AJ

Coming Up for Air

__

It seems as though scarcely a blink has passed, yet somehow it is the end of March, a quarter of the year having sped past. Winter, a not particularly difficult one as I recall, has been and gone. Incessant rain interspersed with sunshine, longer days and the first sight of flowers blossoming all point to spring on the horizon, and how have I needed that! There is also the small matter of a milestone of sorts – four months in the new gig. A semblance of routine has taken root: Monday night flights to the continent, three days of hard work, and a late return to London on Thursday nights, followed by some work from home on Fridays.

Stopping by in the N/E and catching up with U was a much needed break from the monotony. I am finding that nothing pleasantly surprises me more these days than the joy of friendly faces in middle-of-nowhere places, not that Hull is quite the middle of nowhere even though given the hoops I had to jump through to get there, it might as well have been. The trains were a nightmare – standing room only – turning what should have been a run of the mill Sunday evening hop to Sheffield and then onwards into an epic battle of wits and patience.

Frequent trips to the continent add an element of excitement to my life at the moment, given the occasional propensity of the Dutch train system to collapse on itself, not unlike the sporadic East Midlands-induced kerfuffles. Three incidents stand out: one where the driver reached his maximum hours, leaving the train company scrambling to find a replacement; another involving train works redirecting me from Rotterdam to my regular stop and back again; and a third where the train was delayed for over an hour with announcements solely in Dutch.

Passing through Schiphol airport twice a week or so has put Brexit into perspective, especially waiting in line for entry/exit stamps. The looming spectre of ninety-day limits weighs heavily on my mind, prompting me to create a spreadsheet to track my cumulative days spent over the past 180. Tempers have occasionally flared; I witnessed a tense moment between a burly airport security officer and a passenger, nearly coming to blows over directions to the passport queue. “I’m British,” the passenger vehemently declared as he reluctantly joined us in the queue alongside other Brexit-affected plebs. If there is a silver lining to all the travel, it is getting back on my book reading and podcast horse. The Poetry Unbound pod is a perennial favourite, though I am finding the draw of the last season less strong. I did pick up a new favourite though, Sandra Cisnero’s When in doubt one I have come back to again and again along with previous favourites.

Having Fridays and Mondays back home afford me the opportunity to do the school drop offs, and the joys of seeing L blossom into a precocious almost three year old. Ne’er a day passes without us being regaled of some event involving a best friend N. A chance meeting with N’s mum the other day suggests the admiration is mutual. Surely it is too early for her to give me a heart attack? She has also somehow taken a shine to Nigerian gospel music with the likes of “Big God” and “Over” getting extreme plays. I shudder at what this year’s Spotify wrapped for me will look like.

Simmering at the back of my mind is the question of what to do with this space. Back when I finally kicked it off, it was a good way to get some thoughts down – and navel gaze/belly ache about being out in the middle of nowhere. As P pointed out the other day, I am still a prodigal of sorts; just one who has less to belly ache about. What that truly means remains to be seen, I suspect.

Oh… and Happy Easter…

AJ

Beginning Again

Turning forty four sometime last year (where did the time go) seems to have been a trigger for thoughts about legacy rising to the fore in my mind, the end result of which was packing up my bags and swapping the sand dunes for Surrey. The decision being made, it still took the better part of six months to execute; lining up something this side of the dunes, rolling up the detritus of 1200 days of life and navigating notice periods amongst other things. Tnere was a lot of hand wringing, offer/counter offer and a little bit of emotional blackmail (of the good sort) but in the end what had to be done had to be done and I was on a flight heading bacck to good old Blighty.

Being back has been interesting, the key change being slowly reintegrating into the routine of domestication. Driving, bins, and all the quotidian things which make life up have become mine again, and slight irritations apart – I’ll swear blind I didn’t really mean this- it has been a good reintroduction, topped up by the delights of lots of time with L and S. Swathes of greenery all around has also been great to enjoy, cold snaps apart, as has been the ability to indulge my proclivity to dump a couple hundred pounds now and again on a used thinkpad (not much longer I suspect, seeing as the largesse from prodigaling has come to an end).

