Tag: Lebanon
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BAALBEK, THE CITY OF THE SUN
While on assignment in Lebanon, I took an afternoon off to vist the ruins of Baalbek, located in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley. They are among the world’s most impressive and best-preserved Roman archaeological sites. Once known as Heliopolis, or the “City of the Sun,” Baalbek was a major religious center dedicated to Jupiter, Venus, and Bacchus. The sprawling complex features towering columns, massive stone blocks, and ornately carved temples, including the Temple of Bacchus—one of the best-preserved Roman temples anywhere. The sheer scale and craftsmanship reflect Rome’s imperial power and architectural mastery.…
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BACK AT ICARDA
It’s taken me 25 years, but I’ve finally returned to the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas, the organisation I once worked for. This time it wasn’t in Syria but the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon … but Syria was just a few kilometres away beyond the mountains in this photo. The location has changed but not the work. ICARDA is doing some amazing work in regenerating seeds from crops native to the Fertile Crescent. For me, it felt like old times when I lay down in the soil…
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REPLENISHING THE SEED OF THE FERTILE CRESCENT
Ahmed Amri stood in the middle of a checkerboard-patterned field. “This field sums up the diversity of wheat in the Fertile Crescent,” said Ahmed. “All the plots are wild wheat, but each one is slightly different, and any one of these could possess a beneficial trait which could help crop breeders develop wheat varieties more resilient to climate change.” Ahmed, the head of the Genetic Resources Section of the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), was surveying seed regeneration plots in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley, in the very…
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FUN IN THE GENEBANK
In the 48 hours I was at ICARDA’s Terbol station in Lebanon, I shot close to 1000 photos. This is my favourite and sums up the joy I felt in sharing time with ICARDA’s Genetic Resources team. As I started firing off shots of Ahmed Amri and Mariana Yazbek in the genebank’s active collection, I questioned why Ahmed was so serious. Earlier in the day he had told me ‘I am always smiling’. I must have caught him in a serious moment of reflection while studying the bar codes of the…
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