Tag Archives: landscape I was never very good at history at school: I could never remember the names and dates required. Walking around European cities, with layers of history in the stones around me or under my feet: that is a completely different story. Bearing witness to the slow march of people over time into new regions of the […]  My idea of a great New Year’s party is a trip into nature. The bonus of being “down under” is that the New Year break falls in the height of summer. I escape to Kosciuszko National Park to enjoy fresh air, summer alpine flowers, and some quiet contemplation. I have my favourite walking tracks that I return to regularly […]  It takes a lot of time to prepare for a Papua New Guinean sing-sing. Ancient masks and costumes – some pieces carved from wood and others woven from leaves and grasses: all decorated with paint, shells or feathers – have to be checked and repaired. New costume details need to be fashioned from leaves and grasses. And […]  It is true that the Costa Blanca in Southern Spain is ‘touristy’ and full of high-rise buildings. But, when ‘touristy’ means plenty of places to visit and things to do, cheap and interesting shopping, fresh, tasty local and international food, and service personnel who speak your language, it is easy to argue that it is […]  Papua New Guinea is intensely colourful. Papua New Guinea is also – thanks to rugged terrain and relative isolation from the outside world – exceptionally regional. This is certainly the case for the speakers of between 50 and 250 distinct languages (depending on how you categorise things) who live in tightly knit clans in small […] |
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