It all begins with a memory of childhood, more sharply drawn than usual, and then another. And so, the journey starts and a life is traced over a span of more than four decades. In this collection of essays, the architect Huat Lim offers a deeply personal recollection of a very particular kind of trajectory. At its heart is the story of a long engagement with architecture — through rigorous training at the Architectural Association in London to working with some of the greatest practitioners such as Peter Cook, Norman Fosterm, Zaha Hadid and Ron Herron, before establishing his own innovative practice in Malaysia with Susanne Zeidler. It's an engagement that is profoundly influenced by a cultural hinterland that offers the possibilities of an intimate dialogue — with literature, art, film, travel, philosophy and much more. Generously accompanied by photographs that illustrate the life, these essays offer an insightful exploration of Huat Lim's world view of the people he's met along the way, and of the ethos that animates his creative commitment to architecture and to itself.