Who are you?

Who are you?

I am you hypothetical reader who may be mildly interested in who you are.

I see.  Well, I’m quite shy and don’t like talking about myself.

But you’ve put a blog out there!  Don’t you think I have a right to know who’s behind it? 

I’m an Ancient History graduate who actually likes all history.  Some might call me obsessive.  If there’s a religious building, museum, archaeological site, traditional event going on, I want to see it.  I find this sort of thing very educational.

Oh so you’re knowledgeable then?

Not really, but I do try and find out about things.  For example in this blog, I do my research.  Ok, Wikipedia does come into it, but so do the random articles and extracts from books that I find online.  If I’m particularly lucky, I have my own proper paper-books, but since I’m currently separated from my library, I don’t have many on hand.

You’re separated?  Do you think you might reconcile?

I think it’s likely.  They are in England, and I am currently based in a town on the French-Swiss border.

What, are you travelling?

I’m living here at the moment, but I’m in a fantastic spot for travelling.  I do as much as I can afford.  You know how it is.

Well you seemed to have gone to quite a few countries recently!

About that – some of the places I blog about I actually visited a few years ago.  My logic is that if the place I’m writing about is unlikely to have changed since my visit, then it’s fair enough that I still post it.  Also, it’s taken a year for me to get brave enough to publish my first post, even though I’d written some in May.  I hope you’re okay with that.

Well since there are lots of blog posts from the past out there, I guess it’s okay.  

Thank you.  Actually, that’s one of the reasons I wanted to start this blog – there are places that I wanted to find out about, to see if they were worth visiting, and I couldn’t find much, sometimes not even as much as a blog post from 10 years ago.  And you know, sometimes you find information, but it’s either too factual or very personal.  That’s why I thought I’d share my experiences – I’m trying to balance facts with my impressions.

So you think you’re a journalist?

No darling.  Journalists get paid.

Do you get any financial rewards from this blog?

Don’t make me laugh.

And are all the photographs your own?

All pictures on this blog are my own, unless otherwise stated, in which case I put the source of the picture in the tag so you can trace its origin.  I think it’s only fair.  Actually, while I’m on the subject of photos, I should apologise for the quality of some of them.  I’m self-training, and while I’ve loved taking photos my whole life, I’ve only recently started to take it more seriously.  So sometimes I will show a photo of something even though the quality isn’t great.

Well, taking pictures in museums is tricky.

You’re dang right it is.  Some museums do fantastic lighting so that you can see without reflections on the glass getting in the way – some don’t.

You seem to take this museum-going malarkey pretty seriously.

Not really.  I just love it.  If you ever go to a museum and see a 30-something woman jumping around and embracing people, that might be me.  I have been known to get very emotional in museums.  Sensory overload.  It’s a bit like the Stendhal Syndrome, except my symptoms include cheerful excitement.

Okay – you sound like a freak.  No wonder you want to remain anonymous.

That’s right.  Now you know.

Tell me though – what’s with the name of your blog?  Are you exceptionally rotund with a peaky head?

I am rotund, if you must know.  Actually, the chickpea thing is easy to explain.  It all started with this idea – the definition is from the Oxford Dictionaries: