Jan. 3 Photo Brief: Critter count in London, Sandy Hook students go back to school, winter boot camp in Seoul, a Bulgarian bride, Obama’s new year’s swim
Critter count in London, Sandy Hook students go back to school, winter boot camp in Seoul, Obama swims in Hawaii, a Bulgarian bride, a 600 guitar tribute and more in today’s daily brief.
- Children from Sandy Hook Elementary School are seen on a school bus making their way to their new school in Monroe as they leave Newtown, Connecticut. Hundreds of the children who escaped the harrowing attack on their elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, last month head back to classes on Thursday for the first time since a gunman killed 20 of their schoolmates and six staff members. School officials are preparing for droves of anxious parents to join the fleet of buses carting children to a disused middle school in the neighboring town of Monroe.(Shannon Stapleton/Reuters)
- US President Barack Obama as he celebrates the New Year swimming in the ocean in his native state of Hawaii, on his annual Christmas vacation with family and friends, at Pyramid Rock Beach in Kaneohe Bay. (Pete Souza/White House)
- Musicians play John Lennon’s “Imagine” in a memorial tribute to the 23-year old Indian gang rape victim, during a mass guitar ensemble played by some 600 guitarists in Darjeeling. (Diptendu Dutta/Getty Images)
- An Afghan man looks on for a portrait at a refugee camp in Herat. Hundreds of families living in makeshift shelters around the Afghan capital Kabul collected blankets, charcoal and other supplies on January 2 as authorities struggle to avoid last year’s deadly winter toll. With temperatures dropping to -10 Celsius (14 Fahrenheit) at night in the city, the 35,000 refugees who live in the snow-covered camps face a battle to survive dire conditions protected only by plastic sheeting. (Aref Karimi/Getty Images)
- An Afghan family walks on a road in winter on the outskirts of Kabul. (Mohammad Ismail/Reuters)
- A zoo keeper holds a Bull frog during the annual stocktake at ZSL London Zoo in central London. ZSL London Zoo embarked on January 3 on their annual complete head-count of every animal at the zoo, which houses over 17,000 animals. (Ben Stansall/Getty Images)
- A European Eagle owl is seen during the annual stocktake at ZSL London Zoo in central London. ZSL London Zoo embarked on January 3 on their annual complete head-count of every animal at the zoo, which houses over 17,000 animals. (Ben Stansall/Getty Images)
- Zoo keeper Jeff Lambert poses with leaf insects during the annual stock take at London Zoo. The compulsory count of more than 17,500 animals is noted annually as part of the zoo’s license, and the information is logged with the International Species Information System (ISIS), used for managing international breeding programs of endangered animals. (Luke MacGregor/Reuters)
- Severin Freund of Germany competes during a training jump at the FIS World cup Four Hills competition in Innsbruck. (Samuel Kubani/Getty Images)
- Norway’s Tom Hilde takes off from the ski jump during the first practice session for the third jumping of the 61st four-hills ski jumping tournament in Innsbruck. (Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters)
- Students carry a log while attending a winter military camp in Ansan, south of Seoul. Hundreds of students between 11 and 17 years old attend winter boot camp training courses every year. The winter courses range from 4 to 14 days at the Blue Dragon Camp run by retired marines, which also offers summer boot camp for students. (Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters)
- Students attend a winter military camp in Ansan, south of Seoul. Hundreds of students between 11 and 17 years old attend winter boot camp training courses every year. The winter courses range from 4 to 14 days at the Blue Dragon Camp run by retired marines, which also offers summer boot camp for students. (Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters)
- A student attending a winter military camp reacts during a training session in Ansan, south of Seoul. (Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters)
- A homeless man, wrapped in a quilt, sits in an open space on a cold winter morning in the old quarters of Delhi. Heavy fog and a cold wave in Northern India have disrupted life in a number of cities, killing scores of homeless in the state of Uttar Pradesh, as the temperature dipped to around 4 degrees Celsius. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters)
- A father reacts after the death of two of his children, whom activists said were killed by shelling by forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, at al-Ansari area in Aleppo. (Muzaffar Salman/Reuters)
- People walk in front of a mural of a rat on a wall in Berlin. (Pawel Kopczynski/Reuters)
- Indian daredevils perform car and bike stunts during an annual fair in Mumbai. The ten day-long fair is being held in honor of the Sufi saint Makhdoom Ali Mahimi on the dusty Mahim beach, which is full of people on giant wheels, toy trains and enjoying gravity-defying stunts in the ‘Valley of Death.’ (Punit Paranjpe/Getty Images)
- Young carol singers make their way over a snowy meadow as in background can be seen the “Maria Himmelfahrt” (Ascension of Mary) conventual church in St. Maergen, southern Germany. The 2013 “Three King’s Action” charity focuses on the plight of children in Tansania. (Patrick Seeger/Getty Images)
- Fatme Ulanova stands during her wedding ceremony with Djamal Sirakov (not pictured) in the village of Ribnovo, in southwestern Bulgaria. The people of this Bulgarian mountain village are famous for performing their unique wedding ceremonies in winter time only. The inhabitants of the village of Ribnovo are Bulgarian-speaking Muslims, sometimes referred to as “Pomaks” or “people who have suffered”. Muslim Bulgarians are descendants of Christian Bulgarians who were forcibly converted to Islam by the Turks, during the 14th, 16th and the 18th century. (Dimitar Dilkoff/Getty Images)
- Firefighters work to put out a fire at a fur factory that contains six tanks of hazardous chemicals in Wenzhou, in eastern China’s Zhejiang province. More than 350 firefighters were brought in to get the fire under control, while no deaths were reported yet. (Getty Images)
- People leave Damara, the last strategic town between the rebels from the SELEKA coalition and the country’s capital Bangui as the commander of the regional African force FOMAC warned rebels against trying to take the town, saying it would “amount to a declaration of war.” The rebels, who began their campaign a month ago and have taken several key towns and cities, have accused Central African Republic leader Francois Bozize of failing to honor a 2007 peace deal. The sign reads in French “The seductive city of Damara welcomes you and wishes you a pleasant stay.” (Sia Kambou/Getty Images)
- High waves hit the coastline in Le Port, western part of French overseas’ island of La Reunion, as cyclone Dumile approaches and authorities declare today a red alert that forbid people to leave their homes. (Richard Bouhet/Getty Images)