Photographers Blog

By Yiorgos Karahalis

One of my fondest memories is of the snails my mother harvested after the rains. I couldn’t wait for her to get home so that I could grab those tiny animals and play with them for hours, all the while looking forward to the next day’s lunch! Little did I know then that this childhood pastime was also a big business.

Perhaps it was my memories that led me to be intrigued by the story of Greece’s Fereikos Helix snail farming company, a successful business started by two sisters, Maria and Panagiota Vlachou.

“I was having dinner in Zurich as I was speaking to my sister on the phone. I told her that I ordered snails for near 37 euros. And she joked with me, saying we must start growing and trading snails,” Maria Vlachou said, explaining what motivated them to start their business in 2007.

The two sisters set up their first farm in Korinthos, a coastal town some 80 km (50 miles) west of Athens. They have since managed to expand their business throughout the country.

Today it operates as a family enterprise, aimed at educating young farmers or businessmen who would like to set up their own snail farm. It organizes seminars for future farmers, giving a picture of what life looks like when you own and run a snail farm, from buying the snails from the farmers at a pre-agreed price to exporting most of them to European countries.

By Jose Manuel Ribeiro

“Hey, sports fans, think you’re tough? Then try out a growing Portuguese pastime that is like playing rugby with a runaway refrigerator. It’s bull tackling, and nearly 1,000 enthusiasts, or “forcados,” from all walks of life love to jump into the ring for a head-on collision with a maddened bull. A mixture of sport, spectacle, high testosterone machismo, male bonding and, some say, art, the rough-and-tumble event is as unique to Portugal as port wine or codfish ice cream,” Reuters Lisbon chief correspondent Ian Simpson wrote in August 2005.

At the time, if anyone mentioned the notion of women trying out to be a “forcado” you would have said they were dreaming or had no idea of the inner workings of the Portuguese bullfighting world.

But six years later it is no longer a dream as a group of young and graceful women tackle the bulls in central Portugal.

As a photographer, I have the privilege to encounter rare glimpses of the strange and unusual. Most of the time I am thankful to get such an assignment but this particular one turned out to be a mixture of delight and displeasure.

The subject was a Titan arum, or Amorphophallus titanium, one of the world’s largest and rarest plants, which was blooming for the first time in nearly 20 years at a botanical garden in Tokyo. The first visitors lined up from 6:30 am and by the time the gate opened at 10 am, 1600 people had formed a long queue despite the sweltering Tokyo summer heat. The excited crowd was attracted by extensive TV coverage and in the newspaper about this unusual flower that only blooms for two days after taking 16 years to grow from a seedling.

Press were allowed special access to skip the long line and duck under the ropes surrounding the flower to get a close-up shot. At first glimpse, I was surprised to see the 1.5 meter (4.9 feet) tall flower, as it was nothing like any flower I had ever seen before. However, the next moment I stood atop the ladder to get a close up shot, the surprise turned into dismay as a foul odor emanating from the blossom stung my nose. The flower’s rotten garbage-like smell was enhanced by the high humidity and the hot temperature. I quickly snapped a few shots as I held my breath and then put some distance between myself and the flower to catch my breath. I repeated this dance a few times: Hold breath, approach flower, take shots, and retreat. Meanwhile, the gate opened and visitors who’d been waiting for hours flocked towards the gigantic flower. They pushed and shoved to take pictures of the plant and sometimes shouts were heard as people squashed each other.