Photography
weekend walks: porto alegre goal walk
The mayor describes Porto Alegre as “a port where a community with multiple cultures and different ethnicities live in perfect harmony”. This is a really pleasant way to describe the city. It seems rather harmonious but obviously it is tough to know for sure with one of the world’s biggest event currently going on.
Today was game day in Porto Alegre – France vs Honduras and the “Goal Walk” from Mercado Público through to the stadium (Estadio Beira Rio) was filled with French supporters donning the flag and their faces painted red, white and blue! 
But let us share with you some of the historical district that we saw on our walk. The City Hall was inaugurated in 1901. There is a beautiful fountain at the front made of Spanish tiles and given as a gift by the Spanish Community in 1935. The fountain now appears to be a landing pad for pigeons. 
Alfândega Square is one of the most famous squares in the city. There is a park area that has local craft markets around along the pathways and an Art Museum at one end of the entrance. Today we didn’t have enough time to visit the museum but will be sure to get there during our time here. 
Nossa Senhora das Dores Church is the oldest church in the city, and took almost a century to complete. Its blinding white exterior drew us in to walk up all the steps to have a peak inside. And inside was beautiful. The inside smelt like any other Catholic Church: candles burning and “woody” if we can describe it like that. Out of respect for those inside, we didn’t take photos, so you will have to take our word that it was beautiful 🙂 The ceiling was painted in a soft green and the altar was rather extravagant. It was encased in white columns with gold tips and really was the “centrepiece”. 
We finished up our walk at the FIFA Fan Fest for the rest of the afternoon cheering at a big TV screen, sitting on muddy grass 🙂 Hope you enjoyed coming on a brief walk through a Brazilian World Cup Host City with us! 
Wise Monkeys Random Piece of Trivia: The 30°S Parallel South of the Earth’s equator passes through Porto Alegre hence that is the city’s latitude.
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weekly photo challenge: room
A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn. On first entry into the room – there is no bed. While guests are out of an evening, the house keeping will sneak in and prepare the futon on the tatami mat flooring.
This was our room in a ryokan in Hakone, Japan. Surprisingly, it was a very comfortable sleep we had!
Have you stayed in a ryokan? What was your opinion of it?
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weekend walks: 3 museums of sydney
We went for a completely different type of walk this weekend – we visited three museums in Sydney that we hadn’t been to in a while.
Stop 1 – Sydney Jewish Museum
On the first Sunday of every month, entrance is free! So we were lucky to be there on June 1 🙂 There was an Anne Frank exhibit on, which reminded us of our time in Amsterdam visiting Anne Frank’s House. Walking through the museum is simply so moving, such a harsh reminder of the atrocities of the Holocaust and how war is good for no one.
Stop 2 – Art Gallery NSW
Entrance is always free except if you want to see the special exhibits and it is quite easy to lose a few hours wondering around in there. Our favourite rooms are the European art rooms on the main entrance level, makes us excited to be returning to Europe in July to explore the art galleries there once more 🙂
Stop 3 – Government House via Royal Botanical Gardens
It is one of the living museums of Sydney and a guided tour of the inside is available on Fridays through Sundays. The entrance is free and the tour guides are volunteers who share so much interesting information. We learnt about Government House and facts of the history of Sydney that we hadn’t (or don’t recall) learning at school!
It was a side of Sydney that we figured is listed in “Travel Guides” that we ourselves haven’t truly seen. So we played “tourists” in our own city. We were not disappointed!
To add to the distance we walked, we stumbled across the Wishing Tree in the Botanical Gardens. We made our wish and being superstitious we completed the ritual, getting ourselves dizzy circling the tree 🙂
Hope our wish comes true.
Have a fabulous week, folks!
It’s our last full week of work for a while …
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weekly photo challenge: split-second story
Markets present many opportunities to snap a photo that tells a split-second story.
For the weekly photo challenge, we are sharing a photo we took while in Hoi An back in 2012.
wise monkeys abroad 