tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-239410472012-01-29T05:56:30.335+07:00Story is a powerful and clarifying human invention. Stories do not give instruction, they do not explain how to love a companion or how to find God. They offer, instead, patterns of sound and association, of event and image… It is through story that we embrace the great breadth of memory, that we distinguish what is true, and that we may glimpse, at least occasionally, how to live without despair. Barry Lopez From About This LifeJunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.comBlogger901100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-36243620520170346872011-05-20T04:00:00.012+07:002011-05-23T04:05:08.541+07:00

It's been so long since my last post.Some photos from our new European life.Lake Konstanz at New Year 2011King Ludwig's castle in BavariaOld Swiss chalet near BernInterlakenKate at workBalconyBro's Design for Novartis Kindergarten in Basel StadtWoolworths, alive and well and living in DusseldorfWords next time.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-64102335427313541932010-12-19T03:38:00.003+07:002010-12-19T17:45:44.948+07:00

We went to our local Christmas market and realised this was pretty different to our last four Christmases. Each time we went tropical with Yuletide it felt strange as though something was missing, as though something had been added. Heat, palm trees, alien counter culture, you name it. Of course there was the novelty of being sun drenched instead of snow stormed; the quirk of seeing sweating

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-40450446032591545082010-11-15T04:05:00.006+07:002010-11-21T05:53:34.120+07:00

It started with smoke. Or perhaps not. It started with an eerie feeling, like the shiver of a grave walker; tired and edgy from all that has been witnessed. Things have happened, time has passaged a dark route and a once flourishing business has suddenly turned sour or rotten or something. Whatever has happened there has been decline. Slow at first but then rushed; hurried, like rats standing by

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-5478646004033717712010-10-25T03:06:00.011+07:002010-10-26T17:38:35.502+07:00

A few photos from our trip to Graubunden, a region close to Italy with its own distinctive Romanisch, a language imported into the region by the Romans and it is used both in verbal and written form. Buna Saira indeed! It sounded great, full vowel crushes and lilting tones but had to use my minimal German in most situations as English wasn't widely understood.We left Basel in Autumn and arrived,

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-62242099313467876412010-10-14T03:57:00.006+07:002010-10-19T17:33:11.874+07:00

I loved the Graham Greene line about dusk in Vietnam, how daylight would be doused like a candle and in the brief, febrile twilight that followed, darkness would then ' fall like a stone.' Here, twilight seems to gorge itself on the remaining light, filling up our valley with rays thin yet brilliant. And we have found seasons again and it all seems very efficient with nature shifting smoothly

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-48938852759362042222010-09-20T03:39:00.006+07:002010-09-28T03:16:46.452+07:00

When we opened our shipping, our once home packed up and made cardboard if not destitute, there was a cloud of memories ushered in by the quick scent of the tropics, its musky odour in everything. It wasn't mildew exactly, more captured humidity caught in the fibres like the mosquito who rushed out, given freedom and then no doubt shock to find itself suddenly here. I know the feeling.It's been

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-33157292785094121862010-09-02T03:27:00.009+07:002010-09-02T03:43:07.572+07:00

Summer is ending...In the Bernese Alps with the kids, we chanced on a cafe selling Rosehip tea.Our new home town...In case you lose your way on the WanderwegSwitzerland has a one of the highest ratios of gun ownerships in the world. No wonder they stayed neutral.People are getting ready for a long winter..This is our local cafe that has survived recent health scares.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-44354201124509031652010-08-17T03:00:00.003+07:002010-08-17T03:28:38.996+07:00

There's going to be a lot of that - cheesy jokes that amount to more than Fondue, chocolately sweet remarks about life here in Grellingen: Population 1700 + 2 now of course. Our arrival is to be announced in the local paper - not out of celebrity of course but by way of communal introduction. We are expected to introduce ourselves to our neighbours, formally one by one knocking on doors, so we

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-64013097479443856422010-06-27T22:11:00.004+07:002010-06-27T22:32:25.156+07:00

Just to say we are leaving VietNam. It would be both difficult and pointless to summarise our time here in one posting but I hope a sense of our life here has come through in The Junkyard of Circumstance. A little haphazard sometimes I know but I have really enjoyed writing the blog, sending my techie and sometimes tacky postcards from the eclectic thrall of SE Asia and have appreciated your

