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4 December

In the headlines

Israel’s military says it is expanding its ground operation into “all areas” of Gaza. Its forces are pushing into the south of the Palestinian enclave, where more than a million people fled – on Israel’s advice – at the start of the war. The COP28 president has claimed there is “no science” which shows that phasing out fossil fuels is needed to limit global warming to 1.5C, says The Guardian. Sultan Al Jaber, who also heads the United Arab Emirates’s state oil company, told a virtual event that abandoning oil and gas entirely would “take the world back into caves”. The UK’s only giant pandas are leaving for China today after 12 years in Scotland. Yang Guang and Tian Tian (pictured), who have been the star attractions at Edinburgh Zoo since their arrival in 2011, are heading home after the lease agreement to keep them ended. 🐼😢

Photography

More than 1,000 photographers from 54 countries entered this year’s Natural Landscape Photography Awards. Top images include a shot of lava at Fagradalsfjall volcano in Iceland; a golden sunrise illuminating the coastal mountains of British Columbia; mystical trees in a Caledonian forest in Scotland; sand dunes in the UAE’s Liwa Desert glimpsed through fog; and the ancient woods of Vancouver Island. See the full list here.

Zeitgeist

In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl warned that children shouldn’t watch too much television, says The Times. “It rots the senses in the head! It kills imagination dead!” It turns out he might be right. In a recent study, youngsters were either shown a short video clip or asked to read a passage from a story, and then asked to imagine different objects. The video-watchers were on average 7% slower than the readers. 📺📉

The great escape

Travel company Go2Africa has just unveiled what it claims is “the world’s most expensive safari”, says Forbes: a 24-day trip costing just over $690,000 for a family of four. High-end holidaymakers will be whisked around six countries in southern and eastern Africa by private jet, taking in sights including Victoria Falls, Volcanoes National Park in Rwanda, and the white sands of the Seychelles. Highlights include hot air balloon rides, gorilla trekking and even a personal film crew to document the “journey of a lifetime”. Book your spot, for a cool $172,545 per person, here.

From the archives

This BBC report from 1977 investigates the “fastest-growing craze” among youngsters in the UK: skateboarding. The video shows whippersnappers whizzing around on London’s South Bank, an area which still serves as a skatepark today. The voiceover describes the US import as “a kind of cross between surf-riding and roller skating, and with no less potential for the individual to show off all his artistry and skill – or lack of it”. Watch the whole clip here.

On the way back

Toupées are undergoing a renaissance among younger men, says Vice. Businesses in the UK and US are reporting a “surge in interest” for the humble hairpieces, and TikTok is full of videos of “miraculous” before-and-after transformations. One reason is that the quality of toupées has improved significantly. You can treat them “pretty much like normal hair”: washing them, styling them, even swimming in them. Of course, “it’s fine to be bald”. But it’s nice to have options, and the toupée “might be as good as any”.

Snapshot

It’s an unexploded bomb which has been sitting in a Welsh couple’s garden for more than 100 years. Owner Sian Edwards says she used to bang her trowel against it to remove soil while gardening, believing it to be a “dummy” device with no charge. Last week, a police officer informed her he had spotted the bomb and would have to inform the Ministry of Defence. The following day, the bomb squad turned up, discovered it was “live”, took it to a nearby quarry, and blew it up.

Quoted

Quoted 4-12-23

“If one cannot command attention by one’s admirable qualities one can at least be a nuisance.”

Crime writer Margery Allingham

2-3 December

Behind the headlines

The celebrity diplomat who prized stability over all else

No US secretary of state ever achieved such celebrity as Henry Kissinger, says Niall Ferguson in The Wall Street Journal. A 1974 Newsweek cover depicted him as “Super K”, a comic-book-style hero. Time called him “the world’s indispensable man”. And a 1972 Life magazine spread pictured him with a bevy of beautiful actresses. Yet nor has any modern statesman been so “vehemently criticised”. Christopher Hitchens wrote a whole book accusing Kissinger of “war crimes and crimes against humanity in Indochina, Chile, Argentina, Cyprus, East Timor, and several other places”. Those accusations have “stuck like mud”. No one should be excused a “proper reckoning of their life’s work”, says Gerard Baker in The Times. But Kissinger did more than almost anyone in the second half of the 20th century to “avert global war”. At a time of extraordinary peril – the Cold War was the first conflict in history with the potential to “extinguish most life on the planet” – he played a critical role in de-escalating tensions while also “laying the groundwork for the West’s ultimate triumph”.

