at the Cristo de Corcovado.

Great Wall

Another view of the foggy Great Wall of China

Looks like a taco!

Imagine my surprise when we went to a restaurant specialising in Peking duck and found out it's eaten almost like a taco.

Asian maps again

In East Asia their maps are different. Deal with it ;)

In the train to Chongqing

The standard "soft sleeper" cabins in Chinese trains are quite good. Pity the toilets are an absolute disaster, even in the newest trains. In fact, not only in trains, but pretty much everywhere. Maybe the government should start a nationwide "Be dignified, learn to use a loo" campaign?

Chongqing Panorama

Chongqing panorama at night

Lord of Hell

The Lord of Hell in Fengdu, the ghost city.

Continues in part II

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Riga

We were lucky enough to have spent a couple of days of the Easter weekend in Riga, capital of Latvia.  The city has a great collection of Jugendstil (German Art Noveau) buildings from the 1930′s and it was very nice to walk in its cobbled streets, even if the weather was not much better than Finland.  It was very interesting to see how much investment has come from the Nordic countries, with a large amount of Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian companies present in the country and a partly-renovated airport that looks decidedly similar to those of Oslo, Copenhagen, Stockholm & Helsinki with its use of wood, glass and iron.

The country has a long history of foreign occupations from Germany, Sweden and Russia, so a visit to its museums is definitely recommended to get some background information on the way the country came to be what it is.  Furthermore, it currently tries to recover from the after-effects of the global financial crisis, when it’s economy pretty much collapsed.  Not surprisingly, travelling here is relatively cheap, but due to inflation consumer prices are almost at Scandinavian levels.

The break was very welcome indeed and I’m happy to have crossed out the last of the Baltic countries I was missing.

House of Blackheads

The House of Blackheads with the statue of Roland, one of the main hallmarks of the city.

St. George at the House of Blackheads

St. George, a detail of the House of Blackheads

Flowers at the Freedom Monument

The Monument to Freedom. Latvians renew the flower offerings every day.

Latvian National TV in Easter

The country has a sizable Russian-speaking minority, so foreign TV programmes are dubbed in Latvian and subtitled in Russian.

Soldiers at Riga Castle

Soldiers at Riga Castle

Daugava River Panorama

Panorama of Riga and the Daugava river

River in the park

Small channel in the old city.

Promises of eternal love

Promises of eternal love.

Riga skyline

Riga skyline.

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Science poems in the Tube

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Real winter in Finland

 

The current winter in Finland is the continuously coldest, snowiest I have ever experienced after 9 years here.  With temperatures averaging -10 (but reaching -27, without the windchill) and an amount of snowfall that is reaching a metre, the place looks and feels decidedly wintry.  I mean, there’s more snow here than in Lapland!

 

 

 

 

 

Cross-country skiing in deep snow

Cross-country skiing is possible in almost any sidewalk now, even after they clean them.

 

Snowed-over cars

There's a car somewhere under that pile of snow

 

 

 

 

 

Ice panorama

Icicles in a cave

 

Slope in downtown

Snowboarding slope in downtown

 

 

 

Ski tracks in the bay

Ski tracks on the snow over a frozen bay.

 

Winter aerial panorama of Otsonlahti, a.k.a "The calm between snowstorms"

Panorama of the bay between snowstorms

 

 

Winter dusk

Colours of dusk in winter

 

Walking in the snowstorm

The same spot as before, but in a snowstorm

 

 

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Mexico notes, part 2

Palacio de Gobierno

2000 km southeast and 30°C warmer than the previous location: Main square of Mérida, Yucatán.

Sunset over the pool in Celestún, Yucatán

Sunset over the pool in Celestún, Yucatán.

Flamingoes in close-up
Flamingoes in close-up in Celestún, Yucatán

Celestún beach
5 km of virgin beaches in Celestún, Yucatán.

The only not so nice detail was when on meeting some people I hadn’t seen in a long time I realised that the crab mentality seems to be alive and well in certain sectors of society. Shame, but hey, what can you do. ;-) Overall it was great and I cannot wait to be back again, if only for holidays.

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Mexico notes

As my previous post detailed, I spent a great holiday in Mexico, catching up with friends and especially family.  We spent a week in Mexico City, then 6 days in the Copper Canyon trail and a few days in Mérida and the natural reserve of Celestún before having to return to the winter wonderland.  I was struck by the enormous variety of landscapes and peoples living in the country where I was born, even if I knew it in theory.  As usual, pictures say it better (if you want to see more than these, they’re all here).

Fiery dusk cloud

The winter sky sometimes seems to take a life of its own.

Barranca de Urique desde el Cerro del Gallego

Copper Canyon: Barranca de Urique from Cerro del Gallego in Chihuahua state. The largest of 32 federal entities in Mexico, Chihuahua is bigger than many European countries, e.g. the United Kingdom.

Barrancas del Cobre / Copper Canyon national park deep panorama

Deep view of Copper Canyon in Divisadero

Barrancas del Cobre / Copper Canyon national park panorama

Copper Canyon panorama from Divisadero

Barrancas del Cobre / Copper Canyon national park

Copper Canyon detail

Barrancas del Cobre / Copper Canyon national park

Copper Canyon: Piedra Volada or why would anyone get so close to a loose rock?

Clothesline with a view

The rarámuri (tarahumara) peoples live in the area, and many sell their handcrafts to the tourists. I earned some brownie points by thanking them in their own language ("Chirigüeraba").

Panorama of a snowed over Creel

It also snows in parts of Mexico, you know? Creel, Chihuahua

Panorama of Lake Arareco, Chihuahua, Mexico

This is not a Finnish lake, but Lago Arareco in Chihuahua state.

Cusarare waterfall

Cusarare waterfall, Chihuahua.

Continues in Part 2

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Mexico again

Teotihuacán Panorama from the Avenue of the Dead

We are currently traveling in Mexico, enjoying the Christmas & New Year’s break.  The latest photographic developments will be available here.

Enjoy the holidays!

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Nothing symbolises the UK quite like the phone booths

Telephone booth

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Fog

Fog in Keilalahti

This time of the year it is very common to get foggy days in southern Finland.  I find them very interesting because the combination of setting with metheorological phenomenon brings to my mind images of Viking longships raiding the marshes and woods of the lands of the Fenni.

A friend of mine did share a story of Vikings rading a warehouse full of precious animal furs near the town of Nokia, which is where  it takes is name from (noki being “soot” and sable being as black as it).  Somehow drunken barbarians warriors attacking a town for its pelts sounds pretty funny to me.

This brings me to another point: every once in a while I feel like the Arab guy in The 13th Warrior. Par for the course for a southerner living in these northern lands ;)

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