India can’t be instantly appreciated, nor can she be rushed. She will reveal herself in her own time, she will move at her own pace. 





You can’t demand from her nor hurry her along. India is magical, baffling, confusing and unfathomable and frustrating. 

She is captivating and beguiling, fascinating, awe inspiring but most of all, enchanting. 

When she is working with you, she is an unstoppable force. When the time isn’t right, she will leave you hovering indeterminately. 

She is the land of the living oxymoron. Her features are multifaceted. She is a cruel mistress yet she will bewitch and tease and lure you with her endless charms. She will test and she will provoke. 

You can’t fight her or demand an outcome.  One merely has to accept her, love her and see where her journey takes you.

Boys can’t skip. This is a well-known fact, discovered by me at an early age but one which has recently been shattered in the most horrifying way possible and I have now had to amend this statement to ‘men really shouldn’t skip.’ Let me explain.  


I was fortunate enough to attend junior school at St. Hilda’s Convent School in a small town in west Yorkshire.  Boys were allowed to attend up to the age of seven, girls went on to eleven. I have no idea why this was the case.  Once a year we celebrated Commemoration Day which involved weeks’ worth of practising country dances on the ‘little field’, and more pertinently, maypole dancing.