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The Laager
Every evening in the savannah, it is the same. The roaming band has to organise for the night. A temporary shelter to protect itself from predators, animals or otherwise. As they move tomorrow,...
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Nicholas II Cup of Sorrows
Buried under layers of dust, lace and velvet, something glints briefly. A gilded ceramic cup, with Cyrillic script, a double-headed eagle, angular motif, and a tantalising date, 1896. It’s Nicholas...
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Broken Plates, Silverish Spoons, Missing Knives, and Everything in Between
Social media does often gives you a sense of inadequacy. Hair falls like this, bodies look like that, the soufflé always rises and stays up. And, of course, when they clear their basement, “they” find...
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At the Edge of Reality
9 May 2025 – Claviers, France Doom diving from on high, whooshing past the balcony. Adjusting angle and speed for the perfect hit. No hesitation, no brakes, terminal velocity. Darting to and fro, like...
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When Memories Become Unmemorable
The last piece of furniture has been disposed of. It was the worms that got all of them. Some, most maybe, were 150 years of memories written in wood. Eaten through, shedding little showers of sawdust...
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Time Vortex in a Sunny Bedroom
Bed Wall Desk I lie. I stare. I read. Nothing in Nature is unbeautiful – Tennyson Desk Wall Bed I lie, eyes open. I stare, eyes open. I read. Eyes open. No price is too high to pay for the privilege...
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Food, Seriously
1948 – Panda Likasi, CongoPiglet for lunch and my grandparents friend Dr. Iskovici “operating“ Wherever, whenever you are, food is right there, a core element of your experience. Food itself can feel...
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Day of Victory
6 December 2024 – Sainte-Maxime, FranceWW2 Sherman tank near Nartelle beach where it was found The fascination with the Second World War does not wane. In Europe, we are still finding the bombs,...
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Aging Disgracefully
1955 – Claviers, France – Suzanne, my grandmother (age 52)“The little bank with granny (90 years old) minimum! The door at the entrance” Death and taxes. The only certainties, apparently. What about...
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A Century of Taking Pictures
Castle Films “Camera thrills in wildest Africa”, a home movie production(Screenshot from 8mm) Once upon a time, eons ago, in the 90s, humanity finally had the support it deserved to store its records....
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Neither the Destination, nor the Journey
1949 – Nice Airport, France (screenshot from 8mm film) I was born Here. That’s what I was repeatedly being told. Also, I lived Here because Here was best for everything. Primarily because the schools...
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Saluting the Sister Ship
1949 – On the Albertville at high sea, meeting with CMB Gouverneur Galopin We are in March 1949, on deck of the Albertville. The captain’s voice, laced with feedback, sweeps across the windswept decks...
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The Line-Crossing Ceremony
1949 – Line-crossing ceremony on board The Albertville (extract from 8mm film) Sail through the Equator, and Neptune himself will welcome you to the seafaring community! Become one of us salty...
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Aboard a Steam Ocean Liner
May 1949 – Tenerife – The steam ocean liner Albertville on a stopover in TenerifeMy mother Claude (far right), her sisters and Suzanne, my grandmother Very little seemed more of an out-of-body...
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Core Sampling
March 1936 – Kotouba, Cameroon – Core sampling We take for granted the copper of our electrical lines, the iron in our concrete, the rare metals that allowed us to engineer mobile phones that fit in a...
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The Club
30 October 1948 – The Club, Elizabethville (now Lubumbashi), Congo All of it stopped when my grandmother died. It did not have to, but there was an inevitability to it. Maybe because they were doing...
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WWI National War Loan Campaign
1917, The Last Push To finance the war effort during WWI, France balanced money printing and war bonds. The war bonds were not a novelty, and had been used since the French revolution in every...
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Frenchcore
1947 – Jadotville, Panda Likasi, Congo – De Gaulle in the living room If you wish to know yourself better, there will always be people to tell you what you are. Now, it is also true that it is up to...
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French, Not France
Life magazine with De Gaulle – 13 November 1944 Mélanie Vogel, representative for the French living abroad, quoting from the results of a global study among French non-residents, December 2024: The...
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Creepy Crawling Maggots
Now, don’t be squeamish. Maggots are back in fashion. Maggot therapy is even at the cutting edge of wound treatments in establishments such as the Chester and Westminster hospital. We put green-bottle...
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