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Holy Island, Bamburgh and Stormy Environs
How sand came to be in my ears
29 August 2010
Hurricane control panel (altimeter top right in 6-hole middle frame)
Hurricane canopy (left) found in garden being used as cloche
Drove across to Holy Island this morning, ploughing through a water-covered causeway, only to arrive in the midst of a downpour - and then decided that a walk in inadequate clothing would lead to death by exposure, deciding to head south to Bamburgh Castle. Somewhat disappointed by the museum element of the Castle, but delighted by being almost borne aloft - indeed almost to Kansas - by thumping winds. My glasses torn from my head.... more >
A Display of Nuptial Fireworks
Star Wars comes to the Borders
28 August 2010
Elaine and driver of Cumbrian Classic Coach
My having characteristically misread one of two invitations, we arrived marginally late this afternoon for Clare Kerr's wedding to Nick Hurd at Monteviot House, so Elaine and I accepted a lift once we had parked our rental car in a field. This was from the driver of a delightful Cumbrian Classic Coach - nervously aware, even though the trip took about two minutes, that its age and our solitary splendour was probably blowing our carbon budget for the next year or two.... more >
Tessa's Photographs of the White Cliffs Fly-Past
Caught on the wing
28 August 2010
Bottom up: Hurricane, Spitfire and Provost
Bottom up: Hurricane and Spitfire
Battle of Britain Reunion over the White Cliffs
The Lucky 13
28 August 2010
Airbus, Spitfire and Hurricane over White Cliffs (source: PA)
Today, my youngest sister, Tessa, accompanied my father, Tim, on a fly-past of the White Cliffs, with 13 Battle of Britain pilots (Tim included) borne aloft in an Airbus, accompanied for part of the journey by a Hurricane and a Spitfire. ... more >
Abbeys, William Wallace and Walter Scott
A day in the Borders
28 August 2010
Jedburgh Abbey 5 (walrus ivory comb aligning with Abbey tower)
{art of the William Wallace memorial obscures part of Trimontium
Trimontium from Scott's View
Early part of day spent visiting Jedburgh and Dryburgh Abbeys. At the latter, a wedding was taking place, so we hovered on the edges. Then we drove up to the William Wallace Memorial and to Scott's View. Truly strange to find Earl Haig's grave in Dryburgh Abbey. Sent a deep chill through me in the midst of all the nuptial keening of the pipes. The same, though to a much lesser degree, with the William Wallace memorial: poor, brave man.... more >
Lessudden House triggers ...
... memories of Castle Gogar
27 August 2010
Arrived at Lessudden House, on the outskirts of St Boswell, this afternoon. Lessudden was badly damaged in 1544 by the invading armies of Henry VIII, in what was called the "rough wooing", when he tried - unsuccessfully - to force the Scots to allow their Queen Mary to marry the then Price of Wales. Elaine had stumbled upon Lessudden through the good offices of Alastair Sawday. Our hosts, Alasdair and Angela Douglas-Hamilton, made us feel very much at home - and her cooking is exquisite. ... more >
In the Shadow of the Sun
Thank you, Gaia
21 August 2010
Thanks to Gaia's invitation, Elaine, she and I enjoyed the BFI 'In the Shadow of the Sun' panel discussion this evening, focusing on our brilliant neighbouring star. Among those taking part in the panel was Danny Boyle, who Gaia works for, and whose 2007 film Sunshine - in which the modest challenge is to re-ignite the Sun - was due to be shown later in the evening.... more >
If The Dead Rise Not
Wish I was in Edinburgh to hear Philip Kerr
21 August 2010
Although what was meant to be a week of holiday has been gobbled up by a project for WWF International, I have managed to sneak in some other reading around the edges - and yesterday finished Philip Kerr's wonderful Bernie Gunther novel, If the Dead Rise Not. First time I can recollect reading a book that was both a prequel to earlier novels in a series - and that then goes on to extend the story. Have read all the Gunthers to date - and love the style and atmospheres conjured, be it in Germany, Argentina or Cuba. Saw this morning that he's speaking at the Edinburgh Festival - wish I was going to be there.... more >
The Shifting NGO Landscape
So long, holiday
18 August 2010
Seem to have been quiet for a while, though have been doing a little on Twitter (@Volandia), Facebook and LinkedIn. Main reason has been that late last week, just as I was about to start a long-planned break this week, with Sam also away in Rio, a request came in from WWF International for a quick survey of where the NGO world seems to be headed. Quite a challenge, but have been consulting with a range of people around the world and getting some wonderful personal assessments of where things are--and where they may be headed. Should have an advanced draft ready late today to send to WWF this evening, with the final version due late Friday. More anon, I'm sure.... more >
In the President's Hands
The Power of Unreasonable Chileans?
