MY OWN TWO FEET

Soul food

2012-01-30T11:59:00.001+11:00

Rewarded myself for a long day's work with another visit to the IFC cinema in the West Village, this time with Maria to see "How Much Does Your Building Weigh, Mr. Foster?" Very uplifting. Min in Kuching MUST see this! Foster designed the HSBC headquarters in Hong Kong, the Hong Kong and Beijing airports, Swiss Re headquarters in London, and the revamped Reichstag in Berlin (which I regret I didn't visit), among many other stunning buildings... The film made me want to look up and be more aware as I'm walking around the streets. This viaduct, near Millau in southern France, looked amazing in the film, which was beautifully photographed. Foster, a cancer survivor, flies small planes, gliders and helicopters, competes in ski marathons, and is a cyclist. Artist Anish Kapoor was among those interviewed, which reminded me of the amazing exhibition of his work which Uma and I saw in Mumbai, where red paint was shot out of a cannon at a wall-high canvas. Fabulous. I felt excited all through the film. There was so much in it that was beautiful.

Spanish Harlem: Another barrio

2012-01-29T22:00:00.003+11:00

I've been super-busy since I arrived back in New York mid-month. Straight back into proper running training with the 5.30 am crew: Maria, Sung, Sarah, Lissy, John, Heather, Joe, Sun... I'm staying up on E 118th Street and 1st Avenue, in Spanish Harlem, so it takes a little longer to get to our meeting place at Engineers' Gate on 5th Avenue and 90th Street. This area is rather depressed, though I haven't felt unsafe. There are lots of Mexican restaurants, and no Starbucks. We're very near the East River. I miss my usual "barrio" around W 96/97th Street, between Central Park West and Broadway, and have even taken Jack the Mac over to Whole Foods on Columbus to work there for a few hours.My first Saturday back, after just four morning runs, was the Manhattan half marathon. Overnight snow saw the event downscaled to a non-scored race, but it was still worth a credit towards gaining guaranteed entry to next year's New York City marathon. I met Maria at the Metropolitan Museum in the dark before the race, and it was quite beautiful with about two to three inches of snow on the ground. But as the conditions worsened during the race, so did my effort. I just didn't have the base to run a difficult half in those conditions and took the option of pulling out at seven miles when it was announced it was only going to get worse. Maria completed the race, as did Joe, I heard later. Heather did what I did. Pint-size Marie was out there for fun (!) and ran the second loop with Maria.This coming weekend we have a four-mile race, the Gridiron Classic, again in Central Park. I think it has something to do with the Superbowl Finals.Drinks for Lissy's 40th birthday on Friday night at a wine bar on Second Avenue. It's odd to see everyone in proper clothes. Great to see Joanne, who came down from Westchester County for the night. It was also Maria's and Marie's birthdays in the past fortnight.The team I run for, the Hudson Dusters, had an "end-of-year" party a couple of weeks ago over on the west side, where I caught up with Tim, Lauren and Bill (who tied the knot at City Hall a day or so later), Jeremy and Lilit... I won the prize for top age percentage score in a race, for a four-mile event I ran in October.The other night I visited Fran and Renee at the apartment where I usually stay on Central Park West. I also met Mishka, their very well-travelled cat. I had met Fran only once before, in April 2010, when I was in New York for just a week to catch up with Kathy W and stayed at the Chelsea Hotel. Their home is my home here, though, and I stayed in their apartment in Lausanne for a month early last year, so we have quite a long history now. I'll be having dinner with them – fondue! – on Saturday.Films, films, films. There are so many films and documentaries I want to see, but I have very little free time because of my huge workload at the moment. I've managed to see "Domain" (French/Austrian) and "Declaration of War" (French) with a new friend, writer Lisa, and "The Iron Lady" with my very old friend CY. Meryl Streep is amazing as Margaret Thatcher! Today Maria and I are seeing "How Much Does Your Building Weigh, Mr Foster?" (about the architect Norman Foster). I could easily just sink into a film binge...!Other pals I've caught up with are John and Jaymeson, and architect Kate.My alarm is set for 4 am most days, trying to get the biggest bang for the 24 bucks each day provides.

Ciao, ciao, Chile

2012-01-13T09:27:00.003+11:00

I think I may have missed having a gelato on only two days in the past seven or so weeks. I'm not one to do things by halves...

I still cannot get online access to my HSBC Hong Kong account despite having a case manager who is exceedingly available and helpful (much appreciated). It could all come together tomorrow, which would be rather interesting symmetry as it's the day I leave Chile to return to New York and I lost access to the account on the day I arrived in mid-November.

I'm now in Providencia, which is a much easier part of town to live in when I'm very busy with work, as the things I need are at my doorstep. They include a fabulous salad place, where I've been getting my lunch and sometimes also an extra takeaway for dinner each day since I arrived last Sunday.

My social life has been severely curtailed by work this week, but I've caught up briefly with John and Ingrid.

I don't know if Chile will figure again for me as a short-term base. I would like to have seen some of the country (other than just two cities) and done some walks, but that wasn't possible this time. I would definitely need to learn some Spanish if I come back! I'm hoping some friends I've made will stick.

We had a 5.2 magnitude earth tremor earlier in the week. I felt it shake my building.

I'm trying to get some jobs tidied away before I leave tomorrow night.

Ciao, ciao, Chile.

Minding my own business beside the Mapocho

2012-01-02T09:51:00.003+11:00

I've been very busy with work again the past couple of weeks. I'm grateful for the opportunity to knuckle down and focus on something other than the frustrations I've been experiencing with HSBC in Hong Kong, who have taken six weeks to take my situation on board and appoint a case manager to help me solve it. Polly has been wonderful: I would love to have seen her in action. Finally, I have a replacement ATM card (the correct one, this time!); well, it's safe in HK with Polly. I'm still working on getting the replacement security device activated.

I finished off the film festival by seeing "Kinkdom Come" (about Dave Davies) with Ingrid; the Martin Scorcese documentary about George Harrison, "Living in a Material World", and "The Sacred Triangle" (about David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Lou Reed).

I've had dinner a couple of times with Selma and Murray, New Yorkers I met in the Lastarria barrio one afternoon. I enjoy their company here and hope to catch up with them back in New York. I also had coffee with Carlos, whom I'd met in Valparaiso at my hotel.

I've been running mainly in the old part of town around Plaza de Armas and the nearby pedestrian streets in the morning, though on Boxing Day morning I had an hour's run out past El Golf with Max, another transplanted Chilean who returned to Santiago after living in North Dakota for many years. He's from "Fargo" country and was around when the film (one of my favourites) was being made.

I'm back in the first apartment on the river, after moving to another apartment in the next-door building for the week before Christmas. Back here on Xmas morning before lunch at new friend Nat's with Ingrid and a couple of other expat waifs and strays. Next week I move for the last time, to Providencia.

Dinner with Ingrid this week, and met her gorgeous dog Lily. Then a birthday dinner for Veronica with Nat, Daniel, Ron and Ingrid. Leo made dinner last week.

I've hardly done anything "touristy" in Santiago: I regret I haven't seen more, but I've had other things on my mind, and not much disposable cash. I'm very grateful to have met some sympatico people. I'll really miss them.

Sunshine, ice cream and music ...

2011-12-14T22:51:00.005+11:00

The mugging on 15 November that lasted maybe 10 seconds is still causing havoc a month later. I can't recall another time when I've had so many problems on a daily basis relating to every aspect of getting my banking situation back to normal. It's definitely been a lesson well learned in terms of only carrying essentials on me, and then as discreetly as possible. It appears things might have taken a turn for the better in the last couple of days, thanks to help from my sister Deb, Polly in Hong Kong, Ingrid and Claudio in Santiago, and apartment owners Paulina and Jorge in Chile and Maite in New York, who have been exceedingly patient in waiting for me to follow up my bookings with dollars.

While all this has been going on, I've settled into life in Santiago in late spring. Through my initial contact Leo I've met a bunch of people who have been both fun to get to know a little and a great support to me: Susan, Marc (now back in Ireland), Ingrid, John, Veronica and others.

I've been very happy to find a film festival playing ("Stories from the Backstage": mainly documentaries about the music industry). With Maria and Leo I saw "Pina" for the third time (previously in Berlin and Sydney). With Andrew R, a visiting travel writer whom I met in 2009 through my pal Sarah in Vancouver, I saw "The Libertines" (Pete Doherty); and I've seen films on Miles Davis, Ray Davies (The Kinks) and the movie "The Runaways" (Joan Jett). More to come this week... An enjoyable dinner with Andrew in the Lastarria area after the film, during which I heard some of his travel horror stories and raised the possibility of renting his apartment in Vancouver in 2013.

An unexpected treat in Santiago is the profusion of gelato bars. Chileans just love their ice cream! You see people everywhere tucking into a cone or cup, and it's not even summer yet. They also love to display their affection publicly. PDAs everywhere one looks. I guess they can't all get a room...

Getting settled in Santiago

2011-12-02T10:03:00.007+11:00

GAM Building (Edificio Diego Portales) on the Alameda

Santiago is a fantastic city! In fact, it was just voted fifth in South America for its quality of life. I can see why. It's a nice blend of old colonial-style buildings in the historic centre, groovy arts and cafe precincts, and a very modern infrastructure. Apparently it's all been paid for by copper. I've spent the last week getting my bearings and learning about my neighbourhood, which stretches about an hour from home in any direction on foot or a few subway stops.

The apartment I'm renting from Paulina, whose mum Maria and dad Lalo befriended me in Valparaiso, is right on the Mapocho River, which is the colour of chocolate milk. It's runoff from the foothills of the Andes, which loom over the city. At night when the traffic has stilled I can hear the water rushing by.

It's late spring but already hot. There are gelaterias and ice creameries everywhere. I've even seen vendors on buses selling ice creams out of a portable cooler. I'm doing my bit for the economy and having gelato most days.

Maria has taken over from Lalo in watching out for me. She looks after the apartment, and we've been out for coffee. There is a standing invitation to go out dancing with her (tango, marenge, salsa...), which I've promised I will do.

I had an hour's run one morning this week along the river to Los Leones and back. Opposite me is Parque Forestale, a narrow park that lines the river. It's intersected by roads and interrupted by some highways, so running along the river involves quite a bit of criss-crossing the bridges.

I have met a photographer, Leo, whose studio and home are very near the amazing Cerro Santa Lucia. This steep hill with various folly-type ramparts is right in the middle of an arty precinct. There are great views from the top across to Cerro San Cristobal, where there is a statue of the Virgin Mary on the hilltop. I took the funicular to the top last Friday when I was exploring the Bellavista neighbourhood, which is on my side of the river and a 10-minute walk from home. Just over the park is Barrio Lastarria, which is very groovy and has some fabulous (and cheap) clothing boutiques. Leo showed me through it on Saturday evening, and we had lunch nearby the other day.

Museo de Bellas Artes, two blocks from me, includes a contemporary art gallery, which I looked through on the weekend. Another gallery of visual arts is attached to the fabulous GAM building, which also has theatres. I've found two art cinemas and saw the new Juliette Binoche film, "Certified Copy", which had French, Italian and only a little English dialogue, with Spanish subtitles, so it felt like total submersion for me. Cinema tickets are very cheap: around US$/A$6! I've also seen an exhibition of Andy Warhol's works on loan from a museum for children in the States. There was lots of stuff there I hadn't seen before.

I've been into a couple of the huge cathedrals near Plaza de Armas, which is the cultural centre of the city and only a short walk from me. I now want to start visiting the various historical and other museums, including the Fundacion Museo de la Mode, which just bought at auction in London one of Amy Winehouse's iconic dresses.

Still chilling in Chile

2011-11-25T03:02:00.002+11:00

I had a long run yesterday morning, again with Lalo accompanying me on his bike. This time we headed north along the coast towards Vina del Mar. Once we got out of Valpo city we were alongside the sea and beaches. Vina is Chile's main tourist strip; its Riviera. There were a lot of tradespeople beavering away in Vina, readying the place for the summer. Lalo and I had ice cream (me) and coffee and croissants (him) at our turnaround point. All up, about 14–15 km. Very enjoyable.

I like to get into a routine and have really enjoyed the last few days here.

At breakfast yesterday I met an English couple, Carole and Peter, who are full-time travellers. Like me, they have sold up at home and just travel. We had lots of stories to share. I envy them their next destination: six days along the Patagonian coastline by steamer.

I'm packed up and moving to Santiago today, with the help of Lalo and Maria.

Loving the Chile burghers

2011-11-23T04:27:00.006+11:00

After a bumpy start to my extended stay in Chile this time last week, I'm back in my normal positive state of mind. This has come about because special people keep cropping up and taking me under their wings. At Hotel Da Vinci in Valparaiso, Enrico, Natalie, Luis and others have become my Valpo family. I'm also now into a routine, which always gives me pleasure in a new place.

I'll be moving to Santiago later this week, which plan was set in place just a few days after I was robbed. I was feeling vulnerable and limited in what I could do here, but that has now changed. Never mind: I'll be leaving here feeling positive about the place, and hopefully I'll have a chance to meet again with the friends I've made here.

I'll be renting a small apartment in an area of Santiago that is opposite a park where I can run and near to art galleries, cafes and restaurants, and the metro. It seems I was meant to enquire about this apartment! The owner and her family have literally adopted me. P lives in Washington, and the apartment is managed on her behalf by her mum, Maria and Dad, Lalo. They took me out to lunch here on Sunday, and are such lovely people. Lalo lives in Valpo; Maria is in Santiago but was visiting Valpo with their grandson. Yesterday and today, Lalo rode beside me on his bike while I ran along the coast road for some hill training. These were my first runs in two weeks, and without his generosity I may not have run here at all. Maria is a hoot, and just two years older than I am. P will be visiting Santiago next month. She is a runner also, so we are planning to run together.

While I was waiting for Lalo this morning I got chatting with a young New Zealand backpacker who was waiting for a bus to the main station. Rachael came to Chile for a friend's wedding, and has taken the opportunity to travel for a month in Peru, Argentina and Chile. There's nothing unusual about that, except for the fact that she is travelling with her two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Lily, on her hip!

There are opportunistic, dishonest people everywhere; but everyone I've met since that first afternoon in Valpo has been friendly, kind, thoughtful and generous - or just plain awesome.

If I still had a camera I would be photographing the urban art, for which Valparaiso is famous. It's a city made for exploring on foot.

Vexed in Valparaiso, Chile

2011-11-17T23:42:00.002+11:00

Belize (continued)

After working all day on Saturday I decided to spend my last day in Belize on Caye Caulker, which is one of the small islands that line the barrier reef that is one of the great attractions of this part of the Caribbean. I took two small planes and then a golf cart taxi to the SeaBreeze guesthouse at the end of the sandy main road that runs through the township. It wasn't cheap, but it was sort of funky in a backpacker way; I could handle that. But I couldn't get the promised reliable internet access, and then there was no water. I decided to pull the plug and go straight to Belize City ready for my flight to Chile on Monday. I checked out of the hotel I'd just checked into and took a water taxi to the mainland, where a major chain hotel was the only viable option. I couldn't get reliable internet access there, either, so I was already in a bad mood when I discovered my room was double the rate they had quoted over the phone. If I feel I've been mucked about and ripped off, I can turn into The Guest From Hell, which is what happened at The Radisson Belize City. I'm sure Belize, and especially the islands, can be appealing, but apart from offering the chance to catch up with an old friend the place didn't do much for me.

Valparaiso, Chile

I flew into Santiago on Tuesday morning after making my connection back in Miami. (Be warned: Getting a connecting international flight after flying into Miami from outside the US is not to be confused with being "in transit".) I'd arranged a car and driver to meet me in Santiago and bring me to Valparaiso, where I had booked a long stay at Hotel da Vinci in the expectation that I'd love Valpo and would be comfortable here while I focused on a heavy workload over the next month or two or three.

Within a few hours, while I was walking around getting my bearings, I was robbed in a nearby street by three young men who suddenly surrounded me. Before I could fully grasp what was happening, one of them grabbed my shoulder bag and yanked it hard, breaking the strap. I screamed and shouted to people further up the street to grab them as they ran past, but they got away and disappeared around a corner. The bag contained a credit card, debit card, cash, my iPhone, camera, keys and a security device for my Hong Kong bank account. I was shaking in shock.

When I got back to my hotel, Enrico the owner was dealing with some new guests one of whom had also been robbed. Enrico, the other staff here (Natalie, Daniel, Luis) and this bunch of nine women from the US were a wonderful support for me. Marsha, Tracy, Barbara (whose stolen bag also contained her passport), Betsy, Edwinna, Dee, Kris, Linda and another Barbara asked me to join them for dinner at a nearby restaurant after I'd given a statement to the police, who came to the hotel. Marsha lives in Northern Chile, and Tracy (a novelist) lives in Peru. The others mainly live in New Mexico and Arizona. They are connected by various networks and were just finishing a trip together through Chile guided by Betsy.

Yesterday morning, Enrico took me to the police station to put my statement in writing. He knows just how it feels: he was robbed just after he arrived in Chile from Italy a few years ago.

The experience has spoiled Valpo for me, and I'm yet to decide where I'll go after I replace my cards. My first choice would be to return to New York, but I need answers to questions about my visa status before I can decide to go that route.

The Mosquito Coast: Belize

2011-11-13T09:41:00.003+11:00

I'm spending five days in Central America as a bit of a breather between New York and my next long-stay destination, Chile.

I flew in on Wednesday. Each of the four planes I took from La Guardia in Queens, NY to Corozal in Belize via Miami and Belize City got progressively smaller, until the last one, from San Pedro in the island chain offshore from the mainland, had room for just me, the pilot and a couple from Tombstone, Arizona. We are on the Caribbean coast, so it all looks very tropical. Belize is a developing country, so it's also very ramshackle.

My main reason for choosing this particular place for a break was to see an old friend from my years in Hong Kong. Sue F and I last caught up in 1996, during a quick visit I made to HK that year. She retired to Portugal and then to Belize, and is now moving on to Guatemala. We had dinner here at my resort hotel, The Almond Tree, the night I arrived. On Thursday I did some work, then met Sue, her daughter Kim and K's partner Mark, for lunch at Blue's, a lovely place a short walk north along the bay.

Yesterday we drove to Orange Walk Town, from where we travelled upriver by small boat for about 90 minutes to the site of some ancient Mayan ruins at Lamanai. Saw some stunning birds, a couple of crocs, and some spider monkeys along the river. Back to Corozal for a swim in the hotel pool and an early dinner and chat with some other guests (Patty and Michael from Washington State, and Deb and Irv from Minnesota).

I've been working all day today, catching up on some bitty jobs and clearing up loose ends before I leave on Monday for Chile.

A marathon last week in New York

2011-11-13T09:09:00.003+11:00

My New York sojourn ended on a high note with marathon week. Frannie from Albury flew in a few days beforehand to stay with me and take part. She gained entry through the lottery. I gained entry to next year's marathon by running races :-) The unseasonal snowstorm a couple of weeks ago saw my second-to-last race cancelled, but my last one went ahead on a cold but beautiful Saturday a week ago. I was third in my age group in the 5K that went from the United Nations Building to the marathon finish line in Central Park, and Frannie was fourth just behind me!

Marathon day was stunningly beautiful. I went over to Staten Island with Fran to see her on her way to the start, then came back to Manhattan. I watched bits of the race with Joanne on 1st Avenue, where I saw Marie, Steve and Maria. Caught Maria again on 5th Avenue. I didn't see Fran at all, who finished about 15 minutes faster than she'd expected. Both she and Maria had a bad time with cramps, but they still did really well and really earned their medals.

Frannie flew out to see her daughter in the Mid-West on Monday and I packed up my New York life before flying south on Wednesday.

On other notes: During my final week I saw three one-act plays (including one by Woody Allen) on Broadway, and saw a few films as part of the NYC Documentary Film Festival: one about Charlotte Rampling, who did a Q&A afterwards; a fascinating account of the life and work of Charles and Ray Eames, which I saw with Maria; and 'Girl With Black Balloons' (about a long-term resident artist of the Chelsea Hotel). I visited the 9/11 Memorial and saw the water features that occupy the footprints of the original South and North Towers. I had four morning runs with the usual suspects, whom I'll miss incredibly over the next six months. And I joined in the NYC Marathon opening ceremony and Parade of Nations with Fran.

On my last morning I had coffee with architect Kate, with whom I have so many things in common it's uncanny. I also spent time the last week getting to know John Boy and Anne from 96th Street a little better. I'll really miss them.

Au revoir, New York!

Snow Falling on 97th Street

2011-10-30T02:57:00.009+11:00

Engineers' Gate, 90th Street and 5th Avenue, New York: The start of most of my morning runs

I arrived back in New York about ten weeks ago, in summer, and today it's snowing! I can hardly believe what I'm seeing, but I know it's cold enough. At 8 am I ran the last 10 miles (16 km) of the New York marathon course with a bunch of friends and it was damned cold by the time we'd finished and I was walking home. It's now settling on the trees and ground as snow. Gorgeous.

Too much has happened since my last post on 4 October to catch up now. I feel so at home here and I go about my day like any other New Yorker, so it doesn't really feel like I need to keep a travel blog. That will change soon when I fly south for the winter.

My family had a scare mid-month when Mum, in Australia, had serious heart issues and had to have a pacemaker installed. Once the procedure was done she was out of any danger, which was a great relief for us all. I've changed my plans so that I can go back in late February for a week.

Some highlights from the past month: Staten Island half marathon (my best half mara time since 2009 and a third place in my age group); New York Film Festival, including "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" and "The Ballad of Mott the Hoople" (which I saw with Albury pal Mary-Jane); my own mini film festival: "Bombay Beach", "To Be Heard", "Texas Killing Fields", "The Way"; catchup birthday meals and a run in Toronto with Hong Kong pals Sarah and William, and Frances; Niagara Falls marathon: a personal best time of 4:13:00 and a fifth place in my age group on a beautiful day; catchup with my "B" mate Di (Bali, Berlin, Broadway/Brighton Beach); and pre-dawn runs in Central Park three mornings a week with some or all of Maria, Sung, Sarah, Lissy, Heather, Joe, Marie, Steve, John....

