Gstaad
Having spent a great part of my life charting the decline of civilisation, I am not at all surprised at the goings-on in Tunisia, especially as I never considered the place to be civilised. How apt that the arch crook dictator Ben Ali (Baba) slithered away to Saudi Arabia, itself a beacon of democracy and human rights — especially for women — instead of embarrassing my little community of Saanen and landing here in good old Helvetia. Mind you, Saanen airport can only take very small jets, something a crook like Ben Ali Baba would never deign to escape in.
But it’s nice that crooks and dictators help each other. Imagine if Robert Mugabe had not taken in that arch Ethiopian murderer Mengistu. He’d probably be living in a place like Athens or even Rome. When King Farouk fled Egypt in 1952, he left in style, on board the royal yacht, and headed straight for Capri.
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