meemalee

My aunt on my father's side is the physical opposite of me. Willowy, slender and beautiful, with the fairest skin and the glossiest ebony hair. She didn't get married till she was in her forties though - for the most part because her parents, my grandparents, thought no one was good enough for her. I confess I didn't take to her new husband U Thein Han for similar, arbitrary reasons - he wasn't handsome or tall, he was a Muslim whilst we were Buddhist, and he was divorced with children. I was selfishly filled with a sense of what the Burmese call " n'myaw " - roughly translated as feeling their marriage was a terrible waste of my aunt's loveliness. He grew on me though (and maybe I grew up too). He was a lawyer, like me, but unlike me he really seemed to love his job. This passion permeated every part of his life - he was mad about Manchester United (whose games you could only see via "cracked" satellite in Burma) and he was clea...

It's time for Hyper Japan 2012 - the UK's biggest celebration of J-Culture from Friday till Sunday at Earl's Court, London. Kakkoii is the Japanese word for "cool", and it's fair to say that the line-up of food, events, entertainment, books and other goods on sale veers towards the kakkoii, and also the more familiar kawaii (meaning "cute"). The traditional side of Japan isn't neglected though, with stands of pottery, calligraphy, artwork and origami taking part. Exhibitors I'll be taking a look at include Nintendo (who'll have exclusive 3DS downloadable content), Manga Entertainment, CyberCandy, Namco, Artbox and my beloved Doki Tableware . Food and groceries will be available from the likes of the Japan Centre, Natural Natural, Minamato Kitchoan, So restaurant and Bento Ramen. The 2012 Sake Awards and Sushi Awards will also be taking place at Hyper Japan. For those Harajuku wannabes amongst you, there'll be showcases of the lates...

Click the photo to embiggen I just found out that I am mentioned in the latest edition of Lonely Planet Myanmar (Burma). How exciting is that? I'm a national treasure, me. And rather appropriately, tonight I am off to visit family in Burma - see you in a while ...

[This follows on from Specs ] Just before Christmas, my dad, the ophthalmologist, says to me, " I think it's time you had laser surgery ". I do a double-take (actually, it feels like a blood vessel explodes in my head), but I get over my shock quickly and I bounce to a phone to book a consultation. He's recommended a particular surgeon, and a fortnight later, I find myself waiting to speak to the man in question. A cheerful girl takes me to a room and she does a full eye test to check if my vision is stable. I don't have much of a bridge on my nose, so the clunky trial frames keep sliding down, and I end up having to prop them up with a finger. I hand her a list of all my prescriptions since time began, and she looks scared (" Oh god, a looney ") till I explain that my dad compiled them out of professional interest. She then scans me with a machine to measure the thickness of my corneas - the laser will be slicing into them, so the thic...

I get my first pair of specs at the age of 6. My father is an ophthalmologist, so I have my eyes tested for the hell of it, and he discovers that, not only am I astigmatic, but one of my eyes is mildly short-sighted and the other mildly long. This means they sort of cancel each other out, and I don't really need the glasses, not yet. Sometimes I lie on my bed and I hold the specs by their arms up above me, and I squint at the ceiling light through each lens in turn and I marvel at how the light appears fat and blurry in the right lens, and sharp and tiny in the left. But after a while, the long-sighted eye joins the other in its romp into myopia, and the astigmatism marches on. By the time I'm 10, I'm wearing specs full-time and in a way it seems appropriate as I am already the school spod. I let it pigeonhole me to some extent - I give up trying to be good at sports, although enforced activity means I regularly get a netball in my face anyway, and I retreat bookishly behin...

Last night's food quiz was the third time that my impossibly round face has appeared on the television. The first time was in 2003 for University Challenge: the Professionals , and the second in 2005 as 'Er Indoors when my husband got to the final of BBC's End of Story (they showed me failing to catch a frisbee - they wanted to film us interacting, but decided Virtua Tennis 2 was too sedentary. Gits). So I have the rare privilege of having been grilled by both Newsnight anchors without being a politician which is pretty cool. It was so much fun to take part in and it just reinforced for me what a complete quiz nerd I am (and that I really like pressing buzzers). Presenter Kirsty Wark is one of the nicest "celebs" around, and Dictionary Corner's William Sitwell has met me five times now and failed to recognise me each time. Which is nice. By far the oddest thing about last night (apart from seeing myself with subtitles because my mum's hearing isn't ...