11 August 2010
President Piñera has the Power
Nice to see Chilean President Sebastián Piñera brandishing our book The Power of Unreasonable People, though he has a complicated history, it seems. This was an event organised by our favourite Chilean social enterprise, Recycla, who feature in the book.... more >
Drought, Fire and Flood
The future today
03 August 2010
Often, the future asks the past why it couldn't see what was in front of its nose? After a rather frantic time week, I have been working at home today, focusing on a challenge we face in Singapore and on the follow-up to our Biosphere Economy project. In the process, it kept being borne in on me that apparently disconnected events in today's world would look very different through tomorrow's lenses. ... more >
New Look for SustainAbility.com
A different window into our world
01 August 2010
The new SustainAbility website can be found here - I think it's a big improvement.... more >
Visualizing the Word Sustainability
Six posters play with the S-word
29 July 2010
Design by Michael C. Place
Two years ago, Stora Enso, the Scandinavian paper company, commissioned six designers to create posters inspired by the word Sustainability. The winning designs came from Marian Bantjes, Bruce McCall, Christoph Niemann, Michael C. Place, Paula Scher and Winterhouse. Sadly, the series was cancelled when the paper company sold its U.S. operations after printing and distributing only the Bantjes, Niemann and Scher works. But all six are now downloadable for free from a website which I found via a Big Think link Will Rosenzweig of Physic Ventures sent me today. ... more >
Mudlarks
East Head, Again
24 July 2010
Rusty landscape on a tank in Itchenor
Snapped a couple of random images at a wayside garden centre as we headed back to West Wittering, which turned out to be seething - but we managed to get away from much of the crowd by walking out to the end of of East Head. I lay on the dunes, upside down, in the sun, as a bumblebee, or similar, quartered the airspace over my head. I watched, with great joy, several groups of children - mainly girls - working themselves up to coating themselves from head to foot in the dark, unctuous mud of the mudbanks on the other side of one of the bodies of water. To begin with they were tentative, but then started slithering and sloshing around with great gusto. Overhead, a series of microlights buzzed back and forth - and a Tiger Moth, I think, dipped in and out at one point. What a glorious place.... more >
Art through the millennia
Bignor Roman Villa and Goodwood Sculpture Park
24 July 2010
Self-portrait, Goodwood Sculpture Park
Steven Gregory's 'Fish on a Bicycle'
Jilly Sutton's 'Fallen Deodar'
Over 'Fallen Deodar' to Manfred Kielnhofer's 'Timeguards'
'Timeguards', with vegetal echos
Phillip King's 'Sun's Roots II'
Started off the day at the Bignor Roman Villa, which has some interesting mosaics, and a couple of poignant children's skeletons, and then decided on the spur of the moment to go to the Goodwood Sculpture Park again - although, once again, it proved very hard to find. Well worth the effort, though. Lovely weather as we walked around - and very few people indeed. Seems something of a well kept secret, this place.... more >
It Was 70 Years Ago ...
