Tuesday was Saint Anselm’s Day. St Anselm, who lived from 1033 to 1109 was a theologian and Archbishop of Canterbury. At St Agnes, where I go most mornings – it’s an easy walk, we were reminded of his words, ‘I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but I believe in order that I may understand.’

On Wednesdays, there being no morning service at St Agnes, I go to Borough Market for some serious food shopping. It’s an easy journey door to door on the 133 bus. Yesterday I bought coquelet, French, and early season strawberries, English, which made the basis for a delicious dinner which I shared with a friend.

For much of January, February and March I was away from London. Three days after my return I had arranged to go, with friends, to a lecture at Christie’s in King Street in the heart of St James’s.

I caught the 159 bus outside Kennington Post Office and then travelled down Kennington Road, over Waterloo Bridge past Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, up Whitehall, through Trafalgar Square to Lower Regent Street. Then I walked, unhurriedly, I had given myself plenty of time – it’s a family trait, back down Regent Street to Pall Mall past the various clubs on one side and the art galleries on the other to Crown Passage before getting to Christie’s.

As this journey unfolded I became aware of just how spacious central London is. The streets are wide. The buildings, apart from New Zealand House, are generally low. There is space.

My first impression being back in London was of this space. I loved it. I love Bangkok. However, apart from deliberate visits to Lumpini Park, there is little feeling of space there. I realised, back in London, that space is very important to me and that it is not just physical space but also the space silence gives and the space of stillness. Space matters.

It was wonderful being away from London’s cold, damp, grey days and it was wonderful being looked after at the Rose Hotel in Bangkok. Then one of my daughters asked, “Are you pleased to be home?” I hadn’t made my own bed, done my own laundry or prepared my one meals for more than two months! Pleased? Well really!

However, “Yes!” I am very pleased to see her again and the rest of the family in London, and friends. It is family and friends that matter most of all.

Patpong is Bangkok’s Red Light Dustrict, it’s London’s Soho. In the daytime it is simply a wide street between two major roads with nothing much going on. In the evening, as well as what a Thai friend describes as the ‘Hanky Panky Places’ on either side of the street, the street itself is transformed into a night market selling fake designer goods of every sort. There is also a food market with stalls and tables and chairs where you can sit and order a beer or soft drink and eat the food you’ve bought from the stalls.

Patpong is across the street from my hotel and, when I have been out with friends a in the evening, I usually pause there, sit at one of the tables, order a beer, and watch the world go by. It is one of my favourite occupations – people watching – and there are plenty of people, locals and tourists, to watch in Patpong.

The other evening as I watched it occurred to me how visually prejudiced I am. There was a middle aged couple who walked towards me and as I observed them I knew they were right wing, bigoted, disagreeable and probably American. I thought I could tell all that from what they looked like – both were overweight, she in inappropriately short shorts and a low cut top that showed her midriff, certainly dyed hair and a down turned mouth. He was in shorts too and wearing a baseball cap back to front. I could tell they disapproved of everything and everyone.

As they passed my table he said something to her, not in English. Her face lit up and for a moment she looked beautiful. She took his hand, he laughed, they went to the fake Gucci handbag stall and bargained cheerfully with the stall holder. They were not the people I had decided they were at all.

Then there was the beautiful young man who sat, with his back to me, at a table in front of me and to the right. He spent his time examining his face in the mirror of his camera. He inspected his skin for spots and found none. He smoothed his eyebrows with a finger and slightly rearranged his hair. He examined his jawline and seemed satisfied by what he saw. I knew he was a totally self absorbed narcissistic young man.

And then a frail elderly couple came to sit at the table next to him. The table directly in front of me. The young man leapt up to help them with the chairs. He called a waiter on their behalf and then he patiently listened to them, total strangers, as they asked him questions about what to do and where to go in Thailand. I was wrong again.

I realised, on reflection, that of course we all make judgements based on what we see. And so we should. It is when I make the negative, condemnatory judgements that I’m in danger. I remember a priest saying to me once that it is not the prejudice that is the problem. The problem is when we cease to allow that we may be wrong.

As well as my daily swim of 500 meters or so I try to keep up with my steps – minimum a modest 3,000 a day.

Of Tuesday’s 4,717 steps 900 were acquired doing the ritual triple circumabulation, a wian thian, in Bangkok at Wat Phra Chetuphon, popularly known as Wat Pho. It was Makha Bucha Day, a Buddhist festival celebrating the spontaneous coming together of 1,250 of the Lord Buddha’s disciples who were then taught, ordained as monks and sent out to spread his teaching.

