A New Chapter

I said to a friend a few months ago that I find it perfectly possible to fall head over heels in love ten times a day. The guy who sits down at a table nearby and runs his fingers through his hair just so; the man who looks across from a train carriage that is temporarily adjacent in a station before you are both whisked to opposing places; the one who brushes past you in a packed bar and, for the briefest moment, there is a shared understanding of what might have been.

When you travel, life becomes an endless series of departures and separations. However brief the encounter it always lingers somewhere in the back of your mind – and occasionally, as I did just a few days ago, you'll stumble across something tangible to remind you of that moment (in this instance, a photograph of a sunset and 'without words' scrawled across the back). The thing with these moments is that you can be everything you ever thought you wanted to be: it is a meeting defined by its transience, by the sure knowledge of its imminent ending. It's an addictive feeling, everything being charged with passion and promise and the certainty of the exquisite agony of heartbreak.

Which of you readers hasn't forged your own conclusions as to why I've travelled? The Armchair Critic: everyone's favourite role to play, with lines of the likes of 'Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus' playing a starring role in the analysis. I've concluded there's little point trying to explain, since most of you won't believe it over your own versions anyway.

But I can tell you why I pulled the plug on yet another supposed 'trip of a lifetime' a few days ago. (And for the record, I don't define anything I've done in that way and I never have. It's been my whole life, not an add-on that has appeared temporarily.) Honestly, I'm just tired. I have exhausted an entire gamut of emotions by forcing upon myself a 'series of little deaths'. When you find yourself in a beautiful place and you are actively looking for a flaw, you realise it is time to stop for a while. And hey, I ended on a high: thanks to years of air miles I came back from New York into London on a business class flight, complete with a massage and a champagne cocktail to wind down and celebrate the last thirteen years of my life.

I bumped into a box of old photographs a few evenings ago and I re-lived moments from Australia to Zambia. Nobody can ever take away those memories that have defined and refined me, and no one other person will ever know everything I've seen and felt and loved.

It's time to find work that I care about and believe in, and to find peace in familiarity. The 'what ifs' I've created over the years need acknowledging. Most folks, said Abraham Lincoln, are about as happy as they have made up their minds to be – and I've a hell of a lot to be happy about over the coming weeks. There are Christmas trees and heartfelt hugs and laughter and wine and windswept cliffs, all providing the perfect backdrop to my new determination to forge a niche that takes the impact of over a decade of truly global experiences and transforms it into something extraordinary.

“I have an idea that the only thing which makes it possible to regard this world we live in without disgust is the beauty which now and then men create out of the chaos. The pictures they paint, the music they compose, the books they write, and the lives they lead. Of all these the richest in beauty is the beautiful life. That is the perfect work of art.”  ['The Painted Veil', Somerset Maugham.]

Fifty literary feasts

Inspired by the somewhat uninspiring suggestions given on this website, http://flavorwire.com/403319/50-places-every-literary-fan-should-visit/view-all here is my own list of fifty places every fan of literature should want to visit. The original focuses rather heavily on America and merely staring at a house where somebody happened to be born. Mine is, to my mind at least, infinitely more interesting – although I am ready for the accusations that my list is, in turn, overly English in flavour... These are in no particular order, but it would be wrong to start without mentioning Shakespeare: I'm not quite sure how the author of the original list managed to justify eliminating him.

