Quite so. I'm sorry if I was unfaithful.
Oscar is Oscar Hijuelos and the US Embassy sponsored his presence at the Litfest. The real reason that he came, I'll have you know, was that I prayed extremely hard when I saw the list of possible writers the embassy sent. (So sorry Chang-Rae Lee! Maybe next time, huh?)
I fell in love with Hijuelos when I read The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love which won its author the Pulitzer Prize. It has also been made into an excellent film starring Antonio Banderas and (yum!) Armand Assante.
The book is the story of two brothers, Cesar and Nestor Castillo, who arrive in New York City from Cuba in 1949, with dreams of becoming mambo stars. To read this book is to be totally transported to the dance-halls and night clubs of 1950's New York. It's also perhaps the sexiest book I've ever read. It positively sizzles with macho appetite. Now sex is hard to write about well (and small wonder there are always plenty of contenders for the Literary Review's Bad Sex Award), but Hijuelos is for sure among the best.
So when my prayers were answered, I was thrilled to bits. Just before the Litfest, I was invited to a before breakfast (because of the across-the-world time difference) press conference with Oscar Hijuelos in New York, which was a thrill. He talked about his work and managed our questions (even the more inane ones) graciously. He came across, even at that distance, as a wonderfully warm and very modest man. His wife writer and editor Lori Carlson (described later by someone as "a real babe" - quite rightly) also put in an appearance and gave us a big wave across the world.
The Litfest came and Hijuelos' onstage interview with Karim Raslan. Oscar was fresh off the plane as as jetlagged as hell, but managed valiantly, and it was for sure one of the highlights of the festival.
Now the Litfest was a huge exhausting thing for me - and I could not enjoy the event because I felt the whole weight of it pressing down on my shoulders. I was so grateful then, when the US embassy arranged a tea party several days later for Oscar and Lori at Carcosa Seri Negara (one of Malaysia's loveliest old colonial buildings which used to be the home of the British resident).
It was all a little formal and polite, over starched white table clothes and china cups, finger sandwiches and scones, but Oscar was gracious and read to us from Mr. Ives Christmas (which must be the saddest book I've ever read ...) and from A Simple Habana Melody and answered our questions about the books and the film Mambo Kings, the Broadway musical version of the book which he's involved with at the moment, and about his New York post 9/11. Later he signed books (I had a big stack!) and just hung around chatting informally. (My Aussie friend Iolanda and I were debating US foreign policy with him quietly in a corner away from the ears of "the spy guys" as he called them!)
After the tea, Iolanda asked me if there was anywhere where we could sit and catch up on each other's news, so we headed downstairs to the lounge to see if we could get a drink. We learned that the bar was closed, but used a little friendly persuasion! (Nothing stands between a thirsty Mat Salleh and her g and t.) And who should walk by at that moment but Oscar himself. We ask him if he'd like to join us and to our surprise he accepted a vodka tonic and settled on the couch to chat with us.
And then he saw a white piano in the bay window of the lounge and couldn't resist lifting the lid and playing some really cool jazz ... Just for us of course. (Laughing at myself here, of course.)
So that's the story I dine out on now ...
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