Tsuruoka-shi — The view was good. There isn’t much to crave when sleeping in a temple — a decent futon, reasonably new tatami, a bath. Everything else is icing — great food, and of course, a view. I think this is t...
Shibuya-ku — Last night I had the opening of my first solo exhibition in Harajuku, Tokyo. The gallery was full of a selection of drawings, illustrations and sketches I have done in the last 3 years. A little bit l...
Petaluma — I’ve been home for four days, but my body still begins to rise every evening around 10 PM, preparing its energies for a day that is not coming. It’s a thirteen hour time difference between here and Bo...
Berlin — This is, unfortunately, likely to be the last Hi.co post I’ll be writing, since I believe it’s soon to be shut down for submissions. But sad as this may appear at first, there is always a romantic vie...
Tosa-shi — I’m in Shikoku, doing the 88 temple pilgrimage. 四国八十瀉八おへんろ。 As cliche as it sounds this pilgrimage has been more about who I’ve met along the way than the physical temples I’ve visited. Nothing bro...
Istanbul — Istanbul - Turkey All week my inbox has been peppered with state department warnings in anticipation for Norwruz, the Persian New Year Celebration this weekend. Istanbul is on high alert after last w...
Shibuya-ku — I was invited to view a 1:1000 scale model of Tokyo today. It felt … liturgical. Like bearing witness to a holy object. It was WEIRD — let’s just say that — the response I found myself having to thi...
Manchester — I remember that first call on a cell phone with a strange vividness. One of those moments in life that sears itself into your mind — you remember the very instant, the weather, the pitch of blue in th...
New york — Twenty years ago to the day. Maybe fewer, maybe more. Close enough. This very spot I stood, or someone like me, as I was back then. Looking up and down for Coney Island High. I don’t remember the dri...
Victoria — It’s been two weeks of daily visits, two weeks of getting to know him a bit better. Our conversations have ranged from his youth in Italy, working in Germany, to his life in Canada. In other circumst...
Koya — Last week in Japan I was traveling with my 3 young-adult children. I realised that travel is so important for young people that we might want to subsidize it as a society. I am a firm believer in nat...
San francisco — Tomorrow, I turn 32. The other day I went to a fitness class. The kind that is attended almost entirely by women and which has a certain aesthetic. It’s clean. Perfumed. Orderly. The exercises lack c...
Tarabulus — In the heart of Libya lies a city. This city contains all of the remnants of what Libyan culture used to be like; how people used to live, old houses that are now empty, street names made out of marbl...
Saskatoon — I had a high spinal cord injury while I was being born which affected two parts of my brain, the automatic nervous system, and the part of my brain which controls the physical parts of my body. As a r...
Inabe — “When walking, walk. When eating, eat.”1 Walking up Questioning Thoughts are intrinsic to long walks. Yet today, my mind dwelled on just one: Why do this, what worth is in spending the whole day ...
Bainbridge island — Growing up Jewish, my sister and I had no idea the excitement or anticipation kids get on Christmas morning. Sometimes my friends would tell me they wished I could experience it, that they felt bad be...
San francisco — I left her at the foot of his bed. The little beeps and the machines and the tubes all doing what they could. I walked through the doors and out of the hospital. I walked to the cab and into the airpo...
Kamakura-shi — The Beerman sleeps. He orders a beer and then sits and sleeps in this shaded cafe, one of my favorite cafes of the many cafes here, all within which I have spent considerable time during these last mo...
Tateyama-machi — The modern man thinks that everything ought to be done for the sake of something else, and never for its own sake.1 Reset the mind - Reset ones priorities. It takes much time, effort and patienc...
Narita — What right do I claim? None. No family, no blood ties, no citizenship. Friends, yes, but nothing legal. A visa, up for renewal yet again. Nothing binding. Nothing strict. And so you come. You, too, w...
Santa fe — Shoes. Good shoes. Okay, maybe even GREAT shoes. These are mine, photographed moments before they were shucked and torn apart and then rebuilt by a master craftsman in Santa Fe. A man who has been do...
Kalkan — It’s been almost seven days in Kalkan, Turkey now. It’s the third time I’m in Turkey and the very first I feel bad about being here. Even though I’m on a company retreat to get some actual work done ...
Lares — Now that I’m home and sorting through thousands of photos and videos from the trip of a lifetime, I’m realizing that really, as much as you want to share everything you’ve seen and done with other peo...
Tokyo — Small deaths, big deaths, wasted dreams and unfulfilled wishes are all preserved in your “pods.” You will never let them go—you just can’t say good-bye to them. You even pretend that they are still ...
Tako — Every time I’ve come to Narita airport from Tokyo, it has been a sad trip. The perspective of leaving this megapolis that feels like my cute little hometown, has always made me cry. Many of the times ...