1) Shakespeare. You could visit Stratford-upon-Avon and wander around the grounds of Anne Hathaway's cottage, or head across to London and see a performance at the Globe Theatre. Alternatively, hop on up to Scotland and see Cawdor Castle – yes, Macbeth's Castle is open to visitors – http://www.cawdorcastle.com/. Or sidle over to Denmark and check out Hamlet's old haunt - http://www.kronborg.dk/english/
2) Austen. Since her home is really rather lovely and houses an excellent library (it is where I first stumbled across the works of Elizabeth Thomas, subject of my thesis) I will include this 'come and stare at a house' option - http://www.jane-austens-house-museum.org.uk/
3) Pemberly. Go and find your Mr Darcy emerging from the lake at Lyme Park: http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/lyme-park/ Incidentally, 'Pride and Prejudice' is 200 years old this year.
4) The Brontes. Here you get a bargainous 'four in one' offer if you visit the Old Parsonage in Haworth. It's a gorgeous old house in a great little village. The more morbid among you can even go and visit the grave of Bramwell Bronte, where Emily caught a cold attending his funeral; her cold rapidly developed into consumption and she died shortly after. http://www.bronte.org.uk/
5) Wilde. You can visit various homes of his in Dublin, but I'm more of a fan of Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Lather on the lipstick and add a kiss to Wilde's grave: http://www.bestourism.com/img/items/big/6784/Pere-Lachaise-Cemetery-in-Paris-France_Oscar-Wilde-messages_7697.jpg
6) Rimbaud. Yes, he really did wander off to Ethiopia, change his identity and try to eke out his life anonymously. Some pesky tourists recognised him though and blew his cover. Still, it's as good an excuse as any to visit a stunning country: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mytripsmypics/164716940/
7) Hemingway. He went everywhere... My recommendation here, though, is a trip to Kilimanjaro – inspiration for 'The Snows of Kilimanjaro'. Get there before the snow disappears completely. http://www.tanzaniaparks.com/kili.html
8) Hemingway and Orson Wells and Truman Capote – and a few others. Wander over to Venice and hang out in Harry's Bar. Drink a few gallons of mojito and maybe you'll come up with something akin to 'Farewell to Arms': http://www.harrysbarvenezia.com/
9) Umberto Eco. While we're in Italy, we'll make a quick mention of Eco. His most famous work, 'The Name of the Rose', is set in a monastery – arguably inspired by the Moissac Abbey in southern France, http://tourisme.moissac.fr/abbaye-moissac/
10) Browning and Browning. Another double whammy, get to see Robert and Elizabeth's home in Florence, the Casa Guidi. Not only can you see it, if you fork out a small fortune you can even stay there: http://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/search-and-book/properties/casa-guidi-5521
11) Joyce. It's impossible not to mention the annual Bloomsday Festival in Dublin, honouring Leopold Bloom from 'Ulysses'. Dress up in Edwardian costume and follow Bloom's route around Dublin: http://www.visitdublin.com/event/Bloomsday_Festival
12) Woolf. Stay in a cosy little chalet with perfect views reaching across to the lighthouse that inspired Woolf's famous book, 'To the Lighthouse'. http://www.chycor.co.uk/gwithian-towans-chalets-stives-seareach/
13) E M Forster. There are too many places to choose from, so I'm sending you back to Florence – this time, to follow in the footsteps of Lucy Honeychurch, heroine of 'Room with a View'. If Mr Darcy didn't show up on your 'Pemberly' visit, perhaps you'll find your own George in a field near Florence. Just don't forget your macintosh square: http://mmimageslarge.moviemail-online.co.uk/21879_Room-With-1.jpg
14) D H Lawrence. I could send you to the somewhat 'grim north' where Lawrence lived most of his life, but I prefer to despatch you to New Mexico. See if you can also convince the curator to let you in to the now closed DH Lawrence Ranch: http://www.sfreporter.com/santafe/article-7311-ghost-ranch.html
15) Dante. I really should have organised this list more effectively... You're now going back to Florence, and when you are done with the Brownings and Forster you can take a wonderful guided tour of Dante's world. His home is now an excellent little museum – you can buy 'The Inferno' on a single poster should you wish to ruin your eyes with the tiny print: http://www.walkaboutflorence.com/articles/dante-florence
16) P L Travers. Who the devil, I hear you ask, is P L Travers? Why, the author of 'Mary Poppins', of course! And you can visit her unbelievably cute home over in Australia (yes, she was Australian, not British – how many myths have I just busted for you?). There's a lovely article on the TravelBelles website: http://www.travelbelles.com/2013/05/mary-poppins-house-queensland/
17) Paul Scott. Again, I anticipate your eyebrows being raised. Paul Scott is author of the engrossing 'Raj Quartet', filmed by the BBC as 'The Jewel in the Crown'. If you haven't read it or seen it, move it to the top of the 'must experience' pile. Afterwards, you'll be hankering after a trip to India – I suggest heading up to Srinagar, where the British used to retreat to houseboats in the height of the summer. You can even stay on a boat called 'The Jewel in the Crown': http://www.thejewelincrown.com/
18) Confucius. Well, not an author of fiction but he did write some cracking lines, didn't he? And besides, I wanted an excuse to send you to China. His former home is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site - http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/704
19) Baudelaire. After you've left your mark on Wilde's grave, wander across to the cemetery in Montparnasse and see Baudelaire's grave. Yes, I'm a fan of cemeteries. That isn't morbid - they are just peaceful places where I like to sit and think: http://www.poetsgraves.co.uk/baudelaire.htm
20) Dostoyevsky. Visit St Petersburg, arguably the most stunning of Russia's fine and dramatic cities; it's an easy train ride from many parts of Europe. And while you are there, head to the Dostoyevsky museum. You might not have waded through any of his tomes, but honestly, who the heck has? It's still worthy of a visit: http://www.saint-petersburg.com/museums/dostoyevsky-memorial-museum/
21) Achebe. In 'Things Fall Apart', Achebe writes about the 'evil forest' where Christian missionaries have been given land to build their church; this was inspired by his time in Oba-Igbomina, where the school he taught at was built on 'bad bush', an area of land said to be haunted by unfriendly spirits. Head off to Oba-Igbomina and experience something of Achebe's fascinating life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oba,_Nigeria
22) Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Colombian writer, known for his use of magical realism (a technique that, in all honesty, I'm not a huge fan of – and indeed a literary term that I have issues with in itself, but that is for another day). Visit Aracataca, the hometown of Marquez and supposedly the inspiration for Macondo, setting for 'One Hundred Years of Solitude'. http://www.colombia.travel/en/international-tourist/sightseeing-what-to-do/colombia-thematic-routes/garcia-marquez/aracataca
23) Coelho. Some of Paulo Coelho's books are worth reading, but I have found that his interesting ideas are generally just repeated throughout all the books. Read two, and you've read 'em all. Nevertheless, he's a fascinating author and has dominated the international literary scene for over a decade. My personal favourite is 'Veronika Decides to Die', and although you might take Coelho as an excuse to make a pilgrimage to Brazil, I'm sending you instead to Slovenia. To Ljubljana, in fact, where the book is set: http://www.visitljubljana.com/
24) Neruda. (See? There is some sense of order here – three South American authors in a row.) Visit the home in Santiago he built for his secret love, and while there be sure to learn enough Spanish to read 'Tonight I can write the saddest lines' - http://allpoetry.com/poem/8497013-Tonight_I_Can_Write__The_Saddest_Lines_-by-Pablo_Neruda - in the original language: http://www.fundacionneruda.org/en/la-chascona/history.html
25) Antal Szerb. One of my favourite authors by far, the few books he managed to write before his murder (let's just say he was Jewish at a bad time in history to be Jewish in Europe) are little segments of perfection. You'll have to go to Budapest in Hungary if you want to see where he grew up. One excellent spot for a pilgrimage would be to visit the beautiful University of Szeged where he worked for a few years, http://www.inf.u-szeged.hu/~chollo/Kepek/rektori.jpg
26) Goethe. While wandering around Europe, you may as well hop up to Frankfurt and visit the birthplace of Goethe. I'm not a great one for staring at a house where somebody was born, but architecturally this is really rather stunning: http://www.altfrankfurt.com/Goethe/
27) Lorca. The Spanish playwright gives us an excellent reason to wander through Andalucia (avoid those lemons Stewart warns us of while you're driving around). 'The House of Bernada Alba' could be set in any of the white-washed hilltop villages, so you can head off to a number of them and choose which you think is the most probable location. http://www.andalucia.com/
28) Lessing. Doris Lessing's 'The Grass is Singing' is an incredible read. And for this, I'm posting you off to a little known game park in southern Zimbabwe. Us literary geeks want an excuse to go on safari, too: http://www.expertafrica.com/zimbabwe/gonarezhou-national-park
29) Westminster Abbey. I am of course referring to Poets' Corner, the ultimate site to visit when searching for the tombs of famous authors. Tennyson, Dickens, Shakespeare, Kipling and Hardy jostle for elbow room here, and there are memorials to Blake, Milton, Gray, Keats – oh, everyone. They charge a fortune to get in, but I guess it's worth it for the sheer number of literary greats you'll be in close quarters with: http://www.westminster-abbey.org/visit-us/highlights/poets-corner
30) Waugh. I can't get enough of Evelyn Waugh (and particularly love the fact he was married to somebody called Evelyn, too). There are so many places you could visit in honour of 'Brideshead Revisited' – the botanical gardens at Oxford to 'see the ivy', or Morocco to find where Sebastian ended up, or Venice to follow their footsteps through the galleries – but I love the film as much as the book so am sending you up to the gorgeous Castle Howard in Yorkshire: http://www.castlehoward.co.uk/
31) Derek Tangye. Yet more querying looks shot my way, but I love Cornwall and I loved Tangye's books telling the tales of his life running a daffodil farm on the Cornish coast. I visited him for my 13th birthday and we exchanged letters for a while, with him sending me photos of his donkeys Merlin and Suzy from time to time. Head down to Lamorna Cove in Cornwall and, for a truly perfect day out, finish round the corner watching a play at the Minack Theatre – a stone amphitheatre cut into the rocks with the sea serving as a dramatic backdrop. http://minack.info/ and http://www.minack.com/ will help you plan.
32) Du Maurier. While in Cornwall, take a chance to visit some of the sites du Maurier wrote about. You can hop in a small motorboat and head up the Helston River, inspiration for 'Frenchman's Creek': http://www.falriver.co.uk/things-to-do/walking/frenchmans-creek
33) Hans Christian Andersen. He penned the fairytale 'The Little Mermaid', and whether you're a fan of the book or the Disney film it's worth heading over to Denmark to see the statue in Copenhagen harbour: http://www.mermaidsculpture.dk/
34) Anne Frank. If you are in Europe and longing to see anything of importance to writers from the past, it would be wrong to miss out on Anne Frank's home in Amsterdam. It is a haunting, sobering experience: http://www.annefrank.org/
35) Agatha Christie. Stroll around the grounds and sit at her desk at Christie's beloved summer home down on the Devonshire coast. It is a beautiful home and well worth a visit for anyone who has ever been caught up in one of her twisting plots: http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/greenway/
36) The Eagle and Child. I like to give value for money, and by visiting The Eagle and Child in Oxford you get to spend time in the pub where The Inklings used to meet – that would be CS Lewis, JR Tolkien and their other literary friends. http://www.nicholsonspubs.co.uk/theeagleandchildoxford/
37) Scott Fitzgerald. He spent plenty of time being horrifically drunk in Paris, and he offers yet another good reason to go to the ultimate romantic city. On one occasion, he hijacked a baker's bike and went on a joyride down the Champs-Elysees, wielding a baguette at the doormen as he sped by. Take a literary tour if you can't be bothered to find all the places by yourself: http://www.blouinartinfo.com/travel/slideshow/city-walks-f-scott-fitzgeralds-paris/?image=0
38) Klein Constantia. Including a vineyard could come as a surprise – but I have good reason to. Klein Constantia in Cape Town was mentioned in books by both the Bronte sisters and Charles Dickens, and that seems like a viable excuse to head down to sample some of their finest wines: http://www.kleinconstantia.com/
39) J G Ballard. Typically known for his gripping dystopias, 'Empire of the Sun' tells the story of his childhood growing up in war torn Shanghai. It's a city worth visiting anyway, not least because it features a railway that 'floats' thanks to scary magnet technology that I don't even want to think about, but this book gives you another reason to head off to China: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/56674.Empire_of_the_Sun
40) McEwan. He went from writing saucy short stories to some of the most beautifully crafted novels of the present day. I'm not generally a fan of the authors who are currently churning work out, but Ian McEwan is formidable. 'Chesil Beach' is a perfect novelette, and you can wander along the beach too. Stay here for some stunning views of the beach: http://chesilbeachlodge.co.uk/
41) Orwell. Born in India, raised in Henley, and spending his life travelling to some wonderful far flung corners, I've decided to whisk you away to Myanmar where he spent the war years. He was initially stationed in Pyin Oo Lwin, now known as the 'city of flowers': http://www.pyinoolwin.info/
42) Larsson. Head over to Stockholm to take a tour of the places featured in 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo'. The Telegraph have summed up the options pretty well, so I'll just link to their article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/cruises/9111563/Stockholm-on-the-trail-of-the-Girl-with-the-Dragon-Tattoo.html
43) Kundera. He was born in the Czech Republic but now insists he is French. Still, his love letter to Prague, 'The Unbearable Lightness of Being', means you have an excuse to visit the Czech Republic after all. Go to the Globe Bookstore for top tips on where to go and what to see on a literary tour of Prague: http://www.globebookstore.cz/
44) Kafka. While you are in Prague, you'll doubtless want to take the time to see the endless sites devoted to Kafka. Go everywhere from his place of birth to his tombstone, and use this site to help you find the bits that matter in the middle: http://globaltravelauthors.com/145-2/
45) Camus. Visit sprawling Algiers and follow Meursault's footsteps to the beach. Perhaps try to avoid any particularly bright patches of sunshine if you're in a tetchy sort of mood... http://0.tqn.com/d/goafrica/1/0/o/E/dv676195.jpg
46) Tolstoy. Go to Moscow and visit the train station, where Anna Karenina first met Vronsky, and where she threw herself under a train. Alternatively, if you actually liked the recently released film, you'll have to go to the slightly less glamorous Didcot Railway Station that was used: http://www.didcotrailwaycentre.org.uk/filmandfunction/filmtv_credits.html
47) Borges. I love Buenos Aires – it is a city that is alive with an unashamed and intense passion – and a pilgrimage to see something of where Borges lived much of his life means you'll get to experience it, too. The NY Times has done this better than I can in a few short sentences: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/14/travel/14foot.html?pagewanted=all
48) Somerset Maugham. 'The Painted Veil' will send you over to Hong Kong, where the expat lifestyle today is dubiously unchanged from that described in the novel set in the 1920s. (In fact, it was so close to the truth that with the threat of being sued hanging over him, Maugham changed the name of the city to Tching-Yen.) John Le Carre's 'The Honourable Schoolboy', sequel to, 'Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy', is also set in Hong Kong. Wander through the streets and see where they drew their inspiration from: http://www.discoverhongkong.com/login.html
49) Tennessee Williams. Finally, I'll put in something truly American. New Orleans has an annual literary festival dedicated to this formidable writer, and while you are there you can wander round and try to find where you think Stella and Stanley may have been living – and, although it doesn't follow the original route, you really can ride on the streetcar named Desire (albeit in San Francisco): http://www.tennesseewilliams.net/ and http://www.streetcar.org/streetcars/952/
50) St Vincent Millay. Her poetry often brings me to tears... And you can wander around her former home in upstate New York. https://www.gardenconservancy.org/garden-preservation/gardenpreservationservices/preservation-projects/steepletop?view=standardlayout&title=68

And there you have it. If you actually read through all of those, congratulations. I apologise for not having the fancy skills to put photos for every place, but hopefully the weblinks suffice for now. I would love to lead a tour of all these sites... Ah, some day!

On being in quiet control

I seem to remember writing a few months ago that 2013 felt significant in some way; maybe it's because I'd decided – without even really realising – that it was the year I'd set about defining and redefining a few truths about myself.

And without warning, up rocked yesterday's odd combination of conversations and happenstances. The great news first: I was back in a rowing boat for the first time in over two years and, damn, it was a wonderful feeling. It felt right that I was there, sitting in the middle of a river glaring at blades defying my requests. For a brief moment (and only rowers will understand this point) our double sat up beautifully and bubbles rushed under the bow; it's an addictive sound that is always accompanied by a beaming grin. Anybody walking along the riverbank tuning in to my mutterings would have listened to half an hour of quiet cursing followed by a jubilant, 'Oh my God! We've got bubbles!'

I find myself now sitting in a friend's absent landlady's bedroom. It's a lovely house, crammed with quirks and trinkets from travels; there's a would-be office that has essentially been abandoned after a failed attempt to launch a business, and a bathroom that defies the laws of physics by packing so much in to so very small a room. The landlady is pushing fifty, a single vegetarian with odd vestiges of Buddhism draped around her world. It strikes me as the sort of home I might someday create – and that terrifies me. I don't know what life holds for me, but in twenty years' time I don't want to be that caricature.

