When you leave a city and then return, you see it with fresh eyes. I’ve spent the last two months back in London after over two years away. On my return, I feel as though I understand it both more and less. Less, because I don’t really know who One Direction are and I don’t … Continue reading
Author Archives: Nic
God in a Box
I’ve spent the last few weeks in front of a computer. This is not my natural habitat, but for the past month, a recent project has required me to spend my days with my bleary eyes fixed on something that doesn’t actually exist. The internet is far from a big part of my life. I … Continue reading
Hong Kong Over the Years
In the ‘70s, they slept. Apparently. Hong Kong’s buses and trains were full of Chinese men, women and children, fast asleep. Gently rocked into sweet oblivion as these rusty vessels made their way through the city streets. I expect the thick pollution acted as an effective sedative. And it’s an amazing feat, to sleep on … Continue reading
Home
Just over a year ago, God told me to come to Hong Kong, so I came. It ended up being one of the hardest and most humbling years of my life, because (contrary to what He’d let me believe), He hadn’t really brought me here to help drug addicts; He’d brought me here to sort … Continue reading
The Art of Losing
It was my dad who taught me to lose. Saturday afternoons by a log fire. Always either too hot or too cold. Scratchy carpet. Tea. A sense of longing for my dad, even though he was next to me. It was my dad who taught me to play chess. And it was my dad who … Continue reading
This Post Is Not About Facebook
First of all, I’m sorry this is late. Technologically. Such is my technological ludditery that a friend of mine thinks I must’ve spent a decade with the Amish. So, I begin this meandering series of thoughts by the apologetic preface that I’m playing catch up. (I recently read in a newspaper that these days you … Continue reading
The Necessary Brokenness of the Artist
I live in a house of about 30 people. 25 of them are Chinese drug addicts. I am English. It’s a long story as to how I got here, but the bottom line is this: we all follow Jesus Christ, and firmly believe that he’s the answer to our brokenness. So we live that out, … Continue reading
Late
I sit with a pint of bitter and a Macbook in a Mid Levels pub in Hong Kong. The pub is called The Phoenix. Externally it sells quintessential Englishness. But it lies. It was clearly set up by a Brit with aspirations to create a Mayfair-style Members’ Club, but he was too tight to spend … Continue reading
The Smiths (or Morrissey and Me)
The first time I heard The Smiths, I was on my friend Tom’s bed. They were on vinyl. Tom was my housemate and partner in crime through my university years in Sheffield, in England’s Industrial North. I remember that night so clearly. Half cut, lounging on dirty sheets in a room not a million miles … Continue reading
How to Surf the Internet
If you trust Wikipedia (which I do, with my entire life), then you’ll know that the internet was invented in the mid 1980s. Now, if I remember correctly, it was invented in a warehouse in Milton Keynes by Steve Jobs. Obviously Steve Jobs is now dead, but as far as I’m aware, the internet is … Continue reading
Ink And Rage
As an English teenager with arty tendencies, Withnail and I was compulsory (and frequent) viewing. So on discovering that the latest Bruce Robinson cinematic effort was gracing Hong Kong’s screens, it was a no-brainer. Last week, I dragged along a dear and unsuspecting friend to our local multiplex. My expectations were low. Though I will … Continue reading
Day of Living Gently
I write from Singapore, overlooking the monstrous Orchard Road: an entire region dedicated to the pursuits of materliasm. In particular, shopping. I’ve lived in London, Hong Kong and Los Angeles and have never laid eyes on such a place. It is completely comprehensive: every single shop I’ve ever heard of from Louis Vuitton to Marks … Continue reading
To Autumn
The Chinese are utterly unromantic. Even in the westernized-globalised tip toe of Hong Kong, they don’t do romance. A Chinese woman’s idea of being romanced is not having to cook for her husband one night because he gets home too late from work. The closest she’ll get to a massage is an MTR ride in … Continue reading
In Defense of The Best Of…
Naked, post-shower, still wet, no towel. Rummaging though my friend’s CD collection, doing that little fidgety dance to try and avoid too much water dripping on the floor. Failing. Looking for music to dress to. My friend’s out at work. As I scan his shelves of ’90s Britpop, American indie and original Emo (the first … Continue reading
Home
Just over a year ago, God told me to come to Hong Kong, so I came. It ended up being one of the hardest and most humbling years of my life, because (contrary to what He’d let me believe), He hadn’t really brought me here to help drug addicts; He’d brought me here to sort … Continue reading
Darcy and Damascus
A few weeks ago, a dear friend of mine kindly invited me to a night at the cinema. He was paying. I arrived at a pre-film dinner to be told that we’d be seeing Jane Eyre. Now let’s get it out in the open at this early stage of our relationship: I hate period dramas. … Continue reading
Checkerboard Collective 