In Georgia, telling someone they want duck dolma is telling them their wishes are unrealistic. The expression comes from Georgian folklore and usually travels with another, about owls’ eggs; both name the…
I arrived in Tbilisi halfway through the week, which on a press trip is like walking into a cinema after the film has started, with colleagues talking about dinners I hadn’t eaten,…
Riemergasse is a narrow, unshowy street, minutes from the Opera yet outside the theatre of the Ring. We arrived at the Mandarin Oriental on a January afternoon — sunlit, but with the…
Steirereck was born in 1970, the same year as Heinz Reitbauer, who would one day run it. He is exactly as old as the house he directs, proof of two histories that…
Arriving in Vienna After a warm welcome at Vienna Airport, I arrived at the Sacher on a January morning, ready to celebrate another birthday beside the two people who make any place…
We arrived at Dominikanerbastei, an almost deserted street by the canal, shortly after midday. Time does not seem to have changed the area much, but today, more than ten years later, the…
Francisca fell asleep shortly after Vila Real. By the time she woke up, the river was already running alongside the road — silent and luminous between the vineyards. The Douro is one…
Prati doesn’t appear in the more obvious guides to Rome, and the locals would rather it stayed that way. The lady with the shopping cart argues with the greengrocer over the price…
In the morning I was in Slovenia. There was frost on the hotel windows and breakfast — magnificent as it was — ended up carrying that particular flavour of things eaten without…