A Traveller’s Eye, A Thinker’s Heart
I like to tell stories. I like to take photos.
And I like to share them. Enjoy.
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THE ‘YOU NEVER KNOW’ RICE
A rice variety developed in China in 2008, stored in international genebanks, has emerged as a top-performing crop in Pakistan. After years of preservation and testing, this resilient strain—now called NARC-RICE-1—demonstrates the vital role of seed conservation in ensuring future food security.
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UNDER THE MATAPALO TREE. RIP LADD.
I was homeless in Costa Rica for a spell in the summer of 1983. But a mate had heard of a gringo who had just moved to San Jose and might be looking for a roommate. So I called the guy and we decided to meet up at Key Largo, the local watering hole for…
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PARALLEL UNIVERSES
There’s this movie I once saw … or maybe it was a book … about the main character living in parallel or alternate universes. In one universe the character gets up on the left side of the bed and in the other on the right. And that little act changes everything from that moment on.…
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THE WOODEN BELL
If you travel a lot … or if you live a long time … you acquire a lot of trinkets. Souvenirs of travels. Memories of events. I bought a little polar bear when I was in the Arctic. It sits in our living room now. It brings back nice memories of my trip to Norway…
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IS ARCTIC SNOW REALLY BLUE?
For years, I have been seeing photographs of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. And in nearly every photograph, the snow is blue. The Svalbard Archipelago is halfway between the Arctic Circle and the North Pole, so I often wondered if perhaps up there the snow truly is blue. I finally got an opportunity to travel…
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A SEED’S JOURNEY TO THE FAR FAR NORTH
It’s a long long way between Zimbabwe and the Svalbard Archipelago in the Barents Sea inside the Arctic Circle. It’s 10,500 km precisely. That’s a long way for a seed to travel. But a bunch of vacuum packed seeds of rice, sorghum, millets and groundnuts made that journey this week. I saw those seeds at…
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MURDER IN FJÄLLBACKA
I love a good murder mystery and am always on the lookout for new authors. So when my Norwegian friend, Inger, told me about a series of crime novels based near her Swedish holiday home, I was keen to read on. For a couple of years, I immersed myself in the Swedish coastal town of…
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SAFER, STRONGER AND MORE PROSPEROUS
I don’t know where to start to comment about this insanity. I’ll just share my personal perspective. I’ve always been proud about two things as an American: the Peace Corps and USAID. To me, they are symbols of an altruistic country who deeply cares about humanity. Both are the legacy of an inspirational national leader,…
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BIOPHILIA
I learned a new word today: biophilia. I was standing at our beach at low tide as the sun was rising to my back and I wondered why I found the scene was so calming, so serene. So just for fun I pulled out my phone and asked my mate ChatGPT, not expecting to get…
Adventures Agriculture Backpacking Bangladesh BOLD Bolivia Botswana Canada Cassava Chickpea Colombia Community Seedbanks Costa Rica Cowpea Crop Diversity Crop Trust Crop Wild Relatives Egypt Environment Eulogy Family Finger millet Flora Food Security France Friends Genealogy Georgia Germany Grasspea Guatemala History Hitchhiking Honduras ICARDA ICBA India Indonesia Italy Kazakhstan Kenya Kyrgyzstan Language Lebanon Liberia Life's Experiences Malaysia Media Mexico Morocco Mozambique Nature Nicaragua Norway Pakistan Papua New Guinea Peru Philosophical Photography Politics Portugal Potato Recollections Religion Rice Sierra Leone Sorghum South Australia Spain Sweden Sweetpotato Syria The Gambia The Netherlands Togo United States Vietnam Washington Western Australia Wisconsin Zimbabwe
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