The Yassar Arafat Museum has just opened in Ramallah near the mausoleum where his body was brought after his death in a Paris hospital. Arafat’s wife, Suha, took a suite in Le Bristol Hotel in Paris during his illness and after his death. The story of her stay at the hotel is imagined in ‘Suha Arafat and the Hope Diamond’ a chapter in High Times at the Hotel Bristol. 

England's first hotel goes up in smoke

The Bristol Star's report of the fire at the Royal Clarence in Exeter, includes claims that this was the first inn in Britain to be called a 'hotel' in the French manner when it opened as the Abode Exeter in 1769. The fire started on Friday, October 28, in a nearby art gallery, and after burning for 48-hours left nothing but a few walls that need to be demolished. Owners DL say they will rebuild it. It wasn't until 1874 that the first Bristol Hotel was built in London, though there was a Bath and Bristol Hotel in 1792.