TTP's Photo of the Year

Photograph © Alixandra Fazzina-All Rights Reserved
I'm very pleased to announce that the second annual The Travel Photographer's Photo of the Year is the above wonderful photograph by Alixandra Fazzina. It's of an Afghan woman named Siamoy, who's breast feeding her baby boy as she goes to visit her sisters at their home in Khourdakon village, in the remote mountainous province of Badakshan.

Alixandra traveled to Afghanistan with Oxfam as part of its work on maternal mortality, which involves providing help and assistance in Badakhshan from this worthy organization.

Alixandra Fazzina has spent a decade chronicling war, violence, misery and distress, mainly in Africa and the Middle East. She photographed the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army and their victims in Uganda, the Miya-Miya rebels in Congo, and is currently working on a story about people-smuggling from Ethiopia and Somalia to the Yemen and Saudi Arabia. In addition to her work for British newspapers such as The Sunday Times, Guardian, Telegraph and The Independent, her reportage features were published in Newsweek, The New York Times, Stern and Corriere.

TTP's previous post on Alixandra's photo essay Childbirth Perils

Canon 5D Mark II: Availability?

US-based photographers who can't find a Canon 5D Mark II at their favorite (or any) retailer, can always fly to Paris and buy it there. I'm told by a visitor to Paris that she'll be buying one at the retail price of Euros 2400 or 2000 (the latter when clawing back one's "detaxe" or VAT at the airport). Euros 2000 is equivalent to $2740 at today's rate of exchange.

An alternative is to fly to Shanghai where, according to Ryan Pyle, every camera store is flush with Canon 5D Mark II's at same price as here.

Just a thought.

Ryan Pyle: Gongga Shan

Photographs © Ryan Pyle-All Rights Reserved
Born in Canada, Ryan Pyle obtained a degree in International Politics from the University of Toronto and subsequently fled to China on an exploratory mission. In 2002 he settled in China permanently (currently in Shanghai, China), and began taking freelance assignments in 2004. He then became a regular contributor to the New York Times covering China, Time, Newsweek, Outside Magazine, Sunday Times Magazine, Fortune and Der Spiegel.

Ryan recently produced a photo essay on Gongga Shan or Gongga Mountain, which was included as an Honorable Mention in the awards at the Banff Mountain Culture Awards.

The photo essay was produced during an arduous journey through China's remote Sichuan province; departing from the Chinese town of Kangding, Ryan and his writing partner walked 4 days (at an average altitude of 4000m) to reach the remote Tibetan Gongga Mountain Monastery. It was very much a journey from Han China to Tibetan China at a time when relations between the two have been severely strained.

Here's an excerpt: "I had first learned about Minya Konka, or Gongga Shan, from naturalist Joseph Rock. His work in eastern Tibet, now western Sichuan, was pioneering and when he first laid eyes on Minya Konka he believed he had found the largest mountain in the world. He wasn't far off. Minya Konka stands an impressive 7556m and towers above the rest of the range. It's a sight beyond words. The Minya Konka Tibetan Monastery rests at the base of the mountain. My journey to the monastery began on foot in the town of Laoyulin, just outside of Kangding. From there the four-day, 120-km trek to the monastery had taken its toll, walking at an average altitude of about 4000 m. But this is the way many of the pilgrims make the journey to this remote monastery, and it was important to follow in their footsteps to understand the significance of the temple and its role in the community. Each morning at the monastery one monk prays alone in the main prayer hall. It was a damp and cold morning and there was a lovely light coming in from the single window; my only concern was to do justice to the moment."