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Auge um Auge The meaning behind the Japanese Zen garden

The country calling 2022 the 'year of coffee'Coffee isn't just a drink in Saudi Arabia, it's an ancient tradition of hos...
09/06/2022

The country calling 2022 the 'year of coffee'
Coffee isn't just a drink in Saudi Arabia, it's an ancient tradition of hospitality – and as the country opens to tourism, it's also one of its most interesting draws.
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Jabar Al-Maliki stepped onto a stone perch and looked out over the boundless landscape. High up in the clouds at 1,600m, he peered over the craggy mountain tops cascading into terraced farms lined with coffee trees, banana plants and corn crops. Colourful houses and stone fortresses speckled the steep slopes of the Sarawat Mountains, which extend from Saudi Arabia's Jazan region over the border into Yemen just a few kilometres away. He whistled at a scurrying hyrax, the high-pitched echo ringing across the otherwise silent valley below. Then, with a twinkle in his eyes, he said, "It's time for qahwa [coffee]."

It is widely believed coffee beans were first roasted and consumed as the beverage we know today in the Sarawat Mountains in the 15th Century. Historically, the area was all part of greater Yemen, when borders were far less important than tribal and familial relationships. During that period, Arab historian Abd Al Ghaffar first documented an infusion made from roasted, ground coffee beans used by Sufis (Islamic mystics) to help them stay awake during religious recitations. Over time, it became an essential aspect of Arabian culture, with public cafés called maqha sprouting up across the region, where men would sit and drink coffee and share ideas.

Why women have to sprint into leadership positionsIf women don't secure senior jobs in the first decade of their careers...
08/06/2022

Why women have to sprint into leadership positions
If women don't secure senior jobs in the first decade of their careers, they often can't do so later. But this dash to climb the ranks early takes a toll.
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It’s well known women are much less likely to end up in leadership positions than their male peers. Unconscious biases, the tendency for women to take on greater childcare responsibilities and outright discrimination mean women still hold just 23% of executive positions and 29% of senior manager positions globally, in spite of making up 40% of the workforce.

But new research suggests timing could also play an important role in women’s likelihood of reaching the corner office. Women aiming for leadership roles (defined in this study as a director or C-suite-level position) are most likely to secure them in the first 10 years of their career. After that, their chances tend to plummet.

The pressures women face to have children, combined with the fact that once they become mothers they often shoulder the majority of childcare, mean many women feel compelled to ‘sprint’ early on in their careers. While their male counterparts might have the luxury of time, women often establish themselves as early as possible. This puts them in a better position to take time off or reduce their hours once they become mothers, without fear of financial hardship or stalling their career while still in a junior role.

These career sprints show up clearly in the data – women who make it to leadership tend to do so faster than men. But sprinting can take an enormous toll on even the women who make it to the top.

'Cottagecore' and the rise of the modern rural fantasyHow did a bucolic dreamland became the perfect escape from real li...
07/06/2022

'Cottagecore' and the rise of the modern rural fantasy
How did a bucolic dreamland became the perfect escape from real life? Anita Rao Kashi explores a whimsical world of nostalgia, tranquillity and folksy mysticism.
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A few weeks into lockdowns everywhere, a curious thing happened on Instagram feeds. More and more, they filled with images of pretty cottages adorned with climbers and flower-laden trellises, soft-focus sunbeams streaming through dense foliage, dappled wooded pathways and earthy mushrooms growing in abandon, tea tables and picnics in shaded gardens near gurgling streams laden with homemade sourdough bread and scones, soft cotton dresses with smocking and embroidered with strawberries and butterflies... part surreal, part escapist fantasy from the horrors around, and partly about taking control. The phenomenon had a hashtag – . It's a trend that has slowly become the standout aesthetic of the year 2020. Much like Scandinavian concepts hygge and friluftsliv, the pastoral aesthetic of cottagecore is striking a chord.

Male postnatal depression: Why men struggle in silenceMany mothers grapple with mental health challenges after the birth...
06/06/2022

Male postnatal depression: Why men struggle in silence
Many mothers grapple with mental health challenges after the birth of a child. But fathers experience PND, too – and may be slipping through the cracks.
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For David Levine, the watershed moment came when he imagined he had shaken his baby.

It was 2013, and his son was two weeks old. He had put him down on a mat "maybe slightly rougher than I should have", says Levine today. At the time, unable to think straight, he was convinced he'd done worse. As a paediatrician, he knew shaking a baby could cause brain injury, even death. He was horrified.

Levine's anger and frustration had been building since his son's birth. Like many newborns, the baby took time to adjust to the outside world. But to Levine, it seemed like he cried constantly. "I took it personally, like I'm failing, I'm not doing my job here," he says. "I also started feeling like it was directed at me – that my son was crying because he did not like me."

Levine loved children. Since he had begun his career as a paediatrician in New Jersey, US, he'd heard one thing over and over from parents: "You're going to make such a good father someday." He had been excited when his wife became pregnant and gave birth. When she had challenges with breastfeeding, and he could use his medical background to help incorporate formula, he felt useful.

Three ideas for how to live a fuller lifeBy reimagining our relationship with time – and coming to terms with death – we...
01/06/2022

Three ideas for how to live a fuller life
By reimagining our relationship with time – and coming to terms with death – we can improve our existence, argues Roman Krznaric.
“The word death is not pronounced in New York, in Paris, in London, because it burns the lips,” wrote the Mexican essayist and poet Octavio Paz in the 1950s. But for his fellow countryman – who talks about it and celebrates it in the annual Day of the Dead festival – “it is one of his favourite toys and his most steadfast love”.

More like this:
- What it really means to ‘seize the day’
- The book that changed Japan’s image
- Why embracing change is the key to a good life

This was probably an exaggeration, even back then, but it raises the question of the role that death plays in the art of living. Western culture has developed multiple mechanisms for shielding us from the reality of our mortality. The advertising industry tells us that we will remain forever young, we avoid speaking about death with our children, and we shunt the elderly away in care homes out of sight and out of mind.

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