Faber & Faber

If my friends in Geneva are reading this, please come to the Palais des Nations on 9 November, to Room XXIII in Batiment E for a celebration of the Year of the People of African Descent. I will be on a literary panel with writers from Brazil, Haiti, Panama and the United States. Details are on this flyer. There will be an exhibition. And music. It will be a party! I hope to see you there!

The seven billionth baby has been born, welcome to the world little one, whoever you are. That baby is not Danica May Camacho, the little cutie from The Phillippines who is one of several symbolic seventh billion babies. Danica is not the actual seventh billion baby to be born - she merely represents the idea that we are now 7 billion.Perhaps someone should have explained the largely symbolic nature of this to the fifth billion child and the sixth billion ...

I am back in Arusha. Yesterday morning in Harare, as I left my apartment, I heard Toto’s Africa, one of my favourite songs ever. This was the second time in twelve hours: I had heard it the night before, on Friday, in The Lounge, my neighbourhood bar in Newlands. It sounds very, very good on a double gin and tonic. Three hours ago, I looked out of my window on the flight from Nairobi to Kilimanjaro Airport and there, imperial, ...

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From the wonderful Nick Hayes at the Guardian.

When I was at Cambridge, some of my fellow students, and some dons, used to say this thing that first amused me, but became increasingly irritating. I would be at a party, talking nineteen to dozen in my usual way, and then I would find someone staring at me with a look of wonder. The inevitable remark would then come. “You speak such good English.” And this at Cambridge, one of the most competitive universities in the world. To be ...

Michele Bachmann, it is true, is nuttier than squirrel poo and fruitier than an orchard full of apricots, pears, plums and quinces. (That is a little shout out to my trade law friends, whom I miss madly, together with trade disputes about apricots, pears, plums and quinces. I weep when I read the Japan - Varietals case, I simply weep.) Back to the topic - Mrs Bachmann appears to be more than a little estranged from that thing you and ...

The man in brown in the middle there is a policeman. The man in the suit is the President. The young man in blue is a Zimbabwean commercial pilot who was recently in a reality TV show. His name is Wendall Parsons. And yes, he is white. There are lots of white people still in Zimbabwe. They sometimes, if they are lucky like Wendall, get to shake the President's hand and receive money from him. In the white envelope is ...

And now, a musical interlude from Peter, Paul and Mary with Early In The Morning, a song so hauntingly beautiful that it is almost unbearable.

There is a slew of exciting events coming up in Harare this month. My good buddy Upenyu Makoni-Muchemwa has realised her dream of bringing a TEDx event to Harare - Upenyu is also the woman behind the community and activist website kubatana.net, so she thrives on ideas. Good luck Upenyu, and I wish I could be there.Another good buddy, Priscilla Chigariro a model business woman who is also a model (see what I did there?) is the woman behind Fashion ...