Somewhere — That’s about the same as the distance between Berlin and Templin, or London and Brighton, or halfway from Manhattan to the Hamptons. Getting to Hebron from Tel Aviv by public transport takes about two...
Asheville — Inside a tiny gallery in Asheville, a Japanese artist makes teacups. They are grotesque and avant-garde, and I get right away that I won’t be able to make these after six weeks in Intermediate Pottery...
Karas — In the last few years, there’s have been several photos that I’ve really wanted to capture for myself. A number of these have actually been in Namibia and one of them was capturing the amazing-looking...
Reykjavik — Last year I shot a series called Observing, images of people experiencing art, from museums that we visited around the world that year. Why? Because I’m fascinated by how people observe their worlds,...
Tokyo — Everyone get excited. It’s Ebisu ramen time! Ramen, ramen, ramen, RAMEN — everyone loves ramen. With ramen, it’s all about equal opportunity: from ramen in cups, to cheap bajillion packages for a do...
San francisco — A few years ago, I got invited to head up to the top of the Golden Gate Bridge by a friend who worked for the transit district. You start by walking out the bridge to one of the towers, each of which ...
Ronda — I’ve traveled extensively for 40 years. In almost every style there is. Been pampered in first class: I remember a time in Bangkok where they put me up in the Grand Orient Hotel on the river and I was...
Louisville — A nudist camp became a Catholic girl’s school and then a privately run prison colony. Point to the center of this state and find it there. The solstice brought a long bus ride to our new home- dilapid...
Tokyo — Likely a reflection of my advancing age, but never have I been so aware of the passage of time than I have during my life here in Japan. The melting pot of seasonal American traditions get diluted bet...
Augusta — I live for these beautiful, ordinary moments. Nestled in my bed are two precious angels: my daughter and son. They are curled up in sunlight and blankets, their golden hair wild on the pillows. Tangl...
Puno — When this photo was taken, I could barely stand after suffering from severe altitude sickness after experiencing Puno’s altitude of 3860 meters (12420 feet) the previous day. Had been a miserable wret...
Tokyo — Once a month a bunch of drawing lovers get together in Tokyo under the title PauseDraw and we draw each other, things and concepts. We try to learn as much as possible while enjoying the fact that we...
Sitges — I remember when I was about to leave for Asia, or for South America, or for Portugal. Each time I left with a backpack that contained a few pieces of clothing, minimal toiletries and something to read...
Oregon city — Last year, while I finalized edits on The Laws of Average (my soon-to-be-released second collection of short fiction), I found myself tripping over stems and stubs of new pieces that I’m now trying to...
Hong kong — LOOKING out today from our Wan Chai apartment toward Happy Valley, you see a blanket of fog over the hills. They are all over Hong Kong after a squally downburst around noon. It was like seeing the Oa...
Lima — When I come home from any trip, what I hold close to my heart — more than the memories of sites and having checked items off a bucket list — are the people and random experiences that go with them. ...
Chicago — The night before I was supposed to deliver a keynote presentation to 500 creatives in Chicago, I stood in front of the mirror to practice my talk. I talked about IDEO, about Uber, about Mailbox. And i...
New york — I found this photo in my rejected images while cleaning up my Lightroom travel photography archives. I took it during a sunset cruise along the East River on my trip to New York about 3 years earlier....
San francisco — As I greeted our elevator staff, “Happy Almost Friday!,” Gordon says, “I knew you were coming in today (before his shift ended). You always say hi. Everyone’s too busy on their phones to notice I’m he...
Merida — A hundred years ago the city was the capital of the flourishing henequen trade—a crop so valuable it was called “oro verde,” or green gold. Industry barons and landowners scooped up properties in the ...
London — I used to enjoy traveling alone, it was an adventure, an unencumbered excursion into the world, and often, the unknown. Trains, planes, airports, hotels, busses, taxis — all were exciting in their ow...
Augusta — The day began warm in bed, laying entangled with the most amazing man. I knew I had to get up early. The baby would soon cry for me and the next 12 hours I would be filled with responsibility. Winter...
Caledon — So I took on this huge project, a bit foolishly. I definitely bit off more than I can chew. Twelve-hundred ebooks in about three weeks. Doing the work in my own private sweatshop where the working con...
Jinan — In mythical China there is an ancient temple at the top of a very high mountain sitting above the clouds and it takes 7,000 steps up a vertical stairway to reach it. Emperor, poets and pilgrims make t...
Svensby — Myself and Dave Morrow recently spent a week and a half inside the Arctic Circle chasing the aurora and some amazing landscapes. We had arrived near civilization for a brief period, so pulled over to ...