I'm really going to miss friends from 96th Street: Chloe, John Boy and the rest of the crew.

Hallelujah!

2011-10-04T09:15:00.003+11:00

Morningside Park, New York City

I'm counting all my blessings and feeling very grateful for my good health and the special people in my life.

I've run three races since my last update: the Fifth Avenue Mile, an 18-miler (30K) and a half marathon (13 miles/21.1K). My best effort was the mile, which was 5 seconds faster than last year and was of "national class" for my age, according to the New York Road Runners' calculations. I also took 8 minutes off last year's time for the 18-miler, and gained 5th place in my AG in both races. Had brunch after the mile with my Dead Runner mate Josh, last seen in Maine last year. This weekend's half marathon was a 6th place (out of 57). I followed that with a scenic 10-mile run with Maria yesterday in Central Park, up to Morningside Heights and down the Hudson before returning through the park.

Made a return visit yesterday to Shiloh Baptist Church in Harlem with some visitors from Oz, including Liz, an in-house editor for one of my main clients. The pastor used a very detailed baseball analogy (it now being the season playoffs), which was pretty funny. He was swinging a baseball bat and the congregation was getting very worked up. I'd been to a baseball game on Tuesday night with this bunch (and runner pals Heather, Joe, Joe's brother David, Lauren, Steve and Tim) – New York Mets vs Cincinnati Reds – in Flushing, Queens. It was a lot of fun doing The Wave and being pumped up by the music.

I've signed on for next year's Green Mountain Relay (I did this 200-mile event in Vermont in 2009) after being talked into it by team leader Tavia at lunch recently. I also caught up this past week with another former GMR teammate, Tamar (for brunch and later a movie). Our team in 2009 was called "New York Running Chicks and a Few Dudes".

I've been up very early most mornings for regular training runs in the park with some or all of the 5.30 a.m. crew: Maria, Sung, Lizzy, Sarah, Sun, Steve, John, Heather and Joe. Caught up with Joanne for a lunchtime run when she came into town last week from Pelham, and with Marie, just back from a cycling holiday in Sardinia. Had a massage appointment with Marie on Friday.

I saw the play "War Horse" on the recommendation of one of my authors. Fantastic life-size puppet horses. Some 8 million horses died during the First World War. The play includes scenes of trench warfare, and of horses being caught up in the barbed wire. Very harrowing.

Visited the New York Art Fair the week before last and was relieved not to feel compelled to buy something! I've also been continuing my movie streak with the New York Film Festival at Lincoln Center: On Saturday I saw "The Separation" (Iran) and "The Loneliest Planet" (USA/Germany). Both were excellent. Tamar and I saw the German film "3" on Friday down in the East Village. Albury artist pal Mary-Jane is visiting New York for a few weeks and we saw "The Help" after our walk in the park got rained out last week.

I'm feeling very tired tonight and will soon be in bed with a book. It's cold and damp outside, and I don't need to be anywhere but here. Hallelujah!

Walking on the mild side

2011-09-20T23:39:00.005+10:00

The Palisades

I've spent a bit of time recently with new pal Louise, a writer and traveller whom I met through writer/playwright Julia. Amazingly, we have a mutual friend in Ubud, Bali, the writer Cat Wheeler. It's a very small world indeed. Lou has now moved on to the UK, so I wonder where we'll meet up again... Julia is also in the UK, packing up her life there in preparation for returning to NYC at the end of the month.

My training is going very well. I was put to the test this past weekend with my first races since the half marathon I ran in Thailand way back in February. In the Fitness Mind, Body and Spirit 4-mile race in Central Park I dug deep to maintain an average pace of 8:02-minute miles. This was an improvement on last year of a minute overall and two places. (I placed 4th out of 58 in my age group.) On Sunday I went to Yonkers (further up the Hudson River) and ran the 86th Yonkers Half Marathon with NY pals Joanne and Heather. Joanne has just moved out of the city to Pelham, so it was a good opportunity to see her. We three started together. After about mile 6 I took it up a notch and managed to come in at 1:59:45, which gave me a 1st place in my age group (out of 6). In places there were great views across to The Palisades, which line the western shore of the Hudson River for some distance north of the George Washington Bridge.

As there is no rest for the wicked, I joined Maria and Sung for a 4-miler yesterday morning and a 6-miler today (also with Tuesday regulars Sarah, Lissy, John and Sun). (Sung answered an ad I placed on the New York Road Runners website and has joined the 5.30 am group.) I'll resume my weekly massages with Marie when she returns from cycling in Sardinia.

There are two more events coming up this weekend: a 1-mile sprint down 5th Avenue on Saturday and an 18-mile marathon tune-up on Sunday. They will give me five of my required nine races for guaranteed entry to next year's New York Marathon.

My movie marathon is also continuing: "Love Crime" (French, with Kristin Scott Thomas), "Chasing Madoff" (about Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme and the attempts by four whistleblowers to get the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate him), "The Future" (written and directed by, and featuring, the artist Miranda July), "Hedgehog" (a really enjoyable French film, which I saw with Chloe), and "We Were Here" (documentary about the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco).

I've also seen some 9/11-related exhibitions at the International Center of Photography, the New York Historical Society, and the Time Warner Center lobby (portraits taken in the weeks and months after 9/11 using the huge Polaroid camera that was used in Albury by Anne Zahalka and Petrina Hicks to photograph the Fruit Fly Circus kids in 2006).

I've met up with my friend CY, who is looking gorgeous and doing very well after a really difficult 18 months.

I'm now one month into my 10-week stay. It feels longer than that, as I've met so many people; but I know the remaining time will pass far too quickly.

Right on schedule, the weather changed a week after Labor Day. It's officially autumn this week and it's turned cool. A beautiful time of year to be in New York!

One step at a time

2011-09-05T07:37:00.006+10:00

There is nowhere in the world I feel quite so much at home as in New York City.

I've settled into my training for the Niagara Falls Marathon and have been really lucky to be able to pick up where I left off with some runner friends I made in past visits. Heather and Joe, and Marie have, in turn, introduced me to Joanne, Maria and Lissy. I ran circuits of Central Park with them at 5.30 on three mornings last week, and then on Saturday morning I was able to complete a 20-mile (32K) run on not much of a base purely because of the company and support of Joanne and Maria. A full circuit of Central Park, and then a run down the Hudson River to near Ground Zero and back to 97th Street, is a very good way to start a long weekend.

I've caught up with my photographer friend Holly for breakfast and a film about NY photographer Bill Cunningham. Holly is creating a buzz as a drag photojournalist. I've also seen "Higher Ground", "Brighton Rock" and "Rebirth" (a 9/11 documentary).

During the week I went to a writers' group, where I met some very interesting people. Through that group I've become friends with Julia (a playwright/theatre director/writer) and Chloe (a painter/social worker). They are both in my neighbourhood, so it's been easy to catch up with them on most days.

This Labor Day weekend marks the end of summer, but to me it feels like a new beginning. I just need to take it one step at a time.

You might as well train

2011-08-29T09:05:00.004+10:00

Since I flew into New York last Monday we've had an earthquake, a hurricane, and tornado warnings. It seems my spell as Bringer of Gorgeous Weather is over! Hurricane Irene ended up being a bit of a fizzer for us New Yorkers. We dutifully emptied supermarket and hardware store shelves of torches, batteries and bottled water. We filled our bathtubs with water to flush our loos if the power went off. We evacuated (or not), and we stayed off the streets. But nothing really happened... CNN was trying to keep the fear factor going, but it all got a bit silly. Which is not to say there weren't people and places badly impacted by the storm (touted as a hurricane "the size of Europe" and "unprecedented" in its potential to cause damage to cities along the east coast), but Manhattanites aren't likely to put their lives on hold again so readily the next time a big storm threatens.

I caught up with Gordon and Joanna again on Thursday for "afternoon tea" (not a traditional tea, but a bite to eat at tea time) at the Algonquin Hotel. There is no longer a round table; instead, an oval table presides under a painting of the "New Yorker" writers and editors who used to meet here regularly for lunch and to share witticisms, criticisms and general bitchiness.

The hurricane danger has passed, and I have a marathon to get trained for. As Dorothy Parker said, "You might as well live."

The beagle has landed

2011-08-25T08:35:00.005+10:00

Hong Kong

My feet hardly had time to touch the ground in Hong Kong. Cathy N met my plane and deposited me at the door of my hotel, Butterfly on Wellington. I'll definitely stay there again. It's right near the Mid-Levels escalator and the Graham Street wet market, whose days are numbered. Friday morning I had coffee with Bernadette Longley, a publisher with Macmillan, at the Excelsior Hotel in Causeway Bay. Called in to see my accountant, Millie, then had a lovely vegan dim sum lunch with Cathy H-F at the Lock Cha Teahouse in Hong Kong Park. She is doing the Maclehose Trailwalker event again this year. Lunch was swiftly followed by afternoon tea with Cathy and Bec N at the Mandarin Oriental. Great to catch up on all their news. I was feeling overfed by this stage and passed on dinner invites in favour of an early night after drinks at the Foreign Correspondents' Club with Chris D and Polly.

San Francisco

I was met at San Francisco airport by Annie W, a Dead Runner friend from Aptos. We checked into our hotel (Parc55 near Union Square), then walked to the bay end of Market Street to get a bite to eat for lunch. (I had Vietnamese summer rolls.) On the way back we met Rita and Douglas, who had come up from Monterey Bay. It's great when online pals become real ones. We went out for dinner to a Brazilian restaurant on Market Street. I had a huge salad.

Sunday morning we had an hour's run along the bay, Rita and I wearing the tiaras I had bought in Hong Kong. We were called "princesses" by a street person, and we chatted up two Russian sailors who were minding a Tall Ship that had sailed from Vladivostok. Breakfast back at the hotel together before Rita and Douglas headed home.

In the early afternoon, Annie and I were part of a conference call with some other Dead Runners about the DRS world conference to be held in Texas in February.

Walked with Annie over to the SF Museum of Modern Art to meet my former Hong Kong friend Francine B and her service dog Lola. I had last seen them in that same spot in May 2009. We had a coffee, then saw a couple of excellent exhibitions at the Contemporary Jewish Museum: Gertrude Stein and Alice B Toklas at home; and Charlotte Salomon's amazing small paintings that tell the story of her life before she died at age 26 in Auschwitz.

I did some work before Annie and I went across the road to an Italian place for dinner, then worked on until 11.30. I had only two hours' sleep before getting up to do some more work, then headed with Annie to the airport at 5 am. It was fun spending time with her. We'll meet up again at the DRSWC.

New York

I worked for three hours on the plane. As we banked over Manhattan I could see my building! It's the most amazing city to see from the air.

Cabbed it to my home in Manhattan, on the corner of West 97th Street and Central Park West, and unpacked my suitcase for the first time in three weeks! I then went to Whole Foods nearby and stocked up on salad stuff.

Yesterday was my first full day back. At 1.51 pm there was an earthquake measuring 5.8 along the eastern seaboard. I didn't feel anything, but friends in Brooklyn and Maryland said they felt it.

Had dinner with Gordon and Joanna R, who moved back to the UK from Oz about four months ago. Gordon is here to promote his novel Mice, which is published in the US by Penguin. We went to a burger bar near the Rockefeller Center. Jo and I had seafood salads. I'll catch up with them again tomorrow.

Today has been a big work day.

Sydney sojourn

2011-08-17T19:56:00.001+10:00

I've had a fun week in Sydney catching up with very special friends. (And working!)

On Sunday morning Katie M and I walked from Newtown to Bondi Beach via Centennial Park and Bondi Junction. With a breakfast stop it took us three hours, and we chatted the whole time. Katie and I have worked on many, many book projects together since 1994, and it was fabulous to have that quality time with her. She worked at The Law Book Company after I left the company in 1983. We met up with Frannie and Karla from Albury, and 80,000 other City to Surfers.

Had dinner with my best pal from the LBCo days, Gina, on Sunday night. Lots of shared memories of people and places from the early 1980s, including the much-missed Brad Alick. Lots of laughs. I'd forgotten how funny Gina is.

Greg T dates our first meeting to 1976, to the days when Saturdays meant Frenchs Wine Bar on Oxford Street, Darlinghurst. I used to go there to see bands, and Greg used to play there. Our friendship was really forged in the early 1980s. A fun dinner with him on Monday night.

Last night I had dinner with Chris P and his partner Heather at the Spanish Club, where Chris and I spent many evenings in the late 1970s and early 1980s. I met Heather about five years ago when they passed through Albury. Chris has always been a special friend, and I've really enjoyed both times I've met Heather.

I'm also enjoying getting to know Anne Z better each time I stay here at Australia Street Guesthouse. Yesterday we had a little photo shoot in my room.

Today I went up to Frenchs Forest to meet the people I've been working with for many, many years at Pearson Education: Sandra, Liz, Rebecca, Kathryn and Bernadette. Katie is the only one of the team I had met previously (in 1994 and last Sunday). So good to put faces to names and voices.

Tomorrow I'm leaving Oz and heading back to New York via Hong Kong and San Francisco.

The beat goes on...

2011-08-13T07:53:00.006+10:00

Photograph by Anne Zahalka.

My feet have hardly touched the ground since I left Albury a week ago. On Monday I caught up with Susanna B, whom I met in Hong Kong last November. We had lunch, a great chat, and a terrific hug. Some people just seem like instant friends. That night, Barb and Bill and I had dinner with one of my oldest friends, photographer Bill B and his gorgeous partner Sally. Bill and I met in 1968, when he was an exchange student in Albury from the US. I've known Sal since the 1980s. I see them every few years. It's hard to believe we are talking about celebrating our 60th birthdays when we've known each other since our 16th year.

Tuesday morning I met up with Lorraine R, whom I met in Kuala Lumpur about a year ago when I was on my way to Italy. We were both running in the park beneath the Petronas Towers and got chatting. I had a coffee with Lorraine in Albury last week when she was passing through, and we arranged to run at 6.30 in Melbourne this week. I tripped and went flying just as we started running, and hurt my arm. We ran a circuit of The Tan together and had a good chat, then I ran another one on my own. By the time I got back to the apartment the arm had stiffened up and I realised I'd done some damage to it. Bill took me to The Alfred Hospital where I spent the morning having X-rays. It seems I chipped a bone in the radial head. Not broken, but the doctor said I'd need to keep it in a sling for six weeks. As it's turned out, after being fairly useless for four days, it's already coming good and I don't think I'll be using the sling from now on.

Hong Kong pal and photographer Jennifer B and I had afternoon tea at the Windsor Hotel. We caught up for the first time in years early last year, when I went down to Brighton and we had lunch and walked on the beach with her dog Tilly.

Finished the day with Martyn, who came by the apartment for a drink with B&B and to collect me and my bags. We go back to 1974, so we agreed we should rendezvous in 2014 for our 40th anniversary :-)) He took me to the airport on Wednesday.

I dropped my bags at photo artist Anne Z's guesthouse in Newtown, in Sydney (from where I started my travels in May last year), and went into Darling Harbour to meet up with Joanne B. We've seen a lot of each other in the past few months: Bali in December, and in Albury, Melbourne and Sydney in the past month. She was in Sydney for work for the day. From there I went to Suzie's hotel near Chinatown to have dinner and hear about her reunion last week with her birth mother and half-brothers. We caught up again last night for a quick drink before she caught her flight back to the UK. I'll see her again next August when I'm hoping to do another walk with Joanne and Tony.

On Thursday, Chris M (we've been good pals since 1973, when we were at uni together) had dinner after going along to a small function for Christina Noble. Good to see Kirrily again after meeting her for the first time at the ball in Melbourne last week.

Yesterday Anne Z and I had lunch, and I met gallery owner Nicky Ginsberg, who I've bought two artworks from over the years. Made a quick visit to the Art Gallery of NSW. Farewell drink with Suzie, then went to Potts Point for dinner with Marah B. She and Katie M gave me my first jobs for what is now Pearson Education when I returned to Sydney from Hong Kong at the end of 1993. I still do work for Katie, and I've worked with Marah on various art-related projects over the years. She now heads up the Biennale of Sydney. A good night at the end of a very busy week.

A sunny weekend, perfect for the Sydney City to Surf race tomorrow. My race pack never arrived in Albury, so I'm unable to join Frannie and Karla, who came up from Albury yesterday. But I have a Plan B and I'll see them afterwards.

On the road again

2011-08-07T18:22:00.007+10:00

After a month in Albury, and a week of farewells, I kissed my mum au revoir at Albury Airport yesterday morning and picked up where I had left off. I'm staying for a few nights with Barb and Bill in their apartment on Southbank, Melbourne. I'm looking at this Art Centre spire, which is only about 200 metres away and is lit up with blue lights.

JB and I spent last night at a Gala Ball marking the 10th anniversary in Australia of the Christina Noble Children's Foundation. Christina is a powerful, passionate speaker who made a big impression on everyone in the room. I sponsor a young boy in Mongolia through CNCF, and I spent two days helping out at the Foundation in Ho Chi Minh City in 2009.

JB's article about our holiday in Ubud, Bali last December was published in "The Age" today.

Barb, JB and I saw the very amusing British film "The Trip" today in Carlton. I saw it in Istanbul in April, as part of the Istanbul International Film Festival.

I'm feeling very excited about heading off again.

Is home where the art is?

2011-07-29T18:11:00.003+10:00

I have stuff deposited all over the world, but all of my art collection is here in regional Australia. Does that mean Albury is still my home base?

I feel I have at least three homes now: Albury, Kuching and New York (where I'm headed next). Am I just being greedy?

I've spent the past three weeks catching up with friends, family, acquaintances, runners and dogs. I've been to a funeral and the movies, to the podiatrist, optometrist and dentist, and to exhibition openings at Albury Art Gallery/Library/Museum and Wodonga Artspace. I've been taken for walks by my happily rehomed dogs Butch and Charlie, and for long runs in the early-morning fog by crazy runner pals. I've spent time with two dear friends I wouldn't have seen if their visits to Albury hadn't coincided with mine, and with another who made the time to visit from out of town. I've flown to Sydney to spend two days with Chris.

When I moved back to Albury in 1995, I felt I was on my knees. This place got me back on my feet. It's because of Albury and the friends I've made here that I can now do what I'm doing. Albury will always have a large part of my heart ... and, for the time being, all of my art.

Albury, Oz

2011-07-15T08:35:00.003+10:00

I'm now back where I started my journey in May 2010, but only for a month. There's quite a bit to catch up on...

Kuching

I loved spending time with my Kuching family. Min and Eng and I did some very early-morning runs (4.30 am!) in the lead-up to the Wees' KL half marathon. I'm very taken with the "Kuching Shuffle" training technique and have shown Di and Fran here in Oz how it works. I really enjoyed the long runs with Min and the breakfasts afterwards with Sam, Eng Hooi and Belinda, and William and Jackie... Dinner with Habitat for Humanity visitors from NZ. Lunch with everyone at Design Network Architects. Also spent quality time with Emily and Rita, Maz and June (who took me to karaoke and prayers at the central mosque), Josephine, Ramsay, Michael and Moses, Bernard, and Abdullah (our fourth city in five months!). I spoke with a group of high-school kids about my career, and celebrated Father's Day with all of Emily's family. Belinda drove me to the airport, where I got to see the Wees on their way to KL. Can't wait to see them all again next May.

Queensland

Chris met my flight from Singapore. The last time I had seen him was in Canberra in December 2008. We stayed at Eco Lodge in the Glasshouse Mountains. Went for a walk halfway up Mt Tibrogargan, which I then ran twice around the following morning. We met up with my relations June and Kevin for a great walk up one of the other spectacular mountains in the area, then had lunch in Caloundra. Amazingly, we ran into my cousins Ken and Faye just walking along the seafront. From Glasshouse Mountains we went to Expedition and Carnarvon National Parks, where we camped for over a week, sometimes in what Chris calls "wild camps". I did a number of runs, and we went for lots of walks. The walk up Carnarvon Gorge to Big Bend was a highlight, and I loved the Amphitheatre.

We made our way back to Brisbane via Dalby and Bribie Island, where we had a fun night and day with June and Kevin. Spent the last night in Brisbane with young rellies Jaye, Christos, Kellie, Cassie and Lachlan. Saw a Surrealism exhibition at the Gallery of Modern Art and had a quick look through the Queensland Art Gallery. I'm hoping to stay on Bribie for a month early in 2013, with Brisbane just an hour away by train.

Flew to Melbourne, where I spent an hour talking with new friend Kay while we waited for our flights.

Albury

I arrived back in Albury in time for dinner with my sister Deb and brother-in-law Steve, who had collected the key for the apartment I'm staying in on the main street. The big Art Deco exhibition at Albury Art Gallery and Library/Museum opened the next night. Saw many people I know, and met others I had been working with on the catalogue for the show.

Saw my Mum, and my dogs Butch and Charlie on Saturday. Mum is well, apart from having a cold. Butch and Charlie didn't recognise me initially! We went for a walk in the cold with Therese, Jules and Yvonne.

Dinner that night with Deb and Steve and my nephew Mitch, who is now out of the brace he has had to wear since breaking five vertebrae in a motorcycle racing accident some months ago. He's a lucky boy.

Went to the Dogs' Breakfast on Sunday. Good to see Kay, Lyn and Graham, and other friends and their dogs.

Spent some time with Dotti and Rob during the Art Deco walk in the afternoon.

Caught up with Barb and Bill, who were up from Melbourne, and Therese and Gary for an hour before Gary and I went to the movies to see "Oranges and Sunshine". Always great to see B&B. I'll stay with them next month for a few nights.

Dotti and I had coffee on Monday. She brought a couple of my kilim rugs that she's storing for me to put in the apartment where I'm staying.

Ran Tuesday morning with Christine (a fabulous catchup-on-news run), and on Wednesday with Di and Fran. The hardest run I've done in a while! Fran scored an entry to this year's New York marathon in the lottery and will stay with me on Central Park West for a few nights.

Dinner with Mum on Wednesday, and with Jan and Pete and Jo last night. Much to talk about! Had lunch with Kate from Bright.

