Revisiting: North Cyprus, Absinthiotissa
This lovely church and monastery, most of its parts dating from the 12th to 15th centuries, occupies a scenic promontory of the ‘Five Fingers Mountains’ range in north Cyprus. It gets its name from a wormwood bush (from whence the liquor absinthe is derived) that covered a cave in which dwelt a miraculous image of the virgin Mary. Like many places that I visited in the spring of 2006, I had the whole place to myself, and had to do some serious hiking to get there. But it was always worth it.
Revisiting: North Cyprus, Trapeza Church
I remember asking everyone I knew about this church and nobody knew anything about it. Finally, I determined to ride my bike to it early in the spring of 2006. I had to leave my bike at the roadside and walk into the huge fields of new wheat, which was gently swaying in the breeze. From the road the Trapeza church looked as if it floated on a green sea, far away on the horizon. As I waded through the grass, the closer I got the more beautiful it became, and I think it was then that I decided I had to work on this amazing structure (see Academic Articles page). Surprisingly, nobody had ever written on it before; one of Cyprus’s many neglected marvels. Exploring the Trapeza church was one of my many wonderful days on Cyprus, and I’d return many times to survey the building and do the photographic documentation for it.
Revisiting: North Cyprus, Carmelite Church
Another of Famagusta’s remarkable Gothic-era ruined churches is the Church of St Mary of Carmel or the Carmelite Church. Found in the Syrian quarter of Famagusta, along with the Armenian, Nestorian, and Jacobite churches (along with two underground churches), it was one of the city’s larger edifices. There are still frescoes to be found there, though tragically faded by centuries of sun and rain. There are sculptures, too, around the main portal. Like many of Famagusta’s many churches, it was built in the 14th century, when chroniclers thought Famagusta to be one of the richest cities in Christendom.
Revisiting: North Cyprus, St George of the Greeks
In the 14th century the Cypriot Orthodox Greeks built a ‘metropolitan’ or cathedral in Famagusta. Using Gothic designs but modifying them to Byzantine prototypes, the church had elements of both a French Gothic cathedral and a Byzantine church. But the combination, though beautiful, was a bit unstable architecturally. The vaults fell long ago, though they may have been helped by the bombardment of iron Ottoman cannon balls in the 1570 siege (a few of them are still ensconced in the walls of the church). It’s still today one of the great sights in Famagusta, filled with fading frescoes and ship graffiti, it’s a textbook of Famagusta’s storied history.
Revisiting: North Cyprus, Panagia Kyra
This time of year is a natural time for nostalgia, even more for me because December 27th is my birthday, with New Year’s just on its heels. 2016 is also an important anniversary since the beginning of 2006, ten years ago, was when I began exploring north Cyprus in earnest and compiling my digital photographic archive of the art and architecture of the region. It was the spring of 2006–one of the best seasons of my life–that Cyprus came alive for me; its history and beauty, its complexity and tragedy. It was the time that I had the idea to make the documentary film, The Stones of Famagusta, and had the first thoughts of doing the illustrated field guide to the archaeology and architecture of the area. This is an image I took on February 17th, 2006, of the church of Panagia Kyra near the village of Sazlikoy/Livadia. Most of what you can see here dates from around the year 1000, though the boxy extension on the left is later. The oldest part of the church was the apse, dating from the 7th century, where a fragmentary mosaic from that era persisted until around 1980 when it disappeared without a trace. Yet it was already mostly gone in the early 20th century; only an arm of the Virgin Mary and part of the infant Christ’s robe had survived 1300 years. The sacred mosaic icon was said to cure many ills, but one had to pluck out a piece of the mosaic and carry it around in one’s pocket. The efficacy of the icon thus ensured its eventual destruction; it was loved to death, finally to vanish in a final and mysterious iconoclastic moment.
Metro Shiva
The Hindu god Shiva has many identities, one of them being ‘Ardhanarishvara’, where Shiva embodies both female and male creative energy of the universe. I took this image in the fabulous rock-cut cave temple on Elephanta Island, near Mumbai. Note that Shiva has a breast on one side of his body, but is male on the other. He/She was ahead of his time. You’d think that a country with a god like that might be more open-minded about people with varying sexualities and gender identities. It makes me think of the time I was on a train and some ‘Lady Boys’ or transvestites came aboard to beg for money. It made me think there was a documentary to be made there somewhere. What kind of life did they have? India is probably the world’s most fascinating country, but also one of the most difficult ones to travel in. Still, I have such fantastic memories of my time there in the mid-1980s, when I backpacked around for about 4 months. No country has as many wonders, no country has such tangible poverty. What a place.