Deqen — Fortunately, two days before I had met Martin from Uruguay. He was joking about my bike and I hated him for that (though he was right). However, he had some experience cycling the world and he agreed ...
Kudoyama — The expectation is that we don’t speak Japanese. The expectation is we’re from somewhere else — always elsewhere, never nearby. We’re from somewhere else and we’ll barely be able to communicate. We s...
San francisco — Whiz Burgers is a classic fast food joint in San Francisco’s Mission District. It was founded in 1955 and there is a pretty good neon sign out front that proves it. The food is just ok, as far as old...
Saskatoon — I was lost in the land of Chronos. The land that stretches out before you like a prairie road dotted with emails and meetings and appointments. The road is straight and narrow. If you move too quickly...
Toronto — I helped plan a conference. This is a big deal for me. Super fun planning out a dream list of speakers who all enthusiastically agreed to come to another country to talk about ebooks. An awfully auspi...
Hanoi — It’s nearly three in the morning in Hanoi, and I’ve awoken not from the random calls on the street below, or the occasional strange noise coming from the toilet in my bathroom, but the thoughts in my ...
San francisco — Or more specifically, I ate without doing any of the following at the same time: Reading Looking for something to read Checking my email on my phone Responding to work email (though I do have to do t...
Iquitos — I gave the man a whack of U.S. dollar bills. As in most countries that accept American currency, I was expecting a quick exchange, a flip through the stack of 20, a swift writing of a receipt, and bam...
Urubamba — I have walked more this past week than any other week of my life. On Wednesday we took a van into the mountains from Ollyantaytambo—myself, two friends from Cusco, the owner of the hostel where we wer...
New york — As I drove my son and daughter home it was eerily quiet. That type of quiet that’s unsettling, rather than soothing. I peeked over my shoulder at a red light and saw that my daughter had fallen asleep...
Tokyo — Some years ago, I was walking in Meiji Jingu with some friends and a Indian man came to us and ask “where he could find God” in Japan, since in that shrine there was no god. We told him maybe Kamakura...
Reykjavik — Part of the difference is due to the difference in alphabet — there are characters used in the Icelandic language that slip off the Americanized tongue at first, but quickly become familiar the more y...
Hong kong — I love Hong Kong. When I want to loose myself, when I want to find myself, I travel to HK… To be permanently surrounded by thousand of people, 24h/24 is a way to face the reality: humans are ants. ...
Sevenoaks — There’s something about books that is very hard to beat, don’t you think? I’m talking about real, physical books. Especially old books! It’s not just the feel, although that’s definitely part of it...
Agra — This morning at 2am, I left Le Meridien Delhi with a driver, guide, and security guard (just to be on the safe side, according to the hotel) to travel 3 hours to Agra for a chance to capture the Taj M...
Johannesburg — Life decisions are never one-dimensional. Yet we often simplify the decisions others make to squash it into a context that’s easy to understand, because that’s human nature. The problem is that trying...
Tokyo — The months and days are travellers of eternity. Just like the years that come and go. For those who live their lives on boats, or lead horses towards old age, their lives are travel, their journeys ar...
London — … So revealed award-winning photojournalist, Steve McCurry, at an event in London to coincide with the publication of his new book, Untold: The Stories Behind the Photographs. If the name doesn’t so...
New york — I discovered a copy of T.E. Lawrence’s Seven Pillars of Wisdom on a low shelf in the bookstore across the street. It’s a wonderful read - an autobiography with all the lyricism and depth of a great n...
Manhattan — The Strand dollar racks on the corner of Broadway and 12th Street is simply one of my favorite places in the world. In the sorting machinery of New York City, the dollar rack is one of the exhaust ven...
San francisco — The wave organ crouches at the end of a rocky spindle that curls around the small craft harbor. When we arrive, it’s crawling with tourists, their chatter drowning the low moan of the ocean. Still, we...
Toronto — I’m not sure there’s anything more Canadian than seeing Blue Rodeo at Massey Hall in Toronto. For a million reasons. They are masters of their craft but their creative leads — Jim Cuddy and Greg Keel...
Torquay — When Marty McFly traveled through time in the movie Back to the Future, his mentor Dr. Emmet “Doc” Brown supplied him with a DeLorian DMC-12, especially modified for the job. The DeLorian was conside...
New york — This weekend I slipped on some ice near my apartment. I sat there for a moment, looking at the glamorous hiking boots I’ve been wearing since mid-January to skate the unshoveled sidewalks, thinking th...
Woodcliff lake — For a young boy who used to put on dad’s big baggy blazer. He was my hero. For a young boy who grew up with him in the skyline’s highrise offices. He was my hero. For a young boy who witnessed the...
