Shooting the breeze
THROUGHOUT THE history of mankind, stories have been told giving birth to legends, and sometimes even hardening into commonly accepted historical fact. Some are remembered, others forgotten; but the action
Portuguese smoke a packet of cigarettes a day
THE MAJORITY of smokers light up their first cigarette within five minutes of waking up and, during the day, they will smoke between 11 and 20 cigarettes, according to a
Abba Mania
WHEN ABBA decided to split in the early 80s, millions of fans worldwide were devastated to see the end of one of the most successful bands in chart history. As
Alentejo Blue by Monica Ali
COMING OUT in early June, this fascinating novel by the author of Brick Lane, is set here in Mamarrosa, in the Alentejo region of Portugal, (where Ali bought a house
Iranian president writes a letter to Bush
IRANIAN PRESIDENT Ahmadinejad has written a letter to President Bush, the first high-level communication between Iran and America for almost three decades. The 18-page document has not yet been made
ARMENIA
Crash data still missing RUSSIA SAYS it needs foreign help to retrieve the flight recorders from the Armenian Airbus A320 plane that crashed into the Black Sea earlier last week.
Corgis, choirs and politics
IT HAS been a memorable Easter week from Palm Sunday through Easter Day and, to judge by the size of its congregations, the Barlavento branch of St. Vincents Anglican Church
Labour suffers local poll losses
BRITAIN’S LABOUR government took an expected drubbing at last week’s (May 4) local elections, following a series of scandals involving senior ministers. Although quite a catastrophic defeat, Prime Minister Tony
Renault Five’s rule the world
Saturday April 8 GOING AWAY for a while certainly awakens a new awareness within one. I have never agreed with the expression that familiarity breeds contempt, I do, however, feel
Good neighbours and lethal parties
WHEN WE bought a small farm in 1986, the near neighbours were Portuguese with a few British expatriates living on the periphery, an arrangement which suited us very well. Our