The Alternative Travel Group (01865 315681) offers a variety of trips for independent travellers with prices including flights from pounds 650.DO I HAVE TO GET DRUNK?There are no cellar rules as such, although a basic etiquette might usefully be observed. For instance, it may be a tribute to your host’s wine, but it is generally not wise to ask (as one customer did) if you can dig up a vine and bring it home with you. Nor would it be recommended to thank your host for his wonderful wines and in the same breath tell him that they’re much more expensive than you could ever afford. Try not to pour away samples of Batard-Montrachet or spit out into the producer’s new oak barrels. And, Germans, beware the little old French lady who, before you enter the low stone entrance to her cellar, only tells you to mind your head once she’s ascertained that you’re not German.If you swallow every sample offered at every winery visited, the chances are you’re going to end up the worse for wear, albeit pleasurably. It’s useful, though not essential, to learn a little bit about tasting wine beforehand by equipping yourself with one of the basic texts on wine-tasting (see below).

Failing that, practise by following these basic procedures: swirl the wine in the glass, look at the colour, sniff the wine, linger over the aroma, taste it by “chewing” if you can, and try spitting Practising in the bathroom with water is the simplest way It’s not rude to spit out Professionals do it all the time. But if you’re spitting in a cellar, look for a bucket or drain or go outside. It may be too late to ask once you’ve got a mouthful of plonk you’re not keen to swallow.You don’t have to buy and shouldn’t feel pressurised If you don’t like the wine, don’t buy it You won’t thank yourself when you get home if you do. If you do like the wine, and you have room, think about buying between six bottles and a full case of 12, bearing in mind that you may be visiting even better cellars. If your fellow travellers also like the wine, you can always split a case You may be able to pay with plastic but don’t rely on it Growers’ faces always seem to light up at the sight of cash. Something to do with tax, perhaps?DO I HAVE TO PAY DUTY TO BRING WINE BACK?Not any more The abolition of duty- free from 1 July makes no difference. You’re basically allowed to bring back more booze for your own personal consumption than you can carry without severely damaging the rear axle of your vehicle.

To be precise, it’s 90 litres of table wine, of which not more than 60 litres may be sparkling wine, 20 litres of fortified wine, 110 litres of beer and 10 litres of spirits. If you want to bring back more, the onus is on you to show that it’s not for your own personal consumption or that of your family. To give you some idea of whether or not it’s worth bringing wine home, excise duty you save on table wine is pounds 13.47 a case of 12 bottles, pounds 17.97 on sherry, port and madeira between 15 per cent and 22 per cent alcohol, and pounds 19.19 on champagne and sparkling wine. With good cellar-door prices to start with, the champagne cellars of small growers can be particularly good places to buy. The saving on a case of spirits at 40 per cent alcohol is pounds 65.72.IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE I SHOULD KNOW?Key books include: Buying Wine in France, the Traveller’s Guide to Chateaux and Vineyards, pounds 7.99, Mitchell Beazley; Mitchell Beazley’s handy regional pocket-guides and the wine atlas series, which includes France, Spain, Italy, California. Beginner’s Guide to Understanding Wine by Michel Schuster, Simon & Schuster Amazon bookshop on the Internet.

Discovering Wine, Joanna Simon, pounds 14.99, Mitchell Beazley.HIGH FIVESMost attractive: the competition for this award is intense but my accolade goes to Rolfe and Lois Mills’ breathtaking Rippon Vineyard, whose vines skirt the shores of Lake Wanaka, one of the world’s deepest inland lakes, against the backdrop of New Zealand’s Southern Alps. The red Burgundy- style Pinot Noir in this up-and-coming region of Otago is pretty delicious here too. Fuller’s sell it.Most remote: a two-hour flight from Buenos Aires and a three-hour drive through the stunning rock formations of the Calchaques Valley will get you to Colome. At 2,400m, it is not only the world’s most remote vineyard but probably the highest too.

