After leaving her home country of Taiwan at the age of 16, Ninetin was whisked off on a whirlwind odyssey. Life’s voyages have rotted her passport with the detritus of the border controls of over 60 countries and matured her like a fine wine… or rather, a stinky cheese. She has been chased by an orangutan, pounced on by a hyena and stalked by a stingray. She has trod on a Nile crocodile, herded Bedouin goats, spooked a brown bear and been slapped by a colobus monkey… okay, one of these is not true. Ninetin’s experiences are the materials of her writing. When she is in an introspective mood, she likes to quote Dr. Johnson when he wrote that all judgements are comparative. The different places she has seen and the history she has learned are the frames of reference against which she makes judgements about the subjects of her writings, judgements not made in comparison to imagined ideals or future utopias, but rather to what is and has been extant.