WPC: Baby Elephant Playmate

May 31, 2017May 31, 2017 / wrightsolution / 6 Comments

Down in Chitwan, Nepal in the late afternoon, the nearby river was the favourite place for the local kids to play. The rowdy young boys played football and swam in the water together. Our resort elephant took her daily bath and her three month old calf lolloped around the riverbank looking for a friend. The kids would chase her and encourage her to push and wrestle them to the ground. I thought it was so great to have a baby elephant as a playmate. I miss that place!

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WPC: Glimpses of Caribbean Life (Evanescent)

May 27, 2017May 27, 2017 / wrightsolution / 6 Comments

ev·a·nes·cent: soon passing out of sight, memory, or existence; quickly fading or disappearing.

I like to capture daily life from the car whenever possible. You get tiny vignettes of people’s regular routines, a glimpse of the mundane, extraordinary or odd. They are not always the best quality shots but I enjoy them for their evanescent quality all the same:

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WPC: Mother Thames

May 22, 2017May 24, 2017 / wrightsolution / 4 Comments

With so many amazing places to choose from where I have lived, at first it seemed difficult to pick a particular one. But then I thought about my own heritage and what that means to me. There’s no shortage of British heraldic symbols, but for me personally it has to be the Thames. That river has literally and figuratively run through my life, as a child and young adult when I lived in London, and now whenever I have the opportunity to return. Here are a few favourite pictures of familiar and perhaps less familiar portions, and Mother Thames, m’dear, I’ll see you next month!

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WPC: A Walk After the Rain (Reflection)

May 13, 2017May 13, 2017 / wrightsolution / 6 Comments

This afternoon the hot, sunny day quickly changed into a heavy, tropical downpour, which lasted about an hour. Afterwards we took a steamy walk, past the giant puddles and flooding. Reflections a-plenty….

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Cee’s Odd Ball Challenge: May 7, 2017

May 7, 2017May 14, 2017 / wrightsolution / 8 Comments

Here’s a few favourite Jamaican oddballs for Cee’s challenge this week. I have an abandoned clothing theme going on:

Off for a quick dip?

Or there’s this pair that was abandoned altogether. They inflated and deflated with each passing wave.

Hanging from an overhead cable that we drove under. Must have been a game or challenge!

Cee’s Odd Ball Photo Challenge: May 7, 2017

WPC: Warning Sea Urchins!

May 4, 2017May 4, 2017 / wrightsolution / 3 Comments

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They do look dangerous, although I’ve never seen a warning sign on any beach. But if you don’t pay attention, this happens:

The brittle spines do not come out easily. Expect to hobble around for a week until they work themselves out of your flesh! Of course there is always this revenge:

WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge: https://dailypost.wordpress.com/photo-challenges/danger/

WPC: Wanderlust the Hiker

April 28, 2017April 27, 2017 / wrightsolution / 15 Comments

My good friend Carla and I, off to hike the Coast to Coast path in Northern England.

Cresting the Ridgeway in Southern England

Crossing the moors on the West Highland Way, Scotland

I know I get around more than most. One of the downsides of moving all the time is that it can wear out the spark or lust for adventure. Just figuring out how to get your bills paid can be adventure enough at times! For my real getaway–my real adventure– is to go long distance walking: Seeing the trail written before you. Following it despite whatever the weather throws at you. Wondering what is around the next corner.

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Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Winter – Water

April 27, 2017April 27, 2017 / wrightsolution / 6 Comments

Last November we went to Utah for a week. Everyone was eagerly waiting for the first snowfall, which was unusually late. It finally came just a day or two before we left and this is the first dusting in the local park. I hadn’t seen snow in nine years. It felt very odd pulling coats out the back of our Jamaican wardrobe, but we needed them when the snow finally started!

Utah was beautiful and I was very pleased with these shots because they have almost a sepia feel.

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Winter – Water

WPC: Earth Education

April 23, 2017April 23, 2017 / wrightsolution / 6 Comments

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When I think about Earth Day, my strongest memories come from our time in Nepal and the opportunity I had to connect with many Nepali schools on the subject of the environment. In Nepal something like 40% of its population is under the age of 25. In recent years, private schools have sprung up all over Kathmandu in response to this rise in the youth population and the exceedingly poor education offered in public schools. Some private schools are better than others, but some are outstanding, offering education in English and Nepali, and include environmental issues in their curriculum. After the economic growth of the last twenty years, so many developing countries are now knee deep in trash and pollution, and there is a whole generation of young people who think that trashed filled rivers and polluted air are normal. Kathmandu is no exception. Education in understanding how to preserve the environment and build a more ecologically-friendly city is an important start to raising environmentally aware adults of the future.

I visited many of schools while I was there, learning about their eco-clubs and recycling efforts, participating in environmental projects with them and teaching “upcycling” as a creative way of making use of waste. Of course, through necessity, poor countries know more about upcycling than their first world counterparts, but plastic particularly is seen as just trash that needs to be burnt.

Above: Learning how to make useful items out of plastic bottles. I showed them a technique on how make storage containers and vases and then challenged them to come up with their own ideas.

Above: An Eco Club exhibit at a school outside of Kathmandu. The kids came up with allsorts of decorative and practical ideas.

Lastly, one organization collected clean wrappers from packaged food and trained women how to weave them into recyclable products such as colourful baskets and bags, which were sold to tourists to create a livelihood project in the local community.

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WPC: Surprise Poetry!

April 13, 2017April 13, 2017 / wrightsolution / 4 Comments

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I love discovering lonely places. One day, out hiking on our Greek island, we stumbled upon an abandoned home. It still had some furniture and signs of earlier life, although it was quickly becoming derelict. As we briefly poked around, I was delighted to make the surprise discovery of a poem that was painted on the living room wall behind the sofa:

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The Greek was way beyond my level, so I asked a Greek friend to translate. She tells me that the poem is by a famous Greek poet called Kostis Palama and translates roughly as follows:

Let other faraway travelers search for the magical edelweiss on the highest mountains of the Alps

Unmoving spirit, that every April you grace me in my village garden

Oh, lakes and fjords, and western palaces, temples, and ports

Northern lights, tropical blossoms, and meadows

Wonders of the art, and unbelievable beauties of the world

I only love this small little island and always keep its image in my eyes.

I love the idea of someone passing their days in this once-pretty home. They sat on that wooden sofa, looking out to sea, and loving their “small, little island.” It made me sad to see that its day had passed.

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