Christa D’Souza

Tuesday

Christa D’Souza

London can’t lose easyJet

From our UK edition

Of all the disturbing news out there at the moment, up there is some American company's possible takeover of easyJet. Last week we learned that the budget airline had agreed in principle to a £5.7 billion takeover offer from US asset management firm Apollo – days after accepting a bid from rival firm Castlelake. What? Good old sleazyJet exiting the London market? Just when it was becoming really, really good? Alright, I may be exaggerating slightly here – budget airlines never get really, really good (that is why they are called budget, dear). But there is budget and then there is budget. Who can forget when Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary floated the idea of standing seats on flights and a £1 ‘pay-per-pee’ fee to use the lavatory in 2010?

Saturday

Christa D’Souza

Tali Fraser, Damian Thompson, Matthew Wilson & Christa d’Souza

From our UK edition

25 min listen

This week: Tali Fraser gives the definitive answer to what Andy Burnham’s ‘Manchesterism’ actually is; Damian Thompson asks if there is any route back for the Society of St Pius X; Matthew Wilson discusses whether Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey can live up to the 2,700-year history of artworks depicting Homer’s epic; and Christa D’Souza reads her Notes on … Tans.

Tali Fraser, Damian Thompson, Matthew Wilson & Christa d’Souza

Wednesday

Christa D’Souza

Should politicians have tans?

From our UK edition

The cult economist Adam Tooze generally discusses matters far beyond my understanding on his podcast Ones and Tooze. While roasting in my flat over the heatwave, however, I found myself gripped by a segment he did on the economics of beach recreation. Did you know that 50 per cent of Americans going on holiday regard getting a tan as more important than the actual holiday? This correlates with the rise of the ‘tanfluencer’ and ‘tanmaxxing’ among Gen Z and the revival of the full-on, George Hamilton-style tan. As a bit of an old tanorexic myself (remember, fellow boomers, the smell of Bergasol?), I’m quietly thrilled. First, because if this is a competition I will almost certainly win it (spot the brownest white person in the room: that’s me!).

Wednesday

Christa D’Souza

The politics of long hair

What is the literal cut-off point for women having very long hair (and by ‘long’ I mean where it almost goes into the lavatory bowl)? Is it the age of 30? Forty? Fifty? Try 65 – the age I am now. If this strikes you as grossly inappropriate, in theory I’m with you. The unspoken rule is that the older you get the shorter your hair should be. Nobody I know within ten or even 20 years of me has hair as long as mine. What can I say? As with wearing inappropriately coloured nail varnish, it is just another small act of defiance women d’un certain âge can employ to remind this cruel world that we do actually still exist. My hair has been this length for so long it has become part of my identity: how I see myself in the universe.

Sunday

Christa D’Souza

How I made Tyler, the Creator uncool

From our UK edition

I tried getting my husband to go with me, but wild horses wouldn’t have dragged him so I forced a friend’s son to come instead. I’m talking about going to see Tyler, The Creator at the O2. That’s Tyler, The Creator, the magnificent hip hop artist who was banned from the UK in 2015 by then Home Secretary Theresa May on the grounds of supporting homophobia and acts of terrorism.  What, you’ve never heard of him? Well, that’s clearly because you are not as down with the kids as me. I may be a middle-class boomer from Chiswick but I’m also a raging hip hop fan and I know my stuff. Hip hop, drill, rap, trap: you name it, I love it – the more guns, the more swear words, the more misogyny the better. You call Hamilton rap? Oh, please.

Thursday

Christa D’Souza

Scuzz Nation, the death of English literature & are you a bad house guest?

From our UK edition

40 min listen

Scuzz Nation: Britain’s slow and grubby declineIf you want to understand why voters flocked to Reform last week, Gus Carter says, look no further than Goat Man. In one ward in Runcorn, ‘residents found that no one would listen when a neighbour filled his derelict house with goats and burned the animals’ manure in his garden’. This embodies Scuzz Nation – a ‘grubbier and more unpleasant’ Britain, ‘where decay happens faster than repair, where crime largely goes unpunished, and where the social fabric has been slashed, graffitied and left by the side of the road’. On the podcast, Gus speaks to Dr Lawrence Newport, founder of Crush Crime, to diagnose the issues facing Britain – and offer some solutions to stop the rot. (01:28) Next: is it demeaning to study Dickens?

Christa D’Souza

Hell is having house guests

From our UK edition

Since we moved into our house in the Cyclades a few years ago, I’ve come to accept that if you own a home on the beach in Greece with plenty of spare rooms, people will come to stay. But what is it about house guests abroad? Do they need fresh towels at home every time they wash their hands? Do they have to have three cooked meals a day? Do they have chauffeurs in normal life, or do they become allergic to driving only when they are on holiday? ‘We didn’t bother renting a car because we don’t want to go anywhere.’ If you want to make a host’s shoulders slump, saying this will do the trick. If I sound mean-spirited it might be because I’m not a natural hostess to start with.

Saturday

Christa D’Souza

Islands in the sun

From our UK edition

Christa D’Souza plans a Caribbean summer Hate crowds? Haven’t booked your summer holidays yet? Want to feel like you’re getting your money’s worth just this once? If so, let me make a suggestion. Instead of going to the south of France or Puglia this summer, why not try the Caribbean? It may sound perverse, going when the mosquitoes, jellyfish and hurricanes are at their worst, but if you pick the right island, you may find the climate and conditions pretty much the same as they are in high season, with the added bonus of swimming in sea water which, unlike the Mediterranean in August, is relatively sewage-free. Think! The satisfaction of getting a holiday for £2,000 than it should be!