Saigon

8 Mar

The officials at Guangzhou (‘Gwongchow’, Canton in old money) International can smile but it doesn’t happen often. That’s not due to some People’s Republic edict; still less surly disposit­ion. The first time I was there they pulled all the stops … Read More »

Freak tide in Hornsea

2 Jun

Workers of the world: they always did know how to enjoy themselves given half a chance. Here a Bank Holiday Monday, spring tide, bracing wind and gorgeous sunshine all came together on the Yorkshire coast at Hornsea – and the … Read More »

Buffalo soldiers

17 Jan

Late evening at the Seven Olives. Mesfin and I eat chickpea stew with Ethiopia’s ubiquitous injera. Mesfin – below, with Daniel and my tripod on his right – casts a baleful eye over a table on the far side of … Read More »

Last day in Ethiopia

14 Jan

Thoughts now, on my last day in this wonderful, maddening, deeply civilised country. I’ve just seen (not for the first time) a grinning young man, buff naked and hugely endowed, walk down the busy Addis street outside the internet shop … Read More »

Out of Abyssinia

7 Jan

With a cranial capacity of four hundred cc, a third of yours, she’d neither bore you with incessant chatter nor go in for morbid introspection. But she walked upright on two legs, all three foot six inches of her. And … Read More »