Haruki Murakami runs in Mizuno. Not because it's a Japanese brand but because They have no gimmicks, no sense of style, no catchy slogan...Yet the soles of these shoes have a solid, reliable feel as you run. I run in Nike Air Pegasus for no good reason other than they fit me and…
Literature
Peckett Well
You have probably never heard of Peckett Well or of Midge Hole. Well, now you have. On Sunday we walked up from Midge Hole, just past the public loos at the National Trust Car Park at Hardcastle Crags along a bridle path that doubled as a mountain biking track. Crimsworth Beck to…
Pendle Witches Walk
Jan and I completed the Pendle Witches Walk this past Saturday, all 23 miles of it, in 10 hours! Phew! It was a bright, dry midsummer’s day with a light breeze. We started in Lancaster and first drove by coach to Laidburn where the actual walk started ending at Lancaster Castle, retracing the steps of the Pendle…
Train Journeys
My first train journey was from Kano to Lagos in 1961. We were in first class and travelled in luxury. Dinner was in the dining carriage with livery service. And, I slept in the top bunk in our cabin. My memory is of a single track with stops at sidings to allow the train…
Innocent Erendira
I first came across Gabriel Garcia Marquez in 1977/78. That year, I had just graduated from medical school and was completing my house jobs at University College Hospital Ibadan. At last I was able to read for fun and I was earning some money and was able to spend on books. So, I read…
Death on the Track
My journey back from Hebden Bridge this past Monday was eventful. I had risen early for me, at 6:15 am, in time to get to the train station catch the 07:08 for Manchester. This part of the journey went well. I hurried from Manchester Victoria station to Manchester Piccadilly station and was just in time…
The Journey In My Head
In 1931, probably in November, Bernardo Soares daydreamed during ‘the journey between Cascais and Lisbon’. He said I went to Cascais in order to pay the tax on a house my boss Vasques owns in Estoril. I looked forward eagerly to the trip, an hour there and an hour back, a chance to watch…
Alphonse Daudet & The Phenomenology Of Pain
Alphonse Daudet (1840-1897), novelist, playwright, and journalist, contracted syphilis at the age of 17 years, shortly after arriving in Paris in 1857. Syphilis was the HIV of the 19th century. Literary men such as Baudelaire, Flaubert and Maupassant were all afflicted and syphilis was central to Ibsen’s Ghosts and of peripheral importance in Doll’s…
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Brazilians in Lagos
Candido Esan da Rocha was the richest man in Lagos when I was a boy. I lie! When my mother was a girl. He was reputed to own a horse drawn carriage that took him across "Gada" (sic) bridge. It was always unclear whether "Gada" was a corruption of "Carter" or "Girder". Candido lived at…
Chekhov in Siberia
In 1890 Anton Chekhov set off for Sakhalin to conduct a census of the prison and exile population of the island. He was 30 years old at the time and was already suffering from tuberculosis. His letters and the publication of The Island: A Journey to Sakhalin remain compelling documents of the trip, even…
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