AIRPORT LIFE
I followed the last passengers down to the door of the aircraft and started talking to the cabin crew while the final checks were being...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 21, 2023
- 4 min
NOSH
Breakfast around the Middle East is usually a washout. Two places I’ve enjoyed it have been the Hotel Baron in Aleppo and over the border...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 21, 2023
- 3 min
THE GENTLEMAN IN THE RED WAISTCOAT
I saw him one last time this morning, before closing the back door and heading off to work, the little Gentleman in the Red Waistcoat,...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 21, 2023
- 3 min
AIRPORT LIFE
Have you ever wanted to kick a child in the arse so hard, that like that cow, he’d fly up over the moon? Well, I was giving it serious...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 2 min
AIRPORT LIFE
I strode into the office out of a sudden autumn squall, chewing my way through the last mouthfuls of my bun. Budden bounced up out of...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 4 min
LOST IN PERSIA
I had a proper job once. A job that involved the barking of orders, the kicking of arses and of, well, generally getting stuff done,...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 2 min
INSOMNIA
0420. Twenty-past four in the morning. Four-twenty a.m. Not even sparrow-fart. Awake. Or am I dreaming I'm awake. The fish pie was tasty...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 11 min
A CHRISTMAS CAROL IN SYRIA
Syria, early January, out in the Dead Cities; Bara, Sergiopolis, Apamea. The long Cold War of the Classical World had turned hot and the...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 2 min
AIRPORT LIFE
'Glad you got off your fizzer Sven'. 'Which one Senior?' 'The "casual sexism" one' 'Oh that one'. 'How did you manage it?' 'I convinced...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 6 min
THAT BLOODY BYRON ROGERS
I was in the bar with a cocktail and some Hounslow tapas when Blunt Dave dropped a newspaper on my pint of light and bitter spilling my...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 20, 2023
- 1 min
AIRPORT LIFE
'Boing. Boiing. Boiiing. Boiiing'. You can be quite expressive with a 20' perspex ruler, bouncing it on the edge of your desk at...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 19, 2023
- 8 min
THE GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PAST
I may have mentioned that I was born into, grew up in, worked, and grew old in the aviation business and have been lucky to have...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 8, 2023
- 4 min
Family History
My (maternal) grandfather was part of the army of occupation in the old Ottoman Empire after WWI. He survived the Western Front, and was...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 4, 2023
- 8 min
ON THE BUSES
I'd had a pleasant afternoon of tea and hash with the Sufis of Damascus talking quantum mechanics and the unfixed nature of history, but...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 4, 2023
- 10 min
THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA
'The island-valley of Avilion, Where falls not hail or rain or any snow, Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies Deep-meadowed, happy,...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Dec 4, 2023
- 6 min
ENGLISH BOB
Far, far from the swagger of Monument Valley; far from the abstract patterns of Bryce, far from the twisted tortured sculptures of Zion...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Nov 23, 2023
- 4 min
CREATORS, CONQUERORS, & CITIZENS: A HISTORY OF ANCIENT GREECE – ROBIN WATERFIELD, OUP, 544pp, £25.00
I bought my first book on Greek history as a small boy in a second-hand bookshop in Saffron Walden. Those great nodding crests hooked me...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Nov 23, 2023
- 4 min
MEDIEVAL ISLAMIC SECTARIANISM – CHRISTINE D. BAKER Arc Humanities Press, 120pp, £11.95
My grandfather used to read a couple of pages from the Oxford English Dictionary every day throughout his retirement, telling anyone who...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Nov 23, 2023
- 4 min
The Emergence Of The English By Prof. S. Oosthuizen Arc Humanities Press £11.95
I tend to approach books like this with either a degree of trepidation or resignation. As a Welshman, I have had a lifetime of smiling...
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nigelhillpaul6
- Nov 23, 2023
- 7 min
THE THEODOSIAN WALLS pt. II 1-DEC-2016 (Published in Issue Seven of the Byzantine Times)
Well, we’ve had a chance for a bit of a break halfway along the Walls; there is after all, rather a lot of them to cover. A chance to...
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