UNITED STATES
Author Robbins dies at 92
Author Tom Robbins, whose novels read like a hit of literary LSD, filled with fantastical characters, manic metaphors and counterculture whimsy, died on Sunday. He was 92. Robbins’ death was announced by his wife, Alexa Robbins, on Facebook. The post did not cite a cause. “He was surrounded by his family and loyal pets. Throughout these difficult last chapters, he was brave, funny and sweet,” Alexa Robbins wrote. “He asked that people remember him by reading his books.” Tom Robbins indulged the hippie sensibilities of young people starting in the early 1970s with books that had an overarching philosophy of what he called “serious playfulness,” and a mandate that it should be pursued in the most outlandish ways possible. As he wrote in Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas: “Minds were made for blowing.” Robbins’ works included Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, Another Roadside Attraction and Still Life With Woodpecker. Robbins’ characters were over the top, off the wall and around the bend. Among them were Sissy Hankshaw, the hitchhiker with the 9 inch thumbs in Even Cowgirls Get the Blues and Switters, the pacifist CIA operative in love with a nun in Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates. “What I try to do, among other things, is to mix fantasy and spirituality, sexuality, humor and poetry in combinations that have never quite been seen before in literature,” Robbins said in an interview with January magazine in 2000. “And I guess when a reader finishes one of my books ... I would like for him or her to be in the state that they would be in after a Fellini film or a Grateful Dead concert.”
AUSTRALIA
Sewage cancels Adams gig
Overflowing sewage caused by a “large blockage” of fat, grease and rags has organizers to cancel a Bryan Adams concert in Australia, citing a threat to the arena’s toilets. The Canadian singer-songwriter’s Sunday night event fell victim to the sewers of Perth “due to the risk of sewage backing up within the venue’s toilets,” the state water corporation said. “Our crews are working to clear the large blockage of fat, grease and rags, which has caused several wastewater overflows at properties.” In an update yesterday, the water authority said the blockage “could not be easily dislodged,” with venue management taking the “incredibly tough decision to cancel the Bryan Adams concert.” “Contingencies, including the use of sucker trucks, were considered, but the volume of wastewater generated by a capacity crowd of 16,000 people at the arena was considered too great,” it said.
INDIA
Cops end Sheeran street gig
A street performance by Ed Sheeran in Bengaluru was stopped abruptly by police on Sunday, outraging fans and prompting the British singer to issue a clarification. Sheeran, dressed in a white T-shirt and shorts, was seen singing and playing his guitar on a sidewalk in the center of Bengaluru ahead of a concert on Sunday night. Local channels showed a police officer walking up to Sheeran as he was singing the hit single Shape of You and unplugging the microphone, as onlookers jeered. Sheeran left soon afterward. “I refused to give permission because Church Street gets very crowded. That is the reason he was asked to vacate the place,” Bengaluru police official Shekar Tekkannanavar was quoted as saying by news agency ANI. Sheeran, who began his career as a busker in the UK, said later on social media that he did have permission to perform. “It wasn’t just us randomly turning up. All good though,” he wrote.
Shamans in Peru on Monday gathered for an annual New Year’s ritual where they made predictions for the year to come, including illness for US President Donald Trump and the downfall of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. “The United States should prepare itself because Donald Trump will fall seriously ill,” Juan de Dios Garcia proclaimed as he gathered with other shamans on a beach in southern Lima, dressed in traditional Andean ponchos and headdresses, and sprinkling flowers on the sand. The shamans carried large posters of world leaders, over which they crossed swords and burned incense, some of which they stomped on. In this
The death of a former head of China’s one-child policy has been met not by tributes, but by castigation of the abandoned policy on social media this week. State media praised Peng Peiyun (彭珮雲), former head of China’s National Family Planning Commission from 1988 to 1998, as “an outstanding leader” in her work related to women and children. The reaction on Chinese social media to Peng’s death in Beijing on Sunday, just shy of her 96th birthday, was less positive. “Those children who were lost, naked, are waiting for you over there” in the afterlife, one person posted on China’s Sina Weibo platform. China’s
‘NO COUNTRY BUMPKIN’: The judge rejected arguments that former prime minister Najib Razak was an unwitting victim, saying Najib took steps to protect his position Imprisoned former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak was yesterday convicted, following a corruption trial tied to multibillion-dollar looting of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) state investment fund. The nation’s high court found Najib, 72, guilty on four counts of abuse of power and 21 charges of money laundering related to more than US$700 million channeled into his personal bank accounts from the 1MDB fund. Najib denied any wrongdoing, and maintained the funds were a political donation from Saudi Arabia and that he had been misled by rogue financiers led by businessman Low Taek Jho. Low, thought to be the scandal’s mastermind, remains
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday announced plans for a national bravery award to recognize civilians and first responders who confronted “the worst of evil” during an anti-Semitic terror attack that left 15 dead and has cast a heavy shadow over the nation’s holiday season. Albanese said he plans to establish a special honors system for those who placed themselves in harm’s way to help during the attack on a beachside Hanukkah celebration, like Ahmed al-Ahmed, a Syrian-Australian Muslim who disarmed one of the assailants before being wounded himself. Sajid Akram, who was killed by police during the Dec. 14 attack, and
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