... next month
23 July 2010
Chidham 2 - the crash-site is alongside the copse on the horizon
Next month, more precisely 16 August, will mark the seventieth anniversary of the day Tim was shot down during the Battle of Britain, with his Hurricane crashing into the south end of the Chidham peninsula, part of Chichester Harbour, and him landing by parachute near West Wittering. We got as close as we could to the crash site without infringing private property more than we already had done to get to the coastal path, then walked on through a haze of butterflies - and what I think were thunder flies, which blackened by orange shirt at one stage. One treat was seeing an egret on the shore at one point.... more >
Stumbling on a Seahorse
Or at least a Roman variant, at Fishbourne Palace
23 July 2010
Day started with a visit to Fishbourne Roman 'Palace', which delivered an unexpected pleasure, in that I have been reading Poseidon's Steed: The Story of Seahorses, From Myth to Reality, by Helen Scales, and there in one of the best-known Roman mosaics in the country was an unmistakable seahorse - albeit allowing for a little poetic licence on the part of those who laid the floor.... more >
Cursed by Fire and Water
Midhurst, Cowdray and environs
22 July 2010
Skyscape 3: where Catholics prayed for generations, at some peril
Garden bugler
We drove south to Midhurst in Sussex today, walking around the town and stumbling on the ruins of Cowdray House. I had known of its role in history in Tudor times - but had no idea that this is where it was. A wonderfully kept site, but a pretty tragic history at times, what with the fire that reduced the great house to ruins in 1793, and the death by drowning of an heir around the same time. Not sure I believe the story of a curse laid upon the family during the dissolution of the monasteries, that they would be destroyed by fire and water, but it provides a neat hook on which to hang the tragedies.... more >
An Appointment with Cucumbers
Decompression begins
21 July 2010
Maple keys - where the Bramley used to stand
Pat at Burford Garden Centre
Spent the first two days of my week off at Hill House, with my parents, beginning to decompress. Saw quite a bit of Tessa and her boys, who were there, too. Among other things, took Caroline to the Borzoi bookshop in Stow-on-the-Wold and drove Pat across to the Burford garden centre. Slowing down made me realise just how much of an adrenaline junkie I am at times. What an oasis this has been.... more >
Ahead of the Pack
Where can I hide my photograph albums - and this blog?
17 July 2010
It often strikes me--and others--as I report on my travels in this blog series that I love a remarkably privileged live. It also strikes me that the air travel component is something that future generations will not be able to enjoy unless there is an unforeseen breakthrough in carbon-neutral flight. Reading Helen Simpson's wonderful collection of short stories a few days back, called In-Flight Entertainment, I was reminded of this concern by her story Ahead of the Pack.... more >
Auctioned
I seem to have been a prize
17 July 2010
Filmed in the garden, with Amy and Adrian (who we found through Gaia)
Westward panorama from Docklands
I was heavily pollinated by one of the lime trees in the garden at 2 Bloomsbury Place today as we filmed a series of sequences for our Allianz project and for our website. The magnolia is back in flower, to a degree, too, which is lovely.... more >
New Delhi
The longest day
09 July 2010
The Imperial's Jaguar - lens misted by humidity
Our (Bayer branded) Tata Nano for the day
Nano parked on Development Alternatives surface designed to harvest rainwater
Later in the day - and I'm taken with the Nano
George shows us around the new DA building
Inside the building's courtyard - the central rectangle of stone will stream with water
Amy about to interview Ashok
As I emerged from The Imperial this morning, I snapped a picture of the hotel's old Jaguar - my lens steaming up with humidity. One of the busiest days of the trip, with trips to see Development Alternatives, IDE India, (where we had an excellent lunch), TERI, MART and the European Business and Technology Centre (EBTC), which aims to promote a range of technologies, products and services in India, with a particular focus on climate change and renewable energy.... more >
BBC Films Tim
Seventieth Battle of Britain anniversary
09 July 2010
Tim (seated) and BBC film crew pause as plane flies by
