Reporters on the Job

from the April 23, 2007 edition

• Prostitutes are Voters, Too: The hotel in Lagos, Nigeria, where staff writer Scott Baldauf is staying is full of US and European oil company workers. As a result, Nigerian prostitutes patrol the restaurant looking for clients. "Every night I eat my burger in peace, largely because I'm a reporter and seen as relatively poor," Scott says. "But on the first night, I found myself surrounded by three women. When they discovered I was a reporter covering the elections (see story), they lost interest in me as a customer. But we did spend the next 20 minutes in a friendly and well-informed debate on Nigerian politics."

– David Clark Scott

World editor

This Week's Look Ahead

• Monday, April 23: Adelaide, Australia – Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, gives the first of four speeches in Australia on "Challenging How Knowledge is Created." Kingston, Jamaica – Coroner's inquest into the death of Pakistan cricket team coach Bob Woolmer.

• Tuesday, April 24: Mexico City – Mexico City assembly to vote on legalizing abortion. New Delhi – The third "Kashmir round table," a meeting of Kashmiri parties to discuss the disputed Himalayan region.

• Thursday, April 26: Juba, Sudan – Peace talks resume between Uganda's government and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army.

• Saturday, April 28: Havana – The Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) summit is held. It's a trade group of left-leaning countries.

– Associated Press, Reuters

RUSSIAN SPACE GOLFER: Cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin holds the six iron he used to hit a golf ball from the space station. Tyurin returned to Earth Saturday. The ball is expected to travel a billion miles over the next two years. A Toronto golf company paid for the publicity stunt. Sergei Ilnitsky/AP More cultural snapshots

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