In Plain Sight: A Border Wall Photo Project
From Mexicali to Calexico, Tijuana to San Diego, this project witnesses how the border wall reshapes daily life, families, and landscapes—an act of testimony to both human resilience and systemic inequality.
An Ode to Street Photography and How it Has Made Me a Better Traveler
My mother gave me perhaps the best photography advice I’ve ever received: “When you see everyone taking a photo in one direction, turn around and shoot in the opposite direction.” She gave me that advice for a wedding I was about to photograph. But my mother had become my photography teacher long before when we first started wandering the streets of Mexicali, Mexico together in the 1980s. We had fairly…
How to Kiss the Blarney Stone
It is a curious practice we have of kissing a 330 million-year-old dirty limestone. Legend has it that those who kiss the Blarney Stone are given the “gift of gab.” What is gab, anyway? And more importantly, why do we want it? Being a “talker” isn’t usually the most desirable trait — am I wrong? Shockingly, kissing the Blarney Stone was not on my shortlist of priorities during my month-long…
Vlog: Gracefully Global Goes to Ireland – A celebration of music on the Emerald Isle
Join travel blogger Peggy on her journey through Ireland as she discovers the Ireland’s rich connection to music and the many stories it tells.
Stepping Into Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera’s Mexico City
It is hard to imagine that two artists alone could make an indelible mark on a city that would sustain for decades, a century, or more. Yet Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo’s legacy in Mexico City – the fifth largest city in the world – is still very real and tangible. As a photographer, theatre artist, and arts advocate, I feel at home in cities that embrace art, and Mexico…
Call me Jane: Adventures in the Los Tuxtlas jungle of Veracruz, Mexico
I woke up in Veracruz City on the second to last day of 2016 having no idea I’d be going to bed that night in a jungle. Our hostel owner at the Oyster Hostel in Veracruz moonlights as a tour guide and is passionate about the many offerings of the dynamic state of Veracruz, especially the region of Los Tuxtlas around Laguna Catemaco which was our destination that day, compliments…
Life Imitates Art or Art Imitates Life?
In the case of the weekly WordPress photo challenge “Life Imitates Art,” I’m abstaining from profundity of any kind and delving into this photo challenge quite literally, utilizing the immensity of my library of travel photography as a significant asset. I mean, doesn’t everybody love taking silly statue photos?
The reality of budget airlines and why I took the bus to Prague
For a lover of travel, the best thing Europe has to offer is having a completely different culture nearly at your fingertips…traveling from country to country in Europe requires less financial investment and often less time than traveling from state to state in the United States. More affordable European travel is mostly due to a fairly robust train system, and incredibly low-cost airlines (low-cost as in, flying to Paris from…
One of the most beautiful train rides there is
I’m on a train bound for Kufstein, Austria. I’ve made the trip once before, in the winter, and it was a magical winter wonderland. Now it is an Eden of vegetation as far as the eye can see. Payoff for the long, wet winter. The train conductor is inching along and honking at some miscellaneous intruder. More time to enjoy the scenery… This is almost the last leg of my…
Perfect German Gentlemen
I recently spent a weekend in Kufstein, Austria. Which is a pretty small town. According to recently garnered information, it is located between South Tyrol in Italy and Bavaria in Germany, and is right around the corner from SkiWelt Wilder Kaiser – Brixental, which is Austria’s largest interconnected ski area. I don’t ski. And I didn’t study geography in school (unfortunately). So when I went, I really had little to…
Stockholm: The Ultimate Winter Stroll
Most of my friends and family thought I was crazy when I told them I was going to Stockholm for Christmas and New Years. Generally speaking, they are correct. I am crazy. But in terms of my decision to spend the holidays in Stockholm, I beg to differ. Spending my days basked in moonlight surrounded by lakes and bridges, bay views and gorgeous people, I think Stockholm is seeping with…
Art Basel: A visual delight in my own backyard.
I live in Bologna, Italy, a mere five and a half-hour drive from Basel, Switzerland, which hosts one of the most important annual modern and contemporary art shows in the world, Art Basel. In my two years of living in Bologna, did it ever occur to me to make a trip to Basel? No. Why not? Good question. Laziness…money…ignorance perhaps…I guess it gets the best of us sometimes. Our own…