While these 5-foot-long majestic creatures are still a rare sight, they are making a striking comeback.

Last October, the species was downlisted from critically endangered to endangered. But even though hundreds of these dinosaur-like reptiles have been released in the wild, the blue iguanas continue to rely on Burton’s help to maintain their population.

Burton has lived in Grand Cayman since 1979 and spent most of his years working for the government and the islands’ National Trust. He now heads the Blue Iguana Recovery Program (BIRP), for which he has worked as a full-time volunteer for about a decade. He distinctly recalls seeing a blue iguana for the first time in the 1980s, not knowing anything about the scaly reptile that was looking at him from the brush in someone’s backyard.

“You’re sort of looking for mosquitos and you see a red reptilian eye gazing back at you from under a tree somewhere,” Burton says. “And I thought, ‘what’s going on here?’ I had no idea there were animals like this anywhere in the world.”

Burton estimates that the blue iguana population was in the low 100′s from 1900 to 1990, and went down to about a dozen by 2002. An island-wide 2002 survey found that the wild population consisted of 10-25 blue iguanas, making the animals functionally extinct. Ever since Burton began saving the species in the 1990s, he knew his mission was critical.

His conservation efforts began – and continue – at his home office, where Burton set up incubators to hatch blue iguana eggs. After two months of incubation, 8-inch-long baby blue iguanas emerge from the eggs and Burton then sends them to a conservation facility in the Cayman Islands’ Queen Elizabeth II Botanic Park, which he launched with the help of donations in 1997.

The facility has the capacity to rear about 100 baby blue iguanas a year. Two iguana wardens, a field officer, and volunteers provide them with food, water and care. Burton’s goal is to bring the wild population to at least 1,000 “in the next single-digit years,” he says.

A baby blue iguana. Photo by Fred Burton.

The facility rearing and breeding the blue iguanas relies heavily on donations and funding, but the blue iguana’s downlisting from critically endangered to endangered has made it more difficult for the BIRP to gather crucial funds.

“It’s a two-edged piece of news,” Burton says. “It’s a great piece of news, inherently and actually, but what it does is it downgrades also the urgency in the minds of people who grant funding to programs like this.”

In March, the program surveyed the Salina Reserve to see if the blue iguana population has sustained itself. The BIRP has been releasing blue iguanas into the reserve since 2004, but it has always been unclear if the population was supporting itself.

“We’ve got preliminary results from that now and the bottom line is that it’s holding – but it’s only holding because we’re trickling more animals out there every year at the moment,” Burton says.

Blue iguanas. Photo by Fred Burton.

Part of the problem is that blue iguanas lay very few eggs in their early years, and it takes a large number of hatchlings to ensure the survival of a few. Native snakes consume many of the young, and it is only when they reach a certain size that they are safe from their only natural predators.

“A baby that is just coming into breeding age might produce one egg in a year, and the next year maybe three, and the next year maybe five or six,” Burton says. “And until they start producing like 12, 14, 16 in a year, there’s just not going to be enough young iguana hatchlings in order to swamp the snake population’s ability to mop them up.”

The reason blue iguanas initially began to die off – and a factor that will continue to affect the population – is Grand Cayman’s population of non-native predators. When humans arrived on the islands, they brought animals that the native iguana species did not recognize or fear.

“We brought dogs and cats and built roads and started driving cars. So we’ve got habitat destruction and then these invasive mammalian predators that the iguanas have no instinctive fear of,” Burton says. “If you see a baby blue iguana get sight of a snake, it freaks out and runs up the nearest tree – it’s instinctive. But a two-year-old iguana will walk up to a dog and look at it and think ‘who are you?’ – and get its head bitten off. They don’t recognize these things as dangerous because there’s no evolutionary memory [to do so].”

Green iguanas, on the other hand, have multiplied rapidly since the 1980s, after they were brought over as pets and eventually found in the wild.  The green iguanas, which are native to Central and South America, make nests often consisting of 60 or more eggs. In their native environment, they have an array of predators, including jaguarundis, margays, hawks and snakes. By producing large numbers of young and instinctively recognizing danger, the green iguanas have flourished on an island with no natural predators aside from the native Cayman snakes.

An invasive green iguana on Grand Cayman. Photo by Nicole Glass.

“The population is just going crazy – and we don’t know where it’s going to end,” Burton says.

Cayman Islanders have largely grown to despise the invasive species, which have destroyed much of the land.