For all the noise I made about falling out of love with rust, it still pays the bills. That bit is thankfully made more interesting by being in a slightly different space than usual. My old oil and gas haunts have been swapped for something greener, along with which has come loads more reading than I have had to do in a while. There is also the small matter of taking my fascination with graphs/networks and complex systems a bit further with intermitent visits somewhere on the South coast for my sins. Between both, the mental challenge is a good one and should keep me honest for a good few years before the bug to prodigal again bites.

In retrospect, the stint of prodigaling was a lot more good than bad, though at the end it had started to feel staid. I suppose it is the curse of most prodigals to always keep an eye out on what looks like the lush greenery across the road, and weigh the benefits against the discomfort. All told, multiple trips into the continent aside, S and L are much the happier for having me in the vicinity. I suspect in the overall scheme of things that weighs much more than the pain of dealing with the taxman again after a short reprieve. In a sense, I’m still prodigaling abroad, just the small matter of a one hop prodigal, not two.

AJ

Three Fridays of Summer

Never one to miss the opportunity proffered by a long weekend, I drag myself and my back pack in the wee hours of the morning of the 27th to the airport to catch two flights – first to Dubai and then to London. The third trip of the sort this year, it is my ongoing attempt to manage this year of distributed domestication, one in which S and L having returned to London for good I am left shuttling back and forth every few months. Unlike the last time, I do not run into anyone I know, for which I am thankful for the company of Ike Anya’s Small by Small. Beautifully short and deeply evocative of my own memories of growing up, I find myself going down mental rabbit holes, fleshing out the (typically) well written prose with my own experiences. Not being of a medical persuasion myself – engineering saved me from all that – the extensive overlap with friends and family does leave me with enough knowledge to appreciate his specific travails. with the memories of growing up on a university campus it drew in.

Dubai as always is a short pit stop. This time I manage to wolf down an overpriced chicken caesar wrap and a piping hot black coffee to soothe the rumblings of my stomach which had not received any sustenance due to having to wake up at an ungodly hour for the flights. Arriving at Heathrow, the flight lands as flawlessly as could be, which leaves me wondering when last I was part of a bumpy landing. Are the pilots getting better, or is it auto-pilots or just plain luck? I don’t know but a return to more than a few white knuckled landings of the past is most certainly not welcome. One particularly difficult one in which half the plan was pleading the blood of Jesus – of course it was landing in Lagos – comes to mind. The plan this time is to spend three weeks – hence three Fridays – two of which are already tied up with finalising essays for a course I took upon myself (somewhat unadvisedly). Two semi-formal chats around potential roles back in the UK have also been lined up for the three weeks as well as the small matter of F’s 40th birthday shindig up in Kent. Bags collected on the other side, I do not get the usual taxi guy; a small mercy I suppose given that my repertoire of white lies are just about exhausted, plus I am hardly in the mood for banal small talk.

Noon on Saturday finds me with the keys handed back for my designated driver role, and making our way through an M25 bogged down with traffic eastwards. Someone of the other drones on on the LBC, a state of affairs which would becomes the leitmotif for the three weeks. We must have wronged the traffic gods or something because on the way back, yet another accident causes long tailbacks – a helicopter is mobilised this time – with no movement at some stage for almost an hour an a half. The shindig itself delivers as all Nigerian shindigs do, plenty of pepper soup and old friends from the ‘Deen to catch up with and more than a few babies – L included – to pat and rub since I last saw some of these folks. Most of the days after that are filled with writing my essays and ferrying everyone around.

It might be all that LBC, but the unshakeable sense I come away with is that of the UK going to the dogs. All the talk on the radio is of a summer of discontent with strikes across multiple agencies – rail and the NHS included. Farage loses his bank account and instantly weaponizes that to shout about cancel culture from the roof tops. Immigrants – boats, care providers and what not – also fill the air waves. There is also the unfortunate tale of two boats, the potentially hubris inspired implosion of the Titan submersible and that of several hundred migrants on the Messenia which sparks a lot of editorialising of course. Most of the talk is about what it says of us, never mind that fact at us are largely unaffected by the loss and grief that the events cause for those directly impacted. Just Stop oil and their campaign of civil disobedience and disruption of high profile events only serves to add to that sense of a looming dystopian future.

