This is what you see on TV an when you think: “sure, but that will be in a very desolate village”. I can tell you it’s not. These photos were taken in Kaneshi, one of the biggest markets of Accra, the capital of Ghana.

And even though I would never buy any meat from this market, it would be wrong to say that I haven’t eaten from it.
This is where everyone buys their meat, also the the restaurants.
This is how it goes.
This is Ghana.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

See also my other gallery about Ghana: Back to Africa

I went there to find an answer to all the questions I had about Africa. I didn’t find many answers… On the other hand, I came back with much more questions. So I had to go back… Maybe to another part, because Africa is huge, maybe I would find what I’m looking for in Western Africa?

Unfortunately not…

Africa has a mindset which is more or less impossible to understand for anyone from the west, so I had to go with the flow, live like there is no tomorrow and try not to get food poisoning or malaria.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

Wanna see more of Africa? Check out these:
Moz

And he was eccentric, he was going to build the most beautiful cathedral in the world. And he would have, if he had not been run over by a tram after (only) 26 years of building.

Now they have a second god: Lionel Messi, the worlds top of the top in soccer.

Tis gallery is not about Messi and neither is it about Gaudi, even though you can’t visit Barcelona without getting in touch with the Gods.

Come walk with me.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

The event is called the “Battle of Merode”. Earl Frederic De Merode, a big name in times of the Belgian war for independence lost his life about where I’m living and the government makes sure that we remember this. At least once every couple of years.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

Wanna see more of Antwerp: My Monochrome City

But so I’m living in Antwerp. I have always found it hard to photograph the place where I’m living, because sometimes we have difficulties seeing the beauty in what’s so familiar. Here it was different, it’s the place where I’m living but it’s not familiar at all. I had to be fast to get objective shots of a place I would soon call home.

The day I went out it was overcast. It was one of those days when you knew you’d be sorry if you didn’t take a rain jacket, even though it didn’t rain all day.

The first title I had for this gallery was “time for stormy weather”. But I changed afterwards, it looked like a very monochrome trip, even though what it say was colourful.
It could be the weather, the greyness of Belgium or all in my head. It doesn’t matter.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

Mozambique has been suffering from civil wars during most of the last two or three decades of the 20th century. Because national parks are an easy hiding place for rebels, that’s where they had built camp. And any animal in the neighbourhood soon found out the hard way. What was edible got eaten, what was dangerous got killed and what had teeth or a horn that’s worth money… well, you know the story.

Luckily, today Gorongosa is being rebuilt, little by little, mostly by importing animals from the big parks in South Africa.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

If you want to see more of Mozambique, check out   Moz
Wanna see more animals? See
Bird Watching in the Pantanal

It can’t really be like that, right?
Many people are visiting Africa these days though, but they go for the “safe” places. Let’s say everything below the equator which offers all-in holidays and 24/7 security.

I got into a moral dilemma… I wanted to check out some part of Africa without having to spend my whole trip with middle aged Germans in white socks and sandals and giant camera lenses. And on the other had I felt little for falling in hands of a group of rebels who would cut off my body parts one by one.

Mozambique looked like a good option.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

I’m not sure what my expectations of London were… but they surely included: expensive (turned out to be true), huge (correct) and boring (that’s where I got it wrong)

There is so much to do in London: huge parks, huge buildings, a huge royal palace, huge shopping facilities,… if it’s huge, you’ll find it in London. I know I have not spent nearly enough time to get a decent understanding of the city and that reflects in my photos. Here’s what I saw.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

Well buddy, it’s even harder for someone who’s not from Nicaragua, but yet I went and gave it a shot. In this series you will find my idea of  a country which has been holding on to Socialism during the days that   all neighbouring countries were destabilized. This is my image of the country of Daniel Ortega.

One or two decades ago, Nicaragua was considered a No-Go zone. Gangs were roaming the streets and poverty forced even the most honest person into petty crime. But those days are over. These days Nicaragua is considered the new Costa Rica: safe, beautiful and most of all… cheap!

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

For this photo series I went all the way to Esteli, Nicaragua.
Visiting a cigar company gives a whole other meaning to the term “hand made”. Seriously, when you see the people actually rolling the cigars, they seem get more valuable with every blink of an eye.

It’s an interesting procedure which starts from the picking of the leaves, drying, separating the first class from the second and the outer leaves from the inner and eventually the rolling. Men do the rolling and women do the finalisation with their gentle thin fingers. One team, both sexes.

[See image gallery at nicolasdecorte.be]

Haven’t seen enough of the cigar making process?
Check out this previous gallery:
Cigars