THE TOWNHOUSE This three-bedroom house in Hove is tucked away on a granite-cobbled 19th century mews. It retains original floorboards and an old vinery with a double-glazed ceiling, while the facade features green shutters which open to reveal teak-framed doors. Brighton promenade is nearby, along with a wealth of independent shops, cafes and restaurants. Hove station is an eight-minute walk, with trains to London Victoria in just over an hour. £650,000.

Fashion

The idea that there’s an “ancient tradition” of Highland Scottish clans having their own tartans is overblown, says Daniel Kalder in UnHerd – there were regional variations but no “strict family taxonomy”. When George IV visited Scotland in 1822, the novelist Walter Scott essentially made up the tradition for the king’s welcome festival, presenting him with clan representatives “wearing their supposedly traditional and unique” fabrics. So there’s nothing wrong with all the “new” tartans that have been created since. These include official tartans for 27 US states; an “American Dream tartan”, which features 76 blue threads for the year 1776 and 13 red stripes for the original colonies; a “Climate Emergency tartan”; Obama and Trump family tartans; and a rather sombre “Second World War-themed Russian Arctic Convoy tartan”, commissioned by the Russian Consulate in Edinburgh.

Quoted

Quoted 2-12-23

“Though familiarity may not breed contempt, it takes the edge off admiration.”

William Hazlitt

THE COUNTRY HOUSE This Grade-II listed Georgian house sits in 20 acres of parkland in the South Cheshire countryside. It has six bedrooms; a vast yellow orangery with arched doors that open on to a sheltered terrace; a wine cellar with vaulted walls; and stone fireplaces throughout. The grounds include a lake and tennis courts, while a converted stable and coach house provide additional accommodation. Crewe Station is a 15-minute drive, with trains to London Euston in 1hr 40min. £4m.

Quoted

Quoted 2-12-23

“The less you know the better you sleep.”

Russian proverb

1 December

In the headlines

Israel has resumed airstrikes on Gaza after the seven-day ceasefire came to an end this morning without being extended any further. Both sides blame each other for violating the truce: Israel says Hamas fired rockets across the border and failed to release all female and child hostages; Hamas says Israel blocked the supply of fuel to northern Gaza. COP28 delegates have agreed to launch the long-awaited “loss and damage” fund to help developing nations deal with the effects of climate change, says the FT. The EU, the UK, the US, the UAE, Japan and Germany have pledged more than $420m to the “historic” project, which was first announced at last year’s conference. The South East of England has had its earliest winter snowfall in 15 years. Snow and ice alerts remain in force across much of the UK, with temperatures as low as -10C forecast in parts of the North East.

Tomorrow’s world

The Atlantic has compiled a collection of striking pictures of solar power stations around the world, including a circular array inside a disused satellite dish in Switzerland; an undulating sheet of panels covering hillsides in China’s Fujian province; a bird’s eye view of a “concentrated solar” plant in Chile’s Atacama Desert, which uses 10,600 mirrors to reflect sunlight to the top of a 250m tower; a similar operation with 50,000 mirrors in Israel’s Negev Desert; and a newly built floating solar plant on a reservoir in Indonesia. See the rest here.

Noted

America’s classified information system is a total mess, says Sam Lebovic in Foreign Policy. By one 2001 estimate, the US government has around 7.5 billion pages of restricted material – more than the number of pages in all the books in the Library of Congress. And efforts to stop leaks can be farcical. When the name of the US naval intelligence chief surfaced during a corruption investigation in 2013, he had his clearance suspended. He was never charged, but the case remained open for three years – during which he “wasn’t able to read, see or hear any classified information”. Colleagues had to hide all restricted material “every time he entered the room”.