The nose of the car is perhaps a little aggressive looking, but at least it helps clear the fast lane.
Our 2.5-litre, straight-six 523i SE, with metallic paint, electric sunroof, on-board computer and alloy wheels, would set you back pounds 27,880 (the 5-Series starts with the pounds 24,000 520 and rises to pounds 43,000 for the V8-engined 540). That’s slightly less than the new Jag, a good deal less than a Mercedes E-Class, and on a par with the Audi A6.Having driven them all, as well as the Alfa 166 and Lexus GS300, the BMW is the car I would invest my own hard-earned cash in. On the head side of the argument are its legendary reliability, slow depreciation and exceptional build quality But the 5-Series will steal your heart too. Combining rear-wheel drive, a blissfully free-revving engine, acres of interior space and a ride that blends cosseting waft with sporty stiffness, the Munich-meister is a driver’s car that passengers will relish.There will be those who deride the BMW 5-Series for its Germanic perfection and middle-management aspirations, but nothing I’ve driven balances driver thrills (switch off the traction control and hang that tail out) and performance with comfort and practicality in a package this fiscally prudent.Road testIf you would like to take part, write to The Verdict, The Independent Magazine, One Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London E14 5DL, giving a contact phone number, your address and details of the type of vehicle, if any, you drive. For most cars, participants must be over 26, and have a clean driving licence.Leonard Hollingsworth62, teacher, from Bexley, Kent.Currently drives a Rover 600″The acceleration is lovely and creamy, definitely a rival for the new Jaguar S-Type The styling is nicely understated, timeless. It’s probably a feature of most modern cars, but I don’t like the fact that when you are driving you can’t see the bonnet It’s nice and airy inside and the headroom is enormous. If I turned up at school in this I’d certainly get some playground cred.”Chris Cawte37, company director, from Sydenham, London.

Currently drives an Audi A4 Quattro”It’s very accomplished, a fantastic engine, but I don’t think it’s as well screwed together as my car. It doesn’t scorch along and there’s a split second before the throttle takes up. It felt like the kind of car that someone a fraction older than me would own The interior trim is a bit plastic. I feel a lot of people who buy BMWs don’t know a lot about cars, but buy on perceived reputation.”Lynne Pearce43, health worker from Hayes, Kent. Currently drives a Ford FiestaSian Pearce16, Lynne’s daughterLynne: “It took a bit of getting used to after the Fiesta. The acceleration was wonderful but the driving position was uncomfortable because I’m quite short. The fixtures and fittings were excellent.”Sian: “It’s very smooth but, with the new-car smell and Mum’s driving, I felt slightly nauseous.

It’s got a very stylish image, though.”Patrick Reynolds52, accountant, from Sevenoaks, Kent. Currently drives a Volvo V70″As a Volvo driver I found the turning circle very good, but although it’s probably more powerful than my car, I didn’t drive it and go `Wow!’ It’s got lots of bells and whistles inside – there are all sorts of buttons on the wheel and the doors, no idea what they do. I like a sunroof and the air conditioning is good for my hayfever. It’s a nice ride, lower than my Volvo, but I wouldn’t buy one, because I need an estate car.”. Digital cameras promise quality pictures but without the use of film and and the hassle of processing.

You simply take the picture and then have the option of viewing it on a TV screen, printing it out (either yourself or professionally), or downloading it to a computer for storing or e-mailing. The camera can be constantly reused without its memory running out, and you can view pictures immediately after taking them. But are they as good as they appear? Our testers tried out a different camera each, and gave their opinion on the digital future. Sophy Rickett is an artist more used to using Bronica large-format cameras in her work. She went out and about with the Nikon Coolpix 950
“It looks great, and everyone was interested in it.

But there is a potential drawback. Such are the town’s attractions that its population has soared to 60,000 – nearly half the total for the entire borough – and each man, woman and child seems to drive a car.
However, Guildford is doing more than most towns to combat the problem.

It can even boast that rarest of breeds, a car-hating estate agent, in the person of Matthew Burns, who lives in Guildford “We do have a lot of traffic,” he admits. “But the council has launched a major drive to get cars out of the historic town centre.”And alleged traffic congestion hasn’t done much harm to the property market. Turnover has been brisk, says Mr Burns, a partner in Burns & Webber.”Values have increased about 10-15 per cent for cheaper properties and a minimum 20 per cent for family homes in the pounds 400,000 to pounds 500,000 range. Even in the 1980s recession, when other areas were suffering, Guildford was doing well.”A local resident for 30 years, Mr Burns also praises the area’s educational system: “My children attend local schools We have superb state as well as private schools. If a house just falls into the Guildford catchment area, it gets a higher price.”"This area attracts buyers moving out of south-west London areas such as Teddington, Twickenham and Barnes, where prices have gone sky high, and in relation to which Guildford looks very attractive,” says Keith Remington, the manager of Curchods. “We have lots of investors, many of whom buy one-bedroom units which offer an opportunity to commit a smaller amount of capital.

