RIP Hector Babenco, my favourite South American film director (Pixote, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Carandiru). I was lucky enough to hear him talk in the London Film Festival when he presented Carandiru in 2003. Most people – including myself – first came across Brazilian cinema with the 1981 film Pixote, a Cannes Festival stunner. […]
Hom Strom
Deep in the Engadine valley of Switzerland where Romansch is widely spoken, there is a village called Scuol, where a pagan tradition survives to this day: the burning of a straw man (Hom Strom) dating from ancient fertility festivals and possibly human sacrifices. Click on an image to enlarge.
On the trail of Chatwin in Gaiman, Patagonia
“Of course people remember Chatwin,” says Waldo. “He was always in shorts. We had never seen a grown man in shorts before.” Waldo Williams is the Director of Tourism in Gaiman and, like most people in this part of Patagonia’s Chubut province, he’s a descendant of the old Welsh families who settled here in 1865. […]