It's a tough life, but someone has to do it

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Imagine being the King of the Kingdom of Tatarwalistan! I can't, so I make do with being a drone where I am. But that's not completely horrible, and it has its compensations.

I have come to the conclusion that the odder the place, the more interesting the people that it attracts. I have seen few of the corporate Geneva/New York types here, and those few have had delightful quirks that softened their ambition and corporate edge and made them great company. Dinners here are a treat. My cooking may be questionable, but the roads that have bought people here are unfailingly interesting. Dinners benefit from the first-hand retelling of remarkable adventures and the robust debate that comes from people confident in their experience and world view.

Kulture is another treat. This is the place of our common history, and developments from its early times formed the basis of succeeding civilisations, including the West's. Achievements of over 3,000 years ago are impressive even by today's standards, although recent developments in tablets clearly date the Assyrians, their cuneiform alphabet and their clay-based non-electronic tablets.

Sport is a welcome pastime, even if it is a rugby game embarrassingly called "touch". And then there's cricket, which takes skill and patience - attributes that I generally lack. Nonetheless, it is a bit of fun when played on a helicopter landing zone in an area frequented by rockets fired by disgruntled militias.

And then there's the company of those who normally occupy the background. Morning tea is an egalitarian neutral ground, where someone's good company is more important than their position, and where our mate Naresh, upon whom we depend for decent tucker, holds court by virtue of being a good bloke.

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