6 Podcasts for the Drama Lover

My best shot: Rena Effendi on haymaking in Transylvania

‘The light was soft … They were so graceful. They are the last peasants, the last of their kind’

In 2012, I travelled to Transylvania to document what is effectively the last remaining bucolic landscape of Europe. England, for example, has lost most of its hay meadows because of large-scale agriculture, but in Romania this kind of small-scale sustainable way of farming persists. It survived the Ceaușescu regime. It survived the EU. Today, however, it is a vanishing way of life as young people increasingly choose to migrate to western Europe in search of work and faster money.

I spent three weeks in Maramureş in the northern Carpathian mountains, exploring life in six tiny hamlets, each with no more than 500 inhabitants. It was August, the height of the haymaking season. Families worked in the fields from dawn to dusk. These women were from a village called Breb. I saw their haystacks from the road as my translator and I drove past. I shouted “stop!” and ran out of the car towards them. They smiled at me, but we didn’t talk, they just carried on with what they were doing. It was late in the day, and they were getting ready to go home. The women wear trousers to make hay because the wind blows their skirts up. Here, they were putting their headscarves and their traditional skirts back on. Then they gathered their baskets, in which they’d brought their lunch, and walked back to the village. I followed. The light was very soft, and the shadows long.

Cutting hay and stacking it is physically demanding, I tried doing it myself and failed miserably

A Giant Volcano Could End Human Life on Earth as We Know It

Their Mothers Chose Donor Sperm. The Doctors Used Their Own.

Migrant Families Would Face Indefinite Detention Under New Trump Rule

Final Punishment in Eric Garner Case: Sergeant Loses Vacation Time

Fact-Checking Trump’s Claim That He Didn’t Start Family Separations at Border

Johnson and Macron to hold ‘frank’ Brexit talks in Paris

French observers fear Britain’s PM is setting up France to take blame over no-deal departure

Emmanuel Macron will hold a friendly but “frank” working lunch with Boris Johnson on Thursday after dismissing his request to renegotiate the Brexit withdrawal agreement and scrap the Irish backstop as “not an option”.

The French president told reporters on Wednesday night that there was a “British democratic crisis” over Brexit and he was seeking “clarification” from Johnson on his proposals as the 31 October exit date approaches.

Don’t Let Sean Spicer Tap-Dance Out of Infamy on ‘Dancing With the Stars’

Trump Goes Godly

Melbourne archbishop says George Pell innocent and questions if victim mistaken

Peter Comensoli says he accepts victim was abused but wonders whether he was wrong in naming cardinal as abuser

Catholic archbishop of Melbourne Peter Comensoli says he believes convicted paedophile Cardinal George Pell when he protests his innocence, and has speculated if the sole living victim got the name of his abuser wrong.

A day after Victoria’s court of appeal upheld Pell’s conviction for the rape of a 13-year-old choirboy and sexual assault of another at Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral in 1996, Comensoli said while he respected the courts, he also believed his friend and would continue to visit him in prison.

Morrison urged to address human rights on Vietnam visit after calling nation 'free'

Human Rights Watch raises concerns of ‘dire’ human rights record, including at least 133 political prisoners

Scott Morrison has been urged to raise human rights concerns with the Vietnamese government when he makes his first official visit there this week, including the case of Australian citizen Chau Van Kham who has been detained since January.

The prime minister travels to Hanoi on Thursday to discuss the strategic partnership signed by Australia and Vietnam in 2018 with Vietnam’s prime minister, Nguyễn Xuân Phúc.

The Toxic Back Story to the Charge That Jews Have a Dual Loyalty

Microplastics in water not harmful to humans, says WHO report

Experts find no proof minuscule particles are a threat to health but say more research is needed

Microplastics are increasingly found in drinking water, but there is no evidence so far that this poses a risk to humans, according to a new assessment by the World Health Organization.

However, the United Nations body warned against complacency because more research is needed to fully understand how plastic spreads into the environment and works its way through human bodies.

Giuliani Renews Push for Ukraine to Investigate Trump’s Political Opponents

Julián Castro Is in the Next Debate. That’s a Big Deal.

Trump’s Interest in Buying Greenland Seemed Like a Joke. Then It Got Ugly.

A Lust for Punishment

Tanya Tucker Would Rather Be Celebrated While She’s Alive

How Nationalism Can Destroy a Nation

Hundreds of protesters march on Jacinda Ardern's office over Māori land dispute

Petition with more than 25,000 signatures delivered, calling on New Zealand PM to visit sacred Ihumātao site

Several hundred protesters have marched on Jacinda Ardern’s Auckland office, demanding she visit Ihumātao, the site of a major indigenous land dispute that has broadened into wider anger at government inaction in tackling Māori disadvantage.

The protesters delivered a petition, signed by more than 26,000 people, to the prime minister’s office urging her to travel to the site that has been occupied for the past month as part of a housing dispute.

The People’s War Is Coming in Hong Kong

A Popeyes Chicken Sandwich and a Tactic to Set Off a Twitter Roar

Older adults can boost longevity 'with just a little exercise'

Norwegian review of 36,000 cases links more activity overall, light or intensive, with lower risk of death

Even a small increase in light activity, such as washing dishes, a little gentle gardening, or shuffling around the house, might help stave off an early death among older adults, researchers say.

