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Rushdie ain't pleased with the motorcade
February 1, 2009 6:33 pm No Comments
A great cloud of dust, a whoosh of excitable policemen, and a motorcade comes to a gravel-scattering halt outside my hotel here in Cartagena, in Colombia. The most awaited guest is arrived. Salman Rushdie ain’t pleased. The one condition on which he had come here was: no security, no motorcades. He was fuming as he [...]
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In Cartagena the talk is of Farc and fatwas
January 30, 2009 10:28 am No Comments
It’s hot, humid and yet a sea breeze blows down the narrow streets to flutter the table cloths of the pavement cafes. Cartagena is on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Yellow, pink, white, blue houses compete for a ringside seat in this packed town. It’s a natural enough place to have a book festival. There [...]