Sequestered in the corner of the world where we are, the sense of privilege is one which one keenly feels, the luxury of being able to lose oneself in rich verdant countryside within a few minutes of walking being one which should not be taken for granted. Range Rovers, Teslas and the odd used Quashai (ours) dot the garages around, the neighbourly talk being of going away for the summer not surviving. On the five or six days it is reasonably dry and warm, the smell of some neighbour or the other’s barbecue filters through when the wind changes as is its wont. The habits of the past few years are hard to shake so I still wake up way before everyone else, which gives me the freedom of an hour to kill on a light jog and the 5K training plan which the Arabian summers had stalled. When I finally get some breathing space after my essays and exams are done we join the summer day out trail, one day at the Chobham Adventure Farm, two on the (miniature) Great Cockrow Railway line and one at Hobbledown Heath. L seems to like it all, and at the end seems to be getting quite used to the whole two parent thing. On the odd occasion I sit in the chair which S usually does, L screeches – Mummy seat – and points until I relocate myself. One suspects this business of distributed domestication is not much to her liking. Big decisions loom.

AJ

Prodigal Benefits and a Reflection on Spring Cleaning…

Cake with I, somewhere on a humid Lagos afternoon

**

Being a prodigal abroad, in a relatively small, close knit expat community has its perks, not least if you are Nigerian. Truth be told, more often than not, there is a risk of private spaces being invaded, but when they come through, they come through spectacularly. The most recent example of this was Easter Sunday, on which after dragging myself home from work my late evening reverie was interrupted by persistent knocking. At the door was M, the matronly mother figure from three streets over, with a bowl of piping hot egusi soup, some swallow and a tub of fried rice in tow. Whatever misgivings simmered beneath the surface at the intrusion vanished very quickly, wafting away as though borne by the steam still rising from the bowls of food.

Speaking of privacy, over the past year I have been slowly migrating my stuff away from Google, having not been on Facebook in years. Older, pre-2020 pictures though still live in Google Photos, which is why form time to time I get a pop up with a collage or the other of pictures from memory lane. Over the past few weeks, pictures from my early days offshore, of returning to Lagos and cathcing up with the guys and more than a few weddings have popped up. On a level, these are things I would not have remembered without the prompting from Google, all of which leaves me very conflicted. Is the value I get from being reminded worth the hassle of giving up my pictures to Google?

Having not been on here a lot of late, I am hoping to restore my practice of writing regularly. To kick tha off I started with a bit of spring cleaning, tons of spam comments and links in my sidebar getting culled. Amidst all the clutter was having to remove links to Al Mohler, to TA and a few others who no longer blog regularly. Particularly interesting was Al Mohler, who in the early 2000s was a fixture alongside Joshua Harris, CJ Mahaney and the Covenant Life crowd before that all went balls up. The very divergent paths they have taken since those days is real food for thought – Al’s doubled down on Trump and the Evangelical right in America, Joshua Harris has become the poster boy for taking deconstruction to the nth degree, whilst CJ became yet another example of the mega church implosion. It hasn’t been twenty five yet but nothing could be more divergent than that erstwhile group of playmates of sorts.

AJ

Sod’s law

I may have waxed lyrical about taxis too soon, and in so doing vexed the taxi demi-gods, which is the only explanation of how on the one day I needed a taxi badly, I ended up with a guy who barely spoke English and whose understanding of Google Maps was minimal at best. Well, that or Sod’s Law. The fault lay, at least partly, with me. It had been my first full day back at work since the beginning of Ramadan and my hunger addled brain failed to register the fact that the bus which would ferry me back from the middle of nowhere which was my work station for that day would arrive 30 minutes earlier than usual. On the phone to the taxi dispatcher, he explained that the earliest he could get someone out to me was an hour and thirty minutes, which seeing as I had no choice I accepted. Although he had my location, he somehow ended up at a site thirty minutes away. There was much hand wringing, and plenty more oohs and ahhs when he finally turned up, a full two hours later than had first been envisaged. I could only sit and fester for the whole of the 45 minute back to semi-civility and the comfort of my couch. Truth me told, umbrage is a luxury only those who have choices can take. I still hold the view that taxi rides are underated delights, the one caveat though is that there isn’t an insurmountable language barrier.

