It was a great week. Columbia U. announced this year’s recipients of the oldest award for international journalism given in the United States. It’s for excellence in coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean. There’s an Oct. 15 awards dinner in New York.

The last winner from The Associated Press (in 2000) was Eloy Aguilar, the late, great Mexico and Central America bureau chief (past winners). I’m in very distinguished company.  And we’ve certainly come a long way from 1965, when the men’s club lineup included AP’s LatAm editor.

The week’s tweets included this circa 1997 photo ,posted by daughter Luna, in my Bogota office. It had bullet-proof glass surrounded by a thin wooden frame. The Cali cartel was coming apart in those days but FARC rebels were overrunning military bases right and left and parents of my kids’ school chums were getting extorted by the guerrillas.