Being half an hour from both London and the coast makes it very attractive.”The town is also a great place to work in, as Michael and Marion Hardman can testify. They live in Bletchworth but have their business in Guildford and send their three children to school there.The Hardmans, who run a public relations and publishing business, used to be based in Dorking.”We moved our office to Guildford because it has a very vibrant centre, the shops and restaurants are magnificent, and the schools are bloody good,” says Mr Hardman. “Our sons are in West Horsley, and our daughter is in Bramley.”Mr Hardman frequently attends meetings in London and motors to see a major client in south-west London. “It’s faster to central London from Guildford than from many London suburbs.

The train takes only 30 minutes to Waterloo, and the A3 is very fast to Wandsworth,” he notes.He’s not altogether happy with the local council’s attempt to tame Guildford’s traffic congestion: “The traffic management system is not good. The high street is practically closed except for certain times, and the one-way system doesn’t work I park a half mile from the office. I could park closer but I enjoy the walk through the old town.”The soaring car population doesn’t worry him. “Traffic is not that bad anyway,” he says.The Low-DownOverview: For an introduction to the area, climb to the top of what remains of the castle for a panoramic view which reveals, among other things, rooftop flats atop a town centre shopping and car-park complex.Transport: The A3 links London with Portsmouth and, via the nearby M25, Heathrow and Gatwick. Train services include the Gatwick-Reading line as well as the main London-Portsmouth route. London Road station links Guildford with major towns en route to West Croydon.Prices: Flats are available for between pounds 50,000 for a studio, and pounds 95,000 for three bedrooms Houses start at about pounds 140,000. Larger country houses start at pounds 500,000.Properties: The range is from “modest to magnificent”, says Michael Hardman, editor of the recently launched Living in Surrey magazine.

“In the 1970s and 1980s many houses were converted into flats and bedsits, and many are now being converted back.”Wash-basin fetishists: Burns & Webber is selling a detached four-storey period house currently arranged as a B&B, with nearly two dozen rooms, car parking and a large, unused swimming pool for pounds 495,000.Newcomers: Milford St James in Godalming, four miles from Guildford, has refurbished flats in a Georgian Grade II mansion and new-build cottages, town houses and flats. A few virgin and second-hand (but never occupied) flats are still available from developer St James (Berkeley Homes partnered with Thames Water), from pounds 175,000. Phase 2 of Crest’s St Luke’s Park has five-bedroom detached houses and three-storey townhouses with four and five bedrooms. Lampard is developing 10 luxury flats near the river.Boomtown: Guildford businesses and employers include Cornhill, Guardian Royal Exchange, Ericsson, Colgate-Palmolive, Unigate, ARCO, the National Grid and the Government Office for the South East The University of Surrey anticipates rapid expansion. Nearly half (47 per cent) of the population is professional, intermediate or manual skilled, against a UK average of 40 per cent.Include me out: Yvonne Arnaud theatre features pre-West End shows. Organisations and events include the Rose and Sweet Pea Show, Ambient Green Picnic, charity duck races, model steam and canal boat rallies, and a folk and blues festival.Estate agents: Burns & Webber, 01483 440800; Clarke Gammon 01483 880900; Curchods, 01483 458800; FPDSavills, 01483 796820.. Location

797 3rd Avenue (on 49th), Tel: 00 1 212 753 1530
View and clienteleOn my visit, the scenery was pure midtown Manhattan.

Ian’s dawn whimpering had saved us from a similar fate, but we were homeless and, because Dad had not been insured, penniless.The second event happened only a few months after that traumatic landslide incident and is more surreal. I remember telling my dad that I had seen some hippos walking across the golf course which led down to the shores of Lake Victoria, in front of our pink bougainvillaea-wrapped house in Jinja, Uganda. He told me that I was talking nonsense.Throughout my weird nomadic childhood, my parents, Donald and Luba, provided me with a series of stories about their lives which have contributed to what has become, for my family, a soap opera of epic proportions. Last year I was commissioned by the BBC to direct a very personal film which would chronicle my parents’ lives and, of course, my own upbringing This has taken me on an odyssey to Russia, China and Africa.

