May 15, 2026
THE SWEET ETHOS OF SURINAME
Suriname is a small country on the northern coast of South America, bordered by Guyana to the west, French Guiana to the east, and Brazil to the south. Its population…
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Tag: <span>anthropology</span>
Browse the field notes by date, topic, place, and memory.
May 15, 2026
CURING VS HEALING AN AFTERNOON AT AN INDIGENOUS CLINIC IN A RICH COUNTRY
Healing and curing are often used as if they were interchangeable, yet they arise from very different philosophical traditions. In Western biomedicine, curing usually means the elimination or control of…
May 15, 2026
VIPASSANA MEDITATION. A REFLECTION
The widely quoted saying, "Yesterday is gone, tomorrow is not here, pay attention to today," is a modern summary of Buddhist teachings on mindfulness , heavily popularized by contemporary teachers…
Apr 15, 2026
GOOD BYE RAGHU RAI THE GREAT PHOTOJOURNALIST FROM INDIA
Today, in the brief and indifferent cadence of BBC news, I read of the death of Raghu Rai . And yet, what stirred in me was not sorrow, but a…
Apr 15, 2026
ALAIN DE BOTTON. ON LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP AND FINDING ONESELF , THE LAST ONE MOST IMPORTANT
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRMcimuuk0Q. In this talk, de Botton challenges the deeply ingrained romantic belief that successful relationships depend on finding the “right person.” Instead, he argues that this idea is a cultural…
Apr 15, 2026
A CGM CONTINUOUS GLUCOSE MONITORING, ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENE AND THE LIMITS OF CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING
A CGM, Artificial Intelligence, and the Limits of Cultural Understanding For the past week, I have been wearing a continuous glucose monitor, a device largely designed and marketed for the…
Apr 15, 2026
A FRENCH LUNCH. VIVE LA FRANCE !
A French Lunch - A Nutrition Lesson for the USA, UK, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand For a complex mix of anthropological, historical, and geopolitical reasons, English-speaking countries and their…
Apr 15, 2026
FEW HOURS AT THE FAIRCHILD BOTANIC GARDEN. MIAMI, FLORIDA
There’s something quietly radical about stepping out of the noise. Not escaping it entirely-Miami does not permit such illusions-but placing a gentle distance between oneself and its glitter, its urgency,…
Apr 15, 2026
YAQUT AL-HAMAWI THE GREATEST ARAB TRAVELLER OF THE MIDDLE AGES WHO WAS NOT ARAB, BOUGHT AS SLAVE CHILD AT A BYZANTINE MARKET, TAKEN TO BAGHDAD
Epigraph “I am nothing. I shall always be nothing. I cannot wish to be anything. Aside from that, I carry within me all the dreams of the world.” - Fernando…
Mar 15, 2026
GOOD BYE , RICKY CAFE
GOODBYE, RICKY CAFÉ “I carry within me all the dreams of the world.” - Fernando Pessoa There are cafés that serve coffee, and there are cafés that quietly hold fragments…
Mar 15, 2026
PRANAYAMA BREATHING, VAGAL STIMULATION AND DROP IN BLOOD PRESSURE
“Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment; Cleverness is mere opinion, bewilderment is intuition.” - Rumi I have spent much of my professional life moving between worlds-London, Melbourne, Miami, and the…
Mar 15, 2026
WHAT DID THE MEDICINE MAN SAY ?
What Did the Medicine Man Say? “Humility is not thinking less of oneself; it is thinking of oneself less.” - Ancient teaching often repeated among Indigenous elders It took me…