My friendship with Patrick began 13 years before he opened the Hill, Taylor, Dickinson office in Piraeus, and he remained my most constant friend for the following 40 years until his shockingly sudden death.  
We met in 1979 on our first day as English literature university students, sitting next to each other at the freshers’ introductory dinner. From our very first answers to the question “so, where are you from?”, we looked at each other as if we came from different planets and knew we had nothing in common.   A private school Greek girl from London was as alien to him as a grammar school boy from Liverpool was to me.  
What brought us together over weeks, months and years of university was that we were both outsiders to the traditional world of Cambridge.  What sealed our friendship was forming a band together which included another lifelong friend of Patrick’s, Maurice Glasman.  It was a terrible band but an everlasting bond. 
Law, let alone shipping, were not in Patrick’s plans at the time but he was practical and astute so after university he did a conversion course and started his career as a lawyer, falling into shipping law by chance.  I remember the day Patrick came to ask my advice about taking up an offer to work in Pireaus.  It was the first time I spoke to him in detail about the fact that I come from a shipping family.  I told him he was mad and that he would hate it.  He ignored me so I gave him a list of friends and shipping contacts in Athens to help him settle in and off he went.  
Patrick never looked back.  Over the next three decades, every time I went to Greece and every time he came to the UK, we would meet up and talk about films, friends – old and new, family, relationships and children.  Year by year I followed his progress from the first English shipping lawyer in Athens to one of the most important, brilliant, respected and loved members of the industry. The boy from Liverpool became more of a Greek insider than me and gave me more of an insight into the world of shipping than I ever gave him. 
More, much more than that, from that very first day at university, he was always there for me with his loyalty, his warmth, his generosity, his smile and his sensitivity, and, I hope, I was there for him.   
I might never have got through the 3 years of university if it hadn’t been for Patrick reminding me about tutorials, seminars and lectures.  His friendship was as precious to me at 18 as it has been over the last 40 years.  Throughout his life, Patrick was an equally true, devoted and loyal friend to Maurice, always there when he was in trouble, helping him out when he needed it most on a course which eventually led to Maurice’s nomination as a Life Peer. 
Above all, Patrick was funny.  Witty, quirky, ironic, even at the direst times, it was impossible to be with him without laughing.  This year, he sent me a message to confirm our next meeting just a few days away.  Half an hour later he was struck down by a heart attack and never got a second chance.   I will miss Patrick forever.