“They frighten their children, they climb up on houses and they eat the Caymans Islanders’ food, crops, flowers and landscapes,” Burton explains, before describing his own attempt to grow a rare tree in his backyard, only to have it destroyed by the green iguanas.

The green iguanas have the potential to defoliate the environment in the long run, which would be harmful to the survival of the native blue iguana population as well. Some Cayman Islanders have developed a loathing for the green iguanas, which translates to the blues as well – even though the native species remains endangered.

Burton has saved a species from extinction, but in order to bring the population to sustainable numbers, the Blue Iguana Recovery Program continues to rely on donations and volunteers.

The program plans to release another batch of blue iguanas into the wild this summer, which will bring the population to the 800 mark. Although it may be a long shot, Burton hopes to one day see the native blue iguanas reclaim their land without his help.

“If they’re breeding abundantly enough to sustain themselves without us continuing to put the animals out there, then we can close the captive facility and we can release all these adults that we used in captive breeding facilities,” he says. “That would be a fantastic thing to do.”

For more information, visit the Blue Iguana Recovery Program website at www.blueiguana.ky and sign up to work as a volunteer. Check out the program’s Facebook page to get up-to-date news and information about the Cayman Islands’ native blue iguanas.

A blue iguana. Photo by Fred Burton.

Saigas are often hunted for their horns, which are used in Chinese medicine. Photo by Adriana Dinu/UNDP from “Defying Extinction”.

The grasslands of Russia and Kazakhstan are host to an animal that has roamed the earth since the Ice Age, but may soon become extinct: the saiga, a hump-nosed antelope whose population has declined by more than 95 percent since the early 1990s.

The critically endangered saiga, which stands just about two feet tall, is in urgent need of protection from poachers who illegally kill the animal for its horns and sometimes, its meat. In the early 1990s, millions of these antelopes freely roamed the grasslands of Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia and Uzbekistan. But by 2003, only 30,000 had survived.

“We must take immediate action to protect habitat and stop poaching for saiga horns,” said Lhagva Lkhagvasuren of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences. “Otherwise we will have only empty deserts with no saiga. Future generations will never forgive us for our carelessness.”

Today, an estimated 150,000 of the animals remain in the wild, due in large part to conservation efforts made to restore the population. But an increase in the saiga’s numbers has also come with an increase in poaching, causing the animal’s safety to remain a continuous problem.

“While the recent increase in saiga numbers is encouraging, it has also resulted in an increased poaching pressure. With saigas becoming more abundant again, hunting has become more easy and thus lucrative, [since] less fuel has to be spent in search of the animals and more males can be killed at one go,” said Maria Karlstetter, Saiga Programme Manager at Fauna & Flora International, in an e-mailed statement.

Unless initiatives are taken to revive the dwindling saiga population, most people will never come in contact with the unique-looking antelope, which is most often recognized by its bulging proboscis that scientists suspect may be used to warm the cold winter air or filter out dust.

But poachers are after the antelope for its horns, which are used in Chinese medicine, and have hunted the animal extensively throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. To protect endangered species of rhinoceros from being hunted, some conservationist groups in the early 1990s even encouraged hunters to go after the saiga instead. And now, the steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan are empty, devoid of the antelopes that once roamed the land in herds of thousands.

“The saiga have fallen victim to the insatiable demand for wildlife products for the medicinal – and often prestigious – purpose, resulting in a heavy toll on an increasing number of species,” Karlstetter said.

Saiga males use their horns to fight. The antelope has been nearly wiped out by hunting for its horns, which are in high demand for use in traditional Chinese medicine. Photo by Igor Shpilenok.

While poachers have been the main cause of the mammal’s endangerment, the saiga has also faced a number of other hardships. Mass die-offs have killed thousands of the animals for reasons still largely unclear to scientists. In May 2010, 12,000 saigas were found dead in the Ural region of Russia. In May 2011, 450 of the animals were found dead at the same site. Some scientists have suspected pasteurellosis, a bacterial infection, to be behind the mysterious deaths. Others suspected poisoning or contamination of pasture grass – even though there is no concrete evidence supporting that theory. But while the mass die-offs significantly affected the already-dwindling saiga population, the biggest threat to the endangered species remains poachers hoping to cash in on the animals’ horns. These are frequently sold in China, where the saiga became extinct  in the 1960s.

