ktravula – a travelogue!

Postcards from Lagos

Since it’s been a while since I made a picture post, I am using this one to feature a few of the new pictures I have taken since moving to Lagos. They range from snapshots in a crowded bus stop on the Lagos Island, to evening shots at palm wine shacks at Epe, idle passengers in Oshodi, and returning wayfarers in Egbeda. There are a few others clichéd shots of famous Lagos landmarks: The National Theatre, a bike rider on a cool afternoon, a random bridge, or the Lagos harbour on a morning (with moss floating on its surface); and one totally unexpected sight of an itinerant beggar carrying a TESOL bag.

Someday – before the end of the world – I will have a public exhibition of some of the most memorable shots I have taken over all this time. But for now, enjoy.

Minneapolis

I visited my third other mid-western state this weekend. (The first two were Kansas and Missouri.)

Minnesota is the last state on the northern border before Canada. It is bordered on the south by Iowa (where the Republican folks are now playing for nomination), on the east by Wisconsin and Illinois, and on the West by the Dakotas. Minnesota is known for its “10,000” lakes as for its very long winter, the Metrodome, and the Mall of America (the biggest mall in the country). There seem to be a lake on every street – as you’d see from one of those pictures above.

This was a very short, family visit, so here are a few shots. As you’d see, they already have an early winter that will probably last until May. This is the first post of the year, so I wish you a happy new year.

Touchdown, Joplin

Pictures of some of the most heartbreaking of the sites. These are the mild ones. The worst ones featured wrecked, torpedoed cars and total levellings of several huge buildings, and homes.

The pictures were taken around Range Line Road where most of the damage took place over a large expanse of land area.

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but none of these appropriately captures just how bad it is.

Walking the City

It is ancient, it is new. It’s cold, it’s warm. It is windy. It is dry, it is bubbly. It surprises like a carnival. It soothes like a feather. It delights. It surprises. It bores. It hugs. It repels: a beautiful half desert land of strange plants and creatures. Ruins. Concrete. Rust. Trees. Tar. Tall remnants of a history that comes back many times to relive itself. City. Town. Relic. St. Louis.