Video of the day: flying rhinos in South Africa

by Elizabeth Seward on

Flying Rhinos from Green Renaissance on Vimeo.

Flying rhinos aren’t something you see everyday–not even in South Africa, where 19 of these endangered rhinos have recently been moved from the Eastern Cape to a conservation location in the province of Limpopo. Still relatively new, an airlift capture technique was used to transport black rhinos out of inaccessible or difficult locations. Suspending a sleeping rhino by the ankles through the air and to waiting vehicles is undoubtedly a difficult task, but conservation managers, wildlife veterinarians, capture teams from WWF, SANParks, Eastern Cape Parks and Tourism Agency, and Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife all worked in cooperation with each other to ensure the success of this translocation mission.

All in all, these rhinos were moved 932 miles across the country. With an average commute of just 10 minutes or so by helicopter, one of the advantages of flying the black rhinos in this specific manner is that they don’t need to be drugged for an extended period of time. The WWF Black Rhino Range Expansion Project has created seven significant black rhino populations over the last eight years–nearly 120 black rhinos have been translocated due to these admirable efforts.

Travel the world through the photography of Kyle Marquardt

by Jessica Festa on

While there are a lot of beautiful travel photos out there, the images of Kyle Marquardt have a way of capturing those quick, often missed moments while helping people to discover places not often seen by tourists, like a penguin the first second he goes to jump out of the water, a cheetah in hot pursuit of a gazelle, or an iceberg half underwater and half above. So how does he capture such moving shots?

“A certain amount of planning and expectations are required to go traveling, but when I’m finally out there in the wild, I have to respect that mother nature is in full control of the itinerary,” he explains. “I might expect that I want to get to see certain things, but you just can’t ask a group of penguins to jump into the water or a cheetah to sprint after a gazelle in front of you minutes after the sun rises in the Serengeti. You just have to show up and see what you get this time.”

Marquardt is also a photography guide, leading groups into the wild and helping them to enhance their picture taking skills while capturing images they never thought possible. When possible, Marquardt also tries to help the communities he visits. For example, on a guided photography tour in Tanzania, Africa, the group visited LOHADA, a local organization providing care, education, and shelter to young children and adults. After pooling donations, the photography group went out and bought the locals in need supplies like food, toothbrushes, toothpaste, toiletries, vitamins, paper, and pens.

Notes Marquardt, “We came to Africa for travel, luxury photography and excitement and could have forgone a visit to an orphanage. In doing what we did we left with an entirely different kind of fulfillment.”

Interested in taking a Photo Safari with Marquardt? Click here. And, if you’d like to immerse yourself in foreign cultures and landscapes without leaving your chair, check out the gallery below, which contains both published as well as never-before-seen photographs by Marquardt.

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A step inside the Cambodian Landmine Museum

by Kyle Ellison on

Just because Cambodia has found peace, it doesn’t mean it is peaceful. Just because the war is over, it doesn’t mean there’s no longer death. As thousands of Cambodians move to repopulate their former lands, their land is literally killing them.

From 1975-1999, the nation once known as Kampuchea was engaged in one of the most brutal episodes of warfare experienced in modern times. It was relentlessly bombed by US forces, taken hostage by a genocidal madman by the name of Pol Pot, and caught in the middle of a divisive struggle with Vietnamese forces and rogue Khmer Rouge leaders that lasted the better part of 25 years.

During this era of war, enough landmines were laid throughout the country to render 1 in every 290 Cambodians an amputee. An estimated six million mines are still waiting to be found.

Though some of the nation’s landmines are still discovered in the most grisly, unfortunate way possible, there are people out there committed to cleaning up the lingering shrapnel of the past. People who are driven to giving Cambodian’s back the land that for years has been utterly unusable. People who want to stop the suffering. People, like Aki Ra.

Like many Cambodians his age, Aki Ra has no idea when he was born. People tell him 1970, but he can’t officially be sure. In fact, Aki Ra isn’t even his real name. The name is actually a Japanese name that happened to stick, and from that point on, Mr. Ra has been known as Mr. Ra.