Kuching Kapers

2011-06-11T19:05:00.003+10:00

I'm nearly halfway through my return visit to Kuching. I'll be sorry to leave, even though I'm very much looking forward to the next stage of my travels.

Kuching and I seem to have a serious fling going on! It feels like home, and it keeps delivering great people into my path. Fabulous to spend time with Emily and Rita again. We've had various dinners, including at Rita's house with daughters Kah-Yee (just graduated as a pharmacist) and Kah-Ling (studying law). Emily and I have been to the movies, where we froze watching "Kung Fu Panda 2" in 3D. Emily has also put me together with a Chinese herbal medicine practitioner, Dr Tay, for help in clearing up the cold I've had since April.

I'm also taking the opportunity while I'm here to have a complete medical check-up.

New friends Samantha and Min, with kids Sean and Sara, and Belinda and Eng Hooi are a total delight. I met them very briefly in January at the end of a run. We used Facebook in the intervening months to stay in touch, and it felt like we were already old friends when I joined them for dinner at Sam and Min's house last Saturday night. We've had two runs together (Sunday and Wednesday), and have a few more planned. They are training for the Kuala Lumpur half marathon.

I love seeing familiar faces along the waterfront of a morning when I'm doing my run. It's one of my favourite places.

Last night, Eng Hooi and Belinda made a nasi lemak feast at their home, where I met a couple of other people who sometimes join the Sunday morning group run.

I've also caught up again with artists Ramsay and Narong, and hope to have them here for dinner next week.

As usual, I'm staying at Batik Boutique Hotel, where I know a lot of the crew from January. Maz and Jun and I had dinner this week, though they haven't been able to convince me to go to karaoke again.

I've also seen Josephine H for another of her extraordinary facials, and will squeeze in another couple over the next fortnight.

As always, work is very busy.

This photo of the area near Kuching's waterfront was taken by Darroll Lo, Emily's brother.

North to South; West to East

2011-05-29T22:05:00.007+10:00

A very brief catchup on my travels...

Cotswold Way Walk, UK
On 3 May (was it only a few weeks ago?!), Jo and Tony and I met up in Stratford Upon Avon to start our walk along the beautiful Cotswold Way, south from Chipping Camden to Bath for 160 kilometres through woods and up and down rolling hills. We had a fabulous time. Stayed in B&Bs and pubs in Stanton, Cleeve Hill, Little Witcombe (where great pals Peter and Amanda and daughter Elizabeth met me for dinner), Middle Yard, North Nibley, Tormarton and Bath. Our lodgings ranged from 4 star to 1 star, but the breakfasts were always good.

We celebrated reaching Bath by having a cream tea at the famous Pump Room. We have a couple of ideas for next year's walk. I'll look forward to it, and to spending more quality time with Tony and Jo.

Saw Suzie again back in Thames Ditton before catching a cab into London and over the London Bridge to City Airport for my commuter flight to Luxembourg.

Luxembourg
I spent four days here. The first two were spent mainly at the Islamic Financial Services Board annual summit. I edit the standards produced by the IFSB. Good to see Abdullah Haron (we had a meetup in Kuala Lumpur in January), Isma and Erni from KL.

I walked around the old town and checked out the fabulous art gallery, designed by IM Pei. The city was *very* quiet over the weekend. I worked and went to see a couple of films. I was ready to leave by the Monday.

Berlin
Loved Berlin! Very user-friendly city, with so much to see and learn. It's on my list of places to return to and maybe spend a couple of months. I checked out a number of museums, including the Berlin Wall one at Checkpoint Charlie, just near my hotel in the former East Berlin area called Mitte. Ran under the Brandenburg Gate and in the Tiergarten. Fabulous to spend a few days with Di and Ron, friends from the week I spent in Ubud, Bali, when I first left Oz on 24 May last year. We spent one morning seeing another side of Berlin through the eyes of photographer and documentary filmmaker Jonnek Jonneksson (Ron's birthday present to Di). Di and I also saw a fantastic 3D film by Wim Wenders about Pina Bausch, the German choreographer. Stunning.

Ate lots of great Vietnamese food, and German chocolate from Fassbinder & Rausch. Also had dinner with Abdullah, who had flown in after returning to KL from Luxembourg the week before.

Singapore
I arrived in Singapore on Wednesday this week from Berlin via Frankfurt. Caught up with Betty from Towers Watson, and for lunch with Janis and Joel from John Wiley. Also managed to get to a good hairdresser for the first time in ages! Had dinner on Friday at Clarke Quay with Dead Runner pal Ellen (from Ho Chi Minh City, where she and I had dinner in late 2009). We took part in the Sunset Marathon last night, which started at 10 pm. For a number of reasons we decided even before we had started that we would pull out at the halfway turnaround. I walked the half in 3.5 hours and was back at my hotel by about 2.30 am.

Tomorrow I'm heading back to Kuching :-))

Catching up with friends in the UK

2011-05-08T03:12:00.003+10:00

I stayed in Thames Ditton with Suzie and her family. (We last caught up in August in Alnwick, just before the Coast to Coast walk.) Fun to see her again so soon. Our great pal Deb, from our Helena May days, came over to spend the morning watching the royal wedding. I hadn't seen Deb since about 1989. Fabulous to see her again. She's mad for dogs and has got her pilot's licence.

On Saturday I took the train to Exeter in Devon to meet up with Linda (last visited in 2007) and her sister Pam. I met Pam in Sydney in 1994 after I moved back to Oz from Hong Kong. We spent a great four hours or so talking and checking out some op shops for gear for my Cotswold Way walk.

On Sunday, Suzie and David drove me up to Stratford-upon-Avon, to meet with Jo. Jo was one of our group that did the Coast to Coast walk. On Monday we drove over to Warwick for lunch, and for Jo to have a Reiki massage session. On Tuesday I worked, before we met up with our pal Tony for the start of the Cotswold Way walk in Chipping Campden.

Great pals Peter and Amanda were also able to meet up during the walk near Cheltenham ...

Anzac Day, Gallipoli

2011-05-08T02:49:00.002+10:00

I spent 18 hours on the Gallipoli Peninsula, from about 8.30 pm on 24 April to early afternoon the next day, attending the Anzac Day dawn service at North Beach (next to Anzac Cove) and the Australian (at Lone Pine) and New Zealand services. So many people attend these now, it's a huge logistical exercise. Once you cross the Dardanelles on the car ferry, there's no way out except by the bus you came in on anywhere from 18 to 21 hours later. It was very moving having some knowledge of what happened there between 25 April 1915 and the evacuations at the end of that year, but I hated the whole experience of being corralled and herded about for all those hours, and of feeling chilled to the bone during the night. Was it *really* necessary to deposit us there eight hours before the dawn service?

I was very relieved when it was all over. I left Canakkale the next day and took a bus to Tekirdag, on the western shore of the Sea of Marmara in a region that used to be known as Thrace. I stayed the night there before heading back to Istanbul the next day. The following day I flew to London.

Turkish delight

2011-04-24T19:16:00.002+10:00

I’m totally hooked on Turkey…

I’m writing this in Canakkale, the jumping-off point for my visit to Gallipoli for Anzac Day remembrance services. I arrived in a roundabout way yesterday from Istanbul, where I’ve spent the past three weeks. My ferry to Bandirma was cancelled due to high winds, which put a spanner in the works. However, fate was at work… I got chatting about possible alternative plans with a fellow passenger, a uni professor, who was supposed to be giving a speech in Bandirma, and ended up being offered a lift in the car his sponsoring university sent to rescue him. A very nice bloke, with whom I hope to stay in touch through Facebook.

I spent the night in Bandirma and came to Canakkale yesterday (180 km) by very comfortable coach for a tiny fare. If I needed any further reason to plan to spend time travelling around Turkey, that was it.

I’ve been working in Istanbul, but have also settled in and made it home. I was lucky that my visit coincided with the Istanbul International Film Festival. I saw eight films. They were all in cinemas near Taksim Square, so I got to explore that part of town. I also made a young friend, Ufuk, who was a volunteer for the festival. She helped me with tickets and we spoke a number of times and are now friends on Facebook.

I also visited Istanbul Modern, the main art gallery; took a Bosphorus boat cruise; and checked out Santa Sophia (which I could see from my bed), the Blue Mosque, the Royal Palace and Basilica Cistern in my neighbourhood of Sultanahmet. And I've been buying silver jewellery :-))

I got into a routine of having morning runs in Gulhane Park, just a three-minute walk from my home in Istanbul, Agora Life Hotel. Great people there. I’ve felt very welcomed by everyone: Kadir, Ifan, Isa, Furkan …

Other people in the neighbourhood also made it feel like my neighbourhood.

I think Turkish people are incredibly friendly. I’ll definitely be back for a few months, hopefully in mid-2012.

A walk along Lake Geneva: Days 4 and 5

2011-04-24T18:55:00.002+10:00

I'm catching up after my blog has been blocked for three weeks...

I took the train from Vevey back to Lutry on Friday morning to meet Jacques at the waterfront for day 4 of my walk. The sun was back out after being drizzly the day before. We walked through an area of vineyards planted on the very steep hillsides and on every other possible surface. Some lovely villages clustered among the vines, with cellars open for tastings and sales. We ate lunch at a lovely terrace restaurant in Epesses, perched high above the lake. Jacques peeled off at St-Seraphin to catch the train back to Lausanne and I carried on to Vevey.

Yesterday was a stunning day, beginning with a pink and blue dawn complete with sleeping swans on the lake. I loved this amazing fork sculpture. The walk was mostly lakeside, and the kilometre or so just before Montreux was fantastic: gorgeously colourful flowerbeds and lots of bamboo art. In Montreux I had a coffee and croissant before heading back to the lake for the last hour of the walk: to Chateau de Crillon and on to Villeneuve. The weather couldn’t have been more beautiful. As I walked into Villeneuve I watched a couple of hang-gliders landing.

It felt a bit odd to have finished.

I took the train back to Lausanne, packed all my gear, did some work and then had a final dinner at Belleview with Liliane.

What a fabulous month.

A walk along Lake Geneva: Day 3

2011-04-01T04:32:00.004+11:00

I still managed to get lost twice during today's walk. The day started with clear views across to the Alps, with Mont Blanc visible for the first time this month. In 2007 I spent ten days walking in and out of the valleys that surround Mont Blanc. It was my first long-distance walk. Loved seeing it again today.

Very beautiful scenery along much of the way today.

The weather changed after my lunchtime stop in Ouchy.

I love this photograph, which I took between Pully and Lutry. The guy was just standing there looking straight ahead. I didn't have time even to zoom in, but now I'm glad. I like the composition. His umbrella is so tiny... And I like the way the eye moves down from the umbrella to the poles in the water.

The hotel where I'd wanted to stay in Lutry was full, so after a bit of dithering I took the train to Vevey, where I'm staying at a hotel I noticed two weeks ago when Jacques and I drove through here on our way to Montreux. I'll go back to Lutry tomorrow morning to meet him for our walk through the vineyards, then will come back here for the last night of my walk.

A walk along Lake Geneva: Days 1 and 2

2011-03-31T05:18:00.003+11:00

I was born without the map-reading gene, so the first two days of my walk from Nyon to Villeneuve, along Lake Geneva, have been interesting! Very little of the route is beside the lake. Instead, I've walked through woods and fields, through a golf course and a cemetery, beside a river, through vineyards, up and down hills, and along small lanes and main roads. I've had to backtrack many times, found myself back where I started after following the walking man sign, and in some places I've missed seeing where the lake path resumes. I've seen lots of dogs out walking, a fair number of swans, and a squirrel. I'm feeling surprisingly stiff and sore. But I'm having a fabulous time...

I walked from Nyon to Rolle yesterday (about 25 km) and about the same distance today (I'm guessing) to Morges. Tomorrow I'll reach Lausanne (which is visible from Morges) and then continue on to Lutry. Apparently, this next stage is all on lakeside path.

There are small villages scattered everywhere over the hillsides that rise from the lake, so I'm only skimming the surface. Views across the lake are to the French Alps.

An alpine weekend

2011-03-30T06:03:00.004+11:00

Liliane and I spent three days over last weekend seeing quite a large part of Switzerland by train. On Friday we went to Zermatt, which sits at the foot of the Matterhorn – a truly stunning mountain. Zermatt is very user-friendly for skiers, who can take the ski lifts right in town. There’s a flow of foot traffic to and from the lifts at the start and end of the day, and a vibrant après-ski scene. We had apple strudel at a café looking up at the Matterhorn, and dinner at La Dolce Vita on the main drag.

Saturday we took the Glacier Express train from Zermatt to St Moritz. We apparently crossed 291 bridges and went through 91 tunnels. Gorgeous views. Lots of snow. Interesting history. Some fun people in our carriage, including a bunch of gregarious Italians and a lovely Japanese couple.

In St Moritz we stayed in Dorf, the upper part of town, where there is a leaning tower. (The lower part of town, at the end of the lake, is called “Bad”.) One of my clients is from here, and I’ve just remembered that I used to smoke St Moritz cigarettes!

The highlight of the trip for me was our walk around St Moritz Lake on Sunday morning. On the shady side of the lake, which was still frozen, the path was covered in crunchy snow and occasional ice. Very beautiful.

From St Moritz we took the train to Zurich. I was last there in 2007 just before I joined my friend Wisty from Oz on the Mont Blanc Circuit trek. Liliane and I transferred here to the Lausanne train, which went through Bern. On the spur of the moment I decided to spend the night there. I stayed at La Belle Epoque, which I had noticed when I was there a few weeks ago. I took a walk around the part of the city that overlooks the river, got some work done and ate dinner, then finished a job yesterday morning before heading back to Lausanne at lunchtime.

Dinner at Jacques’ last night, where we planned some of my last Swiss adventure…

Last pain de raisin in Paris

2011-03-24T05:53:00.006+11:00

March has been an INTENSE month. My work schedule has been very demanding, but I'm also in a beautiful part of the world and I want to see as much as I can while I'm here.

A week ago tomorrow, my friend Jacques and I saw an exhibition in Lausanne of black-and-white photographs by Hans Steiner, one of Switzerland's most prominent photographers from the 1930s through to the 1960s. It was really interesting to hear Jacques talk about some of the subjects covered in the works. I bought a print (one of ten printed from the original negative) to add to my collection of works bought during my travels.

Jacques then took me to lunch at a lovely place on the slopes above the vineyards in the area that's known as the "Swiss Riviera". We sat on the terrace that looks out over the lake and ate locally caught perch. In Montreux I checked into my hotel (the Fairmont Montreux Palace) before Jacques dropped me at the railway station.

I took the two-carriage train that goes up the steep slopes behind Montreux, past finishing schools and private clinics, to the ski slopes at Rochers de Naye. Very dramatic. It wasn’t perfectly clear weather, but it was the best I was going to get.

Back at lakeside I went to see the statue of Freddie Mercury, which wasn’t on public display when my niece Chloe and I were in Montreux almost exactly ten years ago.

I spent the evening at the movies seeing the Coen Bros film “True Grit”.

At dawn I had a run in light drizzle to Chateau de Chillon, a medieval castle on the edge of the lake. The pathway is beautifully landscaped and there are occasional outdoor artworks. I'll be back here towards the end of the month.

From Montreux I took the train back to Lausanne for one night before heading to Paris last Sunday.

I’m staying in the St-Germain area of the Latin Quarter, on the Left Bank of the Seine, at Relais Hotel de Vieux Paris. In an earlier incarnation the hotel was the “Beat Hotel”, home to William Burroughs, Alan Ginsberg and other Beat poets and bohemians.

The streets are very busy, though it’s still off-season. Remy, who runs the hotel, calls the people who hang out in the neighbourhood “BoBos”: bohemian bourgeoisie.

The day I arrived I had time to see a couple of exhibitions (including Mondrian) and some of the permanent displays at The Pompidou Centre, but I’ve had little free time since then. Each morning I’ve been for a 90-minute exploratory run, which I’ve really enjoyed. The first morning I ran to the Eiffel Tower along the Seine and back to Notre Dame Cathedral. I popped in for a quick sit-down and to check out morning mass. Yesterday I ran via Pont Neuf and the Louvre to the Arc de Triomphe and back via the Champs Elysees and Place de la Concorde. And today I went via the Bastille to an elevated planted promenade that’s a similar concept to the High Line in New York, but longer.

The weather has been beautiful here. I’ve made headway with work. And I’ve had three runs and used them to have my own experience of Paris, even if I couldn’t do most of what I had hoped. The woman in the patisserie around the corner now expects me to call in at about eight o'clock in the morning for a pain de raisin after my run. I like that.

One night in Neuchatel...

2011-03-16T03:38:00.004+11:00

I had planned to stay for two nights, but the place was too quiet.

Liliane and I drove from Lausanne up to Lac de Neuchatel on Saturday, where we had a bit of a look around Colombier/Cortaillod (where I was entered to run a half marathon on the Sunday), Auvernier (where there are some very old vineyards), and Neuchatel. I had already decided to pull out of the race, but it was a good opportunity for an outing and to spend some time with Liliane. We had afternoon tea at a very grand hotel on the lakeshore, then Liliane headed off and I started looking for a hotel for the night. It turned out to be the last night of the World Championship Figure Skating competition and accommodation was hard to find. I was referred to Hotel Touring, which must have been filled otherwise with figure skaters who partied hard after the end of competition, judging by all the noise.

I ate dinner at a small brasserie but failed to include either chocolate or cheese, both of which Neuchatel is famous for, apparently.

The town dates back to the Middle Ages, and there are lots of beautiful old buildings and fountains, cobbled squares, grand public buildings (I visited the art gallery), quirky steps and funky window treatments. I loved the colours. It's all very well looked after, but on a late winter Sunday it was too quiet to keep me after I'd walked everywhere I was going to walk and had lunch at Les Halles. The big place on the hill in the centre of town that looked like a cathedral was shrouded in scaffolding, and none of the interesting-looking shops were open. Best to visit these places during the week, I think.

I took the train back to Lausanne, though I was very tempted to take the one to Bern when it pulled up at the next platform.

Squeezed in around all of this has been work, of course.

I have lots of excursions coming up over the next two weeks, and there is an end in sight to the full-on workload, at least for a few days, towards the end of the month.

The beat goes on...

2011-03-12T07:21:00.008+11:00

Today I had just a tiny taste of what's in store during my walk across the northern shore of Lake Geneva (c. 80 kilometres), which I'm hoping to do over four days in the last week of March when the winter haze should have fully lifted. I took the train just a little way east of Lausanne to Pully, then walked down to Lutry, a medieval village on the lake shore. Above this part of Lake Geneva are steep hillsides planted with wine grapes.

From Lutry I walked back to Ouchy, which is like Lausanne's toe in the lake. It's so beautiful: swans on the water, the French Alps just across the way, lots of dogs out for walks, wonderful buildings. I'm fully aware of how lucky I am to be spending time in this beautiful part of the world. If only I could speak French...!

The end of the last couple of months of intense work pressure is in sight, and so to celebrate I'm going to Paris for five days at the end of next week. I got my train tickets today. I'm booked into a hotel in the Latin Quarter that has associations with the Beat poets.

Bern, baby... Bern!

2011-03-08T04:58:00.003+11:00

How come no one told me about Bern?

What a fabulous city! It's the capital of Switzerland but has a population of only about 130,000. It's about 500 years old, gorgeously situated on the Aare River, has stunning buildings (it's a UNESCO World Heritage site), and there are very funky shops in the lanes of the old town and along cobblestoned, colonnaded Marktgrasse. I went by train from Lausanne this afternoon when I created a window of opportunity for an excursion by starting work at 4.45 am. I didn't know anything about Bern and considered going only as far as Fribourg, which I thought would be more accessible for a visit of a couple of hours than a bigger city. So glad I went with Bern! I seemed to walk instinctively in the right direction, and then I couldn't believe my luck. I also found a great little cinema. I think a return visit for a night or two is on the cards.

Bern is very "German", where Lausanne is very "French".

Yesterday, I took the ferry across to Evian-les-Bains, on the French side of Lake Geneva. It's the old spa town where Evian water originates. There's a small old town area, a majestic former spa that now houses an art gallery and conference centre (I saw an exhibition of works showing daily life in 19th-century Paris), a casino and a marina. It's late winter and the town was very sleepy, but I had lunch and walked along the shoreline checking out the dogs.

From Lampang to Lausanne sur Lac Leman (Lake Geneva)

2011-03-04T07:07:00.004+11:00

If anyone actually reads this blog, I feel I should apologise for the lack of frequent updates. I had hoped to update it every few days, but pressure of work has made it difficult to see and do as much as I might have if my time had been freer, and so there hasn't been much to recount. But it just goes to show that I'm not on a perpetual holiday. I do have some time blocked out for a break in May; the rest of the time it's what I'm calling "business as unusual", where I take my breaks where and when I can find them, just like everyone else.

Having said that, I did spend a couple of days in Lampang, a town two hours by rail south of Chiang Mai, last weekend. I ran a half marathon on the Sunday morning and placed second in the Female 50+ category. It was a fundraiser for the Lampang Pony Welfare Foundation, which was started by a Danish woman, Nana, whom I spent some time chatting with on the Saturday when I registered and again before and after the race.

There was a small field for the half; maybe 70 or so runners. We started at 5.30, in the dark. By 6.30 it was starting to become light, with people and monks heading for temples, and temple music playing. Lots of people spoke to me, or gave me a thumbs-up, or put their hands together and slightly bowed their head, as in the traditional Thai greeting. It was lovely.

I received a trophy at the awards ceremony, which I presented to Dom back in Chiang Mai at breakfast on Monday morning in thanks for his training company. I took him and Mike, and Peter and Jiab, to dinner on Sunday night after I returned to Chiang Mai. I felt quite sad saying goodbye to them.

Flew to Bangkok on Monday, where I mostly worked in my hotel room until it was time to head to the airport on Tuesday afternoon. I took time out for dinner at the Shangri-La Hotel, on the Chao Praya River, where I had stayed with my niece Jaye 20 years ago.