It must be the time of the year. Having gone months without the joys of a party out here, two suddenly came along in quick succession. First was for a 6-year old, for which more adults turned up than kids. I got the call in the late morning inviting me along, and with nothing else to do I hightailed it there directly after work, expecting to be one of a handful of adults. In the end there were close to 8 of us, gate crashing the party and making the most of the opportunity to dig into pepper soup, peppered gizzards and multiple varieties of rice. Proper liquids may or may not have been spotted in what was a proper Nigerian party. A couple of days later it was the turn of the oldies to host a party, L’s missus springing a surprise on him to which we were all invited. A slightly different crowd this this time, things were a tad bit more sedate. Again, the full Nigerian culinary experience was wheeled out, complete with the requirement to be in the know in order to spot some of the prize delicacies. Efo riro, was the special sauce, reserved for those with access to those in the know.

Other less palatable news has had me going back to Christian Wiman’s wonderfully prescient poem, “All My Friends Are Finding New Beliefs”. A chance conversation with a friend with whom I had schooled near on 25 years ago brought to my notice that yet another school mate had passed on, after the proverbial brief illness. Said friend had also had a fairly significant health scare of her own a few months back which led to reminiscing about just how frail and fragile our once young and sprightly bodies once were.

The times and seasons are a-changing, sods law or not.

AJ

Spring Notes

**

As though in the blink of an eye, winter out here has somehow slipped away, the halcyon days of pleasant twenty-five degree mid-day weather and leisurely late evening walks replaced by mid day temperatures in the low thirties. Whilst not truly hot enough to be unpleasant yet, the days leave one with a sense of borrowed time, a fleeting, finite block of time to be enjoyed before harsh reality hits. To make the most of it, and prepare myself for the long slog ahead, I pack the lightest bag I have and catch a flight back to London. Heathrow seems the same way it has always been – functional, frenetic, and increasingly arranged around minimising human contact. Trying to get cash from the ATMs for my taxi raises the spectre of having to pay a withdrawal fee for my UK debit card. A rude shock, and a first for me, if my memory serves me right. A mix-up with the telephone number they have on file for me means we spend the better part of twenty minutes trying to find each other, the blasts of cold, wet air a reminder of the stark difference between here and there. Several phone calls to the taxi company later, he gets my correct number and we find ourselves for the twenty minute ride home via the M25.

**

Taxi rides for me have always been one of the understated delights of travel. They are simple: two or more people, stuck in a man-made machine and beholden to each other by a transaction for a finite amount of time, have to make small talk, unencumbered by the weight of knowing and being known. Invariably, the driver is an immigrant or visible minority of some sort, which being what I am tends to create a certain element of shared experience. This trip, I get someone of Pakistani extraction who, when he finds out where I am coming from, proceeds to regale me with stories of a year he spent there working. He rode a taxi there too, his days spent ferrying military contractors to and fro airports, bound for Iraq in the days of the surge. I learn he has a daughter who is studying to be a Chemical Engineer, a wife who spends too much on henna and that he is planning to take his son and father on the Umrah next year. For my part, I nod sagely at the daughter who is studying to be an Engineer – I am after all that guy who thinks STEM is everything to an extent – and smile uneasily at the complaint about the wife. I suspect that in any other setting, this is not information that would be shared but being almost perfect strangers bound together for a brief moment, white lies and unverifiable anecdotes help pass the time.

**

The cul-de-sac on the banks of the Wey has changed quite a bit since I was last here. The houses which lay empty along the way now have occupants; a lady with a strong Geordie accent and her Swedish beau – both ex Airline folks, a Ghanaian couple two houses down and a Hong Kong repat amongst others stand out. The days are spent taking in what little sunshine peeks out from behind the clouds as I take leisurely walk along the Wey with podcasts for company, ferry L to and from nursery and catch up on sleep and TV when I get the chance. As with all days spent chilling they pass all too quickly. All too soon I find myself in a taxi speeding back to the airport and the onward journey of return. On the other side of the trip, Ramadan starts, and with that an extra hour of work without trips to the coffee stand to break the monotony.