While many foreigners may question why someone would want to adopt an entirely foreign name, it’s understandable why Aki Ra may want to leave the past in the past; as a former child soldier of the Khmer Rouge who was given his first gun at the age of 10, there are many aspects of his past Aki Ra would presumably prefer to forget.On a three-wheeled tuk-tuk ride to Banteay Srei temple, an impeccably carved sandstone ruin that dates back 1200 years, I, for lack of a better term, stumbled upon the Cambodia Land Mine Museum on an unplanned bathroom stop. Located a 30-minute drive from the city of Siem Reap, the museum was actually begun by Aki Ra as a sobering window into the reality of the landmine situation in Cambodia.

And, as he is quick to point out, Aki Ra knows a thing or two about land mines. He used to place them in the field as a child soldier; now he’s defused over 50,000.

For his heroic work over the years and efforts towards cleaning Cambodia of its war-torn past, Aki Ra in 2010 was named one of one CNN’s Heroes of the Year.

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The entrance to the museum itself is lined by massive, unexploded bombs which were dropped by the US military while targeting the elusive Viet Cong. Meandering throughout the small museum, everywhere you turn is an instrument associated with death.

12.7 mm machine guns, A72 anti-aircraft missiles, PMN2 anti-personnel blast mines, TM 62 fuses, nearly all of them deactivated by Aki Ra. When an unexploded device is encountered anywhere in the country, a report is then filed, and professional teams managed by a collection of NGOs are called in to clear the ordnance. It’s unfathomably dangerous work.

At the museum, there is a fenced off section of forest which contains a bevy of landmines still firmly lodged in the Earth. Though a small sign informs the visitor all of the mines have been defused, I am still wary to approach the enclosure with anything but a nimble foot.

Though most museums across the globe provide a window into an intriguing part of the past, the Cambodia Land Mine Museum is unique in that it aims to foster understanding about a harsh reality that is still very much lived in the present.

At an orphanage in the riverside town of Kampot, nearly 300 miles from Aki Ra’s museum outside of Siem Reap, a teenage girl desiring to practice her English was quick to approach the only foreigner in the room.

“You’re English is very good” I genuinely told her.

“How long have you been living here in this orphanage? Where are your parents?”

In her answer lay the reason why the work that Aki Ra does is so important to his country.

“My father went boom” she matter-of-factly stated. “My father went boom.”

Syria memories: grieving for a dictator

by Sean McLachlan on


The death of North Korea’s Kim Jong-il has led to some very strange television–the Dear Leader lying in state, throngs of North Koreans weeping uncontrollably, even rumors of miracles such as grieving birds.

The images coming out of North Korea led to a discussion with some of my Facebook friends over whether or not the outpouring of grief was genuine or staged. I lean towards staged, since the only news we’re getting is from the state media, which has tried to raise Kim Jong-il and his father Kim Il-sung to the status of demigods. Then again, in the cloistered lives the North Koreans live, perhaps they do feel a sense of loss. Even the BBC discussed the issue and came to the conclusion that we can’t know for sure.

The whole thing made me remember my trip to Syria back in 1994. Pictures of Syrian dictator Hafez al-Assad and his family were everywhere–in shops, on the streets, in the front rooms of private homes–as you can see in this photo of what looks like a hotel lobby with portraits of Hafez and his son Bashar, courtesy flickr user Bombardier. Bashar now rules Syria (perhaps not for long) but it was his older brother Bassel who was supposed to take over. When I was there it was common to see photos of Bassel and Hafez side by side, and most Syrians assumed he’d rule Syria one day.

In Syria in those days, if you kept your nose clean the authorities generally left you alone. If you stood up against the government, they leveled your city. So Syrians toted the line in public. In private, however, many quietly told me how much they hated the regime. One admitted he’d never say such things to a fellow Syrian for fear that he may be a member of the secret police. In Syria, there are lots of secret police.