Additionally, keeping the animals in zoos is challenging: past attempts have proven largely unsuccessful, since saigas are difficult to keep alive in captivity. In several instances in which the mammals were kept captive at zoos, they fatally injured themselves while trying to escape.

“They have a strong flight instinct and often blindly ran into the fences, broke their necks, jaws or hips and had to be killed,” Karlstetter said. “The Cologne Zoo managed to keep a small group for about 30 years until a fox killed a newborn in 2006, which set the rest of the group into panic, resulting in fatal injuries of most [of the] animals. The last male died in 2009.”

The greatest hope for the saiga population are the conservation efforts made by governments and conservation organizations that emphasize tighter law enforcement and legislation against poaching, research into the saiga species’ survival, satellite tracking of remaining animals, community awareness, and the establishment of protective areas.

“The illegal saiga horn trade requires cooperation and collaboration across borders and institutions to be dealt with adequately,” Karlstetter said.

Fauna & Flora International works closely with the Kazakh government and the Association for the Conservation of Biodiversity of Kazakhstan to conduct research about the animal, strengthen state agencies that aid in the species’ survival and spread awareness to rural communities. And Karlstetter hopes that enough people will care about the hump-nosed species’ survival to aid in the protection effort meant to restore its population.

“While law enforcement will most certainly continue to play a crucial role for the conservation of the species for a long time to come, I yet hope that future generations with an ever growing access to information will make informed decisions and will value the saiga more alive than dead,” she said.

The saiga antelope has an unusual-looking face with a long nose, which is believed to warm up air in the frigid Central Asian steppe. Photo by Igor Shpilenok.

The sanctuary protects all sharks from targeted fishing and aims to prevent possession, sale, and trade of shark products. The animals are often killed to satisfy the high demand of shark fin soup, an Asian delicacy that sells upwards of $100 a bowl. Sharks targeted for this purpose are often thrown back into the ocean after their fins have been cut off, making it impossible for them to survive.

Jess Cramp, program manager of PICI, and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton show their support for a Cook Islands shark sanctuary. Photo courtesy of the Pacific Islands Conservation Initiative.

As many as one-third of all open ocean shark species face the threat of extinction, and the reduction in their numbers severely affect the ecosystem around them – especially since it often takes years for a shark to mature and since they have very few young.

In June 2012, there were reports that three tons of shark fins were found aboard an Asian fishing vessel in the Cook Islands, which led to a parliamentary debate over the extent of the problem. There is no data on the number of sharks killed in the Cook Islands each year, which makes it difficult to estimate the severity of shark fishing.

The Pacific Islands Conservation Initiative (PICI) spent more than 18 months gathering support for a much-needed sanctuary, after which the Cook Islands declared the entire 1.997 million sq. km EEZ, an area the size of Mexico, a sanctuary protecting sharks, rays, and elasmobranchs. Violators of the sanctuary’s regulations will be fined between $100,000 NZD ($84,000 USD) and $250,000 NZD ($210,550 USD).

Jess Cramp, program manager at PICI, said her group’s campaign was difficult at first and struggled to garner support from Cook Island legislators. The group was met with heavy opposition until it began to get the island community involved.

“We were met with strong opposition from the head of fisheries at first. So much that it made us question why he was so defensive about banning shark fishing,” Cramp said. “So what we did then is we went out into the community and we gave community presentations, we sent letters to the community we couldn’t reach – because it was expensive to get to the outer islands – and we began to acquire what we called ‘shark ambassadors.’”

Cramp and PICI Founder Stephen Lyon spent 18 months meeting with fisheries, collecting scientific data, and gathering community support to make their case to the Ministry of Marine Resources. Once the international media picked up on the campaign, PICI received funding from groups including the Pew Environment Group. When U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited the Cook Islands in August, Cramp stopped her at the Pacific Leaders Forum and told her about the campaign for a shark sanctuary.

Clinton appeared to be excited about the project, especially since she had just discussed wildlife protection with one of her staffers, Cramp said.

Posters made by Cook Island children, displayed at the PICI Pacific Leaders' Forum booth. Photo courtesy of the Pacific Islands Conservation Initiative.

In the Cook Islands, sharks are revered as ‘guardians’, and emphasizing that part of the island’s culture was immensely effective in prompting others to support the cause.

