Blogging with mehar_mah

Portrait of poet Pablo Neruda projected on a building in Santiago, Chile It's World Poetry Day For World Poetry Day, we're seeing the stylized visage of poet Pablo Neruda projected on a building in his native Chile. World Poetry Day was established by UNESCO to acknowledge 'that individuals, everywhere in the world, share the same questions and feelings'. Neruda, a Nobel laureate generally held up by Chileans as their national poet, made his early mark with famously racy love poetry. But his palette of questions and feelings evolved, expanding into surrealism, epic history, and radical politics. His death in 1973 after a bout with cancer was mourned publicly by Chileans - in defiance of newly installed dictator Augusto Pinochet, whom many Chileans link to Neruda's untimely passing. For World Poetry Day, UNESCO encourages embracing the tradition of reciting poetry for an audience - so keep your eyes peeled for poetry slams and other gatherings of langu...

Aerial view of Siesta Beach, Siesta Key, Florida Fiesta at Siesta Here we are in mid-March already, the time of year when American college-aged revellers invade the world's beaches, like this one on Florida's Siesta Key. Located in Sarasota County off the state's western shore, the island beach is a fixture on lists of America's top beaches, a standout even in a state where soft, welcoming sands compose over half the 1,900-kilometre coastline. Using the onset of spring in the region as an excuse to cut loose is nothing new, going back at least to the ancient Greeks and Romans. But spring break as we know it (a holiday period during early spring at American universities and schools) originated in the 1930's, when Fort Lauderdale began welcoming college swim teams for training. In March 1961, over 50,000 young people vacationed in the city. By the '70s, rising prices and increasing consternation of locals began driving the party from Fort Lauderdale t...

Brightly coloured powder for sale during Holi A festival of  colors Hindus in India and around the globe are celebrating Holi today, a spring celebration also called the festival of love, or the festival of colors. Why colors? Because these colorful powders are flung in joyous revelry to welcome spring and celebrate the blossoming of love. It is a time to forget old grievances and hope for a bountiful spring harvest season.

The Joan of Arc Monument at Riverside Park in Manhattan Joan charges Riverside Park! Sculptor Anna Hyatt Huntington was unusual for her era - a successful female artist. In 1910, she first exhibited a version of her Joan of Arc statue at the Salon in Paris, a prestigious art exhibition dating from the 1600s. But she only earned honourable mention because the exhibition’s judges didn’t think a woman working alone could create a sculpture of that magnitude. Paris’ loss is Manhattan’s gain, as the American city soon commissioned a new Saint Joan for display at Riverside Park. These kind of stories, we enjoy sharing on International Women’s Day. Here, the real conquerors are the women who have held their ground and remained invincible despite all the criticisms and objections.

Gustav III Museum in Stockholm's Royal Palace, Sweden These statues tell the story of a lifetime.. The stories of the past, the tales of unending festivities and never-resting place (become the symbol of culture relics), where merriment and laughter still bounce back, through these stone cold walls and marble floors when the rest of the world goes to slumber. The ghosts of the past (emperors and empresses) still embrace this place when no one is there to witness them and nobody is there to hear their wails of sorrow and regrets. This place tells the tales of old times..    King Gustav III of Sweden has been criticized for his extravagant life, but he has a natural appreciation for Italian marble sculpture.  Two years after Gustav's death, in 1794, the Swedish royal family opened the Stockholm Royal Palace to the public, establishing one of the oldest museums in Europe.  This is the Gustav III Museum of Cultural Relics. 

Aerial view of Superkilen Park in Norrebro district in Copenhagen, Denmark

Dyed wool on the Rossmarkt in Berching, Bavaria, Germany

'Mapping Courage: Honoring W.E.B. Du Bois & Engine #11,' a mural by Willis Humphrey, Philadelphia, PA

Golden Hall in Stockholm City Hall for Nobel Prize Award ceremonies

"Lion Dance", Gujo City, Gifu Prefecture. The Lion Dance was started in China and travel to the Southeast Asia. In Japan ,  t his is Gifu, Hachiman-cho, Gujo City.  It is a town known for Gujo dance.  The lion dance was filmed in spring, not New Year's.  The lion dance appears every year at the “Taikagura” held at the Gujo Hachiman Spring Festival in April.