I was in Berlin recently for the first time and found it a depressing place – grey and full of big ugly buildings with huge distances between them, forcing us to take subterranean (U-Bahn) and semi-subterranean (S-Bahn) routes across … Read More
When I was a kid growing up on the streets of Carlisle I loved to play on building sites. Well, in the well-to-do neighbourhood where I grew up, they weren’t so much building sites as small clusters of bungalows-to-be, … Read More
I’ve never really been much of an AbFab fan. I can appreciate it intellectually but it never really makes me laugh out loud like Only Fools and Horses does. But I must admit that every morning when I have … Read More
I was in the English Book Exchange last week browsing for nothing in particular. With the snowflakes falling outside, the Kloveniersburgwal lined with elms and those old-fashioned burgundy lampposts, I felt like I was in an Anton Piek illustration. … Read More
I was catching up with the weekend newspapers this morning when a photo in the sports section of the NRC caught my eye. Unsurprisingly it was of these wintry conditions; a bunch of people on a frozen lake, some … Read More
I’m cycling towards Café Langendijk, at the foot of the windmill at the end of the Sarphatistraat. It’s just after nine o’clock in the morning, a frosty morning, one of the first of the New Year. I’ve just dropped … Read More