“This is something that the locals really grasped onto,” Cramp said, proceeding to explain the arguments that incited Cook Islanders to believe in their cause. “‘We’re not eating the sharks, we’re not making any money off of these foreign vessels coming into our waters eating our sharks. They’re important for the ecosystem, they can’t keep up with the fishing pressures and oh by the way, these are important to our culture. So we can make both an environmental and political statement by standing up and protecting these creatures.’”

On Dec. 12, 2012, Minister of Marine Resources Teina Bishop announced the Cabinet’s approval of the shark sanctuary, just days after French Polynesia included the mako shark as part of an 8-year moratorium on shark fishing. Although the Cook Islands have only identified 18 species of sharks in its water, the neighboring Polynesian islands have identified 40 species and the Cooks are thought to have the same number. The critically endangered oceanic whitetip sharks, blue sharks, hammerhead sharks, and whale sharks have all been found aboard fishing vessels and will now be safeguarded.

“The Cooks in particular are quite savvy,” Cramp said. “They don’t just roll over and let things happen.”

With the new regulations in place, Cook Islanders can rest assured that their ‘guardians’ will themselves be protected in the open ocean while sanctuary violators will be heavily prosecuted.

Students from the Mangaia School show their support for a Cook Islands shark sanctuary. Photo by Mitch Thornton.

Photo courtesy of the National Park Service, Alaska. www.nps.gov

This month marks the centennial anniversary of the eruption of the Novarupta Volcano in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska — the largest volcanic eruption of the twentieth century. On June 6, 1912, the giant eruption blackened the skies with smoke. With an eruption ten times the force of Mount Saint Helens in 1980, mountains collapsed and earthquakes were felt as far as Washington, D.C. Nearby villages were completely buried in ash, many of which were permanently destroyed. The city of Kodiak, located 115 miles away, was buried in two feet of ash.

“The eruption did not kill anyone, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t affect people’s lives,” said Katie Ringsmuth, President of the Alaska Historical Society.

Only Greece’s Santorini in 1500 B.C. displaced more volcanic matter than Katmai. But although the catastrophe destroyed homes and shook the continent, it also led to scientific research and the establishment of a national park.

National Geographic Society’s botanist Robert Griggs led an expedition in 1916 to determine how ecological systems recover from these catastrophic events. He named the volcano and its surrounding landscape the Valley of the Ten Thousand Smokes. The year 1918 marks the establishment of Katmai National Park and Preserve, which was also named a national monument.

Today, the valley attracts wildlife enthusiasts and tourists from around the world.

“People love going to the Valley of the Ten Thousand Smokes,” said Ringsmuth. “There’s certainly a sense of place and connection that speaks to the power of nature, and I think that the valley today isn’t just important to Alaskans, but it is important to people all over the world.”

This year’s centennial celebration features a number of events across Alaska to raise awareness about the region’s history. Ringsmuth hopes the anniversary will inspire new research about an area that has become so important to geologists.

To promote education about the volcano, the Alaska Historical Society held a statewide poster contest for elementary school children about the extraordinary eruption. While some young artists depict the landscape surrounded by bears and wildlife, others illustrated images of the 1912 catastrophe.

“Those posters also reflected a darkness,” Ringsmuth said. “The terror and the fact that people lost their homes was reflected in a lot of those stories [that Alaskan children were told]. So they’re still being passed down to the next generation.”

And although the smoke has dissipated, the volcano’s stories are passed down. 100 years later, this large Alaskan volcano stands as a strong reminder of the power of nature.

“It’s my hope that it will inspire new research, new exploration of the history of what’s really going on here,” Ringsmuth said.

FIRST PLACE: "Afognak Fish Camp" by Nicole Smith, Port Alsworth. Photo courtesy of the Alaska Historical Society.

"ESCAPE" by Conner Romer, Kokhanok Village. Photo courtesy of the Alaska Historical Society.

But while the green iguanas were initially protected under the law, this invasive species has long outstayed its welcome. Before 2010, Cayman law made it illegal to kill iguanas, in a desperate attempt to save the critically endangered native blue iguana. But for the past two years, the Department of Environment has been trying to reduce the green iguana population by killing the giant lizards.

The DoE fears the iguanas could massively invade Little Cayman and Cayman Brac, where so far only a few of the greens have been spotted. While the DoE no longer responds to calls regarding the unmanageable population of iguanas on Grand Cayman, it is trying to prevent them from inhabiting the Sister Islands.

“They have to cull them,” said Bonnie Edwards, a liaison on an upcoming iguana survey, “We love all iguanas, but the green ones don’t belong here and they are a threat to the native rock iguana.”

