the ruins of detroit

Photographers Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre captured these haunting pictures of the city of Detroit. the photos ask us to "wonder about the permanence of things" in a time where change occurs so rapidly.

Biology classroom, Wilbur Wright High School

michigan central station

Room 1504, Lee Plaza Hotel

photo source

news from Jhiri

Take a look at the fabulous website Rachel started for the co-op she works with in northern India. Thankfully, she's able to send us bi-weekly updates on her latest challenges, goals, and success stories, which makes me miss her just a tiny bit less.

I can so easily picture my best friend making these simple, graceful changes to her new community (along with far bigger projects!). She writes, "I painted “pani bachao” (“save water”) on the tank holder/tap area from which the school kids get their water.  I also put up a statistic about how many people worldwide don’t have access to clean water (one in six, closer to one in five in India).  Not only does the water area look beautiful and colorful now, but I have already noticed the kids using less water, and reminding each other to turn of the taps while washing hands and dishes."

way to go rach!

yum! roasted peanuts

photos from her blog

where have you been in europe?

Milan

tallinn, estonia

I've never been to europe.  I imagine it would involve strolling down alleyways, open plazas, and having intellectual conversations with people who look like this...  Am I basically on track?

Paris

photo sources: milan (Dave Yoder), tallinn (Ian Trower), paris (Ed Alcock)

guest explorer

my wonderful friend lindsay has been living and traveling in South France since the fall. She shares her well written adventures on her blog "France Part Deux".  A quick photo tour...

the brioche-like "Galettes de Roi," a special Epiphany dessert

the french version of bloomingdales or nordstroms

the Peyriac-de-Mer ponds

Lindsay's christmas tree in Toulouse

Doesn't everything in france seem to sparkle?

Ukiyo-e

hiroshige

On the last day of 2010, mimoun and I perused a dreamy collection of japanese Ukiyo-e, literally "pictures of a floating world."  I thought it was neat to see the influence this technique and style had on impressionist artists after Japan opened its boarders in the 1850s. This image reminds me of a town we traveled to just outside of Kyoto where we wandered through a bamboo forest and sat by the river.

These waterfalls by Hokusai were two of my favorites from the exhibit.


hokusai

hokusai




I've missed you, my lovely home and blog and friends and libby!

As you could probably tell from my series of emo tweets over the weekend, I am SO happy to be back from my work conference in San Antonio. It was fun to talk with our colorful EPGP PIs and spend time with my awesome boss, but other than that, I was counting down the hours to be back in my beloved SF. 

On the plane, I worked on this little collage (thank you for the idea, other blog) of the stillmans + friends visit to Lake Tahoe last summer. 

I guess it's a little difficult to read... woops! the next one will be better :)

 

Los Angeles

Mimoun is in the New York area touring with Family Portrait, so I planned a long overdue visit to Echo Park to visit my coolest cousin, Molly. Due to the saddest thing, Molly had to be in San Diego for the weekend, and I decided to get on my Delta flight anyways and spend the weekend with my aunt and uncle in Manhattan Beach. Their home is glorious, surrounded by other equally glorious homes, and the size of their pantry is in fact larger than the kitchen of our Mission apartment. Sneaky LA. I was quickly enamored with my soak in their hot tub, steak dinner, and stellar red wine, and began to think, why do I hate LA again? Ah yes, when I woke up at 4 am as usual, trying to solve every problem in my life simultaneously and needing a glass of water, I was brought back to earth by the salty-sweet, pool water taste of tap water that’s traveled hundreds (thousands?) of miles from its source and has picked up heavy metal souvenirs along the way. I choked down my Calm Forte homeopathic sleeping pills, and lay back in bed reviewing the memories the thick, chemistry experiment water had prompted: Muggy, earth quake weather days, playing tag in the dry backyard of my grandmother’s house in Hollywood, my grandfather’s shaky hands reaching for the hot sauce at El Coyote restaurant on Beverly Blvd, and my parents bellowing along to Randy Newman in our purple minivan driving down Highway 5 “I loooove LA...We love it!" My internet is too slow right now to embed the video, but please go watch this music video on Youtube if you've never seen it-hilarious! Fond memories, yes. Fond of LA, no. A great big freeway. Happily, I'll be back under my cloud of smug in the bay area tomorrow night, sipping delicious tapwater with a microwaveable trader joe's dinner.