Best Places of Interest - Page 50 of 181

November 16, 2018 Travel, Round the world

How To Take Amazing Photographs Of Yourself As A Solo Traveler

Photos by Lucas Favre on Unsplash ,solo traveller

Travelling solo is a great way to gain new insights, experiences, and discoveries about the world you live in – and about yourself. When you’re on your own, you have the freedom to roam wherever and whenever you want and do whatever you please. You’re alone, and it’s one of the best feelings ever – unless you want to take home a good photo of yourself.

Since no one’s available to take a photo of you, chances are that you end up stretching your arms the farthest they can get, only to get a selfie that captures 20% scenery and 80% face.

But for some savvy travellers and photography enthusiasts, who always take their IG feed, blog or vlog, and personal album to the next level, solo travel photos are never an issue. You can snap a photo of yourself, in a picturesque location, even if you’re out on your own.

You just need to remember three great Cs: Camera, Creativity, and Confidence.

Camera and Gear

Your tripod is your BFF

A tripod is every solo traveller’s best friend.

You can have a long shot of the beautiful place with you in it without the help of another human. There are three ways:

Set the timer for 10 to 20 seconds, run in front of the camera/phone, and strike a pose.
Set your camera to burst mode, a setting that lets you take lots of photos in a short time.
Purchase a remote controller for easier access.

Next to holding your camera in place as you pose, using a tripod is also recommended for photographers who want to capture photos using long exposure, like shots of northern lights, night sky, fireworks display, and other dark scenes. Perfecting these shots is impossible with shaky hands.

Pick a tripod that’s sturdy enough to hold the camera and withstand the winds. For a more travel-friendly option, go for a lightweight and versatile gorilla pod or a mini tripod that fits easily in your pocket. Lastly, be mindful of your belongings, especially when shooting in public places. One can easily steal your beloved equipment while you’re striking a pose.

2. Bring a monopod or selfie stick

A monopod or selfie stick is a more convenient option. Just pull it out at every opportunity, strike a pose, and click – just like when you’re ziplining. It’s easy to use, carry around, and store inside your bag.

Selfie sticks, however, can only do so little if you want to capture more of the destination. You have a closer shot of yourself and a more limited shot of the space since the stick can be extended only up to 75cm long.

But hey, it’s enough to get more of a landscape into your photo than with a standard way of taking selfies. I mean, just look at the featured photo above. You can even use special effects to up your selfie game, like using fisheye lenses.

3. Use an action camera

Love outdoor adventures? An action camera is a must-have. It can capture images in environments where other cameras may fear to tread.

They come in a waterproof protective case, so you can get extraordinary shots, like when you’re playing with the school of fishes underwater or you’re tumbling through the air. Since it’s small and lightweight, you can place it anywhere – even on your head.

Creativity

4. Take videos and freeze your favourite frame

Just capture a moving picture and freeze it – that’s one amazing way to get a shot that looks alive. The technique works to give you that “candid-looking” shot of you walking along the beach or a jaw-dropping shot of you floating in the air (jump shot).

5. Snap random parts of your body

Sick of seeing your face in every picture? Take a break and just snap random parts of your body. You can take a shot of your feet on the white sand, with the turquoise sea in front of you, or a shot of your hand, holding a vivid cocktail glass in a busy bar.

6. Make the most of the reflective surfaces

We’re not just talking about cringy hotel bathroom selfies – we’re talking about making the most of different reflective surfaces you can encounter. One example is using the glass windows of restaurants and cars and taking a photo of your sunglasses that reflects the picturesque view.

7. Play with different viewpoints and angles

A close-up shot, medium shot, long shot, extreme long shot, low angle, high angle, bird’s eye view, worm’s eye view – your pictures will shine if you have a variety of angles and viewpoints. Use silhouettes too.

Confidence

8. Ask a stranger

Don’t have the skill and set of gears to take photos of yourself? You can always seek help from other people – like friendly strangers.

Ask a stranger to take a photo of you. It can be a hotel staff in the hotel you’re staying in, or a waiter at a restaurant, or a tourist like you. Find someone holding a camera, which may imply that they know how to shoot.