Before the first step I took off my shoes as is the custom. It always reminds me of the injunction to Moses before the burning bush, ‘Take off your shoes for the place on which you stand is holy ground.’ Indian and Sri Lankan Christians often slip off their sandals before going up bare foot to receive Holy Communion. Be that as it may, I then set off, bare foot, for my three times around the great shrine at the heart of Wat Pho.

I was with two friends, both Buddhist, one of whom had been a monk for many years. He reminded me that we had first met thirty years ago when he was a novice monk. He is now married with two daughters. We were each holding incense sticks, a candle and a lotus flower which together symbolise the journey from darkness to light. The recurrence of symbols across religions always touches me. Incense, candles, flowers are common to many.

The number three is also very important in Buddhism as it is in Christianity. While I was doing my steps on Tuesday in the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit my Buddhist friends may have been meditating on Buddhism’s Three Marks of Existence (impermanence, suffering, non-self) or the Three Root Evils (greed, hatred, delusion.) Or they may not. I didn’t ask and at dinner later at a noodle stall on a bridge over a canal we didn’t do theology but reminisced over old times.

Incidentally each circuit of the temple at Wat Pho was for me 300 steps but I don’t put too much store by that. It was the aspect of pilgrimage or journey that was symbolised by what so many of us were doing at Wat Pho that moved me. That I was bare foot, feeling the heat of the marble, made me very aware of my connection with the physical world.

Pilgrimage is a common practice across the religions. I like to think that my few steps at Wat Pho take their place alongside those who travel to Mecca and Jerusalem and Lourdes and Varanasi and Santiago de Compostela and Canterbury and wherever and whenever people go knowing there is more to discover and that we have not yet arrived.

They Almost Spoilt My Evening

It is almost a week ago that I flew from Bangkok to board the Seabourn Encore for my cruise from Hong Kong to Singapore. The memory of that day is beginning to fade.

The flight from Bangkok was awful. The departure time of 3:20 in the morning was my choice. I must have been mad. At Suvarnabhumi Airport I was in the longest queue I’ve ever seen in any airport. Economy class. My own choice.

I asked an official, ‘Why does everyone want to go to Hong Kong Kong at 3:20 am?’ They don’t. They were queueing for Guangzhou. He helped me find the right desk. No queue. The seat was fine but I was not.

I’m old. I like my comfort. I was unhappy: ‘Why isn’t someone looking after me?’ Space tight, sleep snatched, I survived.

Arriving at  6:50 a.m I stagger along walkways. Next on to and off a train but still not at immigration; and when I am it’s all mechanical, electronic, high-tech. It all worked perfectly well. I found that even more irritating.

Out into the world. Time to fill in. They don’t want me at Ocean Terminal until midday so I breakfast at a Japanese Ramen place. The waiter takes me by the hand and settles me down and organises my luggage. He plugs my hearing aid charger into something somewhere and brings lemon and honey tea, a glass of warm water and then noodles and pork gyoza. He almost improves my mood: Almost.

Next a taxi to Ocean terminal; except it’s not. It’s the ferry terminal. The driver doesn’t know Ocean Terminal. No one knows Ocean Terminal.  Even when I go inside to level one, then level two, they don’t know and I don’t know.

Back at the taxi. I refuse to pay until I am at the Ocean Terminal. I go through all my papers. Hong Kong Ocean Terminal. No address, No one knows.

A stranger types into his mobile phone. In English or Chinese I don’t know. And there it is. With a map. He shows it to the driver. They talk and nod and smile. Off we go.

Check in takes two hours. Group one. Group two. On board to the Grand Salon. Visas are required for Cambodia! We have to show ourselves in person. We’re not in Cambodia for another week but we cannot sail until checked. Where is my suitcase? I did not watch to see it labelled. It may be left behind. It has’t been. It is delivered to my suite at 6.15. Everything has taken far too long.  

To dinner, early. I am by the window. My view is a blank wall of the Hong Kong Ocean Terminal. Everything is reasonably familiar, the restaurant and my corner table. Yet somehow it’s not. This has been a dreadful twenty four hours; horrible, terrible, awful.

There is a couple at a nearby table. The man turns and says,

“You’re alone. Would you like to join us?”

And I must reply.

“I am feeling sorry for myself. Do you really want to spoil my evening?”

We smile and laugh and they leave me to the full enjoyment of my bad mood.