Travel – Page 48 – a sibilant intake of breath

Malta photos, from film!

Along with some much appreciated Easter chocolates, the scans and negatives from the Malta trip arrived from my mother today. My thanks to her for all of them. Based on a very rapid survey, I picked out my seventeen favourites and added them to the Photo.net album. I will give them all a closer look after the QT.

A photographer’s self-portrait is included. All told, this one is my favourite; it was worth soaking my feet for. The square block you can see in the distance on the left is the castle on Comino that served as the Chateau d’If for the new Count of Monte Cristo film.

Technical details

The black and white shots were all taken on Kodak T-Max 400 film. The colour is Kodak HD400. It doesn’t surprise me at all that I generally prefer the black and white photos to the colour ones. All were taken using a Canon Elan 7N body, and a Canon 28-105mm f/3.5-4.5 USM II lens. Collectively, the gear these shots were taken on is worth about six times as much as my A510. Are they six times better? I would say not. If you care to compare, all the photos in this presentation were taken using my Canon Powershot A510 consumer-level digital camera.

Not having to worry about fungus to edit out of images is awfully nice, though I forgot how visible the vignetting can be when I use my circular polarizer at 28mm. Scans from Lens and Shutter also require markedly less sharpening than shots from my A510. I may well come back and give some of these more thoughtful editing, after the QT. Some of the B&W shots could definitely use some playing around with contrast.

As always, full sized image files are available upon request. Comments are always appreciated.

Travel plans

As the days get brighter, I have been plotting out travel plans for the period between now and the end of the M.Phil. My primary objective is to see the more interesting, less well known parts of Europe. Much as I enjoy Tuscany or the Italian coastline, it seems more intelligent overall to have a look at places like Estonia, Turkey, and Croatia, while they are reasonably close at hand. Indeed, Instanbul is my top European target at the moment; I am waiting for some combination of free time, money, and a traveling companion to come together. Within the UK, Dublin is the place I would most like to see – ideally with someone like Tristan.

The appeal of Istanbul has much to do with how exotic is seems. Especially after seeing the photos that Emily and Bryony brought back from Morocco, I am hoping to travel somewhere with an Arabic character. It should also afford a good number of photographic opportunities, which is becoming a critical consideration for travel destinations for me.

As much of Europe as their remains to see, I think it’s essential that I see some other regions sooner rather than later. At the top of that list is Africa. Three sub-regions have particular appeal: French speaking West Africa (like Ghana and Benin), South Africa, and Kenya and Tanzania. I remain seriously interested in the possibility of climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro in the summer of 2007, as a follow-up to the M.Phil. To finish an academic program, then climb 5.8km straight up one of the world’s most interesting mountains would make an excellent pairing. I’ve also heard a lot about how people have had their climbs sponsored and, in so doing, raised a lot of money for charity. While the time right before the QT isn’t right for contemplating such expeditions, it’s a good thing to keep in the back of one’s mind.

Asia is another major region that I need to visit. I would very much like to go to Japan but, like Africa, it’s a place I would much rather go along with someone who has local experience and, ideally, appropriate language skills. I can do well enough in Europe with English and French. I think that would be less true farther afield, especially if I want to experience things beyond the simply touristic.

Visiting Nick Sayeg in Australia would be a lot of fun, especially if it was a part of a trip that also involved Sidney and a good amount of New Zealand. Alex’s photos from there are enough to ensure it a place on the relatively long list of potential destinations.

Of course, that leaves South America. For me, South America is more interesting as a quasi-athletic possibility than as a straightforwardly touristic one. My father went cycling in Peru, and Astrid did her incredible looking Andean hiking. It would also be really cool to see Tierra del Fuego, and even Antarctica, if it could somehow be managed.

One third of my Eight Year Plan, the overall strategic framework that should see me through until I am thirty, is defined as “travel everywhere important, or that I really want to see.” Through a combination of planning, intelligent selection of jobs and schools, and opportunism, I definitely mean to do so.