Two people have surprised me in the last week by essentially having the attitude they work hard at what they do and that is the extent of their involvement with their own future. There's no 'end goal', just a constant determination to complete tasks to the best of their ability, presumably with the belief that things will come their way when they are meant to. It seems horribly fatalistic. On a topical note, I can't imagine Margaret Thatcher did anything other than work her cotton socks off to get from living above a greengrocer's shop to becoming such a significant leader she is being honoured with a funeral just a step below that of one afforded to a member of the monarchy.

It is too easy to say everything will happen as it should in the end, so why bother fighting. I have always maintained that life will only happen to you if you make yourself available to it: park yourself at home in front of the television and the most exciting thing that could occur is a rampant bulldozer appearing in your living room. There may be a great many things I've missed out on by constantly moving around but at least I have developed my own philosophy and my own ideas, not merely borrowed from articles I've read or conversations I've overheard.

I wonder if it is coincidence that both of these people who had that attitude are going through a divorce at the moment. Nobody told them to marry: it was a conscious decision on both their parts, wanting to be with a particular person for the rest of their lives. And I do believe that both, albeit under very different circumstances, did marry with that intention in mind. Their choice, their action, is now being spectacularly undermined. And in retaliation to these events, they lead lives that are simultaneously hectic and in part hedonistic while working, working, always working. Work is something you can control, and something that won't let you down.

Here's an analogy that just came to mind. I've visited Kruger many times over the past three years; you will see no more animals if you race along the roads glancing desperately from side to side than if you spend a few hours parked up by a watering hole at the right time of day. The first will leave you stressed and tired and more than moderately fed up, whereas the second will leave you relaxed and satisfied. In other words, put yourself in the right place and, given time and space and a fair dose of calm, the world will provide you with offerings more extraordinary and wonderful than you could ever have imagined. The hard work is getting yourself to the right place at the right time, and having the strength to let go just a little.

“I feel bad for thinking it, but I know it's true. Not thinking about things doesn't make them not true.”

A temporary disillusionment with the countryside

Welcome to the south of France. If you've watched the right movies, you'll know it as a place of endless fields of sunflowers and lavender and row upon row of orderly vines drooping with grapes. Old men play petanque in the dappled sunshine, people hop on their bikes to pop down to the local boulangerie for their morning baguette, and everywhere is lit by a sun that doesn't ever seem to shine over England.

And in pursuit of that sun and those vistas, the Brits have set about invading France. I can't be bothered to do the statistics, maybe somebody else has, but I imagine the destruction that has taken place since Peter Mayle wrote 'A Year in Provence' has been more permanently damaging than anything the Germans achieved during the Second World War.

Thanks to many properties being snapped up as 'holiday homes' by class-climbing Brits, the villages have disintegrated. My local one has a boulangerie, a post office that is open a couple of hours a day a few times a week, and a pharmacy. There is a church where the doors are always locked, and a garage that never seems to be open. Oh, and a petrol station selling fuel at prices nearly 15% higher than at the supermarket 10km down the road. I noticed this morning that there's a B&B with rooms for a meagre 15 euros a night. That shouldn't inspire cries of, 'my, what a bargain!' but rather it reveals how desperate the residents are for some money. Any money.

Some of these houses have stood here for hundreds of years, but are reaching that point where they are no longer decaying gently but vigorously. Overstuffed postboxes from uninhabited homes spill bright flyers onto the cobbles. The depression is almost palpable.

I went to the market in a nearby town last week. It was a warm, bright day and people had emerged from wherever they are hiding to wander round the stalls; everyone was either ancient, or ageing and English. I've been told that the English who did make the effort and move here have since understood the reality of being in an area which offers no laid on entertainment within a two hour radius, and they've taken to alcohol to numb the reality that they've tied up their savings in a property that they will almost certainly never be able to sell.

This business of 'second homes' has destroyed communities. I know that's not a novel idea, but I've never been anywhere the evidence is quite so starkly laid before me. Supermarkets have sucked the life out of towns.

In a country that is known the world over for romance, I don't know of a florist within about an hour's drive (and it could easily be further than that, I just haven't wandered that far yet); the only flowers for sale are in supermarkets. Paris doesn't represent France any more than London does England. And there's something for politicians to take note of: what is relevant and important in London isn't necessarily relevant and important in the rest of England. When does Cameron go to Cornwall except on a summer vacation, when of course all looks lively and well because the place is packed out with tourists? Visit even the most popular tourist spots in the depths of winter and the only cure for the resultant depression is alcohol.

I've always held the belief that life doesn't just happen to you; you have to get out there and make yourself available for life to come and tap you on the shoulder. It seems such a shame that these days 'life' is synonymous with 'cities'. Idyllic rural life has become idle rural life. I might have to reluctantly acknowledge that my next move must be towards a city – it just seems frustratingly ironic that rents are higher in places where there is more for you to spend your money on anyway. Someone should sort that out.

[For the record, this feels like a viewpoint that will almost undoubtedly change in the near future. I'm just currently a little disillusioned with everything.]

“I have no relish for the country; it is a kind of healthy grave.” (Sydney Smith – English wit, writer, and Anglican cleric)

Promoting Adoptions

Just as there is Godwin's Law stating that every argument will eventually wind up with a comparison to Hitler or the Nazis, so there should also be a law that all idle Internet meanderings will result in watching an Ellen DeGeneres video on YouTube.

The last few days have seen me trawling the Internet even more so than usual, thanks to picking up a whole litany of lurgies simultaneously: an ear infection accompanied by a chest infection and tonsillitis does not a Happy Jane make. Battling just the one is hard enough, but the unHoly Trinity is genuinely exhausting. I'm shattered.

Incidentally – going spectacularly off-topic here, but all in a good cause – I was urgently googling in the middle of Friday night for 'home remedies' to cure an ear ache. For reasons I cannot fathom, one of them actually worked: if you're ever wanting to claw your own ear off thanks to an infernal pain inside, take a small piece of onion, warm it in the microwave, and pop it in your ear. Leave it there for a few minutes and you will soon forget your ear ever had an issue. An equally pungent alternative is to create some garlic oil (chopped garlic and olive oil) and pop a few drops of that into the lug hole. (What the devil did we do pre-Internet?)

And now swerving sharply back towards my topic of the moment...

There was a DeGeneres clip that was something or another to do with adoption, and via a series of twists and turns I ended up on the website of an American couple asking for donations to help them adopt a Russian child. More specifically, a little girl with Down's Syndrome who had been abandoned at birth. My immediate reaction was to proffer up a mental face-palm to a site asking for donations for this cause, before I bothered to read on a little. They've broken down the costings and, in doses of $100 or so dollars at a time, demonstrated why it costs around US$40,000 for an American to adopt a child from Russia. (Bear in mind that thanks to Putin it is now impossible for any American to do so, but this is harking back to the good old pre-2013 days.)

Out of curiosity, I googled the cost of IVF treatment. In a nutshell, the sum is unlimited: you could be lucky and have success on the first course of treatment, or it could take you many cycles. And don't forget that what the clinic quotes is only a fraction of what you'll really pay: there is the time needed off work, the travelling to and from appointments, the scans, the tests, the checks, the drugs – and the emotional strain it inevitably puts a couple under.

Did you know that, in the UK at least, one in seven couples struggle to conceive? That's a far higher figure than I ever imagined it to be, and rather marginalises the typical argument of, 'it's so unfair that we can't have a child – everybody else can'.

There are two aspects of this wretched situation that are playing on my mind: 1) why don't more couples readily accept their inability to create a child between them and move towards the adoption route? There are literally hundreds of thousands of children already hanging around in desperate need of loving parents. 2) why on earth is it so damn difficult for people to adopt? Never mind the rather complex relations of the Russia/America controversy, it's difficult enough in your own country to adopt a child. Why? Who the devil is creating these rules and regulations?

Regarding the latter, I know of a couple – both solicitors, both respectable, hard-working and high-earning individuals – who struggled to conceive and so decided to adopt. They battled for years, having to prove themselves to squadrons of social workers, and finally, finally, they have a little boy. Even then, they didn't actually know until the day they picked him up whether they would be allowed to walk away with him.

That one in seven statistic is still knocking me sideways. Why don't more of these couples head down the adoption route? However stressful, it is infinitely preferable to the prodding and probing involved in IVF – and at a mere £160 in the UK it is a bargain in comparison. Women also have the benefit of not needing to go through that whole pregnancy and birth business: no stretch marks, no aching back, no impossible decisions between slicing or splitting. Yes, it might seem tough that you are unable to have a child of your own – but those are the cards you've been dealt, and those are the cards you must play with.

People are always so intent on fighting for their human rights that they forget to be human themselves. Maya Angelou – a phenomenal woman who, along with the likes of Ellen DeGeneres, raises the bar for the rest of us – reminds us that, 'People will forget what you said; people will forget what you did – but people will never forget how you made them feel'. It's a simple but profound truth that if people stopped demanding for themselves and rather thought what they could do for others, life would be rather more worth living for all of us.

I am fully aware of my own faults and I know the areas I need to work on. But I am often entertained by those who sigh and say, 'my, you always meet such interesting people! I never manage that!' The trick is to genuinely believe that everyone has a story worth telling and to ease it out of them. They say that art of pleasing is to be pleased, and I would add that the art of seeing someone as interesting is to be interested.

'Trust that little voice in your head that says, 'Wouldn't it be interesting if...' - and then do it.'

Lazy Blogging

[This was written last August as I meandered around Italy; it's still vaguely relevant and I haven't the time just now to create an entry about what has been flitting through my mind of late.]

Yet another return to the abandoned blog – I wonder how long it will be resurrected for this time? As a general rule, I start blogging when I am dealing with something significant in my life. Chances are that I won't directly write about the relevant event, but reaching out the odd feeler into the virtual stratosphere is a way of becoming reconnected once more.

