As the date gets closer to East Africa, I am like a migratory bird, impatient to start its flight and eager for little else. Like a noisy cinematic reel of old, that strange whirring excitement at the prospect of a spontaneous adventure comes racing back and I hear its drone even as I once recall dashing off into the night, on a whim. My trip as always, is not a planned tour. I will simply live the moment and explore each day as it comes. The kindest part promises to be the intimacy of old haunts. Tomorrow is when I call the hotel I once loved and hope like anything my favourite acquaintances are still there.


By the way, I am at this moment reading John Banville's The Book of Evidence - which is a novel that holds the voice of a society gentleman confessing to a horrific crime he sees as the most ordinary circumstance. Why all the fuss he asks, when questioned about smashing his maid's head with a hammer. He has also stolen a valuable painting in the process. The maid got in his way and annoyed him, he frowns. Wouldn't anyone have done the same? And yet the character with his regal air, cannot for the life of himself understand why he stole the painting. That would to him, seem the more disastrous occurrence.