These 2,500-year-old petroglyphs, portraying figures with tulip-shaped heads and hourglass bodies, mark an ancient human presence in the Sahara's Aïr Mountains. Despite the extreme temperatures and sparse rainfall characterizing these arid landscapes, more than one billion people eke out a living in desert regions today.
Dec 2, 2008
Playful Dolphin, Waimanalo, Hawaii, 2001
Photograph by Jodi Cobb
A bottlenose dolphin plays in a lagoon in Waimanalo, Hawaii. Located just a half hour's drive from Honolulu, Waimanalo stretches out lazily along the coast like a sleeping hound. Its long, curving white-sand beach was once used as a backdrop for the television series Baywatch Hawai'i.
Dec 3, 2008
High-Rise Construction, India, 1997
Photograph by Steve McCurry
Workers perch on the scaffolding of a high-rise development in India. Massive population growth since independence in 1947 has provoked a boom in infrastructure. India now holds 950 million people, one-sixth of the world’s total. An increasing number are middle-class residents of such “concrete colonies.”
Dec 4, 2008
Steaming Laundry, India, 2003
Photograph by William Albert Allard
Untouchables work for a pittance washing clothes at dawn. The Hindu caste system forces 15 percent of India’s population to do jobs deemed “unclean”—anything that involves contact with bodily fluids, such as leatherwork and laundry or burying the dead. Untouchables suffer greatly from discrimination and violence.
Dec 5, 2008
Fungus on a Fly, Location Unknown, 2000
Photograph by Darlyne A. Murawski
Looking like delicate seeds, the spiky spores of a tiny parasitic fungus produce fruit on the back of a fly. These fungi are found throughout the world but will only live on certain insects.
Dec 6, 2008
Man on Camel, Giza, Egypt, 1966
Photograph by Dean Conger
Sporting a kaffiyeh and robes, National Geographic photographer Dean Conger poses atop a camel near the pyramids of Giza, Egypt. Conger joined National Geographic as a staff photographer in 1959 and worked on assignments all over Europe, Asia, and the United States.
Dec 7, 2008
U.S. Warplanes, Near Midway Atoll, Pacific Ocean, 1999
Photograph by David Doubilet
A trio of World War II-era U.S. Navy warplanes recalls the Battle of Midway. An Avenger torpedo bomber (middle) is flanked by a Dauntless dive-bomber (top) and a Wildcat fighter.
Dec 8, 2008
St. Basil's Cathedral, Moscow, Russia, 2000
Photograph by Jodi Cobb
A light snowfall dusts St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow's Red Square. Ivan the Terrible commissioned the iconic building in the mid-16th century. It houses nine distinct chapels, each with its own unique dome.
A goldsmith smelts bars of donated gold for use in the famed Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon (Rangoon), Myanmar (Burma). The 2,500-year-old shrine is said to house several strands of the Buddha's hair, among other sacred relics.
A team en route to Trango Tower in the Himalaya's Karakoram Range hikes along a riverbed in Pakistan. The 1996 expedition lasted nearly two months and culminated in a successful free-climb to the summit of the 20,469-foot (6,239-meter) granite spire's unforgiving East Face.