1 Katharine Whitehorn: British journalist, who wrote a column at the Observer for nearly forty years (1960–96).
1 President Houphouet: See note 2, p. 221.
2 ‘Mon Oncle’: Jacques Tati’s 1958 film poked fun at the questionable French modern architecture of its time.
3 four capitals: As well as Abidjan (Ivory Coast), Ouagadougou (Upper Volta) and Niamey (Niger), for his first two years in West Africa Shaw also had to represent HMG in Abomey, the capital of Dahomey. In 1965 Dahomey broke off relations with the UK, making Shaw’s job slightly easier. Dahomey is today known as Benin, and Upper Volta as Burkina Faso.
1 Deva-Raja: King of the Gods. This deity supposedly protected the Khmer Empire, which ruled South-East Asia in the Middle Ages from its capital, the temple city of Angkor.
1 Dean: All of the foreign diplomats gathered in a particular country together make up the Diplomatic Corps. So as to avoid unseemly arguments about who is the most important, ambassadors place great stock in precedence. The post of Dean therefore falls usually to the longest-serving ambassador in that capital, from whichever country – except in some Catholic countries, where the position goes to the Papal Nuncio, representing the Vatican. The Dean speaks for the Corps on formal occasions.
2 cyclo-pousse: Bicycle-powered rickshaw.