It was the Cryptic crossword that introduced me to the Guardian Weekly. At a friend’s house in the 70s, I picked up a copy and saw the crossword half done. Two hours later, I was still engrossed – and was hooked. Being a lowly assistant teacher on the small island of Ovalau in Fiji, my pay at that time didn’t run to a subscription, but my crossword puzzle-addict mother came to the rescue and I have continued subscribing since she died.
Back in the 70s, the Weekly kept me abreast of international news, and the arts pages and book reviews were of special interest. I would hang on to each issue until I got the next one, and the first thing I then did was to check the answers to the previous crossword, over which I had struggled, sometimes for hours. When my children were older, that had to stop, as they were keen to read it after me, not only for the parts that particularly interested them but also to reassure themselves that my brain was still in working order when they saw the scribbles on the crossword page.
Now living in Suva and with television and the internet, I keep up my subscription, still with the main focus on the arts pages, but the Comment pages help me understand recent international events and give me the bigger picture. Of course, the Cryptic crossword is a weekly challenge, though I do miss Araucaria!
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