Poetry & prose by Alex Hickman
Hong Kong is warm, cloudy and lit up with wonderful flowers – and then suddenly dark and lit by its vertical buildings. It is stirring to see the weight of container shipping moored in the typhoon shelter and queuing for the docks, and the number of skyscrapers (more than New York, an HSBC advert told […]
Read More…Tomorrow I fly away on a visit to Hong Kong and Singapore. My business has recently opened offices in both cities (as well as Bombay) and I will be spending time with our local partners and visiting clients and prospects. With ongoing crisis in the Eurozone and the UK low in confidence I am pleased […]
Read More…I have knocked down our old greenhouse, and with the help of two small boys wielding hammers and wearing sunglasses to protect their eyes from stone splinters, broken up the foundations. Now the glass and the twisted pieces of aluminium and the pieces of half brick and concrete sit in the village trailer waiting to […]
Read More…On Thursday night, walking down Edgware Road heading for Paddington Station and the last train home, I fell in with a group of euphoric Libyans. The group was mostly young women and men and they were shouting and singing, following a man with a loud hailer. Shopkeepers stood on their doorways clapping with delight. Cars and taxis […]
Read More…When the Avon is high She magnifies the beds of winterbournes With her cold, embedded water. Layers of leaves, Spent rushes, flints, the remains of crayfish Presented for analysis Under her volume of glass. The bloated Struggling branches Of the poor drowned trees. When the river floods she moves in To occupy the grazing by […]
Read More…Yesterday (Friday) evening I went for a run. I left our house at 6.35 and made it back at 7.20, by which time it was dark. I ran in a loop around our village; the route – a thread of country lanes and tracks – was 5 or 6 miles. Nothing special. Here is what […]
Read More…Earlier in the week I sat in on a discussion between Sir Christopher Hum (HM Ambassador to China, 2002 – 2005), Professor Danny Quah (London School of Economics) and Roddy Gow (Chief Executive, Asia House). Here are some highlights, focusing on the potential bottlenecks to China’s current model of rapid growth (1) Demographics: – Median age […]
Read More…In essence: the world’s status quo (free trade and the liberal values upheld by democracies) underpins the UK’s prosperity; but this world order is fragile, and Britain has consistently failed to predict from where the next threat to it will come from. In order to defend hard-won liberal values, and not waste our lucky inheritance, […]
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STUFF HAPPENS 