The extent to which I have embellished their stories over the years with my own romantic, and mischievous, imagination has been matched only by the wide disparity between their versions of their lives before they met and fell in love in Shanghai.I have often toyed with fictionalising the Donald and Luba story. This would have made the blurred facts easier to integrate; it would have made the embellishments simpler to disguise. Where the memory lapsed or the facts were boring, I could have just invented incidents to keep things interesting. But in choosing to make a documentary, I have been forced to arrive at some sort of truth – not least because I am featuring my mother, who is still alive, my immediate family, whose hungry curiosity has created much of the mythology, and my youngest brother, who has seen and heard almost everything I have.For this investigation into the murky areas of my family’s history, I have had a significant watchdog: my 21-year-old daughter Kate is my collaborator. Apart from her talent as a film-maker (she is in her final year at university studying film and television), Kate has been a crucial witness to my genealogical dig. She has pressurised me, sometimes unwittingly, to avoid doctoring the truth for dramatic effect and her reaction to our joint confrontation with the reality of our family’s drama has been a vital tool in telling the story accurately.I had never visited Kiev, where my maternal grandparents were born, nor had I been to Harbin in Manchuria, where my mother was born, nor Shanghai, where my parents were married. I was very young when we lived in Hong Kong and Uganda, and I yearned to make some kind of atavistic attempt to retrace my mother’s mysterious journey from Manchuria, through to its tragic denouement in a bedsit in Earl’s Court.

What this delightful old lady made of me – a middle-aged man with a shock of unkempt white hair, eyes permanently glued to an electronic device, carrying a furry pole in his left hand and babbling excitedly to his tall and very blonde daughter, also training an electronic device on me – I will never know.This was a bizarre, moving encounter. I couldn’t help imagining my mother crying in a room like this when she learnt that her brother Alex had died of cancer. Their father dead, their mother thousands of miles away in Harbin. No more Alex to share her rickshaw ride to school every morning. No more Alex to keep her company at night while her sisters danced with strange men in the nightclub down the road.Amazingly, there are still nightclubs lining the Avenue Joffre.

We tracked down the Casanova Club – another name from my mother’s past And we saw the classrooms where she learnt to speak English. According to the schoolmaster we talked to, nothing has changed there in 75 years. Roaming around its corridors and peering into the rooms, with their rows of wooden desks, I could believe him. Apart from one or two portraits of Chinese heroes on the walls, the school reminded me of the classrooms of my own Scottish boarding school. The Russian Orthodox church Mum visited is now the Shanghai Stock Exchange, but the church she seems to remember most from that era is the Anglican Cathedral, which has now been converted into the legislative meeting room for the provincial government During the Cultural Revolution it was a cinema. The fantasies and propaganda of Chinese “liberation” cinema were played out in the holy venue of Luba’s most poignant post- war memory: her wedding.By a quirk of fate, Luba met Donald after the Second World War in the offices of BAT, where they were both working in 1947. He had returned from his intelligence duties in Hong Kong, which had included the supervision of war crime executions.

To understand the bartender’s lot, you have to understand one thing: while you are relaxing, they are working as hard as anyone in the country You unwind; they walk (and run) several miles an evening. You have to decide where to eat dinner; they have to make hundreds of perfect drinks, some requiring lengthy preparation and microscopically fine judgement. You’re drinking with friends; they stay sober and have to be nice to dozens of strangers – even the loudmouthed Jerks In Suits who demand instant attention and then leave a pounds 1 tip on a pounds 150 tab.
Drinking culture in Britain has come a long way from beer and Babycham, but bartending remains a social, service-based job. Good publicans, in the old days, were treated with respect by their customers. In many of the hippest bars, newly affluent drinkers may treat the people working there as servants. Despite the rise of cocktail culture, the creativity of bartenders has yet to be widely recognised.Yet they’re expected to do more than ever, and above all they must be quick This is easy for an order of a beer and a G&T.

