World’s most amazing church?

This is one of my favorite photographs that I took of a church in the Christian Quarter of Jerusalem. But this is no ordinary church. This is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre:

There are so many amazing things associated with this church – my blog is too small to hold them all!  Top of the list: Christians will immediate cite this as the location where Jesus was crucified, and where his empty tomb was discovered.

By my favorite fact is an historical one, not a religious one.  The Church is locked in the evening and opened again in the morning, and the holders of the key (the lockers / unlockers, if you will) have come from the same family (the Nusaybah family) and have been doing this job since the seventh century. Amazing!  I’ve found the best place to read more details about this amazing story is the wonderful book by Simon Montefiori, entitles Jerusalem: the Biography.

 

Indian Aqueduct

If there is one thing that India has done longer and better than just about any other country, it is innovative aqueducts.  Some of the most famous aqueducts are centuries old, such as in the historical city of Hampi; others are still intact after hundreds of years, dotting the rural Indian countryside.

And some of them are quite modern, such as the Varasun Aqueduct:

Helping to provide valuable water from the Kaveri River to farmers as part of a much longer (135 km) canal, the aqueduct is 1.8 kilometers long and towering at an unbelievable height of 16 m.

A True World Wonder – ಶ್ರವಣಬೆಳಗೊಳ

In my opinion, the 60-foot-tall statute of the Indian god Bahubali (sometimes called Gommateshwara), carved out of a single piece of granite and located high on a mountain, is without doubt one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen.

Here’s the top part of his body – and if you look closely, you can see the visitors on the tower just above his head:

Here is the lower part of his body – and again, be sure to look at the size of the people near his toes:

But if you want to visit ಶ್ರವಣಬೆಳಗೊಳ, also known as Shravanabelagola, it won’t look like these pictures.  I was VERY fortunate and priviledged to be able to visit during the Jain religious ceremony called Mahamastakabhisheka, which is only held every 12 years!

Unfortunately, there is so much about this holy site that I do not know. I’ve never been able to find any documentation about who created the statute and why, how long it took, and how they managed to transport it intact up a very high and very steep mountain.

Prime Meridian in Spain

The Prime Meridian is the universal definition of 0-degrees longitude  – but did you know that until recently, there were different prime meridians in use, such as the Greenwich PM and the Paris PM?  I only learned this a few minutes ago, when posting this picture I took on the AP-2 highway, near Candasnos Spain between Zaragoza and Barcelona:

You can see the Cypress trees on both side of the arch, which are a well known sight in southern Europe.

It is wonderful that the Spanish would build an arch – but it is a bit sad they didn’t also add a turnoff, so that you could stop and enjoy the moment less fleetingly.