Camel

The sun is high and it's a slow day for selling and there's not much for a camel trader to do except scatter hay and greens and listen to the big beasts munch. Sounds like shoes walking through gravel. Essam Ammar lifts a cellphone from his tunic. "Hi, Ahmed. No, I won't lower the price." Eyes roll. Ammar pulls the phone from his ear and looks at it; Ahmed's words crackle in the air. Click. It's not even noon. The day seems in retreat. "I've been doing this for 29 years," says Ammar, who wears a white-lace cap and an even snowier pinstriped vest, a risky choice amid blowing dust and rubbish fires.

Inspired by friends' photos, Randy Berler and his wife traveled to Morocco in May to experience the country firsthand. Captivated by the desert bathed in the day's receding light, he snapped this photo while on a camel trek to the dunes of Erg Chebbi. "The early evening sun made for spectacular colors," the Torrance resident said. Berler used a Canon EOS 50D. View past photos we've featured . To upload your own, visit our reader travel photo gallery . When you upload your photo, tell us where it was taken and when.

At the grand opening of Eden on Friday night, Tony Daly and David Judaken's new celebrity-magnet club, it was hard to say what was attracting the most attention. The tragically estranged Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens in one corner, stealing a kiss? Paris Hilton, the patron saint of Hollywood, in black and blond? Or was it another creature with long legs and curly eyelashes? The owners are betting on the tall, tan ungulate, which made its debut around 1:45 a.m. "I never knew so many people were camel fans," Judaken said.

Thousands of supporters of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak attacked anti-government forces in Cairo's main square Wednesday, some charging in on camels and horses in a dramatic escalation of violence that prompted an official order to clear the area. After days of raucous but peaceful demonstrations that had resembled a giant block party, pro-Mubarak forces pushed their way into the square from side streets, wielding clubs and horse whips against cordons of protesters. The crowd of anti-government demonstrators, sparse compared to their numbers in previous days, hurled stones and chunks of concrete.

A camel was apparently killed by lightning that struck a tree in its enclosure at a zoo, officials said. A Metrozoo keeper found Malaka, a one-hump camel, dead Friday after a rainstorm. An assistant curator said the camel probably was trying to hide from the rain and stood under the pine tree that was hit.

A camel taking part in a circus stunt in the city center here Wednesday took a fancy to the green spiked hairstyle of a passing punk rocker and took a sudden bite of it. While the youth got an unexpected and painful haircut, the camel got a nasty surprise, police said. It had evidently thought the hair was grass, but seconds later realized its mistake and spat it out.

The month-long round of women's runway shows came to an end Wednesday in Paris, where designers heralded the return of clean, classic sportswear and searched for a new definition of luxury in the fast-moving digital age. Here are six ideas and trends — spotted in New York, Milan and Paris — that are likely to influence what women wear this fall and beyond. COLOR ME CAMEL‬‪ If there was any doubt that camel is the color of the fall season, it was cleared up by designer Hannah MacGibbon.

"You have served me camel. " "No, no, it's goat. " "It's camel," said Lucas, the driver. "Goat," said the waiter. Unconvinced, but with limited dining options, Lucas spooned meat and gristle from a silver bowl onto his rice. He ate quickly. This wasn't his kind of place, this outpost of herders, mechanics, butchers and a few Lutheran missionaries scattered at the fringe of a refugee camp. He would be here one night, then back to Nairobi. The guesthouse, where he parked his SUV behind a metal gate, seemed safe enough and the manager, a tall man with a short broom in his hands, had a reassuring, timeless face, one you could count on when darkness fell.

One could say that nicotine is the straw that broke the Camel's back! JIM HULGAN Azusa

It has been said that a camel is a horse put together by a committee. What does that portend for a city charter revised by a diverse committee? HILMA OLSON San Pedro

At the grand opening of Eden on Friday night, Tony Daly and David Judaken's new celebrity-magnet club, it was hard to say what was attracting the most attention. The tragically estranged Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens in one corner, stealing a kiss? Paris Hilton, the patron saint of Hollywood, in black and blond? Or was it another creature with long legs and curly eyelashes? The owners are betting on the tall, tan ungulate, which made its debut around 1:45 a.m. "I never knew so many people were camel fans," Judaken said.