On the money

Moët & Chandon is at risk of losing its crown as the world’s biggest wine brand to a Chinese challenger, says The Daily Telegraph. Changyu Pioneer Wine Company saw its value rise by a third between 2022 and 2023, to $1.2bn, while Moët’s fell 10% to $1.3bn. Founded in 1892, Changyu is China’s oldest winemaker, and has more than 20,000 hectares of vineyards across the country. The Changyu Moser Family cabernet sauvignon is available at Selfridges for £41.99 a bottle – click here to order.

On the way back

The pandemic put one hell of a dampener on smooching, says Olivia Blair in Elle, but kissing is back, “in all its sloppy glory”. Celebrities like Megan Fox and Machine Gun Kelly have revived the “steamy public snog”, while the “consistently ahead-of-the-curve” designer Jacquemus devoted his SS21 L’Amour campaign to models making out – “in bed, on the floor, against the wall, on push bikes and motorbikes”. Is it just a fleeting “horniness-fuelled” trend? “Only time will tell.”

Food and drink

Like many pub and restaurant chains, Wetherspoons has an app through which you can order food and drink. But unlike most others, it doesn’t use GPS to verify you’re at a particular branch – meaning you can place an order for any table at any branch across the country. On the “Wetherspoons The Game!!” Facebook group, which has 160,000 members, people post their pub name and table number for strangers to order to. “The game is ultimate karma,” says The Guardian: “a giant round where if someone gets yours in now, you owe someone else in the future.”

Snapshot

It’s an anglerfish swimming upside down. Marine biologists thought the luminescent lurkers adopted this position only when hunting, says Phys.org, but they have now discovered that some deep-sea species spend their entire lives on their back. They appear to have evolved the behaviour to make better use of their natural lures, the long stringy bits that hang from their faces to attract prey. 🐟🙃

Quoted

Quoted

“The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.”

Groucho Marx

30 November

In the headlines

Three Israelis have died in a shooting in Jerusalem, after two gunmen affiliated with Hamas opened fire at a bus stop during morning rush hour. The attack raises fears that the Gaza truce, which Hamas and Israel have extended by continuing to exchange hostages and prisoners, could be jeopardised. Henry Kissinger has died aged 100. The former US secretary of state, who won the Nobel Peace Prize but was also accused of war crimes, advised a dozen US presidents and helped establish relations with communist China. Elon Musk has told advertisers boycotting X (formerly Twitter) to “go f*** yourself”. Brands including Apple and Disney have pulled ads from the billionaire’s social media platform over his endorsement of an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory, a move Musk says is “going to kill the company”.

Food and drink

Sandwich-inspired drinks may be at the “extreme end of social-media-induced gimmicks”, says Robb Report, but foodie cocktails are filling up menus across New York. At Madame George, the NY Bodega Sour features bacon-washed whiskey, egg whites and “everything bagel seasoning” – all served in a bodega-style coffee cup (pictured). Patrons at Reyna can get a Bored in Buckingham, a Thanksgiving-esque extravaganza made of duck-fat-infused bourbon, blueberry syrup and spiced bitters. There are even whispers of “blue-cheese-flavoured sake”.

Noted

Although Israel has portrayed civilian deaths in Gaza as “a regrettable but unavoidable part of modern conflict”, the numbers far outstrip military campaigns elsewhere, says The New York Times. Even conservative estimates of the death toll in the Palestinian territory are over 14,000, of which 10,000 are women and children. That body count, from less than two months of fighting, dwarfs the roughly 7,700 civilians killed by Western forces in the entire first year of the 2003 Iraq invasion, and is comparable to the estimated 12,400 civilians killed by the West in Afghanistan over “nearly 20 years of war”.

On the way back

A shimmery mole that burrows through sand has been rediscovered nearly 90 years after wildlife experts thought it had gone extinct, says The Daily Telegraph. De Winton’s golden mole, named for its shiny fur, hadn’t been seen anywhere since 1936. But scientists recently spotted four of the tiny mammals on a beach in South Africa, and confirmed their identity using DNA from a specimen in a Cape Town museum. Their fur is iridescent because they secrete an oil that makes it easier to “swim” through the sand.

