River of Time

I made another trip to town yesterday and did a little more souvenir shopping for presents to give to friends and family on my return. I also got my suitcase out from under the bed for the first time since I had pushed it under there after unpacking my things eight months ago. It had gathered dust. I realised how I may have trouble packing nine months' worth of life into this piece of baggage. In only eighteen days it will have to be filled and closed ready for my departure.

Today I have been dreaming of rolling green hills and sheep and dry-stone walls. I am looking forward to being back in beautiful Yorkshire, God's own county.

In the meantime, I have completed another book review, this one of Jon Swain's 1996 memoir, River of Time, which recalls his five-year love affair with Cambodia and Vietnam where he worked as a freelance reporter between 1970 and 1975. Although he experienced a very different Indochina to the one I am living in now, Swain's tender nostalgia for those lost times resonates with me, and I understand how much I will miss this corner of the world after I have left. I already feel nostalgic for places I visited in the past months- Phnom Penh, Vientiane, Luang Prabang, Hue, and especially Hanoi- and I know I will miss the Indochina countries searingly after I have left, despite the longing that I feel for my own home right now.