Archive for July, 2008

Russian Landscapes and a Floating Island

Monday, July 28th, 2008

For many the mention of Russia evokes images of cold, industrial cities with dark skies, but I came across some photos of the nation’s scenery that most of us might never imagine. I also stumbled upon a story about one of the top spots on my list of places to visit in this lifetime which [...]

Souvenirs

Thursday, July 24th, 2008

I came across a neat slideshow at TIME.com with photos of one of the biggest museums in the world, one Team AZ will be seeing in 2009:  “The Louvre: France’s Iconic Museum”. If you have some knowledge of art history, you’ll know that the Louvre houses one the world’s most famous paintings, La Giaconda, [...]

Dubious Destinations

Wednesday, July 9th, 2008

While Yahoo! Travel recently posted its list “Best Scenic Drives in the US”, the BBC World Service examined China’s preparation for this year’s summer Olympics which’ll take place in and around Beijing in a timely documentary series. The broadcasts, “Countdown to the Olympics”, presented an investigation of continued religious persecution and political and economic disenfranchisement [...]

The Sistine Chapel

Tuesday, July 8th, 2008

People enjoy mysteries and codes and secrets. Witness the mania in delving behind the esoteric veils of such institutions of the Vatican, Opus Dei, the Freemasons, the Illuminati, et cetera, engendered by Dan Brown’s entertaining (but wildly inaccurate) novels The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons. Witness too the millenarian zeal to find contemporary [...]