For the last 500 years, the locals of Nongriat in Meghalaya, India have grown several hundred bridges across the region’s numerous water channels. Some of the bridges extend over 100 feet in length and are strong enough to support more than 50 people at a time. (via NPR)

(via learningfromthehands)

Source: architizer.com

“Well, I just think they’re just about the most romantic thing you can imagine. I guess I was about eight when I first hit a rock and it fell apart and I saw, inside that rock, a shining, glittering, perfect seashell complete in every detail, and knowing that nobody had seen that before, and it had been laying without the sun shining on it for 100 or 200 million years. Now, that seems to me unbelievably romantic. And fossils have always seemed to me that way. There’s also the part of the treasure hunt in it, of course, you know, of finding things and collecting things. And who knows what you’re going to find when you turn over the next rock. But basically, it’s that thrill of looking at animals that lived a million, 10 million, 100 million years ago. ” – Sir David Attenborough, NPR Weekend Edition, Oct 24, 2010
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“Well, I just think they’re just about the most romantic thing you can imagine. I guess I was about eight when I first hit a rock and it fell apart and I saw, inside that rock, a shining, glittering, perfect seashell complete in every detail, and knowing that nobody had seen that before, and it had been laying without the sun shining on it for 100 or 200 million years. Now, that seems to me unbelievably romantic. And fossils have always seemed to me that way. There’s also the part of the treasure hunt in it, of course, you know, of finding things and collecting things. And who knows what you’re going to find when you turn over the next rock. But basically, it’s that thrill of looking at animals that lived a million, 10 million, 100 million years ago. ”

– Sir David Attenborough, NPR Weekend Edition, Oct 24, 2010

(via the-rx)

Source: cystallineambermoments

Underwater Tornadoes

“For the past 30 years, photographer Wayne Levin has been capturing the magnificence of the underwater world in spellbinding black-and-white images with equal parts mystery and awe. One day, as he was swimming to photograph the spinner dolphins of Hawaii’s Kealakekua Bay, infamous as the location of Captain Cook’s death, Levin came across what appeared to be a giant coral reef. But, as he approached it, the “reef” began to move and morph, turning out to be an enormous school of bigeyed scad fish. Levin snapped some photos and scurried to find the dolphins, but the experience stuck with him. Over time, he developed a fascination with the strange beauty and synchronicity of these fish schools and spent the next 10 years capturing them on hundreds of rolls of film.

“His new book, Akule, offers a selection of his finest photographs, named after the Hawaiian word for bigeyed scads. Haunting and poetic, Levin’s work is particularly fascinating — if not melancholic — when examined in parallel with the Census of Marine Life and our efforts to reverse the damage we’ve inflicted on this whimsical microcosm.”

By Maria Popova

Full article at Brain Pickings, interview with Levin on NPR, and Levin’s website.