Passed Out. Photo by Tristan Scholze

I wrote this guide to Japanese hangover cures for Japanzine way back in April, 2006. My memories of writing it are hazy, largely because – in my pre-teetotal days, when I was fully embarked upon a successful drinking career – I merrily put myself through the research described in detail below. I’ve re-written this article on a couple of occasions since, though never with quite the same grizzly authenticity.

For the lucky few, the heady highs of New Years Eve are a fond and distant memory. Most of us came through it battered and bedeviled, but ultimately unscathed – and eager for more liver abuse the following weekend. For others less robust, your harrowed correspondent included, the experience was a disturbing one. As the years pile up and each weekend blends into the next, hangovers become less a medical problem than an existential crisis.

Happy news, then, that hanami season is just around the corner, a period when “I’m sorry, I’ve got work tomorrow” holds no sway whatsoever. True, there’s always the oolong-cha option, but seriously, who amongst us is really that strong? Once the atsukan starts flowing, all hope is lost. It’s every man for himself. Last one with a necktie round his head’s a whoopsie. Look, mama! I’m dancing!

Kamikochi - Not what Michael Palin saw

During a brief stopover in Kyushu in the early 1990s, British broadcaster and former Monty Python Michael Palin stopped in at Huis Ten Bosch, a faithful recreation of a Dutch town, replete with gouda, tulips, windmills and a clock tower built out of bricks shipped from Holland. Not sure what to make of it all, he dubbed it ’cultural karaoke’ and quickly moved on. It’s a phrase that I’ve had reason to recall many times, albeit never before when discussing a mountain range.

Tokyo - Strange facts and useless lists

How many Tokyoites can you squeeze into a Mini Cooper? How many times has Godzilla attacked Tokyo? Why was Paul McCartney banned from having bananas?

All the questions you never had about Japan’s great capital, answered here before you’d ever thought of them…

The people of the Arabian peninsula know it as ‘The Empty Quarter’. The Bedouin know it, more simply, as ‘The Sands’. Whatever name you give it, its unforgiving vastness comprises 650,000sq km of sand – the largest sand desert on the planet. At the height of summer, temperatures have been known to edge towards 55˚C, but as we enter the winter months, the late afternoons are cool and the evenings cold – ideal weather to hit the Al Hama’im Road and head towards the Saudi border.

On this page you’ll find your complete guide to exploring Abu Dhabi’s own portion of this great wilderness, including the hows, the wheres, the whos and, above all, the whys…

Good old Wilfred Thesiger. The explorer’s five years in the heat of the UAE desert have inspired countless expats to dip their toes in the shallows of the Rub’ Al Khali, and his books and artefacts have become a small tourist industry in their own right. You can head out to the museum in Al Ain to gaze upon the man’s engraved rifle, or you can flit down to Liwa and have a go at desert camping, trying to imagine what it was like to be the UAE’s first expat explorer. You’re never going to get close, of course.

All smiles until they started beating themselves down

When I first arrived in the UAE, I met up with a family friend who’d spent more years in the Middle East than in his native Ireland. Keen to impart some of his local knowledge, we arranged a trip to Dubai’s Global Village where he agreed to verse me in haggling culture. ‘The golden rule,’ he explained, ‘is never to show any interest.’ ‘So, I’m to feign lack of interest in something I’ve got my heart set on?’ ‘Right,’ he grinned. ‘They can’t stand it.’

Clearly, the world of bartering is a confusing place, not dissimilar to that of relationships. But the idea that there might be a ‘golden rule’ was intriguing. It suggested that there might be a science to getting the perfect price. With this in mind, I took a few half-baked theories to the streets of Abu Dhabi.