Simon Winchester's Hong Kong Diary -- Fifth Installment, June 30: Just what did China's president Jiang Zemin mean by "vicissitudes"?"

The glitterati pour into Hong Kong four days before handover

In the military, that means rape and pillage at will -- and in your own ranks.

Banging the drum for CIA-crack conspiracy theories, questioning the sex charges brought against black Army officers by white enlisted women and passionately defending affirmative action, confrontational Rep. Maxine Waters has risen to the top level of black political leadership.

Hong Kong's last British governor winds down years of bad fung shui and ponders the future of democracy in the crown colony.

"Tea leaves and witchcraft" are keeping hundreds of qualified, innocent people out of government jobs.

Timothy McVeigh is toast

As China prepares to swallow Hong Kong, one imperiled dissident refuses to leave his country.