Maybe it's because Australians aren't really into tea, so they don't realise the merit of a top quality biscuit to dip in the tea. Whatever the cause, Australians are terrible at biscuits. And chocolate. Chocolate especially because it all has that non-melting agent....

I've been in Melbourne for one month now. As it turns out, moving to another country is quite different to travelling or holidaying. Before I left I pictured us driving up the Great Ocean Road in the cheapest working car we could find, embracing koalas, splashing in beautiful rivers, seeing the Great Barrier Reef... So far I've managed to almost completely replicate my life in Galway and we haven'...

Dan and I sat in a pizzeria in Tokyo on our last night before leaving for Indonesia. All that remained of my blandest-of-the-bland pasta in tomato sauce was lumps of aubergine and courgette, two of the many things on my list of things I hate to eat. It's not the taste. They have none. But they're squishy and this is upsetting. I was in a sombre mood because I (thought I) knew that no matter how to...