Reflections on Italian Taste: why do people bang on about the Italian sense of taste and style? True, some Italians are tasteful and stylish. But everywhere one looks there is evidence to the contrary. For each perfectly conceived piece of modern furniture, there are so many hideous piece of repro...
To Sorrento for a couple of days, to catch up with dear friends who are visiting for a week. The kinds of friends with whom one just takes off where one left off, despite not having had much serious contact for a year or more. About Sorrento and the Amalfi coast, least said soonest mended. I mean, t...
On Saturday a 15 ringgit cab ride brought me to the Forest Research Institute of Malaysia, at last away from the hotel-conference centre axis. It is a good place, full of interesting things to see and people seeing them. And if KL is very Blade runner, then the forest is very Raiders.
This just in from Luigi in Fiji (or wherever he was when he sent it).
"Yeah yeah ok ok, here they are …
Hullo this is Ruth and these are my Oscar picks. I used to be quite cocky about the annual face off between Luigi and myself -- mainly because I always won. I won for years and years and years and years. Then Luigi moved to a place where he could actually see some of the movies that were nominated and he started winning. Which is weird because movies win Oscars for all sorts of reasons that have nothing to do with how good they are and you should be able to pick the winners without having seen any of them. Anyway, now that Jeremy's in the running I hope to start winning again, or at least to not be the biggest loser. Okay, without further ado…
