The TImes: Comment

On January 13, I lost my grandad; yesterday, due to Covid in my household and a number of vulnerable people in the family, I was forced to miss his funeral. Devastation doesn’t quite cover it. Grandad was always there through every school holiday, every celebration, every event — good or bad — and latterly, every Sunday evening via FaceTime. To have not been able to say that one final goodbye in person has intensified my grief tenfold. Instead, however, I will try to say it in a tribute here.

Only, squeezing 28 years of grandad into a few sentences is almost impossible. He was such a huge influence on my life in so very many ways that, as I try to describe just how much he meant to me, I find the words die at my fingertips. Nothing seems to do him justice. 

How do you honour a man who, despite being a child of the 1930s, never treated his granddaughter any differently from his grandsons? As far as he was concerned, a girl could sweep dew, light a bonfire, climb a tree or whittle wood as well as a boy — it’s just that she generally did it while attached to a small cuddly toy. 

The foggy days between Christmas and New Year are meant to be for watching films, eating chocolate and not thinking in any capacity. Unfortunately, if you have an older brother like mine, this is nigh on impossible. Last week, on God-knows-what-day-it-was, I was trying to have a relaxing afternoon watching an old favourite, The Lion King. Instead, I got sucked into what can only be described as a viva exam in which my brother defended his thesis on the inadequacy of Mufasa’s domination tactics. 

“Scar is the true hero of this film, you know,” he said, flopping down next to me. “Much more inclusive than the Mufasa-Simba regime who wanted to starve out the hyenas.” 

Unaware of what I was starting, I simply told him that he’d always been a Scar fan. 

“Well, because he was obviously more intelligent than the other characters.”

I laughed and should have just kept quiet, but my old mouth suddenly spouted that we couldn’t know about Mufasa because he’d died too soon. What a mistake....

Gaza needs a ceasefire now. The majority of our MPs couldn’t call for this in the vote last Wednesday, but I’m not afraid to say it: the conflict in the Middle East needs to stop immediately. 

I’m aware that Israel may be hesitant; that in its eyes, downing weapons just gives Hamas a chance to relock and reload for further massacres. I get it. But have we all forgotten what a ceasefire actually is? It doesn’t mean guerrilla warfare on a Monday and then everyone back in the office, sending emails and downing coffee on a Tuesday as if weeks of death hadn’t just occurred. A ceasefire is cold, hard negotiation — negotiation that must include the release of hostages and the vow that both states will be free to exist... 

It didn’t escape me that last Tuesday was World Mental Health Day. I don’t think any of us can pretend our mental health isn’t currently taking a beating; being surrounded by daily reports of horrific conflict in the world takes its toll. Personally, I feel angry and sick. So, we have to find ways to protect ourselves. One of my methods is to focus only on the good, the innocent and the sweet. Like my nine-year-old neighbour.

You may remember this child as the gardening aficionado and builder extraordinaire who, last year, dug water channels for my plants and constructed a swing in our shared garden. Well, he has since changed professions; he is now something of a part-time persuasive speaker. Just recently he was sitting outside with a few friends when I overheard their conversation turn to the very pressing order of the day: the existence of Father Christmas....

I love a clearout. Not because I’m some Marie Kondo mutant who dry-heaves at the sight of clutter, but because there’s always gold in them thar cupboards. A recent rummage in my parents’ utility room proved me right; I found a little piece of treasure in the shape of a 1930s gardening encyclopaedia.

It had belonged to my mum’s grandma and was stuffed full of newspaper clippings with hints and tips on how to grow a garden like Mary Quite Contrary. The majority were admittedly quite dull to someone like me, whose fingers are only green in certain lights. But then I unfurled the best prewar advert I think I’ve ever seen. “RADIOLISER,” it screamed, with a little lightning bolt border, “radio-active PLANT ENERGISER for plants, radio-active LAWN TONIC for lawns.”...

Slightly late to the party, but I’ve finally seen the Barbie movie. Great film, very funny, loved the final scene — however, I was not prepared for what happened afterwards. I’d gone with my mum and as we sat in the car, I found myself bursting into tears. It was all down to a line in the film: “Mothers stand still so their daughters can look back to see how far they have come.”

