Sarah Evans

A national treasure.

Honoured beyond words to receive the ‘Order of Ikhamanga’ in Gold - the highest National Order given by the President to South African 🇿🇦 citizens who have excelled in the fields of arts, culture, literature, music, journalism and sport. Sharing a glimpse into the ceremony, the awards and the conversations behind this incredible honour. My deepest gratitude to the President Ramaphosa for this recognition and heartfelt thanks to everyone who has been part of my journey. Music continues to be a bridge between people, cultures and hearts around the world. ✨🇿🇦 #flutepainter🎶🎶 #wouterkellerman #OrderofIkhamanga #southafrica #nationalorders #proudlysouthafrican #artsandculture #musicbiz

This is the greatest video I’ve ever seen. No notes. The lifeless clanker carcass just laying there. No crowd reaction, anything. Just Billie Jean. Until its lifeless shell is shamefully dragged off. Purely amazing.

THIS is what religious leaders must do. Build bridges, intensify dialogue, and galvanise polarised people around love and respect. They exercise decorum. But not that vulgar Chief Rabbi from South Africa. He could have easily reached out to Archbishop Brislin - who is BOTH Archbishop of John AND a Cardinal. A direct line to the Pope. But he saw it fit to malign The Pope and The Holy See. His rhetoric is always inflamed, insulting, and threatening. Catholics are too quiet. Saying, "The Pope has blood in his hands " because he denouncing wars, crossed a line and should not be tolerated. Catholics are too quiet.

wake up babe the pope is laudatosiposting

This moment in a nutshell.

I wrote about the price of the illusion of American omnipotence that’s driving this reckless war in Iran, and so much else. nytimes.com/2026/03/26/opi…

Moral clarity.

😲

What wine pairs best with monitoring the situation

This is the issue

I am a diplomatic aide in the Sultanate of Oman's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. My job is logistics. When two countries that cannot speak to each other need to speak to each other, I book the rooms. I prepare the briefing materials. I make sure the water glasses are the right distance apart. You would be surprised how much of diplomacy is water glasses. Too close and it feels informal. Too far and it feels like a tribunal. I have a chart. We had a very good month. Since January, Oman has been mediating indirect talks between the United States and Iran on Iran's nuclear program. The talks were held in Muscat and in Geneva. The Americans would sit in one room. The Iranians would sit in another room. I would walk between them. My Fitbit says I averaged fourteen thousand steps on negotiation days. The hallway between the two rooms at the Royal Opera House conference center is forty-seven meters. I walked it two hundred and twelve times in February. This is good for my cardiovascular health. It was less good for my knees. Both are in the service of peace. By mid-February, we had something. Iran agreed to zero stockpiling of enriched uranium. Not reduced stockpiling. Zero. They agreed to down-blend existing stockpiles to the lowest possible level. They agreed to convert them into irreversible fuel. They agreed to full IAEA verification with potential US inspector access. They agreed, in the Foreign Minister's phrase, to "never, ever" possess nuclear material for a bomb. I have worked in diplomacy for seven years. I have never seen a country agree to this many things this quickly. I made a spreadsheet of the concessions. It had fourteen rows. I color-coded it. Green for confirmed. Yellow for pending. By February 21 the spreadsheet was entirely green. I printed it. It is on my desk in Muscat. It is still green. That phrase took eleven days. "Never, ever." The Iranians initially offered "not seek to." The Americans wanted "will not under any circumstances." We landed on "never, ever" at 2:14 AM on a Tuesday in Muscat. I typed the final version myself. I used Times New Roman because Geneva prefers it. The document was fourteen pages. I was proud of every comma. Here is what they said, in the order they said it. February 24: "We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity." — The Foreign Minister, private briefing to Gulf Cooperation Council ambassadors. I prepared the slide deck. Slide 14 was the implementation timeline. Slide 15 was the signing ceremony logistics. I had reserved the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Room XX. It seats four hundred. We discussed pen brands for the signing. The Iranians preferred Montblanc. The Americans had no preference. I ordered twelve Montblanc Meisterstucks at six hundred and thirty dollars each. They arrive on Tuesday. February 27, 8:30 AM EST: "The deal is within our reach." — The Foreign Minister, CBS Face the Nation. He sat across from Margaret Brennan. He said broad political terms could be agreed "tomorrow" with ninety days for technical implementation in Vienna. He said, and I wrote this line for the briefing card he carried in his breast pocket: "If we just allow diplomacy the space it needs." He praised the American envoys by name. Steve Witkoff. Jared Kushner. He said both had been constructive. I watched from the Four Seasons Georgetown. The minibar had cashews. I ate the cashews. They were nineteen dollars. The most expensive cashew I have ever eaten. But it was a good morning and we were within our reach. February 27, 2:00 PM EST: Meeting with Vice President Vance, Washington. The Foreign Minister presented our progress. Zero stockpiling. Full verification. Irreversible conversion. "Never, ever." The Vice President used the word "encouraging." His aide took notes on an iPad. The aide did not make eye contact for the last nine minutes of the meeting. I noticed this. Noticing things is the only part of my job that is not water glasses. February 27, 4:00 PM EST: "Not happy with the pace." — President Trump, to reporters. Not happy with the pace. We had achieved zero stockpiling. Full IAEA verification. Irreversible fuel conversion. Inspector access. And the phrase "never, ever," which took eleven days and cost me two hundred and twelve trips down a forty-seven-meter hallway. Every American president since Carter has failed to get Iran to agree to this. Forty-five years. Not happy with the pace. February 27, 9:47 PM EST: The Foreign Minister's flight departs Dulles for Muscat. I am in the seat behind him. He is reviewing Slide 14 on his laptop. The implementation timeline. Vienna technical sessions. The signing ceremony. The pens. I fall asleep over the Atlantic. I dream about water glasses. February 28, 6:00 AM GST: I wake up to push notifications. February 28: "The United States has begun major combat operations in Iran." — President Trump. Operation Epic Fury. Coordinated airstrikes. The United States and Israel. Tehran. Isfahan. Qom. Karaj. Kermanshah. Nuclear facilities. IRGC bases. Sites near the Supreme Leader's office. Israel called their half Operation Roaring Lion. Someone in both governments spent time choosing these names. Epic Fury. Roaring Lion. I spent eleven days on "never, ever." They spent it on branding. The President said Iran had "rejected American calls to halt its nuclear weapons production." Rejected. Iran had agreed to zero stockpiling. Iran had agreed to full verification. Iran had agreed to "never, ever." Iran had agreed to everything in a fourteen-page document that I typed in Times New Roman. The President said they rejected it. I do not know which document the President was reading. I know which one I typed. February 28, 18:45 UTC: Iran internet connectivity: four percent. — NetBlocks, confirmed by Cloudflare. Ninety-six percent of a country went dark. You cannot negotiate with a country at four percent connectivity. You cannot negotiate with a country that is being struck. You cannot negotiate. This is not a political opinion. This is a logistics assessment. February 28: The governor of Minab reported forty girls killed at an elementary school. I do not have logistics for that. There is no slide for that. The water glass chart does not cover that. February 28: Lockheed Martin: up. Northrop Grumman: up. RTX: up. Dow futures: down six hundred and twenty-two points. Gold: five thousand two hundred and ninety-six dollars. An analyst at AInvest published a note titled "Iran Strikes: Tactical Plays." The note recommended positions in oil, defense stocks, and gold. The most expensive cashew I have ever eaten was nineteen dollars. The most expensive pen I have ever ordered was six hundred and thirty dollars. The math suggests I have been working in the wrong industry. Defense stocks do not require water glasses. Defense stocks do not require eleven days. Defense stocks require one morning. February 28: Israel closed its airspace and its schools. Iran launched retaliatory missiles toward US bases in the Gulf. The Supreme Leader promised a "crushing response." Israel's defense minister declared a permanent state of emergency. Everyone is using words I recognize in an order I do not. I recognize "permanent." I recognize "emergency." I do not recognize them next to each other. In diplomacy, nothing is permanent and everything is an emergency. In war it is the reverse. February 28: The Foreign Minister has not made a public statement. The briefing card is still in his breast pocket. It still says "within our reach."

