Mongolia and the Northern Islands of Hawaii

seem to have absolutely nothing in common, other than they are each on exhibit at the National Geographic.

The Mongolian exhibit focuses on two things:

First, some very nice journalistic-type photographs of rural Mongolian families engaged in their daily life activities, and particularly in their annual seasonal migrations. The colors are particularly good. The photographs are by Gordon Wiltsie.

Second, on an appealing Mongolian Buddhist ceremony called Tsam. I can't begin to explain it, except to say it features a number of gods and near gods in variegated stylized costumes and terrific animal like masks (they all look like NHL goalies) who participate in a comic/drama whose goal is to drive evil out of the community. You can't argue with that. The exhibit includes four life size masked models in historic clothes (led by the blue bullhead god Dandinchoijou) and twenty or so 18" models.

The Northern Hawaii exhibit is only photographic, and involves portraits birds, fish and other forms of sea life taken from a chain of environmentally protected islands northwest of the inhabited Hawaiian Is. They are so protected that not only does no one live on them (although they are the stated ancestral homes of native islanders), but you cannot visit them without a reason to go, and then you are in virtual quarantine (and even not allowed to wear clothes you have worn anywhere before, for fear that there might by some seeds or pollen that could pollute the area). The photos are large and very artistically done, generally isolating the subject against a large single color (often white) background. Most appealing are four portraits of a winter tern leaving the egg; a baby albatross and a brown booby. The crustacea are just as interesting but not as appealing. And the photos of the coral and other attached sea life are fascinating, but for me more difficult to appreciate.