A couple of disappointments when I went in to Spanish today. For one, I had completely forgotten everything learned the previous week. More importantly (as I think it will come back to me), my teacher had been changed. The new one is very nice and capable, but somehow I didn’t quite click with her, and […]
Light relief
Fearing a difficult day, but there was something to cheer me up. Possibly fictitious, but the government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province had a live stream on Facebook of a press conference to announce something or other, and apparently forgot to turn off the cat filter first. To think satire is banned in Pakistan.
Boiling pots, abandoned cities
The morning brought bad news. I called home for Eid and learnt that a relative is very unwell, so that my father had to fly suddenly to Karachi. Very troubling indeed. KP had Eid yesterday, after multiple reports of a moon sighting, despite the astronomical evidence that only 0.2% of the moon would have been […]
Disentangling
The end of our second-last day in Cholula, and while the excitement about Oaxaca is building, so is sadness at leaving. One settles so easily into little routines and habits that then disappear entirely, from knowing exactly which point on the dial of the stove to prepare my tea in the morning, to the habit […]
Clinging on
The European election results are in, with no surprises and will be interpreted by everyone as they think best. I voted for the Greens as the Remainer party that also had a coherent EU manifesto that I largely agreed with. I’d hoped they’d pick up a third London seat, but oh well. All in all, […]
Back in time
We woke up early – I woke up very early, around 5, as I was unable to sleep – and took a taxi to Chichen Itza. We arrived ten minutes after the opening hour and there were already about 100 people queuing for tickets. Luckily the line moved fast and it was still cool, so […]
Shame
Every time I think that I have reached the height of disgust and despair, a new height is reached. I’m used to it from Pakistan, and now buffeted by it from every direction.
Someone else’s rupees at work
This is from Dawn today. ISLAMABAD: The government and the opposition were on Tuesday unable to reach a consensus in the National Assembly over Minister of Water Resources Faisal Vawda describing Prime Minister Imran Khan as the “biggest personality” on earth. The house was adjourned till Wednesday evening without any proceedings having taken place.
Storied aunt
Last night we went for dinner to the home of a storied aunt, one who suffered an unspeakable tragedy when she was in her late teens and, according to all her relations, has not been the same since. There was something not quite as usual about her, but after a stilted start to the evening […]
Sabres rattle
The jangling of metal against metal is deafening. It does make one sceptical about any form of government, really, when one has de facto army rule on one side and a least common denominator Hindu nationalist democracy on the other. Yesterday we had a visitor, the GF’s uncle who accompanied us to Thailand about a […]