Short Cambridge foray

I just returned from Cambridge, after a long coach ride in the same clothes I wore last night, on account of having forgotten the change of clothes I packed in Wadham. Largely due to time constraints, I saw hardly any of Cambridge. I saw the inside of Christ College, where we had dinner, and some of the surrounding streets. From the coach, I saw the river.

Like St. John’s College, in Oxford, Christ College seems to extend back in fairly linear fashion from the porter’s lodge. Meeting some of the students at our sister college, as well as a surprising number of Wadham graduates who I don’t recall having spoken with before, made it a fairly good use of 24 hours. The knowledge that I only have 15 days left before my qualifying test led to me going to bed enormously earlier than most people seem to have done.

Obviously, I will need to return at some point. I am off to shower and get back to reading.

PS. Mica has two new videos online.

Malta Trip Photos: Final Installment of Digital Camera Shots

Regrettably, there will probably be some duplication once the film gets developed and scanned. Even so, I thought these were worth putting up.

Harbours, boats, and clear seas

Interesting rock formations

Limestone farmhouse

Fisherman’s chapel

Field of flowers

My mother certainly has a disapproving look here, probably because of how much the wide angle effect increases the apparent size of the bottle.

Malta Trip Photos: Second Installment

I will keep posting photos here that are not quite arty enough to be part of the Photo.net album, but which have some documentary value that compensates. As a bonus, all photos on the blog are included at 1024×768 resolution, while those on Photo.net are a maximum of 800×600. People wanting the full 2048×1536 jpeg files my camera produces can request them by email or comment.

Valletta’s status as a frequently invaded city is demonstrated by the elaborate fortifications that have been constructed around the harbour.

An important trans-shipment point between the countries circling the Mediterranean, Malta has extensive ship building and material transfer capabilities, both in Valletta Harbour and on the south side of the island near the main power plant.

The interior of St. John’s Co-Cathedral is both elaborate and unusual. The church is rectangular, with alcoves along the edges and a semi-cylindrical roof. Also, can anyone – perhaps Tony – enlighten me as to the meaning of a ‘co’ cathedral?

The emergence of skeletonized dead from tombs is an exceptionally common motif on the panels that make up the cathedral floor, each of which seems to be a grave marker.

My mother under an archway in central Valletta.

Malta Trip Photos: First Installment

In some order determined by my patience and level of distraction by other ongoing concerns, I will be posting a collection of photos from the Malta trip here, as well as on my Photo.net page. Keep checking back for updates, if you’re interested.

The architecture in Malta frequently reflects its 98% Catholic population.

This shot was snapped between two chained and angry dogs, during our first hike.

Surprisingly elaborate steps down to a Maltese beach.

You can identify a traditional Maltese fishing boat by the Eyes of Horus near the bow, as well as a distinctive colour scheme.

Much of Malta seems to be either in repair or under construction.

From tiny island country to small island country

Well, I am back in England – where you can’t figure out how to turn on dryers and water heaters (the secret is often pulling on a rope hanging from some dark corner of the ceiling), where they will charge you as much for a half hour train ride as lunch and a whole day’s exploring in Gozo does, and where you will wrap your rain jacket around your shoulders while reading, despite being indoors, within the confines of a surprisingly sunny living room. That’s not meant as a series of complaints, of course. Indeed, I read about sixty pages of Bill Bryson’s Notes from a Small Island while trying to dry my socks on an icy radiator and can therefore say that the above is positively chipper by comparison.

In a few hours, I am heading to Drury Lane to see The Producers with my mother before trekking myself and a great mass of dirty clothes to Marble Arch for the bus back to Oxford. One piece of welcome news, delivered by text message as my mother and I waited in line at passport control at Gatwick Airport, is that Louise will be in Oxford next week. Her presence will either mean that I will have someone to scrutinize my efforts at revising, even as I play the same role for her, or that I will have good company to look forward to in those periods when I will take breaks.

