Harvey Travel Arts

I'm still fishing through the old to-be-sorted file. A couple of weeks ago, I posted on the perspective of seeing two different scenarios from one window. This time, my thoughts on perspective are a little different. This photo from a hotel in Mexico reminds me of an art class I took in college. We had to sit out in the hallway and draw perspectives much like the photo above. I'm sure the lesson was an important one for the artist, but it's also an important one for us as individuals. Don't loose your focus. Right now, I'm taking a Bible study on finding God when we're stuck in the wilderness. Life gets difficult. Illness, accidents, jobloss, the loss of a friendship, failure in school, so many things take our focus off of God and and puts it onto ourselves. This self centeredness keeps us trapped in negativity and keeps us from seeing what God has to offer. In this photo, most of what you see is concrete and bland. Through the doorway at the end of

I'm going through all of the random photos in the to-be-sorted folder. As I said in my last post, these are some old photos that have been scanned in from a disk. This one in particular took me down memory lane, and was a little bittersweet for me to find. It is a photo of one of our favorite restaurants when we lived in Heidelberg. Granted, this Cafe Journal location is actually in nearby Schwetzingen; the other one was on the Hauptstrasse in Heidelberg. The restaurant served delicous soups, sandwiches and salads for a nice lunch, or tasty entres for dinner. We preferred this location because it was a beautiful location to not only people watch (as you can do so easily on the Hauptstrasse), but to take in the beautiful palace across the road. This town had a great squre where the restaurants all were, a farmers market, and in the winter, ice skating. Some friends of ours lived there and we enjoyed spending many afternoons or evenings visiting the town. We really miss liv

I came across a group of pictures that I thought were taken with film camera. Instead, they were lost in a "to be sorted" file that Brian created. They weren't in there before and I'm going to ask him about it later. Oh well. It's a set of random photos from various times in our life, but most of them were taken when we lived in Germany. This one should be obvious, it's the infamous Leaning Tower of Pisa. We were so busy on this weekend getaway thanks to Ryan Air (that's a whole 'nother post, or maybe not) that we didn't actually go inside the tower. We walked around it then took the train to Florence where we spent most of our weekend. I think we also had a rental car, and spent some time driving the countryside. It's silly, really, but on trips like these we sometimes like to explore something mundane, like the grocery store or market, sometimes shop in a regular clothing store. You see, Brian and I like to learn about an entire cul

Last week I posted pictures of bridges from Venice, and talked about how we have to walk across difficult bridges in life. This week's bridge is from Hamilton, Ontario. We traveled there in the fall, and earlier I posted photos of the waterfalls. Today's post is to remind us to build bridges in relationships. I have had to learn how to build relationships because Brian and I move so much. I've made close friends at a location, only to lose the friendship after a move. Sometimes we stay in touch, other times, it fades. Perhaps it is a lack of common ground after we move apart. It's frustrating when that happens, but every new location brings new opportunities. It's not easy being new in town. At first, the excitement of the move starts, and I'm busy learning about my new area and getting settled. I start to make contacts for volunteer or work opportunities, but after three weeks, I feel a slightly nervous twinge at the back of my mind: it's time

I've never been to Haiti. I've known of a few missionaries over the years who have been and served God in that country. Today the Haitians are suffering a demise so severe most of us can not understand what they are going through. I posted this picture of the beach in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic, because as Haiti's neighbor, that's the closest I could come for a picture for this post. Sadly, this beautiful beach does not represent what most people on these islands experience on an everyday basis. And now, especially, their world has been turned upside down. Devastation runs deep beneath the surface. I, like many of you, have seen the photos. I can't look at them all, but I try. You see, it's easy to send money to help. To pray. Those things are easy, and they're very necessary. That's what most of us can do. Praying is so simple, and God listens to our prayers; He knows what's on our hearts. What is more difficult to imagine is t

Back last autumn, Brian and I went to Pennsylvania's Falling Water, a Frank Lloyd Wright house that literally sits on the water. I've talked about Wright's architecture in here before, but it always amazes me just how houses can be built perfectly balanced in unusual settings. I can't imagine being able to walk down my steps out to the water, or look down through a window from inside the house and see water rushing below. Despite this fascinating manmade structure, there is One who created the world, something no man could do. Many are familiar with the first verse in the Bible, in Genesis 1 that starts with "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." But God didn't stop there; he went on to create man, animals, plants, day, night, water. Where is your foundation? In the things of the world, or in God? Falling Water had to be structurally supported and designed in such a way to withstand the water rushing beneath it; otherwise it would have

It's cold out there! Much of the US and parts of Europe are experiencing colder temperatures than usual this winter. Freezing ice and snow in Florida? Snow Christmas Eve in Texas (which of course isn't well prepared for such weather). When Brian and I drove home Christmas, I was worried about the weather on the way down, but I didn't know that the bad stuff wasn't going to hit until we reached Caddo/Royse City area of I-30. We were heading to Hurst, and the normally hour long drive between those points took two nail-biting hours. The snow was minimal, but there are a lot of bridges; in fact, with urban sprawl, the road is almost all bridge. As we drove, it was accident after accident. Blue and red lights everywhere, cars skidded off the side. I have never seen such a succession of fender benders in my life! Fortunately, it looked like most people were okay, just dented up cars. We detoured off the bridges where we could; being native to this area of Texas we

Venice was unlike any city Brian and I had ever been to. I looked forward to walking around in the auto free zone and not having to dodge crazy driving, but I didn't think about the bridges. We're used to walking; we walk often in the evening, up and down hills in our neighborhood, and we walk a lot on our travels. But the constant up-and-down stairs reminded me that I wasn't accustomed to that type of walking. I felt even worse about my lack of fitness when I realized that the deliveries had to be carted over these steps. In the mornings, we saw a lot of men about, pushing carts of produce, office supplies, etc., over the steps and down the narrow alleys. To get to where they were delivering, they had to find a way to carry it all. In the same way, to get to our tourist destinations, we had to walk across many bridges, some large, some small, some one-right-after-another. It was a beautiful walk, though, and well worth it. There will be bridges in life that have

The Basilica at St. Mark's Square in Venice...what a beautiful building. The scaffolding on the exterior was a bit distracting and disappointing for a photo, but it doesn't take away from the obvious magnificence of this structure. You can still see the craftsmanship and the detail that is lacking in most modern construction. Brian and I wound up having to take turns to view the inside of it. When we walked up to the entrance, there was a sign telling us that no backpacks could be brought inside. An official at the entrance told us to walk around to the back to drop off our bags. We walked and walked, but could not see this drop off point. Seems there were others who were having the same difficulty, as there was a cluster of us waiting outside with backpacks for others to come out of the Basilica. It was amazing. I wish that we had photos of the interior, but you'll just have to take my word for it. Some say they get tired of seeing cathedrals in Europe, but I enj

Normally with my blog, I try to publish at least two photos per entry. Today's entry only has one. Hidden behind these walls is one of only a handful of Jewish synagogues still standing in the Jewish Ghetto in Venice. The story behind the Jewish settlement is not unlike many others across the world. They came to the area during around 500 years ago to seek a new life, one free from the persecution they were enduring. What they found was a city that, while welcoming their services, kept them hidden in their own neighborhood. The Jews were not allowed to own land which kept them from farming. They were, however, allowed to be doctors (dealing with blood and sick bodies was not a welcome profession) and bankers (charging interest was considered a sin to many in that time). They could do these things, so long as they wore their yellow and retired to their quarters by curfew. There were synagogues built on top of existing structures representing different languages from the exi