How true, I had thought. My grandmother left a profession in aeronautics for her children and my mother paused her scientific career for ten years to look after us...

German funeral notices make for an interesting read. No honestly, I’m serious. I was flicking through the Süddeutsche Zeitung e-paper and for the first time, my eyes rested on the little black-and-white box of sadness at the bottom of the page. To all appearances, it was very much like those in Britain, with time and place of burial, name and age in stark print. The classic grief in ink. But then I noticed a small addition in the line of information: profession.

Suddenly, a whole host of elderly south German electricians, hairdressers, engineers and managers were dancing across the page — even the odd hausfrau came to join in...

It’s another five years of Erdogan for my fatherland. The pain this causes me is almost unbearable. This election was an important one: the Turkish economy is on the brink of collapse, freedoms are increasingly restricted, corruption is rife. As a result, I registered to vote in the country and so here I am, in Turkey, and now devastated.

I never had much hope. Erdogan has control of every relevant institution and nearly every media outlet, making it almost impossible for the opposition. But I still couldn’t stop myself imagining change. And boy, was it good...

I have the answer to the question that’s on everyone’s lips: is it worth making the Coronation quiche for the big event next weekend? With the recipe released just a few days ago, I have put some effort in and, for the interests of this column, made, baked and taste-tested the pastry in advance.

It wasn’t an easy task. I have a severe aversion to quiche after foolishly choosing it as the product to develop for my GCSE food technology coursework...

Amsterdam doesn’t want us. Or rather, Amsterdam doesn't want British men aged 18-35 on stag dos, cannabis trips or drinking days. As a result, they’ve started an online campaign targeting such men with videos to put them off. I don’t blame them. We all know the type — reeks of beer, fag behind the ear, vocabulary consists mainly of “wahey”. It’s fair enough.

However, I’ve watched the videos and unfortunately Amsterdam has completely missed the mark...

I take antidepressants. This isn’t a big confession, a tell-all aimed to shock or garner sympathy. It’s a simple fact I wanted to state after seeing that the NHS is once again suggesting alternatives  be found to these medicines. Such debate is dangerous as it attaches stigma to a pill that, sometimes, is the only thing that can put the colour back into life. Over the years I’ve tried it all: gardening, colouring, meditation, cognitive behavioural therapy. And each method can help – I’m not denying that. However, there are occasions when they just don’t work...

Here’s what it feels like to wake up to an earthquake
04.17 – the minute that lasted a lifetime. I’m currently in Turkey visiting relatives after my husband’s grandad broke his hip, and on Monday morning we experienced the huge 7.8 earthquake that hit the southeast of the country. Mersin – the town we are in – may be 300km away from the epicentre and thankfully we are all safe, but my God, did we feel it...

Happy new year and get well soon. This appears to be January’s seasonal greeting, as everyone is ill. So ill, in fact, that there’s not enough Lemsip in the country. Luckily, however, I had the lurgy before it became mainstream, so the shelves were all still full. Not that I cared; that strange paracetamol drink tastes so ghastly I didn’t go near it. Instead, as my eyeballs popped from an overstuffed sinus, I tried natural remedies from my “apothecary” father...

Happy winter closure period, everyone. Brighton University has suggested this phrase as an alternative to Christmas so as not to offend any non-Christians, heathens or infidels like myself. Although I thought it was a good idea to be inclusive during the season of love and understanding, I’ve heard that Christians are getting offended at the erasure of their religious celebration. Now I’m not sure what to do...

There must be something wrong with me. On Friday, Fifa ruled that English football fans dressing up as Crusaders was offensive to Muslims, and yet I – who may well carry the blood of a Muslim slain by a crusading knight – couldn’t care less about the outfit. I’ve tried getting angry, I really have, but a middle-aged man in fake chainmail just doesn’t ignite any fury. What is going on?

It has led me to a lot of soul searching...

"Getting started with Mastodon is easy.” So fibs the new social media platform that people are migrating to now that Twitter has been taken over by Elon Musk. But nothing about the platform is easy. Wait, I’ve already got that wrong. Mastodon isn’t a platform, because it’s decentralised with hundreds of servers owned by all sorts of people, but then they link up to form one big happy e-family, so I suppose it’s more like a social media commune.