Then, on 22 January 1994, Bassel died in a car accident. I’ll never forget the grim military music that played on the state radio and television for several days afterwards, and the constant coverage the state media gave to his life and unexpected death. As soon as the news broke that first day I went out onto the streets of Damascus. Shops were closed and there were far more soldiers and police on the streets than usual. A rally was already forming in one of the main squares.The rally wasn’t very big, just a few dozen young men chanting slogans in support of the regime. There was no counter demonstration. Strangely, the cops seemed to be trying to calm the most vocal supporters. One young man got onto the shoulders of another to be more visible and started loudly chanting the praises of Hafez al-Assad. The cop made him get down and stop. It seemed that any outspoken statement, even one in support of the government, was viewed with suspicion.

The government declared several days of national mourning. All shops were to remain closed. I had befriended a shopkeeper near my hotel, a friendly fellow with good English who changed money at a black market rate for a steady stream of backpackers. Let’s call him Samir. I won’t tell you his real name or occupation for obvious reasons.

Samir lived frugally. I got the impression all that hard currency was going somewhere else. A nest egg? Support for extended family? I never asked. He was like many such people I’ve met in my travels in that he enjoyed talking to foreigners as much as he enjoyed making money off of them. I changed money with him only a few times, but every day we sat sipping sweet Arabic tea and having long conversations about everything except politics. Samir never discussed politics, not even on January 22.

In fact, all Syrians were silent with me on the subject of Bassel’s death. While they didn’t look choked up about it, they didn’t want to risk saying anything about the dead son of the dictator, not even to a foreigner. I saw no evidence of grief, not even at that rally. Those young men in the square only seemed to be doing some very public brown nosing. The rest of the people of Damascus just went about their day-to-day lives and kept quiet.

The days of mourning were declared over and Samir reopened his shop. I was just about to enter for our morning tea when a cop showed up. He told Samir that the mourning period was still on, and demanded to know why the shop was open. Samir cringed and pleaded that the radio said the mourning period was over. The cop told him that was wrong (it turned out they’d extended it at the last minute) and that he better close his store quick. Then the cop left. He could have hauled Samir before a judge, or demanded a bribe to keep him out of jail. Instead he just walked away. Perhaps he wasn’t fond of the al-Assad family either.

It was the least mournful period of national mourning I’ve ever seen.

So are the tears for Kim Jong-il genuine? If Syria is anything to judge by, they aren’t, but Syria and North Korea are two very different cultures and Syrians were never as cut off from the world as the North Koreans. So, as usual with the world’s most isolated country, we once again have to shrug our shoulders and say we don’t know.

Perhaps the greatest tragedy of Kim Jong-il’s death, besides the political instability, is that the passing that same week of Václav Havel has not received the attention it deserves. Havel was a dissident playwright in Communist Czechoslovakia who refused to stop making his art despite being repeatedly imprisoned by the government. In 1989, Communism fell and he became president, helping to lead his country’s transition to democracy. He did it with no bloodshed and a minimum of ill-will. And then he went back to his writing. Check out this obituary of Václav Havel to learn more about a leader whose death really does deserve tears.

New eco-friendly destination for 2012: Yoyogi Village, Japan

by Jessica Festa on

While the existence of the Yoyogi Village in Tokyo, Japan, is nothing new, it has never been much of a tourist destination. Aside from Yoyogi Park, one of the largest parks in Tokyo, there has never been too much there to draw the attention of visitors. That has all changed this past November, as the rarely-noticed area has been completely remodeled to be an eco-friendly hub of activity.

The project is one of many for innovative thinker, Takeshi Kobayashi, who has been involved in many initiatives to help people live a more simplistic and natural life. With this latest project, Kobayashi aims to show the enjoyable side of sustainable goods and organic foods.

The new Yoyogi Village is separated into zones that symbolize the balance of enjoyment and ecology. For example, in the Container Zone you can find venues like clothing stores, book shops, a travel agent, and an art gallery, while the Village Zone features a music bar, special VIP room, and an upscale dining facility called Code Kurkku. There is also a holistic mind and body center where you can enjoy reflexology, mind therapy, and aromatherapy.

It isn’t surprising that profits made from the new Yoyogi Village don’t go to board members, but to other farm and restaurant-based businesses to help continue the eco-friendly cycle.

To learn more about Yoyogi Village in Japan, click here.