When Britain was being locked down, the country was assured that all risks had been properly and robustly considered. Yes, schools would close and education would suffer. Normal healthcare would take a hit and people would die as a result. But the government repeatedly said the experts had looked at all this. After all, it
I moved to Bangkok ten years ago in order to be in a place where nothing happens, where no one knew me and where nothing cost very much. A decade on, after a military coup, running street battles between protestors and soldiers, a ceaseless social life and costs reaching about the same levels as Brooklyn,
Kenya Suddenly all the great powers are courting Africa. Like emissaries to the 14th-century Malian monarch Mansa Musa in his adobe Timbuktu palaces, foreign officials from West and East compete for attention in multi-country tours across the poorest continent. Recent visitors include the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken leading caravans of Washington officials, Moscow’s
Ommm… are you in the lotus position? Then I’ll begin. The studio was literally Hades, four industrial heaters blasting in each corner. We were crouching on our knees, sweat dripping, foreheads to the floor. It was a weekday morning. Then our instructor said the six words I can never unhear. ‘Flower your anus to the
One year ago I walked into an operating theatre, dressed in a tiny surgical nightie. Over the next three hours, through various keyhole incisions in my belly, my left kidney was cut from its pillow of protective suet and extracted from below the belt line. The kidney was rinsed through, put on ice and boxed
For the first time since Russia’s invasion, schools in Ukraine are starting to re-open. For many parents, including my own, this presents a dilemma. Is it safe for pupils to return? My brother is seven and has spent the past year doing ‘remote learning’, which is hard enough in countries at peace, let alone those
One of the worst things about being attacked by a cow is that no one takes it very seriously afterwards. My partner Claire and I found that out the hard way after a walk in Devon. We were making our way through a large field on a public footpath, heading towards a herd of cows
Butter was not a major part of my childhood. In fact, I don’t remember it ever being in our fridge. My parents were subject to the saturated fat scaremongering of the 1980s, and consequently believed that butter was the enemy. Instead, we had spread: margarine, rebranded as a cholesterol-busting alternative to heart-clogging butter. But spread