Smiley Face
Everywhere in India the schoolchildren love to see foreigners and often like to practice a few words of English. It’s fun for us as visitors, too, to see those wonderful faces. This little girl’s smile really shined.
Rainboats
Near Trivandrum, India, is a small port that’s a strange hybrid, with Muslims on the north side and Christians in the south. Yet the whole village is gathered around a small bay which one can walk from one end to the other in about five minutes. It probably has a population of about 1000 people. Gulf money has sponsored two giant mosques, which dominate the northern skyline. It’s much more than the village needs, but the overkill is ideological, not practical. All that money when the fishermen struggle to feed themselves and their families. Whether Christian or Muslim, they fish in their colourfully painted wooded boats, Jammed together, they make a pretty photograph. I liked this one, with a white egret camouflaged in the curves of the boats’ hulls.
Keep on Truckin’
This young truck driver in Old Goa was proud of his truck and was checking all of us out in our bus. He gave us a smile and motioned for me to take a picture of him. I think he knew he was good looking and was proud of that too. Now he’s on my blog, so he’s famous! On the window behind him is a decal of the monkey god Hanuman, a character from the Hindu epic, the Ramayana. I guess Hanuman protected him and his rig on the dangerous streets of India.
Chickpea Roasting in Goa
This picture was taken in Old Goa. After a tour of the churches of the area, since there was a festival going on and an impromptu outdoor mall had been set up with all kinds of vendors, our guide decided to take us through the shopping crowds. Everything was lively and all kinds of things were being sold. It was a wonderful open air market. Some sold roasted chickpeas and they were being roasted on the spot. I went back and took this picture of the man beside his rustic oven–made of stones, mud, and bits of scavenged metal plates–taking out a tray of roasted chickpeas and dumping them into a bucket. He worked fast and every movement seemed efficient. He was kind and didn’t scowl at me when I crowded him. Only later did I notice that the fan he used to keep cool looked like a halo behind his head. In the churches of Old Goa I’d seen many statues and altars of saints with golden halos, but for me sainthood lies with ordinary people who survive by working hard and giving their best, even during times of adversity. So my vote for sainthood goes to this fellow with his steel-fan-halo of sacredness.
Hopeful Kitten
This kitten in Cochin, India, lived down by the fish market and this picture encapsulates his misery. Whenever he put his nose close to a fish the fishmonger would give him a swat or a kick. Born into this Dantesque world of torture, all he could do is longingly look at the fish in their bowls and tubs, so close but unattainable. I hoped at least that, at the end of the day, there were some unclaimed bits for him.
Cashews Again
While we’re on the subject of the cashew factory (previous post), I took this picture of the weights used to weigh the tins of processed cashews. I’d taken the picture with the dust and the cobweb on it, which I liked. But as soon as I snapped it one of the managers (all of whom were male, while all the workers were female) ran over and started dusting them. I guess he didn’t want the factory to look bad.
Cashew Factory, Mangalore
It was hard to come up with a picture that embodied the complex feelings of being in the cashew factory in Mangalore. On the one hand it was nice to see the women having jobs and day care for their children, but at the same time the days were long and the work monotonous and hard. And the pay was meagre by western standards, our guide said four dollars a day, and dodged the question of how long a work day was. The working conditions were not bad, I’d say, but the noise was incredible and I didn’t see a single woman with a pair of ear protectors or plugs. So one is happy they have work, but also wanting conditions to be better for them. I singled out this one lovely woman at the moment she raised her eyes from her work to look outside. The light vaguely made me think of Vermeer. I converted it to black and white so that the light would be emphasized, without the distraction of colour. I imagined her imagining, of being outside and free of the mechanical clamour of the factory. It’s hard to see, but she wears a thin latex glove as she shells the cashews because the oil of the cashew shell is toxic. That’s why you’ll never see cashews for sale in their shells.