But when the drinks are complicated, speed requires dexterity, precision, encyclopaedic knowledge and boundless physical stamina. They must retain their composure under working conditions that make a trading floor look like a Zen garden. And they must be polite even when the customer is unbearably loud, unspeakably rude, or oafishly sexist.These pictures show the glamorous world of modern bar-life from a different perspective – the perspective of sobriety, hard work and economic necessity. If you ever go to bars, you owe them your full attention.Captions: Where: Leisure Lounge, Holborn, LondonWhen: 26 March, midnightBehind the bar: Eddie Santos, 20″It’s a Sixties, Seventies theme night A lot of drunk people Good atmosphere. They love drinking, man! They love to dress up Sixties and Seventies style as well The majority come in wigs, flares and so on It’s a fun night They’re a lively bunch actually. They like to chat when they’re drunk, but mainly they come just to have a dance and get drunk on vodka and Red Bull Some crowds you get, they’re a bit funny, rude as well But most of them are all right.

You don’t really deal with people on a one-to-one basis because it is quite busy and you don’t get that much time to mix with them. The only time you ever chat is when they come to you for a drink: you might have a two-minute conversation. At the time this picture was taken, things were starting to warm up. Most of them had probably just come in.”Where: Floyd’s Sports Bar, Charlton Athletic FC, LondonWhen: 3 April, 1.45pmBehind the bar: Kelly Luby, 19″Before the match they come in and then again after the game to drown their sorrows or celebrate. They’re like, `I knew it, we’re useless.’ They often cheer up after a few drinks They drink more when we win If we lose, they’re normally gone by eight or nine But if we win, I’ve seen them staying right till close.

One or two hapless hits apart, we saw little of the disaster that descended on the unfortunate young man, who resembled a Maurice Sendak character as he wandered forlornly through the rough.Sport is not just about success and hope and glory; it’s about head-exploding, will-sapping, spirit-crushing failure, too. Waddle, Pearce, Southgate, Batty: we remember them as indelibly as we do Moore and Hurst and Peters. What’s the most famous moment from rugby league Challenge Cup finals? Ask Don Fox. And will Jana Novotna be most fondly recalled for winning Wimbledon or losing it? And so on. We needed to see the Torment of Sergio Garcia because it’s good for the spirit. Well, my spirit.Still, although the course was clearly a pain in the backside for the young Spaniard, it was a bit below the belt for Peter Alliss to observe that “he could be trying for one of those big floaters”. Settling in for the long haul made one susceptible to thoughts like that.

It’s difficult to discern any shape to the day, and random associations drift in and out of the couch potato’s mind like golfers in and out of regulation.I became excited, for example, on hearing that there was a golfer called Glenn Matisse – paired with Turner, presumably – only to learn that it was actually Len Mattiace, not the same thing at all. But the thought did occur that the officials could have a lot of fun with the tee-off times.Franco and Moseley would have been ideal partners, for example, with Bevan to occupy the left side of the fairway, while Lehman and McCarthy (or indeed Leonard and McCarthy) could team up in a supergroup with Gallacher and Lyle, augmented by Watts, Charles, Stewart and Raitt (they would, of course, Singh Funk).Then there’s Goosen and Steve Pate, or Goosen, Herron and Kim Jong-Duck (there’s also L Donald and Kim Jong-Duck, but that’s another story altogether). And among other pairings I’d like to have seen were Frost-Gump and Farry and Parry. But then that’s just me.Alliss was enjoying himself in his customary, cosy, comfy fashion “Oh.

he’s not sure, Our Jim,” he murmured as Jim Furyk – whose Jim? Not my Jim – lined up a drive. “Oh sugar,” Alliss followed up as it headed in the general vicinity of John O’Groats. It’s this corduroys-and-malt style, Des Lynam without the rough edges, that has underpinned the BBC’s golf for decades, and I know of one or two people who’ve had enough of it.Beverley Lewis is, perhaps, the acceptable shock of the new, the sound of the future – as laid-back and silken-voiced as Alliss, but without that slightly sickening sense of self-parody that hangs round the old boy like the overly fragrant smell of pipe tobacco.At least Alliss, an old Ryder Cup player, has been there. We expect our sporting pundits to have practised what they presently preach, the epitome of such experience can be found on Channel 4’s Tour de France coverage, where Phil Liggett is assisted by Paul Sherwen.On one stage last week, when they were talking about the time factor involved in riders being eliminated, an anecdote cried out to be told, but Sherwen was too modest.He completed five Tours, including 1985, when, four kilometres out from the start, he grabbed a team-mate’s jersey to stop him from crashing to the ground, only to slam into a metal barrier himself. His team-mates came back to help him, but he was in a bad way and told them to go off and salvage their own race. He eventually limped home 26 minutes after the elimination point.The Tour organisers, who like their heroes, immediately waived their own rules and reinstated him.