Zeitgeist

Dancing on tables at private members’ clubs and shopping on the King’s Road are considered “awfully passé” by today’s young bluebloods, says The Times. The “upper-crust Chelsea crowd” is now full of “Bopeas”, short for “bohemian peasants”. Among their approved hobbies are rewilding, keeping chickens and cold-water swimming; no-nos include processed food, supercars and “bread that isn’t sourdough”. They don’t make honking jokes about sex; they do chat about gut health. And obviously, “they are still rich”.

Love etc

Every app can be a dating app, says The Wall Street Journal, and American singletons are increasingly trying their luck. Some are making romantic advances on the exercise tracker Strava, complimenting fellow athletes on their runs and workouts; others do similar on the language learning service DuoLingo. Even the recommendation site Yelp has been repurposed for love: Las Vegas resident Mel Chiong met his wife Terri after praising her review of a macaron bakery.

Snapshot

It’s Aitana López, Spain’s first “AI influencer”, says Business Insider. The pink-haired poser, who has amassed 174,000 followers on Instagram, was created by the founder of a modelling agency who said he was tired of accommodating the “egos” of flesh-and-blood models. López earns her creators up to €10,000 a month, and has an account on Fanvue, a subscription platform like OnlyFans, filled with racy (digitally generated) images of her in lingerie.

Quoted

Quoted

“The nice thing about being a celebrity is that when you bore people, they think it’s their fault.”

Henry Kissinger

29 November

In the headlines

All 41 men trapped in a collapsed tunnel in India were rescued yesterday, ending a 17-day ordeal. The construction workers, who became stranded underground after a landslide, were extracted by specialist “rat-hole miners” brought in to finish the job by hand after a large mechanical drill bit snapped. The Dutch version of a controversial new book has been withdrawn from sale, after it appeared to identify the royal family member who allegedly asked questions about the skin colour of Harry and Meghan’s baby. The publishers of Omid Scobie’s Endgame blamed a translation error for the revelation, which has been widely shared on social media. A Penny Lane street sign has been returned to Liverpool, 47 years after it was stolen on a drunken night out. An anonymous ex-student admitted that he and his pals had been “worse for wear” when they took the memento in 1976, nine years after the road was immortalised by the titular Beatles song.

The great escape

Tourists usually flock to Bergen in Norway for the Christmas markets at this time of year, but it’s also home to the world’s largest gingerbread town. Every year since the tasty tradition began in 1991, “Pepperkakebyen” becomes a little more elaborate, with 10,000 volunteer bakers contributing to the 2023 creation. People from all walks of life construct buildings for the confectionary conurbation, from kindergarten pupils and university students to prison inmates. Volunteers build whatever takes their fancy: this year’s cityscape includes multiple Big Bens and Eiffel Towers alongside less traditional landmarks such as a Quidditch arena and a Tardis.

On the money

Last year was a good one for Tony Blair, says Tom McTague in UnHerd. The Tony Blair Institute, a non-profit set up by the former PM to promote “global change” and advise governments – “often for a hefty fee” – saw its turnover jump to $121m in 2022. That’s up 49% on the year before. Staff numbers are up by 53%, to 514, while the four other directors aside from Blair (who doesn’t take a salary) were paid a total of $1.1m.

Fashion

Thanks to the TikTok-driven “cosy girl” trend, fashion brands are embracing comfy, wrapped-up styles this winter, says Lauren Cochrane in The Guardian. One notable feature is sleeves, which have reached hand-swallowing lengths. Labels including Acne Studios, Balenciaga and Givenchy have featured models wearing oversized sleeves; Alexa Chung “has been spotted in a shirt with gigantic hand-covering cuffs”; the new Doctor Who, Ncuti Gatwa, recently wore a very-long-sleeved coat at a GQ awards show. They’re warm, but they also have a tendency to droop into your food. “Soup may be off the menu at stylish tables this party season.”

Gone viral

This video of an intrepid pair skating on crystal-clear ice in Alaska has racked up 73,000 views on YouTube. Rescue instructor Luc Mehl says the rare “ice window” formed in October on Rabbit Lake, near Anchorage, after an unusually cold and dry transition to winter. See the full clip here.