But regardless of their uncontrollable population, the green iguanas remain a fascinating species. Scientists are studying their social behavior to better understand how herbivorous dinosaurs behaved 65 million years ago.

The dinosaur genus Iguanodon, meaning “iguana tooth,” was named because its beak-like mouth and back teeth resembled those of an iguana. Green iguana babies, like many herbivorous dinosaurs, form social bonds and travel in groups for survival.

And while the Cayman’s native blue iguanas more often appear on postcards and travel brochures, the green ones continue to pose majestically for tourists’ photographs as the five foot long lizards munch peacefully on leaves, flowers and fruit. With no natural predators on the island, it looks like the green iguanas are there to stay.

“It’s about connecting our communities with each other and bringing these places to life,” said Seth Teicher, Vice President of Atlas Obscura‘s Strategic Partnerships and New Media. “It’s about escaping the web and uncovering the world yourself and discovering that there’s wonder in abundance and intrigue all around us.”

At a time when 78 percent of Americans are connected to the Internet and 50 percent of the country is on Facebook, it sometimes takes more motivation to get a group together to explore. People book plane tickets to foreign countries, often leaving their own cities unexplored.

But between 3,000 and 5,000 people are expected to leave their homes in search of a local adventure on this year’s Obscura Day.

Atlas Obscura was formed with a similar mission to National Geographic, said senior editor Annetta Black.

“It’s in the same spirit that National Geographic was formed in the 1880s – this idea that the world is absolutely amazing, and if you spend your time looking for and cultivating those amazing stories, it cultivates a sense of wonder that permeates your life,” she said. Most rewarding to her is witnessing people’s new-found love for places they once took for granted in their hometowns.

“We really do overlook all these amazing places near us. We reserve or excitement for traveling to faraway places, and it’s ridiculous because there’s amazing places next door,” she said.

More than 100 events have been organized throughout the world for this year’s Obscura Day, and here’s just a few:

Particle Accelerator Tour — Athens, Ohio

The Edwards Accelerator Library is home to the largest and highest energy accelerator in Ohio. A free tour of the lab will teach visitors about neutrons (which can be used to detect explosives) and explore the 4.5 million volt tandem accelerator.

“People love particle accelerators,” said Teicher. “There’s something about smashing atoms together at the speed of light that really gets people off.”

Off Limits and After Dark at Alcatraz – San Francisco, California

A three-hour walking tour through this former prison – which no one had ever escaped from – includes visits to off-limit areas. The longest tunnel on the island, as well as guards’ apartments, the firehouse, and a Civil-War age fortness known as “the dungeon” are just some of the places that Obscura Day visitors will be taken to.

“People love exploring abandoned asylums and museums and that sort of thing,” Teicher said. This abandoned prison ranks as one of the more popular Obscura Day attractions.

Bivouac New York Rooftop Camping – Brooklyn, New York

For the more adventurous explorers, camping on one of Brooklyn’s rooftops — with the lit up Manhattan skyline in the background — is sure to be a memorable night. Spend an evening “roughing it” with other New Yorkers, discussing alternative living spaces and pioneering skills.

The rooftop will be equipped with tents and a library, and provides the opportunity to spend a night meeting other local adventurers.

Street Art and Graffiti – Berlin, Germany

Ever felt the urge to see a graffiti artist in action (or learn to become one)? Berlin, the city of urban art, is hosting a walking tour and workshop to demonstrate the techniques behind the art that famously left its mark on the Berlin Wall. After a walking tour to see the works of more than 50 street artists, tour-goers will be given the chance to do their own form of (legal!) spray-painting.

Although tickets may be sold out and Obscura Day events don’t take place in every city, Teicher hopes everyone will go out and do their own local exploring. Got cool pictures? Atlas Obscura hopes to see them on Twitter.

Go rooftop camping in Brooklyn, NY during this year's Obscura Day. Photo courtesty of Atlas Obscura.

Learn the secrets of Berlin's graffiti artists during a street art workshop. Photo by Nicole Glass.

From building community gardens on vacant city lots to monitoring sewage water, these projects have triggered an urban movement towards maximizing the city’s environmental potential.

Don’t Flush Me

New York City’s outdated sewage system does not have the capacity to transport unusually high amounts of water to one of the city’s 14 Wastewater Treatment Plants. During times of severe rainfall, sewage pipes are often overloaded, and more than 27 billion gallons of raw sewage and polluted water flow into the city’s waterways each year.