To enter the commune, you must choose the server that suits you best – a decision harder than picking cereal from a variety pack...

Ah, autumn, isn’t it just the best season? It’s all so comforting, so cosy, so colourful – and so damn Instagramable. I mean, the rich chestnut tones of a freshly fallen conker; the lanes lined by trees bursting with hues of red and yellow; the long shadows cast among golden light. It’s enough to turn you into an artiste who uses a finger-frame before capturing the shot...

Being from a British-Turkish background is tough. When people don’t know much about my country, they expect me to account for everything wrong with it. All of a sudden, they accost me and demand to know: what’s going on with what’s-his-face? They can’t quite pronounce his name, but I know immediately the politician of whom they speak. Grimacing involuntarily, I just shrug and sigh in a manner that conveys the message: “Some people are obsessed with him, but don’t look at me, mate, I’d put a plague on his house if I could.”

sda is doing something lovely this winter. Throughout November and December, its stores are offering soup, a roll and unlimited hot drinks for just £1 to all those over 60, in an attempt to help their elderly customers with the spiralling cost of living.

I absolutely love this idea. Not only because I am sure it’ll help a lot of vulnerable people keep warm this winter but also because it has unexpectedly provided me with some excellent entertainment.

Halloween is an abomination. It’s bad enough that little children are encouraged to run around after dark dressed as evil reflections of their souls, but allowing them to collect buckets of sugar at the same time is criminal. It is so unhealthy it is clearly the Devil’s work. Thank goodness, then, for health secretary Thérèse Coffey. She has inadvertently come up with a way to make Halloween healthy: hand out antibiotics.

Coffey said she shares the medication with friends and family herself, so why can’t we?

Absolutely outrageous news from Virgin Atlantic. The company is allowing its male crew, pilots and ground staff to wear skirts if that’s what they’re most comfortable in. Comfortable? How ridiculous. A skirt – and a pencil one at that, judging by the pictures – is anything but comfortable.

In fact, of all the skirts on this green earth, the pencil is the worst. It’s a downright snake...

Whip out the party hats, it’s time to celebrate. The Faculty of Oriental Studies at Oxford University has changed its name to that of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies and is due to change the name of its department building too. Excuse me while I pull on a party popper because I am extremely invested in this and the reason is threefold...

The Queen has been laid to rest. And I cried. I’m not sure why the tears came; perhaps it was the bagpipes, perhaps it was the angelic choir voices, or perhaps it was another wave of realisation that we have lost a remarkable woman who had respect for each and every one of us, regardless of background or faith.

Perhaps, also, it was because I’ve not had any experience of a Christian funeral. I’m lucky in that I have very little funeral experience at all, but any that I’ve been even remotely involved with have been Islamic. It has made me wonder, what would all of this have looked like under the Islamic tradition?

My deepest sympathies and the greatest respect to all those raising teenagers. Honestly, I take my hat off to you, I bow down to you. You poor souls must be so very hungry.

I’d always heard about teenagers eating their parents out of house and home but, as I was the one doing the eating I can’t say I ever cared. Then this week, as a final summer hurrah before school starts, my 17-year-old brother-in-law came to stay. Blooming heck. How on earth does one who consists only of arms and legs scoff so much? 

Call me Frankenstein because I’ve created a monster. I live in a flat with a shared garden and last week I made the mistake of letting my neighbour, a rather bored eight-year-old boy, help me dig and prepare a small plot to space out my tomato and cucumber plants. It was sweet; he brought out his toy digger, let me use his tiny trowel and told me all about how he wants to be a builder when he grows up. The next morning, however, it rained so I couldn’t continue. When I went out later on, he came running over, pointing to the ground.

“Look,” he cried excitedly, “I dug a channel for the rain water to soften the ground.”

And indeed he had...

Sajid Javid has grown a beard. With a Twitter poll and a mention in an interview on Saturday, it has been the talk of the town and I can see why. The beard is a surprise; it suits Javid. And I say that as someone who thinks hairy cheeks should generally be viewed with scorn. On this rare occasion, facial fur has transformed a man...

