Why I like Virginia Woolf

A Friend of mine found the narrative of Virgnia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse  too chaotic to understand and he decided to  pass it up as holiday reading. Instead  he chose Joseph Conrad’s Victory.  Here’s what he said to me: “I’ve temporarily abandoned To the Lighthouse. It doesn’t seem suitable as holiday reading.  I’ll borrow itContinue reading ”     Why I like Virginia Woolf”

On My Mother’s Back: A Memory from Queensway 

The earliest memory I can summon is not crystal clear, but it holds a warmth that has stayed with me for decades. It was sometime around 1960 or 1961. I was two or three years old, small enough to be carried on my mother’s back, cradled close in a traditional ‘mei dai’ carrier. I don’tContinue reading “On My Mother’s Back: A Memory from Queensway “

The Rest Between the Notes

Sometimes time vanishes without a trace—like those nights of dreamless sleep when the clock leaps forward and we only meet ourselves again at morning. But I’ve never passed a night without a dream—and I don’t think most people do—so I couldn’t quite imagine what that absence feels like until a recent colonoscopy. I was sedatedContinue reading “The Rest Between the Notes”

Am I another Ship of Theseus?

The identity of an object does not lie in its material, but in its form and purpose, which persist even through transformation. Thomas Hobbes As I trace these fragments of myself—Margaret’s scarf in the wind, James’s quiet wisdom, Angel’s laughter dissolving into Pattaya’s sky, the long gone voices —I wonder: if identity is woven fromContinue reading “Am I another Ship of Theseus?”