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Continue reading →: M6. Tales from the Farmhouse: The Noisy EditionEveryone imagines rural life as tranquil silence. Wind in the trees, birdsong at dawn, the occasional tractor in the distance. And yes, sometimes, rarely, it is exactly that. But there are nights, most nights, when the countryside seems to shake itself awake and remind you that you are not alone…
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Continue reading →: Four Years In: From Notary Desk to Off-Grid Dreams
At 10am, four years ago today, we sat down at the Notary to sign for what would become our new life. It felt official, weighty, and just a little surreal. The process itself took three hours. Page by page, document by document, everything was read aloud and translated for us,…
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Continue reading →: M5. Where happiness livesIn a world that constantly measures and compares, it’s easy to forget the quiet joys that live around us. The things that don’t shout, but quietly lift the heart. I decided to pause and notice them, the small moments that make me smile, that bring warmth, that will continue to…
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Continue reading →: M4. The Kettle KnowsIt knows when I finally clear the dining table, stack my notebooks, open the laptop, and tell myself, Right, today I’m going to write properly.It waits there, innocent-looking, all shiny clear glass, decorative silver rings and black handle, pretending to be just another appliance and absolutely not the shiny troublesome…
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Continue reading →: M2. When the River StilledFor generations, the river had been known for its strength and energy.Each spring it spilled eagerly over its banks, the urgent slap of water against stone, rushing into the fields, giving life to seeds and replenishing tired soil. The villagers praised its abundance. They planted closer and closer to its…
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Continue reading →: M1. The Night She Dimmed the LightFor so many years, she had kept the lighthouse burning bright without question.Every evening, as the sky bruised into indigo, pink and orange and the sea kept its relentless beat against the rocks, she climbed the spiral stairs. The smell of rusty railings filled her nostrils as she lit the…
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Continue reading →: F1. The Luxury of Slowing DownI have lived in Spain for more than ten years now and, more recently, in the countryside, where the days stretch differently and time softens its edges. My life has slowed in ways I didn’t know I was craving back when everything was measured in urgency and motion. Here, the…
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Continue reading →: T7. Somewhere Between BordersThe morning after New Year’s Eve in Phnom Penh arrived quietly. The park outside the Royal Palace had returned to normal, the ice-cream cartons gone, the kites replaced by traffic and dust. The night before already felt oddly distant, as if it belonged to another version of us. We woke…
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Continue reading →: T6. Letting the Rails DecideThe train pulled out of Bangkok’s Hua Lamphong Station with a series of lurches and reluctant sighs, as if to remind everyone that it was getting far too old for all this hard work. We settled into our hard wooden seats in third class. The pull-down windows, most of them…
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Continue reading →: T5. The Itch to Go (Again)Only a few months after arriving back in Spain, we were off again. Thirty-litre backpacks ready, minds already slipping back into travel mode. It felt like an itch I just had to scratch, despite promising myself I’d behave for at least a year.We chose Bangkok as our first stop deliberately.We’d…
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I’m Dawn
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Dawn Punter 