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A fond farewell to the royal train
đ„© Dinner with Anna | đźââïž Sex police | đšđł Guessing game
Quirk of history

Queen Victoriaâs carriage in 1890. SSPL/Getty
A fond farewell to the royal train
Of all the places that can boast âQueen Elizabeth II slept hereâ, only one has plastic taps, Formica tables, strip lighting âand an address in Milton Keynesâ, says Robert Hardman in the Daily Mail: the royal train. The claret-coloured locomotive â which Buckingham Palace has announced will retire in 2027 â never arrives at its destination more than 15 seconds late, halts no more than six inches from the red carpet laid out on the platform, and has a bullet hole in the Royal Household dining car from when a police officer accidentally discharged his side arm in 2000. Staff bunks lie horizontally, like any regular sleeper train, while the Royalsâ beds run lengthways to match the direction of travel.
The train, complete with avocado-coloured bathroom suites and the ambiance of a âtwo-star hotel circa 1980â, has been a much-loved method of travel for monarchs over the years. The Duke of Edinburgh kept a âframed, blown-up copyâ of his Senior Citizenâs Railcard on the wall of his carriage. Queen Victoria was so convinced that eating or using the loo while on board was disruptive to her digestive system that she had elaborate premises for âretiringâ built at stations along the route between London and Balmoral. Edward VII ordered new rolling stock with the proviso that it must be âas much like the Royal Yacht as possibleâ, and Queen Mary demanded that the train never travel faster than 5mph when she was in her full-length bath.
đ âïž Scrapping this environmentally friendly, âclockwork-perfect piece of British engineering heritageâ will save less than Ed Milibandâs department spends annually on air fares, says Michael Gove in The Spectator. As Philip Larkin put it, when another round of cost-cutting left a lesser Britain:
âThe statues will be standing in the same
Tree-muffled squares, and look nearly the same.
Our children will not know itâs a different country.
All we can hope to leave them now is money.â
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Comment

Rick Friedman/Getty
Chinese Ivy Leaguers are finding America oddly familiar
When Marco Rubio announced in May that the US would begin âaggressivelyâ revoking the visas of Chinese students, says Lavender Au in The Atlantic, it was the start of a âred lineâ being drawn to keep out students perceived as a national security threat. The trouble is, âno one knows exactly where the line isâ. One Chinese social sciences student told me sheâd downloaded the encrypted messaging app, Signal, and set all her messages to disappear after 24 hours. She no longer sends even remotely sensitive links in group chats â anything âDonald Trump, Israel or DEIâ is off the cards â and discussion of American politics in the campus cafeteria with her Chinese classmates happens in hushed tones.
Thereâs a sense these students are caught in a âguessing gameâ. A formerly benign decision about whether to go on a trip beyond US borders now seems like a âhigh-stakes gambleâ. One masterâs student who did venture abroad was pulled into an immigration interview room at the airport on her re-entry â a place known colloquially among Chinese students as the âlittle black roomâ. Back home in China, itâs used for suspicion of anti-government conduct. In the US, Chinese students could find themselves in there simply for studying computer science. A PhD student was expressly warned by her adviser to avoid all protests, steer away from posting pro-Palestine content online, and drive carefully amid fears Chinese students could be deported for such minor infractions as a speeding ticket. Another received an email from her university department with an âemergency plan for sudden visa revocationâ, which included making a contact list of immigration attorneys and guidance on securing temporary housing. For a lot of Chinese kids, America is starting to feel just like home. âBut not in a good way.â
Zeitgeist

Snatching the âbest of the sexual revolutionâ: hippies at Woodstock in 1969
How glad I am to have avoided the âsex policeâ
When it comes to sex, says Rowan Pelling in The Daily Telegraph, âyouth is wasted on the youngâ. Weâre edging ever-closer to a real-life version of PD Jamesâs novel The Children of Men, in which mass infertility leaves humanity teetering on the edge of extinction. Just look at the National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles: over the past three decades, there has been a âsteady decreaseâ in the average number of so-called âsexual episodesâ among millennials and Gen Z. Nearly a quarter of them have been celibate for at least a year. The reason? The âdraconian rules and regsâ that have infected modern dating, which make âCistercian monks look like Woodstock hippiesâ.
At a recent dinner party, we Gen X crew learnt from our children that it is now, apparently, âunspeakably creepyâ for a young man to approach a woman and flatter her with a compliment. Even if two youngsters do somehow start dating, it takes a âcryptic set of intimacy stepping stonesâ before they admit to it. âCall someone a âboyfriendâ or âgirlfriendâ before the relationshipâs official and a 20-something will react like youâve arranged a shotgun marriageâ. When my son said he wouldnât dream of kissing a girl unless he had permission, âwe oldies yelped in horrorâ and protested there is nothing sexy about a man asking: âMay I kiss you?â It makes me long for the âgood-old bad days of the early 1990sâ, and the joy of sexual amateurism that made chemistry and a little enthusiasm far more important than whether youâd âticked every box on the sex policeâs formâ. I canât help but feel we veterans âsnatched the best of the sexual revolutionâ.
Life

Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty
My power struggle with Anna Wintour
Anna Wintourâs decision to step down as editor-in-chief of US Vogue brings to an end a 37-year âNuclear Wintourâ, says Graydon Carter in The Times. When I briefly worked at the magazine, you could âalmost smell the fearâ among Wintourâs underlings. âAttractive young women skittered by with terrified looks on their faces.â At the one editorial meeting I went to â chairs arranged in a V formation, Annaâs desk at the point â she met most story ideas with âcold staresâ. At one point I looked around at my fellow attendees. âIâve seen cheerier faces in hostage videos.â
At times I found Annaâs efforts to seem intimidating and powerful âalmost comicalâ. When our children were in the same class at school and they put on a fashion show, I turned up to find Anna in the front row wearing her trademark black sunglasses. âI almost burst out laughing and had to turn my back.â Another of her power moves was to turn up early: arrange a meeting for 9am, and sheâll catch you unawares at 8.45; move the next one to 8.45, and sheâll turn up at 8.30. Towards the end of my time as editor of Vanity Fair, we had a meeting scheduled at my offices at 11am. Sure enough, at 10.40 my assistant came into my office in a panic saying Anna was there already. âGood,â I replied. âAsk her if sheâd like anything and tell her Iâll see her at 11.â Iâve never felt braver.
đ„©â±ïž Dinner with Anna is like something dreamed up by a âMcKinsey efficiency expertâ. Seated at 8pm. No need to see a menu (âsteak, rareâ). And if sheâs with colleagues, the moment she finishes her last mouthful she gets the bill. âHer dinner mates might be mid-bite.â
Quoted
âItâs called the American dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.â
George Carlin
Thatâs it. Youâre done.
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