Are you good with secrets? If so, I want you to throw that skill out of the window immediately. Something has come to light that needs to be spread. The American musician Jax and her brilliant new hit song Victoria’s Secret has finally outed western society’s beauty standards for what they really are: entirely fake.

We should all know this. However, it’s quite obvious that we don’t. When we look in the mirror, scores of us think we don’t look “right”...

Vilify Britain at your peril. If Rishi Sunak becomes prime minister, you might just find yourself referred to Prevent, the controversial government counter-extremism programme. Following the announcement of these plans, there has been a commotion on social media, with many wondering what the programme would look like under the new strategy...

It came home. England women are European footballing champions, and the win means so much. It means the FA owes every woman an apology for ever banning our game and stating that football is “quite unsuitable for females”. It means every single player who has struggled on in spite of the sexist comments, the lack of funds for training, the refusals of sponsorship and stadiums has been vindicated...

It’s national emergency hot. Apparently, this means that it’s so hot there’s even a risk to those of us who are healthy. I say that means our brain function diminishes considerably, leaving us able only to talk about the heat. Either way, we’re all looking for tips on how to survive this weather. So, as Turkey regularly hits 40 degrees in the summer, I thought I’d impart some Turkish wisdom on dealing with high temperatures...

Welcome everybody, once again, to the Conservative leadership race slogan workshop. The place where we discuss, dissect and develop candidate campaign mottos. It seems to come around faster each time, doesn’t it? Funny that. Well, let’s crack on, we’ve got heaps to get through and I don’t want to still be here when the next one starts...

"Would you like to try out some Botox, sir, madam? Or perhaps a smidge of filler?” We’ll soon be accosted with these questions when shopping in John Lewis, as the retail giant prepares to bring the cosmetic procedures in-store. Some experts have raised concerns, but I’ll be honest — the first concern I had when hearing this news was the marketing. How are John Lewis ever going to be able to make one of their iconic adverts using Botox and fillers?

I declare the culture wars officially over. It may have passed you by but the American rap artist Lizzo recently released a single, Grrrls, that contained the word “spaz” in its lyrics. “Spaz” being a derogatory term for spastic diplegia, it caused a stir amongst the disabled community. Yet, not quite as much a stir as you’d think – and this was the great turning point...

We need to save CBBC. In a drive to conserve funds, the channel is to be banished to the online-only world within the next three years. As someone who had her eyes glued to it every afternoon between the ages of six and twelve, I tell you: it’s a huge mistake. Let the children slob on the sofa after school watching a CBBC comedy on TV as they inhale toast; stop pushing them online...

Everyone meet Albert Square’s new residents: Chaz and Caz. Yes, what better way to celebrate the Queen’s 70-year reign than sticking Charles and Camilla in EastEnders. It’s only meant to be a guest appearance, but I think the makers of the show would do far better if they kept them as recurring characters and threw in the rest of the royal family for good measure.

Camilla could become the new Pat Butcher. I think we could all see her in a bit of leopard print with a dash of heavy blue eyeshadow, a pair of huge earrings and a fag in hand...

Move over Greta Thunberg and Extinction Rebellion, climate change just got a brand new enemy: the old Las Vegas Mob. As a result of the climate’s treacherous activity, Lake Mead – a reservoir near the Las Vegas Strip – is drying up and probable victims of the gangsters’ 1980s heyday are now resurfacing. According to Oscar Goodman, a former mayor and lawyer who had previously represented Mob members, his past clients are now rather interested in “climate control”.

I didn’t realise quite how broken the NHS is. That’s normal, I suppose, when you’re lucky enough not to require its help very often. But this past week a family member has desperately needed it and my eyes have been opened. A ten-hour wait in A&E; a possible overnight admittance that ended up being a midnight return home; an ambulance call-out the next day; over an hour’s wait in an ambulance outside one hospital before being transferred to another; no food; very little water; sparse bits of information; and hardly any doctors to be seen. An absolutely dreadful experience.

This is no one’s fault but the government’s...