Love etc

In the world of sexual fetishes, crossing the political aisle is an increasingly popular kink, says The Washington Post. Some people get turned on by having their views mocked by political opponents, while others prefer to dominate them. Sub-categories on the social networking site FetLife include “hot conservative girls who make liberals cry”; its Kinky Conservatives group, in which members discuss dominating “libtard slaves”, has more than 2,000 members. Other BDSM sites cater to taboo turn-ons with names like “Triggered Liberal Snowflake” – a type of political role-play that insiders say grew particularly popular during the Trump administration.

Snapshot

It’s a newborn Sumatran rhino, whose arrival bolsters a species with fewer than 50 living members. The unnamed male calf, born at a sanctuary on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, weighs just 25kg, and is the second of his species to be born this year. His father, Harapan, was the last Sumatran rhino in the world to be repatriated after his birth in Cincinnati in 2006. Today, the entire population lives in Indonesia.

Quoted

Quoted 29-11-23

“The world is not driven by greed. It’s driven by envy.”

Investor Charlie Munger, who died yesterday aged 99

28 November

In the headlines

The four-day truce between Israel and Hamas has been extended for a further two days. The Palestinian militant group has confirmed that the extension carries the same conditions as the original deal, with an Israeli hostage released for every three Palestinian prisoners freed. Rishi Sunak was at the centre of a “diplomatic storm” this morning, says Politico, after cancelling a planned meeting with the Greek prime minister in a row over the Parthenon Sculptures (also known as the Elgin Marbles). Downing Street claims Kyriakos Mitsotakis broke assurances that he wouldn’t publicly discuss the topic during his visit to the UK. The first transatlantic flight by a large passenger plane powered only by “sustainable aviation fuel” took off this morning, says Reuters. The Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787, which is flying from Heathrow to New York’s JFK airport, is using a combination of waste fats and the leftovers from corn production.

Architecture

Travel + Leisure has compiled a list of the most beautiful college campuses in America. It includes Berry College in Georgia, an English Gothic-inspired pile set among 27,000 acres of grounds; Flagler College in Florida, which started out as a Spanish Renaissance-style luxury hotel; Notre Dame in Indiana, with its famous golden dome; and the University of Washington in Seattle, with views of a snowcapped Mount Rainier. See the rest here.

Inside politics

When I was foreign secretary, says William Hague in The Times, I once took a call from a senior figure in the United Arab Emirates who was furious that the BBC had been running stories that “reflected very badly on some powerful Emiratis”. I listened patiently, before explaining that the British government honestly had “no knowledge of, or control over”, editorial decisions made at the corporation. “Never mind what they say about friendly countries,” I told him, “you should see what they say about us.” Eventually my caller accepted that I was telling the truth, but he clearly thought it was a “very odd way to run a country”. That’s why I find the likely acquisition of the Telegraph and the Spectator by an Emirati sheikh so “disturbing” – over there, there’s simply “no clear separation between private and public interest”.

On the way down

As if wasting muscles, thinner bones, and “the prospect of death in the endless vacuum of space” were not enough to contend with, says The Guardian, male astronauts may be prone to erectile dysfunction. New research has found that the radiation from “galactic cosmic rays” can impair the function of tissues in the penis, possibly for decades. Treatment with specific antioxidants appeared to lessen the problem, however, so spacemen bound for Mars “need not be too deflated”.

Gone viral

This video of a man shuffling debris on a rug into a single line before scooping it up in one fell swoop has racked up more than 130,000 views on X (formerly Twitter). As one user says: “Don’t work hard, work smart!”

Noted

For all the talk about electric cars, says The Conversation, it’s electric bikes and mopeds that are really making a difference to climate change. Thanks to their rapid uptake in China and other countries where mopeds are a common form of transport, there were 280 million of these zippy two- and three-wheelers on the world’s roads last year, compared to around 20 million electric cars. Their use has cut demand for oil by around a million barrels a day – four times more than Teslas and the like.

