Wichita, Kansas, USA

Some chains are international, some national, and some, like Dog N Shake, are local. Want to enjoy their chili cheese fries, you have to go to Wichita, where the name, the sign, and the architecture will take you back to the post-war automobile era. [2021]

Wichita, Kansas, USA

Here's the world's first Pizza Hut, but it's so perfectly put together it's hard to believe it was so handsome when it stood on the streets of Wichita only minutes away from Wichita State University (moved to campus in 1986), where the brothers who started the chain found bellies begging to be brim-full of pizza. They were fast to franchise, and the rest is history. [2021]

Wichita, Kansas, USA

Cable-stayed bridges have become very popular since the 1990s, even for pedestrian crossings. But, the eye-catcher here is probably the Keeper of the Plains, the guardian of Wichita, who thinks this cable-stayed bridge was modeled on Indian bows and arrows. [2021] 

Novosibirsk, Russia

Siberian blue shows up frequently on the streets of Novosibirsk. It's one of the signature colors of not only Siberia, but also Russia as a whole. Red, on the other hand, is one of the signature colors of a certain cola company, and globalization as a whole. [1999]

Novosibirsk, Russia

Until Communism came to power, the city of Novosibirsk was built largely of wood, and many of the housing units were traditional Siberian cottages. Few are left. Those that are continue to reflect the chroma of Siberia: rich blues and greens, just like the colors chosen for the city's Ascension Cathedral. As for Communist-era buildings: no chroma. [1999]

Novosibirsk, Russia

Ascension Cathedral (Russian Orthodox, of course) came up with the city of Novosibirsk. Its wooden predecessor and the city both date back to the 1890s as the Trans-Siberian Railroad was pushing its way east. In 1970, rebuilding began (during Soviet days!) and by the time the Soviet Union collapsed, the new stone-built church was ready to take center stage. [1999]

Stockton, Maryland, USA

In broadleaf forests, you look up to enjoy autumn's colors. In saltwater marshes, you look down. These might be cardinal flowers: They seem to merit the name as they add some crimson hues to Pikes Creek Marsh on the Delmarva Peninsula. [2020] 

Stockton, Maryland, USA

What is that house doing there in Pikes Creek Marsh? And, it's on land that has been set aside as a wildlife management area. When will we realize that human settlement should not take over unique habitats that provide what we call today "ecosystem services" and which used to be called "natural capital"? [2020]

Stockton, Maryland, USA

Pikes Creek Marsh is a wetland that occupies a small part of the Atlantic Coastal Plain. The row of trees on the horizon indicates a ridge of slightly higher and slightly drier land where trees can take root. In swamps and marshes, just a few inches difference in elevation can yield an entirely different ecosystem. [2020] 

Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Phnom Penh occupies a confluence site where the Tonle Sap joins the Mekong. If you are approaching the city from the east, you have to get across at least one of these big, water-engorged rivers. Whether on foot or cycle, ferry boats are there to give you a lift. [2016] 

Phnom Penh, Cambodia

The golden dome marks the site of Phnom Penh's central market, or Phsar Thom Thmey in the Khmer language. But wait! That first word, Phsar, does not appear to be Khmer at all. It looks like a loan word from the Persian language: bazaar. In one form or another, bazaar is used all over the world for a market place. [2016] 

Phnom Penh, Cambodia

One is meditating, the other is asleep. Sleep habits differ around the world. Throughout Southeast Asia, napping takes place out in public and often in a hammock. It might be compared to the siesta in the Hispanic world, but one is public and the other is not. As for North America, napping during the day, and especially in public, is considered bad form. [2016] 

Elkhorn, Montana, USA

No one his age or driving a new FWD lives in Elkhorn today. He seems to be someone, however, who wants to spend a little time exploring one secluded corner of his home state. (Either that, or he's a ghost who haunts the road to the cemetery!) [2020]

Elkhorn, Montana, USA

The ghost town of Elkhorn is easily segmented into three zones: (1) the surrounding forest, which provided timbers essential to the mines, (2) the mining zone itself, with its mine shafts and tailings, (3) the town proper, which sprawls along a main street and periodically jabs into the mining zone. [2020]

Elkhorn, Montana, USA

Surrounding the town of Elkhorn are mine shafts galore, and the ore bins that serve them. Although the mining era was largely over by 1900, a new mining venture staked out its ambition to re-exploit some of the old mines in 2006. Gold was their target mineral, and its price was on the rise. [2020]

