Category Archives: Photo Collection

وا حد. Uncle Vartan’s Carrots

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Took the death plane from Heathrow, a numbing multi-stop ride; first Schipol then Sofia, which only a few of us survived, before we landed in Cairo at two o’clock in the morning. At each stop, EgyptAir 778 bumped the tarmac and the empty seats flopped forward, their backs pointing to the ceiling, crash position. Is ‘heads between knees, hands behind heads’ really the best way to to make it through?

It was December and cold when I left, but when we reached the final destination it was hot and humid and my first thought was, Oh my God! after the jabs for yellow fever and tetanus, the pills for malaria and the cholera tablets, I had forgotten hepatitis!

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สอง. Rubies and Rucksacks

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On to Pieria he stepped from the upper air,
and swooped down upon the sea,
and then sped over the wave like a bird, the cormorant,
which in quest of fish over the dread gulfs of the unresting sea
wets its thick plumage in the brine.
In such wise did Hermes ride upon the multitudinous waves. The Odyssey – Homer


A well-dressed man in a formal grey suit came up to me to ask where I was from. It was my third day in Bangkok and up until then, I had been alone. I was standing in Sanam Luang Park in front of the Grand Palace when he approached, and he had a generous smile, was fluent in English.

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Apat. Life in Paradise Part 1

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Karin skipped through the barriers and past a security guard. She took one final look back at me, over her shoulder and her eyes were green as the misty slopes of her Cambrian childhood, glistening despite the cold neon lights.

ဆယ့်သုံး. Reporting from Rangoon Part 1

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Dressed in faded denims, he wandered past bottles wrapped in shining glittered paper for the connoisseurs of fine liquors. His shirt was stained and punctured with wear. Jeans stretched, they hung loosely around his buttocks and were frayed at the ankles. Sweat gathered in black shavings where the plastic straps of his thongs rubbed his toes. And he shuffled around the aisles, parted the hair away from his eyes and stared along the display for the right whisky.