Flew via Doha to Geneva overnight on Tuesday, and then took the train to Lausanne. I was last in this neck of the woods in 2007, when I walked the Mont Blanc Circuit with my friend Wisty and a bunch of people on an Exodus trip. Before that, I was here with my niece Chloe in 2001, when we made a side trip to Lausanne and Montreux (and London) from our base in the Marais district in Paris. It would be fun to go to Paris for a couple of days while I'm here, but work pressure may knock that idea on the head. Hopefully, I'll be able to do a few things closer to home. I'm staying in the apartment owned by the people I rent the apartment in New York from. Their friend Liliane met me in a bistro at Lausanne Gare yesterday and brought me to the apartment. People are so nice :-)) On a clear day there are views from where I'm sitting across the lake to the Alps and France, but it's been very white/grey since I arrived.

Run off my feet ... with work

2011-02-24T23:33:00.004+11:00

I definitely feel like I've been living in Chiang Mai during the past month. I've done very little that a tourist might do. I would like to have spent a couple of days trekking, visited some of the "long neck" villages, and flown with the gibbons on the flying fox through the trees. Instead, I've been visiting the dentist at regular intervals and trying to stay on top of my workload without having a meltdown.

I was very lucky to end up staying here at PJ's Place, which is small and homely. I've enjoyed getting to know Peter and Jiab, and long-term residents Mike and Dom, a little. Dom has run with me around the moat in the early morning a few times. It was his birthday this week and he took us all out for dinner to Chilli Mango. I also enjoyed meeting a friend of theirs, David, who lives in New Jersey.

Dom and Mike headed in a hire car to Lampang today for a few days at a resort on a river near a national park. Dom has just got his car driver's licence and was designated driver. Mike called earlier to say they had arrived safely. He sat in the back of the car. I don't know if he wore the motorbike helmet he had planned to wear. Peter and Jiab also went out of town today, to a village near the Burmese border for the funeral of a young guy (25) who had previously worked here and died suddenly this week.

My friend of 33 years, Chris, and I have been talking all week about our plan to meet in Alice Springs, in Central Australia, in July for a bit of a bush bash/camping holiday in his 4WD. I've never been out that way. Looking forward to it.

Tomorrow I'm taking the train to Lampang, where on Sunday I'm taking part in a half marathon to raise funds for the Lampang Pony Foundation. Notice that I didn't write "compete in" or "race in". I'm so undertrained it's not funny, but I'll enjoy the time out from work.

I've been in Asia since mid-November, so it will be a complete change now to head for Europe, where it's just on the verge of spring, so still quite cold. I have lots of great things planned (as my dad says, planning is one-third of the fun), including meet-ups with some fabulous friends made since I started my travels last May.

Which wat's what?

2011-02-07T22:53:00.004+11:00

I've been in Chiang Mai a week. I was last here in about 1989, but I have no memory of the old city, the 700-year-old centre of town. The area is a square, 2km along each side, with remnants of the old wall and moat. There are 100 or so wats (temples) in Chiang Mai, and they are stunning. This one is Wat Phra Sing, on the western edge of the square. I want to spend a day wandering through the area but haven't had a chance to do so yet.

I'm staying about 10 minutes' walk from the old city. My neighbours Mike and Dom, permanent residents here at Peter and Jiab's guesthouse, have taken me under their wing. Dom took me on his scooter to Chiang Mai University for a run yesterday afternoon. (I had a run near there a few days ago.) He ran a circuit with me, then I attempted to run another on my own but got hopelessly lost. We are planning to do a 6 am run around the moat on Thursday.

Tomorrow I'm having my first run – at Hua Tung Tao Reservoir – with a woman named Ann. A few days ago I emailed the local Hash House Harriers and asked if they knew of anyone training for a marathon or half marathon who might like company on training runs. I had a response that led me to the British Council, and through a guy there I was put in touch with Ann, who does triathlons.

Work has been very busy, so my sightseeing so far has been squeezed in around that and visits to a dentist for the first week of some intense dental work.

Malacca (Melaka) Musings...

2011-01-29T00:08:00.002+11:00

I've been very lucky again with my accommodation. Courtyard @ Heeren is a heritage building that has been very nicely revamped as a boutique hotel, and it's in a perfect location: parallel to the famous Jonker Walk in Malacca's Chinatown area and just a few minutes' walk from the really gorgeous Malacca River. The staff are very friendly and have really gone overboard to make me feel at home. Most guests come for a few days over the weekend from KL or Singapore, whereas I'm staying for 11 days. I've been here a week already; I leave on Monday for Chiang Mai.

Malacca has a very rich history going back to about the 1200s or 1300s. The period of the Sultanates was followed by Portuguese rule from the 1500s, then the Dutch, followed by the English. The Japanese occupied it during the war, then the English took over again before Malaya became independent Malaysia. It's a very multicultural place, like all of Malaysia, so there is breadth as well as depth to it.

Chinatown is a great area to stay, and especially just now in the lead-up to Chinese New Year.

I particularly love the river that winds through town. It's more like a canal, and is lined with cafes and homes and heritage buildings. I ran along it one morning this week and late one afternoon.

I've been working very hard while I've been here (a couple of 4 am starts), but I've also tried to see something of interest each day. There's a whole bunch of museums close by. I've visited the art gallery and a couple of historical museums. I also saw a fascinating exhibition called "Enduring Beauty" (about deforming the body in the name of "beauty" by scarification, tattooing, neck rings, lip plates, foot binding, etc). There's a nice walk up the hill to the ruins of an old church with a very unsympathetically positioned (by the British) ruined lighthouse in front.

Yesterday I went to Kuala Lumpur to meet up with two work colleagues (and Facebook friends) at the Islamic Financial Services Board. Really enjoyed catching up with them again after meeting them for the first time in 2007.

At lunch today I met a woman from South Carolina who is travelling in a very intrepid fashion around Asia for three months with her eight-year old granddaughter. They'll be in Chiang Mai while I'm there, so we may catch up again.

This past week has also been about thinking ahead. I've entered a half marathon in Turkey in April, firmed up plans to walk in England (the Cotswold Way) in May with Tony and Jo (pals from last year's Coast to Coast walk across England), made plans to visit Luxembourg (for work) and maybe Germany for pleasure after the walk. And more...

Salaam, Bombay

2011-01-19T00:42:00.004+11:00

It's been a case of Mumbai madness over the past week. My artist/illustrator friend Uma, whom I met in Malta in 2007, met my plane in Chennai very late on Wednesday night. My suitcase didn't make it, though it caught up with us two days later in Mumbai. I stayed with Uma and her sister Subashree for the night before Uma and I flew to Mumbai on Thursday morning. Terrific flight across the country. Quite barren and wild in parts, especially the Western Ghats.

We checked into the Taj Palace and Towers Hotel, just across the road from the Gateway of India. The Taj was one of the sites of the November 2008 terrorist attacks, and the security in the vicinity of the hotel is very tight. We went to some fabulous clothes markets opposite Crawford Market, where I bought some tops and leggings. Also checked out the fabulous Victoria Terminus rail station (VT), also a site of the 2008 terrorist attacks. We went to see a new-release Bollywood film on Thursday night at a cinema just near the hotel.

Friday until mid-afternoon was devoted mainly to seeing art. We met my running friend Sanjay at 3 pm in the rather funky little Samovar Cafe attached to the Jehangir Art Gallery, close by the National Museum of Modern Art. He and I then walked to where the running expo was being held for the Mumbai marathon and half marathon, to pick up our race packets. We met up again in the evening at the Cricket Club of India for drinks and then had dinner of crab at a nearby seafood place.

Saturday morning Uma and I took a ferry over to see the Elephanta Caves. She was a brilliant tour guide, as she could explain the significance of the various groupings of Shiva and co. We had a late lunch at the Leopold Cafe, another site of the 2008 attacks, where a very friendly Australian couple bent my ear for about an hour.

Sunday was the half marathon. I picked up Sanjay at 5 am, and we went together to the start at Bandra. A crowded start in the dark at 6:15, but after a couple of kilometres I found my stride and then maintained a pretty steady pace. We ran over the Sealink and along Marine Parade, beside the bay. It reminded me of the Melbourne half marathon a few years back! My final time was 2:10 (my slowest half time ever, I think) and I placed fifth in my age category (67th out of c. 1360 women overall). I saw the two Ethiopian women winners of the marathon sprint to the finish, with only a second separating them. Walked back to the Taj for a big breakfast.

Sanjay pulled a calf muscle about 15K into the run and had to be doped up to walk to the finish :-((

In the afternoon, Uma and I took a taxi out to see an exhibition of works by Anish Kapoor, a London-based Indian artist. I was really taken with the huge installation called "Shooting into the Corner", which involved pots of red wax being fired at a high white corner space using a cannon. Fantastic!

Back at the hotel I settled down to do some serious work.

In the late afternoon, Uma headed off to stay with her cousin for a couple of days before flying back to Chennai tonight. It was great to spend time with her, and I hope I can get back to Chennai sometime as there was no chance to see anything of it this trip.

Caught up with Sanjay and his wife Reetu at the Cricket Club of India again last night for drinks, and for dinner at a great little place near the Taj called Indigo. I'm going to head off there again now.

It's been fabulous meeting Sanjay after getting to know him over the last couple of years through the Dead Runners Society.

I've been struck by the number of dogs that lie sleeping by the roadsides in Mumbai (let sleeping dogs lie?), and by the amazingly gaudy horse-drawn carriages that ply their trade here in Colaba. I just saw one pony whose back legs were slipping all over the place on the cobblestones.

Tomorrow night I fly back to Malaysia – Malacca – until the end of the month.

Kuching postscript, 11/1/11

2011-01-11T23:18:00.003+11:00

A 'mishap' last night at Kuching Airport (the terminal was designed by Edric Ong, Ramsay's cousin), where an Air Asia flight skidded off the runway on landing in heavy rain, closed the place down for most of today. My flight was shuffled to tomorrow.

This event gave me time to focus on the job I'm doing for Sarawak Energy, though the tradeoff is I don't get to see anything of Chennai this time, apart from the drive to and from the airport.

The Sarawak Energy project came through Ruth S, who is Jay's neighbour. We met briefly the other night as I was walking to meet Mas and Jun to go to their karaoke bar. Ruth checked out my website and then mentioned me to Nick, and Nick made contact and came here on Sunday to explain what would be required.

Ruth and I had breakfast and a fabulous talk this morning at the Grand Margherita. We both felt like we'd already known each other for ages. She is also a dog person, with Bella, a Lab, back in Oz. Her sister, who lives in Wodonga (the twin town to my home in Oz), had even mentioned my Dogs' Breakfast Group to Ruth some time ago. And here we are, meeting in Borneo!

Au revoir, Kuching

2011-01-11T09:14:00.006+11:00

I've been very busy while in Kuching, working on a marketing textbook as well as some smaller jobs. I've met a lot of new people this visit. Through Jackie (investment banker who started the Batik Boutique Hotel where I'm staying), I met Jay (formerly with the World Bank), who organises a lot of hikes. Two weekends ago I joined a hike to Jangkar Falls, c. 100 km from Kuching, with visitors from Melbourne Stephen (HR with World Vision) and Anthony (a "retired venture capitalist" who looks about 25!). Their friend Byron (a mortgage broker whose family lives in Kuching) was out of action for the day. I ended up slipping on wet rocks and banging my chin hard on a boulder. This led to a visit to Normah Hospital a day or so later for X-rays. Not broken, but badly bruised. I caught up with the boys for a brief lunch the day after the walk.

On 2 January I picked up where I'd left off with my training, and really enjoyed running along the river in the morning. I ran into Johnny (who I know from my last visit) a couple of days ago and we had a run yesterday. It's too wet to run this morning, and I have a breakfast meeting, but I'll catch up with him and Sim, Madeline and Alan in May when I'm back for a month. I loved seeing the same faces in the morning; people are just so nice. I talked with a lot of them. After running each day, I went to a cafe at the far end of the Main Bazaar for roti, which is where I met June. She's into kayaking. One morning Feeza, from Batik, came with me.

Mas, who also works here at Batik, and her husband Jun took me out for breakfast one day and to a karaoke cafe one night. Lovely people. I had to promise to learn a song for next time I'm visiting!

Had dinner a few times with Emily, Rita and Ka-Yee, Darroll and James; met Emily's mum and dad and uncle. We went to see "Tron" at Spring Mall last week. Emily and Rita are very special.

On Saturday Jackie and Jay organised another hike, on a trail that was supposed to lead to a lost antimony mine. Instead we ended up in a leech-infested swamp for three hours. The nice people – Jackie, Jay, John (banker), Kho (office equipment), Tan (?), Joanna (landscape designer) and Sharon (ICT) – made up for the leeches.

Through Jay I met Ruth S, who is working here with Sarawak Energy Berhad on an 18-month assignment. Ruth mentioned me to Nick W, who is involved with a huge rebranding exercise at SEB. Nick got in touch and we had a meeting here on Sunday morning. Today I'm having breakfast with Ruth to go over the brief for my first job for them.

I had my first appointment with Josephine, beauty therapist extraordinaire, yesterday: a three-hour facial.

The crew here at Batik have been amazing: Lily, Kenny, Peter the Great, Hafizz, Raj, Jake, Jo-Lyn, Hafeeza, Mas, Umpai...

On Sunday morning I met a group of runners just after they had finished their regular long run. They have invited me to join them in May when I'm back: Min is an architect, Lim an English and PE teacher, Belinda a teacher and vice principal, Samantha an interior designer and Sara, a student (daughter of Min and Sam).

I think Kuching is unique in the friendliness and openness of people you meet casually on the street. I'm really looking forward to coming back in May.

Today I'm flying to Chennai, India, to spend time with my friend Uma. We met at Norbert Attard's studio in Malta in 2007. On Thursday we're flying to Mumbai for six nights. I'm looking forward to meeting Sanjay, a friend since 2009 through the Dead Runners Society.

1/1/11

2011-01-02T21:39:00.002+11:00

What a lot of possibilities are implied by all those 1's...

I had the most amazing year in 2010. I packed up my life in Australia and became a non-resident "editor without borders", travelling the world permanently, and editing books and other publications for my clients from wherever I found myself.

I spent time in Australia, the United States, New Zealand, Bali, Sarawak, Hong Kong, China and Macau, Italy, England and Scotland. I ran a half marathon and two full ones, achieving personal best times in both of the marathons. And I walked across England. But the most amazing experience has been meeting fantastic people all around the world. Thank god for Facebook! I've been blown away by the warmth and friendship offered me by people of all races and beliefs and cultures. It really is an extraordinary planet, but it's the people I've been blessed with meeting on my travels who are making the whole world feel like "home" to me.

Thank you to friends old and new. Have a WONDERFUL 2011.

A Kuching Kristmas

2010-12-25T11:30:00.003+11:00

Had a terrific couple of weeks with JB in Ubud. A nice balance of work and play. Through Cat Wheeler we met Gede, who drove us anywhere we needed to go. He is the instigator of the Bali Project Fund, which supports families and children in Gede's home village in East Bali. JB and I each bought a piglet from the mother of our masseuse, Nyoman. In about a month, they'll be old enough to be separated from their mother. They'll go to women in the village who can raise litters for sale from them when they are old enough. Nyoman is a real sweetie. We went to her village and met her parents (rice farmers), brother Ketut (a wood carver), sister-in-law and toddler niece. She came to see us off on our last morning and gave us each a gift of a handwoven shawl.

The food and fruit/nut milk drinks on offer in Ubud are a reason on their own to spend time there.

We spent a day with Gede driving north to Kintamani to see Lake Batur, Mt Batur and Besakih, the Mother Temple, but were defeated by the rain. On returning to Ubud we chanced upon a huge double cremation ceremony just near Cat and Gede's street. I saw a cremation back in 1978. It was serendipitous that we saw the procession just as we arrived back in town.

Another day we went down to Kuta to see the Bali bombings memorial and to check out Jimbaran and Seminyak. We found ourselves back there on another day after aborting a visit to Nusa Dua at the invitation of the Peninsula Resort. If you're visiting Bali and are asked to fill in a survey, and are then offered a free holiday as a thank you for doing so, yes, it's a scam!

JB had a few early salsa dance lessons at Cafe Havana with the delightful and cheeky Karma ("Shurre") and dance sensation Made. We got to ride a couple of times in the '63 red Chevvy that ferries patrons to and from the club.

The Jazz Cafe was welcoming, with a waiter called "Good Looking".

On the second-last day we met an English guy, Justin, who has spent a few weeks recently in Sulawesi. I've been getting pointers from the universe about Sulawesi, so I bought a map and spent an hour with Justin at Bali Buddha taking notes. He is an architect, and his father is a painter based in Thailand.

Had dinner at Siam Sally, Laughing Buddha and Cafe des Artistes with Cat, whose book is being reissued under a new name and with new cover art.

I've booked a week back at Tegal Sari for next June, on my way back to Oz.

On Wednesday I flew up to Kuching. Called in to see Emily on Thursday morning, and had dinner with her, Rita, Rita's daughters Kah-Yee and Kah-Ling (Bebe), Emily's brother Darroll (back from Florida for Christmas) and a couple of others at a steamboat place. Emily earlier gave me a drawing she had done for me, showing my aura as a runner. I was really impressed by her drawings when I saw them back in June. She tried for some months to do the one for me but couldn't get it right, she said ... until she got back from Sri Baba's ashram in India. She then drew it in one day.

On Thursday I also called into Artrageously Ong to see Ramsay and Narong. Narong is always painting; Ramsay is always talking, as he has so many visitors. I met Lesley and Aiden there, a retired couple from England who now live in Kuching. Last night I was invited to dinner at Michael Lim's house, where I visited in June. Moses picked me up and dropped me off. He's a real sweetie, and is Michael and Ramsay's #1 man. Talked with David, a teacher, who I met in June, and with Stephanie, who has known Michael and Ramsay since they were children. A good long talk with Ram. Others there were Vivian and Jessie, and Michael's sister.

I'm staying at Batik Boutique Hotel, where I had my farewell dinner in June. It's in a great location and I love the decor. Jackie (into hiking and climbing) is the director. Hafiz, who picked me up from the airport, is studying marketing and uses the textbook I'm currently working on! Fiza (Hafiza) is into cake decorating. Other staff are Kenny, Jake, Raj, Lily and Mas (Mastura).

Today is Christmas Day. I'll be spending it working on the marketing textbook. My Christmas present is the fact that I can travel the world and meet wonderful people while doing my work. Thank you :-))))

Uber-groovy Ubud

2010-12-10T21:00:00.002+11:00

I had a bit of a last-minute panic in Hong Kong a week ago when my laptop died without warning. I was lucky to find an Apple Store nearby and within three hours all my files had been transferred over to a new 17" MacBook Pro. The hiccup meant I didn't get to catch up with my friend Nicola. A day or so earlier I'd had a drink with Cathy H-F, who had finished the daunting MacLehose Trailwalker event the previous weekend.

Really enjoying Ubud with my pal from Oz, JB. I'm in full-time work mode, but we go out for our meals and are treating ourselves to spa treatments. I've had a manicure, pedicure, foot reflexology, facial, and three massages, two with flower baths and a papaya body wrap. All very indulgent.

We caught up with writer Cat Wheeler for dinner on Wednesday at Siam Sally. (I met Cat in May.) Went to her house yesterday for JB to have a Reiki session with Cat, who is also a Reiki Master. Her dog Hamish followed us to Juice Ja (shown here) where we had lunch, then he tootled off home afterwards. Last night Cat spoke and read from her book about Ubud at the Bar Luna Lit Club night. JB and I had dinner afterwards at Cafe Havana.

Our stay has coincided with Galungan Day. Activities extend for about 10 days. Lots of processions and noise, and the temples are all freshly decorated.

The villa where I'm staying at Tegal Sari is gorgeous. JB comes to use the pool and to have massages in the pavilion in my garden from Nyoman from Sang Spa. I also had one with her this morning.

Heading out to a reggae place tonight.

Hunkered down in Hongkers

2010-11-23T21:18:00.003+11:00

Since I arrived back in Hong Kong last Wednesday night I've had my head down and my tail up. I'm seriously in work mode. I spent five days out at Pokfulam, staying at the home of my buddy of nearly 40 years(!), Cathy, who is away in the States. I've never stayed out of town before… It's VERY different. I enjoyed having the company of Juni the cat and Blackie the very big dachshund. I'm now staying back in the thick of things, in a hotel in Causeway Bay. This return visit marks my first full circuit of the world on my open-ended journey.

Silicon Valley Sojourn

2010-11-19T23:16:00.003+11:00

On my way back to the future (crossing the International Date Line), I stopped off in Santa Clara, California to spend a few days with runner friends Kathy and Karl and their daughter Kayleigh. Santa Clara is in Silicon Valley, the home of Google, Intel, and many other high-tech firms. Did a good hike on Sunday morning with Kathy and her friend Miriam (whom I met in NYC in April for the More Women's Half Marathon), and Kathy and I ran around their neighbourhood on Monday morning. We visited the Santa Clara Library, where Kathy is a trustee, ate out at a couple of fun places, and had coffee with a friend of Karl's after our hike. I got a good amount of work done, which is now a priority and will remain one over the next few months.

In Hong Kong I'm staying until Monday at my long-time pal Cathy's apartment while she is in New York State. I'm enjoying having the company of Juni the jovial cat and Blackie the dog. (I'm not sure what breed he is.)

I'm finding some amazing coincidences between my travels and places that are being mentioned in my work.

Post-marathon madness

2010-11-13T12:38:00.003+11:00

A very quick update: I had a brilliant New York Marathon! A wonderful experience on a beautiful day. I had a personal best time of 4:27:22 (or was it 19 seconds?) and my last few kilometres were faster than my very evenly paced first 40K. I don't know how I got so lucky as to have fun (my goal) AND get a PB! There were 45,350 runners, about 580 of whom were women in my age group. I beat around 420 of them. I felt strong the whole way. The legendary New York crowds were fantastic. I just focused on them the whole way. Had a quick celebration that evening at a pub on Columbus Avenue with my Hudson Dusters teammates.

