weekly photo challenge: from above

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Greece, Jebel Akhdar, Jordan, Nepal, Oman, weekly photo challenge

Saturday, May 4: This week’s WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge is From Above: Change your perspective on something. Share a photo of a subject which you shot from directly above.

From above at the Monastery of St. Barbara, Meteora, Greece

Looking down at Kalambaka from the Monastery of St. Stephen at Meteora, Greece

from above: Nepalese Vegetarian food: basmati rice, black lentils, vegetable curry, spinach green curry, pickle, papad (some kind of mushroom curry?), salad and curd.

the view from above at the Hotel View Point in Nagarkot, Nepal

From above: flowers at Pokhara, Nepal

the view from above at the ancient Crusader castle at Karak, Jordan

from above: the curving staircase at Eikan-do, Kyoto, Japan

From above in a hot air balloon over Cappadocia, Turkey

From above: the “fjords of Arabia” in Musandam, Oman

Omani children at Jebel Akhdar, from above

weekly photo challenge: lunchtime

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Greece, Nepal, Oman, postaweek2013, South Korea, weekly photo challenge

Saturday, March 16:  The WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge is lunchtime.  Michelle of WordPress writes:

Time to show us your lunchtime. This might seem like a pretty narrow task, but if you think of “lunchtime” as a theme, there are lots of places you can take it:

• Show us what you actually had for lunch.
• Show us what went into your lunch — a stunningly saturated pile of red radishes at the farmer’s market, or the process by which you construct the Ultimate Turkey Sandwich.
• Show us what a mealtime is like at your house. Who’s there? What are they doing?
• Show us a photo of someone truly enraptured by what they’re eating and capture the deep satisfaction of an enjoyable meal.
• If you don’t have time for lunch or eat on the run, show us that.
• Show us your favorite place to sit while you eat lunch, or your favorite place to prepare food.
• Capture a candid photo of the guy behind the counter of your favorite greasy spoon.

This is meant to be another phoneography challenge, which I’m not at all keen on since I don’t have a camera phone.  Since I usually eat lunch at my desk at work, and since I didn’t feel like hauling my camera to work to take a boring picture of me eating lunch at my desk, I thought I would post some of my favorite lunchtimes I’ve experienced in my travels.

I’ll start with the smoked salmon, cream cheese and caper baguette I ate for lunch on Thursday at the Blue Marlin at Marina Bandar al Rowdha in Muscat.  I have to say I didn’t find the lunch all that exciting.  On the contrary, I found it totally uninspiring.  I probably wouldn’t go back to this place again to eat.

Smoked salmon baguette at the Blue Marlin

Only one time in the whole year and a half that I’ve been in Oman was I invited to an Omani’s house for lunch.  First they brought out this.

the snacks before an Omani lunch

Those beans on the left hand bottom corner of the large tray were delicious.  So were those French fry-like things.  I ate and ate, thinking this was our lunch.  After I was fully stuffed, they brought out this.

the main course, rice and chicken and salad

Needless to say, I tried to eat as much as I could, but it was hard because I wasn’t hungry at all after eating all those beans.  (nakhal fort, lunch with an omani family & a wild drive up wadi mistal)

Here’s a hole-in-the wall lunchtime place, similar to many such places in Oman, that Mario and I encountered when we went exploring wadis on a rare day of flooding in Oman.

a “restaurant” on the way to Wadi Damm

Here’s a “restaurant and coffee shop” (they don’t seem to believe in naming restaurants in the interior) in Ibra, where my family and I ate lunch while they were visiting Oman in January.

a typical Omani restaurant like most you will find outside of Muscat. This one is in Ibra.

My son Adam eats lunch with his hands, Omani style, in Al Hamra.

To be honest, I’m not all that crazy about Omani food or Oman’s Indian food, the only alternative outside of the capital.  I normally like Indian food, but in these types of restaurants, the menu is limited to Chicken Biriyani or Chicken Masala.  Both Omanis and Indians in this country are really fond of chicken.

Neither did I care much for Korean food when I lived in South Korea, but here is a typical Korean lunch of bibimbap I shared with my son Alex when he came to visit me in Korea.

Korean lunch of bibimbap

Koreans have to wash a lot of dishes for breakfast, lunch or dinner

However, in most of my travels, I adore the local cuisine.  Turkish and Greek food were my favorites, but I also loved the food in Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam.  Here are some pictures of my Greek lunches.

Sardines and caper leaves in Fira, Santorini, Greece.

