The Lantern Festival that takes place in China and other
parts of Asia, seems like a very interesting and beautiful event. And today’s
POTD captures nicely the graceful
beauty of the festival in Singapore.
This picture (and others) taken by weegolo, really brings the
event to life for those of use watching at home.
My last stop on the September at the Shore series is a quick trip to
Asbury Park, NJ. For some unexplainable reason, I’ve developed quite a
crush on this rundown seaside music town.
Earlier this year, on a gorgeous spring day, I was heading south on the
GSP, listening to Springsteen, when I got the urge to check out
Asbury Park, so I skipped the Turnpike and headed straight to exit 102 on the Garden State. I had never been to AP, but
I’d been hearing so much about how it was “making a comeback” that I had to go see for myself.
The Bamboozle Festival was in full swing, so there was lots of activity at
the Convention Center, where Bruce had played the Paramount
Theater to kick off the release of Devils and Dust
just weeks earlier. I wandered the streets near the newly refurbished boardwalk, snapping
photos of the famous
Stone Pony and hollowed out hotels that whisper of summers past. Although
Asbury Park may not be thriving just yet, it is surely alive and kicking. Economic
redevelopment is well underway, and
positive signs of rebirth
continue to appear.
I’m really interested in monitoring the growth that takes place here in the coming years. In the meantime, I’m
studying up on the history of the community, and I’m currently half way through a fascinating book —
4th of July, Asbury
Park, A History of the Promised Land — the story of the founding of the town as a Methodist retreat in the late
1800’s through the years to present day (2001). I’ll have to do a follow-up post when I finish the book. I’m also going
to try and catch the November premiere of the documentary
Greetings From Asbury Park at the Two River Film
Festival in Monmouth.
Asbury Park has an intriguing and captivating story to tell. It’s an up and coming shore spot to keep your eyes
on.
[Previously: Sea Isle,
Point Pleasant,
Bay Head,
Atlantic City]
We mentioned the fairly revolutionary
Web-only series that Yahoo is doing with Kevin Sites, the enterprising one-man band journalist who has been doing
mostly TV work up to now.
The series is called Kevin Sites In the Hot Zone, and promises riveting
dispatches from many of the world’s most dangerouus and miserable places. Since the announcement of this new series,
I’ve been very eager to check it out.
Well, it’s here. The first series takes on Somalia and features some pretty respectable photos as well as various
video clips of the issues Somalis face. It’s a good start. A little disjointed, and I’d like to see a bit more
narrative, but a good start.
Here is a question for you to ponder: should we care if the polar ice caps are melting?
Seriously. Does it really matter? Sure, certain places like the Maldives might disappear beneath the sea, destructive
hurricanes might continue to ravage our coastlines, Vegas might become beach-front property, poorly adapting species
might go extinct: but is it worth it to try to address the issue if it means giving up our SUVs and reducing our
insatiable demand for energy? Hard to say. And for now and perhaps the next day or two, the question is more
theoretical than real. So we have some time.
But if you’re interested in the subject just for conversation’s sake, you might find
this piece in the Times of interest. Scientists are
saying that the ice sheet way up there where no one really goes anyways….at least not New Yorkers (which again, prompts
the question, does it matter)…is likely to be about 20 percent smaller than the overall average of the last century
or so. Here’s a nifty map
showing the shrinkage.
So again, does it matter, or is it all just part of God’s great plan for this great spinning blob in space?
Years ago when I did my honeymoon in Israel and Egypt, I was down in the Sinai doing some killer diving in Dahab,
one of the coolest places by far I’ve ever dived. And at that time, you could see Mt. Sinai off in the distance,
looming there like something, well, right out of the bible. I really wanted to hike the sucker, and asked around how
that might be done. But it took several days to get a group together and there were all sorts of other lame issues
about getting there, so I bailed on the idea.
So it was cool to read this article
about the Sinai and climbing the mountain that at least let me live vicariously through the author. Hiking along with a
“cavalcade of camels” the makes the summit and finds it teeming with tourists, not the most pleasant thing to find when
you make such a trek, but still seeing the sunrise from such a place has got to be a once in a lifetime deal. The
article provides some nice history of the area as well, and makes a nice little travelogue of a cool adventure.