Economist, Dec 19, 2015

choi

(1) Festive splurges | Bank Run; It’s the most cashed-up time of the year. Economist, Dec 19, 2015
http://www.economist.com/news/fi ... -time-year-bank-run
("In rich countries, where card payments have become common, cash in circulation tends to jump by less than 5% in December; in America it hardly rises at all. * * * The world’s most cash-crazed consumers are in China. Chinese New Year, which typically falls between mid-January and mid-February, boosts demand for cash by over 20%")

Note: cash-up (adj):
(a) "(Australian, informal) having plenty of money"
www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/cashed-up
(b) "Australian informal[:] having a lot of money; wealthy <cashed-up individuals from the corporate world>"
http://www.oxforddictionaries.co ... n_english/cashed-up

choi

(2) Agony aunts through the ages | Whatever Should I Do?  To understand how societies evolve,read the problem pages
http://www.economist.com/news/ch ... hatever-should-i-do

Note:
(a) There is NO need to read the rest. The historical introduction is the interesting part.

(b) advice column
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advice_column
("an advice columnist (colloquially known in British English as an agony aunt, or agony uncle if the columnist is male)")

(c) "FOR more than 1,000 years the Oracle at Delphi offered advice to all who asked for it. More than 500 snippets of oracular wisdom have survived."
(i)
(A) oracle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oracle
(section 1 Description)

* The word "oracle" can also mean the words spoken by a priestess.

oracle (n):
"1a: a person (as a priestess of ancient Greece) through whom a deity is believed to speak
* * *
c :  an answer or decision given by an oracle"
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/oracle
(B) Pythia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythia
(name of any priestess throughout the history [ie, at all times, not just a particular year] of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi; The name "Pythia" derived from Pytho, which in myth was the original name of Delphi. The Greeks derived this place name from the verb, pythein (πύθειν, "to rot"), which refers to the decomposition of the body of the monstrous Python after he was slain by Apollo)
(C) Delphi
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delphi
(section 2 Dedication to Apollo)
(ii) list of oracular statements from Delphi
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li ... tements_from_Delphi

(d) "unlike modern agony aunts, she [Delphic Oracle] spoke in riddles. When the Persians were invading Greece, she told the Athenians to put their trust in 'a wooden wall.' Themistocles, the Athenian leader, realised that this meant 'build lots of ships.' He acted on the advice, and his navy routed the Persians at Salamis in 480BC."
(i) Themistocles
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Themistocles
(c 524–459 BC; During the first Persian invasion of Greece, he fought at the Battle of Marathon [Aug 12 or Sept 12, 490 BC]; In "the second Persian invasion * * * Due to subterfuge on the part of Themistocles, the Allies lured the Persian fleet into the Straits of Salamis, and the decisive Greek victory there was the turning point in the invasion")

(ii) For the location of Marathon and Island of Salamis, see a map (whose heading is: "Major events in the second invasion of Greece") in

Greco-Persian Wars
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Persian_Wars
(iii) But where is. or are, "Straits of Salamis"?  I googled and found nothing.

Battle of Salamis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Salamis
(September, 480 BC; The battle was fought in the straits between the mainland and Salamis)

But the Salamis island is surrounded by the mainland in half a circle -- around the northern half of the island.

There is  map at section 6        The battle, demonstrating the strait at the issue is on the right of Island of Salamis (the BIG part on the left edge of the map).  

(e) "But her refusal to give a straight answer could lead to disaster. In the sixth century BC King Croesus of Lydia was told that if he made war on the Persians he would “destroy a mighty empire”. That empire turned out to be his own."

Croesus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croesus