Tomorrow, it will take the greatest restraint to avoid spending hours sorting and editing photos. That is to say, I will almost certainly spend much of tomorrow doing exactly that. I will then work myself into a proper panic by looking through the dozens of exam related Word document attachments that are lurking in my email inbox. My mother is stopping by Oxford on Monday and spending that night, before returning to Vancouver the day after. Hopefully, she will have the chance to meet a few more friends I’ve made in the U.K., as further demonstration of how clever and interesting Oxford graduate students can be.

Final post from Malta

Happy Birthday Lauren Priest

We had our final Maltese walk today, along the many small bays of the southeast coast closest to Libya. The major path we followed was atop a long wall of white limestone cliffs. One got the impression that some excellent diving might be done along that coast. Partly because today is a national holiday, there were also a lot of locals swimming or just sitting in the sun in the bays. Along the ridge were hundreds more birds in tiny cages, being used by men in hides to lure in their fellows for entrapment and sale.

In addition to about 350 photos taken with my digital camera, I’ve nearly finished four rolls of film. In all probability, I will be able to have a few of the digital shots online tomorrow night, with more to follow on Sunday. The film has a longer journey to make, but will ultimately be online as well. I’ve been trading URLs with some of the other relatively avid photographers in our group.

Malta, in the end, was quite a pleasant place to visit. The appeal was athletic, aesthetic, and intellectual. This is definitely an appropriate time to make the trip over, given how blisteringly hot I expect it will be here in a few months. For those of the ‘long pants, a hat, and SPF 45 sunscreen’ school of solar appreciation, now is the time to take in the views without being overly exposed to the cancer ball in the sky.

The end of poverty

As Kerrie pointed out in a comment, it is unlikely that Jeffrey Sachs’ objective of ending extreme poverty by 2025 will be achieved. If his figures are correct, that is a fairly substantial indictment of the entire rich world. While I haven’t quite finished his book, his central claim is the much of the world is caught in a ‘poverty trap’ wherein it is too poor to begin the process of development. For about eighty billion dollars a year, sustained for a decade, that vicious cycle could be broken for all those inhabitants of the planet who presently live in extreme poverty. That’s about 10% of the GDP of Canada – a nation that is neither highly populous nor highly powerful. According to Sachs, if the OECD nations actually committed the 0.7% of GDP (seven cents on every ten dollars) that they have repeatedly promised for development assistance, the gap between what the developing nations can pay and the sums required would be filled.

Even if Sachs’ most ambitious proposals are beyond what is politically possible, the idea of a poverty trap is potentially an incredibly important one. If it can be shown that countries can be lifted out of extreme poverty through what amounts to a one time grant, the prospect for eliminating extreme poverty is very real. That conjecture is certainly one that could be evaluated at a smaller scale than the laudable worldwide plan that Sachs proposes.

In any case, it is an inspiring book and one that people interested in world development should take the time to read – even if they happen to be on vacation.

Gozo visit

Today’s expedition was to Gozo: the second largest island in Malta, reached by means of a twenty minute ferry ride. Like the island of Malta, Gozo is speckled with churches of a distinctive architectural style, each of which serves as the most visible component of the towns of golden-yellow stone that dot the coastlines and hilltops.

Unlike previous days, our Gozo tour happened primarily by minibus. This allowed us to see what seemed to be a good cross section of the island’s attractions, and left our legs feeling strangely fresh at the end of the day. We saw a number of churches, the citadel, and a remarkable natural feature on the coastline called the Azure Window. I will make sure to post some images of it once I return to Oxford. It consists of a pillar connected to the land by a flat slab. Beneath it, the surprisingly violent waters of the Mediterranean churn.

The tour group format of this whole trip is quite unfamiliar to me. I am learning that it definitely has advantages: primarily insofar as housing and transport are arranged. Never having to mess about learning how to get places and waiting for buses really increases what you can see over a period of time. There is also value in being able to converse with relative strangers who you will nonetheless see again and again over the course of the week. I tend to work my way to the front of the column of walkers, pause to take a photo or two, and end up at the back again. This gives me a regular rotation through the ranks of our fellow travellers.

