Saad Shaikh, MD

  I took this picture back in the summer of 2017.  What stood out to me about that time was that there were very few tourists anywhere, especially around the pyramids, and it wasn't  because it was 110 degrees that day. I was traveling with my family and it was our first day in Cairo. We were staying at the Sheraton on the Nile, and that morning, as we were leaving our hotel, I noticed there was a well-dressed gentleman in our group, which was odd because we were supposed to be the only ones on the tour. "Who is that joining us?" I asked the hotel lobby representative "Oh, you're Americans. All Americans are assigned a bodyguard. He will be with you throughout your time here in Cairo. His name is Ali." And with that, he pulled open his jacket to show me his submachine gun, and off we went. We visited the pyramids, the Manshiyat Nasr district, and Al-Azhar that day, and I had a great time chatting and eating with Ali. Apparent...

  I took this photo when in San Miguel Allende two year ago. What I loved most about the small Mexican towns and cities are their zocalos. At the zocalo, or main square, one finds a church (which before the Spaniards arrived would have been a temple), often a gazebo where local bands play music or young women are taking photos for the quincinieras, and various other evening happenings. I am sure people have been gathering in these centers for ages and still it seem like everyone in town makes it to the zocalo to watch the sunset and the church lights turn on and just hang out. So whenever I travel to Mexico, if there happens to be a zocalo nearby, I do as the locals do and make sure I find somewhere to sit comfortably in the evening and just observe the crowds and the ambience around me - oh and the things you'll see. Sometimes you'll catch a young man proposing to his girlfriend, but to he'll sing her favorite songs with a mariachi band he...

Your Page Title   I took this photo while traveling through New Zealand a few years ago. That was such a lovely trip. I had rented an old Japanese car with about 300,000 KM on it and all the announcement and display markers were in Japanese, but it ran perfectly. I drove it all across the North and South Island, stopping at places to sit and reflect, organize (and still now learn to let go) my thoughts, and just reflect on the beauty of the plants and the glacial lakes. I saw this Tiki in the Botanical Garden in Auckland and you have to look really closely to even find it, as it blends so perfectly in to the environs.   The thing about tikis is that the local Maori Islanders believed they protected the land. They, like many indigenous cultures I have visited in my travels, did not have a concept of property. Agrarian cultures do and that concept of property even included humans. The Declaration of Independence in its first drafts did not read...