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As we inch closer to the New Year, ticking off annual ender lists and preparing resolutions to start afresh, it is important that we keep looking back once in a while to see what we might have missed and pause to ponder. This week's Photospeak seeks to bring you an interesting mix of history, culture and the environment around us from around the globe. Get a glimpse of how soldiers train shirtless at minus 26 degrees Celsius, a father bidding farewell to his children before he undertakes a journey — to space and Google's CEO trying his hand with Indian willow:
Demonstrators carry cutouts representing Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff and Brazil's former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva during a protest calling for the impeachment of Rousseff in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, December 13, 2015. Many Brazilians are more upset about the worst economic recession in at least 25 years and a corruption scandal at state-run oil firm Petrobras that has ensnared many of Rousseff's allies. ~Photo: Ricardo Moraes/Reuters
Men dressed as 'Krampuss' prepare to parade at Munich's Christmas market, December 13, 2015. Young single men will wear the traditional attires known as 'Krampusse', consisting of animal skins and masks, with large cow-bells to make loud and frightening noises and parade through the city. They follow 'Saint Nicholas' from house to house in December each year to bring luck to the good and punish the idle. ~Photo: Michael Dalder/Reuters
A pelican spotted at Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary in Srirangapatna, near Mysuru, on Sunday. The number of bird species in lakes of Mysuru city is on the decline, with water bodies getting polluted. ~ Photo: M.A. Sriram/The Hindu
Removal of a tree line has taken place as preparations are made for the construction of new housing at the Institute of Advanced Study, Thursday, Dec. 10, 2015, in Princeton, N.J. The prominent academic institute, where Albert Einstein worked, wants to build a 15-unit faculty housing development on land adjacent to Princeton Battlefield State Park. But the seven-acre tract on Maxwell Field is seen by scholars and preservationists as the site where historians believe George Washington’s charge first struck British lines during the Battle of Princeton in January 1777. ~Photo: Mel Evans/AP
Soldiers of China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) jump as part of their winter training in temperature of negative 26 degrees Celsius at China's border with Russia in Heihe, Heilongjiang province, December 14, 2015. ~Photo: Reuters
A 1941 edition of Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf" ("My Struggle") stands at the library of the Deutsches Historisches Museum (German Historical Museum) on December 15, 2015 in Berlin, Germany. The state of Bavaria took possession of the copyright to the book after World War II, though the copyright is due to expire and the book will enter the public domain on January 1, 2016. Germany will continue to heavily restrict publication of the book in Germany though it will have little control over publications abroad. Hitler wrote the book that is both an autobiography and also presents his political vision while he was a prisoner in Germany in the 1920s. ~Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images
A pregnant wild gaur found dead at Kappistore, near Marayur, in Idukki district recently. The death was stated to be due to haemorrhagic septicemia, a bacterial infection connected directly to the vagaries of weather change. ~Photo: The Hindu
Member of the International Space Station expedition 46/47, British ESA astronaut Timothy Peake chats with his children during a sending-off ceremony at the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, 15 December 2015, before travelling on board the Soyuz TMA-19M spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS). ~Photo: Kirill Kudryavtsev/Reuters
Two MiG 29 K fighter aircraft that are part of aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya's integral air defence fleet demonstrate their skill during the operational demonstration witnessed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi off the coast of Kochi on Tuesday. ~Photo: The Hindu
A visitor reads a catalogue during an auction for items belonging to late British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at Christies on December 15, 2015 in London, England. The 'Mrs Thatcher - Property from the Collection of The Right Honourable The Baroness Thatcher of Kesteven LG, OM, FRS' sale featured a total of 186 lots. The six-hour event raised, according to the BBC, more than £4.5m. ~Photo: Carl Court/Getty Images
A Kashmiri man shows a piece of frozen ice at Srinagar's Dal Lake in Srinagar on December 16, 2015. The minimum temperature recorded in Srinagar last night was minus 3.7 deg C, which was the coldest night this winter. The region is experiencing intense cold weather for the past couple of weeks. ~Photo: Nissar Ahmad/The Hindu
Johannes Vogel, director of the Berlin Natural History Museum stands next to the skeleton of Tristan the Tyrannosaurus Rex during a media preview at the Museum fuer Naturkunde (Natural History Museum) on December 16, 2015 in Berlin, Germany. The skeleton, unearthed in the U.S. state of Montana in 2012, is among the best-preserved large dinosaur skeletons ever found. Tristan is approximately 66 million years old, is 12 meters long and is the first complete Tyrannosaurus Rex to ever be displayed in Europe. Tristan will be on exhibition at the Berlin natural history museum for the next three years. ~Photo by Axel Schmidt/Getty Images
Boats of fishermen are seen on the dried Poopo lakebed in the Oruro Department, south of La Paz, Bolivia, December 17, 2015. Lake Poopo in Bolivia, the Andean nation's formerly second largest after the famed Titicaca, has dried up entirely. With the water now gone, animals have died off in the millions, according to studies. And the local families, having lost much of their sustenance, have been forced to migrate. ~Photo: David Mercado/Reuters
CEO of Google, Sundar Pichai takes out some time to play cricket at India Gate with the locals in New Delhi on Thursday, Dec 17. Pichai was in town for an interaction with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then with the students of Shri Ram College of Commerce. ~Photo: PTI
Indian labourers construct a temporary pontoon bridge over the River Ganges ahead of the upcoming 'Magh Mela' festival in Allahabad, India, Friday, Dec. 18, 2015. Hundreds of thousands of Hindus are expected to take holy dips at the confluence of Ganges,Yamuna and mythical Saraswati rivers during the astronomically auspicious period of over 45 days celebrated as Magh Mela, that begins later this month. ~Photo: Rajesh Kumar Singh/AP
A message which reads "I love you beautiful" is displayed at the Archives de Paris center, after being removed from an informal memorial at one of the sites of the November shooting attacks, in Paris, France, December 18, 2015, more than a month after the shooting attacks which killed 130 people in the French capital. The operation to collect the notes, poems and drawings left by passers-by directed by the Archives of Paris is to save and store the documents to keep the memory intact of the moving and spontaneous show of solidarity and compassion toward the victims. ~Photo: Philippe Wojazer/Reuters
Mumbai’s iconic boulevard Marine Drive (shown above in 1940), also popularly called the Queen’s Necklace, on Friday (Dec 18) completed 100 years, and residents of the city’s western waterfront flagged off the centenary celebrations with a postcard showcasing the crescent-shaped bay off the Arabian Sea. A part of city’s collective consciousness associated with the name Bombay, Marine Drive was part of the great revival as the metropolis transitioned from its 19th century fort ramparts to a modern city in the 1860s during the tenure of British Governor Sir Bartle Frere. In the rebuilding process, the city was blessed with two great architectural styles — the Victorian Gothic and Art Deco. ~Photo: Dinodia Photo Library
