Melting Hail Stones

The Winter crept on me, and I found myself suddenly standing under heavy clouds blinking at a gray blanketed Winter day!

I am writing to you  with one hand while the other is reaching out collecting pearls of hail stones falling from the sky, soon melting away in my palms like those days spent on the shore of this land.

I have been loving my days of Dahab, It struck me today that it has been six month since I arrived to this beautiful Bedouin village. Here, I have been spending many early morning..

Strolling along a promenade, where rusty street lamps stood, mere shadows of their former selves,

wandering shores strewn with sea garlands

and sea shells full of  sea tales..

and bird feathers and curious sea treasures.

I have been climbing the summits of ancient mountains..

and I found solace in the echoing silence, between mountain peaks and boulders..

and ancient stories embedded on sharp-edged mountain stones.



I have been diving to the heart of a deep blue sea..

when a reach of sunlight fell through its surface..

a wondrous world was illuminated before me.

Dahab has  been brimming with joyful wonders, alas it's time now to pack and wind my way back, with heavy pockets full of cherished memories and sand, to the edge of the city, to a tiny nook that I call home.
Meeting Dahab was like meeting an old friend, warm and familiar, and so with  a promise to come back, I bed you dear old friend-land farewell.

"Traveling provides occasions for shaking oneself up but not, as people believe, freedom. Indeed it involves a kind of reduction: deprived of one’s usual setting, the customary routine stripped away like to much wrapping paper, the traveler finds himself reduced to more modest proportion – but also more open to curiosity, to intuition, to love at first sight." - Nicolas Bouvier, The Way of the World

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Cat Who Run With The Sheep

 From mother sheep's milk she was fed

and a among this herd she peacefully lived..

as one of their own.

Photos by Mitzi Buys

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Karnetta - The Eight Arms Of Inspiration

In the quietness of an early Dahab morning, there's only the sound of calm waves rushing to shore and right into my imagination, I mounted the shoulder blade of a lonely rock sculpted by waves and time and watched the sun whisper first ray of light into the day.

my vision was filled with shimmering beauty..

 while Eel & Lion fish trotting below my feet like magic...

 when the sun moved higher I dismounted my rock, I walk toward the shore, scattering the golden stream of sunlight reflected on the surface of the sea, I'm enchanted.

I walked along the shore, by mountains and sea delighting in the beauty and intensity of the landscape

I passed by a fellow admirer of the new day canvas, unaware of danger lurking beneath..

below his rock there laid the trickster of the sea, with his eight arms wandering cautiously...

But alas, this fellow crab was fast and alert, he out ran eight arms of  a witty sea trickster and took a fast leap into the sea, leaving a disappointed octopus wondering aimlessly..

When I went back to my drawing table, I found him waiting for me.. 

with his playful arms wrapped around my rusty wheels on imagination, he managed to make them turn... 

as I was playing with eight arms and possibilities this fluttering fellow paid me a visit, with his critic round eyes he moved through my scribbles, from one arm to the other, wings fluttering -I hope in approval- before he took a flight into the day..

and all too soon there he was before my eyes, looking back at me with a curious glance..

delighting in a paper boat, making ripples...

resting atop a lonely rock by the sea 

while buffer fish float around him like thoughts.

and just in case you're wondering,

 "karnetta" is the Octopus Bedouin name.

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