Category: photoblogging

Colour Gravity: Spring 2006

I take a shortcut down gravel roads when I drive to and from North Battleford. There is a tremendous amount of water laying in the fields and ditches this spring – I had to double back on one part of the trip as the highway was closed by flooding.
The colours on the prairie are fabulous at this time of the year – this evening I stopped to take a few photos. Enjoy!
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(Right clicking on the smaller thumbnails should allow you to open them to full size.)
Colour Gravity *

The Yezidis

A Michael Totten photo essay from “The Beginning of the Universe;

In Northern Iraq there is a place called Lalish where the Yezidis say the universe was born. I drove south from Dohok on snowy roads through an empty land, seemingly to the ends of the earth, and found it nestled among cold hills.
I went there because the President of Dohok University told me to go. �I am a Muslim,� he said. �But I love the Yezidis. Theirs is the original religion of the Kurds. Only through the Yezidis can I speak to God in my own language.�
Yezidis are ancient fire-worshippers. They heavily influenced Zoroastrianism, and in turn have been heavily influenced by Sufi Islam. The temple at Lalish is their �Mecca.� Hundreds of thousands of remaining Yezidis � those Kurds who refused to submit to Islam � make pilgrimages there at least once in their lifetimes from all over the Middle East and Europe.
[..]
�Can someone from another religion become a Yezidi?� I said.
�No,� Baba Sheik said. He shrugged his shoulders and cocked his head. �We are the original people,� he said and spread out his arms. �We can�t become a cocktail religion like Islam.� Everyone, including my Muslim driver and translator, thought that was hilarious.
They�re a bit like the Druze then, the fierce people who live in the mountains of Syria and Lebanon. You can�t convert and become a Druze either. Yezidis believe they will be reincarnated as Yezidis after they die, just as Druze believe they will be reincarnated as Druze.
Baba Sheikh apparently didn�t want me to think they were close-minded bigots. �We are a peaceful people,� he said. �We don�t interfere with others. We are the nation of generosity and kindness.�
He didn�t think that about everyone else in the region.
�72 times Muslims tried to conquer us,� he said. �Christians never once tried to conquer us. The Christians are wise, not like Muslims.�

It’s an interesting piece.

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