This week I'll post a black and white photo, and follow Paula's theme. This is my younger daughter, the one who has provided me with twin grandchildren, and the opportunity to make frequent and extended visits to Poland. The one who cycled from Tokyo to Warsaw with her husband, after cycling all over the world often on her own: won the University Medal for linguistics: is training for a half marathon. And most admirable of all to me, as I struggle with basic greetings in that language, speaks fluent Polish.
Ròża at Gryżyna
I love black and white portraits. Unfortunately, most of them remain my private pleasure to protect the privacy of others. If my daughter objects, I can always touch blur her face.
Poland hardly ever impinges on my Australian world. However, the 25th anniversary of the first free elections since World War 2 precipitated a flurry of segments on Radio National's Saturday extra program. Here are links to them.
An interview with Radislav Sikorski, Poland’s Foreign Minister, who is an Oxford-educated former journalist and author, a respected strategic thinker, a frank commentator on geopolitical matters and a crucial player since the Ukraine crisis erupted.
Adriano Bosoni, a Europe Analyst with the geopolitical intelligence firm Stratfor, says it's not an exaggeration to speak of a Polish “economic miracle.” But he believes Poland must still confront some complex issues, including the reliance on EU development money.
In spite of its growing economic success, this 25th ‘celebration’ of freedom reveals a nation still grappling with some inner contradictions that stem from the big tragic arc of history.
A new international campaign was recently launched by Poland to capture the changing mood of the nation. Polska: Spring into the new. But Spring into what?
In spite of its growing economic success, this 25th ‘celebration’ of freedom reveals a nation still grappling with some inner contradictions that stem from the big tragic arc of history.
Guests Beata Zatorska and Michael Moran explore contemporary cultural life and different perspectives of Poland.
Because I'd read Michael Moran's book about his experiences in Poland in the early 1990s, “A country in the moon”, I checked out his blog
My image was photographed from the castle walls looking down to Lake Bled in Slovenia. Although I was charmed by the tenacity of this plant growing from the stone wall, I was terrified at the sight of a small child perched on the same edge, with his feet dangling over sheerness.
This week Thursday was indeed special, although it's taken me till Saturday to post. I've been home for two weeks, and Thursday was the first time I've stirred out, camera in hand, ready to delight in my own turf, and eager to begin a monster blogging project: visiting the 83 beaches of the Eurobodalla shire. To mark the occasion, I begin with something small – an assemblage of leaves on the sandy track behind the dunes of Jemison's Beach, in Eurobodalla NP, and virtually on my doorstep.
I suspect this challenge of Paula's may have set me on a new path to obsession. Since I decided to participate, I've been using Lunapic to turn colour to black and white, and I'm quite taken with the results. As I cull the three thousand photos on my iPad from my three months away (and this is after many mini-culls), I try some of them out for conversion. What I'm learning is that I need a photo sharp and absolutely in focus. And if I work with that, I end up with a shot that displays detail in an entirely new way.
Here's my first contribution to Black and White Sunday. It's new for me to post only one photo and I feel oddly exposed doing this. I think I feel that I need numbers to add up to quality.
It's fitting that my first photo is from Plitvička Jezera in Croatia, Paula's country.
While I was away, I developed blogging friendships with a number of people. One of them is Paula who lives in Zagreb. She is a photographer I admire immensely. I also admire her minimalist approach to blogging – one exquisite photo at a time. She invites fellow-bloggers to join her by posting something special on Thursday, at
Trawling through my photos, I found this one. As I was walking from my apartment in Dubrovnik to the old city to catch it in its early morning activity, I spotted this imaginative use of an old bath tub as seating in a cafe. It's a fitting photo to begin my relationship with Thursday's special, because Paula was born in Dubrovnik.
It may not be inspirational in quite the sense Paula intended, certainly not to other people. But for me it reflects the “fullness of life and absolute freedom” that I found in my seventieth birthday journey through my travel fears and Eastern Europe.
No. I didn't want to come back to the responsibilities of home ownership.
But now I'm here, I'm discovering that odd things give me pleasure.
Lounging about in my dressing gown, one of the few things I missed on my pootle through Eastern Europe.
Washing up with a plug in the sink: I never acclimatised to the lavish use of water in a plug less wash-up.
Preparing food with a bench top larger than a chopping board: mind you, I didn't actually do much food preparation while I was away.
Shopping without worrying about currency: I can actually hand over the right amount without offering my hand to be pecked at.
Living in the same time zone as most of the people I love: no more phone calls at strange hours.
And this morning, bizarrely, pegging out the washing. I haven't handled a peg since I left Australia in mid-May, nor has my washing dried in outside air. Right now, it's on racks on the deck: mottled by sunlight shining through the callistemon, twisting in a useful breeze, held in place by faded multi-colored pegs. It's those pegs that are the real source of my peculiar and puny pleasure this morning.
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