I have often thought that some people appear in your world for a brief period, to serve a particular – not necessarily identifiable – purpose. And writing this makes me remember waiting for a friend in a bar in London a few years back. It was relatively busy, but I managed to get a table to myself and settled down to watch whatever it was on the television. I think it might have been Wimbledon. Anyhow, an elderly gentleman was looking around for somewhere to sit, pint in hand, and I offered him the spare seat at my table. I had been feeling particularly anti-social at that point, wrapped up in whatever was bothering me. But we started talking; I remember he was visiting from Ireland, and had spent the last few days in the archives at the British Library.

Honestly, I don't recall much else. Other than he made some very perceptive remarks to me, comments that for some reason I needed to hear at that point. It was as if a guardian angel had temporarily popped down for a pint. I have met such people on trains and planes, people you have a particular and utterly unexpected conversation with that reveals something about yourself or the world that makes it all become crystal clear for a moment.

On a recent flight, I was parked next to a large ginger guy armed with a McDonald's paper bag – the sort of person you eye up in the departure lounge and quietly hope you aren't seated next to. He turned out to be the most harmless and charming of geeks (a commentator for a card game called Magic The Gathering...), although that image was somewhat shattered when 'Fifty Shades of Grey' somehow came into conversation and it was revealed he is also, and I quote, a 'sex therapist for S&M couples'. The presence of two young children just across the aisle fortunately forestalled any in-depth information about this side-line of his.

There was a point to mentioning him. (Good God, my blogging skills have gone downhill in the past two years. I hope I remember how to write before you all get bored of such postings.) Oh yes. I said to him that I was off to Italy to check out a cottage, somewhere to put down some roots. And store my vast supply of books. He loved this – the fact that I could see nothing unusual or untoward about 'putting down roots' in a country that was not my own. And he understood it.

You see, the way I live my life makes perfect sense to me. My seemingly erratic bouncing from pillar to post. If I take the last year, I have – without so much as a second thought – sidled between four continents. I was pretty taken aback when someone I had thought of as a friend said to me angrily that I never followed anything through, and why should I ever expect to get anywhere that mattered with that sort of attitude?

She proved a few things to me with that remark. First off, that yes, some people do only enter your life for a specific time period. Without her kindness and friendship, I wouldn't have dealt with Hong Kong. And secondly, that I am capable of producing pretty strong reactions in people. I am, ha, Marmite Woman.

The problem with Marmite is that, however much you love it, too much might be a bad thing.

This posting is dedicated to all those fleeting glimpses of guardian angels, and to the people who will stick with me through the years. 'No man is an island, entire of itself', wrote Donne. I think I'm a pretty isolated peninsular of a person, but am always grateful for the narrow causeway linking me to the mainland.

On Education, Education, Education

The depressing reality is, I created my best piece of writing at the age of 15. Typical teenage existential angst drove me towards reading anything and everything related to WW2, and I wound up on a school trip to Auschwitz. I never studied history at school – well, the first couple of years we were forced to attend classes but all I can remember is a teacher who was either drunk or hungover, and my friend creating a poster entitled 'Roman Life was Hard' depicting a group of guys lining up miserably alongside what was meant to be a drawing of grain bins but looked suspiciously like a communal ablution facility.

That's it. That's what I remember from three years of History classes in a grammar school. Oh, and a line from a poem that had all these ideas about, 'When you are sick you are green/ When you are angry you are red' – that sort of thing – with the last line, 'And you have the cheek to call me coloured?' I thought at the time it was quite neat, but after three years in Africa you come to realise that people here who are coloured are damn insulted to be called anything other than coloured. I'm pretty sure the most useful thing I learned in school was how to use a band saw.

I read Rimbaud and Sartre the way kids today read 'Twilight' and 'Harry Potter'. Is it any wonder I produced such a perfect piece after my Auschwitz visit – wasted as part of my English Language GCSE Portfolio. It was the year after Diana died and we were all expected to write about how that made us feel; I informed my teacher that, lovely lady though I'm sure the self-titled 'People's Princess' was, I had no opinions whatsoever worth considering and would much rather choose my own topic. The poor guy had long ago concluded it was far easier just to let me have my way...

And now, thanks to the Internet and a hefty dose of good fortune, I earn my living by writing. Some of it is diabolical, it really is. Worse than the drivel I inflict on blog readers. This morning I wrote about China's only female monarch, Wu Zetian. Someone who loved poetry, and cheerfully killed a bunch of concubines in order to be successful. Oh, and her daughter (just incase she grew up to be an even more obnoxious, ambitious little tart). I think Lady Macbeth was modelled on her. Last week, I focussed on smartphones and how they have changed the work place. And Sappho, I wrote about Sappho.

When I wrote about Auschwitz, I didn't really care about the end product. I didn't know what 'alliteration' meant; I hadn't studied speeches and the art of rhetoric. A few years earlier I wrote a couple of poems, one of which was about child abuse and I am proud to say disturbed my psychologist mother to such an extent she charged off to the nearest Abuse Expert and begged their opinion. For none of these pieces did I, in theory, know what I was doing – I just wrote what flowed from the pen.

I'm worried that I've lost that ability, irretrievably. The chance to perfectly capture a moment, to weigh words against each other somewhere inside of me, to know instinctively how something should be. I taught myself to read – I don't remember doing this, and my mother certainly doesn't remember teaching me, but she knows I picked up a book one day and read it aloud. Formal education is something that is supposed to expand our horizons but all it has done is limit mine. It forces us into ever tighter corners, limiting our possibilities and futures and dreams. It stamps out creativity and difference and originality because these are 'difficult' for teachers to deal with. As long as we allow teachers into our classrooms who are scared to encounter a student smarter than themselves, the education system is fundamentally flawed.

I've struggled to end this – education and writing are both subjects close to my heart and I could produce reams on either. But I think I'll close with the words of Ken Robinson; if you haven't yet seen his TED talks then go there immediately. I just wish that governments would acknowledge the importance of what he is saying and make the changes before it is too late – before we have created a system whereby nobody cares any more, and nobody sees anything wrong with the way things are.

“Imagination is the source of every form of human achievement. And it's the one thing that I believe we are systematically jeopardising in the way we educate our children and ourselves.”

On the Friend Zone

Ah, the 'Friend Zone'... At some point, the enemy of almost every guy out there – although thinking about it, I've never heard a female who has cursed being parked in the Friend Zone. It doesn't happen. [The picture has no relevance at all to this post. I just rather like it.]

Guys, I'll tell you how you get placed there. Three ways.

1) You know the theory that if you're kind and understanding and always available with a shoulder to cry on, that eventually a woman will realise you are just so darn sweet she needs you in her life? Oh so wrong. Chicks want all that – but preferably in a package that suggests excellent and regular ravishing. We might not be so keen on the genuine 'bad boy', but a hint of subdued 'badness' is always welcome. Why on earth do you think that ridiculous creation, 'Fifty Shades of Gray', has taken the world by storm? All those readers are probably dating or married to Beige Boy, a bland creation who believes a candlelit dinner with a violin scratching away in the background is ideal for 'getting her in the mood'.

2) If the chick has any morals whatsoever, you'll be automatically Friend Zoned if she meets you when you're married or in a serious relationship. You will be mentally designated a 'no go area'. It's well nigh impossible to ever leave the Zone if she is friends with your wife or girlfriend: she'll know every detail about you. Everything. Women are vicious and have no qualms at all about discussing the most intimate details – particularly when a relationship is heading towards the rocks and they're trying to justify the Drop Off point.

3) The final method is the biggie, because it is entirely self-created and self-perpetuating. Girls know it is hard for a guy to make a move: it requires a modicum of courage and more than a touch of self-belief, and that's partly why we leave it up to you. There is also that thing of chicks being automatically branded a Tart if they so much as hint at making the first move. In a nutshell, we expect you to put in the effort. We are more than happy to provide you with ample opportunities and drop hints here and there, but remember: hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. We'll regard it as 'scorning' if, after all our efforts, you still don't make a move – and promptly throw you for all eternity into the Friend Zone.

It seems to me that in the initial stages of a relationship, the girl holds all the cards. She has something the guy is after – something the guy probably doesn't get anywhere near as much he likes to convince his buddies he does – and has total control over where and when that is made available. Unfortunately, after a certain point (could be weeks or months or years), the guy has something she wants: the offer to look after her forever; the chance of a family; security and dependability. And there we have it, the guy now has control. Bham.

Only when guys are ready to play that role will they do so, and there's not a damn thing any woman can do to make them change their minds. All these people who speak of 'the one that got away': if you're a chick, the guy would have run no matter what you did so stop beating yourself up. And if you're a guy, chances are you are entirely responsible for ending that by determinedly staying in your Child Zone and not migrating to Adult Territory.

On another note, and something I'll perhaps delve into with slightly more determination on another occasion than this particular posting, I actually think it is possible for any guy to get any girl – he must just play his cards right. But for any girl to get any guy? No, it doesn't work both ways. Hm. I'll think about that one.

*This blog posting was brought to you by the letters A and M: Appalling grammar, Minimal editing, Morning not-really-awake-yet-ness.

- “It's easier to say you've been friend-zoned than admitting you're too shy to take the initiative.”

Into the living sea of waking dreams -

I don't know about you, but I have the tendency to re-evaluate everything at the start of a new year (or, in this instance, half way through the first month of a new year). And I've had a few conversations recently that have left me wondering who I really am.

Which led me to thinking about writing some kind of blog post about that – which in turn led me to thinking about the line in John Clare's poem, 'I am – yet what I am none cares or knows.' So then I thought it would be beyond self-indulgent for me to figure out what I am through a blog post that I then inflict on you poor readers, before it struck me that you don't have to read the dratted thing if you don't want to so, darn it all, I'll write it anyway.

I don't fit into any conventional pigeonholes. My nomadic lifestyle sees people automatically assume I'm something of a hippy – and perhaps I am in a way, just without the dreads, the dope, and the tie-dyed tshirts. I'm vegetarian (and have been for fifteen years now), have dreams of one day having my very own vegetable patch, I try to buy products that haven't been tested on animals – but you won't often catch me banging a bongo ever-so-slightly out of rhythm on a beach while a few guys dance with fire in the background.