If the golfers think they’re being put through the mangle, they should try the Tour de France.. It’s the year 2010 and Rupert Murdoch (or his successor) has just launched a bid for Magdalen College, Oxford. The 30 fellows must decide where the interests of future students best lie. And into the balance they must weigh their one-thirtieth share of the pounds 20m the media mogul has placed on the table

Inconceivable? Probably.

He rises every morning at 3.30am for the first of his four daily training sessions, and is driven on by what his mother told him two years ago, that he would one day beat Rhodes and become world champion.
Matthews stepped into the fight on Monday when the World Boxing Organisation middleweight champion, Bert Schenk, pulled out of his defence against Rhodes because of injury.Confusion reigns as to whether the full title or an interim version will be contested on the night. What is certain is that Matthews – nicknamed “The Method Man” after one of the members of his favourite group – intends to seize his opportunity.”The Method Man had always got a different style, he’s a one-off,” Matthews said “That’s me I’m going to box and punch. I’m going to grind Rhodes down and knock him out.”Matthews, beaten just once in 21 professional fights, is looking forward to fighting Rhodes “I jumped at it I can beat him. Ryan Rhodes is a good fighter, he’s a good puncher, but he’s no good on the back foot I’m going to come forward and get him.”. UNFANCIED BELGIUM made an excellent start to their Davis Cup World Group quarter-final against Switzerland in Brussels yesterday as the 18- year-old Xavier Malisse earned a straight-sets victory against Lorenzo Manta in the opening match. Malisse took two hours to beat Manta, who reached the Wimbledon fourth round last month, 6-4, 6-0, 7-6 .
After taking the first set 6-4 with a single break of service, Malisse sped through the second set but eased up in the third.Manta broke him for a 3-1 lead, but Malisse swiftly broke back and went on to win the tie-break 7-1 after the Swiss man served three double-faults.”I didn’t play my best tennis but at least I was fairly consistent,” Malisse said.”Winning the first match is very important and I hope my victory will give the rest of the team confidence.”Russia took a 1-0 lead over Slovakia in their quarter-final in Moscow when Marat Safin came from a set down to beat Karol Kucera 2-6, 6-4, 6- 2, 6-4.Slovakia’s top player, who is ranked 13 in the world, started powerfully, breaking the 37th-ranked Safin twice to take the opener 6-2 in 25 minutes.But the big Russian fought back with his serve and a solid game from the baseline. He took advantage of some sloppy shots by Kucera in the ninth game of the second set to edge 5-4 ahead and held on to level the match.After trailing Kucera 2-0 in the third Safin reeled off six straight games to take control of the match.Kucera again took an early lead in the fourth set, 3-0 and 4-1, but the 19-year-old Russian refused to be rattled and, cheered on by a partisan 5,000-strong crowd, broke back and went on to win the match in two hours and 10 minutes..

A HARD day’s night was in store for the Champagne Mumm Admirals Cup crews yesterday as they began a 36 hour, 225-mile slog down and up the south coast. There was an air of grudging reluctance to leave their berths just after lunch and line up for a beat into the 12 to 15 knot breeze just south of west, but there was no shortage of typical cut and thrust as they zig- zag tacked their way westwards close to the Isle of Wight shore. Gear- changing between medium heavy number one and number three headsails kept foredeck men busy.
The first leg to keep them cold and damp on the windward rail was nearly 60 miles to the East Shambles buoy off Portland Bill, but however many fillings had been rattled on the upwind way, they would rather that than no wind at all. A big softening-off was a real possibility.The Royal Ocean Racing Club management was ready to shorten the course at any one of several points as the fleet returned up-channel.