With the build-up to the seventieth anniversary of the Battle Britain, I have been fielding a number of interview requests for my father, Tim. He did a filmed interview this week, to screen in September. Doesn't much like interviews - says he didn't do much and can't remember much - but he did and does, and I think it's great that there is such interest these days.... more >
Solar Impulse
Sun-powered aircraft makes it through the night
09 July 2010
25 years ago, Pelican published my book Sun Traps: The Renewable Energy Forecast. At the time, the aerial solar phenomenon was the late Paul MacCready's Solar Challenger, which I featured in the book. As we travelled around India, Richard (Northcote) was keeping a close eye on developments with the first through-the-night flight of the Solar Impulse. The pioneers this time being Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg. Their aim, in a few years, is a round-the-world flight.... more >
A SEWA Day
How we stopped the traffic
08 July 2010
Early morning prayers - my lens misted by humidity
Francis Bacon would loved it here in the fish market
In conversations - at the vegetable market
Fascinating day spent with SEWA, the Self Employed Women's Association, visiting various of their activities, including their HQ here, their vegetable and fish marketing operations, and their bank. Found the women enormously engaging, with their enthusiasm and energy, but the conditions in which they worked in the markets were horrendous.... more >
Gujarat
A day down (or up) on the farm
07 July 2010
As if encouragement were needed to blow horns
Shrine as we turn into the farm
Rather discreetly decorated
We flew this morning to Ahmedabad, arriving at 11.30, and then were driven three hours north to meet a group of farmers. A moment of vertigo as I looked down the farm well, or one of them, to see no bottom and no obvious water. First time, I think, that I have seen biogas digesters in the wild, though these ones didn't look that effective. Among the minor touches I liked were the home-made sparrow nests that had been tied to pillars around one of the courtyards, to help birds that helped hoover up the flies and other insects that gathered around the farmyard. Then three hours back to Ahmedabad.... more >
Bengaluru
Energetic day, followed by a night in a tent
06 July 2010
Richard, Amy, Azita, Rohini, me
Amy interviews Chitra Vishwanath at Biome Solutions
My tent - the morning after
Someone else on a journey as we leave
What a relief Bengaluru (Bangalore) is after Mumbai, with abundant signs of better urban management. We fly in on Jet Airways 2112, then make the long trip into town to see Rohini Nilekani - and learn more about her various initiatives, among them Arghyam, the India Water Portal and Pratham Books. Lovely to see her again and to see how her team is growing and her agenda evolving.... more >
Bombay Bandh
Driving through a temporary ghost city
05 July 2010
After the guests (or most of them) had gone
We are in India working on a new project with Bayer MaterialScience - and spend the morning at their Mumbai offices, hosted by Stefaan Gerlich. Later on, we do a teleconference with Kishor Chaukar of Tata Industries, who I know as a fellow member of the Board of the Global Reporting Initiative. We had intended to meet face-to-face, but the nation-wide strike (or Bandh) today makes travelling to some parts of the city difficult - or impossible.... more >
July 4 in Mumbai
Gate of India from landward side
04 July 2010
Slum with a view - of how the elite lives
Flew in to Mumbai today with Amy (Birchall) on flight 0199, bringing to mind the Beatles and Back in the USSR, though this was BOAC's successor, the embattled BA. And Russia's influence on India is way less these days than it was the Sixties. We are staying at the swish Renaissance Mumbai Conference Centre Hotel - where the view from my room, when I swish back the curtains, and fittingly perhaps, turns out to be of satellite dishes, skyscrapers and a somewhat cheek-by-jowl slum.... more >
Reminder of Glencot Years
School photo conjures a different world
04 July 2010
Glencot school photo, early 1960s
Was sent this photo today by Sam Hunt, who lives in Somerset, showing the denizens of Glencot preparatory school, near Wookey Hole, sometime early in the 1960s. He is third from right, third row; my brother Gray, who would eventually become Head Boy, eightth from the left, front row; and I am seventh from right in the back row.... more >
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