Showing 1 - 5 of 5
For Belarusian troupe, show must go on despite dangers
Spectrum, Ezra Kyrill Erker, Published on 19/08/2012
» Thespians of the Belarus Free Theatre have been beaten, arrested and harassed by authorities. And husband-and-wife co-directors Nicolai Khalezin and Natalia Kaliada, as they explained to Spectrum last week while on a visit to Bangkok, are now forced to live in exile, facing prison sentences if they return home. Within Belarus _ their large landlocked country of just under 10 million people, bordered by Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Latvia and Lithuania _ the actors continue to perform in secret and at great risk to themselves and their audiences.
Dragons & butterflies, an inmate finds inner peace
Spectrum, Ezra Kyrill Erker, Published on 13/05/2012
» South African Alexander Krebs, known to friends and family as "Shani", arrived in Bangkok in April 1994 on a 10 day holiday. He was 34 at the time and writing a novel, but was also a 15-year-long drug addict who had a sporadic wild streak in him and had just broken up with his fiancee. His family thought the time away would do him good.
A mercenary's tale
Spectrum, Ezra Kyrill Erker, Published on 06/05/2012
» Peter Slade was once in prison for five years on charges of murder, conspiracy to commit another murder and attempting to overthrow a foreign government _ partly a victim, he says, of a corrupt Australian judicial system. He fought in the Vietnam War, was a security contractor in 1973 Rhodesia, a debt collector at home in Melbourne and as far afield as Nigeria, and arrived in reconstruction-era Cambodia and Iraq without connections but a desire to start anew, in stints that would last some seven years each. He witnessed first-hand the Bangkok coup that killed journalists Neil Davis and Bill Latch in 1985 and was on the beach in Patong the morning the tsunami struck Phuket in 2004.
Voices of the silent
Spectrum, Ezra Kyrill Erker, Published on 11/03/2012
» Last Thursday was International Women's Day, an occasion that for a century has served for people to demand greater civil rights, representation and equality; to honour wives, mothers and girlfriends and the accomplishments of women; to call for an end to global hunger and poverty; and, increasingly, to highlight the plight of refugees and the displaced.
All packed up and many places to go
B Magazine, Ezra Kyrill Erker, Published on 15/01/2012
» Twenty or even 10 years ago, Western budget travellers would descend on the country, spending tens of thousands of baht on flights and then, to the bemusement of Thais, proceed to travel in third-class train carriages or buses to rudimentary guest houses on the beach or upcountry that cost 40 baht a night, where they showered out of buckets and shared dormitories with strangers.