Elkhorn, Montana, USA

The railroad was far more important to Elkhorn than all-weather roads. In fact, the road into town has never been macadamized. Judging from the artifact seen here, though, at least one early 20th century denizen got a car up the mountain to a resting place where its spirit of early automobility co-mingles with the spirit of place. [2020] 

Elkhorn, Montana, USA

The two largest buildings in Elkhorn are Fraternity Hall and Gilliam Hall, perfect examples of frontier architecture from the late 1800s, when the silver, lead, and gold mines gave the mining camp an economic base large enough that it grew into a proper, family-oriented town with a post office of its own. [2020] 

Elkhorn, Montana, USA

With a population little more than 10, Elkhorn is little more than a ghost town. In its heyday, however, it had about 2,500 residents, constituting miners and their families, plus the business owners that supported them. By 1900, the mining era had passed, people were leaving, and buildings eventually began to collapse. [2020] 

Taipei, Taiwan

What is she doing on the sidewalk right out in front of her eatery? It looks like some greens have just been delivered curbside. They must be washed, so she does the job with a blue plastic crate and an orange bucket to catch the water. Voila! Clean enough to eat. [2012]

Taipei, Taiwan

The world has embraced Robert Indiana's oft-replicated LOVE sculpture. It grew out of the artist's boyhood in, yes, Indiana. Now, it has become a pop culture icon that graces landscapes around the world, sometimes in English, as here in Chinese-speaking Taiwan, and sometimes in other languages. [2012]

Taipei, Taiwan

What is the function of cats in an urban ecosystem? Unless they are kept indoors all the time, cats are natural predators, which means they keep the populations of mice, rats, and rodents under control. Unfortunately, they also eat birds. Whether their predilection for foraging around outcast kitchen garbage is good or bad, you can decide. [2011] 

Matthews, North Carolina, USA

Masks and 6-foot distancing are required at the Matthews Farmers' Market. Right now, we are taking bets on how mask wearing and social distancing will continue even after the pandemic. After all, the people of Asia have been wearing masks for decades as prophylaxis, and that would also apply to social distancing. [2020]

Matthews, North Carolina, USA

The Matthews Farmers' Market is located in the old downtown and is open every Saturday all year (even during Covid). Cabbage and leafy greens are exactly what you would expect for a shopping trip in late November. What are the clues that Matthews has been embraced by the expanding suburbs of Charlotte? [2020] 

Matthews, North Carolina, USA

If your meals come from the farmers' market here in Matthews, you are considered a locavore. In fact, you are a premium locavore since your food comes from producers located within 50 miles of town rather than the standard 100-mile radius which is the outer limit of a locavore's range. But, let's face it, most of us are distavores. [2020]

Lisbon, Portugal

Sixty trams serve Lisbon. This one serves the tourist destinations, of which there are many in this former imperial capital. It almost looks as if it goes back to the early 1900s when fixed-rail transit first arrived in the city. [2009]

Lisbon, Portugal

Lisbon's trams run on the electricity provided by overhead lines, so don't think that EVs, or electric vehicles, are something new. Line 15 trams are modern and air-conditioned, while other lines resemble trams of yesteryear. [2009] 

Lisbon, Portugal

Crowded bus stops, lifespan diversity on city streets, elevated (really elevated) highways soaring over 6-story buildings, no private automobiles in sight, plus a small fleet of night buses materializing after dark: Rarely do you see such scenes in American cities. [2009]

Topeka, Kansas, USA

Only a few blocks away from the Westboro Baptist "Church" is the University United Methodist Church, with the rainbow colors of the LGBTQ community flaming away out front and seeming to complement the flame that engulfs the stained-glass window. Would you expect anything less from a church next to a college campus? [2021]

Topeka, Kansas, USA

Right across the street from the hate group Westboro Baptist "Church" stands the Equality House, proudly painted in the colors of the LGBTQ flag (see it flying?) and now proudly donning a Black Lives Matter placard. The other flag is the blue-pink-white transgender standard. [2021]

Topeka, Kansas, USA

This is no April Fools joke! But the three of us laughed anyway. "It's worse than we thought," we proclaimed to each other. Yes, Westboro Baptist "Church" has become a tourist attraction. If it is really a church (though it looks more like a fortress), why were there no services on Palm Sunday morning? In fact, there was no activity at all. [2021]