And besides, you’re not only travelling to see a foreign place or culture. You’re there to take part in a whole different world or way of life. Interacting with a new person is a great way to make memories.

9. Work it!

By taking a photo of yourself, especially if you’re carrying attention-grabbing gear, you might get that “look at that self-centred tourist right there” kind of glare from people.

The key is to stop caring: The less you care, the better the photos will turn out. You won’t even notice if anyone’s looking at you because you’re too busy framing the shot. It’s better to feel slightly uncomfortable for a little while than leave the place with regret because you weren’t able to document your journey through photographs.

Carmina Natividad is one of the writers for Holiday Inn Parramatta Hotel, a modern hotel in Western Sydney known for their exceptional hotel accommodation and location, which appeals to travellers in Australia. She has always been passionate about giving in to her wanderlust and collecting mementoes from different places.

November 14, 2018 Round the world, Travel

Beyond neon signs

Hong Kong china night cityscape coastline coast

The financial hub and port known for its skyscrapers and bustling markets has a scenic side waiting to be explored.

Cut through the brick and mortar and Hong Kong can be quite a revelation. The land we usually perceive as a concrete jungle dotted with shopping malls and high-rise buildings has 40 percent of the area covered by national parks. One wonders why there are not many more people exploring its majestic islands, beautiful trek and nature trails, scenic beaches, caves, fishing villages and some of the most adventurous cable car rides to reach these vantage points. Just a bit of research can change the been-there-done-that mindset that people usually have while visiting Hong Kong especially the frequent business travellers.

Nature trail

Lantau Trail Section 2 - Silver grass | by ystsoi Hong Kong — Lantau Trail Section 2 – Silver grass | by ystsoi

Get up early and enjoy one of the 25 hiking trails in Hong Kong. Nicely paved and dotted with well laid steps along the way, these hikes do not require you to be a fitness enthusiast. It was heartening to see people from all ages an octogenarian to an infant along with their families enjoying these trails. You could choose one from MacLehose trail, Dragon’s back, Hong Kong trail or Lantau trail. Each one of them is a different experience and takes you to spots that offer breath-taking views. If you think these are just small artificial stretches laid out for hiking, you could not be more mistaken. MacLehose trail is the longest and stretches up to 100km-meaning if you’re game, you can walk on and on.

Surf’s up

Hong Kong has a beach for all kinds of people. If you like surfing, head to Big Wave Bay beach. If lazing and soaking in the sun is your idea, head to Cheung Sha and Pui O beaches. Enjoy barbeques at Hung Shin Yeh beach and swimmers can head to Mui Wo and Silver Mine Bay beach. Tung Wan or Kwun Yam beaches are perfect for windsurfing fans. And if you simply want to enjoy a resort-like relaxed vibe, Repulse Bay beach is your must go.

You may also like to read 14 Best Romantic Things to do in Hong Kong

Go Fish

For a peek into the original Cantonese culture and gorgeous coastal scenery, head to seaside towns and villages like Tai O, Sai Kung, Cheung Chau and Shek O. Narrow streets, single-storey homes with clothes drying outside, roadside seafood stalls and cafes selling traditional Cantonese seafood, quaint temples and a very laid back attitude is definitely not the Hong Kong you may have seen or experienced in your previous visits. These fishing villages are mostly visited by locals on weekends rather than the tourists.

Water sports

Particularly kayaking, standup paddle-boarding, windsurfing and sailing are big with locals. Do check the weather and schedules during your visit though.

Must try

Tim Ho Wan– Cheapest Michelin Star chain across Hong Kong and the rest of the world with 50 outlets. Their dim sums and roasted pork buns are to die for.

The Flea Market of Sham Shui Po uncannily resembles Mumbai’s Crawford Market or Delhi’s Sarojini Nagar market, selling daily household items, clothes and electronics. But mostly, it’s known for its cheap and authentic street food. Try the snacks and desserts made from soft silky tofu at Kung Wo Dou Bun Chung.

A tea tasting workshop at MingCha Tea House is a tea lover’s delight.

Modern Cantonese cuisine is the latest range with many trendy high-end outlets here.