San francisco — This week was one of the worst ones I’ve had in a while—I must be at that point in grad school where I just want to cry / quit—so I’ve decided to find ways to kickstart my creativity (and regroup / cl...
Ankeny — After ignoring two days of panicked, desperate text messages, I finally plucked up the courage to pick up the phone. He didn’t answer his cell phone or his work blackberry, so I tried the home phone. ...
Quebec — Days that start with -12°c are called beautiful days in Quebec city. Temperature drops down to -25°c sometimes. Being born and raised in the sunny Morocco, I am not used to check the weather forecast,...
Kerry — I remember when I first learned that marvellous, heartbreaking word. It was while reading Le Petit Prince, and the word was “éphémère”. Our teacher helped us grasp the meaning by comparing it to a s...
Kerry — It wasn’t cold, I can remember no scarf, and my hands weren’t shaking as I took the photograph. The trees were all around changing colours, and their mood infected my own as I watched your windows fo...
Semporna — I’m turning into a real Picasso with the oatmeal; boiling down hunks of apple and ginger to mix, with a little cinnamon, into the oats. Some lemon to go with tea because we both have colds and the Fis...
New york — Who doesn’t have an Olympic dream? Who hasn’t longed to represent their country, wearing red, white, and blue across your chest as you push your body to improbable limits? Who hasn’t craved, at least ...
Tokyo — Somehow I cannot draw (or take photos) straight. I am completely sure this has something to do with my general lack of balance in my physical being, the asymmetry of my body (for instance my left foo...
Nottingham — My hometown was obliterated during the war. Hitler’s Luftwaffe had destroyed the lovely pier and the docks, hoping to eradicate the strong Navy presence in and around Plymouth, historically one of th...
Greenville — “I think it’s time for you to throw those out.” It hasn’t been that long, really, since he left for California (god. that’s such a cliche, isn’t it?) and yet it’s been months, maybe even a year, sinc...
Ash shorafa wa al ateyat — Thursday morning, the 7th. When I go on deck, we are very close to the bank. The color of the earth is exactly the color of the Nubian girls I saw at the Slaves Bazaar. We haul the boat with ropes; t...
New york — Picture-taking was technically prohibited— I couldn’t help myself. The point of “Funky Turns 40” was to celebrate all the realistic, positive black characters that revolutionized Saturday morning ca...
Tübingen — It’s probably a melting process. Often we feel weak afterwards, in a very agreable way. Even our knees, the most important joints in our bodies, have lost considerable strength. It feels so good to mo...
Clifton — Turn the radio on, people chirp about the snow. Turn on the tv, people warn about the snow. You can keep your warnings and first-world fears, I’m making bacon, putting it in a bowl, and taking a pictu...
Kaesŏng — In 2008 I had a rare chance to take a bus trip from S. Korea to N. Korea. Here is what I wrote of that adventure. I had a blog but got a bit lazy. Just came back from one of the most interesting trip...
Avignon — I’ve been to many a castle. It’s what you do in Europe when your parents feel the need to educate you about history. It’s what you do as a tourist - you go to castles and churches, because that is whe...
Barcelona — Three years ago my husband (then boyfriend) and I were driving down a mountain in Ecuador. We were on a motorcycle and it was at the midway point of a five month journey from Cartagena, Colombia to Ri...
Dietingen — We went to the crystal palace. We found all kinds of glimmering rocks, many of them beautiful enough to break our hearts. We thought some looked like frozen fire, others could almost be read as satell...
Portland — This is my first visit to Portland, and the stakes are high. Our family made the decision to try to leave South Africa and move back to the US. Portland is our current city of choice, and I’ve been se...
Malacca — When I went to Malaysia, I was mainly staying in Kuala Lumpur, but myself and my good friend and photographer Danny Xeero took a day trip down to Malacca / Melaka to catch the sunset. I got some stan...
Toronto — Most Canadians have had enough at this point. Of winter, that is. With a challenging season that is only half through with us, and all of the biting cold and snow, wrapped in high wind chills (breathl...
New york — Seven AM is about when they open the gates. By “they,” I’m referring to the NYC Parks Department and the staff that open and close the gates to over 1,700 municipal parks in the five boroughs of NYC. ...
West — The aurora borealis is currently the most beautiful thing I’ve seen in this world and I have a feeling that is unlikely to change any time soon. What really hooked me was the feeling that this green a...
Aireys inlet — As an historian of technology, I am perhaps overly sentimental about the passing of particular devices, implements or technological systems. This image shows the last incandescent light globe/bulb st...
Southern peninsula — For years, I’ve wanted to relax in the Blue Lagoon in Iceland, drop my body into the warm, blue, mineral-rich waters and gaze into the mist coming off the warm water into the cold air. I imagined that...