In Lima

THE RUSSIANS cut queue, heated words were exchanged, and suddenly dozens of cameras were turned on and raised into the air.

On Sunday at the International Media Centre in Lima, perhaps the best documented shoving match in the world broke out. It happened among a handful of photographers and cameramen jostling for the limited spots allocated to cover an Apec event. It happened with a few hundred of their peers from around the world standing inches away.

The fisticuffs, which took place on the last day of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation Summit, capped a week when the security lock-down on Lima provided many moments of frayed nerves, amusement and confusion.

One source of all three was the “pool’’ arrangements. With thousands of media and only limited slots available, only a selected number of journalists were allowed in to the events. How to get into the group wasn’t entirely clear. The prescribed way was to send in a form ahead of time and hope.

But those who went to the trouble would occasionally find that those who simply showed up at the last minute also got in, with the added advantage of not having to wear a bib that made them look like a purple potato sack.

Sometimes, skin colour helped too.

If you were Chinese and pretended you knew what you were doing, you had a good chance of getting into the venue for Chinese President Hu Jintao’s address. No such wiggle room for the keynote address by US President George Bush though.

Journalists had to walk through two metal detectors and had their equipment checked out by a sniffer dog first before they were allowed anywhere near. It meant having to gather at 6.45am for a 9.30am speech.

The metal detectors that journalists had to go through every morning were another source of amusement. These were so sensitive that they were set off at the slightest provocation – whether it was a smart chip in a passport, the silver foil in a packet of Fisherman’s Friend mints or sturdy bra straps.