Board of Peace immediately bored of peace

This is why we need the humanities (philosophy, especially). The computer scientists cannot be left alone at this.

This gets at a bigger idea that separates journalism from Big Tech & the obsession over data collection. The entire point of a newspaper is curation. Story judgment. Discovery Endlessly chasing data signals as a roadmap is what got us the ubiquitous algorithmic feed of CONTENT

@nickhedley But the trans vibes, don't you see

Just insane that Americans voted this vile human into power.

Speaking as a reporter who writes on Substack, anyone who thinks individual newsletters are somehow a leaner version of a newsroom is clueless about how journalism works. Feature writing and investigative reporting are team sports. You need sharp editors and, in many cases, stiff-spined lawyers. It helps to have other reporters whose expertise and sources you can call upon, too. You can do a lot to pump out scoops on your own — I regularly break stories on my Substack — but serious beat reporting requires a team.

The American voter has unleashed a madman upon the Earth, and the insane among them are celebrating: “Yeah yeah we are tough! We have balls of steel. We can fuck anyone and everybody in the world.” The sane ones want to rein him in but don’t know how. The best they can do is utter lamentations and wishful thinking on varied media: “That is illegal, that is unconstitutional!” Oh yeah? So what are you going to do about it? Is there no rule of law in your country? Didn’t you proclaim all men are equal before the law? “Oh yes, but all we can say for now is the man has dimentia, his hands are rotting, he has cankles!” and “Oh, he is a pedophile and Epstein will come from the dead and rescue us from him!” and ”Oh, dont worry, age will catch up with him, he’s dead meat as we speak!” Really? Is that’s all you can do? Are your constitutional and statutory systems so weak that they cannot provide any guardsrails against such lawlessness? Meanwhile the madman continues wreaking universal havoc unabated, like an evil comic book villain but with real-life dead bodies piling.

Proud of this music. open.spotify.com/track/2dmBe80E…

As a country can we please get our shit together as far as rewards cards are concerned.