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-17864544115398297412010-05-08T09:43:00.017+07:002010-05-10T09:55:51.784+07:00

As is often the way, it started with discomfort; such an everyday feeling, a slight ache, a moment of sinew awareness, of interior. The doctor asked me to categorise the pain and this was at least a familiar request. Pain has its definition and rememberance; in the hospital a few days later the nurse showed me a flashcard with an array of faces from happy through grimace then taut then crying,

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-18238137231919436512010-02-15T19:18:00.002+07:002010-02-15T19:30:42.420+07:00

Stayed at home for Tet this year and it's worth it just to reclaim the streets for a few days as a big chunk of the neighbourhood pack their mopeds high with food and gifts and head off to distant relatives. Birdsong, usually vanquished by engines could be heard and the rats too seemed to be enjoying the freedom of the road, unsquashed. Chuc Mung Nam Moi! Happy Year of the Tiger.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-3598170531606766222009-12-24T21:25:00.003+07:002009-12-24T21:41:34.570+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-47907743140915079322009-12-18T21:18:00.000+07:002009-12-18T21:19:36.643+07:00

Prayer of Peace - Relief & Resistance in Burma's War Zones [English subtitles] from Front Films on Vimeo.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-34837914703902527432009-11-16T12:25:00.001+07:002009-11-16T19:33:40.962+07:00

The rat is out of the bottle, shaking its fur, blowing hot small breaths on to its legs.A quiet but intense whine emerges from his vibrating body." Would you get that?"The man doesn't move from his lounger."Honey, I said would you get that?"The woman is watching someone move in the bushes close to the poolman's hut."I'm busy."The woman scoffs," Oh sure, busy doing nothing. And they talk about the

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-10723246025201165022009-11-11T20:41:00.004+07:002009-11-12T12:52:51.555+07:00

The rat was pretty wet. Stuffed as he was into the water bottle there was still room for the water to get in.His fur was slicked with pool water but he was nearly out.The plastic was tough but he had nearly gnawed enough for his head to poke out. "Well?"The man was sitting on the steps, after work, drink in his hand, his silk tie with ethnic pattern lay draped across his thigh. The top button of

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-60708772729075521132009-11-10T09:54:00.003+07:002009-11-10T12:50:58.255+07:00

"I'm going to set a trap for the maid."The woman slides the patio door closed and looks across at her husband who is lounging by the pool."What's that?"The woman kicks a few dead leaves along the pale tiles. " Does the poolman just clean the pool?"She kicks the leaves into the pool.The man squints over his sunglasses."Honey, you know I hate it when we talk across the pool. The water just swallows

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-66408731508881143232009-09-22T09:47:00.005+07:002009-10-05T14:10:41.862+07:00

The pool man after waiting patiently at the edge of the pool for the water bottle to bob towards him, scoops it out of the water, shaking the excess back into the pool."Anyway."The woman sits on the edge of her lounger and scrolls through her emails."Anyway what?"The man squats down at the edge of the pool and then quickly stretches out to do a few press-ups in quick successionThe pool man walks

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-46278198272528278922009-09-15T12:43:00.014+07:002009-09-22T13:02:21.929+07:00

"Oh my god, that maid of mine..."A rat peeks out from under calentia bush close to where a woman is lounging by the pool.The woman tuts at web footage on her phone of photographers hounding Air France relatives, white with shock, as they arrived at the terminal to await news. "How awful."The pool guy looks up and smiles. The waitress in an ao dai has let a tray of bottled water slip from her grip

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-13522462472094208782009-08-16T22:00:00.004+07:002009-08-19T22:27:26.739+07:00

It was the right idea, a now tried and tested route; from long haul to short break; from moving around as much as we could to staying still, limiting need to beverage decision and the sugary dilemma of where to eat. Such sloth beguiled by willing hands paid at local rate; such was our jet lag we sank into neo-colonial roles and listened to the splash of pool water, the rustle of palm fronds and

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-56838694502140303172009-08-16T21:29:00.003+07:002009-08-19T22:27:49.344+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-80917580354565933612009-06-23T07:39:00.001+07:002009-06-23T07:39:25.345+07:00

64 Words for Aung San Suu KyiShared via AddThis

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-75905995406094550402009-06-19T21:11:00.003+07:002009-06-19T21:13:39.125+07:00