AJ

The Year in Reading -2022

It’s that time of the year again where I reflect on my reading over the course of the year. For a more wide-ranging review of the year in books, check out the coverage at The Millions here. My previous attempts are linked here.

**

As has been the goal for most of the past few years, at or around two books a month for a total of twenty-four books for the year was the reading target. Unlike previous years, I was open on the subjects, more open than usual to wending my way through the year in books depending on what piqued my fancy at any given time. I’d like to think that shows in the range of subjects and authors covered by my reading this year.

David Epstein’s Range kicked off the year, a fascinating look at the debate around what correlates (or causes) success between being a generalist or a specialist. Not being the unbiased referee – I am after all a purveyor of a niche engineering discipline – I found it hard to swallow the premise that generalists fare better/ triumph. The nuanced view, if there is any, is that the world needs both generalists and specialists, but even specialists would benefit from a broad base of knowledge, delaying specialization to as late as possible.

Carlo Rovelli’s Helgoland was one of several science based history/ biography books I read this year, the others being Helge Kragh’s Simply Dirac and Brian Greene’s Light Falls. Dirac’s Engineering (and Bristol) connections were an interesting subplot as was revisiting Eisenstein’s life as he battled with the theories for which he won a Nobel Prize.

Anyone who has followed me for any length of time on Twitter knows that I am a Pádraig Ó Tuama/ Poetry Unbound fan boy. Having read the hard copy along with inhaling as much of the podcast as I could get, I probably listened to the audio version of the book two or three times in full and several times for specific poems. This genre, of close reads of poetry almost akin to a spiritual practice, is one I have a lot of time for. In addition to the book above, I listened to the audio version of William Seighart’s The Poetry Pharmacy twice at least during the year.

From podcasts I listened to this year came several books from different genres. William Dalrymple and Anita Anand’s Empire led me to the fantastic read that was Sathnam Sanghera’s Empireland. The Holy Post led me to John Walton’s The Lost World of Genesis One which weighed in on the side of a non-literal seven day creation on the origins debate. Football Weekly led me to Calum Jacob’s A New Formation, an attempt to chronicle the influence black footballers have had on the British/ English game. Philip Yancey’s memoir, Where the Light Fell, was also a delightful read. His gift as a writer of a decidedly evangelical bent seem to be an ability to balance difficult issues which have threatened to tear the church apart.

Another blind spot I will admit to have relates to the big oil industrial complex and energy security, seeing as my livelihood depends (for now) on it. Whilst I have gone on record in the past to say that I think the answer lies in nuclear, it was refreshing to read Vaclav Smil’s How The World Really Works, a hard nosed, pragmatic view of the world’s energy challenges and how they might be solved sensibly.

All told it has been yet another interesting year in reading, one in which I think not having a set direction allowed me meander and pivot depending on what was the burning issue in my mind when I sought to pick up a book. Here’s hoping 2023 is as interesting a year in books for me.

AJ

Prayer

For the Sunday Muse prompt #235:

**

Breath by breath, bead by bead,
the prayers of this parched heart rise.
Lips quivering with the yearning of a
thirsty heart, pursed to take the blood
and flesh, blessed, transubstantiated.
Kneaded by hands washed seven times-
stripped of yeast and the things that beguile-
we come to take the bread in hope
to shed our turpitude, arise anew.
In the ritual of rest and reset,
we speak our words into the world,
lingering in the liminal space
between asking and accepting

AJ

Kneeling in the Light

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #234. Image source: Rosie Ann Prosser.:

**

Still, in the silent solitude of repose,
I survey the face that peers back at me.
Three candles flickering in the dark,
a space suffused by a mellow, yellow light
pushing back against the dark.

The ghosts of grief, railing against delight
fight the light, their dissonant sounds
a constant clang. But in light, there is delight
to know this is to rest, here.