But Leif Percifield’s project, Don’t Flush Me, aims to install solar-powered sensors around New York’s major sewage overflow points to monitor the water levels. When sewage water reaches overflow levels, residents who register their phone numbers of Twitter accounts with the project will receive a message telling them not to flush their toilets during that time and to reduce their water usage.

“The idea is to create a text message alert system where someone can get the information on their phone or to a device that will suggest to them that now is not the time to use a lot of water,” he said, standing beside a canal in Park Slope. “They should save a flush, take a shorter shower, or avoid washing a giant sink of dishes.”

Leif Percifield stands in front of a canal in Park Slope, where he has installed his first combined sewage overflow sensor. Photo by Nicole Glass.

Community Gardens Replace Vacant Lots

Brooklyn is home to about 596 acres of vacant public land, and a recently launched ioby-funded nonprofit is trying to make use of them. 596 Acres, led by Paula Segal, distributes maps of vacant land and helps residents acquire the city’s permission to use these empty lots as a community-controlled green space.

“When we put up a sign, it means that the agency that owns the land doesn’t have a plan for it,” she said. “And if the community got together, they would let them use it.”

And that’s exactly what happened at Compost for Brooklyn, where more than a dozen Kensington neighborhood residents spent the weekend gardening and planting seeds in the once-abandoned lot.

“I would have never thought that composting could bring a community together, but it really has,” said Emily Osgood, one of the project’s founders.

The 462 Halsey Community Garden will open on Earth Day. Photo by Nicole Glass.

Paula Segal of 596 Acres stands in front of a former vacant lot that is now used for gardening. Photo by Nicole Glass.

Velo City Takes Teens On an Urban Ride

New York’s neighborhood residents rarely have a say in designing their own surroundings – but Velo City is planning to change that. Through a program that takes high school students from the South Bronx on city bike tours, the non-profit is hoping to inspire a new generation of urban planners, while also encouraging a healthier lifestyle.

“Everyone knows what a lawyer is, what a doctor is, but what is an urban planner?” said Samelys Lopez, one of Velo City’s founders. “We’re getting youth to see that these professions are important, because they shape the physical environment that they live in.”

Last summer’s program resulted in students leading a community-wide bike tour of their own, and co-founder Naomi Doerner hopes this year will produce a group of equally engaged students who are interested in urban planning.

“It’s essentially a curriculum, not necessarily a tour,” she said.

Velo City Co-Founders Naomi Doerner and Samelys Lopez Raise Awareness at their container at DeKalb Market. Photo by Nicole Glass.

Of the New York City projects that are attempting to make the city a more pleasant environment to live in, 78 percent were successfully funded through ioby – projects that may bring a larger community together for this year’s Earth Day.

Former North Korean propaganda artist Song Byeok stands in front of two of his newest paintings. Photo by Nicole Glass.

Washington, D.C. will host a unique, temporary art exhibit from April 13 – 30, depicting images of North Korean oppression, propaganda and satire – an exhibit that takes us on a journey through the mind of a North Korean defector – Song Byeok.

“They will be shocked, surprised. Who’s gonna dare make a painting like that?” said Byeok, imaging a typical North Korean reaction to his art. “He’s the Son of God. You cannot make fun of Kim Il-sung.”

But that’s exactly what Byeok did after his escape from North Korea. The former North Korean propaganda artist used to paint images glorifying the “Great Leader,” Kim Il-sung, as well as Kim Jong-il. Now, he uses art to ridicule the men he once worshiped.

Byeok’s early years were filled with happiness and pride for his propaganda art. His troubles began after the death of Kim Il-sung in 1994, which led to a nationwide famine that compelled Byeok and his father to illegally cross the border into China in a desperate search of food.

“At least when Kim Il-sung was alive we were still able to eat corn, as opposed to rice, which is Korea’s staple,” he said. “After Kim Il-sung died, our food rations disappeared and many people starved.”

But on one fateful border-crossing journey, his father was swept away by a strong current of the Tumen River. After searching the riverbanks for his father’s body, Byeok was arrested, questioned and brutally tortured by North Korean border guards – and that’s when escaping first crossed his mind.

“When I was in prison, I realized there was something wrong with the North Korean government, so I wanted to go to South Korea,” Byeok said. “I was released because I was almost dead and they didn’t want to keep me.”