I've had a very busy work week since then. Tomorrow I'm flying to San Francisco to visit with friends for a few days before heading back to Asia.

Au revoir, New York. You've been brilliant.

Pre-marathon madness

2010-11-02T06:59:00.002+11:00

The New York City marathon is next Sunday, and I leave New York the following Saturday. I've been back for eight weeks already!

I've had a few quality training runs, but I'm nowhere near fit enough to do anything more than take it easy and have fun on the day. Two days after I ran an early-morning circuit of Central Park with my 2009 Vermont relay friend Tavia, she was in a car accident in Pennsylvania. Miraculously, she escaped without a scratch, though her car had been airborne and rolled, and she'd had to crawl out of a window. Amazing!

On Saturday I ran the last 9.8 miles of the actual marathon course with Dusters Rich, Lauren, Steve and Leslie, and Hasher Eric. I enjoyed it a lot. A lot of other people had the same idea. Went back to Rich's on W 70th Street for coffee and bagels.

I've seen two fabulous films, "Punching the Clown" and "A Small Act", as well as the mainstream shoot-em-up "Red".

Last Sunday I walked from Wall Street up to and all over the Lower East Side. I've also spent quite a bit of time down around 14th Street and Greenwich Village lately, though not last night when two million people turned out for the Halloween Parade. The real nightmare would have been getting home again on the subway.

Tonight I'm running in Central Park with Dusters friend Katie (who works with primates in a neuroscience lab) and her friend Sari.

The Maine Thing

2010-10-23T23:26:00.003+11:00

This time last week I was just starting a 20-mile (32K) run with Dusters Heather and Jessica. We ran over the Triboro and Queensboro bridges, and around Randall's Island and Roosevelt Island, and then in Central Park. The fantastic views from the Triboro Bridge were a surprise.

Sunday I flew up to Portland, Maine, where Dead Runner Josh met my plane. I spent a couple of days in a cottage he and Mary Ann had rented for a fortnight at Indian Point, on Georgetown Island. It's not far above the high tide line, and the views were stunning. We ate local seafood and talked, and I did a little work and took a couple of short walks. Had a bit of a look at Portland on Tuesday before Josh dropped me back at the airport.

Busy with work all week, though I took some time off on Thursday, my birthday. Holly and I went to see the play "Time Stands Still". Laura Linney and Christina Ricci were both excellent.

I managed to meet Tavia for a 10K run around the park yesterday, but my cold had taken firm hold. I had hoped to do a Shorewalkers walk today, but I'll be lying low instead.

I've been a bit of a hermit...

2010-10-15T07:35:00.003+11:00

My priority over the last 10 days or so has been staying on top of my workload. I'm not on a working holiday; this is my lifestyle now. I may be working in different places around the world, but I'm still working full-time. And work makes it all possible, so I have to take deadlines seriously.

I'll be taking time out on Saturday, though, to do a badly needed long run with my Dusters pal Heather. Then on Sunday I'm flying up to Maine for a couple of days.

Last Saturday I had lunch with Cy Adler, author of "Walking Manhattan's Rim: The Great Saunter". He has self-published a few other books as well. Holly and I spent a couple of hours in Central Park. It was a beautiful day for John Lennon's 70th birthday, and the park was filled with beautiful people and beautiful dogs, some of whom we met. Lots of boats on the lake and brides at the Bethesda Fountain.

On Sunday I caught up with friends from Oz (Geelong) for a fun and yummy dinner near Greenwich Village. On Monday, Tamar and I saw the excellent documentary "Waiting for Superman", and I saw the Facebook movie ("The Social Network") yesterday. I thought Jesse Eisenberg was brilliant as Mark Zuckerberg.

I need a pedicure!

2010-10-05T06:00:00.004+11:00

I've just finished editing a book about manicures and pedicures (or 'pedicares', apparently), and my poor old feet could do with one of the latter.

Last week I ran and walked the whole way around the island of Manhattan – or at least those parts of it that are accessible to pedestrians. Tamar and I ran the first 10 or so miles up the Hudson River from the Staten Island Ferry Terminal early one morning. Then the next day Holly and I walked from where I'd finished the run, at West 125th Street, right up to the top of the island and around to East Harlem via the Harlem River. I finished that leg at East 96th Street. The next afternoon I started from there and went all the way back down the East River to my starting point. It was good fun, but my right knee was sore at the end of the second day and my feet were sore by the end of the third. I've just written my next column about it.

It was also a social week, with a fun catchup over lunch in Midtown with Tavia and Robert from the team I ran the Green Mountain Relay with last year, and a really nice dinner with Heather, Joe and Marie from the Dusters.

On Friday I took the train to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where I stayed with Dead Runner Peg and her husband Larry. On Saturday, they and their daughter Laura showed me around central Lancaster (the market, etc) and the neighbouring areas where Amish families have farms and businesses and there are some covered bridges. We went to a nice place for dinner.

Yesterday, Peg took me over to Hershey, near Harrisburg, for the inaugural Hershey Half Marathon. It was good to spend time with her. I was really pleased with the way I ran my race. I was very focused and able to keep my momentum going very strongly without overdoing it. I placed second woman in my age group.

"Third mummy on your right"

2010-09-27T10:19:00.003+10:00

I'm just LOVING spending time again in New York.

Some people who were new acquaintances last year have become good friends. Tamar and I caught up three times this week, twice for 6-mile morning runs in Central Park, and today for some wine and chocolates on the lawn in the park with her new friend Arn, from Vancouver, before catching some of the Black Sea Roma Festival (a celebration of gypsy music) at the Sound Stage. I walked home through the park and saw parts of it I hadn't seen before. It was really heaving; so much was going on.

On Thursday, Holly and I went to see "Catfish", one of the two films about Facebook that have just come out. I found it compelling. We're planning to see "The Social Network" when I'm back from Pennsylvania. Holly and I are planning a big walk this week if the weather is kind.

Yesterday morning, I ran about 8 miles in the park with Rich and Katie, who I met last year through the Hash/Hudson Dusters, Eddie (a blind runner) and Kim (a journalist with "Shape" magazine and formerly with "Glamour"). Kim led Eddie for the first six miles, then Rich took over. Eddie's a bit of a comedian.

I've been back in the city for three weeks and have already run in three events :-)) The T-shirts quickly start to mount up! Last Sunday, Heather (from the Dusters/Hash) and I ran the 18-mile Marathon Tune-Up together. She made it so much more bearable; it was even quite fun. And today I ran the 5th Avenue Mile and did a better time than I'd expected: 6:59. I placed 5/31 in the 55–59 category and 19/102 in the 50–59 group.

So, the last week has mainly been devoted to taking my training up a notch and working at my desk. I did manage to check out a few of the ancient Egyptian exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum of Art this morning when I called in to pick up my membership card and to use the loo before the 5th Avenue Mile race. "Just past the third mummy on your right," the attendant said, when I asked for directions.

I caught up before the race with Josh, a friend from the Dead Runners Society who I met last year in St Louis at the DRS World Conference. He ran the race in the wave after mine. We then went for breakfast with Akshay, a former colleague of Josh's at IBM.

A busy week of just living here...

Seeing double in Central Park

2010-09-18T02:03:00.007+10:00

This morning while waiting on a Central Park bench for my running pal Val to arrive, I couldn't help noticing a pair of twins. I really thought I was seeing double.

Near the main steps up to the Jackie Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, two very attractive young men were running in place, side by side, near the bridle path that encircles the reservoir. In perfect unison, their feet pushed alternately off the concrete curb and road surface, creating a rhythmic, hypnotic sound – a soundscape.

They were dressed identically: shirtless, to show off their lean brown torsos; khaki shorts to just above the knee; running shoes. In their right hands they each held a dark blue shirt. Dark, curly hair – picture early Michael Jackson – framed their heads like halos.

As passersby noticed them, they smiled.

"I thought I was seeing double," one woman said to me.

"That must be fun to watch," said another.

When Val arrived, I pointed them out and we watched them together for awhile.

As we walked over to the bridle path to start our run, I looked across at them and raised my right thumb in a salute. They raised two right thumbs in return.

Was it running ... or performance art? Are these twins the Gilbert and George of running?

Sutton Square sunset

2010-09-17T09:25:00.004+10:00

On Tuesday, I arranged an evening picnic with gal pal Holly and Maltese artist friend Norbert at Sutton Square, where this scene was shot for Woody Allen's film "Manhattan". It's a wonderful spot. Norbert has been staying with me while he completes an art project with a community garden group up on 104th Street.

On Monday morning Tamar and I ran 10K in CP, and I ran on my own yesterday morning twice around the bridle path and once around the reservoir (named after Jackie Kennedy Onassis, who used to run there). I've entered a couple of events: an 18-mile marathon tune-up this Sunday and the 5th Avenue Mile the following Sunday.

I saw a preview yesterday of "Eat Pray Love" over on 3rd Avenue. I've been looking forward to it. It was OK, but I don't think I'd see it again. I was running late after that, so instead of doing a hash run that was starting just a block from my apartment, I looked in some thrift stores where I found a brilliant leather coat.

I'm back on top of work :-))

The Harlem globetrotter

2010-09-13T10:29:00.005+10:00

I spent a good part of today, Sunday, in Harlem. The bad part of the day I spent back at my desk, working.

Last year I found a great Baptist Church on Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard, just a few blocks up from 125th Street and the famous Apollo Theatre. I went back this morning … and man, that place rocks! They have a great gospel choir and band. The Reverend Dr Calvin G. Sampson, the resident pastor/preacher, was on fire. And the ladies in the congregation were totally rocking! I spent a lot of time watching one woman with waist-length braids and a jaunty hat with a feather in the side. She was giving it everything! I went across and said hello to a woman I saw three times last year. She's very dignified looking, and always wears a great hat. I left feeling very uplifted, as if I'd been to a great band gig.

Back on 125th Street, I went to the Studio Museum in Harlem. This is where I discovered the video works of Kalup Linzy last year. I'm a huge fan of his now and hope there'll be an opportunity to see him perform while I'm in New York.

Today I liked the exhibition of portraits of migrant workers in their homes by the South African artist Zwelethu Mthethwa, and former artist-in-residence at the Studio, Lauren Kelley's stop-motion animated videos using action figures and Barbies. My sister would really enjoy Kelley's work.

From www.newmuseum.org/events/203: Lauren Kelley’s “stories are visually and stylistically reminiscent of children’s programs that were launched in the 1970 and ´80s. Using dolls and claymation, Kelley’s visual technique contrasts with the disenchanted, sexualized narratives of a cast of discontent and struggling ingénues. Through commonplace, if not clichéd, circumstances, Kelley explores the female disposition in a demanding and oversexed world…. Lauren Kelley uses stop-motion animation to explore stereotypes of femininity and race. By using her voice to speak for a cast of black dolls, Kelley breathes life into plastic characters while poignantly and humorously addressing issues such as gender, womanhood, and the human condition. Whether telling stories of unplanned pregnancy or exploring the world of flight attendants, Kelley’s work introduces its viewers to a world in which dolls and puppets are caught in endless streams of consciousness and are trapped in a bizarre theater of the absurd.”

9/11

2010-09-12T12:31:00.010+10:00

Tonight, being the ninth anniversary of 9/11, I went down to the World Trade Center to see these lights. They are moving to see, but the area itself is still an ugly construction site.

I'm reading a novel based on the history of four families whose stories go back to the earliest days of New York (New Amsterdam) and up to 2001, so I skipped ahead to the 9/11 chapter while I ate dinner in an Italian restaurant on Greenwich Street before walking a little way to the site.

This morning I ran my first race since I suffered heat stroke in Kuching in a race in June.

The day was gorgeous – a perfect blue sky, and not too hot. I ran the Fitness Mind Body Spirit 4-miler in Central Park in 33:34 minutes, which wasn't bad considering I'm not running-fit at the moment. I was going to run it at a very easy pace, but a race is a race and ... what can I say? I gave it my best shot. I placed 6th woman out of 59 in my age group. Last year I was 6th in my first ever race in New York, which really surprised me. Today, I'd actually hoped for a higher placing, but the field was too strong. Even in the next age group, 60–64, five of the top women had faster times than mine.

I run races in New York as a member of the Hudson Dusters team. As a team member, you don’t just get to contribute points; you get a support network. I ran the first part of the race with Heather, a fellow Duster I met last year. Her husband, Joe, called out my name to encourage me at around the halfway mark; and Andy, another Duster, cheered me on closer to the finish. It really helps!

For my non-running friends, 4 miles (6.4K) isn’t a long way when compared to a marathon (42.2K) or even a half marathon. But whatever distance a race is held over, you give it your all. A 5K race can hurt far more than a 15K run.

After the race (I know I raced it, because I nearly threw up twice after I crossed the finish line), I introduced myself to a 77-year-old French New Yorker who I learned has been running since the 1970s. She came in just a couple of minutes after me and was first in her age group. I gave her my card, and I'm hoping to have a chance to hear her story next week.

After listening to a band in the post-race area perform a fantastic version of Aretha Franklin’s “Respect”, I walked over to the Emerald Inn, on Columbus Avenue, to meet some fellow Dusters. It was good to talk with Tim (who ran part of my farewell Three Bridges Run last year) and Bill (who was really helpful to me in the last leg of the Green Mountain Relay in Vermont). The TVs in the bar were showing the 9/11 memorial service and reading of the names of the victims. Tim knew one of them.

Yesterday I ran with Tamar, who I haven't seen since my last day in New York last year. She was one of my teammates in the Vermont relay. (Our team was called “New York Running Chicks and a Few Dudes”.) She and I ran a couple of loops around the bridle path in Central Park, and then she did a third loop. We picked up coffees from a Cuban restaurant near my place (Tamar has been to Cuba, where I want to visit next year) and scrambled egg and cheese rolls from a deli nearby, and then sat on a stoop to eat our breakfast. It's good to pick up where we left off. We're running again on Monday.

After working all afternoon I went over to New York Road Runners to register for today's race, and to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to renew my membership. I was mainly interested in seeing two photography exhibitions, one of which was shots by Leon Levinstein of New Yorkers on the streets, from the 1950s to about 1980, called "Hipsters, Hustlers and Handball Players".

Speaking of photographers, my friend Norbert Attard will be staying with me next week. I met Norbert in Albury when he was an artist-in-residence prior to the opening of the new Albury Library/Museum in 2007. I then spent a week as editor-in-residence at his studio in Malta, on the island of Gozo, later that year. He has been doing a residency in Washington, DC, and will be working on a project here next week, just a few blocks from my apartment.

Uptown girl

2010-09-10T10:49:00.006+10:00

I love living in my 'hood on New York's Upper West Side.

Since I arrived from Edinburgh on Monday afternoon I've been up and down Manhattan a couple of times. Tuesday afternoon I went by subway down to Houston Street to see "Winter's Bones" at the Angelika Film Centre; and last night the NYC Hash run was from Central Park South (59th Street) down to 14th Street via Times Square, Bryant Park, and a couple of office lobbies. I've also had two approx. 10K runs in Central Park: on my own yesterday morning, and today with Dead Runner Val. We'd arranged to meet at the Guggenheim, on the corner of 5th Avenue and 89th Street where New York Road Runners is located.

I was over on the East Side earlier to catch up with my dear friend CY, who has had a very trying half-year. Great to see her looking really well and with some exciting plans.

At the Hash last night I talked with Heather and Lauren from the team the Hudson Dusters, which I joined last year. I also met a couple of new people: James (English) spent 13 years in Miri, in northern Sarawak, where I met Jennie Soh and other people in June; and Julian, who is from south Florida, loves the Keys, where I'm hoping to spend a month next year.

An action movie is being filmed in my neighbourhood. There are trailers set up in the streets, a strong police presence, hordes of film people milling around, and hordes of spectators milling around the hordes of film people. I also saw Matthew Broderick (husband of "Sex and the City"'s Sarah Jessica Parker) crossing 95th Street. It must have been Ferris Bueller's day off...

Tomorrow is the start of New York Fashion Week.

What a blast!

2010-09-07T11:12:00.002+10:00

I spent my last couple of days in the UK in Edinburgh, after Michele and Dave dropped me at a rail station on their way back to the east coast. I was at the Old Waverley Hotel, where my room looked directly across at Edinburgh Castle. Last night I watched the fireworks concert that closed the Edinburgh Festival from the comfort of an armchair in my bay window on the fifth floor.

Earlier in the day I visited the Edinburgh Art Centre, where I really enjoyed a very big exhibition of William Wegman's photos and videos using his Weimaraner dogs as models.

From sea to shining sea

2010-09-04T16:58:00.003+10:00

Our merry band of trekkers arrived in Robin Hood's Bay, on the North Sea, on schedule yesterday, 13 days after we set out from St Bees, on the Irish Sea. It was the hardest long-distance walk I've done. We couldn't have had a better group or better weather.

Dales and moors

2010-09-03T02:24:00.005+10:00

We spent a couple of days walking in the Yorkshire Dales, but saw little of the valleys. Instead, we clambered on goat tracks around the surrounding hills. The last few days we've been on the moors, where it's still grouse shooting season.

Yesterday, half of us hiked up and down these hills, part of the Cleveland Hills. The views were fantastic! The afternoon was just a very long slog. Today we could see the sea, and tomorrow we'll arrive at Robin Hood's Bay.

Touching the bog lightly

2010-08-29T06:10:00.002+10:00

We crossed from Cumbria to Yorkshire today, where the main challenge was traversing boggy ground for a few hours. We were in luck: there was some rain, but it wasn't heavy. we could see where we were going, and it was only a 13-mile day. The easiest way to cross bog is to try and flit across the surface, like an insect, getting purchase from reeds and grass clumps. We had a lot of fun.

We're staying in tiny Keld tonight. Another good dinner (salmon in asparagus sauce, and creme brulee). We're now halfway across England.

Eastward Ho!

2010-08-28T16:31:00.005+10:00

Today we'll reach the halfway point (c. 96 miles), and the start of the Yorkshire Dales. We left the Lake District the day before yesterday and have since been walking through rolling countryside and farmland. The most distinctive thing about Cumbria is the dry stone walls that we've seen everywhere, even up the steepest slopes. Something to do with the Enclosures Act. For us, the Lake District was all about ascending and descending the rugged peaks; it wasn't about lakes, as we saw only a couple of the main ones.

We've occasionally had some very long views back to where we've come from and towards where we're headed. It really is extraordinary how far two little feet can take you in a day if you keep putting one in front of the other.

We all have dinner together every night and are enjoying our good fortune in having such a great group. We lost Hannah yesterday... Her blistered feet were just too bad to continue and we had to shoot her. I'm kidding. She took the train back down south. The rest of the group is our guide Steve (formerly in IT), Amanda (doctor/now medical researcher), Michele (librarian), Carol (garden designer), Jo (palliative care nurse), Mat (personal trainer and our Weather Man), Liz (human resources manager), Tony (retired music industry accountant), Marlene (retired school principal) and Rick (architect/designer).

A journey of approximately 195 miles begins with a single step

2010-08-23T15:39:00.003+10:00

For the next two weeks, Michele and I are walking this route across England. Our group of 12 people is a lot of fun. Everyone has bonded well, and there are no outsiders. We are now in the Lake District, where Romantic poets once abounded.

Open arms

2010-08-21T18:55:00.002+10:00

Barbara and I walked around just a small part of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh yesterday before I caught the train south.

Here in Pennington, near Ulverston, in Cumbria, I literally hit the ground running. Michele and Dave met my train, then Michele and border collie mix Maggie took me for a run around the countryside near their 300-year-old house. It was drizzling and we couldn't see much of the views, but today it's a gorgeous day. We had a fab dinner last night at the Braddylls Arms pub in Bardsea. I've fallen in love with little Cooper, Michele and Dave's ginger Norfolk terrier. Desi is their third dog. They are all here in the UK on US passports.

Today we're heading for St Bees, to check in for our briefing and the start tomorrow of our walk across England (220 miles, or c. 350 kilometres). We should reach Robin Hood's Bay on 4 September.

Festive Edinburgh

2010-08-20T16:18:00.003+10:00

I'm staying with Barbara and Anita, who live within walking distance of everything you'd want to see in Edinburgh. I've only ever visited the city while on my way to somewhere else, but I really want to come back and base myself here for at least a month sometime. It has all the things I really like in a place: old friends, easy walking, great cultural life, fabulous architecture, and a hill that provides a view over the city. We won't have time to climb it today, unfortunately. Next time...

The festival is on. We saw Bolivian Baroque in Greyfriars Kirk. This is the church where, in the 19th century, the faithful Bobby kept watch over his owner's grave for 14 years. We had a drink in Bobby's Bar. Just beforehand we checked out an outdoors shop to get me a couple of things for my Coast to Coast Walk.

I last saw Barbara in 1995, in Brisbane, and Anita in about 1992, in Hong Kong. Polly and I worked with Barbara on texts for the new Open Learning Institute in Hong Kong in the early 1990s.

After the performance we checked out what was happening along the Royal Mile. People out everywhere. A great atmosphere. We then had dinner at the Mussel Inn. After getting through a half-kilo pot of mussels, Barbara said she had mussel fatigue :-))

Perusing the Percys' porcelain

2010-08-19T00:48:00.008+10:00

This afternoon I visited Alnwick Castle, which is home (between November and March) to the 12th Duke and Duchess of Northumberland. The castle, which was Hogwarts School in "Harry Potter", has been home to the Percy family for 700 years. I wandered through the state rooms: the library is fantastic. The China Gallery houses a very important collection of Meissen porcelain. I really wanted to take a photo of my finger pointing at the Percys' porcelain, but no cameras were allowed.

This portrait caught my eye. It's of Lady Elizabeth Montagu Douglas Scott, and was done on the occasion of her marriage to the 10th Duke in 1946. I think she is very beautiful.

To the treehouse

2010-08-17T16:00:00.002+10:00

I'm now in Alnwick (pronounced "Annick"), on the coast north of Newcastle, staying at the Tate House B&B. Somewhere south of here, during the train trip up yesterday, I would have crossed the route of the Coast to Coast Walk, which I'm doing, starting next week, with my Dead Runner friend Michele.

