Tag: Peace Hotel
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The Peace Hotel and the Changing Face of Mogadishu
‘You will see some changes,’ Bashir said. Bashir owns the Peace Hotel in Mogadishu. He was welcoming me there for… it must have been for the fifth or sixth time. He joined me for a coffee in the hotel’s leafy garden café. I like Bashir. I like his energy and his optimism. I appreciate his […]
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Peace and War in Mogadishu
Bashir calls his hotel in Mogadishu ‘Peace’. He might as well have called it ‘War’. Almost everything about it is designed to counteract the violence that too often goes on outside its blast-proof walls. It was my first visit to the hotel since some of its outbuildings and houses along the road were destroyed in […]
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Dawn Chorus and Sundowners in Mogadishu
I woke to gunfire. Well, I thought it was gunfire – the staccato sound of AK47s. Maybe it was the early risers opening the rickety metal gates in the compound. And then there were the dull thuds – the heavier sounds of mortar shells. Maybe someone was heaving his heavy case down the concrete stairs […]
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Mogadishu’s Oasis of Peace
‘Don’t worry, we’re not under attack, it’s just an assassination’. As a senior government official’s car exploded a few blocks away from where we were having our meeting, our Somali colleagues carried on talking business and sipped their tea with a composure that can only come from living in a city like Mogadishu. That said, […]
Going Places Africa 