Proud of you Frances! See the link to The Vaselines live on Rolling Stone.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-18007362072642244082009-06-03T09:25:00.001+07:002009-06-03T09:25:28.478+07:00

At the side of the road there is a rat. An ex rat. It must have run out of the undergrowth that's sprouting with wild plants and fuming with fermenting garbage. A quick dash across a busy Hem like some kind of grimy Watership Down scene and splat the rat is flattened by a bike, the thin tyre track still visible on its grey fur. Squeezed like a tube of toothpaste near its end. Everyone must have

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-64588604505161053702009-04-23T20:48:00.005+07:002009-04-24T21:51:40.000+07:00

Wary of summation, knowing the pitfalls of characterisation after the briefest of times, it is hard to describe the two weeks in Japan. Having been in Vietnam for nearly three years I know how initial impressions of a place can be tempered into something different. What seems strikingly different can turn out to be remarkably similar while cultural quirks can become intractable ticks, the slide

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-68842165075414519442009-04-22T20:32:00.003+07:002009-04-23T12:52:16.384+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-56285470393111283642009-04-22T20:27:00.004+07:002009-04-23T12:48:41.973+07:00

It's not surprising that the Japanese love Sakura or the cherry blossom that explodes in April. Of course it's a sign of spring and that is welcome after cold, hard winters but it's also because it's pretty and pink; like the lap dogs with tartan bows and pink ruffles in an Osaka park; like the kittens and cats adored and fattened in quiet Tokyo streets. While it was great to take photos of major

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-82754890115507560832009-04-18T21:53:00.010+07:002009-04-22T20:25:56.113+07:00

The metro provided a funneled, concentrated view of the inhabitants of the world's largest city. There were many facts to digest, one, took a while to chew as well as to get through; a downtown station called Shinjuko handles around 34 million people a day.Women are given their own carriage to avoid the attention of gropers who, we are warned, take advantage of the crush to touch what isn't

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-50861426495816076482009-04-06T19:51:00.002+07:002009-04-06T20:14:16.540+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-87135003128570468572009-02-12T20:31:00.023+07:002009-02-25T10:21:13.966+07:00

There are triple the number of cars compared to when we first arrived, clogging up the potholed arteries that form most of the city streets. It does seem strange to notice such a thing, as though the roar of the South East Asian tiger, the growl of industrial change can be measured continuously by the eye. It can here. Buildings growing like rapeseed; ugly, progressive, striking and yet the

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-6607584193932836402009-01-26T21:10:00.004+07:002009-01-26T21:40:26.325+07:00

Everybody has gone from our neighbourhood. Nearly everybody. At Tet those with family in the Mekong or other provinces make the journey to their hometown by bus, truck or moped, their belongings lashed to their back. The street stalls near us have a few traders remaining who sell last minute melons ( a traditional New year fruit) and a few more forlorn sellers of Tet trees, sit beside their yet

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-60533464591765574992009-01-25T21:00:00.001+07:002009-01-25T21:02:38.022+07:00

Wishing you all a happy new year of the Ox

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-30195252235152845362009-01-03T17:19:00.002+07:002009-01-03T17:22:31.420+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-31987963624401788182009-01-01T20:25:00.001+07:002009-01-01T20:27:51.825+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-18889163413709833772008-12-26T15:35:00.002+07:002008-12-26T15:40:53.650+07:00

It never happened. Nothing ever happened. Even while it was happening, it wasn’t happening. It didn’t matter.Rest in Peace.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-79846182107276529772008-12-24T11:04:00.004+07:002008-12-24T11:18:54.398+07:00

To all friends and familyWe are on Koh Phangan in Thailand for Christmas and New Year. I'd like to share Yuletide Greetings with friends and family and to thank you for your kind comments about the blog. It means a lot to know that people are reading about our lives in South East Asia. Thank you too for your emails and letters. Your words andpictures bring a valued sense of home and connection to

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-68320114557493805902008-11-22T22:27:00.002+07:002008-11-22T22:33:58.066+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-72223846132294169332008-11-16T22:09:00.007+07:002008-11-17T21:34:01.420+07:00

Hue had the $$!t bombed out of it in the American war and there is a sense here, even though people are friendly, that memories are longer and the party line is more strictly followed - the taxi driver gently but firmly corrects my use of Saigon to the simply correct name, Ho Chi Minh City. There are still bullets in the citadel, a huge expanse of half renovated religious outhouses - antiquity

