Can a book save one’s life? I used to think so when stationed in Mogadishu, avoiding thoughts of murder or suicide in that sunburnt madness only by immersing myself in Gerald Hanley’s Warriors (1971). Day after day I would throw myself on to my bed after another utterly fruitless, pointless day in the president’s office, and lie down, sweating beneath squadrons of flies and mosquitoes, and try to forget about it all.
Read MoreMemories of an Indulgent Burma
I am probably one of the few persons to have been tipped by a taxi driver, instead of the normal reverse transaction being the case. It was a small matter, yet provided an unforgettable moment of illumination of a cultural and spiritual divide between the East, as represented by Burma, and the West.
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