\n", "content_hash": "sha256:88f34b788f409b6cc4938ab3951c0c5a3415a409604cc0d622e088a70b8586a2", "media": [], "changelog": [ { "version": 1, "at": "2026-10-09T19:12:29Z", "note": null, "pinned": true } ] }And the meetings were difficult. Anyone who has spoken to Yi-Fu knows that he did not do small talk and that a conversation would include many long, extended, moments of silence. In response to something I said, Yi-Fu would lean back in his chair, perhaps stare sideways out of the window, and put his hands behind his head and… nothing. There would be silence. I was not particularly good at silence, so would attempt to fill it. Our first meetings were probably just me speaking endlessly. The point of the silence, though, was to think. And just as Yi-Fu’s letter to me gave my own letter the honour of a thoughtful response, so Yi-Fu’s silence was preparation for a considered response to whatever I had just said. It took me six years to really get used to this and to sit with the silence while Yi-Fu gathered his thoughts. It was usually worth the wait.