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Winchester, United Kingdom “Why are you here?” I asked the woman. We were attending the same course and it seemed polite to make conversation. “Ritual killings,” she said. There was nothing I could usefully reply. It was Winchester and once again I was a student. This time it was a world called osteoarchaeology, which is the study of ancient bones. Winchester is a good place for this, as the city, which was built in 70AD, was a Roman stronghold known as Venta Belgarum. The last Roman soldier left Britain in 407AD, but[...]

Troutbeck, United Kingdom “If the weather is like this,” he said, “then I’ll be walling. But it’s no use in the frost.” I looked at the Lakeland hill farmer, as I tried to extract a commitment from him. I wanted to establish if he would be building a dry-stone wall the next day, as I hoped to join him and learn about walling. An established delivery company had only just texted me to say my parcel would appear at 9.13 a.m. Surely a hill farmer could be as precise? But hill farmers[...]

Bodelwyddan, Clwyd, United Kingdom “If you want to hear a ghost, you need silence,” said Ifor, as we downed several pre-pandemic beers. We were in London, at a time when few had ever thought about coronavirus. “You’ll hear them best towards evening,” he added. Thanks to Ifor’s words, and a year later, I found myself in the gloaming beside a normally busy A-road, on the outskirts of a North Wales town called Bodelwyddan. The coronavirus was at full pitch, a second wave was underway, Wales had closed its borders to all but[...]

Tripoli, Lebanon As an orthopaedic surgeon who has undertaken more than a dozen ICRC missions to the Middle East, I was horrified to hear the organisation was proposing closure of its reconstructive programme in northern Lebanon. Surely, I thought, they must be joking? Sadly, it appears not. In 2014, ICRC opened its Weapon Traumatology and Training Centre (WTTC) in Tripoli to help the chronically war-wounded. It now admits patients from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and beyond. Its creation was a courageous stroke of genius by the ICRC of that time, as to[...]

Glenridding, Lake District, United Kingdom I have done it, at least they have done it for me. A little while ago I reached the zenith of my skiing career and became a member of the Lake District Ski Club. Moving to Cumbria had been a life decision, swopping London’s pollution for the purity of Lakeland air. The ongoing pandemic persuaded me, as I had no wish to spend a second lockdown period in London.  Yet the last thing I was expecting in Cumbria was a ski tow, clinging out-of-sight to a patch[...]

Setmurthy, Cumbria, United Kingdom I am uncertain why I visited The Lakes Distillery, but I am glad that I did. It is one of those places that has a presence. I should add that I am no drinker, perhaps a cider from time to time. Whisky is alien to me. At least it was until my tour of the distillery. Somewhere near the northern tip of Britain’s Lake District, the country’s largest national park, and also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a man called Paul Currie had a vision. He had made[...]