A Funny Thing Happened…
I knew it would not be an easy trip. The Amazon I set out to visit was very different from what it is today. Then no highways pierced its close. Then no mobs attacked it with flame throwers and diesel power. Nature,…
The Difference Between New York and Washington?
(Editor’s note: Sidney Freifeld’s new book about some of the amusing sidelights of the Department over the years, Undiplomatic Notes: Tales from the Canadian Foreign Service, was published by Hounslow Press in October. See our review on page 40.)
This Shouldn’t Happen to A…
(Editor’s note: Sidney Freifeld’s new book about some of the amusing sidelights of the Department over the years, Undiplomatic Notes: Tales from the Canadian Foreign Service, is being published by Hounslow Press in October.)
Tales from Chile: Dip Bags, Hot Stuff and Jesus Poblete
Three years in Chile during the most volatile era of the “protestas” of the mid-1980s produced a wealth of memorable experiences … of demonstrations, strikes, funerals and a major earthquake, larger, but thankfully less lethal than the ones which were to hit…
A Failure of Soviet Intelligence?
Although newspapers at the time did not report it, and no mention of it is to be found in External Affairs’ files, the USSR’s vaunted intelligence apparatus seemed, curiously, to have failed for a few days back in 1971. This is what…
Beetles
With its iridescent carapace glinting in the African sunshine, the ungainly beetle lumbered unhesitatingly over the edge of the concrete staircase. The fall tumbled it onto its back and stunned it into temporary immobility. Slowly it began waving its legs, clawing at…
Zdenek Cipra
by Islay Mawhinney
“For Want of a (Wing) Collar…”
by Sidney Freifeld
À la Plaine des Jarres (Là-haut chez les Lao)
Il m’arrive souvent de regretter de ne pas avoir tenu de journal au fil des années que j’ai passées en poste à l’étranger ou durant mes nombreux voyages officiels. Sans doute, me disais-je alors, que ce qui m’arrivait était plutôt banal et…
Off-Track in the Kenyan Highlands
One of the last things I had to do, before I ended my tour of duty in Kenya, was pay a final site visit to the Mobile Pastoral Training Unit (MPTU), a CIDA-sponsored development project located in central Kenya. The drive north…
