Kumari Samita Bajracharya sits in front of devotees offers during a special puja at Kumari Ghar in Patan, Nepal, 09 April 2011. It is believed that worshipping Kumari and receiving tika from her reduces illness and avoid problems. Kumari, or Kumari Devi, is a “living goddess”. The word literally means virgin in Nepali. The Living Goddesses are young pre-pubescent girls that are considered to be incarnations of the Hindu Goddess of Power, Kali. The Kumari retires when she reaches puberty. (Photo by Narendra Shrestha/EPA)

In this June 29, 2015 photo, forlorn buildings are seen at Hashima Island, commonly known as Gunkanjima, which means “Battleship Island”, off Nagasaki, Nagasaki Prefecture, southern Japan. The island is one of 23 old industrial facilities seeking UNESCO's recognition as world heritage “Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution” meant to illustrate Japan's rapid transformation from a feudal farming society into an industrial power at the end of the 19th century. UNESCO's World Heritage Committee is expected to approve the proposal during a meeting being held in Bonn, Germany, through July 9. (Photo by Eugene Hoshiko/AP Photo)

Merit: A Night at Deadvlei. The night before returning to Windhoek, we spent several hours at Deadveli. The moon was bright enough to illuminate the sand dunes in the distance, but the skies were still dark enough to clearly see the milky way and magellanic clouds. Deadveli means “dead marsh. The camelthorn trees are believed to be about 900 years old, but have not decomposed because the environment is so dry. (Photo and caption by Beth McCarley/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

People watch as lava flows from an eruption of a volcano on the Reykjanes Peninsula in southwestern Iceland late on Monday, March 29, 2021. Iceland's latest volcano eruption is still attracting crowds of people hoping to get close to the gentle lava flows. The eruption in Geldingadalur, near Iceland's capital Reykjavik, is not seen as a threat to nearby towns and the slow flows mean people can get close to action without too much harm. (Photo by Marco Di Marco/AP Photo)

Revellers hit the town on Saturday, February 19, 2022 for a pub crawl despite the snow in Leeds, United Kingdom. The UK capital was placed under its first ever “red” weather warning, meaning there is “danger to life”. The same level of alert was in place across southern England and South Wales, where schools were closed and transport paralysed. (Photo by Nb press ltd)

“These incredible pictures capture the stunning moment waves roll on to a tropical beach. Photographers Nick Selway, 28, and pal CJ Kale, 35, position themselves in the magnificent Hawaiian water – and then wait for the waves to crash into their heads. Their only equipment are standard cameras – but a waterproof case means they do not need to sacrifice their cameras for their art”. (Photo by Nick Selway/CJ Kale)

Laos, officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic, is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia, bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the south, and Thailand to the west. Its population was estimated to be around 6.5 million in 2012. A third (33%) of the country's population lives below the international poverty line which means living on less than U.S. $1.25 per day.

A genetically engineered featherless rooster struts around the campus of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Department of Agriculture May 22, 2002 in Rehovot, Israeli. After two years of research, departmental scientists announced the naked chicken, as it has been dubbed, as a low calorie bird because the lack of feathers means the chicken has less fat. It also matures earlier than its feathered counterparts. (Photo by Moshe Milner/GPO/Getty Images)