Did you promise to get active in 2011? If you have a taste for the offbeat — swamp soccer, anyone? — these one-of-a-kind sporting events can help you keep that promise and travel at the same time. The World Bog Snorkeling Championship If you love to snorkel, you can have a "bog-tastic" experience at the World Bog Snorkeling Championship in August in Llanwrtyd Wells, Wales, where snorkelers complete two lengths of a 60-yard water-filled trench cut through a peat bog. Competitors wear snorkels and flippers, but they don't use conventional strokes — just their flippers.

"You have served me camel. " "No, no, it's goat. " "It's camel," said Lucas, the driver. "Goat," said the waiter. Unconvinced, but with limited dining options, Lucas spooned meat and gristle from a silver bowl onto his rice. He ate quickly. This wasn't his kind of place, this outpost of herders, mechanics, butchers and a few Lutheran missionaries scattered at the fringe of a refugee camp. He would be here one night, then back to Nairobi. The guesthouse, where he parked his SUV behind a metal gate, seemed safe enough and the manager, a tall man with a short broom in his hands, had a reassuring, timeless face, one you could count on when darkness fell.

It happened more than a million years ago, but the fossilized evidence preserved the scene. A horse not much different from modern horses was enjoying a cool drink at a watering hole in what is now San Timoteo Canyon when a saber-toothed cat sneaked up and grabbed it by the haunch. After finishing its meal, the cat left the skeleton to be buried in mud from flash floods. That cat, or one very like it, eventually also ended up dead and its skeleton joined the horse's in the accumulating sediment.

Ezry Keydar and Nadav Ben Israel, two Israeli filmmakers, began making a documentary last year about a Bedouin man's dream of restoring camel races and cultural pride. But even before the film has been finished, his dream has become theirs. Camel racing in Israel may sound outlandish, but there's a serious point. Keydar says Israel is systematically pushing camels — a symbol of Bedouin culture — into extinction. Keydar lives in the desert, respects its harsh ways and wants Bedouins and camels to stay part of Israel's natural and cultural landscape.

When the black-and-orange funicular cars of Angels Flight resumed rattling up and down Bunker Hill two months ago, they were justly hailed as a link to the city's past. After all, the 298-foot-long ride — dubbed "the smallest railway in the world" — dates to 1901. Don't expect comebacks, however, from some other past transit systems, such as the San Pedro-L.A. camel train, the Aerial Swallow monorail, the Pasadena Cycleway and L.A. River Cruises. Each flamed out. L.A.'s brief camel era began in 1863 after the city was given 28 of the creatures from the 1st U.S. Army Camel Corps.

Animal "sporting events" around the world: THAILAND: Beetle fighting SOUTH AMERICA: Spider fighting ENGLAND: Dogs-vs.-rats fighting TURKEY: Camel fighting CHINA: Cricket fighting Source: World Features Syndicate

In your story on the "most memorable" ads ("Lingering Scent," May 24), I noticed where Camel cigarettes was mentioned for its cartoon character. The R. J. Reynolds spokeswoman, Maura Payne, claims that "we took extra pains to make sure that he appealed to adults, not children." If what Payne says is true, why have I observed so many young children wearing small T-shirts with the cartoon camel in front? Who do they think they are kidding? DOUG WEISKOPF Los Angeles

If you think teenagers today are less susceptible to smoking advertisements than those of yesterday — remember all those Virginia Slims "You've come a long way, baby" ads? — you'd be sadly mistaken. A study published March 15 in the journal Pediatrics shows that the 2007 R.J. Reynolds' cigarette campaign for Camel No. 9 had a significant effect on teen girls. Researchers at UC San Diego and the American Legacy Foundation enrolled more than 1,000 children, ages 10 to 13, in a study in 2003 and followed them through 2008, asking them about their favorite cigarette advertisement.

The month-long round of women's runway shows came to an end Wednesday in Paris, where designers heralded the return of clean, classic sportswear and searched for a new definition of luxury in the fast-moving digital age. Here are six ideas and trends — spotted in New York, Milan and Paris — that are likely to influence what women wear this fall and beyond. COLOR ME CAMEL‬‪ If there was any doubt that camel is the color of the fall season, it was cleared up by designer Hannah MacGibbon.