Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Wordless Wednesday #4





(Click for hugeness)



To see other Wordless Wednesday participants, go to www.wordlesswednesday.com

25 comments:

Simon said...

Top:

"We mustn't go to Camelot -- it is a silly place."

"It's only a model."

Bottom:

"Impressive? It doesn't even have a roof! Maybe they should have called it the 'Acrapolis'."

Mark said...

Top:

"I can't believe the best our agent could get us was the Homeward Bound in Europe."

Bottom:
"Hey, I can buy a lot of Friskies with the paycheck I'm getting."

(cool pics, Moksha. I love the animals' complete indifference to the historical architecture in the scene)

Unknown said...

Well done! Happy WW! Villager

Anonymous said...

Top:
"Honey, we're getting those for our next doghouse entrance."

Bottom:
"Behold, my playground."

Moksha Gren said...

The story:

In the spring of 2005, Moonshot and I joined our friends Elsa and Taltap for a week in Greece. Amazing trip with amazing friends. Anyway, one of the things that really stood out was the abundance of stray animals throughout the country. The island of Crete was overrun by stray cats. And Athens had dogs. Apparently, various humane societies offered to help the Greek government deal with all the stray dogs in the lead-up to the 2004 Olympics but Greece said they had it under control. They then ignored the issue until just before the games and then gathered up as many as they could catch and euthanized them. A truly horrible way of dealing with it, if you ask me. Anyway, We visited about nine-months later and there were still dogs everywhere. I have no idea what it was like before.

Top Picture: This is Minas, Dog King of Athens. Like many of Athens’ dogs, he makes his living by attaching himself to tourists and keeping them company until they start feeding him. He was polite, knew how the lights at the crosswalks worked and seemed to understand the frequently traveled paths tourists tended to take…he was often able to walk in front of us like some sort of tour guide. “Oh, done at Hadrian’s Arch? You’ll probably be heading to the Museum, eh? Follow me, I know the way.” This picture was taken through the gates surrounding the Temple of Zeus. The gates are locked in the evening and the dogs flock there to rest. It was here that we realized that our tour guide was actually the canine ruler of the dog world. The other dogs showed huge respect to him, moved out of his way, jostled to lick his chin. We hadn’t realized we were touring with royalty. Retired for the evening, this was the last time we saw Minas.

Bottom Picture: As guessed, this is the Acropolis. However, it’s not the main structure, the Temple of Athena. It’s the much smaller entrance structure. Not as many dogs up here, but there were several cats roaming.

As Mark mentioned, I really liked including the animals in the shots as they create an interesting contrast to the historical architecture in the background. Also, they were everywhere…and it seemed a much more real way to capture the modern experience of visiting these sites.

Thanks for the captions, everyone. I’m really enjoying the whole Wordless Wednesday thing if only to see what folks come up with.

Holly Schwendiman said...

Okay, I'm just busting up over the first comments of commentary - those are awesome. I'd love to go to Greece! Thanks for sharing!!

Hugs,
Holly

Rayne said...

Very funny captions, guys. they really made me smile.
Moksha Gren:
Thank you for explaining the photos. I had a good time envisioning your royal tour. Great photos by the way.

Josh & Emily said...

I think the cat looks stoned.

Anonymous said...

very nice shot!

Mz Jackson said...

Wow, I really like these photos! Thanks for sharing.

D-HOR said...

"(click for hugeness)"

That cracks me up. :)

Anonymous said...

Nice pictures. Believe it or not, I was reading about the Acrapolis, er, Acropolis today.

Christi said...

Cool pictures - thanks for sharing!

Donna. W said...

The animals make those unusual. I first figured you must have photo-shopped them in or something. What a neat story, and wonderful pictures.

Melanie said...

I love the pictures! Neat story about the animals.

Dorothy said...

Very unusual, but great shots. The story about euthanizing the dogs just before the games reminds me of the China story when dogs got rabbies there and they destroyed every dog they saw.

MommaBoo said...

I love how you incorporated your "babies" with the anciet buildings.

Nice touch!

Thanks for sharing!

Happy WW and blessings for a nice week ahead!

Sherry said...

Nothing like classic cats and dogs. Too bad that they let the animal population get out of hand to begin with.

Anonymous said...

Nice shots. I have to agree the cat looks a little out of it. Nice shots for Wordless Wednesday.

I just had to laugh at your comments on my Apollo capsule. Yeah it still is kind of out there in the middle of nowhere!

Pearls of Wisdom said...

Nice shots! Thanks for sharing and Happy WW.

Angel Mama ():)

Patty said...

very nice!

TorAa said...

These are really brilliant "tourist" photos. Thanks for sharing.

Simon said...

Thanks for the back story, Preacher Gren. That really adds to it. Midas is sitting there practically bleeding royalty all over the grass at his feet.

And Jet, man, don't ALL cats normally look stoned? (Or pissed off?)

Rebecca said...

Great pictures, and happy *late* WW!

Macoosh said...

these are sooo cool!!! sorry i'm WAY LATE, the end of the semester is finally over and I can return to being a normal blogger!! yippee!!! thanks for stopping by mine!