China

Trails of the Unexpected

September 4, 2009

I stare at the newspaper. It wasn’t me. I gawp at the television. It wasn’t me. I trawl through the internet. It wasn’t me! I listen to the radio, podcasts, and conversations on the bus. It WASN’T me! At least — I hope it wasn’t me?

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The Reprint: ‘Bon Appetit’

March 19, 2009

It’s a rite of passage that a traveller devour something they couldn’t find in their local café. Your friends expect it. Your family retches at it. People you meet on the road compete against it, and the bottom line is someone’s always gone one better.

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The Reprint: ‘Ginger Blue’

March 5, 2009

I only ever had one pet. It was a tabby cat. I called it Thomas. My sister called it Fluffy. My dad called it Cat. It would forever be known as Thomas Fluffy Cat. Then TFC ran off, probably to a derelict pig farm at the end of our road that was the headquarters to […]

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The Reprint: ‘A Finer China?’

February 6, 2009

It’s no secret that China is building bridges in both the literal and physical senses and it’s a consequential fact that their economy is blowing smoke in the face of their environment, and their population. This weeks Reprint image is a soft example of pre-Olympic Beijing.

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To Songpan, and beyond!

September 24, 2007

Staring intimidatingly into two fresh black eyes, I barked menacingly, ‘reach for the sky!’. No response. I yelled, ‘this town aint big enough for the two of us’. Zip. ‘It’s not a laser. It’s a little light bulb that blinks’. Nothing. ‘Somebody’s poisoned the waterhole!’. Nada. ‘Who are you calling busted, Buster?’. Zippo. He just […]

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Answers on a Postcard

September 14, 2007

The red-faced King of the South paced nervously around his ageing palace, closely followed by a fidgeting guard. If either dared peer out through the ornate wooden shutters and across the blood-tainted river, they would of been overcome with terror. Advancing towards them at a frightful pace were a pair of canons in search of […]

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Bee for ‘Banna

September 3, 2007

My mother always insisted vegetables were good for me, so for 21 years I obediently munched my way through her gloomy carrots, sinewy runner beans, and even the odd heap of pungent spinach. Then I cut the apron strings, and for four years I phoned her weekly to ask her how to recreate the sloppy […]

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