Stories

• Statue wars: What should we do with troublesome monuments?

  The Guardian

  From Cape Town to Charlottesville, public monuments have become flashpoints in the struggle between left and right in a post-truth world. Should any statue be safe? A deep dive into the history of the present moment.

  (6,000 words)

  

• ‘We stand to lose a whole era’: How the 1970s could vanish from Vancouver

  The Guardian

  The Empire Landmark Hotel is the latest brutalist icon set to be demolished in a frenzy of property speculation. Is it wrong to destroy an entire decade?

  (1,645 words)

  

• Monrovia in the Spotlight: Can this fragile city ever really replace ‘Ma Ellen’?

  The Guardian

  Since the civil war, Liberians have known only one leader: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who helped transform the ruined capital. Now some observers worry that this month’s election could undo Monrovia’s progress.

  (1,300 words)

  

• ‘I’m moving to Canada’: the cops, pop stars and athletes who made good on the threat

  The Guardian

  From the female squash champion fleeing the Taliban, to the gay popstar who became a hit back in macho Brazil, it’s often Canada’s newcomers who can tell its most dramatic stories.

  (800 words)

  

• Race and real estate: how hot Chinese money is making Vancouver unliveable

  The Guardian

  After Canada’s ugly episode of racism in the early 20th century, Vancouverites feel uneasy talking about how this beautiful but unassuming city became one of the world’s least affordable: an unprecedented flood of capital from China.

  (2,240 words)

  

• The story of cities: Vancouver dumps its freeway plan for a more beautiful future

  The Guardian

  In the 1960s, Vancouver’s historic downtown was at risk of being razed for modern road projects – only for an extraordinary protest movement to turn the tide, helping transform it into one of North America’s most ‘liveable’ cities.

  (1,850 words)

  

• Reading cities: books about Vancouver

  The Guardian

  As a relatively young global city, Vancouver can play up to its brash, breezy image. But some of its most celebrated books are rooted in harder times, as it struggled to find its place in the world, and to deal with racial tensions.

  (1,300 words)

  

• My big fat Myanmar wedding

  Newsweek

  In rebel-occupied Myanmar, desperate times call for mass weddings.

  (1,337 words)

  

• A dead boy

  Hazlitt

  The choice he had: between a life of boredom in a displaced persons camp or joining the armed struggle. A dispatch from among the Kachin Independence Army of northern Myanmar.

  (1,242 words)

  

• Kicking the habit in Myanmar

  VICE

  Myanmar is the second largest opium producer in the world. In some parts of the country, addiction rates among young men are thought to approach 50 percent. It’s hard to get clean when a hit of high-grade heroin costs only £1.

  (2,090 words)

  

• The war goes on

  World Policy Journal

  The Kachin Independence Army, defending a religious minority of devout Christians in Buddhist Myanmar (Burma), has bulked up its military forces in the face of increased violence against civilians, torture, and pillaging of properties by Myanmar government troops. University students, women, and children have joined the resistance. (Full portfolio here.)

  (1,637 words)

  

• What life is like for Liberians dealing with the ebola outbreak

  VICE

  “It’s like it was during wartime. I remember people were fearful to go out; they just stayed home. It is the same today. Except, with Ebola, you can’t see the enemy.”

  (1,400 words)

  

• Goodbye, babylon king

  Virginia Quarterly Review

  The civil war in Liberia was one of Africa’s longest and bloodiest, destroying hundreds of thousands of lives. With the ouster of warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor, can Liberians overcome his legacy of brutality? A dispatch from Monrovia on the eve of an historic presidential election.

  (8,740 words)

  

• In Somalia’s shadow

  Virginia Quarterly Review

  How a determined group of refugees, rebels, and diasporans are building a democracy in the shadow of the world’s longest-running failed state. A dispatch from Somaliland, Africa’s best-kept secret.

  (11,450 words)

  

• Separation anxiety

  The Walrus

  Caring for civil war survivors in Somalia’s only mental hospital.

  (1,151 words)

  

• Nomads, no rights

  In the Field (CBC Radio)

  Radio documentary on how climate change and cheap guns are making life difficult for Kenya’s nomadic Turkana people.

  (11:44)

• Somaliland stands alone

  Dispatches (CBC Radio)

  Radio documentary on Africa’s secret democracy and its struggle for international recognition.

  (11:57)

• Drifting through God’s country

  Toronto Star

  On the water with Botswana’s River Bushmen.

  (1,200 words)

  

• Where the city goes to worship

  The Globe and Mail

  Visiting Istanbul’s lesser known mosques.

  (900 words)

  

• The road to Jijiga

  Descant

  Crossing Ethiopia’s Ogaden Desert.

  (3,000 words)

  

• The two Amazons

  The Globe and Mail

  The Bolivian rainforest by day and by night.

  (1,500 words)