I wouldn't classify myself as a high-achiever – but I'm the sort of person you'd expect to find in that category. My sport of choice is rowing, and any boat club around the world is invariably filled with some seriously successful individuals. Some of my closest friends are unbelievably smart people; I love the conversations I have with them that are a constant test of mental agility. It's unusual to find people who can keep up with me, and I love that I know some people I have issues keeping up with – there's nothing as satisfying as making them laugh. But a rapier wit needs to be constantly used or it becomes dull, and I readily admit I don't make the effort.

I am constantly dissatisfied with what I have, hence always moving on incase the grass is greener elsewhere. I find it difficult to be content in a place for long: what if somewhere else is even better? This means I have mastered the art of turning up in a random location and making something of it within a matter of weeks, but I have no staying power. I'm terrified of finding a comfortable rut and, while sinking gratefully into it, the world moving on without me.

Being readily addicted to anything and everything is handy in that I've focussed my attentions on a huge variety of arbitrary information over the years. But it means I am, what is that expression?, a jack of all trades but a master of none.

I have grand ideas for the world, but too healthy a dose of realism to do anything about them. As a teenager I had notebooks plastered with the words of Gandhi and Martin Luther King – 'Be the change you want to see in the world' I had pinned above my bed, and back then I meant it. Now I just figure if you can get to the end of the life without harming too many people, you've played your bit-part well.

A year ago I held a beautiful baby girl, barely 24 hours in this world. Her perfect little fist clutched onto my finger as I looked down at her, transfixed. I don't think it was until that moment I'd fully realised that we are born with infinite possibilities, with an infinite capacity to love and be loved, with infinite dreams to forge and follow.

I have some idea that 2013 is going to be a significant year for me – just a feeling I have. I'm not quite sure how, but I think it might be the year I'm finally okay with being me. I've always worried about not really fitting into any predefined niche, and always felt that people are disappointed in me in some way because I'm neither one thing nor another. Enough of that, though.

“To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not be false to any man.” (Shakespeare, of course)

On loving, losing, and learning

I've never mastered the art of a dignified heartbreak. I remember sitting in a cafe in Oxford crying at a table and repeating over and over that I just didn't understand. It's possible to become foetal sitting on a small stool in the corner of a bar – I know, I've done it. You can stare at a gently swaying tree for a day without moving, without realising a day has somehow passed. One moment you're crazy about each other and then they say something which makes it appear as if you've never known them.

You spend your time playing games with your willpower. 'If I can manage to not check my phone for text messages for the whole day, there'll be one from him in the evening', you say to yourself. If you deprive yourself of that last chocolate, if you go to the gym one hour longer, if you leave everything in the room exactly the same – just perhaps, it'll all be okay. Just perhaps, it will never have happened.

And there are times when it seems your body has given up the fight entirely. It's not a conscious decision, but you can't bear the thought of eating – all you want to do is sleep, sleep for an eternity.

All the comments your friends make fall on deaf ears because, at that time, you're still in love with the guy. You know they are right but you refuse to acknowledge it. All that revolves in your mind is a never-ending reel of images: laughing together in a bar; curling up close at night; sitting on a park bench watching the clouds go by. The little things. At some point you know more about the guy than you do about yourself – 'you' have somehow become lost in the 'we' of a relationship, however brief. All your points of reference are to that guy: what you would have bought for him in the supermarket if you were going home to him; what programme you'd have watched if he was beside you on the couch; what clothes he'd have wanted you to wear for an evening out.

And it's all taken away, and you have to set about reconstructing – resurrecting - yourself.

Perhaps it gets tougher as you get older as your expectations change. At eighteen, you look forwards to a weekend together; at thirty, you have started planning a lifetime. It hits harder to have everything taken away. Children become faceless, and a house is taken apart a brick at a time. The morning goes from perfecting tea and toast and scrambled eggs to slugging juice from the bottle and scooping yogurt from the pot.

You know that you'll get through it. At some point you'll realise you have had a whole day without thinking about them and your heart will lift a little. A stranger will flash you a glance on a train and your inward smile will start to feel alive once more.

No, I've never faced heartbreak well. Perhaps because I don't see any shame in having loved and lost. But I will always admire those who can maintain a dignified silence, confining their feelings behind tight smiles until an evening alone comes along.

Perhaps loving someone shows us who we are, and a broken heart shows us who we can be.

I'm still waiting for the fairytale – not because I have been blinded by a Disneyfied world, but because I am human. Being accepted by another person, who isn't obligated by familial bonds, is a blessing by the universe. It shows you've done something right, that you deserve to be who you are. And so, we stumble around looking for that other person who validates us.

"It eluded us then, but that’s no matter — tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning — " ['The Great Gatsby', Scott Fitzgerald]

Yet Another Departure

Once more, I have broken a contract; yet again, I have found myself in a boss's office muttering something along the lines of, 'it's not you, it's me'. The sort of barely audible drivel that nobody really listens to – they tuned out after the 'I'm leaving' part of the sentence and started silently cursing you for causing them recruitment issues. Ultimately it makes little difference why you're leaving: even if you think there are problems within the establishment the bosses will obviously disagree, given that there isn't a sudden mass exodus.

I've had a frustrating year in Swaziland – or Swaziville, as I've taken to referring to the place. The country is the size of Wales, and the implications of the term 'ville' are accurate to a disturbing degree. There is more gossip here than in the tiny village in Yorkshire where I used to live. I've heard a member of staff ask another where she was the previous evening: 'I saw your car about five o'clock heading out of town...'. Nosy sods. It is even more impossible to find privacy on the hilltop I've been confined to for thirteen months now. Since absolutely nothing of note happens up here, your personal life becomes public property, something that can be discussed either in your presence or absence.

I am tired of the levels of bitchiness up here. I'm tired of the back-stabbing; people constantly looking for scapegoats, blaming everyone but themselves for a 'crisis'; the dramatic elevation of a minor incident into a major, staffroom-dividing event; the seemingly endless stream of utterly pointless meetings where everybody speaks but nobody listens (actually, a few have given up speaking and taken to napping in the corners). I'm tired of the passive-aggressive notes pinned almost daily onto the various notice boards dotted around campus; the frequently-voiced delight that we are 'making a real difference' up here as teachers (whatever makes you sleep); the eternal quest to discover just exactly what the hell ToK is. And what 'UWC' means, truly means, to Waterford. Blimey.

Wherever I have lived in the past, I've had different groups of friends: those I work with (on the odd occasion I'm actually working, that is) and those I drink with and those I row with and those I mull the mysteries of the world with. Up here, they all come as one frustrating package deal. Nothing can be expressed that won't be endlessly repeated – naturally with the 'now don't tell anyone else this but...' clause attached to it.

I miss rowing. Hell, I just miss boats and messing about on the water. I miss the possibility of meeting new people. I miss sitting in a bookshop with an impossibly large slice of cake and my laptop. I miss people-watching. The freedom to have a thought or an idea that isn't immediately pried out of me and hijacked by others.

I also miss having a freezer and decent ice-cream, come to that.

Since coming up here I've discovered there are some aspects of teaching I genuinely enjoy, but since I've recently started burying my nose in books again and have started a Masters in Education I realise that this is where my true interest lies. I'm the academic and the theorist rather than the 'do-er'... I have established that I have the most effective glare ever dispatched in a classroom, and that I have the ability to make those who were previously totally disinterested in my subject actually want to do well in it. More importantly, I've realised there are some kids who, for whatever reason, just don't want to be interested in literature and will always dig their heels in. I'm learning to be okay with that; they're the ones missing out.

Come December 3rd, at something like 10 o'clock in the morning, I'll be leaving the hilltop. I have 56 days left in this random little mountain kingdom (before you pedants note, yes I know this is an expression most commonly used in association with Lesotho), a place that leaves me with decidedly confused feelings regarding Africa. Okay, the south-eastern corner of Africa. I think using Swaziville as a template for the whole continent might be slightly ambitious.

Where to next? Johannesburg, is the surprising answer to that question. And more on that move in another post on another day.

Online Dating, Part 2

In response to my previous posting regarding a 24 hour online experiment with match.com, I received an email from a friend dubiously knowledgeable in all things dating and internet related. But before I get onto that, let me just tell you a few interesting figures I read recently. At any one time, something like 96% of match.com profiles are apparently inactive: in other words, they are people such as myself just putting up a profile and not paying. Also, the 'rate of response' is apparently incredibly low – explaining to some degree the 'winks' and messages I received from totally inappropriate individuals. Men, increasingly driven by desperation, send shorter and less personal messages to hordes of women, and obviously these messages are not received with any particular pleasure. And so, they get fewer and fewer responses... The cycle continues. They pay up for another six months. I was correct: only a fool would ever pay for online dating.

And then I received this email, telling me about another site called okcupid.com – a name which is, if you ask me, particularly ridiculous. Surely a 'most excellent cupid' would do better than one which is merely 'okay'...? Anyhow, I digress. The point of this site is that it is entirely free, and you can message and 'instant messenger' people to your heart's content. I decided that in order to extend my internet dating investigations, I'd put a profile up – again, for a brief period, merely out of curiosity.

My immediate observation was that the majority of people using this site are computer geeks. Compared to the typical 40+ supposed bachelor of match.com, these people were on average younger, more adventurous, better travelled and more widely read, and wrote with higher grammatical accuracy (a fairly important point by my standards). I sat and waited for the messages to appear, and yes, they did. I think the messages were better written, more personal, responding to specific points made in my profile; very few of them were along the lines of a particularly comedic favourite: 'you intrigue me'. Hm.

To cut a long story short, I was knocked sideways a few days later. Someone sent me a message, interesting and well-written and pertinent, and I decided to respond. I could, after all, ask these people why they were using the site at least and thus gather more information for my investigation. I'd noticed in one photograph he was wearing a BarCamp tshirt and so mentioned that I know a person involved with this in Hong Kong; he responded naming the individual, and it transpires that they are friends and have been for years.

This was already surreal enough, but it later turns out that this same guy was also a close friend – and has been for years – of one of my best friends in Oxford. This friend of mine in Oxford had also, bizarrely enough, met my Hong Kong friends when he visited me there.

The world has suddenly shrunk and is balanced delicately on the head of a pin.