When I got to know my friend Suzie in Hong Kong in the mid-1980s, she was known as "Trees". It's funny that, all these years later, we should have dinner together in a treehouse!

The Tree House restaurant is on the grounds of Alnwick Castle and Gardens and is like something out of a dream ... or a nightmare.

Suzie and I travelled rough in Rajasthan, India, in 1987 for three weeks when she was returning home to the UK from Hong Kong. We then caught up again for a night out in Hong Kong in 1990 when she was visiting with her husband David from their home in Singapore. Since then, she has raised two great kids.

Suzie, Charlotte and I had a drink at The White Swan before joining David and Will for dinner. While we walked back to Bondgate afterwards the kids bandied around names for a pair of cats. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were two of their suggestions. You've gotta love well-educated kids!

On the road again...

2010-08-16T16:22:00.002+10:00

Yesterday, Wendy and I met up with a former trekking mate, Dermot, for a walk in the New Forest. (He and I were in the same group that trekked to Everest Base Camp in 2008. I had to pull out two days before reaching EBC when I broke my wrist, but I saw Dermot back at the Kathmandu Guest House before he headed out again on the Annapurna Circuit trek, which I had also signed on to do. It was during those couple of days that he also met Wendy.) We walked for a couple of hours, then had a bite to eat in a very kitsch tearooms.

I spent the afternoon working, then we popped down to a quaint little pub not too far away after dinner for a quick drink. Back at home, we watched the third film in Wendy's mini film festival about mountains. This one was about a base jumper who wears a special outfit that allows him to "fly" very close to mountains, including the Matterhorn.

I've really enjoyed getting to know Wendy better over the past four days. Our paths crossed two years ago, and we've stayed in touch. I'd love to do a trek with her and Chris.

This morning I'm heading north by train to Alnwick via London and Newcastle.

Holed up in Hampshire

2010-08-15T15:29:00.008+10:00

Apart from daily walks, I've been lying low and trying to get some work done. On Friday, Chris and I took a walk through the woods for an hour, and yesterday Wendy, he and I walked for about 90 minutes along Winchester's Itchen River, a gorgeous water course that runs through town alongside one of the old town walls, and then out into meadows. We walked up St Catherine's Hill, which used to be a fort, and had a coffee at Saint Cross Church. Lunch was in town at a cafe. We got caught in a downpour just as we were ready to leave, and it rained on and off for the rest of the day.

Wendy and I had a girls' night in last night, with pizza, wine and a fabulous documentary: "Blindsight", about a group of six blind Tibetan children climbing in the Himalaya. "They lost their sight, not their vision." Wendy has a connection to one of the boys.

Stoned ...

2010-08-14T03:17:00.003+10:00

It was sad to say a final (for now) "ciao" to Giorgio, who has become a great friend.

My friend Wendy met my plane from Milan yesterday. (We've been getting to know each other for the last couple of years since meeting in Kathmandu, Nepal, in 2008.) From Heathrow, we headed down to Hampshire. It's so great to hang out in the lovely house she shares with her husband Chris (who I also met in Nepal) and one of their sons, Jamie. (Jamie is heading to Malta tomorrow.) For the past 10 weeks I've been staying in hotels and guesthouses... I've been working in their gorgeous conservatory, where doves periodically land on the pitched roof and a steam train regularly passes close by. Last night after dinner we watched a documentary about Everest.

I'm caught in a bit of a work bind while I'm here, but I'm taking time out when I can. Wendy and I took a walk around the neighbourhood late yesterday afternoon, and today we made a quick visit to Stonehenge. I hadn't been there before and I was surprised by its modest scale. It was a bit like when I saw the Guggenheim Museum in New York for the first time: in my mind, I'd imagined something a bit bigger. It's hard to comprehend that Stonehenge is 5,000 years old.

The Big Butte

2010-08-11T15:53:00.013+10:00

Yesterday, Giorgio and I walked to the top of Mont Thabor, in France. We estimated it was about 30–35 kilometres and took us 8+ hours. It was fantastic! There is a wonderful mountain outcrop that looms above the valley where we started from (I named it the Big Butte), and we ended up seeing it from all sides. From the top of Thabor we were looking down on it, far off in the distance. Then we walked down the valley so that it was on our left. There is a kind of long, grey escarpment that was almost like something out of this world.

We started the morning with coffees and pastries at a bar, and another coffee in the rifugio at the start of the walk. Lunch was in a field beside the stream of ice melt after we'd done the hardest part of the descent. (Hard for me, because of the loose stones. Giorgio and Amy run down these sorts of slopes.) Giorgio brought a bottle of chardonnay, and we shared some filled rolls we'd bought earlier. Back at the rifugio, we had a glass of red wine and toasted our successful climb.

Dinner later with the family at the apartment in Sansicario. Amy had done a 30K run in the hills nearby, and Olivia had done "nothing," she said!

Another fantastic day. I really enjoy Giorgio's wit. We spend a lot of the time laughing.

The Life of Briancon

2010-08-10T14:40:00.005+10:00

Briancon, a French ski resort town a half-hour's drive north of Cesana through the mountains, was pretty lively for a Monday evening. Giorgio, Amy, Olivia and I went shopping for new trekking boots for me and bits and pieces for Olivia and Amy. We then went to the old, walled town for a yummy dinner of crepes, creme brulee and cider. I'd spent the day working at a cafe. Today we're doing another big walk.

Getting high in Italy

2010-08-09T16:40:00.003+10:00

Early on Saturday morning, Giorgio met me at my hotel and we did a 15K or so scenic run through the centre of Turin, across a bridge over the Po River built by Napoleon and up to a castle (or was it a monastery?) that overlooks the city. My month-long break from regular running doesn’t seem to have done me much harm.

Giorgio picked me up again an hour later and we drove up to Cesana via La Venaria Reale, the restored 17th-century Royal Palace museum and gardens on the outskirts of Turin that was built “to celebrate beauty, hunting and leisure”. It’s a fabulous complex of buildings and the museum aspect is really well done. We had a bite to eat there in a café in what had been the old kitchen area.

I’m staying at the Hotel Ginestra in Cesana, which lies at the foot of Mt Chaberton in the Italian/French Alps. Cesana is a resort town for skiers in winter and walkers/mountain bikers in summer. It looks gorgeous at the moment, with vividly bright flower boxes everywhere, cobbled streets, a fast-flowing icy stream running through the centre of the village, and quaint houses and shops with balconies and shutters. The block near me, right beside the stream, is closed to traffic, and people promenade and walk their dogs there. Yesterday a folk band was playing on the other bank of the river. The instruments were Alpine equivalents of what you might find in a zydeco band, and holidaymakers were doing folk dances. It was fun watching them while I ate my coconut, baci and stracciatelli gelato.

Giorgio and Amy have a holiday apartment in Sansicario, about 6K further up, that looks back across to Chaberton. Amy, who works as a freelance translator (Italian to English), keeps her horse nearby and does a lot of riding. She’s also a really talented runner, with a recent marathon PB of 3:15.

My first day here, Giorgio drove down to Cesana to pick me up for dinner with Amy and two of their three daughters, Jenny and Olivia. Valentina is away in Sardinia at the moment. The girls are gorgeous, and speak English as well as Italian. It was a delicious dinner (bruschetta, gnocchi with tomato and beans, chicken with prosciutto and salad, and berries). Giorgio and Amy are really into wines. I’ve noticed that a lot of Italian dishes are based around the colours of the Italian flag: white (pasta/bread/gnocchi/mozzarella and other cheeses), green (basil and other leaves/beans/peppers) and red (tomatoes/peppers)!

Olivia is really sweet and did my washing for me :-)

Giorgio is very funny. He’s also very knowledgeable and a total history nut, with an endless supply of stories that he shares in a really entertaining way. He cracks himself up all the time. He hosted the Dead Runners World Conference in Turin a few years ago. I gather everyone had a ball, and I can see why!

Yesterday, he and Amy came for a quick breakfast here at the Ginestra after dropping G’s car in a spot where we would end our walk to the summit of Mt Chaberton. Amy then drove us over to the start of the trail in France. G and I then walked for seven hours. The ascent is challenging, with fantastic views of the Alps from the top where there are ruins of a fortress that was destroyed in the Second World War (www.exploguide.com/site/mount-chaberton-fortress-briancon). I found the descent a bit precarious; it’s steep with loose stones and gravel. Giorgio and Amy know the woman who won the marathon here last weekend. G said she just spreads her arms out and flies down, barely touching the ground. Giorgio has run it himself, and I think yesterday was his 55th ascent.

My new trekking shoes are too small, which caused me some grief on the descent. I switched to my running shoes when we stopped for lunch at a very rickety picnic table down in the foothills. Giorgio had brought baguettes with prosciutto, chocolate with hazelnuts, and a bottle of a light red wine, which he opened with his Swiss Army knife. It was good fun.

Back in Cesana we had an espresso with grappa at a little restaurant/bar to toast our successful climb. Giorgio and Amy came back down from Sansicario for dinner at the hotel. I had onion soup, trout, some of Amy’s salad, and crème caramel: delicious. Amy had spent the day riding her horse.

I’m totally blown away by Giorgio and Amy’s kindness to me at a time when they have great sadness in their own lives. (Amy’s sister died recently after a horse-riding accident in the States.)

Today, Monday, I’m going to knuckle down to work at the bibliotèque, which is just up the road. But first, breakfast at a café…

Mambo Italiano...

2010-08-07T12:20:00.007+10:00

OMG, I wish I'd been born an Italian!

But to backtrack a little...

My last day in Hong Kong was spent seeing the mind-boggling film "Inception" with Cath, and having dinner at the FCC with Polly Waffle, Mary and Ian (who I'd run into at Cheung Sha Beach on Sunday). I had a great time during my five weeks there.

On Wednesday I flew to Kuala Lumpur, where I stayed at a very unusual guesthouse called Sekeping Tenggiri, in the Bangsar area. My room, the Glass Room, was perched at tree level. The bathroom was partly open to the sky, and I could step out of the room on to the wire mesh roof overlooking the small pool. The bed, on a wire mesh base, was on a raised platform. I thought it was a bit hazardous. You wouldn't want to stay there if you had a tendency to go walkies in the night...

I managed to have two runs, which I hope will get me back on track with my training. The first was with Jess ("Jess Do It"), who I met, with her husband Stephen, in Sarawak on the Headhunters Trail. We ran circuits of a park in Petaling Jaya, across the state border from KL (for Albury friends, Wodonga would be the equivalent), then had dinner at a noodle place. They gave me a ride back to the guesthouse and came in for a look. They both work in the interior design/drafting field. It was great to see them.

On Thursday morning I took a long taxi ride to the Petronas Twin Towers so that I could run in the park at their base. I ran here in 2007 in the lead-up to the Hong Kong half marathon. I just love these towers. I ran part of the way with an Australian woman who is based in KL with Oz Immigration. I took the Metro to Bangsar and had some laksa for breakfast, then made my way back to the guesthouse by a circuitous route. (In other words, I got lost.) I spent the rest of the day working by the pool while a thunderstorm raged.

Unfortunately, my Islamic Financial Services Board friends got caught up with an Islamic Finance forum and weren't able to make dinner this time.

A great flight to Rome. I was wedged between two blokes in the centre aisle (I hate that), but I took half a Xanax and slept for about six hours on and off (I love that). Transited in Rome to Torino (Turin). A fabulous flight: clear blue skies, very smooth flying, and views of the island of Elba (where Napoleon was imprisoned) and then of the towns from Genova inland to Milan. I was sitting next to a very dapper chap who turned out to be the ambassador to Italy from Belize (where my friend Sue F is hoping to move from Portugal) and was formerly ambassador to Cuba (where I'm hoping to spend December 2011). He gave me his card and said if there was anything he could do... (No, I wasn't in first class; there was only the one!)

My friend from the Dead Runners Society, Giorgio, met me and drove us back to Torino (home of the Shroud of Turin), where I'm staying at the Art Hotel Boston, a very funky little establishment. I only said "Shit!" once as G sped down the highway in his souped-up mobile office. I'm dubbing him "the Alfa male".

We had a fabulous pizza for lunch at a place in Turin, then I worked on a new book back at the hotel for a few hours. G picked me up at 6.30 to go and see his parents at the house where he lived as a child. His mum just broke her leg and is back home recovering. We then took a walk around the old city, which was quite heavily bombed during the war. It's just beautiful. There are towers and walls dating back to Roman times, and some fabulous grand buildings. Torino was home to the first king of a united Italy. There are lots of public squares, and colonnaded boulevards, and narrow cobblestone lanes overlooked by uniform stone apartment buildings with little balconies and wooden shutters. Giorgio told me that the buildings would have been occupied in the past by all members of society, with the rich folk on the lower levels, the petit bourgeoisie on the middle levels, and the artists and the poor in the garrets at the top. We saw where Nietzsche ("What doesn't kill us makes us stronger") and Puccinni (La Boheme, Tosca, Madame Butterfly...) lived.

Dinner was fabulous: a degustation menu of about six courses with a delicious local wine. Ah, Italy!

This morning we're doing a long scenic run. Then we're driving up to Sansicario, in the mountains bordering France, where I'll meet Giorgio's family and we'll walk up a mountain or two.

It was Giorgio who put me in touch with Italian Dead Runner Cristiano, my Merchant of Venice, when I contacted DRS Italia in 2007 to ask if anyone would like to do a scenic run with me there.

Ciao for now!

Oh, islands in the sun

2010-08-02T14:12:00.004+10:00

Yesterday I had lunch at a beachside South African restaurant on Lantau Island and dinner at a seafood place at Sok Kwu Wan on Lamma Island. I walked with the hiking group I’ve joined, swam in the sea, got a bit sunburned, collected some shells for Michele, ate lobster, crab, scallops, prawns and calamari, drank white wine, met some old friends and made some new ones, rode on some ferries, and was introduced to a dog named Fugly. A perfect weekend in alternative Hong Kong.

Laidback Lamma

2010-07-31T22:19:00.002+10:00

How easy is it to pick up where you left off with an old pal after 17 years with no contact? Very easy, when that pal is Nicola N.

We’re friends from the early days of the Women in Publishing Society in Hong Kong. Nicola is an editor/journalist. She’s now living back on Lamma Island after a three-year stint in London. She and Enid, a financial journalist, live with their two cats in a fabulous pad in the tiny village of Pak Kok Tsuen, a half-hour's walk from Yung Shue Wan, where I arrived on the ferry.

There are no cars on Lamma, which is criss-crossed by narrow paths. It’s a great getaway from Hong Kong. Today was hot and sunny, so there were lots of daytrippers about.

Coming back, I took a smaller ferry from Pak Kok Tsuen to Aberdeen. Where I was sitting in the back, there were eight or so people and five dogs, who looked like they’d enjoyed their excursion to laidback Lamma.

On Thursday I had my appointment at the bank to set up a business account for my newly registered Hong Kong business. I got back to the Helena May right on time for the book group lunch I’d been invited to by Cath’s friend Melinda. This is the first time I’ve finished reading the assigned book before a book group meeting. I really enjoyed it: Elizabeth Strout’s novel, “Olive Kitteridge”. Others there were Lydia, Bren and Liz, who was back visiting Hong Kong from London and is running the New York Marathon this year. We’re going to try and catch up afterwards.

Yesterday, Polly and I had lunch at the FCC with Maggie and Karen from a company here whose monthly newsletter we produce. It was fun. From there I went to Causeway Bay to see an exhibition at Times Square that Polly had seen and thought I would like. I just loved the work by the Korean sculptor Hwan Kwon Yi.

Back to the FCC last night for drinks and dinner with Cath, Polly and her friend Betty. Charlie arrived from Macau with my camera charger that I’d left behind. Cath and I then went on to the Skylark Lounge to see Brendan’s band, Bank Job, play. Cath’s Rebecca joined us there. I thought the second band, Balu and The Jungle, were fantastic.

Confucius's descendant says, 'Don't throw family pet out with baby's bathwater.'

2010-07-28T21:09:00.002+10:00

Polly and I had lunch with our accountant, Millie, on Monday. We did a bit of reminiscing about the old days, and looked at my options for the future.

When I spent three months in the US last year, my house was looked after by Gary and Sue C, whose daughter Megan designed my name card. I've now met another member of that family. Megan's brother Brendan works in legal publishing in Hong Kong, and we caught up for drinks and a great chat at the FCC on Monday.

Yesterday I met up again with a new pal from Saturday's hike. Lucy, a financial planner, is Australian, but born in Beijing. She's been here four months and is loving it. We had a couple of drinks at the Dog House bar in Wanchai. I went from there to dinner at a nearby Peking restaurant with Polly, Jenny E and Rehana S from Women in Publishing (WIPS), and Angela S from Saturday's hike. A really fun dinner. I met Rehana at a WIPS function here some years ago. She's writing a Pakistani cookbook. I’ve rearranged my weekend so that I can do Angela’s Sunday hike on Lantau.

Cathy H-F, who has been a WIPS president, took me to lunch today at the Quartermaster Deck, where I had dinner last week with Cathy, Brenda and Melinda after the book fair. Cathy is the sort of person you want on your team: she’s a changemaker. She’s also a marathon runner and marathon trail walker, dog rescuer, chairman of the SPCA in Hong Kong, and a volunteer extraordinaire. She’s also good fun.

Cathy invited me to go with her to the SPCA offices this afternoon for the opening of their ‘Caring Family, Happy Pet’ program. The ‘faces’ of the campaign are a cat whose name I didn’t catch, La Fleur (a Shih-tzu x Maltese with a fabulous overbite who I spent some time with), and the ‘famous celebrity’ Susan Tse Suet-Sum and her daughter Ka-Wing. A former Chinese opera singer and actress, Susan is also, according to Wikipedia, the 76th-generation descendant of Confucius.

Cathy also introduced me to Sandy and Wendy, executive director and customer services, respectively.

A lot of pets are surrendered or abandoned in Hong Kong when families are expecting a baby. The traditional thinking is that it’s bad for the baby to be around dogs and cats. The aim of this campaign is to try and change this thinking.

Hot town, summer in the city...

2010-07-26T12:22:00.004+10:00

... Back of my neck gettin' dirty and gritty.

Did I mention it's mid-summer in Hong Kong? It's hot and humid, which makes it perfect movie-going weather. I've been lucky to find the perfect f*** buddy in my old friend Cath. That's "film buddy"! Yesterday we saw the mainland Chinese blockbuster "Aftershock" (directed by Feng Xiaogang), about the impact on one family of the 1976 Tangshan earthquake. The acting was a bit cheesy in some scenes, but it was gripping viewing for over two hours. We both were big sooks. Very cathartic.

Last Friday I went to two sessions at the Hong Kong Book Fair. The first was a talk by Andrew Xia Fukuda (www.andrewxiafukuda.com), a Japanese-Chinese, Hong Kong-raised, New York-based criminal prosecutor. His book "The Crossing" is his debut novel and took him 10 years to write.

Between that session and the evening one I met up with one of my authors, Eva Wong, whose book "The Power of Ren" I worked on about four years ago for John Wiley in Singapore. Eva is pretty amazing. Last autumn, she emerged from a detention centre in Beijing where she had spent two years on charges relating to mismanagement of tax payments by her China coaching company. Her husband is still in another detention centre in China, with two more years to go. Eva spent the time doing life coaching with the other inmates. She is a perfect example of someone who had made the best of a negative experience. She believes that no one can deprive you of your liberty, even if they can imprison your body. We popped up to see Mary J, Eva's friend and former colleague who took me to lunch a couple of years ago. We have a friend in common at Pearson Education in Sydney, where Mary once worked.

Back to the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre to meet Cath for a two-hour forum with writers Stephen Fry, Frederick Forsyth (whose first novel was “The Day of the Jackal”) and Andrew Roberts, and moderated by Sir David Tang, who is an eccentric art collector, businessman/entrepreneur and loose cannon. It was good fun. (See http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2010/07/23/hong-kong-book-fair-three-british-writers-on-censorship-and-money/.)

I met two of Cath's book group pals, Brenda and Melinda, over dinner at a restaurant on Fenwick Pier after the forum. Both have lived in Hong Kong for 25 years or so. Brenda is a wine importer and Melinda's a speech therapist; I liked them a lot. I didn't manage to get to Cath's reconvened book group (though I read the book, Hilary Spurling's biography of Pearl Puck in China), but I'm reading the book for Melinda's group that will meet this Thursday in the Helena May's Blue Room, where I've been working some days. ("Olive Kitteridge", by Elizabeth Strout ... I'm loving it.)

On Saturday afternoon it was great to catch up for coffee with Sue S. I've done work for her company and an associated company since the early 1990s. We had a fun chat.

After that I joined up with members of a hiking group I've walked with before in Hong Kong. Last time we walked way up in the New Territories; this time, because it's mid-summer, we did an evening walk up to The Peak from Central. Because it's Hong Kong, and we could, we started the walk by taking the Mid-Levels escalator up through SOHO and the area above it, around the mosque, to where we could access the old route that becomes Old Peak Road (shown above). It's very steep and a terrific workout. I'm going back there again this week to help prepare for my walking holiday in Italy, which is coming up at the end of next week. In the early days of Hong Kong, people living on The Peak (i.e. the British colonial administrators, business taipans and other moneyed folk) were ferried up and down in sedan chairs carried by "coolies".

When the path back down got very slippery, Jenny E (who I know through Women in Publishing) and I peeled off and took a cab to Hong Kong Park, where the others arrived soon after for a Thai dinner. I had met Angela S on my previous walk with this group. She's a life coach and knows Eva. Lots of interesting people among the group.

I'm now finishing up breakfast at the Foreign Correspondents' Club. Polly and I are having lunch today with our old friend Millie S, at the Hong Kong Jockey Club at Happy Valley Racecourse. Millie has been the accountant for Women in Publishing since we became a society in the early 1990s. We're looking into the tax implications of my no longer being a resident of Australia. Plus it's always good to see Millie!

