My Merrell's

My Merrell’s

When I take photographs I try to include perspective which is something that can be lost in a photograph.  I usually use my traveling buddy but sometimes I resort to my feet.  This blog is dedicated to my now worn-out Merrell shoes.

By Nerak Seldnar

In the first photograph I shot a section of the floor in the Santo Giovanni in Laterano.  One of the seven pilgrimage churches in Rome, San Giovanni was the first Christian church constructed in the city.  The basilica was built in 313 c.e. but transformed by Francesco Borromini into a Baroque church in the mid 1600’s.  It was the home to all the popes until the Renaissance renovation of St. Peter’s Basilica.  Until 1870 all popes were crowned here and the basilica continues to be the home church of the Bishop of Rome who happens to be the pontiff (or pope.)  The floor resembles ancient Roman mosaics as can be seen at the Baths of Caracalla.  The floor appears three-dimensional in person and in the photograph.  Consequently, adding my shoe to the photo helped to emphasis the floor’s faux effects.  The basilica is an easy Metro ride and worth the time.

The Tokyo Tower in Tokyo, Japan, not to be confused with the Tokyo Skytree, is 333 meters or 1093 feet making it higher than the Eiffel Tower on which it is based.  The observation deck at 250 meters includes a glass floor.  The orange Merrell’s appear again.  I should note that the Tokyo Skytree is far more impressive At 634 meters or 2080 feet it is the tallest tower in the world displacing the Canton Tower in Guangzhou, China and the second tallest structure in the world after the Burj Khalifa, the incredibly tall skyscraper in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.  Imagine being in any one of these towers during an earthquake.

The Merrell motif continues at Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland.  The causeway was formed by volcanic eruptions.  As the surface of the lava flow cooled, it contracted and crystallized into hexagonal (six angles and six sides) columns.  However, the real story is far more interesting and being Ireland a legend will do.  According to Irish legend Giant’s Causeway was built by Fionn mac Cumhaill (transcribed into English as MacCool), a mythical hunter-warrior who built the causeway as stepping stones to Scotland so as to engage in battle with a rival Scottish giant by the name of Benandonner.  He once scooped up part of Ireland to fling it at a rival but it missed and landed in the Irish Sea becoming the Isle of Man.  The beautiful strangeness and bizarre regularity of the stones make the place memorable. Visitors are allowed to walk and climb on the stones.

Standing on the meridian (0⁰ longitude) at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England, the Merrell’s provide the needed perspective.  The historic town of Greenwich is an easy Metro ride from London and should not be missed.  The town contains many worthwhile sites such as the Queen’s House, designed by Inigo Jones in 1637 and the first Palladian-style villa in Britain, and the Cutty Sark, a clipper launched in 1869 to transport tea from China, to name a few.  Referred to as the Longitude Problem, the difficulty of determining a ships east-west position on the sea could not be fixed without a fixed point from which to measure.  The problem was solved by John Harrison in 1760 after 45 years of effort.  The solution meant that every 15⁰ of longitude equals an hour when comparing the difference in sunrise or sunset times between two places.  For example, the time gap between Greenwich and New York City is five hours which translates into a longitudinal difference of 75⁰.  Consequently, Greenwich became a baseline for world time and the prime meridian.  Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) is the current time anywhere in the world.

In the final photograph the Merrell’s have been replaced with my Ecco sandals.  Let me explain.  When I packed for a central European vacation I figured the weather in May would be warm enough for sandals.  I was wrong thus explaining the socks.  Always a fashion diva, the use of socks with sandals caused somewhat of a stir in Europe but I figured after I left a new trend in footwear would appear.  The photograph was taken at the Gemäldegalerie (Picture Gallery) in Berlin.  The gallery holds many German works from the Middle Ages and Renaissance including Cranach’s The Fountain of Youth and Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights.  Photographs are allowed in the gallery but no flash.  The other foot in the photo belongs to the guard who wanted me to prove my flash was disabled so I pointed to the floor and pressed the shutter release.  The result contained a bit of humor and a reminder to check the weather at one’s destination before leaving home.

Thus concludes my experiences with shoes and the good memories they conjure.