Josh Wallman

I got to know Josh well some thirty years ago when he visited Oxford for an ornithological meeting in which I was not involved.  But he looked me up because of our common interest in eye movements.  Although we must have spent some time in the lab. what sticks in mind is the amount of time we spent talking about life and loves, and trying as many restaurants as possible.  

Over the years Josh became not just my friend, but my wife's friend and our daughters' friend - and last year our older daughter took her boyfriend to meet Josh too!  In the summer of 2002 Josh joined us (myself, my wife, and then 16 and 8 year old daughters) in a memorable trip round China.   Josh had a neck-cooler that was a sausage-like object that seemed generally to be in use cooling our eight year old's neck rather than Josh's.   Food was of course a major part of the experience.  Josh relished experiences as various as the night-markets where we were offered such delicacies as scorpion kebabs, and a splendid banquet Josh arranged in a house in the old city with a descendant of the Imperial food-taster.   We had only one Chinese speaker amongst us (my wife) and towards the end of the trip she decided to go on strike and left Josh and I to fend for ourselves.   We strolled along the Beijing street looking for interesting restaurants we had not already sampled and settled on one. The waitress showed us to a table and handed us menus in Chinese.   An awkward delay followed until she said in halting English "You need help, Sirs?"  "We need help"; we said "What are your specialities?"  "Ah Sirs", she said, "We special fish-head restaurant; only serve fish head."  So fish-head it was, complete with an explanation of the correct sequence in which to eat the various parts, leaving the choice delicacy - the eye - to last.  I confess we did not eat the eyes, and probably not only because it seemed improper to consume the subject of one's research!  

We miss greatly his kindness, his quick mind, his terrific enjoyment of many subjects, his openness, and his ability to talk share deeply of himself.   He loved banter, but could also be intensely serious.  He had a deep aversion to lies, and once told me with great earnestness  "Love is not a feeling".  One of the most poignant aspects of his last year were to see the complete trust and confidence he had in Valerie as he and she travelled this most difficult of paths together, and the huge love between them.   Her loss is of course the greatest of all.

Stuart Judge