I threaded my way through a narrow, abandoned channel, walking back in time through incised rocks that looked like wide-waled corduroy on the horizontal.
Threading my way through the crowds, I passed through Chinatown, where elaborate characters covered double-happiness archways and storefronts bore names like "Lising Kok Ultimat Door Mats" and "Ip Min Wan Standard Store".
It was market day when I arrived, and I threaded my way through the stalls on the main square to get to the town museum, where a small permanent exhibition of photographs, documents and other material on Mahler opened in 1986.
Threading my way through a slalom of checkpoints and blast walls surrounding the British mission, I arrived to find the boyish figure of Our Man in Kabul, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, being hustled into a convoy of heavily armoured Range Rovers by his ever-present phalanx of bodyguards, walkie-talkies crackling and assault rifles primed.
Threading my way through the milling stock traders, I walked out onto the Bund, admiring its array of Art Deco office towers from Shanghai's heyday in the 1920s and 1930s.
Now I am threading my way across an al fresco terrace, through what seems to be a staff outing from Perfect Curve, and lining up for a table in the booked-out diner.
By the afternoon country music was already blaring from speakers all over the campground as I threaded my way back through the crowds to the Burn Rate marquee, where our party was just getting under way.
People looked at me but no one looked outraged as I threaded my shirtless way through the chairs, around the flags, past the lectern and down the stairs, dodging units of men in uniform posing for photos.
I felt the same sensation, over and over, of a sharp needle threading its way through my chest.
As I reach the end of my career, I find these obstacles daunting, even though they affect me only indirectly through the difficulties my students and postdocs encounter as they attempt to thread their way through this career minefield.
It fell to Dr. Cox, a statistical geneticist, to thread a way through the maze.
