The Long Sneeze

• I smelled a flower and I didn't stop sneezing

For many people the subject of sneezing is a joke, but for Amanda Writs, a sixteen-year-old schoolgirl from Argentina, it was something quite different.

Her sneeze began one Saturday and continued day and night for one week. After the second day, Amanda was desperate and her mother took her to hospital and the doctor to cure her attack.

Amanda, who is now back at school, described what happened to her. "I began to sneeze after walking in the park with my boyfriend. He gave me a beautiful flower and I smelled this flower. Its scent was interesting and exotic but I started to sneeze and I didn't stop. I drank a glass of water, which my boyfriend gave me, but that didn't do any good. Late in the morning, the sneeze continued. My mother gave me a pill but that didn't do any good. I was desperate! The sneezes didn't go!"

At night, she and her mother went to the hospital. The doctor took an X-ray of her chest but he couldn't find anything wrong.

"The doctor gave me some tablets and they slowed down, but it was another day before the tablets worked completely and my sneeze stopped."

Amanda was very lucky. The world record holder is the unfortunate American teacher Louise Mendis, who sneezed constantly for two months.

YASMÍN