Archives: Guide

The plan is to get a train to Dammam. I’m only going because I want to keep my visa multiple and I have to cross a border and the nearest and most accessible is Bahrain. To do this I need to get to Dammam and then get...

‘Excuse me?’ I asked with stress in my voice. The mechanic stopped drilling and looked up. He stamped out his cigarette and babbled. I looked at my friends, none of us spoke a word of French and we were all tense.

Our business trip to Guangzhou China - We were driving 1 hour to the factory, the sky was a dark charcoal colour..I commented 'Looks like we are in for a bad storm'? " Oh no " the driver said that is "Prousion"

No pun intended but I love playing with words. My son asks: “Is this place called Amman because a man sings all day?” He was referring to the mosque calling, my seven year old boy. “Maybe it’s because a man...

The tiny, overcrowded bus from Santorini’s capital, Firà, came to a screeching halt, and unceremoniously dumped its sweaty passengers onto the black volcanic sand of Perissa beach. “God, it’s hot”, observed...

Setting off from my house in Barka, near Muscat, at 4am I meet an Indian neighbour sitting in the comfortable dark cool of the morning; we smile and wish each other a good morning. I start the car and note that the...

We are lost. Hopelessly lost in Chandni Chowk, the ‘moonlit market’, in a sensory overload of nighttime noise and colour. The streets that seem so benign in the daylight quickly become the place where two unescorted...

O dear, have I ever been in a place I didn’t want to be? Possibly while picnicking on yesterday’s cold parathas, heavy oily flannels of indigestible dough unwrapped from the car boot and three layers of foil on the...

Note to self. Next time you go to Hong Kong for new years, book a room in advance. After hours of walking I finally found a hotel with a vacancy. The owner called his wife to show me to my room.

Who knew a 45 second encounter with a girl no more than 12, could have such an impact? It’s been 3 years, and I still think of her often. I wonder if she feels the same.