A timely puzzle from Sayang ushering in the Year of the Horse, its Chinese New Year over this weekend. I thought the grid was quite straightforward and that the setter had decided to serve up a more accessible puzzle for most people. Some standard / oft-seen clues which should be retired (e.g. 19d) in my humble opinion. Quick, pleasurable solve this. Gong Xi Fa Cai ! (12,16ac) to all our Chinese friends. Apologies if the blog below doesn’t look right on the first pass – I had a technical glitch on PD’s awesome tool so switched to using Nick’s WP editor, my virgin attempt (EDIT – That didn’t go too well either so I am just making do by directly working on WP)
ACROSS
1,4 Silver pan and gifts exchanged during New Year in China (6,8)
SPRING FESTIVAL
Anagram of SILVER PAN and GIFTS – An alternative name for the Chinese New Year
9 Law of suffix – not on many industrial code summaries initially (6)
NOMICS
Initial characters of Not On Many Industrial Code Summaries
10 Valley with drug for making mountains out of molehills perhaps (8)
SILICONE
SILICON (Valley) with E (drug) – I am parsing this as an allusion to anatomical augmentation of the mammaries (my somewhat futile attempt in trying to dignify the clue).
11 Part of game accepted by Finn in Germany
INNING
Hidden in by fINN IN Germany
12,16 Greeting the horse (4,2,2,3)
GONG XI FA CAI
Mandarin for Happy New Year – 2014 is the Year of the Horse in the Chinese calendar
13 Therein lies a lady (3)
HER
Hidden in tHERein
14 Full hundred for right draw (6)
ENTICE
ENTIrE (Full) with C (hundred) replacing R (right)
17 Patella can keep twitching (7)
KNEECAP
Anagram of CAN KEEP – I thought the surface was nice and indeed, the patellar region is a very common site of injuries amongst runners.
21 Mid-Pacific representation for an element (6)
IODINE
I (Middle letter of Pacific) is the symbol for Iodine. Can’t say I liked this clue much.
25 It’s a cop holding bag (3)
SAC
Hidden in It’ S A Cop
26 The core of ICI’s business (8)
CHEMICAL
ICI stands for Imperial Chemical Industries – The core of ICI is the letter C for Chemical. I would have wished for a more difficult clue for this.
27 Holmes’s deerstalker, for instance, is out-of-date
OLD-HAT
Cryptic definition, referring to Sherlock Holmes’ headgear, which was popularised by the images that Sidney Paget drew for the Strand in the late 1890’s. I remembered trivia that in the actual novels and short stories, he doesn’t wear this much.
28 Money given to sailor for cross-Channel express (8)
EUROSTAR
EUROS (Money) TAR (sailor)
29 Female embraced by goddess is also a goddess (6)
ATHENE
HEN (Female) embraced by ATE (Greek goddess of Mischief) giving us the Greek goddess of Wisdom.
30,31 Official fruit for 1 (8,6)
MANDARIN ORANGE
Direct clue – Mandarin Oranges are given as gifts during Chinese New Year celebrations. The printed version missed out mentioning 30 in the clue
DOWN
1 Sentry posted in elevated railroad (8)
SENTINEL
SENT (posted) IN EL (short for elevated railroad)
2 Ponder over strange nameless native (8)
RUMINATE
RUM (strange) INnATE (native without ’n’ – nameless)
3 Cut tin up to make third ornamental article (4-4)
NICK-NACK
NICK (cut) NAC (tin up = can reversed) K (make third i.e. 3rd letter of make)
5 Steroid almost destroyed our chief (6)
EDITOR
anagram of sTEROID (steroid almost)
6 Lean man emptied what-d’you-call-it (6)
THINGY
THIN (Lean) GS (man emptied – GuS, name of a man, emptied) – Generic name for pretty much anything. Not too happy with the parsing though, so any improvement is much appreciated. THIN (Lean) GY (man = GuY emptied)
7 Twelfth Night lady without a popular musical instrument(6)
VIOLIN
VIOLa (Main character of the novel Twelfth Night by the Bard, without a) IN (popular)
8 Wonder arising in open country for elbow-room (6)
LEEWAY
EWA (Wonder arising – awe reversed) in LEY (open country)
12 Grant first half of 8 each a senior officer (7)
GENERAL
Grant in the clue refers to General Grant (Ulysses S.Grant, former President of the USA). The first half of 8d is LEE, which refers to General Lee. <Edited – Thanks Muffyword>
15 Discontinue dying department (3)
END
Triple definition <Edited – Thanks Muffyword>
18 Perhaps Gallup’s rest disrupted by parrot (8)
STER (rest disrupted) after POLL (reference to Poll Parrot in the Nursery Rhyme)
19 The genie conjured up a majority number (8)
EIGHTEEN
Anagram of THE GENIE – age of becoming a major in many countries.