Earlier this morning I ran up on Bowen Road. For a while I tucked in just behind the left shoulder of a Filipino woman who was probably a bit younger than I am and running at a good pace for me. The only sound was our well-matched footsteps. When we reached the Stubbs Road end of the path, I thanked her for letting me hang off her back and we spoke for a little while.

She said that running, for her, is "free medicine" and "God's grace".

What could I say, but "Amen!"

Look what they've done to Macau, Ma!

2010-07-21T20:34:00.004+10:00

I love an audacious building, but some of the new hotel/casinos in Macau just look silly.

When I first started visiting this former Portuguese colony in the 1980s, the very modest Lisboa Hotel and casino on the Macau waterfront was the city's only high-rise building. Today, Macau (on the Chinese mainland) and the island of Taipa have been changed almost beyond recognition. This building, the Grand Lisboa, now towers over its aged relative. Reclamation along the waterfront and on Taipa has created space for dozens of spectacular, and some spectacularly kitsch, casinos. It's best seen at night, when the lights help distract from the tackiness of the place.

I'm not saying the buildings aren't "grand" and spectacularly fitted out, but they are casinos and they are there to attract mainland Chinese gamblers. Sleepy, laid-back, Portuguese Macau has been sold down the Pearl River for the sake of a lot of patacas.

I spent two days there this week with my long-time friend Polly and her partner, Charlie. I had a dicky tummy and didn't have much of an appetite, but I enjoyed doing my bit for the economy of Macau by playing the pokies at The Venetian and City of Dreams casinos (cashing in each time before I inevitably lost the lot), checking out the Macau Museum of History, wandering through the old shopping lanes near the ruins of San Paulo, and eating dinner at Fernando's on Coloane Island. The three of us also went for an early-morning walk up to the top of the hill near Charlie's apartment on Taipa, which provided great views of the casinos and across what's left of the river to Macau.

Oh, and I also saw a lot of loos during my visit.

Film note: I saw "Fish Tank" last Sunday with Cath and her daughter, Rebecca. Highly recommended for a grisly look at family dynamics in a run-down housing estate in England.

Guangzhou: Why?

2010-07-17T22:01:00.011+10:00

I’ve just spent a couple of days in Guangzhou (formerly Canton), China, where capitalism with Chinese characteristics is thriving. I stayed in the garment district, a good hour’s walk north of the Pearl River. I know this, because I walked there the afternoon I arrived and it was a very long return trip by taxi.

I went via Liuhua Park, which is at the southern end of the street where my hotel is located; I then headed in the general direction of the waterfront.

The covered market lanes in the old part of town along the river’s edge are quite incredible. There seem to be many dozens of them, all disappearing into the distance, all with similar goods for sale. The nature of the goods gradually changes as you walk along the street that leads into the lanes, but each lane caters to a distinct wholesale buyer.

I’ve just finished reading a biography of Pearl Buck, author of “The Good Earth”. She visited this part of Guangzhou in the 1930s. Today it’s been ruined (aka “improved”) by a modern road system with flyovers. I hate them. By the time I had navigated my way to the old White Swan Hotel, I was tired, very damp, and a tad bad-tempered.

While I decided on a refreshing drink from the menu in the riverside coffee lounge (a Peppermint Punch), I watched a man swimming upriver in the polluted waters with some sort of basketball attached to his body.

“Why?” I asked.

I waited ten minutes for someone to take my order, but was then told: “Wait.”

“Why?” I asked.

When I gave up on the Peppermint Punch and asked at the hotel entry for a taxi, I was directed to the second floor, well above ground level.

“Why?” I asked.

Eventually, I found my second taxi driver from hell for the day to take me back to my hotel just off Zhanqian Lu. (The first had delivered me there, shaking and quaking, from Guangzhou East Railway Station earlier in the day.)

The area where I was staying is a hive of activity. There are huge numbers of wholesale clothing outlets, firms that design and produce gorgeous shopping bags, freight companies, and suppliers of mannequins, racks, hangers and other display accessories. I’m assuming that most of the people who were staying in my hotel were there for some serious shopping.

It’s a good thing I wasn’t tempted to flash the plastic, or I might have come away with 3,000 pairs of knickers, minimum.

I decided to spend my only full day in Guangzhou catching up on work and checking out my immediate neighbourhood. I just couldn’t bear the thought of having to take a taxi to or from any of the main museums that I had been hoping to visit. I also gave up on trying to track down the elusive Ping Pong and Vitamin contemporary art spaces that I had read about. It was just too difficult, given the limited time I had available.

Besides, in China, time is money … and I had clients waiting.

Guangzhou is a city where you need to speak Chinese. I would return only if I was with a Chinese-speaking companion who knew people in the art scene, or if I had begun speaking in tongues.

My working week

2010-07-15T00:04:00.003+10:00

I spent last weekend mostly working, apart from having yum cha with Cath and David N on Sunday. I caught up with Cath when I was in Hong Kong early last year, and we’ve stayed in touch since then. We were all young twenty-somethings together in college at the University of New South Wales at the start of the 1970s, and now we are at the other end of our careers.

Monday morning I got “back on the horse” after my disastrous run two weeks ago, when I got heat stroke in Kuching in a 7K race. I walked up the hill to Bowen Road (shown here), where I used to run the 8K course frequently in the 1980s. I ran only a couple of kilometres, but it was enough to put some distance between me and my fears.

Had dinner at David N’s on Monday. Others there were a British dentist who has written three books on the history of the Macau Grand Prix, and his partner, a diamond valuer. David has offered me use of his villa in Croatia. Two problems: I’ll need a car, and I no longer drive; and it doesn’t have internet, so I wouldn’t be able to base myself there for anything more than a quick visit. I want to find a way around these problems, as it looks gorgeous and it’s a very generous offer.

On today’s early morning repeat visit to Bowen Road I got talking with the editor of an Asian finance magazine. Lara and I, and her young pup Gypsy, ran together for about 2.5K.

I’ve been working quite a bit from the Foreign Correspondents’ Club’s Main Bar, where there is reliable internet access. As I was leaving today to meet Carol for lunch, I saw Marty M, who I now know through my Melbourne pal Jenny. He had also been for a run this past week.

Carol and I had originally planned to go to China Tee Club, where in about 1988 get-togethers of what became the HK Women in Publishing Society used to be held. (Carol has been hugely important in getting “Imprint”, a publication showcasing the writing of WIPS members, into print each year.) China Tee was closed for a private function, so we went instead to Post 1997 in Lan Kwai Fong. In 1985, when this was still “1997”, I went there for dinner on my own during a business trip to Hong Kong. I decided that night I would try and return to Hong Kong to live. That decision changed my life.

I missed out on going to Cath’s book group tonight. The assigned book was Hilary Spurling’s “Burying the Bones: Pearl Buck in China”. I’m about halfway through it and I’ll take it with me to read on the train to Guangzhou (formerly Canton) tomorrow morning. I had to finish a job tonight, and technology was uncooperative so I was running late. I really wanted to go!

Instead, after I finished work, I had dinner in the main lounge here at The Helena May. (I’m staying in the annex, but I also use the main building for better internet access.) The place is so different from when I lived here. To its credit, it has totally reinvented itself as a very different restaurant venue in Central.

I haven’t had time for sightseeing this past week, but I managed to get to the Chilean artist Margarita Dittman’s exhibition on Hollywood Road. Fabulous. She’s only about 30 years old, but makes very complex, satisfying photographs.

Picking up where I left off

2010-07-11T00:00:00.004+10:00

It’s easy to hit the ground running when I already have friends in a place.

Cath and I went to the movies at midday the other day to see ‘Chloe’. I enjoyed the film, but I also really enjoyed the picnic lunch of corned beef and salad sandwiches that Cath brought along, complete with salt and pepper, other condiments, and napkins! The theatre has only about seven rows, so it’s obviously used only for art house films.

Yesterday I went up to Clearwater Bay, in the New Territories, early in the morning to do a walk with a publishing contact, Carol, and her two rescued labradors, Guinness and Penny. The views over the bays and across to various islands were stunning. We ended up at the Tin Hau temple, where there has been a temple of one kind or another since the 13th century, I think Carol said. The last time I was there was in about 1990, with one of my authors and her husband on their private junk. The other guests included an ABC TV film crew from Australia, who were making a documentary about the forthcoming handover of Hong Kong back to China in 1997.

Last night was spent at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club (FCC). I had a fabulous time meeting some more of Polly’s friends. Chris is in communications. He has written and published books on buying property in Hong Kong and Japan. He’s good fun and has encouraged me to visit Japan, as did Marty the other night. Ian is an old b/f of Polly’s. He’s with the police. I met him years ago very briefly. A really nice guy. His girlfriend Mary is with a bank and moved here from New York only last year. We had a great talk for hours. Polly’s boyfriend Charlie is a sweetheart. He works in Macau in security with The Sands casino.

Polly and Charlie came by the Helena May this afternoon for a drink. Among other things we talked about my tax status in Australia if I’m no longer going to be a resident there.

I spent four hours today working at the FCC and eavesdropping on the tantalising conversations around me. One guy was flying off to Manila in a few hours to judge an art competition, while another had just had a book published. I chugged away at editing a book on leadership in China and tried not to drop cellophane noodles from my Thai seafood salad on my keyboard.

Getting back on my feet

2010-07-08T00:58:00.007+10:00

My first week back in Hong Kong has been a tad frustrating.

Let me rephrase that: my first week back in Hong Kong has been *very* frustrating. I rely on having seamless internet access, but I've had so many problems here. Bali and Sarawak were a breeze by comparison.

Other than that, I'm enjoying being back in a familiar, yet constantly evolving, environment.

I have some long-time friends here. Cath and I go back to the start of the seventies in Oz, when we were at university. Polly and I met here in 1988, through our mutual friend Linda. We work together every month on one or more newsletters. I've caught up with each of them twice this week, and they are my main women here.

Hong Kong still feels like a place I once called home.

I'm trying to see a lot of art, and I'm liking what I'm seeing. It's a very interesting time for both mainland and Hong Kong SAR art.

I also need to "get back on the horse" after my disastrous race in Kuching and go for a run in my new Asics.

Memories of The Helena May (my home for the next month)

2010-07-01T23:26:00.003+10:00

From April 1986 until mid-1988 I lived in a private club in Hong Kong, just uphill from the American Consulate and the lower Peak Tram station. The Helena May is a white, colonial-era building; during my time as a resident it had slowly turning ceiling fans and wicker furniture. It had been built in 1916 to accommodate young British women who had journeyed out to the colony in the hope of finding a husband among the ranks of the young colonial administrators or the traders in the commercial firms, or who were on their way to China to work as teachers or missionaries. During the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong after Christmas 1941, The Helena May was used to house Japanese soldiers and stable their horses.

When I was living there, it housed single "gels" like me who were in possession of a foreign passport and were in Hong Kong to work. It was sort of a boarding school for mature-age students, but with privileges that didn't include taking men to one's room. During the day, the club catered to the expatriate-wives-who-lunch-and-play-bridge set. It also had the best small library in Hong Kong.

I became pals with a group of Brits. Sarah worked for Swire, one of the oldest of the Hong Kong hongs (or trading houses). Swire owned Cathay Pacific, and Sarah was personal assistant to the head of Personnel. She had previously worked for a Harley Street specialist and at the Kuwaiti Embassy in London. Suzie worked in administration at one of the International Schools that provided English-style schooling for the children of expatriates. She also volunteered some of her nights as a Lifeline phone counsellor. Debbie, who had lived in Dubai before coming to Hong Kong, worked in fashion. She had a Muslim boyfriend who would turn up every now and then from the Middle East and whisk her off to somewhere exotic. She and I would sometimes go down to the squash courts near the Peak Tram station for a game of hit-and-giggle squash after breakfast. She was very glamorous and invested heavily in gold bracelets. Anne worked in finance. She was my "business manager", in that she would receive my faxes and bring them home to the HM at the end of the day. Imelda worked in the South China Morning Post Bookshop on the Star Ferry concourse, and Francesca was a journalist with the Post.

We would all start the day together at "our" table. After brekkers, my pals would head off down the hill to their various offices. (On Hong Kong Island, everything is either uphill or downhill from where you are.) I was now a fully-fledged freelance editor and working from home. I would go back upstairs to my room and gather up whatever job it was I was working on that day, along with my pens and corrector fluid. (It was all very low-tech in those days.) I would then set myself up at my table in the lounge and work all day until my pals starting drifting in during the late afternoon.

The lounge had a regular rhythm during the day. Club members would start arriving from mid-morning for a cup of tea with a friend, to exchange their library books, or perhaps to have a game of bridge. I must have been an enigma to those women: always there; always alone; my small round table covered in papers and books. My clients must have thought I had a secretary to answer my phone, when it was the staff of the club.

At around midday the place would fill up for lunch. The Helena May was a blessed relief if you were spending the day shopping in town. It was cool and civilised. The lunch menu offered reassuring choices along the lines of toasted cheese sandwiches and pumpkin soup. And their cheesecake was renowned.

After lunch, the lounge would empty. It wasn’t until school finished, around mid-afternoon, that the pace would pick up again. Mums and kids would have arranged to meet at the HM, so there would be another flurry of activity, with trays going to and from the kitchen and kids going to and from the library. It would all quieten down again after about an hour, and I would start to wind up my work on whatever new book I was editing on the trials and tribulations of doing business with China. By about 5.30, Sarah, Deb, Suzie, Imelda, Francesca or Ann would have drifted in and we would settle in the padded armchairs and have a natter about our day.

"Glass of wine?"

"Don’t mind if I do."

If any of us were known to have gone out the previous night and hadn't shown at breakfast, we were deemed to be "dirty stop-outs".

On nights when we went out, we would be let back in (if we weren’t being dirty stop-outs) by the night watchman. We would press a buzzer on the wall beside the side gate at whatever ungodly hour it was to raise John, who would be sleeping on a camp-bed in the kitchen.

"Thanks, John! May I have one of your cigarettes, please? I promise I’ll pay you back tomorrow."

"You been to nightclub AGAIN?" he would ask, handing over a fag or two.

…

On on ... to Hong Kong

2010-06-30T11:56:00.006+10:00

I couldn't have timed my departure from Kuching any better ... Five thousand Hash House Harriers are descending on the city for the 17th World Interhash. It could get very trashy!

Last night was a farewell dinner with Emily, Rita, James, Ramsay, Michael and Moses at Tarot Salmon. This new Japanese restaurant is attached to the very funky Batik Boutique Hotel. Great food and excellent dinner companions. James took pics.

I've had such a wonderful time here in Kuching, Sarawak. My hotel, the Lime Tree, has been brilliant. Lovely people.

It aint over until it's over

2010-06-27T09:19:00.005+10:00

I'm perfectly OK now, but I burned and then crashed (literally) in my race yesterday afternoon.

I overheated, got the staggers, and then apparently passed out. I have no memory of what happened after I first started lurching around, until I came to surrounded by blokes from the mosque. My only physical injury was a big lump on a left knuckle. I don't recall seeing any other runners pass by, which makes me think I might have wandered off course. For about 20 minutes I lay propped up against the roadside embankment, where I vomited, panted, and answered questions. A couple of blokes fanned me with bits of cardboard.

I begged a lift to the finish line back on the waterfront, and two blokes took me in their car. I was disappointed to see it was less than a kilometre away. The St John's Ambulance people there didn't know what to do with me. When I said I was going to be sick again, someone handed me a container the size of a soap dish. I brushed it aside, spread my feet, and vomited a huge spray all over the pavers.

An ambulance arrived, and we went (with the siren blaring) to the Kuching Specialist Hospital where I spent a couple of hours on a drip. On the way, Rita gave me some treatments and held my hand, while Emily and James went back to my hotel to get my passport and some clothes. They have been *amazing* friends.

It was a hot day, and there were hills. I should have taken water if I wasn't sure there'd be some available along the course. By the time I was in trouble, I wasn't thinking right.

A lucky escape. A damned shame about the medal, though!

It just goes to show that, in a race, it aint over until it's over.

Postscript:

Yesterday, Emily and Rita and I retraced my steps from the last part of the course I could remember. When I "came to", I was about 500 metres off course. I apparently fell at some stage, and must have staggered through traffic. I was headed totally in the wrong direction. We talked with some people from the kampong near the mosque who had been there. They had seen me staggering and had stopped me and sat me down. They gave me something to drink. That's when I vomited. They were understandably confused by my thinking they were involved with the race. I must have been off the planet for 15 minutes or more. Given that I went into a kind of coma, it's possible I had heat stroke, and not just heat exhaustion, brought on by dehydration in the hot and humid conditions.

But I still won a medal. It turns out I was in a category of one "VIP/Guest" running the 7K. However slowly I had jogged it, I would have come first.

Who has time to work?

2010-06-25T22:46:00.003+10:00

I'm having difficulty squeezing in work around my busy social life here in Kuching!

Rita picked me up this morning for a two-hour remedial massage therapy session at the holistic healthcare clinic where she has her practice. She shares it with two retired GPs who now practise complementary and alternative medicine. Rita is an Emmett practitioner. It was fantastic. I also got to talk with Drs Leong and Yao. I wouldn't hesitate to put myself in the hands of these three people if I ever had any issues with my health. I'm going back on Monday for another session with Rita, and I'll do some other therapies with the docs when I'm back in December.

I squeezed in a couple of hours' work before heading out to see Ramsay mid-afternoon. I wanted to get a couple of gifts, things made by him. In the gallery, he was talking with Bob Reece, who is the author of articles and books on Borneo, including "The White Rajahs of Sarawak". He told us a bit about an article he has just written on a previous Sultan of Brunei. I ended up buying that book, and Edric Ong's book "Sarawak Style", on Amazon.com and using the Central Park West address in New York for delivery. They are both heavy coffee-table books.

I gave Emily her gift. She showed me some of the drawings she does. They are really beautiful. (The one accompanying this note isn't one of Em's.)

Tomorrow's race is at 5.30 pm. Emily said James wants to get some video footage at the start and along the course!

Going bananas in Borneo

2010-06-24T18:03:00.005+10:00

This is Ritchie, the alpha male out at Semenggoh Wildlife Reserve. There are about three dozen orang-utans that have been rehabilitated to life in the wild or born there. It's amazing watching them tree surfing.

I had a half-hour interview at Radio TV Malaysia in the afternoon with Jennifer Lau for her program, "The Living Room". I got in a good plug for the charity run on Saturday. (The guest before me was Edric Ong, who I met through Ramsay!) Daryl called yesterday to tell me that despite my age (!), they were making an exception yet again for me and allowing me to run the 7K course. The other guests are entered in the 3K event.

Emily picked me up at 5.30 and we went to her brother James's video editing suite. He showed me the corporate video he was working on when we were there a couple of weeks ago, plus a music video and a couple of other more creative things he's worked on. Rita met us there. We went for dinner nearby. The girls and I went to see "Sex and the City 2". A bit of fluff. There wasn't enough of New York for my liking!

Ran c. 10K with the Kuching Rat Pack this morning. We backtracked when it started to sprinkle with rain. It seems December is monsoon season here...

Worked all day today.

I've got less than a week left here.

I was catching up the other day on some "Borneo Posts" from when I was away and in one issue I knew two people who were written up (the mayor of Miri, and a trainer who came to my talk there)!

A "welcome home" hug from Kuching

2010-06-22T22:23:00.005+10:00

The Kuching running rat pack appeared on schedule just after six this morning near the Hilton. So good to see them!! We did the basic 10K run over the bridge and back to the kampungs, but Sim threw in a few extra hills. I think she has a slight sadistic streak!

Daryl Leong, from Saturday's race sponsor, arrived at 3 pm for an interview for an article that may come out in the "Borneo Post" tomorrow or Thursday. My event is over 7K.

I called in to see Ramsay this morning, and he and Michael Lim called by the hotel early evening to drop off the work of Ramsay's I've bought. I'll have it here to enjoy for the rest of my stay, then it will be sent down to Albury.

Saw Emily this morning after my run. Having dinner with her tomorrow.

I've decided after talking with Sim and Madeleine this morning to come back to Kuching on 22 December and spend Christmas through to mid-January here training for the Mumbai half marathon on 16 January. I love this place, and I've been really lucky to find such a great bunch of people to train with.

Medamit–Limbang–Miri–Labuan

2010-06-20T19:12:00.006+10:00

Instead of staying the last night of the trek at a longhouse an hour upriver from Kampung Medamit, I asked Han to negotiate a price for me to go by longboat down to Medamit, from where I could get a van to take me to Limbang. This was all because I had no dry clothes to change into! The chief of the area ferried me downriver. If it hadn't started to pour with rain halfway through the trip, I might have felt a bit like Katherine Hepburn in "The African Queen". Instead, I just felt very soggy!

The air-conditioning in the vehicle that took me on to the market town of Limbang was fierce, so I was soggy and shivering by the time I checked into the commercial traveller-type hotel that was home for the night. It was the best available in town and was very ordinary. I bought some cheap clothes in a shopping centre attached to the hotel and after a hot shower I felt a lot better.

The next morning I checked out all the wet and dry markets around the main part of town, then headed out to the airport.

In Miri, Jennie Soh collected me from the Mega Hotel for dinner with her husband Matthew, daughter Cheryl (a perky businesswoman who spent five years studying in New Zealand), her NZ partner Chris and their NZ colleague Oliver. The three of them run an IT business. Miri is an oil town. Shell seems to run the place.

Jennie picked me up at midday on Saturday for lunch. We then went to Pustaka Miri, where there was a notice up saying: "A Moment with Robyn Flemming from Australia: A collaboration project by SOSWE (Society of English Writers Northern Zone Miri) & Pustaka Miri".

There were only about 20 people, so it wasn't as scary as I'd feared. I talked about my career and about travel writing, and answered questions.

After the talk the mayor of Miri, Lawrence Lai, presented awards to some students who had won a writing competition and also presented me with a gift.

Today I flew up to Labuan. I went straight out to the War Memorial to see the plaque with the name of Dad's Uncle Alf, who died during the forced march of Australian prisoners across Borneo in 1945. His body was never found, but if his spirit is there, he's in a good place. It's by the sea, and the place is well maintained and very peaceful.

