Mar 29
Several years ago I had a vision.
I was standing on a powder-soft beach with the waves gently lapping against my feet. A wooden pier stretched out into the calm, crystalline waters. In the distance a schooner had its sails furled, and the vessel cut a graceful figure against a ridge cloaked in tropical rainforest. Read more
Jan 20
You may have heard of a ‘Blog Hop’ that is currently making the rounds in our community. I was kindly nominated by one of my favourite bloggers, Madhu from The Urge To Wander, to take up the challenge and pass it on to one or two others. Read more
Sep 25
The headline was typical of so many articles shared on Facebook; it employed superlatives and throwaway adjectives, enticing readers with the promise of revealing Asia’s secret destinations.
50 Most Stunning Lesser-Known Places In Asia You’d Love To Go, it shouted. Read more
Jul 10
I recently spent two weeks travelling in Indonesia during the run-up to yesterday’s presidential election. Never has one in Indonesia been so polarising, or so high-stakes, with an outcome that was almost too close to call. Joko Widodo (known as “Jokowi”), the populist grassroots politician, is the presumed winner by almost five percentage points, although his rival Prabowo Subianto has fought back with his own declaration of victory. Read more
Jun 5
One by one the candles were lit, a steady stream that ran across the six football pitches stretching the width of Victoria Park, spilling over into the nearby basketball courts and central lawn. For the first time I was attending Hong Kong’s annual vigil commemorating the Tiananmen massacre of June 4, 1989, in the middle of a crowd numbering over 180,000 by organisers’ estimates. Read more
Nov 12
Oftentimes we think of war and genocide as something that happens in distant lands, or a scourge already dealt with in generations past, but the ongoing crisis in Syria – and the persecution of Myanmar’s Rohingya – is a stark reminder that this is a daily reality for too many people. This September I had the privilege of meeting a survivor of those horrors; this is his story. Read more
Plus Ultra 