This day, 10 September, in 1960, President Ahmed Sékou Touré of the Republic of Guinea paid an official visit to China at the invitation of Chinese President,...
The everlasting gobstopper is of course the invention of Roald Dahl. It’s his hero, Willy Wonka, who manufactures the boiled sweet that keeps on giving.
Well, everlasting flavour is something that appeals to anyone who’s been stuck with flavour-faded chewing gum. But, sadly, diminution is the way of things in the real world. Let’s call it the curse of osmosis.
It’s natural for people to try and squeeze the last dregs out of something they’ve paid for. And British fiction also has various other characters (mean old misers, mostly) who...
No matter how much we enjoy a thing, it’s not enough; our enjoyment seeks validation.
Imagine a friend gave us a new DVD, but without introducing it. It’s blown us away. What a film! We’ve lingered over the credits, and, well, we’re now just one click away from checking the review on Rotten Tomatoes. But why would we read a review now?
Because we desperately want to see our opinion echoed in a forum higher than our own heads. Secretly, we want to see opinions like ours validated in the highest...
there were some TV commercials for Kellogg’s Corn Flakes. Various respectable-looking adults found themselves restricted for choice at breakfast time, while camping or abroad, perhaps... Anyway, they were forced by circumstance to eat Corn Flakes.
“I’d forgotten how good they taste”, they each said. And that was the tagline of the series.
The implication was not that these adults had grown out of breakfast cereals; it was merely that they had spent years pursuing different kinds of breakfast cereal, neglecting the one that started it all. Rather than getting sick of...
Suntory’s bottled “Black Oolong Tea” is an institution, as well loved in China as in its native Japan. And here it is, refrigerated and available for purchase, in the UK.
Always the stingy skinflint, I resent paying three times the price when the main ingredient, water, is on tap and essentially free. But here it is. Nice to know.
I buy a packet of oolong leaves instead. This is an Asian supermarket in Cardiff. These stores are easier to find than ever, thanks to the steady stream of Chinese students...
