I was aghast: TPR’s latest protest at the time that I spend away from him in London took the form of a small tattoo just above his right breast. To me it looked like it spelt out the word “Greece”, but TPR insisted that the script represented the symbols of undying love. He then revealed two older tattoos, neither of which I had ever seen before. He told me that the one on his left hip was relatively recent, but the poetry across the top of his back had supposedly been there since 1979. How come I’d never noticed THAT before?

Still reeling from these revelations I stepped out of my sister S’s bedroom into the corridor of my childhood home where I tripped over two teenage girls, asleep on the floor. One was Malaysian and the other Chinese. They were squatting in the house too, having taken over one of the big bedrooms that looked down the valley to the river. Both seemed very much at home amongst the jumble of antiques and peeling wallpaper.

In the large sitting room in the main part of the house the other residents were transfixed, eyes apparently glued to the television coverage of events in Egypt. However, on closer scrutiny, it seemed that the girl with the remote control was of more interest. I recognised her as a PhD student. Here she was setting up the television to record her favourite programmes throughout the course of the day so that she could watch them in the evening after work. Task complete, she rewarded her audience with a beaming smile and everybody cheered.