You may also like 20 Hong Kong Foods you must try

Nausheen Tareen’s article was published in Times Life dated November 11 2018

November 12, 2018 Literature/ Art/Music/Education

What is Eurythmy? It’s a path to self- knowledge

Eurythmy is not dance, nor mime, but an art of movement, wherein speech and music are made visible through the conscious movements of the limbs.

In 1912, Dr. Rudolph Steiner, an Austrian initiate, scientist, artist and philosopher, brought a new art of movement into existence on the foundation of Anthroposophy.

Anthroposophy is a path of knowledge, which changes one’s whole outlook to life. A new world of consciousness opens. “Anthropos’’ in Greek means the human being, striving through the inner wisdom or consciousness, “Sophia”, to receive the wisdom or universal consciousness.

Sound creates movement

Anthroposophy brings new light of consciousness into every field of life, from education, curative education, arts and science, to medicine, architecture, social science, bio-dynamic farming and a new art of movement called Eurythmy.

The new art is not a dance, nor a meme, but an art of movement, making visible the “EU”- beauty and harmony of sound in speech and music and creating a new health-giving rhythm in the organism. Eurythmy is speech and music made visible through conscious movements of the limbs. Eurythmy uses for its expression the most flexible of all instruments, the human body. Eurythmy knows no limitations in its possibility for the development of the body, mind and soul. Sounds contain wisdom, laws and mystery of the universe.

Sounds made visible through conscious movements of the limbs in Eurythmy, make these very laws more real and unlock step by step, the dynamic force behind the tangible world. These are the very forces, which are working in us, sustaining our organism.

The very fabric of our being is created by the formative forces of the cosmos. The whole universe is created out of sound with its seed in Om or Aum. The Upanishad says: “Brahma begins creation”. It means the whole creation comes out of sound. Om is the universe.

Invoking these sounds, activating them through the movements of Eurythmy, we strengthen a general feeling of wellbeing. Not only that, but Eurythmy is differentiated, since sound is also differentiated in structure, and the process of its unfolding is highly curative for any illness, be it of the psychosomatic kind, chronic or acute.

Aspects of Eurythmy

Dr. Steiner has developed Eurythmy along a three-fold aspect. Firstly, as a performing art, secondly as group Eurythmy for children and adults, thirdly, therapeutically as curative Eurythmy in Rudolf Steiner clinics, hospitals, institutions and homes.

Dr. Steiner has given innumerable indications for Curative Eurythmy for innumerable physical and mental problems. These curative exercises must be done under the doctor’s guidance, otherwise the same could be harmful if given without proper guidance or responsibility. Through Eurythmy one experiences health in its totality.

Through Eurythmy one becomes more sensitive, more ecologically conscious and more aware of forming a deep connection to whatever one is doing in everyday life.

Eurythmy does not try to manipulate one’s destiny in order to seek a quick and easy way out of one’s problems. Instead, Eurythmy tries to strengthen one’s inner self to combat and overcome difficulties and not to push away any difficulty by strategy.

Where to watch this?
Light Eurythmy Ensemble from Dornach, Switzerland, performing on Saturday, November 24, at 10.30am at Inodal Waldorf School, Andheri West, Mumbai.

Dilnawaz Bana, had her training in Dornoch, a town near Basel in Switzerland, which houses the University of Spiritual Sciences, known as the “Goetheanum”. Complete study to become a Curative Eurythmyist can extend up to six years of sound study, which includes subjects like speech formation, painting, sculpturing, geometry and basic study of the anatomy and physiology

November 9, 2018 Food

Street food France

Paris is the capital and most populous city of France. Situated on the Seine River, in the north of the country, it is in the centre of the Île-de-France region, also known as the region Parisienne, “Paris Region”.

Paris: City of lights! Paris is the capital of the culinary world and food is equally treated as an art form. In this city, each food has its own specializing store: boulangerie, fromagerie and charcuterie. Ishai has 24 hours to dive into the wonderful French cuisine, where he will learn how to make the baguette, smell so many cheeses his senses will go into overload and meet with the famous food critic, Gilles Pudlowski.

In my earlier post on What is your favourite street food? Part 14, mentioned street food in France. I came across this funny video which I would like to share with you.

Travel Picks: Top 10 Street – Food cities (in English)

So, what is your favourite street food?