I walked back to the hotel along the sea. Lots of families were out having picnics and barbecues for Father's Day. I wished a few of them who greeted me a "Happy Father's Day"!

After a quick look around the town—it's a duty-free port and offshore financial centre—I've been working.

The thing to do here is scuba diving. There are four great wrecks, one of which, the Cement Wreck, is apparently "the world's most colourful and photogenic wreck".

A Girl's Own Adventure in Borneo

2010-06-19T09:42:00.010+10:00

This is a preview of my second column about Sarawak...

When I emerged from the jungle on the last day of a four-day trek through Gunung Mulu National Park, in northern Sarawak, I was relieved to find I had provided lunch for only one of the half-dozen or so leeches that had chosen me as a possible meal ticket.

The Headhunters’ Trail is a dank-smelling, 11.3 km path once trodden by Kayan headhunting parties. Today, it forms either the start or finish of a trek that takes in some of the highlights of this UNESCO World Heritage-listed park. Our group of trekkers and guides had started out from park headquarters, near Mulu’s airport, after a night spent in basic dormitory-style accommodation.

The Mulu Caves are mindboggling. Lang’s Cave (a wonderland of dripstone formations) and Deer Cave (its cave passage would fit eight St Paul’s Cathedrals) are an easy 3 km stroll along well-maintained plank walkways from the entrance to the park. Deer Cave is home to an estimated three million small bats that emerge in waves most afternoons in search of insects for supper.

I enjoyed the Canopy Skywalk, about 15 swinging bridges suspended high up in the foliage.

The next morning, after a journey up the Melinau River by longboat, we visited the Cave of the Winds and Clearwater Cave, which extends for over 170 km and is popular with adventure cavers. Following a further stint on the river, including some whitewater longboating, we disembarked and walked for over 8 km through dense rainforest to our camp for the next two nights.

Camp Five is the starting point for an all-day return climb to the summit of Gunung Api to see the limestone formations known as the Pinnacles.

Readers of this column will know that I enjoy hard walking. The more effort a trek requires, the better I like it. However, I started to reconsider making the ascent when our guide, Han, described it as "a really, really high-risk activity". I think what clinched it for me were the hazard warnings, complete with 13 exclamation marks, on the map of the route on the information board at camp.

I decided to complete only the first of the three distinct stages of the climb, a distance of 900 metres, from where I could descend on my own. From there on up, it’s considered dangerous to descend unaccompanied. The final stage of 400 metres is traversed mainly on ladders; technically, it’s more climbing than trekking. And in a landscape with razor-sharp limestone outcrops, a slip could prove very nasty.

I really enjoyed the effort of clambering up to the first rest stop, sometimes using the ropes strung along the more difficult sections. The descent—which I made with a young English lawyer who was feeling unwell—was harder than the ascent.

Back at camp, I washed off the sweat and grime in the river, and then headed back out along the trail we had used to reach camp the day before. For two hours, I walked alone along that track through the Borneo jungle.

I am in awe of everyone who did the Pinnacles Walk, and feel some regret that I wasn’t among them. But, a girl can still have her own adventure.

Up, up and away

2010-06-13T20:17:00.003+10:00

Tomorrow I'm flying up to Miri, and then on to Mulu in Gunung Mulu National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage listed area, for four days of walking, trekking, climbing and general exploring.

I had dinner last night at the home of batik artist Michael Lim. I was invited by Ramsay Ong (one of whose works I bought today to send down to the Albury Art Gallery for safekeeping). Another guest was Ram's cousin Edric Ong, an architect-designer and president of the Arts and Crafts Society of Sarawak in East Malaysia. He designed Kuching's airport and the Sarawak Cultural Village (which I haven't had a chance yet to visit), and wrote the text for the coffee table book "Sarawak Style". Alicia, who works at Artrageously Ramsay Ong, was there with her husband, I think Andy. The very sweet Moses Joseph, who works with the water board, picked me up and dropped me home afterwards. I didn't have a chance to talk with Colin and David, and one of Michael's sisters, who were also there.

Michael made an amazing meal. Apparently his cooking is going to be featured in a series on The Discovery Channel.

I've found my hairdresser in Kuching :-))

Rob in Wonderland...

2010-06-10T22:03:00.004+10:00

I'm completely amazed by what has been happening to me since I flew out of Oz two weeks ago.

The "Borneo Post" ran a piece this morning titled "Author from Hong Kong keen to share her writing experience with Miri residents". Apparently, I'm still a Hong Konger even though it's 17 years since I lived there, and it seems I've already completed my book based on my experiences! Readers are urged not to miss my talk on 19 June in the far north of the state.

This morning I ran 10K again with Sim, Johnny and Madeleine (I misheard her Chinese name as "Akia", but Madeleine is her English name), and new acquaintance Lim. Before he peeled off, Johnny told me there is to be a charity fun run later this month to raise funds for children's cancer research. I Googled it and found a number to call. I was put through to Daryl Leong, who is organising the event. When he told me it's open only to Malaysians, I told him I'm writing about running in Sarawak and asked if an exception could be made for me. (I believe in asking for what I want!) He called me back and said that the powers-that-be had seen the "Borneo Post" piece and would like to invite me to run as an "international guest". Yay!! Daryl came by my hotel a few hours later with the entry form. He's 32 and totally besotted with Melbourne, where he did some of his studies. He is the corporate communications manager for the main sponsor of the event, which was actually his idea. He asked me if in the week leading up to the run I could be available to do some interviews with him for press releases! He said that I'll now be running the 7K course, though the website says "guests" do only 3K. (They include dignitaries, invited celebrities, and moi, apparently.) It's shaping up to be a real hoot. Lots of entertainment. The 7K course goes along the waterfront to the Chinese History Museum, up Jl. Tabuan, across to and around the Padang, then on-home. That doesn't sound like 7K to me. Maybe it *is* just 3K. Anyway, I'm going to give it my best shot.

I was incredibly lucky the other morning to pick Sim out of the blue to run behind. She is a core member of a rat pack of Chinese runners who have adopted me. During the run today I asked her what languages she speaks. Bahasa Malaysian, her own Chinese dialect, Mandarin and English, she said. I asked her which one she dreams in. Quick as a flash, she said: "German"! We were waiting near some piles of huge pipes for Madeleine and Lim to catch us up at the top of the big hill, and she said, "Let's take one and sell it." Sim's a card!

I've been trying to get through some work today while also gathering together things I'll need for my trek. I bought some cheap tops that I'll leave with Emily after they've been washed. She told me when I called by today after my run that she encourages friends to give her clothes they no longer want and she gives them to an HIV/Aids charity for distribution. HIV/Aids is a disease of the lowest socioeconomic class here, she said. I met another friend of hers today, Zarina, who works with the New Straits Times — in marketing.

I've added an excursion on to my trip next week, which I'll write about next week.

My throat is sore. I think I'm coming down with something.

There's something fishy going on...

2010-06-09T19:10:00.006+10:00

I went out with Emily (who runs the laundry I've been using) and her friend Rita (a remedial therapist) last night and had a fun time. They picked me up from the hotel and we went first to visit Emily's brother James, a film and video producer who was editing a film on (I think) Johor Bahru. We ate at an open-air food court in a suburban area. Lots of very unusual dishes and great juices... Emily has travelled in India, Cambodia, Vietnam... I like her a lot.

Rita has two daughters, studying pharmacy and law in KL. At age three, the daughter who is studying pharmacy became a paraplegic after contracting a virus.

I'm hoping to have a massage from Rita when I come back from my trek.

We had a look at one of these fishing places. It's open until 2 am and costs a few dollars to hang out with a rod and fish for prawns and other critters. We also called into a pet shop, where there was a gorgeous maltese/shitzu belonging to the owners. Rita bought some Frontline for her dog, also a maltese/shitzu. Emily has had four bichon frises but said it was too painful when they died, so she no longer has a dog.

Met up with Sim at 6 am today for a run as planned. Her friends Alan and Akia, who I met yesterday when we all found ourselves in the same tambang, also came along. We headed off along the waterfront. Yesterday, when it looked like Sim wasn't going to show, I'd asked a guy who was running past to keep an eye out for a Chinese runner who looked like she might be waiting for someone. When I'd given up waiting and started to run, he was coming back and said he hadn't seen anyone. Today, soon after we started running, he appeared again. When he saw me he pointed to Sim and said, 'This is who you were waiting for yesterday?' It turned out they run together all the time! (They are both retired public servants.) So, Johnny joined us and we were now five runners.

Sim and I decided to do the 10K run on top of the 2Ks we did along the river, and Johnny and Akia went some of the way with us before heading back. Our route was through the suburbs, over a long bridge, and then back along the main road. We cut down to the kampung the way I went yesterday and got a tambang (my Chinese friends just call them sampans) back over to the south bank.

Sim is 60, and a good strong runner. Her daughters are a doctor and a pharmacist. A couple of years ago Sim climbed the Pinnacles, which I've been worrying about. After talking with her I felt reassured that I might be able to manage it. In any case, there's only one way up and one way down, so if I lose my nerve I'll just wait it out.

My visit to Miri on the 19th to speak with people from the Society of Sarawakians Writing in English is now a major event. Apparently, I'm a "rare gem" to come into the lives of wannabe writers in English in northern Sarawak, and Jennie Soh isn't letting the opportunity slip by. I'll meet her when she flies into Kuching from Miri late on Sunday night, and before I fly out to Miri first thing the next morning. The "New Sarawak Tribune" is now also on the story!

It's all very surreal. I spent all day working on a job for my client in Singapore and keeping my feet on the ground.

Sleepless in Sarawak

2010-06-08T18:37:00.007+10:00

I tossed and turned last night, unable to turn my mind off. Up early and down to the waterfront to meet Sim at 5.50. By just after six she hadn't shown, so I ran a couple of kilometres and then decided to take a tambang across the river and run around the kampungs. It's very odd over on that side: there are some significant buildings — the Legislative Assembly Hall (shown here), the Astana, or former Rajah's palace, and Fort Marguerite — but I couldn't find how to get to the first two. Roads and paths just dwindle to nothing. The buildings seem to be plonked down in the middle of nowhere, though they are seen to advantage from this side of the river. I got quite lost, and was a bit wary of dogs, and ended up sort of scrambling through someone's backyard to get to a laneway that took me to a narrow road, that took me back down to the river. From there I walked back along to the tambang jetty. I was one of the first in, and we waited as more people arrived for their morning commute until it seemed no more could fit. Then a pair of legs appeared wearing running shoes, then two more pairs. It was Sim and two friends she had invited to join us on our run! I thought it was amazing that we had both chosen to cross the river and had ended up at the jetty for the return trip at about the same time! She said she'd been running a bit late.

"Sorry-ah. Tomorrow-ah? Sixaclock-ah? Wait-ah?"

Yesterday I read in "The Borneo Post" about an English-writing workshop being held on 19 June, organised by SOSWE (Society of Sarawakians Writing in English). Thinking it was being held in Kuching, I phoned up the contact given, Jennie Soh, and offered to help out if she thought I could be useful. She was keen.

I had lunch with Bernard Long, a former Old China Hand now turned Old Borneo Hand. His company researches companies and prepares "health reports" on them for clients in the US and elsewhere. Just the sort of thing I could help with, except that he does any of the rewriting that's necessary himself :-)) He has run 14 marathons.

After lunch I went to the travel desk at the Hilton and finally worked out an itinerary for next week's hike along the Headhunters Trail, and visits to longhouses and various caves in Gunung Mulu National Park in northern Sarawak. It involves five days and four nights, and four flights in small planes. I thought I'd be back in Kuching the day before I'd be needed for the writing workshop.

Today, Jennie Soh contacted me, asking if I would mind if they did a piece for "The Borneo Post", using me as a kind of drawcard to get people to come along to the workshop! That's also when I realised the workshop is in Miri, in the north. So, I've now changed my bookings to spend two nights in Miri following the trek in order to be a guest speaker. It's a totally unexpected turn of events!

I called in to see Ramsay and Alicia at Artrageous, and we're having dinner on Saturday night. I'm going to buy the work of his that I really loved and will send it back to the Albury gallery when I leave at the end of the month.

Having dinner tonight with Emily, from the laundry around the corner, who I've enjoyed chatting with. She asked for more of my cards and has been handing them out to various people.

Column #7: Footloose in Ubud

2010-06-07T11:42:00.004+10:00

Sometimes a girl just has to take time out to put her feet up and recharge her batteries.
Ubud, in Bali’s central highlands, was a good choice for a week’s recovery from the stresses of packing up my life in Oz and preparing to go on the road.
Spas abound, with prices to suit all pockets. I could wax lyrical about the all-over pampering I enjoyed for two-and-a-half hours at Skin on Jalan Gootama, and about the even more bargain-priced foot massage and pedicure I had at Fresh on Jl. Dewi Sita.
Sang Spa, on Jl. Jembawan, comes very highly recommended by my new friend Di, a graphic designer and writer from Perth who has spent many years sampling the massages and beauty treatments on offer in Ubud.
I met Di early on the morning of my second day in Bali. I was walking to the local warung for breakfast from my villa that overlooks the rice paddies, just south of town. Di was running along the roadside. I introduced myself and asked if she would mind if I joined her the next morning for a run.
I think fate intended for us to meet. We got on like a villa on fire.
During a recent visit to Vietnam, Di ran regularly around Hanoi’s Hoan Kiem Lake and recognised "Mr Chin" from my description of him in my column titled "The Quiet Australian"!
"He’s there every morning," she said.
Di and I caught up a number of times over the next few days, for runs and for meals. One morning we spent some time with a long-term Ubud resident, Canadian Cat Wheeler. Her book Dragons in the Bath: Tales from Rural Bali (available at Ganesha Books, www.ganeshabooksbali.com) is a must-read for visitors to Ubud. Cat is a catalyst for good works in the areas of literacy, dog welfare, and many other local social issues. She is also a hoot. In addition to three dogs, two turtles and a reticulated python, she has a parrot that calls out, "I love you!"
Di and I have offered to organise a dog-themed art exhibition in Ubud next year as a fundraiser for BAWA (Bali Animal Welfare Association), which is doing amazing work (www.bawabali.com).
I couldn’t leave Ubud without joining in the weekly Hash House Harriers run. It had rained for the previous three days, and clambering up and down muddy embankments and wading through knee-high irrigation ditches in the rice paddies wasn’t a lot of fun. But it was even less fun for the young American mum and her 19-month-old son who I stayed with at the back of the pack. This was Tara’s first-ever hash "run", but there was no running to be had. It was difficult just to walk. Tara showed she had the true Hash spirit, though, when she said: "If I knew there was a short cut to the finish I’d take it and start drinking."
My villa was located in a small village a 20-minute walk from the centre of Ubud. I enjoyed living in that community, having breakfast at the warung and my clothes (and running shoes) washed by the local laundry. I very happily walked into town twice a day, past paddy fields and family compounds complete with their own temple. But after dark I would take some form of transport — a taxi or, usually, a motorbike.
A lift on his motorcycle with young Made (pronounced "Marday", and meaning "second child"), who told me he had done some jogging, led to an invitation from him to go for a run in the countryside the next day. I accepted the offer, but the 30-year-old Balinese boy with the long ponytail proved to be no match for this 57-year-old Albury girl.
After leaving the bike with a friend near the Agung River, we proceeded to run straight uphill. I wondered why Made had chosen this particular route when, very soon after we had started, he stopped running, clutched at his chest and gasped, "Smo … king!"
After a number of start-stops, my well-meaning friend had to pull the pin. While he returned to our starting point to get the bike, I ran on through the luscious green landscape.
Back in Ubud, over breakfast at Kafe, Made told me he had lost three significant people in his life: two brothers to strokes, and a friend who had been a bartender at the bombed Sari Club in Kuta in 2002. He has vowed to quit smoking and start training so that we can have a proper run together when I’m back in Ubud in December.
Many Australians think of Bali as just an offshore playground. It’s a wonderful, unique place that needs both to preserve its culture and to cope with the problems of modernisation. A few dollars can go a very long way. If you would like to help in some way, contact Sue Winski, a longtime resident, the owner of the villa where I stayed, and the incoming president of Rotary, at balisue@yahoo.com for some suggestions. I donated the security deposit I’d paid for the villa to buy books for a mobile library that will visit elementary schools in the Ubud area, and Di is donating her graphic design skills to help raise awareness of the work done by BAWA.
DON’T MISS: Evening legong and gamelan performance (tickets are readily available on Ubud’s main street, Jl. Raya Ubud); salsa dancing by wait staff and salsa dance lessons at Café Havana (www.cafehavanabali.com); organic produce at Nomad (http://nomad-bali.com); The Yoga Barn (www.theyogabarn.com) for all things spiritual and alternative; and Bali Buddha (www.balibuddha.com) and Kafe (www.balispirit.com/kafe) for the chilled-out vibe.

Footsore

2010-06-04T22:50:00.007+10:00

Wah! Foot reflexology really hurts! Or does pain mean I'm in bad shape? I had a 90-minute session with a young girl whose fingers were so strong I reckon she could crack walnuts one-handed. I asked her to lighten up a little, but she just couldn't do it. A good thing it was dirt cheap.

I worked for four hours this morning, then had a cultural few hours visiting museums: the small Art Museum, which had some great sculptures of big birdlike creatures made out of found objects and recycled cans; the main Sarawak Museum, with models of dwellings of Sarawak's tribal peoples, fauna, etc; and the museum extension, where there are exhibits on Sarawak's history, which goes back to Neolithic times. From 1841 it was under the administration of the "White Rajahs", beginning with James Brooke. I had dinner tonight at a place on the waterfront named after him.

Lunch was in one of my favourite streets, Leboh Carpenter, at a little eatery called Madam Tang's that has Sarawak laksa as one of its specialties. My young waiter was a tranny, with huge false eyelashes, some sort of amazing contact lenses, and a great toss of the head. The laksa was as fabulous as she was.

Kuching: City of Harmony

2010-06-03T22:00:00.015+10:00

Kuching means "Cat City". I saw a bunch of cats in Chinatown at lunchtime, but I've seen only one dog in the two days I've been here. It's a complete contrast to Ubud, where dogs rule. I had lunch in a Philippine restaurant: stir-fried seafood and rice, and a watermelon juice.

This morning I ran up and down the waterfront a few times at around 7 am. I think the real action happens there at around 5, 5.30 am... At 7.30 I was still a bit early for a juice on India Street, though it wasn't too early to visit the Tua Pek Kong Temple.

I worked on a new job today, as well as on the textbook that I need to finish this week. I think I have a pretty good balance happening. I want to have time to do something new each day, and to experience the place I'm spending time in; but also, the work makes it possible to live this way, so I need to be respectful of schedules and the needs of my clients. I'm still really excited about my new life!

I made friends with Emily at the Chinese laundry around the corner today. Hotel laundry costs are outrageous, even at this lovely family-run hotel (www.limetreehotel.com.my) that I was lucky to choose to be my home for a month. Julie, the daughter of the family, solved an IT problem for me and has been super-helpful. She even found for me a hanging cloth wardrobe tidy, so that I can put everything from my suitcase in the wardrobe. (Jenny, would you believe I ironed everything I own today?)

I'm really bowled over by people here.

After work I headed out and revisited Ramsay Ong at his gallery to have another look at the work I'm going to buy, and I called in again to see Derrick Chin at Asiana Gallery. There are a couple of his pieces at my hotel.

By accident, I discovered that Kuching has a cinema, on the ninth floor of a gaudily painted high-rise. Thankfully, most of Kuching's central district is still low-rise, with old shophouses and artisan streets. Great for wandering and exploring... For three bucks, though, I might have to go and see a few blockbusters.

The dragon boat teams were out training again tonight. Exciting to watch.

I took a tambang (small motorised taxi boat) over to the kampung (village) on the other bank of the Sarawak River. The astana (castle) that was the residence of the first to third rajahs of Sarawak from the mid-1880s is on this bank. These rajahs were British, but Sarawak didn't actually become a British colony until after the Second World War.

There are a couple of big open-air food outlets on the riverbank. I had seafood noodles (I can see I'm going to be noodled out after Kuching!) while listening to the Muslim call to prayer.

While I waited for the tambang back to my side of the river I got chatting with a bunch of young boys who were hanging out together at the jetty smoking cigarettes after footy training. The alpha male among them was very friendly and we talked about Australia and New Zealand, where he said he wanted to visit, and about Kuching, which I said I was very happy to be spending time in. They passed my card from hand to hand, enjoying recognising the reference to King Kong, then handed it back up the line to the alpha male who asked to keep it.

Sunset in Sarawak

2010-06-02T21:24:00.004+10:00

I think Kuching and I might become buddies. I could also get quite fat here. You could graze all day on the most wonderful Malaysian, Indian, Chinese and Thai hawker food, and iced juices and fruit teas.

I'm here for a month, staying at The Lime Tree, a quite groovy family-owned boutique hotel in a great location in Chinatown, about a 5-minute walk to the waterfront. The promenade alongside the Sarawak River is 1 km in length, so that's where I'll be running in the mornings.

This morning I met two really interesting locals. Derrick Chin has a business making fabulous furniture from recycled Borneo timbers (www.asiana.com.my). If I was setting up house, instead of having just dismantled mine, I would have been tempted to buy about four pieces from him. Ramsay Ong is a local artist who has exhibited worldwide. I really liked a lot of his work when I had a look through his gallery ARTrageously (www.artrageouslyasia.com), but one work really stood out for me. Well, two, but the other one is out of my price range! I spoke with him for some time. A lovely, gentle man. He lived for eight years in Kandy, Sri Lanka, which I loved when my sister and I were there in 1992. He has used leaves from the bodhi tree in this work. It has a lot of depth. Very beautiful. Just the other day, he watched the documentary "Herb and Dorothy", which I was talking to friends in Albury about recently. I saw it last year in New York and I bought the DVD to watch again when I'm back there in September.

I worked this afternoon, then went out for another jalan-jalan (stroll) in the late afternoon. Had an early dinner on the waterfront, where five dragon boat teams were training for the big regatta that's being held in July.