An Exploration of new South East Asian Arts Festival in Georgetown, Penang, woven through reflections on a friend, the director, Joe Sideq, with a few other things thrown in. … Read More Seeing with Fresh Eyes: The Pearl that is Penang
The Call of the Wanderer In 1990 I left England and did not return for 16 years. It wasn’t just a holiday; it was for work. I got a job in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and we had to hand over our passports to the employers. I’m sure it was not legal, but it was… Read More How Archetypes can be the hidden drivers in your Life
There is so much to say about Cuba it would fill a library. I have been there three times since 2015, visiting Havana, Cienfuegos, Santa Clara, Varadero and now the more remote Cayo Guillermo, in Ciego de Avila province, an area praised by Hemingway in his book Islands in the Stream (1970). Some countries get… Read More Six Reasons to Love Cuba
Last time I was at my mum’s house, we got talking about all the places I had been. “Well, I’ve kept all your postcards.” “You did?” “Yes, they’re upstairs in a brown envelope.” I ran upstairs to get this envelope and tossed them all on the carpet at random for closer examination. I’d completely forgotten… Read More Post Cards from Everywhere
I turned myself to face me In the darkness, a spotlight focusses on a cadaverous, mascara streaked face; the atmosphere is electric. It’s Hammersmith Odeon, July 1973; a guitar strums a simple chord with a plangeant brush-like sound. The Spiders have vacated the stage, but this is even more electrifying than any magisterial Moonage Day… Read More Touched by the Flaming Dove: Bowie’s Asteroid Muses
Out of Sheer Rage I would like to begin writing this today…… only tomorrow feels better since it is about deferring. It should be no surprise that I say this because it is traditional to turn the phenomenon of procrastination into a joke. This is a good way to belittle it, and make it bad, … Read More D.H. Lawrence and the Procrastinator’s Bible
