“Catch of the Decade”. Can you guess what happened next? Photo location: Katmai National Park, Alaska, USA. (Photo and caption by Aaron Baggenstos/National Geographic Photo Contest)

A visitor poses with artist Joyce Pensato's artwork “Mickey for Micky” at the Frieze Art Fair in London, October 14, 2014. (Photo by Luke MacGregor/Reuters)

Paramasivan points to the statue of sun god Surya at a temple outside the Kodaikanal Solar Observatory, India, February 5, 2017. In the early morning darkness, Devendran P. walks up a hill to a solar observatory in India's southern hill town of Kodaikanal, trudging the same path his father and grandfather walked in a century-old family tradition of studying the sun. (Photo by Danish Siddiqui/Reuters)

A man looks at a pyroclastic flow during the eruption of Mount Semeru in Lumajang, East Java, on November 19, 2025. (Photo by Agus Harianto/AFP Photo)

Visitors pose for pictures under blooming cherry blossoms at a botanical garden in Nanjing, capital of China’s eastern Jiangsu province on March 15, 2019. (Photo by Reuters/China Stringer Network)

Students of Kiev's Olympic College perform during a rally in front of the Parliament building in Kiev, Ukraine, 15 September 2020. Students were protesting against the reorganization of the college, at risk of being closed, and the land where it rises which could end up for sale along with the facility's stadium. (Photo by Sergey Dolzhenko/EPA/EFE)

Nine years ago, Tom Carter traveled from San Francisco to China, responding to a job posting that turned out to be a scam. He managed to find another job as a teacher, and saved enough money to embark on a 56,000 km trip through all of China's 33 provinces that lasted two years. Carrying a camera – just a a 4-megapixel point-and-shoot – Carter captured some amazing images of the widely varying landscape, people, and architecture across the nation. Photo: Buddhist pilgrim family from Sichuan. (Photo by Tom Carter via The Atlantic)

Men walk towards law enforcement with their hands up on August 24, 2020 in Kenosha, Wisconsin. A second night of civil unrest occurred after the shooting of Jacob Blake, 29, on August 23. Blake was shot multiple times in the back by Wisconsin police officers after attempting to enter into the drivers side of a vehicle. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)