I return to my work at the Council, and the interactions and travels it entailed, after ten posts about my student travels in Europe. Or rather, there were eleven posts, for I wanted to conclude such travels for the period before what I term adult life began, a period that I believe started when I finally settled down to work ...

Back home after a fortnight away, I find that it had rained horrendously while I was away, and it still continues to rain. So my morning ventures to the balcony, to feed and admire the fish, have to be short, for even if the rain has stopped the seats are all wet. The seat under an overhang, next to the ...

After I returned to Oxford from that 1973 summer break, I have no record of travel away from Oxford in the Michaelmas term, except that at the very end I went for a lunch party to Evenlode given by an older man from Merton, Joseph Egerton, who like me did no better at the Union than get onto Standing Committee, ...

My last account of travels in France as a student. The pictures are of Vile Bodies events which show Andrew in Calais in 1974 and at dinner the following year, and of Giles at dinners in 1978 and then 1977, the second an informal picture after dinner, at Corpus Christi College. The last picture is of Andrew and Christine and ...

This first post about my days as a graduate does not contain any letters. Instead there is the introduction to Part 2 of the collection in A City of Aquatint, available at Godage & Bros next to Ananda College. This part deals with what I termed ‘The Reprieve – Graduate Work’. But in addition to the process of settling down, ...

The perversion of authority at local levels This post is numbered consecutively from the last one, but I use a new title. This is to indicate the transition from days when Parliament was my main focus to a time when my work in Reconciliation was much more important. I had first written about travels abroad , when recording journeys I ...

This describes a fun excursion and then the continuing efforts at Norham Gardens and the changeover of tenants in the two flats. The pictures are of Malcolm and Chris Hall, below, along with Margaret MacDonald, then Dave Rampersad on the right at an early planning meeting of the Piers Gaveston Society, and then Stephen Coles and Carole Lansbury, Malcolm’s mother, ...

This notes how English medium was started again in government schools, my most important I think initiative. It also notes another initiative, the second project I did with Jeevan for the Council for Liberal Democracy, but unfortunately the able Civil Servant he suggested conduct it turned out unreliable, and missed events which was not at all a good example for ...

As the title last week indicated, this series of posts is a recycling of those that have appeared on my Facebook page. But given the difference in the readership of the blog, I wanted to share here too my joy in the puppies. And it has also been interesting to reread, six months later, what I felt in those long ...

In discussions at District and Divisional Secretariat Reconciliation Committee meetings, one of the most common complaints is with regard to teacher shortages in rural schools. The lack of English and Maths and Science teachers is seen as deeply detrimental to the education of children in the area, but even though this is recognized at all levels of government, for decades ...

There are two other beds in the downstairs garden, in addition to the two I showed last week. One was there from November, in the corner between the downstairs bedroom and its bathroom, and I have tried roses there but they have failed to produce blooms, doubtless because not enough sun reaches the place. I have greater hopes of the ...

I wrote last week about the sheer joy of spending much time with the puppies last June, when they were growing up so delightfully and estabilishing their individual personalities. But changes began then, for in June Bruno went away, to join his brother Blackie at Kithsiri’s. He had been meant for Getamanna, from where I had got Toby, but Jothini ...

The next day was also filled with calls, including from Morar Lucas, who had known my uncle Lakshman when he worked in the East End of London. She had married the brilliant philosopher John Lucas, who was at Merton, and they had both been immensely kind to me during my time at Oxford. They had been in Rose Lane when ...

After nearly two months I go down again to the main garden, though there is not much to show there in the way of flowers. However while I was away in January Somapala corrected the deficiencies I have noted previously with regard to the new little beds in the garden. He raised the level of the bed in the southwest ...

It was to Fatehpur I went after my brief stay in Ajmer. It was a long journey, for this was in an area north of Jaipur known as Shekhavati, famous for its havelis. My old Lonely Planet guide was enthusiastic about these, but they are still still largely unknown to tourists, and I had most places there to myself. The ...

After nine posts about travel in students days I come back to the following decade and journeys in Sri Lanka. This post describes the rest of that exciting visit to Trincomalee, when for the first time I interacted closely with members of the forces, and was deeply impressed with their professionalism, from the chaps who took me round to schools, ...

Today’s pictures are from a visit to Uganda at the beginning of 2015. I had booked the trip and the tour earlier, not realizing that I would be a Minister by then. But I did not put it off, not least because, as one journalist put it, I was the only Minister doing any work and I thought a short ...

It was still light on that Monday evening when we got to Sanjeeva’s house in a little town in Wales. It was a little house, and the children had been moved out of their room for me, but the downstairs had been extended so that there was substantial sitting space in addition to a dining room and a kitchen. And ...

We now come to the Provincial Council elections, where the Liberal Party played an interesting role as described. But as important in terms of my later work was my involvement with the Ministry of Education in the Furniture Project which the British government had instituted in token of its support for the Indo-Lankan Accord and what was supposed to be ...

Today I write about a new city, where I recaptured the enthusiasm of my youthful journeys, and spent most of the day on my feet. The first picture is of the wonderful decorations in the tomb of Gallia Placida, and then there is the exterior of the Cathedral. But then for the record I have myself trying to sleep in ...