“Caroline Phillips is a tenacious and skilful writer with a flair for high quality interviewing and a knack for making things work.”
‘The first thing I want to do is get rid of this mystique,’ says Barry Webb, an English scholar and former Oxbridge admissions tutor, as he kicks off the first session of a three-day intensive residential course for Oxbridge interview preparation with a talk about what our interviewers will be looking for.
No calorie counting, no low fat, no deprivation. Just excellent, abundant gourmet meals. Who knew that losing weight was so much fun? Or who realised that the gut is the control centre of good health? That there are the on-going clinical trials that have used a gut-friendly diet to reverse early onset Alzheimer’s, improve diabetes and treat depression? And that you can sort out digestive issues and improve sleep and skin conditions with food? Welcome to The Gut Makeover Retreat in Menorca. The brainchild of Jeannette Hyde, an erstwhile journalist turned nutritionist. And author of The Gut Makeover – a four-week programme to revolutionise your health. She’s evangelical about the gut – having burnt out ten years ago and, finally, healed herself with ‘real’ food.
It was opened in 1969 by an emperor. That’s pretty good for any hotel. But the ceremony for this one was performed by Haile Salassie, the Ethiopian who was his country’s regent until 1974. And the man revered by the Rastafari movement as God incarnate. That makes for an enticing introduction to a hotel. Welcome to the Hilton, Addis Ababa.
Ethiopia, it’s said, is perhaps the most intriguing country in Africa. It’s a place of scale, Biblical beauty, and oodles of historical treasures. It’s a land boasting a colourful, gracious and welcoming people. And somewhere with awesome landscapes, the likes of which are rarely seen outside of good dreams. This is an impressionistic account of its wonders.
Hundreds of people are weeping and wailing for those recently deceased. They’re shrouded in white shawls over their heads, and their bodies are draped in white cloth, like exotic ghosts. They’re sitting on the ground paying their respects. This is a regular Ethiopian Orthodox Christian practice. Meanwhile, an eagle soars above in a cobalt sky.
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