The Foreign Service Journal, October 2016

82 OCTOBER 2016 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL LOCAL LENS BY BETH PAYNE n DES MOINES, IOWA Please submit your favorite, recent photograph to be considered for Local Lens. Images must be high resolution (at least 300 dpi at 8” x 10”, or 1 MB or larger) and must not be in print elsewhere. Please include a short description of the scene/event, as well as your name, brief biodata and the type of camera used, to locallens@afsa.org. A man plays a tune on a colorful street piano on a summer day in Des Moines, Iowa. After spend- ing more than two decades exploring other cultures and countries, I have begun to explore the diverse cultures across the United States. I first discovered “Play Me, I’m Yours” pianos in Port- land, Oregon, where street pianos were placed around the city for anyone to play. Local artists painted the pianos to reflect their unique areas. Later, coming across this Des Moines pianist connected the two very different cities, reminding me that despite our many differences, we are still all one nation. n Beth Payne retired from the Foreign Service in September as a Minister Counselor. She joined the Foreign Service in 1993 and served overseas in Kuwait, Israel, Rwanda, Senegal, Iraq and India. In Washington, D.C., she served as director of the Bureau of Consular Affairs’ Office of Child Issues and as associate dean of the Foreign Service Institute’s School of Professional and Area Studies. She takes up her new position as director of the FSI Transition Center’s Center of Excellence in Foreign Affairs Resilience in October and has volunteered as chair of the FSJ Edito- rial Board since July 2015. She took this photo with a Canon 7D.