Eggplant rolls in Fira, Santorini, Greece

Greek salad for lunch in Akrotirion, Santorini, Greece

Bruschetta with feta cheese and olives & Greek beer in Fira, Santorini, Greece

the owner of the Meteora Restaurant, who serves her customers right from the huge pots as we bring our dishes around

My delicious meatballs at the Meteora Restaurant in Greece

Here is a lunch I enjoyed at a riverside restaurant in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.  I love this kind of food.  It seems so healthy. 🙂

Cambodian lunch of steamed fish with dipping sauces 🙂 YUM!!

In Nepal, I ate a wonderful traditional Nepali lunch outdoors while enjoying a view of the Langtang range of the Himalayas.  This was my most recent special lunchtime break. 🙂

traditional Nepali food for lunch

my view of the Langtang Range of the Himalayas during lunchtime in Nagarkot, Nepal

I love taking lunchtime breaks while traveling, but if I make the mistake of having a beer or wine with my lunch, I get really lazy in the afternoon.  I try to save wine or beer for dinnertime, but I’m not always successful. 🙂

travel theme: mountains

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Greece, Nepal, Oman, travel theme

Saturday, February 16: Ailsa’s Travel Theme for this week is Mountains:  She writes: It’s hard to beat the soaring majesty of mountains. It’s also apparently hard to define exactly what a mountain is. Countries around the globe use factors such as height, elevation, relief and volume in a vain attempt to define them. The Oxford English Dictionary settles for something suitably vague: “a natural elevation of the earth surface rising more or less abruptly from the surrounding level and attaining an altitude which, relatively to the adjacent elevation, is impressive or notable.” Merriam-Webster doesn’t do any better: “a landmass that projects conspicuously above its surroundings and is higher than a hill.” Look up ‘hill’ in the same dictionary and you will find that it is described, helpfully, as “lower than a mountain.”

Some of the world’s tallest mountains are the Himalayas in Nepal.  Here is a view of the Annapurna Range taken from Pokhara.

the Annapurna Range seen from Pokhara, Nepal

Machhapuchhre, or “Fish-Tailed” at sunrise

Here are mountains, with monasteries built on top, in Meteora, Greece.

Meteora, Greece

And finally, in Oman, where I have never seen snow-cover, are the mountains of Jebel Akhdar.

the view of Al Ayn and the gorge on top of Jebel Akhdar

For more takes on the theme, see Where’s My Backpack? Travel theme: Mountains.

To see more of my trip to Nepal: catbird in south asia

To see more of my trip to Greece: greek wanderings

share your world: cee’s life questions (week #15)

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Cappadocia, Greece, Istanbul, Santorini, share your world, Turkey

Here are Cee’s life questions for week #15.  This is a great way for bloggers to get to know each other; it also encourages us as bloggers to share stuff about ourselves with our readers that we might not otherwise write about.  Thanks again to Cee for Share Your World – Week 15!!

If you had to move to a state or country besides the one you currently live in, where would you move and why?

I would move to Turkey, preferably Istanbul.  I love the rolling hills and the colorful houses of Istanbul, and how the city straddles two continents across the Sea of Marmara and the Bosphorus.  It’s breathtaking, the way the city sits on the water, with the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia on the hill.  I also love the coast along the Aegean Sea and the inland area of Cappadocia.  Turkey is romantic and rich with history and the people are amazingly friendly.  Hands down, this would be my choice.

Istanbul ~ the view from Galata Tower to the Bosphorus

If you were a car or truck, what make, model, year and color would you be?

I would be a hunter green 1974 Jaguar XKE Convertible.  I had a friend in high school who owned one and we were able to cruise around in it looking and feeling oh-so-cool.  Honestly, I’ve never really cared much about cars; my only care is that the car be dependable and get me where I want to go without breaking down.  But, if I had to choose, this would be the one.  Oh yes.

What one thing have you not done that you really want to do?

There are hundreds of things I really want to do (see my recent blog post: things to do before i die ~ otherwise known as my “before-i-kick-the-bucket list”), but since I can only do one thing at a time, the thing I want to do next is to take a yacht or ferry around the Greek islands and explore mainland Greece.  My plan is to do that this summer.

Santorini, Greece: the stuff of dreams

As far as personal accomplishment goals, I’ve written the first draft of a novel, but for some reason I can’t seem to make myself revise it.  No one has ever seen it except me.  So, I guess the thing I really want to do is revise it and get it published.

Where do you eat breakfast? 

I usually eat breakfast in front of my computer in the morning, while catching up on emails and reading my favorite blogs and reading any comments on my own blog.  When I’m traveling, my favorite place to eat breakfast is on a rooftop overlooking some beautiful landscape.

a rooftop breakfast in Cappadocia, Turkey