At the Pień cemetery, Poland, the dead were forbidden to return; the living made sure of it. Local residents buried their relatives face down, with heavy stones placed on the body, arms, neck, or between the thighs, and with chains on their ankles or sickles at their necks. All this to prevent vampires, the undead, or creatures of the night from returning to bring plagues and diseases. The first undead appears in fiction with The Vampyre by John William Polidori in 1819, decades before Bram Stoker’s celebrated Dracula (1897). In the reality of Eastern Europe, however, the Slavic word was used a century earlier. In 1725, the Austrian newspaper Wienerisches Diarium already mentioned vampires to describe medical reports of alleged cases of the undead in Serbia and Hungary.

In the small and prosperous town of La Marsa, right in the middle of legendary Tunisian Carthage, a dozen tattoo studios now proliferate, giving an idea of how trends and globalization find cracks in the smallest country of the Maghreb. They are no different from the studios in the center of Barcelona. You could get tattooed there with characters from La casa de papel or Peaky blinders and the designs preferred by tourists, such as moons and abstract figures, for which a European would be willing to pay up to 600 euros.

In 1976, all the ingredients were on the table of the Catalan performing arts for a new contemporary Catalan circus to appear. The death of Franco gave wings to the young artists who, for some time, had been waiting for the opportunity to grasp freedom, go out into the street, and create. "We were born as a utopia," says Adelaida Frias, from Circ Perillós. When she looks back and thinks about those days, the artist recalls, above all, "a kind of joy, a need for overflowing imagination, a desire to move, of a changing era". With Comediants, Joan Brossa, Carles Santos, and Els Joglars as pioneers and benchmarks, at the end of the 70s there was an explosion of new companies such as Circ Sèmola, the Poltrona brothers, Picatrons, and La Tràgica. The latter marked, on October 6, 1976, the beginning of the Catalan contemporary circus with the premiere of the show Tripijoc joc trip, starring six auguste clowns and performed during the Sarrià Major Festival, in a tent at the Pati dels Caputxins.

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When he was a child he was gifted a Super-8 camera and he made his first short film at only 13 years old. Born in Rosario (Argentina), Claudio Lauria was a “precocious” filmmaker, who learned very early on the power of mobilization of a good documentary, at a time when the Argentine dictatorship prohibited any form of cultural expression. Years later, already settled in Catalonia, he was a pioneer again when he founded the International Environmental Film Festival, today called Suncine and considered the oldest in the world of its genre. Lauria defines himself as a "militant of culture, of cinema and of life", and it is in large part thanks to his militancy that Suncine –which from November 4 to 22 will celebrate its 33rd edition– has just been declared by the Catalan Parliament as a "strategic cultural event for Catalonia".

This photograph was taken on Monday. It has no artistic pretension, but rather a testimonial one. But after a diplomatic crisis was unleashed between the world of football and the government of China, the label on the water bottle with the smiling face of Mbappé becomes ironic. The footballer's expression acquires an almost comic meaning. For years now, Kylian Mbappé has been a commercial asset in the Chinese market. The player's face is used to sell, among other products, bottled water with isotonic properties. Judging by the bottle labels, it even seems as if the footballer provides aromatic properties. One drink tastes like peach, the other like lemon, and the one featuring the player's photograph is as if it contained the essence of Mbappé. Mbappé water. On the packaging, the footballer laughs, oblivious to the large-scale conflict that has been triggered by a spontaneous comment: the player explained that his favorite meme is one where his face is superimposed on that of Mao Zedong. The footballer referred to him as "a Chinese dictator," which is what he was. He likes it because it exaggerates his authority on the team and among his teammates. In a world of stratospheric egos, becoming a character of absolute power boosts self-esteem.

If it were a man instead of an orangutan, the image could look like the Normandy landing. It has the drama of a war scene. But the Reuters photograph, by Victor Fidelis Sentosa, is from Borneo, in Indonesia. A member of the rescue team and veterinarian Karmele Llano, head of the YIARI foundation, transport an adult female during a rescue operation in an oil palm plantation, in the village of Laman Satong, in the Ketapang region. The rehabilitation center has been taking in dozens of orangutans for months as severe forest fires ravage their natural habitat. The fires, which began in July and are expected to last until November, mainly affect the islands of Borneo and Sumatra, and are the worst the country has suffered in a decade. In 2015, fires in Indonesia already caused a major environmental and health crisis, with pollution that spread to other countries in Southeast Asia.

Do not be alarmed if you run into teenagers on the street wearing stickers the size of a gummed label on their faces. Your vision is not failing you, nor are you experiencing a vitreous detachment. It is simply a trend that has been spreading among young people after the American brand Starface began marketing them. The reason? Treating acne pimples with hydrocolloid patches that absorb the liquid and protect them. But if until recently many of these patches were sold in beige tones, with the intention of going unnoticed, some young people have now decided to do the exact opposite: turn the pimple into an ornamental pretext. The patches are sold in bright colors – even fluorescent ones – and take the form of stars, moons, hearts, emojis, panda bears, avocados, or ghosts, in addition to reproducing fictional characters. Famous people like Justin Bieber and North West, along with her mother, Kim Kardashian, have joined this trend. But, as often happens with contemporary fashions, not everything is new under the sun: behind these apparently innovative stickers, a much older gesture is hidden.

