Timeless

[The_Traveler]

There is a timeless quality about much of rural Southeast Asia. Things are done now the way they have been for a thousand years.

These women are working on the periphery of a floating island on Inle Lake in Myanmar. The vertical bamboo poles are the supports for a bamboo mesh mat that is covered with earth dug from the swampy shores.
The dirt-covered mat becomes a field and, as successive years and layers of soil weigh it down, it gradually sinks to the shallow bottom and becomes a real island and then then the bamboo poles are removed to be used again.

The heavy pp-ing and vignetting is an attempt to look 'old.'

 

[IzzieK]

I love the sepia treatment you did with this shot...and the composition is excellent...Does someone live behind where the little hut is at the back?

 

[The_Traveler]

The stilt houses on the lake are usually in little 'towns' because they need to ship in water, etc. so any isolated houses are often places just to store stuff while working on the fields.

In this thread I show one of these huts.

The stilt houses are usually high off the water to get away from humidity, to provide a shelter for boats underneath and to be above any rising lake waters.

This is a stilt house of teh Intha people. Note how he paddles and steers using one leg on the oar.

 

[annamaria]

Nice I like the sepia look to it too.