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-36361106125177584422008-11-09T20:43:00.002+07:002008-11-09T20:48:08.793+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-52454908727490823282008-11-08T21:43:00.001+07:002008-11-08T21:45:15.631+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-84975598541038865852008-11-02T21:55:00.002+07:002008-11-03T21:04:16.116+07:00

Sea air makes sleeping incredibly sweet... as Diane Cluck sings. This is further away from that but there can be autumnal daydreams in a two season, one temperature climate. The season or is that the times have changed here when Halloween skeletons ride mopeds embracing their Frankenstein driver, gathering all that is foreign to them. And teenagers gathering on a main street with matching mopeds

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-91749078623583716812008-10-25T22:02:00.011+07:002008-11-03T20:49:14.196+07:00

the first of a few photos from around the city...The Vietnamese lady with Kate is Miss Hieu, a talented massage therapist who can work painful wonders on tired bodies. As you can see, I need a little more work...

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-82473149933477242232008-10-18T22:12:00.005+07:002008-10-18T22:47:41.914+07:00

This is Nelson Mandela. Her name is Aung San Suu Kyi and she has just celebrated her 63rd birthday alone. She has been under house arrest which sounds like some cosy alternative to being in prison. Her husband has died while she has been in this prison; her sons have grown up and a nation she had democratic aspirations for has been drowned by nature and tortured by generals.She is now in her 13th

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-36952387144767721872008-10-04T20:56:00.003+07:002008-10-04T21:09:41.939+07:00

A writer's life is a highly vulnerable, almost naked activity. We don't have to weep about that. The writer makes his or her choice and is stuck with it. But it is true to say that you are open to all the winds, some of them icy indeed. You are out on your own, out on a limb. You find no shelter, no protection - unless you lie - in which case you have constructed your own protection and, it could

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-11758559260917253542008-09-15T22:27:00.006+07:002008-09-15T23:17:42.912+07:00

Of course this was a full moon party VietNam-style but lets try not to be condescending; no it didn't have the coolness of a Koh Samui sandfloor; of grooving Thai-dyed hedonists, still there, still not. And no, there was no Balaeric pick-up; thongs and songs in a post-Mediterranean setting, a site for disc eyes and incubating doubt. There was none of that. Instead there was guy with a couple of

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-10025446006247342252008-09-02T21:02:00.004+07:002008-09-02T21:22:55.898+07:00

music: ElfpowerCame back on the night train to Saigon, five hours from Phan Thiet and the beach. Sluggish and daylight at first as it passed through red sand dunes and into the countryside with its rasta Dragon Fruit trees, a crowd of nodding dreads with pink heads and green gills hanging limply in the air. A strange fruit. Then it sped up as it closed on Bien Hoa as though rushing to

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-5352255862631406592008-08-10T09:53:00.014+07:002008-08-15T21:54:55.618+07:00

Home is where the hope is; body parts don't come into it. We confirmed an expat status and toured our home; where before, a month earlier, we looked forward to coming home a month later we looked forward to coming to this other home, to this sub-tropical land. Tired of noise and clogged with dust we had left Saigon. On our return we spent just a few hours in the push and rush and made good time

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-89918103043900745932008-06-11T21:24:00.009+07:002008-12-12T12:02:25.582+07:00

They are taking away the Cyclos. Another icon bites the dust, the march of progress of course, a roughshod quickstep over what was once essential but now inconsequential. So it was with London Routemasters; Glasgow trams, Shanghai rickshaws. Russian Trebant Taxis. What next? The Manila jeepney, the Thai songtaow...The cyclos are as iconic for VietNam as the conicle hat. Although only seen in the

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-72669366419645724892008-05-27T22:23:00.004+07:002008-12-12T12:02:26.548+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-30539350033929229212008-05-01T21:32:00.011+07:002008-12-12T12:02:27.057+07:00

Of course a World Heritage indicates a site of antiquity or beauty or of concern for the past as well as the future. It has been alleged that years previously Angkor Wat was an exotic location for corruption parties attended by those with money and power and who were chauffer driven to a certain Wat to party the night away while antiquity shuddered with a bass kick.It's better now. Antiquity is

