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An audience with Aung San Suu Kyi

The truth of her house arrest and hopes for Burma's future

 

Ed: Aung San Suu Kyi gave this account shortly after being freed from detention on November 13th 2010. The Anthill publishes it on the one-year anniversary of that release, as unparalleled reforms in Burma allow her to run in elections.

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Stories from Mumbai's red light district

Sex workers in Asia's largest prostitution district speak out

 

In south Mumbai’s red light districts there are an estimated 100,000 brothel-based sex workers. Most of them are not there voluntarily. A high proportion of the women and girls have been sold into sex work, often by a relative or a trusted family friend; others are born into it.

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Blogging Burma

Thoughts of a Burmese blogger before the 2010 elections

 

Burmese language blogs started to boom in 2007. During the September uprising [Saffron revolution] a lot of foreign journalists met us and took an interest in us, which raised our profile. After the uprising, the government started cracking down on blogs and banned blog sites. It was funny, because since the crackdown there are even more bloggers.

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A conversation with Ian McEwan

Miscellania from a novelist's mind

 

In the spring, your humble correspondent talked with novelist Ian McEwan for the online feature FiveBooks (where I work). Read the full interview here. It was a wideranging conversation across the sofa in McEwan’s London house. In fact, it was so eclectic – two hours of it – that there was some interesting runoff that didn’t make the cut. Here it is for readers of the Anthill.

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The Broken Comb

A new short story from Shanghai

THIS STORY ORIGINALLY APPEARED IN H.A.L. PUBLISHING

 

I live alone, apart from the cockroaches. My room is on the ground floor, down a lane. The house is as old as the People’s Republic. Damp is climbing up the walls, and the paint is peeling. I lock up my bicycle outside. At night, someone tucks it in under a blue tarpaulin. I have never seen who does this.

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