Miraculously, Byeok escaped from North Korea in 2002, and has spent the past decade working as a satire artist in Seoul.

His two-week long exhibit at “The Dunes” in D.C. will feature twenty pieces of art, six of which have never been seen before.

Perhaps his most famous work depicts the head of Kim Jong-il on the body of Marilyn Monroe, trying to keep the wind from blowing up her dress.

“Marilyn Monroe is trying to hide something like Kim Jong is trying to hide something,” the artist said, who uses clothes to represent power. “I am mocking Kim Jong-il in a way and it’s a very humorous way.”

Monroe’s body is surrounded by little red fish, who Byeok says represent the people of North Korea, looking for freedom.

Although Byeok is sure that the mockery could put his life at risk, he hopes North Korean leaders will see his work and be influenced to see past the propaganda that shapes their society.

“A lot of high official leaders are watching this and they are shocked, but they will be thinking about my work, my message,” he said. “They’re not dumb.”

Hannah Barker, the exhibit’s community relations representative, said Byeok’s art has attracted crowds from all walks of life, from lovers of pop art to students interested in North Korea, and has the power to touch a lot of lives.

“The presence of the artwork is so much more alive when you see it in person,” she said. Barker, an American University senior who has helped Director of Operations Gregory Pence put together the showcase, said Byeok’s work and positivity has inspired her.

“He paints a future that he’s imagined, that there is no guarantee will ever happen – especially no guarantee that it will happen soon,” she said. “But the fact that someone who’s been through as much as he has and can still look positively at the future and hope for that – that’s pretty inspiring.”

Song Byeok’s artwork will be displayed at The Dunes at 1402 Meridian Place, NW until April 30. Visit www.songbyeok.com for more information.

Song Byeok stands in front of his Marilyn Monroe-style painting of Kim Jong-il. Photo by Nicole Glass.

Mental athletes memorize a sequence of random digits. Photo by Nicole Glass

Nelson Dellis left Saturday’s US Memory Championship with gold medals around his neck and a trophy in his hand. He had broken new records, memorized 303 random numbers in five minutes, and recited the order of two decks of cards. The second-time champion was living proof that a 28-year old with an average memory can become the country’s greatest mental athlete.

The technique? Translating data into visual images and placing them into a “memory palace” – a place in your mind that you can walk through again later and gather the storage.

Dellis came to the competition with a new technique: he would turn a group of seven numbers into a single image. To him, the number 0093495, for example, represented an image of Olivia Newton slam-dunking a helmet while wearing spandex.

Using the same colorful imagery, Dellis and the other mental athletes memorized a 50-line poem, 99 names and faces, random words and numbers, and biographical information including zip codes and phone numbers – all under the pressure of a few minutes each.

Joshua Foer, a former memory champion and author of Moonwalking with Einstein, came to cheer on this year’s competitors, but says he no longer has the skills to win.

“It’s not like training for an event like this improves some underlying generalized memorability,” he said. “You’re not turning up some volume knob in your brain. For these events, you’re quicker, faster and can remember more, but if you step outside of these doors, Nelson or I or any of these competitors are not going to have a better memory for where we put out car keys.”

But although this type of memory can only be achieved through actively applying these techniques, extensive practice can grow one’s brain the same way that one can work out to gain muscle.

According to Dr. Majid Fotuhi, chairman of the Neurology Institute for Brain Health and Fitness, this type of training actually causes brain growth, helping prevent Alzheimer’s later in life.

“When you’ve acquired the skills, you’re more likely to use your memory more often,” he said. “And the more often you use your memory, the stronger your hippocampus gets.”

Fotuhi refers to bad memory as a self-fulfilling prophecy. When someone assumes they have bad memory, they avoid efforts to train their brain — training that can help prevent brain shrinkage. And Tony Dottino, the founder of the annual championship, is familiar with the difficulty of recruiting people to compete.

“It’s easier for me to stand on the street and get people to come in here and stand on this stage naked before I can get them in here to compete in a memory competition,” he said. “The hardest thing I’ve had to do in fifteen years is to find mental athletes.”

Dellis began training his memory after his grandmother died from Alzheimer’s.

Whether memorizing to win a competition, better one’s test scores or as a hobby, the health benefits are undeniable.

“We should take care of our minds, that’s the bottom line,” said Dellis, with cards at his feet and a trophy in hand. “I hope you are inspired a little bit to explore your own mind.”