Snapshot

It’s an artificial glacier, designed to provide water during the dry months in the arid Ladakh region of northern India. The 20ft “ice stupa” prototype was created in winter by spraying water out of a pipe running down from a stream further up the mountain, says CNN. The freezing air temperature does the rest, “immediately crystallising the water droplets into ice”, forming a mound around the pipe. The resulting cone-shaped structure can store 150,000 litres of frozen water, which is then slowly released when it melts in spring.

Quoted

Quoted

“We are here on Earth to help others. What on earth the others are here for I do not know.”

WH Auden

27 November

Hamas says it wants to extend the ceasefire deal with Israel before it expires later today. Israel has said the four-day pause, which has so far seen 39 Israeli hostages released in exchange for 117 Palestinian prisoners, will be extended by one day for every 10 additional hostages freed. The United Arab Emirates planned to use its role as host of the COP28 climate summit this week to strike new oil and gas deals, according to documents leaked to the BBC. A UAE spokesman didn’t deny the claims, saying “private meetings are private”. Irish author Paul Lynch has won the Booker Prize for his novel Prophet Song, set in an imagined Ireland descending into totalitarianism. While some past winners vowed to use the £50,000 prize money on luxuries such as a swimming pool (AS Byatt) or “something perfectly useless” (Ian McEwan), Lynch said it will go towards his mortgage.

Photography

The winners and finalists in this year’s Ocean Photographer of the Year awards include shots of a gentoo penguin leaping from the water in Antarctica; a cormorant frozen above a vast shoal of fish in Mexico; a close-up of an open-mouthed lizardfish – and its last meal – in the Philippines; and a squid whizzing through jet-black water in Cornwall. See more here.

Inside politics

Over the past couple of months, two convincing AI-generated audio clips have circulated on social media of politicians “saying things they never said”, says Josiah Mortimer in Byline Times. One was purportedly Keir Starmer bullying Labour staffers; another had Sadiq Khan seemingly declaring “I don’t give a flying shit about the Remembrance weekend”. Perhaps “the most worrying part” of this is that the Met Police had to drop its investigation into the Khan clip, as there don’t seem to be any laws expressly making political deepfakes illegal.

Quirk of history

Every year, says The Times, Norway sends a Christmas tree to Trafalgar Square in gratitude for Britain’s help during World War Two. According to biographer Nicholas Shakespeare, the tradition was started by Ian Fleming. To celebrate the safe return of a Norwegian commando after a raid on his occupied homeland, Fleming, then working in naval intelligence, arranged a knees-up at the Savoy. After much roistering, the group piled into two jeeps and found that the commando had brought back a pair of pine trees to give to King Haakon VII of Norway, who was seeing out the war in Berkshire. A well-refreshed Fleming suggested they stick one up there and then – and so they did, tying it to a balustrade in Trafalgar Square.

Gone viral

A tear-jerking Christmas advert for a pub in the town of Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, has racked up almost eight million views on X (formerly Twitter). The two-minute video shows an old man visiting a gravestone with flowers, then getting ignored by passers-by on the street as he tries to greet them. He eventually enters Charlie’s Bar, where he’s given a pint of Guinness at a table beside the fire – and immediately makes friends with a couple and their dog. It ends with a quote often misattributed to WB Yeats: “There are no strangers here, only friends you haven’t yet met.” Watch the full ad here.

Letters

To The Economist:

Although David Kirke is justly famous as the inventor of bungee jumping, I must take issue with the description of him as the pioneer of cluster ballooning in 1986 (Obituary, November 11th). Several people before Kirke accomplished this feat, most notably “Lawnchair Larry” Walters in 1982. With 42 weather balloons attached to his lawn chair, Walters rose to a height of 16,000 feet and was spotted by two commercial airliners. He drifted across part of Los Angeles before bursting several balloons with a pellet gun to slowly return to earth.

Keith Van Sickle, California

Snapshot

It’s a “lunar halo”, a rare visual phenomenon spotted in the skies over parts of England on Saturday evening. The radiant ring, caused by the refraction of moonlight by ice crystals in the atmosphere, can be a sign that rainfall is on its way. Click here for more images.

Quoted

Quoted 27-11-23

“I don’t want to live on in the hearts of my countrymen; I want to live on in my apartment.”

Woody Allen