Travel & Humanitarian Photos
Workmen arriving at Machhapuchhre Base Camp in the Annapurna region of Nepal
Many of you will be familiar with my rainbow-coloured umbrellas by now. For those who are not, I’ve been visited by this colourful umbrella in a number of guises. It first appeared in Nepal, where it was being carried by a group of monks. It recently made an appearance in Varanasi, where two children where using it to protect themselves from the monsoon rains on their way home.
Since then, there has been a deluge of rainbow-coloured umbrellas. Perhaps it was the heaviest monsoon rain in India and Nepal for over thirty years that prompted people to go in search of something bright and colourful to cheer their rain-soaked days? I know the feeling!
From the banks of the sacred river Ganges in Varanasi, to the lofty peaks of the Nepal Himalaya, I have photographed rainbow-coloured umbrellas in rain and shine. There is much talk in photographic circles of pro photographers needing to specialise these days, to find a niche… I suspect this might be pushing the definition a little too far. Still, a book of rainbow-coloured umbrella pictures is always a possibility.
One rainbow-coloured umbrella appeared during an especially heavy downpour in Boudhanath. Like a child following the Pied-Piper, I was inevitably drawn to follow it as its owner paddled her way home through the flooded streets, soaking my camera gear and myself up to the waist in the process. Perhaps most bizarrely of all, at the end of a long day’s trek towards Annapurna Base Camp, I arrived in sight of Machhapuchhre Base Camp and was looking forward to a steaming mug of hot tea and a Mars Bar when I turned to look back down the path and saw three workmen walking towards me. I’m not sure if this man’s rainbow-coloured umbrella was actually offering much in the way of protection in the driving rain but, photographically, it was an opportunity too good to miss.
I have my very own rainbow-coloured umbrella, which I am going to offer as a prize for the person who comes up with the most imaginative and inspiring collective noun for “Rainbow-coloured umbrellas“. I’ve already offered you a “deluge” of rainbow-coloured umbrellas. Come up with something even better and leave your suggestion in the comments below.
Here, now, to brighten your day and mine, is my definitive collection of rainbow-coloured umbrellas.
A man reads beneath a rainbow-coloured umbrella on the banks of the river Ganges in Varanasi, India
Buddhist monks share a rainbow-coloured umbrella at Boudhanath Stupa, Nepal
Buddhist monks share a rainbow-coloured umbrella at Boudhanath Stupa, Nepal
Two children walk home beneath a rainbow-coloured umbrella in Varanasi, India
Two children walk home beneath a rainbow-coloured umbrella in Varanasi, India
A group of people shelter from the monsoon rain beneath a rainbow-coloured umbrella in Boudhanath, Nepal
A group of people shelter from the monsoon rain beneath a rainbow-coloured umbrella in Boudhanath, Nepal
Schoolchildren on their way home through the rain in Patan, Nepal
How about a “Spectrum” of rainbow-colored umbrellas?
Love the shots too.
Mark
I saw a monk in Bylakuppe last month checking one of these out and thought of you!
My immediate thoughts were ” A Gavin” or “A Gough”, but I think i am going to go with “a Pantone”
How about “a jollybrolly?” It could even be “a polyjollybrolly” if you so dared.
A rainbow is polychromatic. Umbrellas are domed. Rainbow-colored umbrellas are polychromes and domes. So my vote is for “polychrome-domes” (with or without the hyphen).
I misread what you asked for. Oh well.
Well…how about “glut” or, to take an opposite approach…”drought”
It just has to be a ‘monsoon’ of rainbow-coloured umbrellas…
Best wishes
Ian
Gavin, I enjoy how you blend light, motion, and lens distortion into images of beauty!
Oh yeah, the umbrella: “yummy shelter”
I am suggesting “chakra” umbrellas.
I suggest “an arc” of rainbow-coloured umbrellas. Not only does it reflect the shape of the rainbow, it sounds like it would save me and a friend, carrying us away from the deluge of rain.
The one that came to my mind ….
” VIBGYOR’ed”
A ‘splash’ of rainbow-coloured umbrellas.
I would like to say “a myriad rainbow-coloured umbrellas”. This word fascinates me because I always think it should be ‘a myriad of’ something but its not! I have been looking for a rainbow-coloured umbrella here in Bali so I think I deserve it!
Gavin, great images. How about a “cornucopia” or even a “lollapalooza” of rainbow umbrellas!
A kaleidoscope of rainbow umbrellas. Love the photos. Wish we were still there to do another course!!
“scope”, its a broader perspective that yields understanding. I see life as more fulfilling when its splattered with a endless array of colors, with boundary less scope.
I like a “rush of rainbow-coloured umbrellas” because that’s the feeling I got when I saw these images!
First off, these are simply gorgeous pictures! Your travel pictures are definitely an exotic visual escape for me. Thank you for allowing myself, as well as others, to see the world vicariously through your lens.
Now to the “Legacy of the Rainbow Coloured Umbrella”… which is already a great title. While browsing these images I kept singing the Judy Garland song from the Wizard of Oz… “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”… “skies are blue….” Because your images are all seen by you first, “somewhere over the rainbow”.
Cheers,
Deborah Flowers
Great pictures!!
There are quite a few appropriate nouns but I’d go for “A shower of rainbow-coloured umbrellas”.
As in “a shower of meteorologists” or “bar stewards” for that matter – take your pick….
Given that You found them everywhere Gavin i will say definitely “UBIQUITY of rainbow-coloured umbrellas” !
I got, I got it (I hope!)!!
“Somewhere Under the Rainbow”
I got, I got it (I hope!), Gavin!!
“Somewhere Under the Rainbow”
(Thank you for brightening my day with your photos. When it rains, it’s a monsoon.)
ThuyVi
Hi Gavin,
To me a deluge is more like you see rainbow umbrellas everywhere. In reality they appear and then disappear in front of your eyes.
They became deluge only after you captured them and make collection. Until then they are more like flashes or apparitions or cycles or string… streaks… or progression….
But English is not my first language, so I may be totally wrong.
In any case the photos are just beautiful. These umbrellas are like gems…
Cheers
Sharka
This blog post is a beautiful “cascade” of rainbow-colored umbrellas, but that may not the noun to use as a title. I like Sue Taylor’s answer: A “Kaleidoscope” of umbrellas. Or you could switch it around and call it a “rainbow” of brightly-colored umbrellas. There must be something to the elusive and synchronistic, recurring nature of these umbrellas for you. Maybe “omnipresent,” “chronic,” or “ubiquitous,” but those don’t capture the mood. Perhaps a “giggle” or a “gaggle”? For my final answer, perhaps just keep it simple with “recurring.”
A managerie? A prism?
Hi Gavin, It’s so weird.
I have just returned home this very evening, having just spent 4 hours shooting images in my local towns’ annual fair “Foires d’Orval” in the heart of France. The most cheerful rainbow umbrella was for sale on one of the stalls and I procrastinated over wether to buy it or not for the remainder of the afternoon, eventually deciding not to on the grounds of the rainbow brolly shots being a little clichéd.
How wrong was I? The next thing you know I’ve dived in at random to read David DuChemin’s “visionmongers”. Followed his link to your site and lo and behold a plethora of rainbow umbrellas. Clichéd? I’ve changed my opinion of that.
Lovely images. Inspiring. Now if only I had a rainbow umbrella…………………………………….
If your still with me after this little voyage I think that the collective noun for them would have to be a “Smile” of them, or maybe a “gladness”.
You never see a sad face with a rainbow brolly.
“Smile and the whole world smiles with you”.