My profile is removed and will never be resurrected, but I'm going to stay in touch with this individual I 'met', purely because he has been granted a seal of approval by being friends with two people whose judgement I trust implicitly.

I think the experience has proved me wrong to some frustrating degree: it seems there are decent, genuine people out there, searching online for their Someone To Come Home To. It is only this most peculiar set of circumstances that mean I'll stay in touch with anyone at all from this site; I could never trust anyone I found online, and wouldn't advise any female to either. As a general rule, the longer the conversations I had went on, the more inclined the men were towards sleaze and it was obvious why they were there at all. I don't see that meeting someone online can ever give you that feeling in the pit of your stomach when you see a person in reality who makes your heart skip a beat. People shouldn't give up the chance of that lightly, just because they are so desperate to find 'someone' to be with.

'When love is not madness, it is not love.' ~Pedro Calderon de la Barca

'People who are sensible about love are incapable of it.' ~Douglas Yates

Online Dating

I've recently acquired a new hobby. From 4pm onwards in my Swazi hilltop hideaway, it is cursedly freezing – which means I'm spending a lot of time regaining feeling in my toes by either parking myself in the bath with my laptop propped up on the toilet seat showing whichever movie matches my mood, or I'm curled up in bed hugging a hot water bottle to myself. Just to clarify, this is most certainly not the life I'd imagined when moving to Africa.

The point is I'm 'home alone' a good deal, excellent in that I have a chance to get through some of the marking mountains that appear on a weekly basis, and furthermore in that I have even more Thinking Time than usual. This Thinking led to me needing something new to mock and laugh at, and I finally decided that creating a profile on a dating website back in the UK would serve my purposes well. I have zero intention of being a paid up member, which means I can only 'wink' at other members and can't send them any messages or respond to their 'instant chat' requests.

I went online expecting to find one group of men: the unattractive, the clearly desperate, the uneducated and uninteresting all lumped together in one endless stream of unflattering photos. (Before anyone gets the wrong idea, I would like to firmly reiterate I have zero intention of signing up for this or any other site in any seriousness; I would hate to go the rest of my life having met someone 'online'. It seems a way of having finally Given Up and just accepting that you want Someone, Anyone, and you go to a place where you know people operating with that in mind also loiter. Of course match.com has countless success stories – logic dictates it must.)

Anyway, the point is, they aren't all hideous specimens. I'm operating on the basis not all members can have lied through their teeth or spent hours with Photoshop. I remember one arrogant guy who clearly thinks he is the cat's pyjamas: he is 5ft 10, and in his list of endless requirements for his date he wanted her to be between 5ft 5 and 5ft 8. Right, so he's a successful businessman, reasonably good looking, and yet he is still intimidated by tall women? It is incredible how precise some people are with their requirements, down to specifying eye and hair colour. I can't believe they will also put in a request for the woman to be earning within a certain income range (notably, Mr Arrogant also had her earning less than him...).

There are the guys whose profiles are written in appalling grammar with spelling mistakes abundant. There are those who, without any discrimination whatsoever, 'wink' at me – I glance at their profiles and honestly, if they think we have anything in common they really are desperate. Someone who lists their hobbies as 'eating out, going out, hanging with friends, cooking' is going to have about thirty seconds of conversation to share with me, I suspect. I also like the somewhat vague 'other' that can go into that endless list the site provides.

I was also 'winked' at by someone who declares his favourite holiday destinations to be Las Vegas and Dubai. Considering I've been fairly honest on my profile, for the sake of carrying out this experiment properly, he again is some desperate individual seeking the not-so-elusive Anyone.

The problem now is that I'm being acknowledged by guys who seem genuinely nice. I'm starting to feel guilty for almost 'leading them on'. They don't know I'm not signed up and have no intention of becoming so, and so they send me messages that I can't read and request conversations I can't have. A decent looking individual with kind eyes who has a PhD (sorry, a 'DPhil') from Oxford Uni wants to get in touch; a self-employed photographer and climber from York keeps 'winking' at me; a tall, dark, and decidedly handsome guy who has travelled everywhere for scuba diving is keen to speak with me.

The site is impressively created, I'll grant them that. For anyone with an even slightly addictive personality it spells trouble – and for anyone genuinely seeking their Life Partner, I can see why they keep using such sites. It is unbelievably easy. You are on there and messages pop up telling you who is looking at your profile; you can follow a link to their profile. Presumably paid up members then send a message or start having a chat. It is also fairly brutal in that people will visit your profile and then leave without any remark or attempt to catch your attention, leaving you thinking for a moment, 'What is wrong with me?!' The first evening I went online, I swear they must have withheld the profiles of the decent looking guys, because when I looked last night they'd suddenly grown a few inches, lost a few stone, and weren't all bald or sporting a few jars-worth of hair gel.

Something else that amazes me is the genuine anonymity most of the users cling to – despite the fact their photos are up there for all to see, not one user has made any attempt to make himself 'searchable' on google. This suggests to me that yes, they are all fully paid up members, assuming everyone else would be too. For a single month, it is £30; if you pay for six months up front, you can get them for about £13 a month or thereabouts. It's an expensive business, just to find a date. Surely that money would be better spent joining some club or other, and there you go: whole new batch of people waiting to be met.

If the UK were anything like Swaziland, I'd almost understand the use of such sites. Meeting people here is well nigh impossible, particularly with my job. There just isn't time. And everyone is either in a committed relationship, impressively unattractive, or yet another of the 'single female' masses. Single men, it seems, don't head off in their droves for Southern Africa. But the UK isn't like that: it is small enough that you can date from one end of the country to the other without too much hassle, and there are countless small pubs and big clubs through which to meet people.

Maybe in ten years time my somewhat cynical view will have changed, but for now I hope to meet my Prince Charming, my Mr Darcy, somewhere slightly more exciting and relevant than via a couple of computer screens on a cold and lonely evening. I just hope I'm not making a mistake by clinging onto my decidedly pre-21st century views...

Afterthought -

I think I've put this on here before, but I was mulling my world this evening and this poem came to mind. Pablo Neruda. Who else. How on earth can these students not appreciate the beauty of such poetry??


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
`
Write, for example, 'The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.'
`
The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.
`
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.
`
Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.
`
She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.
`
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.
`
To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.
`
What does it matter than my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered and she is not with me.
`
This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
`
My sight searches for me as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.
`
The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.
`
I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.
`
Another's. She will be another's. Like my kisses before.
Her voice. Her bright body. Her infinite eyes.
`
I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.
`
Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
`
Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Why I'll never again date a guy who uses Facebook...

I use Facebook; I'll not even bother denying that. I put up photos, I update my status to inform people where I am or where I'm going, and occasionally I'll post a link to some article or another I thought a bored individual or two may appreciate. If someone puts something particularly witty on their wall, I'll give them a 'thumbs up', and every now and then I'll make a remark – usually noting (thanks to the Facebook reminder) that it is their birthday and I hope it is a happy one.

As for my Relationship Status, that is nobody's business. Favourite movies and books? Quite irrelevant. A long list of current and previous employers and the schools I attended over twenty years ago are decidedly absent. I am not a 'fan' of anything on Facebook; I shudder at the thought of being a 'fan' of something as vague as a subject ambiguously entitled 'Travel' or pretentiously named 'Literature'. Back when I first joined the site, I became a member of a bunch of groups for no reason whatsoever. I should probably delete all that too, if I can ever be bothered.

The majority of my supposed Friends on Facebook aren't quite that. I have a purging session every now and then: clean out the cobwebs, remove the people whose photos I no longer peruse and whose love-lives are suitably dull as to not spark even a moment of mild curiosity in the gossip recesses of my brain. (I'm female and, whether they admit it or not, pretty much every female has a default gossip filing cabinet in her mind; it needs stocking up every few days or everything seems remarkably tedious.)

Considering that if my close friends are on Facebook I've already added them, the only people I add these days are: people I want to be darn nosy about, people I feel obligated to add otherwise there will be ripples of friction spreading through the virtual stratosphere, and people I add for the briefest of moments to catch up on their lives and then promptly delete. Usually after establishing they've never left their home town and married their next door neighbour, have produced a brood of ghastly children and are living off benefits; their photos show them on drunken nights out either in England or Ibiza (the former with pale white skin, the latter with lobster red skin), and they've usually acquired a couple of decidedly ugly and aggressive looking dogs. You wouldn't believe the number of people I was at school with who now fall into this category.

The problem with Facebook, as almost any user of it knows, is that the majority of users are artful swines who deliberately use it to manipulate or injure others. Not always, and not necessarily even consciously at times, but nevertheless it is done. The deletion of key photos; the spiteful status updates aimed at an ex – even worse, such updates that aren't spiteful but rather along the lines of, 'Look at me! Life is wonderful! I can't believe how happy I am these days!' Passive-aggressive is an art-form on Facebook. You can write on someone's Wall ostensibly to just 'pop by and say hello', but secretly to annoy the bejesus out of a partner who thought you'd lost contact with that individual.

I have seen whole relationships conducted on Facebook walls: the I Love Yous and I Miss Yous written for all the world to see. Why your entire friendship group needs to know that you miss your snuggly-wuggly is a little beyond me.

I justify using this cursed internet phenomenon for a few reasons: one, it keeps me in touch with people when I'm overseas (which, let's face it, is pretty much always). Two, it allows me to put photos up so friends can see them if they want, and not have them inflicted on them by me in some painfully drawn out evening display of My Latest Holiday. (Plus, having had a hard-drive crash, and the back-up also crash, I'm mighty glad some of those photos are there as otherwise I'd have lost them forever.) Furthermore, it allows me to satisfy that gossip-loving female mind of mine. And I talk with people using the Chat feature.

Quite frankly, a guy who uses Facebook – with all that wonderful manipulative potential just waiting to be pounced upon with the click of a few icons and tap of a few keys – is not the guy for me. A guy who does anything as frivolous as blog is not the guy for me. (MySpace doesn't even warrant a serious mention; it goes without saying that anyone who uses MySpace is painfully cretinous in the first place and therefore not welcome in my world. Likewise Twitter. Who gives a damn what the hell you had for breakfast and all that menial information people clog up the internet with via that particular site.) Facebook is designed for women and their aforementioned gossip requirements. That's it.

