A list of good reads
- Scroll explains how the spouses of H-1B visa workers changed the country’s food culture forever.
- BBC News looks back at the murder of textile businessman Abdul Kadir Bawla in 1925 in Bombay—which sent shockwaves throughout the British Raj and toppled a king.
- The Atlantic (splainer gift link) offers a scathing take down of Mark Zuckerberg’s sudden makeover as Musk II.
- BBC Science Focus busts the myths around ‘porn addiction’—and its hazards.
- Staying on theme, Rebecca Watson in the Financial Times (splainer gift link) asks whether erotic cinema can ever move beyond pornography.
- Vogue (login required) reports on the latest Japanese cleansing craze: a deep house cleaning ritual called Oosouji.
- Vox offers an illuminating must read on how meditation works—by “deconstructing” your mind.
- Also in Vox: Adam Clark Estes’ review of last week’s CES in Las Vegas centres on the really important question—are gadgets getting good again?
- Associated Press reports on the comeback of the Art Deco style across industries—from architecture to fashion.
- Inanna Hamati-Ataya pens a compelling essay in Aeon arguing that there are no ‘pure’ cultures—because all were shaped by mobility and exchange through history.
- John Kenney in Washington Post (splainer gift link) has a New Year’s resolution—rethink the meaning of ‘self-help’ books.
- Sticking with self-help, The Guardian shares a key secret to nailing the perfect squat—cut yourself some slack!
- Katy Kelleher in Nautilus looks at how the New Mexico desert helped her smell.
- Scientific American breaks down why we’re so preoccupied by the past.
