Word: quaintly
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...especially for wanderers smitten by places they ought to think twice about: where quaint cultures run up against armored jeeps charging through city streets, where emergency travel kits had best include not just a bottle of Lomotil but also a bulletproof vest. The surprise is not that such dangers exist but that so many of the countries where they are commonplace want you to spend your vacation there. In the relentless quest for the tourist dollar, even places like Kashmir (400 civilians killed last month) and North Korea (no casualties, but why go?) are advertising their supposed charms...
Raising cash was no problem for the Aga Khan's illustrious grandfather, Sultan Sir Mahomed Shah Aga Khan. He simply let followers hoist his 243-lb. frame onto a scale and then match his weight in diamonds or gold -- a quaint practice that lapsed long ago. The present Aga Khan, Prince Karim, retains the reverence that goes with his heritage: he is the spiritual leader of the 15 million Ismaili Muslims, who regard him as a direct descendant of the prophet Muhammad. But even though Prince Karim has long been ranked as one of the world's richest...
...comedy engine, but that machinelike predictability was its major drawback. Regular characters came and went, coupled and uncoupled, but the relationships seemed inspired less by anything organic in the show than by the simple need to open up new gag territory. Gags, moreover, that too often depended on the quaint TV fiction that people always play out their intimate moments in front of at least four other people. Cheers was a bar where everybody not only knew your name; they also knew your embarrassing secrets and the details of your sex life...
Bruce Springsteen's famous lament 57 Channels (and Nothin' On) now seems almost quaint. Very soon, the 57 will multiply to 500, or somewhere in the neighborhood. And even that will be only a way station. The final destination is a post-channel universe of essentially unlimited choice: virtually everything produced for the medium, past or present, plus a wealth of other information and entertainment options, stored in computer banks and available instantly at the touch of a button...
...much femininity that the pilot is overcome and the engine malfunctions; later, the ghost of Nelson's sister returns to watch him make love to Mariels. American readers can swallow these events when they're set in Macondo and Aracatacas; magical realism has been relegated to the level of quaint events in imaginary south of the-border villages. Fourteen Sisters challenges us to believe that magical realism can take place even in the practical, level-headed United States of America. This is what makes Hijuelos' novel so magnificent, for it is a novel inspired by America and written for America...