You’re familiar with the rule by now. Do not carry your own liquids allowed into the airport departure lounge.  … except that I was drinking an awesome green tea I’d brought with me from China. And no one was asking me to surrender my cup. How long, I wondered, could I keep this up?  Right up to the boarding gate, it turns out.    Actually, it’s quite the comfort to have tea, especially green, in one’s hand while being herded through an airport. But why haven’t any of the other liquids in my...

It’s teenagers who enjoy it the most. It’s there in so many of the snacks they eat. It is a horrifying rottenness. They love it. They are wrong to love it. Of course, many of these snacks of rottenness contain chilli; that fresh adventure for the young person. With alcohol, even coffee, still far on the horizon, the enjoyment of chilli carries an illicit charge and bragging rights. And, of course, these snacks are heavily freighted with umami, the protein decoy. While adults somehow remain wary of this big-FMCG alchemy, the...

I am a contrarian. All of this unpopular opining of mine may look like critical thinking, heroic truth-seeking.  But don’t be fooled; it’s just knee-jerk doggerel.  My world-view is permanently controlled by the assumption that “those millions of people talking around me can’t possibly be right”. My brain rails against whatever prevails. Remember that, especially when you catch me writing about Chinese medicine.  Remember where I am writing from. Here or there. Remember whose those surrounding millions of voices are.  If I am in my native UK, stifled by familiarity, you will find me warmly...

They call it “herbal medicine”. And in this house, this week, it’s everywhere. I call it “horrible medicine”. But I actually quite like it.  It smells of fragrant-soil and it tastes like fragrant-soil-with-brown-sugar.   Apparently, it has an English name; Isatis Tinctoria. But, like the names for all those things popular only in China, that’s not really an English name.  The brew hasn’t caught on elsewhere; what Americans call root-beer is a completely different thing. But here it’s enormous. As I write, your local pharmacy is selling fast out. There’s no scientific evidence that...