When ‘selfie’ was announced by Oxford Dictionary last week as its word of the year for 2013, I smiled… just quietly to myself, not down the lens of my smartphone. Yes, I hear the sighs about newly-made-up words going into the dictionary. I hear the cries of narcissism and cultural decline that have been debated … Continue reading Can’t help my selfie, bad habits?
There’s something about spectacular scenes in nature that can leave you lost for words. That’s particularly the case in an age where adjectives are thrown around in everyday life with an abandon that renders them impotent when you really need them. Words like awesome, amazing, incredible, wonderful. The Blue Mountains near Sydney is a place … Continue reading Mountain beauty finds simple expression
People love to remember where they were when big events in history took place. Depending on your age, you might have a well-worn story about what you were doing when you heard about the death of JFK or Princess Diana, about the September 11 terrorist attacks or the Boxing Day tsunami? It connects our lives … Continue reading Chance encounters, lasting impacts
On my last full day in Cambodia, I had a little moment. I had left the house in a tuk tuk to get some final gifts and we had to weave our way through a busy market street in Phnom Penh. It was bustling with local shoppers and stalls offering everything from lush tropical fruit … Continue reading A moment before we said goodbye
This is a wild guess, but they may have used two or three times as much wiring on Cambodia's mains power than was needed to get the job done. Actually, that guess could well be on the conservative side. Once you see the photographs below, you may agree? I still remember how I felt the … Continue reading It’s electrifying
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