I was in a cafe in Miraflores having a quiet coffee and reading Vargas Llosa's book "Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter" when I realised the guy sitting beside me was reading "A Tale of Two Cities" in Spanish, obviously. So we got talking about how good both writers are. He was impressed when I quoted the first sentence of his book to him, but I didn't bother with the bit about it being a far better thing that I do, as he hadn't reach that bit yet so didn't want to spoil his fun. Turns out he is a lawyer, taking a break I assume from the rigours of the law in Lima. He didn't know anything about Neil Morrison unfortunately, but his brother is a colonel in the Peruvian Army. Very strange I thought to myself.
The main news hereabouts right now is the pardon request from ex-president Fujimori who is serving 25 years for human rights abuses and theft from the state of about $15 million. Not a good man, but popular because a lot of folk think he got rid of Shining Path, but really he is a nasty wee fascist. He has a pal called Vlad Montesinos who is also in jail because of various crimes he committed as Fujimori's right hand man. Of course they all say they are innocent. It is said that Vlad has people on the outside doing his business for him and that they have ears everywhere, so won't say anything about him. But it's all there for anyone to read about. Amazingly 60+ percent of Peruvians are in favour of granting a pardon. I don't envy President Humala his decision.
There was a bit of a riot two days ago in a place called La Parada. Big fight with the police, seems like an operation badly planned which went out of control, leaving two people dead and many injured. I worked there for two days last year and wrote about it in my blog. I don't think I will be going back in a hurry.
"I've always imagined him to be hung like a budgie." Rupert Everett on Piers Morgan.
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