Engaging Culture: Assorted Photos

For today's blog, I decided to use pictures that reflect our everyday experiences in the city, countryside, and at the beach. (To see larger versions of the pictures, just click on them - you can see a slideshow that way without all the text).  :)

 

Street vendors. 

It's common to see street vendors squatting alongside small piles of in-season fruits and veggies. Nearly all of these are elderly women. This vendor is seated (very rare - squatting is far more typical), and is wearing plastic bags on her head and body to protect her against the rain. The contrast with the LG ad is striking.

Computer/video game center.

We see a lot of signs for "PC Bangs" (literally, "computer rooms") where kids pay about $1/hour to play multi-player computer games.  The name and logo of this particular one, however, with a beaver holding a wooden sign, would NOT work in an American context.

Pre-school book.

We never run out of awkward English examples. This was an early-reader book we found in a pile of English-as-a-second language resources.  I love the sub-title about relaxing with joy and choosing the way of happiness.  Clear influence of buddhism here.

Weeding the rice field ditch by taxi.

When driving home from the beach (see our building just left of the telephone pole?), we often cut through the rice fields.  This day we noticed a taxi (rare outside the city). The driver and (passenger? friend?) were out pulling weeds from the rice/road area.  You can really tell who tends their fields (nearly no grasses or weeds amid the rice) and those who don't, as the rice is golden and the weeds stand about against it.

Surfboard upcycled into a bench.

We live just 10 minutes away from a renowned surf beach, and several (tiny) shops have surfboards, sailboards, scuba gear, and even para-sails.  I love this surfboard-bench, made from old office chairs and a surfboard. I manage to walk a beach almost every day to see what the tide has brought in. We find shoes, gloves, fishing bobbers/nets, and disposable lighters on every walk; whole lightbulbs are fairly typical  too, though I can't imagine how they survive the surf.

Ajeema collecting seaweed.

At one beach in particular, we often see a few ajeemas collecting a particular type of seaweed (sometimes called "dead man's fingers"). The ladies are usually in full sun gear, but this woman wasn't afraid to show her legs.  She used a stick to grab the seaweed out of each wave; others use their hands or just go through what's laying on the beach.

Seaweed Samaritan.

Sometimes I also collect the seaweed and bring it to the ajeemas, careful to bring some to each one who is out collecting.  I usually get a smile and nod from them - and I'm sure they enjoy having a story to share over dinner that night.

 

Garden spider.  

We had garden spiders in Iowa and enjoyed touching their webs to see them dance (or, as wikipedia prefers to describe it: "oscillate the web vigorously"). They're common here, though a bit bigger than what I'm used to: 3+ inches.  Praying mantises are also common and are larger than in Iowa - we saw an enormous one last week, about 6" long.  I did not love that.

Asian swamp eel.

This was a new creature for me to see on the beach: like a worm or snake, but vertically flattened.  It was slow and appeared to be nearly dead, so I picked it up by the tail for a closer look. I was so surprised when it thrashed and writhed and flapped about that I screamed and flung it into the water, where it rapidly swam away then crawled back out onto the beach.  Google told me this was a baby swamp eel - only 4" long, and they can grow to 40+ inches.  Eew.

Pale frog (marsh frog? unsure)

A small pond on campus has lots of small, bright green frogs, and I have seen this large, pale frog a few times. I used to love watching birds and butterflies, but as I get older and lazier I prefer watching slower creatures.  They're easier to photograph, too.  :)