Still, it was a longstanding colonial habit to picture the empire's jewel as a congeries of religions, castes and languages: in effect, a black hole of community belonging and identity, from which few flickers of individuality escaped.
Many cards offered endorsements of the colonial enterprise, with pictures of children praying in missionary schools or women using sewing machines under the supervisory eyes of nuns.
Decorative skeletons and skulls are on display at many houses and hotels, nowhere more so than at a fantastic little hotel we discover at another must-stop on the silver town trail, the state capital Guanajuato, a picture-perfect colonial gem, full of partying students, craft markets and mariachi bands.
There are nail marks in the wall because I've replaced the pictures of colonial buffalo hunts and Moravian mission churches with my friend Kassandra Pardee's "quinces", and her drawing of her yoga "warrior position" on the book stand is intended to urge me upwards and onwards.
As we drove through the neighborhood our son and daughter-in-law especially liked with its graceful old pre-war, squeaky-floored, radiator-heated Tudors and colonials, I snapped pictures and exclaimed, "How beautiful".
The early chapters in her autobiography paint a nostalgic picture of a colonial upbringing – her father was in the Admiralty and part of her childhood was spent in Singapore – and an Enid Blytonish Catholic boarding school in Bath.
In the city itself there's a design centre, showcasing the area's architects and furniture makers; the Queen Victoria museum and art gallery, with an interesting selection of work including everything from the colonial art including Robert Dowling's picture Aborigines of Tasmania, to Jenny Gill's collection of matchboxes; and the Seaport area, great for a bracing stroll or a quayside lunch.
Why do you want to come and spoil ours?" And so through ellipses and half-glimpses a gradual picture of post-colonial, Kenyatta and Moi-era Kenya emerges.
I hopped a train to the industrial city of Semarang and took pictures of crumbling colonial structures decorated with psychedelic street art, and in the pub at the back of another century-old hotel I drank way too much beer with the British manager of a ceramics company.
Or maybe you picture the rare Colonial-era books and documents in our research Library, or our spectacular collection of Tiffany lamps.
Also, if these pictures really show the colonial view of Australia, it's through several filters.
