Welcome to the Pig Beach

Known officially as Big Major Cay this uninhabited island of Bahama Archipelago is populated by some swimming feral pigs. There are few theories about appearing of swimming pigs. The most well known is history of sailors that have dropped their animals off on Big Major Cay by hoping to come back and eat them. The sailors, though, never returned and  the swines probably survived on excess food dumped from passing ships.
Today, famous pigs are tourist attraction, taken on many photos during swimming out to the boats in an affort to get some food.
There is a children's book dedicated to the famous pigs, "The Secret of Pig Island", written by Jennifer R. Nolan, containing photos taken by Jim Abernethy.

Felicien Rops, Pornocrates, 1896

From The World According to Art (Rijks Museum Amsterdam):When the Belgian artist Félicien Rops worked on this image in 1878, he was in a state of fever, brought on by the stifling heat and intoxicating perfumes of cyclamen and opopanax in his room, which he considered to be very beneficial to the end result.The image, called Pornocrates or The Lady with the Pig, challenges us to decide who is leading who. After all, the woman has the pig on a leash; at the same time, she is blindfolded, so perhaps it is the pig that is actually controlling where she goes. What does the pig represent? Is it man, bestial and ignorant, or does its golden tail represent the lure of worldly goods? And what does its title tell us?Looking at this picture, it is not hard to imagine that Rops belongs to a movement called Decadence. Rops’ works are often sexually explicit and in the eyes of many, perverted. Religion is ridiculed. He was fascinated by the dark side of life: death, satanism and sin. Most of all, he was intrigued by the contemporary woman: assertive, seductive, ruthless and devouring, a Femme Fatale. Just like men were possessed by women, women were possessed by Satan.To Rops, his art showed scenes which typified the 19th century. Living in Paris, he saw the excesses of modern city life and their consequences. A degenerate society, driven by sexual urges, with fancy clothes concealing the dangers within. Several in his circle of friends, like Baudelaire, Flaubert and Manet, died of syphilis. It was a world where the fine arts would suffer, as we can deduce from the frieze below the lady with the pig.While it is often assumed that Rops harbored feelings of hate against women, the perversities of the city and its women energized him. Towards the end of his life, he expressed his greatest fear: ‘I am afraid of being old and of no longer being able to inspire love in a woman, which is a true death for a man of my nature and with my needs for madness of mind and body.’(text: Pauline Dorhout)

Blind Pig Brewery

An ideal place for the beer and pigs lovers :)! The Blind Pig Brewery is a pleasant bar situated in the town of Champaign (Illinois). They have got very large beer selection and they are brewing their very own beer as well. The origin of brewery's name comes from the period of Prohibition, when “pig” was the slang term for a mason jar and “blind pig” was an unmarked mason jar. Many legal saloons served bootlegged booze, which was always served in blind pigs. So if you wanted the good stuff, you asked the bartender for a blind pig.
Luckily Prohibition is finished and we can legally sip our beer in the bar. I wish I could try one, made in the Bling Big Brewery. In the view of many barflies it's probably one of the best bars in the U.S.

a Very Unusual Pig

Unce upon a time, in one chinese farm was born very unusual animal. A pig without back legs.
When the farmer Wang Xihai saw that one of his new born piglets doesn't have legs, he ran to say it to his wife. The woman was very scared, she thought it might be a bad sign, and she wanted Wang Xihai to kill lillte animal imediatelly. The farmer did not agree and he decided to keep the unusual pig. He named it Zhu. The piglet grown and very quickly learnt to walk and even to run with only two front legs.
Un usual animal became a local star. People were comming to see it and some of them wanted to buy it. Even a circus offered a high price for Zhu, but the farmer refused to sell. 'She proved to us that no matter what form life is it should continue to live on,' he said. 'I won't sell her no matter how much the offer is.' 

 

Cool Tram

The tram car that looks like a pig. What a nice idea! This pink tram named « Säulianhänger »  sponsored by Kantonalbank was circulating in the city of Basel in Switzerland. Very fun way to travel :)!

Joy of mud

Look at them! They are, as the saying goes, “happy as a pig in mud” :).  Pigs don't perspire, and so wallow in mud to keep themselves cool in a hot day. They are naturally very clean animals and, if given the choice, they prefer to cool themselves down in fresh water.  
Watching this five friends playing, you can see how much they really enjoy it. I wish all pigs in the world felt the smell of fresh grass and the joy of wallowing in the mud.

Pig-Sculpture

A wonderful sculpture of Leo Sewell, titled "NO FEEDING REQUIRED", created from  found materials,  assembled with nails, bolts and screws. 
Sewell's art follows naturalistic themes, and animals feature in his creations. He uses recycled materials and "found objects" in his work. During his career, artist has produced over 4,000 works, which are included in over 40 museums worldwide and in private collections.

"When Pigs Fly"

An expression, a way of saying that something is unlikely to happen :)...

Too Fresh Meat...

The movie didn't make me to laugh. I was rather sad after watching it. It has given me the sad reflection that we are a society of hipocrits... 

Vintage Chinese Stamp

Lovely green vintage stamp , a part of the Pig Breeding set, designed by Liu Shuoren. Issued in China on June 1960. My favourite from the series.
Here, the rest of piggy collection, unfortunately only the miniatures:

 

Super Hero of the week

 probably somewhere in Poland...

Pig Dictionary :)

свіння  - Belarusian       Porc - Catalan                Prase - Czech                
Varken - Dutch                Gris - Danish                 Siga - Estonian          
Sika - Finnish                  Cochon - French           Schwein - German      
χοίρος - Greek                Disznó - Hungarian       Svín - Icelandic           
Maiale - Italian                 豚 - Japaneese             Porcus - Latin
Cūka - Latvian                 Kiaulė - Lithuanian        Gris - Norvegian
świnia - Polish                 Porco - Portugese        Porc - Romanian
свинья - Russian            Prasa - Slovak              Cerdo - Spanish
Gris - Swedish                Domuz - Turkish            свиня - Ukrainian

Sir Winston Churchill's quote

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"I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals."

British politician and Nobel Prize Laureate Winston Churchill

under construction...

Here you will find very soon new blog about pigs :) Welcome! Witajcie! Wilkommen! Soyez les bienvenus!