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-45618206238071969732008-04-25T22:16:00.013+07:002008-12-12T12:02:27.304+07:00

Click on the link to the right for photographs from Hong Kong and Phu Quoc.Of course for a writer to say every picture tells a story there is a little twisting going on, like the writer knows there's a pun to be had at his own expense. Surely, he will say, when recovering his composition, every picture SHOWS a story, it doesn't tell it and then maybe with a touch of hubris he will say you need

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-38449687126895532882008-04-15T21:26:00.005+07:002008-12-12T12:02:27.475+07:00

Just back from Holiday in Cambodia (sic). Photos and words to follow about a magical week on the island.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-15208470014692469782008-03-16T22:40:00.012+07:002008-12-12T12:02:28.405+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-59031992975604768172008-02-23T13:44:00.007+07:002008-12-12T12:02:28.947+07:00

After being in the mostly fresh air of Chaing Mai,(Tuk Tuk rides can be asphyxiating), it is a familiar shock coming back to Saigon. Greeted now at a new airport terminal by throngs of taxi drivers eager to turn off their meters for the short run to the apartment or at least to state an exorbitant price aimed to catch those unfamilair with the value of the Dong. I have mustered the effort to say

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-32463921280801575452008-02-12T21:49:00.000+07:002008-02-12T21:55:04.491+07:00

A Celebration in the foothills. See the quicktime movie to the right for an excerpt.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-15095825239638984082008-01-08T11:05:00.001+07:002008-12-12T12:02:29.336+07:00

We could have called it Holiday of Fear; got tabloid on our vacation using descriptors that wouldn't be found in the guides. On island and in primary forest there were moments of fright, waking up in a cold sweat; staying awake in a hot sweat. Our imaginations have got used to these conditions; they are ready to play tricks, tease with possibility and fake for fun whatever the weather.On Phu Quoc

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-88398512768843888812007-12-31T15:03:00.000+07:002007-12-31T15:16:52.139+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-458290106664264812007-12-21T22:12:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:29.737+07:00

Merry Christmas to all my blog readers. More bad puns for sure in 2008.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-85356909563190063492007-12-20T22:57:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:30.000+07:00

We got away from Saigon kitsch and escaped to the hills. A remarkably cold climate which saw the Vietnamese dressed up for a big freeze whereas for me at least it was a Scottish summer's day and of course the hills made it all the more alpine, our sub-tropical year was quickly behind us as we embraced the cold air. Dalat is already pretty high up for VN and after a few hours walk through forestry

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-62585101591270013702007-12-04T21:36:00.000+07:002007-12-04T21:38:52.813+07:00

The first of a few rough and ready slices of Christmas in Saigon served up with plenty of background atmosphere canbe viewed in the Quicktime movies hyperlink to the right.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-31011608809569708092007-11-11T17:04:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:30.124+07:00

New Silva Rerum added

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-14965298312618595202007-10-22T10:15:00.001+07:002008-12-12T12:02:30.989+07:00

We needed this. Thailand before had been reduced to a supermarket sweep, a race against the clock, the ticking time of a weekend against the mad dash for all previously unavailable consumables; so give us tofu burgers and fennel toothpaste; underwear that fits and electronic gear that works after a few months in the cold heat of Saigon. This time we ventured beyond our epicureal desires and

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-17509159541865782812007-10-12T23:01:00.000+07:002007-10-12T23:16:26.974+07:00

Please click on the link and see how the Japanese are countering their stereotype with full on panache and a samba'd verve. We are travelling now, this time to northern Thailand by sleeper train and then to embed with writing.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-32272069278642499562007-10-07T22:17:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:31.700+07:00

Someone says we exported this. Did we? Aspiration certainly seems a globally imposed phenomenon. I've heard a few people take it on the cheek like plucky ex-colonials; dutiful apologists for a capitalist system that has been marketed so well, melded so aggressively into a new way of life here where mobile phones can be bought at every ten paces, where the shopkeep's Buddhist shrines are carefully

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-74239561134061089972007-10-05T07:53:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:31.853+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-7119264114173626492007-10-01T22:57:00.001+07:002007-10-01T22:59:08.898+07:00

This is the place for us.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-27318753163517172572007-10-01T22:26:00.000+07:002007-10-01T22:27:30.654+07:00

