Buy a house in a foreign country and, it seems, that anything which can go wrong usually does.

My father used to say that stories are part of the most precious heritage of mankind.

There's nothing like a pack of mules to give one a sense of entourage.

The Occident has never found it easy to grasp the strange netherworld of spirits that followers of Islam universally believe exist in a realm overlaid our own.

Explorers like to pretend that they are a select breed of people with iron nerve and an ability to endure terrible hardship.

Usually, there is nothing more pleasing that returning to a place where you have endured hardship.

Contemplation is a luxury, requiring time and alternatives.