In the summer of 2002 I travelled with Annette and Sasha to the ISA XV World Congress of Sociology in Brisbane. It was an eventful trip – my first visit to Australia – and I have just discovered a diary I wrote at the time (one happy consequence of a small study replete to overflowing… Read More »
The final blog: from Beijing back to Epsom: Sunday 19 August We opted out of the group’s morning tour to the Summer Palace in favour of a wander under our own steam and an excursion to the Forbidden City. We kept to our plan, sort of. We found our way, circuitously, to Tiananmen Square, pausing… Read More »
Onwards via blog 5 to Beijing: Friday 17 August We felt we had been micro-waved and well browned by the time Eva knocked on our cabin door at 4am. Was our arrival in Beijing imminent? No. We were on schedule, but it was the use of toilet facilities that was urgent, unless visitors/invaders from other… Read More »
Blog number four: from Irkutsk onwards: Tuesday 14 August Breakfast, ironically, was in the bar I had vacated about 1am, whence a minibus transported us back to Irkutsk Station. Eva seemed reluctant to talk over plans for the day. Maybe this reflected local uncertainty, but on the other hand … We had learned to be… Read More »
This third blog on our trip on the Trans-Siberian railway takes us from Irkurtsk ever onwards. Saturday 11 August We were due to reach Irkutsk in the early hours of Sunday morning, so this was out last full day on board for a while. Respite from the journey was, I suspect, eagerly anticipated, a chance… Read More »
At least this second blog gets us on the train. So here goes: Wednesday 8 August Ken, Nigel and I made our way mid-mooning to Moscow’s Red Square. Taking a circuitous route through GUM, we stood in line behind a group of Americans outside Lenin’s Mausoleum. I waited for one of them to ask ‘who… Read More »
In one of those ad hoc conversations in a local café in the autumn of 2000, two old friends (Ken and Janet) invited Annette and I to accompany them on a journey on the Trans-Siberian railway, starting in Moscow, ending in Beijing. Within what seemed like moments, and somewhere in the midst of a couple… Read More »
This is the third and final blog of the drive from Atlanta to Los Angeles, San Diego and back, a way of filling and slightly exceeding a mid-semester break in teaching at Emory University. Saturday 14 March It was not the earliest of starts as we made the trip to downtown El Paso, parking as… Read More »
This is the second blog of our long mid-semester drive to and beyond the Grand Canyon in 1998. Tuesday 10 March We were relieved to find it dry and sunny when we awoke. We completed the final 80 miles to a highly organized tourist complex, stopping only for a swift coffee at the most up-market… Read More »
During our mid-term break as visiting Professors of Sociology at Emory University (in Atlanta, Georgia) in 1998, Annette and I went for a drive. Intending to get as far as the Grand Canyon, we ended up targeting more distant horizons. As we progressed I kept a diary for my father, then in his 80s, and… Read More »