On September 14, 1985, thousands of Catalans gathered at El Prat airport to welcome the expedition that was returning home after reaching the summit. For the first time, the Catalan flag had flown atop the highest mountain in the world, Everest. Two weeks earlier, Òscar Cadiach, Toni Sors, and Carles Vallès had made history, and Cadiach had been responsible for delivering the good news via a precarious radio connection: “Catalonia has reached the roof of the world”. Curiously, many people still believe that the words were "We have reached the summit", but that was not the case. The Tarragona native, who had climbed without the help of oxygen bottles, arrived with so much energy at the top of Everest that he had time to read the Sextine Ode to some intrepid Catalans that the poet Joan Brossa had dedicated to those brave men.

“A map is a technical tool, but it also shapes our perception of peoples and continents”. This is how Togo's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Robert Dussey, justified the resolution approved by the UN, which recommends using a different world map from now on.

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It is not always necessary to carry out a major renovation to radically change a house and the life that can be lived there. In Fonolleres, a small village in the Empordà region, the Anna & Eugeni Bach studio started from a home built in the early 2000s and intervened with an almost classic strategy: preserving a good part of what already existed and adding what was missing to gain comfort and, above all, to adapt the house to the tastes and habits of its owner. The result, however, is far from conventional. With a few operations, the house has profoundly changed its way of being experienced.

Getting lost in the labyrinthine corridors of Laika studios, located on the outskirts of Portland, the cultural and gastronomic capital of Oregon, in the United States, is like taking a walk through the history of cinema. During an exclusive visit by the newspaper ARA this summer, we were struck by a total silence. Wildwood, their latest film, the sixth and most ambitious of them all, is in the final phase of post-production and the sets are perfectly lit but without a soul in sight. All the rooms are closed off by a curtain accompanied by a rudimentary sign with the name of a color that identifies each of the spaces so that the animators do not get lost. They started with the basic colors: blue, green, black. As the locations multiplied, they ran short and had to add blue 2, green 2, and black 2. On our tour, we find much more specific ones like salmon and turquoise, which complete the more than 100 locations and 130 sets used in total. Quite a feat.

My mother used to say that she had been lucky. When she met my father, the actress Kim Novak was in fashion, and with her, a type of woman with hips and a generous body. In other words, not thin. Later, she would lament that fashion had changed and that gaunt bodies had become the trend, because she knew that her daughters would have a harder time of it. I would listen to her and curse my bad luck because, at home, for years and years, I was the fat one, the chubby one, the one who didn't have the normative weight that was expected and, of course, was a person in a permanent war with her own body.

Smashed shop windows, emptied stores, luxury bags disappearing in mass. On October 17th, several French luxury houses were looted during a day of social protests across the country. Dior, Celine, Hermès, Louis Vuitton… These are not just any shops, but temples of exclusivity, showcases of a sector that trades on distinction—and social inequality. The looting occurred in the context of the French student mobilizations, which demand more resources for public education, more teachers, better infrastructure, and more equal opportunities. But what does demanding quality public education have to do with looting a boutique of luxury?

An upright piano with exposed strings rests on a carpet of sawdust. For the first time in six days, at the old textile colony of Cal Rosal, in Berguedà, silence has fallen. The artist Bru Ferri prepares to play and sing. But first, he highlights the work of the tired yet moved audience in front of him. In less than a week, among many other things, the stage where he will perform has been built. And not in just any way, but with natural, traditional construction, making each piece by hand. Wood, earth, lime, stone, and plant fibers serve to recover traditional techniques such as the Catalan vault, wood joinery, stuccos, and earth construction. "Without spaces, there is no culture," asserts Ferri.

When Jonathan was born, Charles Darwin was only 23 years old. This giant tortoise of the Aldabra species is the longest-living (terrestrial) animal in the world known to date. It is 194 years old and still today it walks, at a very slow pace, through the gardens of Plantation House, which is the residence of the governor of Saint Helena, one of the Seychelles islands. It has lost its sight and sense of smell, and it must be fed (basically lettuce and carrots), but it is still active and weighs about 180 kilograms. Now, scientists have studied its DNA to try to extract data that will help us live longer.

British actor and presenter Russell Brand steps out of a black Mercedes in front of the Southwark Crown Court in London. His sunglasses, the tie undone over his chest, the way he adjusts his trousers, and his air of superiority are more reminiscent of a celebrity arriving at Paris Fashion Week than a defendant appearing before the justice system. Brand faces seven charges related to sexual offenses, including three allegations of rape. Six women accuse him of acts that allegedly took place between 1999 and 2009. He maintains he is innocent. In the photograph, his bodyguard is carrying the Bible in his hand. A grotesque detail that has to do with the new image this individual is trying to build for himself following the accusations.

"Cross the catwalk!" It has been 25 years since this television catchphrase became popular. It was one of the key moments of every broadcast of Operación Triunfo, the talent show that revolutionized Spanish television and music and that this October celebrates a quarter of a century. On the night of October 22, 2001, TVE kicked off a new format that mixed elements of the reality genre, which was just beginning to emerge, and musical contests. After the third gala, when the phenomenon exploded, nothing was ever the same again, neither on Spanish television nor in the lives of the sixteen young contestants who had signed up for the program with the hope of making a career as singers.

In a moment when we live surrounded by notifications, photos that disappear in 24 hours, and messages that are forgotten in seconds, writing and sending a postcard is almost a revolutionary act. The truth is that finding the time to look for a postcard, write a thought or an experience on it, buy a stamp, and go to a post office or a mailbox to send it forces us to slow down, to connect with the here and now. And that is precisely what we at ARA wanted to propose to you with the initiative A postcard summer, in which we asked you to send us a postcard telling us about your summer, and in return, you could participate in the raffle for three analog cameras, thanks to the collaboration with Carmencita Film Lab.