The views from your windows

Saint Paul, US

"I spend much of my time on the patio during the warmer months here in Tampa, Florida. The flowers are Amaryllis. They originally began as just one bulb several years ago and I brought it with me when I moved to Tampa. If one allows the flowers to go through their entire cycle eventually there will be seed pods which develop. Within each pod are many seeds which can be easily started, taking three to four years to grow their own flower stocks."

Larry Zollner lives in Tampa, Florida, in the USA.

Mazatlan, Mexico

Joan Pierce lives on a bluff overlooking the main channel of the Mississippi River near St. Paul, Minnesota, USA.

Leipzig, Germany

"This is the view from my window at work early in the morning in Mazatlan, México. While I wait for a ship to enter the port and dock, I get to feel the early sunshine :)"

Chamely Orona lives in Mexico.

Paris, France

"This is the view of a student neighborhood with two children playing on concrete spheres in Leipzig, 2010."

Alexander Araya is a Costa Rican sociologist and he is in Germany to get his Ph.D. at Freie Universität Berlin.

Pune, India

"This is the view from my little balcony in a roof apartment on Montmartre that I bought about a year ago. Sick of paying high rents, I'm finally a proud owner - and this view towards the Panthéon, the Centre Pompidou and the Louvre had some impact in the decision to buy this place. The balcony is just big enough for one chair and a little tray, but finally, this is my home ... yeah!"

Jochen lives in the Montmartre area of Paris in France. He is originally from Germany but has lived in Paris for the past eight years.

Hebron, West Bank

"I live in Pune, India. The area where I live is very green. This is a view from the window of my bedroom. There is a huge tree outside my apartment. I live on the first floor and sometimes the branches of the tree enter my room through the window. I simply love the tree and the view.

Every morning I wake up to the sound of birds chirping on the tree. Many species of bird sit or have made their nests in the tree. The most common ones are pigeons, crows, cuckoos and sometimes I have even seen a kingfisher or two sitting on the branches.

Many times I have watched quietly and seen two crows or pigeons sitting together perhaps talking to each other in their own language. I find this so awesome. There are lots of squirrels on the tree and sometimes one of them loses its way and ends up in my room through the window, but eventually manages to find its way back to the tree."

Preeti Bhardwaj lives in Pune in the Indian state of Maharashtra. She works as a translator of German to English.

Tuen Mun, Hong Kong

"I live in Hebron, in an area known as 'Tarqoumya.' This is the view from my window at night with a little bit of mist ."

Hasan Mraqtan lives in the West Bank city of Hebron.

Kirobohrad, Ukraine

"I live in Hong Kong, in an area known as 'Gold Coast''' in Tuen Mun. This is overlooking the GGold Coast Marina and Castle Peak Bay further down. On a very clear day you can even see Macau in the distance."

Nana Listl is an Indonesian-German living in Hong Kong with her husband since 2006 due to their employment. They love living in Hong Kong, she writes.

>"This is the view from my window. We have many trees on our street where every day we see more beautiful birds. It's a little woodpecker."<