I recently travelled to Seoul to visit a friend who is doing her master’s there. The trip was a good mix of learning about South Korean history and culture through visiting temples and museums, and consuming barbecue (and a fair amount of soju, a rice spirit rather like vodka). One of the most interesting parts of my stay was comparing what it’s like being in your 20s there and in the UK. I was explaining the crazy rental market in

My dad occasionally likes to gift me books that serve a double purpose. So when he spotted one that covered both my work and my passion for cooking, he thought, ‘Bingo!’ And so to Edible Economics: The World in 17 Dishes, where author Ha-Joon Chang, a professor at SOAS University of London, aims to make economic concepts more digestible by serving them up alongside stories about… food! To give you a flavour of what’s covered in the book, in the

After having managed to pull off a very successful year at Fathom Consulting, I came to the conclusion that I deserved to treat myself to a nice watch that could complement my ‘out of consensus’ dress style. This experience has been much more interesting than I could possibly have imagined, and I feel an overwhelming urge to share it with you today. Are you ready? If you had asked me around a year ago to list you the best watch

‘Christmas in the city and Easter in the village’ is the most probable response from a middle-aged Greek when asked about their plans for Easter (or indeed Christmas). It may seem boring to have the same plan year in, year out, but the truth of the matter is that you never change a winning combination. Almost all Greeks of my generation feel a sweet melancholy and nostalgia for our childhood Easters in the village. Easter in the village is a

Seeing the fearless 16-year-old Luke ‘the Nuke’ Littler reach the Darts World Championship final earlier this year reminded me of my own darts performance under pressure. It wasn’t quite the same, I guess. For one thing, he wasn’t dressed as a cowboy on an inflatable horse. Littler coped extremely well under pressure, but not all of us do. Somewhat different to the World Championship final, my performance was in an exhibition darts[1] match in front of a couple of hundred

As a tired father of two I thought it might be fun to calculate a monetary value that could convince me to try to have a third child (or, more accurately, convince me to attempt to convince my wife to try). The figure: £15,669,144,525. 4 years of nursery: £105,600 (£2200 per month x 48) 18 years of clothes: £27,000 (£1500 per year x 18 – conservative: a pair of Nikes can cost £200!) Pram: £1,159 (Stokke Xplory X pushchair) Bigger

With eight months until election day, Donald Trump is favourite to be the next US president. A lot can change, but current polls suggest voters remain upset with Joe Biden’s handling of the economy and concerned by his age. What would a second Trump term bring? Fathom’s base case is that some of his more outlandish rhetoric won’t get turned into reality, consistent with a scenario we have previously termed ‘Trump Lite’. However, it would be irresponsible to ignore his

As a child, I remember flicking through the children’s encyclopӕdia my parents had bought for us. Although it was likely bought as an attempt to give them respite from the endless questions the three of us had, it encouraged us to find the answers for ourselves. Fast forward a couple of decades and I can answer virtually any question in seconds… through my phone, of course. This isn’t just my personal journey of swapping pages for screens, but reflective of

Lying on a lounger in the shade on a beach in Antigua, glass of piña colada in hand, a good book dog-eared on the table next to me, looking at the turquoise and ultramarine sea and the pale gold sand, the white nicks of sails on the horizon, watching a squadron of pelicans skimming the swell, and the bright yellow bananaquits or iridescent hummingbirds flitting around the dark green foliage: there’s not much better in life than that. At least,

At the tender age of 51 I have, for the first time in my life, found the need to employ a team of builders. This is turning out to be a stressful experience, not because I doubt their ability or indeed their honesty, but simply because of the sums of money involved. Over the next few months, I shall be spending something close to 20% of what my lender judges to be the current market value of my home on