20 He has taste, mingling with European person of culture (8)
AESTHETE
Anagram of TASTE around HE and E (European)
22 Character about to get into financial swindle (6)
SCREAM
RE (about to) in SCAM (financial swindle)
23 Nerve cell nurtured by entrepreneur once (6)
NEURON
Hidden in entrepreNEUR ONce
24 Rest seat is vandalised (6)
SIESTA
Anagram of SEAT IS
25 Expedition a long way off in South Island (6)
SAFARI
A FAR (a long way off) in SI (South Island)
Thanks Turbolegs and Sayang,
I couldn’t do 12, 16 due to my ignorance of what must be a fairly well-known expression.
I wondered whether the plethora of hidden answers was a theme of some sort, but probably not!
GENERAL is a reference to both Grant and Lee, who are each Generals.
I think 6dn is THINGY
I am not sure I understand END, and even wondered if it could be ENT. However, I think it’s probably a triple definition – end = stop or discontinue, end = dying (as noun) and end = department as in the north end/department of the region or as in that’s his department/end to look after.
Many thanks Turbolegs & Sayang – which I now see is the Malay word for love.
Very appropriate because I did love the puzzle.
However, I missed out on 12a 16d: GONG XI FA CAI
I shall now try to remember that for next year.
Oh yes: I do agree with Muffyword @1.
6d should be THINGY = THIN G(u)Y
And I now find that SAYANG was also known as UNCLE YAP who used to blog the Guardian puzzles on Tuesday.
Great to see you again Uncle Yap!
Muffyword is right on all scores. I rather like the slang word, THINGY and managed to get it into this celebration puzzle. END is an alliterative triple definition (I saw a quadruple a couple of days back)
Gong Xi Fa Cai is a traditional greeting that wishes you prosperity, reflecting the materialistic part of the Chinese.
Happy Lunar New Year.
Turbolegs – my apologies for the technical glitch on the blog writing utility.
The FT has a typo in today’s crossword. This FT puzzle has AROSS clues instead of ACROSS clues.
Hence the utility could not find any clues for you to use. I will make the next version (coming soon) a bit smarter.
Too many chestnuts in this one for me – possibly a crossword for the beginner rather than an old hand.
Hi Muffyword – The only reason I know Gong Xi Fa Cai is because I live in Singapore, and right now, you can’t miss it even if you tried to. I wouldnt have ever expected it to appear in an FT crossword but the fact that it did is a pleasant surprise.
Also, thanks for the help with THINGY – I for some reason didn’t think “slangy” enough.
Thanks Sayang for the grid !!
Hi PeeDee – No apologies required; The blogging tool you have created is really great as it is – can’t wait to see what updates you are making to it.
Didn’t help myself by putting in SAL for 13ac…
I enjoyed this but am among those who missed 12/16.
Did no one else have a problem with 2d? Wouldn’t “nameless native” be I[nn]ATE? “INATE” is not “nameless”; it merely has had one “name” removed.
Also, I thought “Sentry” was a bit too close to SENTINAL, especially with many other synonyms at hand (guard, guardian, watchman, etc.).