Category: photography

Not gonna lie, I thought Budapest was in Africa.

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It’s Europe, but in the middle: a collection of photos in Germany, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and the Netherlands from my last winter break.

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Singular noun: sunsets.

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Sometimes, birds can look… so dumb.

Birb.

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Traveling alone isn’t as glamorous as I heard it to be.

Or, like, living.

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Life can fall apart so quickly.

Innit.

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I used to get angsty at how most western European countries have a history of colonialism. Now, I’m just grateful to experience the world with my family.

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I have always viewed sunsets, in addition to their aesthetic contribution to the world, with a lens of redemption. No matter the happenings, good or bad, that occur throughout each day, the sunset transitions our immediate conception of the world from a state of consciousness to a state of nothingness. And after our sleep, we awake to another day and forget about the sunset that occurred the previous day. We could treat the previous day as a dream, and sometimes, especially in moments of sharing happiness with those we love, it often does feels too blissful to be real life. Like a dream.

I wonder how many sunsets I will continue to see in my life. After all, life is very finite, and I could lose my ability to appreciate sunsets at any moment in time. I wonder how many sunsets I will forget, or in the same boat, how many memories of those cherished I will forget. Because, it seems to me no matter how hard I try to preserve the beauties in life that I try to experience, the only certainty that exists is the fact that all moments will come to an end. Or, perhaps, it is the very definition that says it all — that it is necessary that beauty is finite. Without the coming and going of moments, how can we say that we are living at all?

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I am rarely exposed to as many individuals who come into and fade out of existence as I am during my experiences as a tourist. Especially in those locations that are frequented by tourists like me, the sheer volume of individuals can sometimes be overwhelming. Especially among individuals who I know nothing about, I cannot help but wonder about the complexities of their lives. Within as egotistical a conception of the world that I have, how is it that there exists an infinite amount of individuals who have lived, are living, and will lives just equally as complex of a life as mine?

At La Sagrada Familia, which attracts tourists like me because it is the tallest church in the world, I felt the feeling of humbleness. Of realizing that even though I am the most important part of my life, the universe is completely indifferent to my existence. I am reminded at La Sagrada Familia that regardless of if I live or die, it does not matter in the grand scheme of things. I find such thoughts liberating; at such moments, I am letting go of my conception of my self and sensing the true state of the world without the pollution of my own thoughts. The world is indifferent towards me. The beautiful world is beautifully indifferent. So much indifference, so much beauty.

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