The world from my window

Back from Colombia, weary, jet lagged and minus a suitcase, we pay a fleeting visit to North India, courtesy of a Bollywood Night at  Bridport Electric Palace with the mighty Dhol Foundation . It's the launch of the town's first-ever Winter Solstice Festival, which I've helped to organise. Tonight, it's Billy Bragg with Grace Petrie and Whatever Happened to the Protest Song?  It's sold out, so I hope I can get in. The loud and joyous music of The Dhol Foundation is a tonic to the ears and tired bones. There is nothing to do but smile and dance and show off a henna tattoo I had done on my hand by a very beautiful and gracious young lady in the foyer. I'm fifty-five and have never had a tattoo, henna or otherwise, in my life. I like it. Mr Grigg and I must visit India next. And get tattoos. It's been a busy old year, travel-wise, with trips to Budapest, Madeira, Iceland, Dublin, Corfu, Sicily and Colombia. Phew. In hindsight, it was too much rea...

It's morning and the town square is buzzing. Not as much as it was last night, mind you, when there were stalls, music and plenty of rain. Today, there is a large cockerel crowing in the ramshackle garden next to my hotel. A caged bird sings five notes, over and over again, and not necessarily in the right order. The smell of coffee wakens visitors from their slumber. A new day begins. Here in Salento, Colombia, the town is making the most of Advent. At night, this little place west of Bogota, on the verdant coffee growing slopes of the Andes, literally lights up. There are candles in the most inspired cardboard holders in front of shops, bars and houses. Strings of white lights delineate doors and window and a decorated palm tree stands in the middle of the square. In the church where I light a candle for family I have lost, the nativity scene is resplendent with sparking lights, a little town of Jerusalem covered in tinsel. Christmas is coming. Out in the hinte...

I t's a strange day today. Black as the inside of a bag and raining like billio. I don't like it. We had snow last week. Just five minutes of it, but snow nonetheless. It's as if the natural world is protesting at what's going on in the unnatural world. Refugee crisis, terrorism, Trump... Don't get me started. And since my Brexit heartbreak , the landscape has been changing. Literally. Here's a couple of trees whose progress I've been following since the summer. (Excuse the quality of the photos, they were taken on my phone. I blame Brexit). Indulge my flight of fancy, but I think they look like the British Isles. I am always seeing symbolism in nature. This is what the trees looked like in the early summer. Scotland was a big dodgy and the west and south east coasts of Ireland weren't quite right, but you can see what I mean, can't you? Fast forward to the late summer/early autumn. Wales has dropped off but Scotland, surprisi...

We're walking down a wooded lane, Arty the dog and I. There's a high estate wall on one side, a long bank on the other. We crunch through leaves and step on chestnut husks. She's on the extendable lead as a yappy little dog roars up around the corner. Arty bounces, a bit, to one side, an incomer in a new place. The other dog sniffs his approval and then trots back to his owner. 'It's a lovely morning,' the woman says. 'There's no-one about. You can let her off the lead.' I explain that as we're only staying here a couple of days, I want to see the lie of the land first before allowing the girl to explore unfettered. We leave the lane and enter a large, sheep-free field. A short walk through the grass, around the bend and then there's this... Wow. We meet another friendly dog walker, who directs us up some steps and through a wood. We emerge onto a quay and I can look at the viaduct from a different direction. ...

Yet again, the stops are pulled out. There are bells, knobs and whistles, and music with a bass line to make your rib cage dance. It's carnival time again in south Somerset and I love it. The gaudy costumes, the bright lights, the majesty and the humour, they all combine to make a magical evening. Next stop is Taunton on Saturday 15 October. That's about it. Love Maddie x

There's a wedding today in the heart of Ortygia, Sicily. Women in high heels and expensive dresses stand at the door of the imposing Duomo. Every few minutes, men glance at their watches. A busker changes instruments and the sweet sound of lute is replaced by swirling bagpipes. Three cyclists, in tight, bright Lycra, do figures of eight in the piazza. Guests begin to spill out from the cafes in which they have been waiting, as an advance party comprising photographer and video cameramen announce the bride's imminent arrival. A sleek, black car pulls up outside the church, an old man gets out and two women fuss over the bride, who towers over them all as she emerges, wearing shoes the height of Etna and a bun on top of her head. There is applause from the watching crowd as father and daughter walk, arm in arm, up the steps. The doors are shut and the people in the Piazza del Duomo disperse. That's about it. Love Maddie x

It is morning on Nikiforou Theotoki Street in Corfu Town and someone is playing a clarinet. They're high up in one of the tall, Venetian buildings and practising their scales, the notes rising slowly and then falling again, up and down, up and down. The smell of garlic wafts down through the street from the Restaurant Rex. It's early September and the shops are full of cut-price summer sandals, on sale now that the season is coming to an end. A new pair of shoes is just what I don't need, having bought a pair of shoes every week for the last six weeks as a bizarre way of coping with my grief. Mr Grigg shares a surreptitious rice pudding with Gorgeous George and then he meets Eleni on her fruit and veg stall. A friend in the market is better than money in the purse.   'Why you been away so long?' she says. Back in the village, a swallowtail butterfly flaps by and lingers, lazily, on the cerise bougainvillea that spiders its way along the front of the ...