Author: Ms. R.

Not far from the house with two house numbers is a large industrial-looking brick building that would not draw a second glance from most passers-by. But this old milk factory was once the center of an international milk war, which was then followed by a butter war. The building was built in 1904, spearheaded by father Van de Elsen, as the milk processing center of a  milk cooperative for farmers in the area. Because this is the border town……

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There are border towns all over the world where houses or entire areas sometimes move from one country to another when the border shifts, but what happens when the border goes through your front door? The town of Baarle is home to perhaps the craziest border situation in the world, with dozens of enclaves and exclaves dotting the area, with their borders running criss-cross through everything—including houses. This means that people could have their kitchen in one country and……

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Ice is full of surprises, and we’re not talking about that slick patch you don’t notice until it’s too late. Water’s solid state can take some wild forms. There is delicate, rare, short-lived hair ice, which is sometimes mistaken for wads of wet toilet paper. The frozen Frisbees known as pancake ice are much more common, particularly in polar regions and the Great Lakes, but they’re not actually as flat as a, well, you know. Each thin piece has……

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Right next to Tuvalu’s tiny airport is a small shop known as the Tuvalu Women’s Handicraft Centre. Lined with colorful handmade baskets, fans, necklaces, mats, fishhooks, and woodcarvings, the shop showcases the work of female artisans from the island nation. The shop is only open two days a week when flights land on the Funafuti Airport Airstrip. It is Tuvalu’s only souvenir shop. In Polynesia, it’s often the women who learn and pass down traditional techniques used to create……

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Zayaan Khan’s work as a seed librarian and horticulturist often seems fun and playful. As she talks to insects, sticks her hands in the dirt, and puts strange plants in her mouth at her workshops, it’s obvious she finds joy in what she does. But much of her practice revolves around the confrontation of a traumatic past. In South Africa, colonization and genocide have erased millennia of local food knowledge, leaving the country with a food system at odds……

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The terrorist attacks on four targets in the United States on September 11, 2001, shocked the world. In the years since the tragedy, numerous monuments have been erected in the U.S. and other locations around the world. One can be found in Padua, Italy, a glass sculptural installation known as Memoria e Luce (Memory and Light). The location is not as surprising as it may initially seem. The U.S. has maintained military facilities in Italy since World War II, many in……

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The Big Water of Fleet Viaduct is a large, disused single-track viaduct constructed of granite. It was opened by the Portpatrick Railway in 1861. At just over 274 meters (900 feet) long, 21 meters (69 feet) tall, the 20-arch structure was the largest engineering structure on the railway. The viaduct required much maintenance during its active life, cracks started to appear in the structure, then in 1924-1926 the viaduct piers were encased in red brick which contributes the viaducts current……

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At a park in the east Amman neighborhood of Marka, a local street cat stalks two small birds past shrubs and saplings. Deema Assaf, an architect turned environmentalist, stops talking for a moment to watch the interaction. Only a few feet from the oblivious birds, the cat freezes. Then it loses interest and walks away, curling up near Assaf in a rare patch of weeds—most of the unwanted vegetation was pulled the day before by volunteers. The birds are……

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At more than 200 kilometers (125 miles), Praia do Cassino is considered the longest sea beach in the world. From the breakwaters at the seaport of Rio Grande, the beach extends south to the Chuí Stream, where it approaches the border of Brazil and Uruguay. The beach is named for the casinos that were once common in luxury hotels in the surrounding area….

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Núcleo Museológico do Sal was founded in 2007 to document the ancient practice of artisanal salt production in Figueira da Foz. The museum is fittingly located in the middle of salt-producing establishments, or salinas. It consists of a warehouse repurposed to house the museum and actual ponds with a walkway in the middle.  Depending on the season and the amount of rain recently received, the walkway can be dry or covered with a layer of water, which can make……

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