And after I've hopped back online to post this, I'll wander over to Facebook and see if anyone has commented on my link. It's to a conversation someone created between Mr Darcy and Mr Thornton, a wonderfully dark and brooding duo who would surely send even the most level-headed ladies into swooning ecstasies. Did I put that link up to mock all those guys on my Friends list who are ex boyfriends, or those who never even temporarily made it to 'boyfriend' status? Or to amuse the odd decently-read female who happens to be passing by my profile page? You can figure that out for yourselves, dear reader, because whatever I write on here will only ever be my conscious interpretation of events, sifted and sorted to fit with what I want you to know about me. The wonders of a virtual version of yourself: you can edit away unflattering photos, convey emotions via a series of unambiguous icons, and keep your true feelings firmly locked inside. My real friends take the time to step beyond Facebook and know what those wretched status updates fail to show.

Mossy musings

Blogs are, by their very nature, pretty self-indulgent enterprises. I assume that in the majority of postings made by a few million people around the world every day, the purpose is primarily for the writer to figure something out – rather than to entertain or amuse the masses. I'm feeling in a particularly ruminative mood today and as such am going to allow myself to wander down memory lane. This lane specifically stretches over the last ten years, to a point back in the year 2000 when I left the UK to live abroad for the first time.

2000 – the day after my last A-level exam, I hopped on a bus up to Heathrow airport and caught a flight to Sydney, Australia. I had never had a job before, and never lived anywhere other than Home. Within weeks, I had acquired a well-paying secretarial job at the Prince of Wales Hospital in Coogee; a few months later, I moved into a house a few hundred yards from Bondi Beach. I went to cheer on Kathy Freeman and Michael Johnson at the Olympics, saw in the New Year at the Sydney Opera House, and discovered mangoes...

2001 – after a month messing around in Canada and a few months working as a cleaner in a ludicrously poncy hotel on St Martin's, the Isles of Scilly, I set off for university. I joined the rowing club and lost stupid amounts of weight by over-training and under-eating.

2002 – ah yes, the year of the weir, when the women's 1st VIII all nearly drowned one freezing morning in February. This was also the year I was, somewhat hilariously, accused of 'criminal assault and battery' – how I wish I'd kept that piece of paper as a memento. I spent some time in Washington DC and saw in the new year in Times Square, New York; there, I became part of the world's largest synchronised bell-ringing event... I think this must also be when I went to Romania for a month, just to see how depressed it is possible for a human being to get.

2003 – this was the year I discovered South America – I went to Peru, paddled around on Lake Titicaca, dragged myself along the Inca Trail, and flew up to Cuba for the carnival in Santiago de Cuba. I spent two weeks getting the best suntan of my life in Jamaica and went home via Miami. I bought a DKNY tshirt for USD5 and didn't know for the next two years that I actually owned a piece of 'designer clothing'. Horrifying realisation. After a few weeks in the Amazon rainforest, I went down to Buenos Aires for new year and for the first time fell in love with a city.

2004 – I wrote reviews for London hotels and apartments, and gained my 1st in English Lit, despite only doing about four hours of work over the previous three years. I think this must be the time when I returned to Buenos Aires, spent a month in Santiago de Chile establishing that the two places were not remotely comparable, and passed the new year in BA. (I spent a few months living in a hostel, the Portal del Sur, and just a few weeks ago bumped into someone who had worked there – he was visiting Swaziland. Blimey.)

2005 – at some point, I figured that perhaps I should do something 'sensible' with my life and subsequently applied for a Master's degree at Oxford University. I still don't know why, but I was accepted. To celebrate this, I obviously returned to Argentina and Peru, coming home via Mexico, Atlanta, DC and NY. A month over Christmas in Goa, India, was followed far too rapidly by a transition to Sweden for the new year – my body never did deal well with the cold...

2006 – a lot of rowing coaching, a lot of messing about in boats, a good deal of Pimm's and many drives in classic cars around the English countryside. A month in Swedish wilderness was followed up by a long drive down to Andalucia and installation in the most miniature of cottages; I saw in new year in Knysna, Spain. I think this must also have been the year I went to Morocco and returned with severe and somewhat terrifying food poisoning.

2007 – after a few months messing around doing some work or other in Oxford, I took a job in Hong Kong. Thank goodness for discovering Lamma Island there, or I may not have lasted the year. Hang on, this must also be the year I first went to the Philippines, did my PADI course, and fell in love with the underwater world. And I also found out the merits (and curses) of sea-rowing, outrigging, and dragon boating.

2008 – mostly spent in HK, with a trip to Thailand thrown in for good measure. I ended up on Palawan island seeing in the new year. A year is never complete without a couple of months of serious Philippines beach time, I've decided.

2009 – a few months working as a writer and editor, and flapping about teaching English in Oxford, before rather randomly taking up a post in Swaziland, Southern Africa. I barely knew this place existed before coming here. A long trip to South Africa, and I discovered Kruger, the Garden Route, and incredible Cape Town – a decent place to see in the new year.

'A rolling stone gathers no moss'... Well, after those ten years galloping around the globe I am most decidedly without moss. Maybe a bit of moss would do me good. I wonder.

“A man travels the world in search of what he needs and returns home to find it.” (George Moore)

Some Peculiarities of Swazi-Ville

There is a custom in Swaziland that requires you greet every person in a room when you enter, and those greetings must be appropriately acknowledged in response. Considering there are over fifty members of staff here and a good portion of those hang around in the staff room in the mornings before lessons begin, it can be something of a tedious and lengthy undertaking to enquire after the health of multiple people you have seen probably a mere twelve hours before. The only exchange I have with the majority of colleagues consists of, 'Good morning! And how are you?' 'Good morning! I'm fine, thank you. And you?' 'Oh, good, good. Cold at the moment, isn't it?' I then usually signal an end to such banalities by slotting in my headphones and staring firmly at my computer screen.

Now, there are two possible reactions to this. Or probably more, but I'm going to consider two. Some of you will immediately respond that it is nice and polite to greet everyone, and since I'm living in Swaziland I should logically adopt their customs. But those of you who are anti-social sods such as myself, and indeed advocates of people being remotely genuine in their behaviour, will appreciate the issue I have with this whole pointless scenario.

I'm also tired of standing in shopping queues and having someone pressed against me. Without putting too fine a point on it, I'm not entirely sure that deodorant has reached all corners of the globe and certainly not this one; I'm not overly keen on spending the rest of the day with the smell of somebody else's stale sweat embedded into my clothes.

And I'm not that wild about the fact any time I am required to have a conversation with someone whose job description falls under the broad umbrella of Customer Service Assistant, I am forced to wait while they finish personal calls, file their fingernails, wander off to do – well, God knows what. But they always wander off in the middle of conversations and, after a few minutes of absence, you are forced to ask one of their co-workers, 'Er, do you think they'll be coming back??'

A few months ago I was required to rent a car for a period of five days. I phoned around all the local car rental companies and came to the depressing realisation that the cost of renting a car in Swaziland for five days is the equivalent of buying and insuring an old banger in the UK. I went with my friend into the chosen company's offices, and spent maybe forty minutes filling in documents and looking over the car. Five days later we returned as arranged, to the exact same people in the office looking at us completely blankly. 'Erm... we're here to return the car' we eventually explained; the three Customer Service Assistants exchanged startled looks which clearly meant, 'Heck, we rented a car out? Really? Do you remember this?!' Paperwork finally confirmed that we had indeed hired a vehicle from them and, before the price went up even further for a Late Return, we'd very much appreciate if they would take the wretched thing back.

The odd encounter like this might be classified as entertaining, but such events on a daily basis can eventually take their toll on a person. Through my teaching and such mindless interactions, I'm learning to have the patience of a saint: you now won't see me angrily tapping my watch when a train is two minutes behind schedule, as would the majority of Brits lined up on a platform. Stay over here for a while and you'll soon learn to appreciate the arrival of any train at all, late or otherwise. And be glad of the fact that, as a female travelling alone, it is possible to board that train after dark and not be embarking on a suicide mission.

I have never been so aware of my safety as I am forced to be over here. It is unsettling; constantly looking over your shoulder is surely no way to live a life. And I have never been so aware of the fact I'm white – and the implications that seem naturally to come with that fact. I live in a country that is unquestionably one of the most beautiful I've seen, but which is also a complete social disaster with no apparent hope of the issues being resolved. When I stop seeing the beauty, I guess that will be time to leave.

Erm... why am I teaching??

I'm working as a teacher in Swaziland – a job which came as a considerable surprise to me, too. I've generally been an advocate of the 'those who can, do; those who can't, teach' philosophy, and consider the concept of an 'intelligent teacher' to be the finest definition of oxymoron going. Thus, somewhat out of character, I try to muster enthusiasm for course guidelines, exam regulations, and the restrictions imposed by the endless reams of instructions examining bodies are capable of producing. I remind myself regularly that the likes of DH Lawrence and Robert Frost worked as teachers.

In addition to brandishing my own endless reams of Browning and Shakespeare and Blake handouts at students, I am also required to teach the most ridiculous of courses: the ToK element of the IB diploma. ToK stands for the somewhat pretentiously named Theory of Knowledge aspect of the programme the students here follow. At first glance, those of you who have managed to avoid become embroiled in this wretched course may enthusiastically consider that it could be a sort of beginner's guide to philosophy. Why yes, it could! But it isn't. It is something that involves extremely loosely defined 'knowledge issues' and for individuals to be able to consider the various 'areas of knowledge' via the 'four ways of knowing' (language, reason, emotion, and perception – for those of you remotely interested).

It is a course that currently clogs up four periods a week on my timetable, and sees me standing in front of a class flailing vaguely in the direction of the ill-defined syllabus. Today's session at least created an interesting debate, although not that which I'd intended upon when entering the classroom. Via a series of leaps and bounds the students ended up discussing why they get educated at all: half were convinced it was so they could get a job with more money in the future, most of the rest 'abstained' (they couldn't care less, they just knew they were told to go to school and did so), and a couple of others seemed to be edging towards what I believe is the real purpose.

More accurately, what I believed. I now don't know. If even the pupils don't think it is to stretch their minds and make them more inspired, more interesting individuals with greater potential for understanding the problems the universe still daily throws at us, then I'm not sure it is for teachers to define it in such a way...