Being sedentary, for instance, by sitting for long periods of time, has been linked to an increased risk of developing many conditions, including heart disease, as well as an early death.

Donald Trump and the ‘Disloyal’ Jews

A Heartbreaking Choice for Moms: Food or a Family’s Future

The Fabric of Nigerian Weddings

Trump Orders Student Loan Forgiveness for Disabled Veterans

'Just wanted to drive a little': eight-year-old German boy takes car for 140km/h spin

Child reaches high speeds during night-time motorway adventure before pulling over and putting his hazard lights on

An eight-year-old boy has been found safe after taking his parents’ car for a 140km/h (87mph) night-time spin down a motorway in Germany.

He tearfully told police he “just wanted to drive a little bit”.

Jay Inslee Ends Campaign for President

Protesters in West Papua clash with Indonesian security forces – in pictures

Large demonstrations and violent protests have taken place across the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua. On Wednesday, Jakarta said it was sending a further 1,000 security personnel to tackle the unrest, sparked by the arrest of Papuan students in the Indonesian city of Surabaya. Indonesia’s communications ministry cut the internet to its most eastern province on Wednesday ‘until the atmosphere of Papua returns to being conducive and normal’. Jakarta has battled an independence insurgency in the region since it was incorporated into Indonesia in 1969 after a widely discredited UN-sponsored ballot

California arms traffickers used Snapchat to market illegal weapons

Recent investigations show that in the Bay Area, social media is playing a significant role in firearms sales

One post showed the man walking through a home brandishing a gun with a high-capacity magazine and tapping an unidentified woman on her buttocks with the barrel. In another, he waved a pistol loaded with a 50-round drum magazine in the air while driving a car.

They’re two of several Snapchat posts by Anthony Reed, a 22-year-old Nevada resident who prosecutors allege used the social media platform to market weapons in California.

West Papua protests: Indonesia deploys 1,000 soldiers to quell unrest, cuts internet

Jakarta cuts online access to Papua ‘and surrounding areas’ until the atmosphere ‘returns to being conducive and normal’

Indonesia has deployed more than 1,000 security personnel to the province of West Papua and cut internet access, amid spreading protests and violence.

On Wednesday, violent demonstrations erupted, a market was torched and street battles took place between police and protestors.

Why are there violent clashes in Papua and West Papua?

The Free Papua Movement has been fighting for independence from Indonesia for 50 years, so why is there a big flare-up now?

Papua and West Papua form the western half of the island of New Guinea (the eastern half is the nation of Papua New Guinea). The region was known as Irian Jaya until 2000, before the provinces were renamed in 2003 as Papua and West Papua. Jakarta maintains they are an integral and indivisible part of Indonesia, but that has been contested for more than half a century, including via a low-level, armed insurgency. Indonesian troops have been accused of human rights abuses and violent suppression of the independence movement. The two provinces have suffered from systemic underdevelopment but are rich with natural resources, including gold, copper, and timber and generate billions of dollars for Indonesia.

Pakistan Leader Vents Frustration at India: ‘No Point in Talking to Them’

M.I.T. Media Lab in Crisis After 2 Scholars Vow to Leave Over Epstein Ties

Vaping Sicknesses Rising: 153 Cases Reported in 16 States

Where the Titanic Rests, Decay Races On

Mr. Trump, Stop Questioning the Loyalty of American Jews

Big Tech, a Conservative Provocateur and the Fight Over Disinformation

Trump, Greenland, Denmark. Is This Real Life?

Justin Trudeau: the rise and fall of a political brand

Thanks to his clever use of social media, he was dubbed the first prime minister of the Instagram age – but after four years in power, cracks in his image have started to show.

By Ashifa Kassam

On the last night of March 2012, Justin Trudeau climbed into a boxing ring in downtown Ottawa, the Canadian capital, intent on rescuing his public image. He was clad in a lustrous red robe, the colour of the Liberal party, for which he was then a junior member of parliament. In the opposite corner, wearing Tory blue, was a young aboriginal leader and Conservative senator named Patrick Brazeau, who is a former navy reservist and a second-degree black belt in karate. Bookies had given the lanky Trudeau, a former high school teacher, three-to-one odds against.

The televised match was ostensibly a fundraiser for cancer research, but in Ottawa it became a sensation – a display of partisan pageantry rarely seen in the staid world of Canadian politics, where “bland works” had been the watchword of one long-serving provincial premier. The fight’s symbolism was lost on no one: in recent years, the Conservatives had battered the Liberals, turning a narrow lead in the 2006 election into a majority government by 2011. The Liberal party, which had governed Canada for much of the 20th century, had been reduced to a historically low number of seats.

Deficit, Immigration, Mongol Derby: Your Wednesday Evening Briefing

School reopens inquiry into teens giving Nazi salute as new clips emerge, reports say

Videos appear to show students marching with German flag and wrapping themselves in Confederate flag

School officials in southern California are reportedly reopening an investigation into a group of high school students seen giving Nazi salutes on video, after more racist video and images surfaced on Wednesday.

The initial video obtained by the Daily Beast shows members of the boys’ water polo team at Pacifica high school in Orange County in an empty room that administrative officials say was later used for an athletic banquet. The video, which according to the Daily Beast was taken before an awards ceremony late last year, showed about 10 boys in a stiff-arm salute while singing a Nazi marching song.

Budget Deficit on Path to Surpass $1 Trillion Under Trump