My last night before heading to Kabul tomorrow On an airline that I don’t know owned by a government (or at least flagged by them – turns out it’s privately owned) which any number of ratbag elements would love to target. Of that I have no doubt. I have always wanted to visit this ‘great…
17,022 total views, 27 views today
She has a round dark face that is more chipmunk cheeks than anything else, cheeks that prop up eyes that glitter with mischief. The narrow, high set benches means we squeeze in to sit down and she laughs at two tall guys struggling to fit in without knocking any else’s tea on the floor. She…
18,267 total views, 27 views today
I’m not what you call a clubbing type. No, not seals on ice but nightclubs. I have no particular aversion to them, but neither have I ever had any particular attraction to them. I do regret not being in one in Elizabeth in 1980. Or was it Gawler? Fozzie leapt for the wagon wheel chandelier…
19,307 total views, 27 views today
While we eat our cornflakes as the sun comes up, and wonder where our colleagues are, at the end of the street two thieves stand among a crowd of excited neighbours and a collection of security guards. They are two of four the guards have caught. They are not running anywhere. To start with the…
17,046 total views, 27 views today
The day is clear and warm. On the lee of the escarpment and under the canopy of tall trees the humidity is a light flush on the forehead but no more. A perfect day no less. By the time we reach Naivasha, an hour out of town we have left the cosy climate of Nairobi…
18,333 total views, 27 views today
There is a creeping awareness this week that we Australians, for all our fretting about porous borders ( a lot of nonsense) have it just way too good. I have always known that of course. On one occasion my return to Australian soil after a precarious adventure was so emotional I wanted to do ‘a…
17,050 total views, 27 views today
It’s a quiet Sunday and after a slow start I decide to walk to the nearest shopping centre. A walk can only be a good thing after last nights festivities. The rest of the house is not stirring. The day is clear and burning hot, something I had not really noticed under the shade of…
17,056 total views, 27 views today
Imagine a series of low rolling, heavily vegetated ridges radiating out from the city centre. They parallel each other as best they can but like spokes they are forced gradually apart. Roads run along the crown of each, houses sit off the road and then gardens and forest fill the gullied gaps. In many sections…
17,024 total views, 27 views today
The moon washes a glittering city in its milk yellow light as we wind up and wind up and wind up and roll and roll until the wingtips lift and the wing straightens up and the fuselage of this 400 tonne behemoth settles into its load carrying wings. And as it does my breath catches…
17,018 total views, 27 views today
More directly, what is your network? A bunch of people you have fleeting or other connections with, hooked up by coffees, or more ephemerally, via an image and a bio stored in someone else’s server? And if so what merit does it have? Is it there so you can admire the fruits of your labour?…
17,030 total views, 27 views today