Two Quicktime films showing the annual Moon Festival celebrations

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-77591858540303161552007-09-25T12:26:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:32.057+07:00

" I am hungry." There are diffferent kinds of hunger. There are gluttons who will crave more food when their belly obscures the floor; there are people living in the gutter, on hot, steamy streets with no light apart from the odd battery-powered flourescent strip that splashes cold light on a desperate scene; there are people, peaceful, spiritual people who have been pushed into a corner by a

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-33196347616573669812007-08-20T20:34:00.000+07:002007-08-20T20:36:36.110+07:00

One minute Quicktime movie added

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-91598071805399465282007-07-27T23:51:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:32.085+07:00

Of course it was a blur; a pulped mash of memory and muse; of sights and sounds filtered through the skin of travel, osmotic sensations rippling. In the blink of an eye we came back; a red eye journey that was longer than just miles. It seemed to us, this journey, to stretch beyond continent and ocean; city and country. We have become more elasticated, as though we were both ready to be propelled

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-81657445427484741052007-06-08T23:10:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:32.851+07:00

And so we came to our brave new world. A chip off the old block. Eastern bloc. We arrived with trepidation but with the hope of the resuscitation of our senses; from the ritual of routine to the edgy dance of expectation; from close proximity of the familiar to nuzzling with strangers in queues, in the streets as we shaved our safety limits, the protective barriers removed with the hope of fate.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-27000013487071847782007-05-20T21:49:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:33.658+07:00

I was with the tea ladies, scurrying between their legs as they balanced trays of scones and chocolate crispies. The table was already groaning with white bread sandwiches, their crusts tidily discarded into their own bag near the piano of the music room. We were in the church hall and the stockinged feet friends of the Alloway Parish Drama Group were in full swing; egg mayonniase poised,

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-71747076116513937302007-05-05T22:21:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:33.848+07:00

You are welcome to attend. I wish you could. Some familiar faces would be great. A diversion from the horror of the last post; a thankful sideshow to the ongoing apocalyptic epic that has us singing and dancing in the twilight of the oil age.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-36713239720032469252007-04-30T21:36:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:35.711+07:00

Quotation from Pol Pot. Photographs from Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.Button added in support of the kidnapped Alan Johnston. Please click if you wish to add your name to the petition.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-70791023781137422452007-04-14T20:31:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:36.737+07:00

In the back of Volvo, not just the back seat but the open plan boot of that old yellow estate. My father used the car for company work that took him length and breadth but during school holidays we piled in, the gang of four children and headed for summer Lake District or winter Darlington. Being the youngest and of course the smallest I was put on the bench seat at the back of the car, getting

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-89493093918142688112007-03-18T22:01:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:38.785+07:00

So much of movement, of relocating from A to B, in transit, en route and in the hasty retreat from work is done by taxi. Our metered chauffeurs are usually silent, the language barrier scuppering clichés of chatty cabbies or grumpy road experts. But not always silent. In the throb of Ho Chi Minh traffic, many a driver ( man and woman) seems capable of haughing up a steady stream of flem to be

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-69529635486025433072007-02-17T15:18:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:39.023+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-14356173002940737972007-02-03T20:59:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:39.915+07:00

There have been many moments in woods and forests; sucked down as a child into the soil, nails clawing into earth then digging up worms for inspection, old toys, old soliders who had been buried alive in some previous battle. In the wood near my home it was possible to talk tactics with friends, shocked and awed by the scale of possibility. Now that it was summer we could eschew our bedrooms and

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-80181771420013148892007-01-04T22:00:00.000+07:002008-12-12T12:02:40.110+07:00

So many things have been lost in translation. Not just here where here is the last day at Quy Nhon in Central Vietnam; not just the tonal gymnastics of Vietnamese that is tackled with a kind of obdurate pessimism by expats. It's too hard. It's too difficult to understand... It always is. Not just here. Miscommunication is everywhere be it from a cell phoned gallows to a carnivorous public; from

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1166684508499005042006-12-21T13:52:00.000+07:002006-12-23T08:46:08.450+07:00

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1164642338226928512006-11-27T22:19:00.000+07:002006-11-28T22:28:26.863+07:00

And so we have travelled to raise our own awareness, to see sights not seen and to embrace a reconstituted sense of home in a foreign place. And we needed things we thought we missed. Consumables and desirables. Products unknown in Saigon. You learn things so they say by travel, it broadens the mind while it saddens the heart. You learn things about yourself thinking about how on earth you can