This goes some way to explaining, however, why none of my supposedly intelligent students saw any comedy in Kafka's, 'Metamorphosis'. Why they still insist on calling Levi's, 'If This is a Man' a mere story. Why the existential angst of Camus' protagonist in, 'The Outsider' will inevitably be lost on them.

Ignorance is never blissful – I will always be the curious fool who opens Pandora's box and goes dramatically into battle with the consequences. I can't understand these students who see the process of education as the great curse of their youth and as a mere means to a financially beneficial end. Imagine being granted the opportunity to spend the rest of your life researching anything that came to mind that morning when you woke up, following whichever path your brain desired until it found a new avenue to explore. And to experience everything this world has to offer: never mind just reading about the tribes in Papua New Guinea, but getting to go live with them and see for yourself. Don't just know that the Great Wall of China can be seen from space (I'm not even sure that is true, come to that) but go and see the dratted thing for yourself, snakes and all. Not just hear of the unrivalled majesty of the clouds lifting over Macchu Picchu as the sun rises between the mountains, but go and watch for yourself as the lost city is unveiled.

So many people wrongly accuse me of being 'angry with the world', and it becomes ever more tedious with each rendition of the tired phrase. I am angry with people who don't know and who don't want to know; who are content in their small corner of the globe to limit their experiences to a distinct safe sphere; who look scornfully at my erratic and seemingly unstable version of existence.

I think the trick with life is to realise when something is no longer engaging your interest and to be able to step away from that situation and head off to find new pastures, while fending off feelings of being jaded or discouraged. Some people think there is merit in 'sticking it out' and plodding wearily on when they are no longer content, that you can learn and – to use a painful Americanism – 'grow' from such experiences. I'm not so sure there is any great quality in learning to handle your increasing misery when you know how to exchange that state for a happier one.

'May you live all the days of your life'. (Jonathan Swift)

Coming back to blogging...

It has been over a year since I posted on here. There are multiple reasons for this, but the primary cause for the last nine months has been an essential inability to get decent internet access. I'm now living in Swaziland and every day experience something beyond blog-worthy; I finally went into battle with blogspot this evening determined to succeed and, gosh darn it, I've emerged victorious. Welcome back to my rants! I think throwing some of my anger at the world on here will help to moderate the building up frustrations I have.
And heck, maybe somebody will learn something by reading this witterage... Stranger things have happened.
I actually wrote the following nearly two months ago for no reason other than I suddenly felt the need to document the experience. And I'm too tired this evening to come up with anything creative or entertaining, so this will have to do. An insight into the real South Africa that isn't being seen on your television screens as you peer into the country hosting the World Cup.
(As an aside, the picture is totally disconnected to the story below. They're the African Penguins at Boulders Beach in Cape Town. Awesome little creatures.)

I decided that the day shift had slightly more amenable hours – 7am to 7pm seemed somehow more feasible than a twelve hour shift in the cold and dark. I hadn't quite factored in the 5am start, allowing time to get across Johannesburg in the morning and check all necessary kit was in stock before the day started. (Notably, all necessary kit wasn't in stock, and indeed it never is. The paramedics are hopelessly underfunded and the supplies system is unnecessarily complex; it is often the case that the guys working will buy the required gear themselves. It saves time and frustration.)

At 0701, the first call of the day comes through: the radio crackles into life and gives the briefest of details. A female at such and such an address. We're in Hillbrow, one of the most notorious districts of any city in the world: once where upper class European immigrants vied to have an apartment, and now a place teeming with drug dealers, prostitutes, rapists and murderers. White visitors to the city are ill-advised to step foot into the area, and the only reason I would remain relatively safe was by merit of the fact I with the two paramedics; they're respected in the community. Most of the time.

The address is logged into a SatNav and we speed off from the station – the new Audi performs well as we screech around corners and leap through red lights. When arriving at the destination, I cautiously emerge from the car, keeping close to the two guys: the neighbourhood is full of watching eyes, crumbling houses, broken barbed wire fences, and flea-ridden, mangy dogs. We push through a fence and go round the back of the house to see a 20-something black woman, probably from Zimbabwe, lying on the ground. She's surrounded by worried looking relatives who we usher into the house so the paramedics can do their job: in this case, that is merely confirming that yes, she has died. Her three week old baby cries in the arms of his young aunt. They establish that death was not caused by a drug overdose, hear that she'd had a few breathing difficulties since giving birth, and recommend that the family call a funeral parlour.

There will be no post mortem, no autopsy. There aren't the resources, and nobody really cares. Life moves on rapidly in this part of the world. A guy comes in from next door and asks if we can bob by and see his wife – she's been feeling sick for the past few days and he figures that while there's a medical man around he should take advantage of the fact. We traipse into a small and dark room that stinks of stale sweat and food rotting on plates in the sink; the examination is brief and perfunctory, merely informing the woman that she is quite probably pregnant. She groans and rolls her eyes. I guess that another child to add to her extensive brood wasn't exactly planned.

Just as we're pulling away, a van with 'Flair Funerals' written on the side turns up. The dead woman barely fits in the back and is slotted in without care or delicacy; her sister climbs in alongside and they set off. Meanwhile, the rest of the family has arrived – all dressed in black, they've just come from another funeral.

I have some free time for the images to sink in as we head off to a local garage where the two guys get themselves strong coffee and settle onto the plastic stools. They tell me about some of the things they've seen and experienced, the Johannesburg paramedics known and respected throughout the medical world as being very much on the front lines. If you need someone who knows about stabbings and multiple gunshot wounds, about brutal slayings and horrific traffic accidents, ask these guys. They see it all. Daily. A shift without a few dead guys, violently killed, is a rarity.

We're called to an RTA – a Road Traffic Accident – shortly after the rain starts. One of the combis, the local taxis, has crashed into a wall and two women are complaining that their shins hurt. This is the kind of call the paramedics really hate: the women are clearly fine, they possibly have a few bruises, but protocol demands that they stay until the ambulance they are requesting has arrived. Waiting for the ambulance means other calls will go unanswered, and there isn't anybody else to respond to them. There is one car per district. The car for Hillbrow is parked up on a side-street, the paramedics sucking in cigarettes and exchanging jokes to pass the time. We're stuck there for nearly 90 minutes waiting for the ambulance, by which time we've missed countless calls. The guys aren't exactly subtle and don't bother to hide their frustration.

While waiting for the next call they take me down to the local market, the one where the witch doctors sell their wares. In some parts of Africa, up to 95% of people will use witch doctors in preference to western medicine; they're a huge part of life out here. They're identified by the white beads in their hair, and I see two looking into the back of a hearse that has pulled up. The potions they make often incorporate human body parts, and these two are buying direct from the funeral parlour – in broad daylight.

And then I'm rushed to the scene of another incident: a guy was trying to cut through cable with a simple saw, desperate to acquire the copper inside. Unfortunately, he chose a main power cable. Beyond a high fence topped with razor wire we can see him sitting there in a daze – barely alive. 50,000 volts have shot through him and his skin is hanging off in shreds. The worst part is, we can't get at him. The security guard is there but he gets locked into the site for the day to ensure he stays and does his job, and we are forced to wait for the company owners to arrive and let us in, the paramedics beside themselves with rage at the situation. Eventually they're allowed access and head towards the burn victim, and I figure it is wise to hang back at the car. Hang back with the gathering crowd who are jeering and pointing and taking photos with their mobile phones.

When the ambulance arrives, the man has essentially been mummified with wet bandages, a drip has been inserted and oxygen administered. One of the paramedics rides with him to the hospital because they don't trust the ambulance staff to actually take care of him on the thirty minute journey. He has 95% coverage of third degree burns to his body, and a pretty low chance of survival. A black guy has been turned white in a split second.

I'm getting a mere glimpse into the lives of these Hillbrow paramedics, and I'm not sure I can hack the rest of the day. They do it day in, day out, for months on end, and they're paid next to nothing for what they do despite working in one of the most dangerous cities in the world and in the most violent communities. Most of them are divorced or in disastrous sham marriages, with strings of broken relationships. Turning off emotions is essential in this job, and it is hard to turn those on again once you head back home; priorities are somewhat altered when you see dismembered bodies and the bloody results of brutal killings as par for the course.

At one point in the afternoon, a guy who is high as a kite on 'ganja' (the local term for a particularly strong type of marijuana) deliberately jumps into the side of our car. The way the two guys leap out to pursue him, I'm convinced they're going to beat the living daylights out of him: a broken wing mirror equates to a car that cannot be driven, and a car that cannot be driven means they're sitting around twiddling their thumbs while it is fixed – and while people die. Fixing a car out here can take months. I know. Mine was smashed into a wall by a mechanic who was driving it, and five weeks later I still don't have so much as a courtesy car and some stranger doesn't have a wall to his lounge.

The police eventually arrive but don't bother to leave their vehicle; they survey the scene, listening vaguely to both sides of the story. At some point the man we apparently 'drove into' makes note of the fact he's not actually being watched and slinks off around a corner, unobserved. No chase is given – not by the police, the two paramedics head after him but he's lost in the maze of buildings within moments. Nothing is done. And heaven only knows what is happening to the person we were on call to.

A man comes up to us and says he can cut us a new wing mirror, and since we have to hang around for an official Accident Investigator to appear we say go on, give it a shot. Fifty Rand if you can do it. He takes an old, blunt scalpel from a plastic bag, a bathroom mirror, and a sheet of newspaper. Slowly but surely, he cuts us a new mirror; he pops into a hardware shop to buy glue and sticks it on, his hands full of splinters of glass by this point. We give him a hundred because we're so impressed by his ingenuity, and are extremely grateful for making the car legal once more.

A brief visit to Hillbrow Police Station to report the incident is enough to illustrate to me why the crime levels are so high in this area: the police simply don't care. Half the time, it seems, they don't even enter the buildings where crimes have taken place because they're too scared. There is no law here. The underworld, the corrupt, they are in charge and rule by fear.

By the end of the day I am physically and emotionally drained. But I'm lucky: I get to wash my clothes, have a shower, leave behind the grime and the smells of Hillbrow, and wake up the next morning knowing I never need to go back there again if I don't want.