With every place in each of three classes costing 2.5 points, that is a serious chunk from the total of 12 on offer from eight races. Britain was leading the nine-team event, though the French are running only two boats by just 5.5 points over the defending champions, the United States, with the Netherlands and Germany also within 10 points. And well in the hunt are the two rival teams from Italy: the pre-start favourites, Europe, just pipping their home rivals on Italy.On their own home water, the Chernikeeff team did not look like England’s glory in the opening tussle. The Dutch, on Innovision and the Italian- Kiwi line-up on Brava, sailing for Europe, were in front by the time the big boats reached the Needles.

But they had been shown the way by Jo Richards and Graham Deegan, sailing for Peter Harrison, sponsor of the British team but competing against them under a Commonwealth flag in his own boat, also named Chernikeeff.Nor were things much better in the Sydney 40s, where a dour Chris Law was struggling in sixth at the Needles in Nautica, as were the boys on the Mumm 36 Barlo Plastics.Stevie Benjamin on America’s Blue Yankee was leading the 40s, Tony Gale had a handy lead for Germany on the 36ft Jeantex.n Vincenzo Onorato has replaced Enrico Chieffi, skipper of Europe’s 36- footer Moby Lines, with the 1986 America’s Cup skipper Mauro Pelaschier after a dispute.. NEW TESTING methods designed to detect the use of a life-threatening drug among cyclists is to be implemented during the Tour de France, which was described yesterday as “almost clean” of doping. Perflurocarbone (PFC) is dangerous because “it can destroy the body’s organs,” said Dr Leon Schattenberg, head of the anti-doping commission of the Union Cycliste Internationale, the sport’s governing body. He added that, with the approval of the French sports ministry, riders would be tested on Monday.
The president of the UCI, Hein Verbruggen, said that it should be made clear, however, that this was not anti-doping but a health check.

It is not for me, save in a clear and extreme case, to pass judgement on the merits or otherwise of another jurisdiction.”One in seven people in the Northern Cape town of Prieska, where Cape had a mill, now has asbestosis. The lawyers for the workers, Leigh Day and Co, believe the South African courts could refuse to hear the case on the grounds that it should be brought in the UK.Cape, which operated asbestos plants and mines in South Africa until the 1970s, has mounted a fierce rearguard action against the compensation claim.Mr Justice Buckley said that South Africa was “clearly and distinctly the more appropriate forum” for a hearing into conditions in South Africa over 20 or 30 years and the individual histories of the claimants.He had heard that Cape, which now works in asbestos removal, had sold its mines in 1979, and today had no interests in the country and very little documentation relating to the relevant period.”I cannot find, on the evidence, that the South African courts would fail to deal with the matter appropriately. The case will now go back to the House of Lords, which has already ruled that another group of Cape workers who have the same illness can sue in Britain.
Campaigners say the UK is out of line with the rest of Europe on the issue, and that if Cape had been a German firm the workers would have had their cases heard by now.If the appeal fails, the case will have to go ahead in South Africa, where such a group action has never before been heard. The disease killed her sister Emily, the author of Wuthering Heights, three months later, while Anne died the following May, two months after the letter was written..

UP TO 4,000 South African workers victims of asbestosis had their compensation case thrown out of the English High Court yesterday. After nearly two and a half years of legal proceedings a judge ruled that the English firm involved, Cape Plc, should be sued by its former staff in South Africa rather than in Britain. but there have been hours – days – weeks of inexpressible anguish to undergo and the cloud of impending distress still lowers dark and sullen above us.”The letter was written from the Parsonage on 15 March 1849 to Laetitia Wheelwright, a former pupil and a friend, who was living in London.For all the repression and isolation they may have experienced, the Bronte sisters demonstrated the fiercest access to their own emotions and Charlotte’s letters – which she came to live for – are one of the results.The new, four-sided letter, will be displayed one year in four under a low light to prevent deterioration.It is called the “dreadful dream” letter because it opens: “I have not quite forgotten about you through the winter but I have remembered you only like some pleasant waking idea, struggling through a dreadful dream.”Charlotte’s brother, Branwell, a notorious drinker with an opium habit, died from tuberculosis in September 1849. She is a natural-born writer.”The only time the letter has been published was in the Twenties, in a collection of her letters – but the transcription was flawed.In sepia-coloured iron gall ink on mourning stationery(white paper with a black border) Charlotte writes: “God has hitherto supported me in some sort through all these bitter calamities … The museum contributed pounds 10,000 and the remainder was raised mainly through private donations.”Oh yes, here is the ‘dark night of the soul’,” said the museum’s director, Mike Hill, who was enthused to the point of delirium by the rhythmical beauty which Charlotte’s grief appears to have delivered.”It does so bring out that she was a natural writer This is not an artificially composed letter There’s a fabulous rhythm there. The Bronte Society contributed pounds 8,000 of the pounds 50,000 needed to bring it from the United States, where it was part of a private collection and spotted for sale in a dealer’s catalogue.