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1162047386892246592006-10-28T21:27:00.000+07:002006-10-29T19:15:51.393+07:00

We took a walk that started in daylight. We weren't sure how far it was. We hadn't bought a map of the island. This tear shaped island in the Gulf of Thailand didn't really seem big enough to worry about having a map for its 45km length. Stepping off the surprisingly smooth ride on the prop plane we already knew there was some jungle to greet us as it felt like the wheels had clipped and chipped

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1160232424826222982006-10-07T21:21:00.000+07:002006-10-07T22:34:01.456+07:00

Woke up and the world revolved. Not evolved. Should have. Could have. If mud-slides hadn't taken away mudhuts; if the ground hadn't been taken away from under them just before they were typhooned, old and ancient Hue battered with fresh and natural violence. Could have. If we had eyes to see as the smoke from Malaysia heads for Singapore's clean streets and then. And then. The apocalyptic

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1158507469522986102006-09-17T21:54:00.000+07:002006-09-18T06:45:10.616+07:00

Okay, lets get a possible cliche out of the way first. The journey from paradise to hell can be a long one. Another weekend at the beach. ( 2 in a row, for christsakes' and I complain that the work is v. stressful ? Yes and eh, yes. Anyway, Mui Ne was its sublimely peaceful self. From the hub of humanity to the lull of waves, I am here again. In the morning there is talk ( but not mine) of dawn

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1158161472968116382006-09-13T22:22:00.000+07:002006-09-13T22:31:12.970+07:00

Actually the first movie didn't work too well and apparently a password is needed. I'm gonna post this new movie, of a brief visit to Mui Ne beach last weekend, and see what happens.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1157299371505278212006-09-03T22:49:00.000+07:002006-09-03T23:02:51.516+07:00

Eh, this is just a brief blog. It's been a quiet day here in Saigon, the day after a red flagged National Day and the celebrating of independence has seen the mopeds off the streets for once and it was possible to cross looking left and right only a couple of times ! There's a link to the right of this text which I intend... no not the Google news one...which I intend to direct visitors to a

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1156780737147715652006-08-28T22:19:00.002+07:002006-08-28T23:01:05.726+07:00

We're here,there, not here, not there, swirling like specks of dust, claiming for ourselves the rights of the universe. Being important, being nothing, being caught in lives of our own making that we never wanted. Breaking out, trying again, wondering why the past comes with us, wondering how to talk about the past at all.Jeanette Winterson from 'Lighthousekeeping'

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1155825861010705562006-08-17T21:35:00.000+07:002006-08-17T21:51:19.390+07:00

So, you reach a new place, a life trailing behind you and for a moment there is a sense of perspective. A confident, seemingly fulsome knowledge hiccups its way through possible tales of eclectic experience to eccentric bars; from the needy tug on a sleeve by a street kid to declaring pride in the importance of cultural exchange. Here we have the congratulation of something already celebrated.

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1154316925813591752006-07-31T10:27:00.000+07:002006-07-31T10:45:38.910+07:00

Ooops. I guess we have arrived. Through the looping films of the long flight over, the whooping of Big Mommas House 2 merging somehow with the squeak of the hostess trolleys; into the thick, embalming heat of the airport with its bewildering layers of red tape and the anxious moments as customs question our motives for entering the country. They are of course good questions.And on, rushed through

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1150567278302313312006-06-18T01:01:00.000+07:002006-06-19T04:05:37.230+07:00

Having just been to a favourite spot on the Ardnamurchan penninsula with the knowledge that I am soon to leave Scotland for a new life in Vietnam made the trip all the more poignant. It has always been a much-loved place, a perfect setting for wild camping on Achateny beach facing the rising peaks of Rhum; a swim in the cold and clear water, getting close to seals with a snow-capped Ben Nevis in

JunkyardofCircumstancenoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23941047.post-1142255572002849672006-03-13T20:03:00.000+07:002006-08-22T18:18:44.620+07:00

Using these two photos of the gig I did with the lovely Frances McKee at the Crossing Border Festival in The Hague, November 2005 is a good place to start this premier blog.The Barry Lopez quotation at the top says it all. I Photos courtesy of Michel Faber

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