March may be the ideal time to visit Malta. The attractions of the place – like those of Italy – are split between the aesthetic and the historical. It has certainly been very sunny here, though not nearly so warm as July or August threaten to be. As such, we’ve been reasonably comfortable walking the terraced hills: looking at the cacti and lizards, as well as stopping regularly at the innumerable cafes. Malta certainly has more to it than you expect of a sun-and-sand style destination, and it’s certainly helpful that absolutely everyone seems to speak good English.

I dispatched a second wave of postcards today. Unfortunately, I forgot that the only copy I have of most people’s addresses is the one in my iPod – which I decided at the last minute to leave in Oxford. Thankfully, to send cards to people in Oxford requires only memory of which college they are at. I will also send postcards to as many people as possible who emailed me their addresses when I was in Estonia. With 81 emails in my inbox (as well as more than 200 automatically marked as spam) and the internet expensive and frustrating to use in the hotel, new contributions are not being solicited at this time.

The next two days are the last real touring days. Each is meant to involve a fairly long walk, which I am keen on after a day with relatively little exercise in it. I am onto my third roll of film (the second roll of T-Max 400, with another roll of HD400 untouched) and I’ve filled half of the 512MB memory card in my camera. Obviously, only a fraction of those shots will ultimately be good enough to post, but I am already looking forward to picking out the best (and removing the irksome fungus blotches from the digital shots). Mostly, the photos have been of the landscapes, though anything distant tends to be obscured by haze. I’ve also been chasing around some of the local wildlife. The birds in tiny cages that the hunters use as lures are easy enough to snap a photo of, though the result is as depressing as you would expect.

One thing that I miss about self-directed travel is the freedom to choose where you eat. The simple lunches of cheese, bread, and tomatoes that my mother and I have been eating are probably tastier, and certainly better value, than the hotel meals, which are fairly generic and not very vegetarian friendly. It’s certainly decent fare, but obviously geared towards meat eating Brits who are not very adventurous.

My return to Oxford will probably be late on the night of April 1st, after I see The Producers in London with my mother. Anyone who is burning with anticipation for an email response or a photo posted to the blog had best find something else to occupy their attention until then.

On Valletta and Jeffrey Sachs

Happy Birthday Robert Wood

My mother and I visited the fortified port of Valletta today. Aside from walking about in the centre of town, the group also took a boat cruise along the edge of the harbour, which divides into narrow sections like the fingers of two hands. Like Tallinn, Valletta has been subjected to a great many attacks and invasions, from different directions and in different periods. The ongoing strategic importance of a useful pair of islands in the middle of the Mediterranean is thereby demonstrated.

The city itself reminds me a great deal of the quieter parts of Rome. The streets are narrow and flanked by multi-story buildings with shuttered windows. Wild cats are numerous and fearless: sunning themselves and adding to the menace posed to Maltese birds by the many shooting clubs you can hear off in the countryside. The main cathedral is quite an unusual building, with a floor plan markedly different from that of any Christian church I can recall seeing, as well as a profusion of patterned wall sections composed of deep grooves cut in stone.

Today involved much less walking than the first day – a shortfall that it seems will be remedied tomorrow as we walk to and around the old capital of Rabat. I hope that the many photos I took over the course of the boat ride and wandering in Valletta will turn out well.

While I have been in Malta, I have been reading Jeffrey Sachs’ The End of Poverty. While it’s not the most well written book – his excess of exclamation marks is especially annoying – it is nonetheless one that strikes me as extremely important. The idea that we could eliminate the kind of extreme poverty that cuts people off from any chance of improving their lot and that of their children by 2025 is a profoundly inspiring and exciting one. It’s the kind of idea you really wish could take hold within the corridors of power and the hearts and minds of people in the developed world. It’s the kind of project that is enormously more important than any one life, or even the entire history of any one country. The imperative is to act as a collective in a way that humanity has never managed: to conjure the mechanisms by which bold ideas and conceptions of justice can be converted into reality out in the world. To be shown fairly convincingly that we have the power to end untold misery around the globe creates a real obligation to make good on that potential. It’s an effort that I hope to become a part of.