But remember that you’re only at your best when you feel comfortable – unless you feel happy with the new society you’ve entered into, there’s absolutely no point in being there.Interview by Fiona McClymont. You may want to consider learning about art or wine; there are courses for this type of thing. Prepare to get very organised; if you are invited to dinner parties and openings every evening of your life, you’ll need to be. There are various rules, such as only talking to the person on your left at a big dinner party – it seems strict, but it’s there to prevent people being ignored – you’ll learn them as you go along. One tip is to always write and say thank you to your hosts – that way they will have your name and address, so you may get invited again.You’ll have to learn manners, of course. But remember that unless you are one of the world’s doers and contributors, nobody will be interested.
If you do get invited to places, don’t over-network and try to turn every occasion into some sort of opportunity; people can tell it’s not genuine and you might find yourself being dropped Be subtle. If you’re going to try and go right from Z to A in society, have a reason to do so.

What is it you want? If it’s because you’re marketing or promoting something, then fair enough. You have to offer something – there’s no point in getting invitations to society events unless you’ve got something to talk about and to contribute, otherwise you’ll just feel totally out of place, very uncomfortable and wish you were down the pub. IT’S NO good thinking that, because you’ve just won the lottery or made a lot of money by fleecing someone, you will get invited to grand dinner parties. You need to have done something that elevates you to being a person that people would like to know. The bosses don’t like me `hanging out’ in the mornings.”In February, she told a reporter: “Channel 4 have told me, `If you’re crap we’ll sack you’.”. Kelly: “Why didn’t you take someone with you?”Elisabeth: “Because it was a solo row.”Johnny: “What is the average amount of lottery grant awarded to Manchester?” Kelly: “What, money-wise?”When asked how she got the job, she replied: “Well, there are two obvious things…”Kelly: “Personally I’d like to wear more skimpy things, but now I have to wear cardigans… I can pronounce “satirical” while standing on my head, giggling inanely and looking into Camera One.And if you ever fancy a Caribbean holiday, I’m a dab hand with the Ambre Solaire.The Wit and Wisdom of Kelly BrookJohnny: “What is the number of Australians who surf regularly?” Kelly: “The number? What, how many?”Kelly meets Elisabeth Hoff, the young woman who tried to row solo across the Atlantic.

Foiled.Looks like I might have stick to the day job (that’s if they’ll have me back). Unless, dear Johnny, you can find it in your heart to give me a chance? I’d travel to the ends of the earth for you (well, at least the Docklands). Should I try the old crying trick, or attach myself to a desk with my Barbie balloon?Instead, I ask to use the toilet, in the hope that if I hide there long enough, I’ll be able to find someone to talk to. The runner sees straight through this cunning plan, and suggests I use the visitors’ toilet on the ground floor. Ed is out of the office all day and there is no one else around Sorry.He gives me the phone number of their PR company.

It’s the number for the stroppy lady that I called earlier.”But can’t I just talk to you”, I beg “I know I’ll be just perfect for the job, please, please.. I’ve made my own balloon.. please.” I’m starting to lose it Things are looking bleak. I start to put my feet up, and run through my requirements in my mind: health-club membership, pension plan, open-top car, luncheon vouchers…Five minutes later, the runner is back. The walls are covered with huge posters of gorgeous Johnny.I am let in to the office by a scruffy runner from the show I say “I’m here about the job” and ask for Ed Forsdick He looks bemused. I say: “Well, Kelly’s gone, hasn’t she?”"We can’t say either way,” he replies but directs me to an office to wait.I am offered two glasses of water and asked what channel I want to watch on TV while he goes to find Ed. The two switchboard operators and the electrician, who is mending something in the ceiling, are really friendly and obviously recognise my star potential.