Category: Eyewitness

by Bobbie Bergesen It is the 1970’s and you are stationed in the newly independent nation of Bangladesh. Take a scenic trip with the author and her husband on a paddle wheel ship through the delta region called the Mouths … Read more

by Alfonso Arenales The author was a career U. S. diplomat from 1957 to 1988. In addition to senior assignments in Washington, DC, and on the U. S. delegation to the UN in New York, he held positions abroad in … Read more

by Karl Sommerlatte

by J.R. Bullington

by Bobbie Bergesen

by J.R. Bullington

by Bobbie Bergesen

by J. R. Bullington Storks and rains The annual rains, along with the migratory storks that always accompany them, arrived early this year,promising relief from food shortages and threatened famine. Substantial expanses of greenery now mark the orange-brown landscape; dry … Read more

by J.R. Bullington

by Rick Sherman The author, now retired in Washington, D.C., served as a career U. S. diplomat from 1966 to 1993. Among his six posts abroad, he was consul general at Auckland, New Zealand. See a previous contribution of his … Read more

A BRAZILIAN DIPLOMAT in Lisbon first mentioned Tróia to my husband and me soon after our arrival in the late 1960s. His enthusiastic description of the place sent us there on the next springlike Sunday. My husband, Alf, had been … Read more

Lauren Wilcox, a Brown University graduate, now studies creative writing in a Masters program at the University of Florida in Gainesville. In June 2000, she made her second visit to Cuba with a group sponsored by the Church of Reconciliation … Read more

When Jim Bullington, a former U.S. ambassador and regular contributor to these pages, decided he’d had enough of retirement, he applied for a Peace Corps position and soon found himself in West Africa. He promised to keep our readers posted … Read more

by Michael Cotter

As the author, a retired U. S. Foreign Service officer, observes, “For most of us, making history is not in the cards. But,for any of us a close brush with history can happen any time — perhaps without our knowing!” … Read more

The author lived in Havana as a Foreign Service spouse in the 1990s. Here she presents — in fictional form — an impression of Cuban life at that time. ~ Ed.   THE SEA STRETCHES OUT, LUMINOUS AND BLUE, to … Read more

The author served in the American embassy in Ottawa and as Canadian desk officer in the Department of State, 1947-1951. Ambassador Dale retired after thirty years in the Foreign Service in 1975.– Ed.   AT AN INFORMAL RECEPTION given by … Read more

  We agreed to finish out our tour in Ankara, Turkey, by filling an unexpected staffing gap at the Consulate in Istanbul. In exchange for camping out for five months with only 400 lbs of air freight trucked to us … Read more

by Edward L. Peck   Ambassador Peck, a thirty-two-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service, now retired in the Washington, DC, area, recounts one of his less run-of-the-mill experiences as the principal officer of a small U.S. consulate.      ~ Ed. , … Read more

by Carl Fritz Our vision of China today is that of an emerging gigantic economic and military power, one with a huge trade surplus with the United States and a reputation sullied by violations of human rights, spying to obtain … Read more