演出樂手： 　　 
        周雲蓬：吉它 唱 
        葉鵬剛：貝斯 和聲

        演出時間：2008年12月14日（星期日）晚上10：00-11：30

        演出地點：油麻地Kubrick書店

        票價：100元，現場另有周雲蓬專輯發售

        周雲蓬簡介：

        1970年出生于遼寧沈陽，九歲失明

        1994年畢業於長春大學中文系

        1995年到北京圓明園開始賣唱生涯

        2002年創辦民刊《低岸》

        2003年錄制專輯《沈默如謎的呼吸》

        2005年出版詩集《春天責備》

        2007年，出版第二張專輯《中國孩子》

　　

        以下引自《南方週末》的報道《音樂公民：周雲蓬》

2007年，37歲的周雲蓬自費發了一張專輯，還自己做經紀人、樂手、歌手和唱片推銷員，在中國27個城市巡演。這張
        專輯的名字叫《中國孩子》，但長頭發、滿臉胡茬的東北大漢周雲蓬並不是個善於跟孩子打交道的人。因為小孩
        子見面總會對他說：“你把墨鏡摘下來給我看看。”“九歲失明”、“盲人”對于幾歲的孩子是難以理解的概念，
        於是見了孩子，周雲蓬總想找個托詞趕快躲開。

　　
        《中國孩子》唱的是抽象的孩子，是魯迅的《狂人日記》裏“救救孩子”的“孩子”。周雲蓬喜歡讀魯迅，把魯迅
        當年寫過的想法移植到自己的歌裏唱唱，沒想到竟讓很多聽到的人為之一震。

　　
       “不要做克拉瑪依的孩子，火燒痛皮膚讓親娘心焦。不要做沙蘭鎮的孩子，水底下漆黑他睡不著。不要做成都人的
        孩子，吸毒的媽媽七天七夜不回家。不要做河南人的孩子，愛滋病在血液裏哈哈地笑。不要做山西人的孩子，爸爸
        變成了一筐煤，你別再想見到他。不要做中國人的孩子，餓極了他們會把你吃掉，還不如曠野中的老山羊，為保護
        小羊而目露凶光。不要做中國人的孩子，爸爸媽媽都是些怯懦的人。為證明他們的鐵石心腸，死到臨頭讓領導先走。”

　　早在1994年克拉瑪依火災之後，周雲蓬就想寫一首歌，可是一直沒想好。那時他剛大學畢業，被分配到一家沙拉油廠
        做工人。這家工廠用周雲蓬，只是為了免去一部分稅收。周雲蓬感到被騙，離開，又向一所盲童學校申請教職，校
        方卻認為聘用非失明的教師更為合適。

        1995年，周雲蓬背著吉他離家遠行。父母都是沈陽鐵西區工人，周雲蓬的音樂啟蒙就來自街頭巷尾：上世紀80年代
        的鐵西區，很多人在路燈底下彈六弦琴，唱的是鄧麗君、劉文正。他15歲開始學吉他，25歲開始以街頭賣唱為生。
        “盲人有自己的祖先。荷馬、高漸離這些盲藝人都喜歡到處走，在街頭唱歌。可能因為失明以後會脫離社會的流水
        線，成為很閑很沒用的人。沒用也就不會受到流水線的帶動、沖擊，就到處轉一轉，用唱歌記錄時代，一輩子就
        過去了。”周雲蓬的語句有一種詩意化的傾向。解釋音樂於自己的意義時，他說：“是船。音樂可以幫助我維持經
        濟收入，可以安身立命，也可以審美，就像船，不是大輪船，是一葉小舟，很美。”

地点: 香港 大會堂劇院、百老匯電影中心、電影資料館等

 

部份放映節目： 　　
　　巴黎 (Paris)
　　MR-73 (MR-73)
　　與狼共存 (Surviving with Wolves)
　　The Class (Entre les murs)
　　只剩得我倆 (2 Alone in Paris)
　　99法郎 (99 Francs)
　　理想邦 (Andalucia)
　　人性問題 (Heartbeat Detector)
　　我要做個賊 (I've Always Wanted to be a Gangster)
　　好揀唔揀 (Just Anybody)
　　雨總要落下來 (Let It Rain)
　　天使的印記 (Mark of An Angel)
　　舞莫停 (Rumba)
　　夏日時光 (Summer Hours)
　　美麗的人兒 (The Beautiful Person)

電影節簡介：
　　
　　香港法國文化協會每年在12月舉辦的法國電影節為香港帶來法國最新最精彩的電影製作。今年第三十七屆明顯是以革新、多樣化，以及優質電影作為策劃的方針。
　　
　　我們的目標是帶給大家一些震撼法國及世界影壇的最新影片。今年我們很高興能與香港電影發行商合作，為三部電影在香港作隆重首映，而其中最重要的一部《我班小鬼頭與我》奪得了2008年康城電影節的金棕獎。
　　
　　除了「新片速遞」這環節所選映的十五部從未在香港放映的新作外，今年法國電影節增加了另外三個環節，足以顯示出法國電影製作的充沛活力。其中的「法國導演新生代 — 處女新作」介紹一些法國當前甚具潛質的導演新秀。
　　
　　「特選短片」選映一系列動畫短片及實境短片，而其中最值得留意的是獲頒發2008 年奧斯卡最佳實境短片的《小偷至尊》（The Mozart of Pickpockets）。
　　
　　第四個環節是「薛德烈．格比殊電影回顧」。這位導演的電影充滿詩意和幽默感，在世界各地均有無數的擁躉，但可惜他的電影至今從未在香港的商業院線公開放映。他的新作《巴黎》由茱麗葉．庇洛仙及羅曼．杜希主演，將為今年的電影節展開序幕。
　　(節錄自http://www.frenchcinepanorama.com)

彩虹站C2出口小巴到西貢，轉94號九巴至北潭凹落，此處海拔100多米，為西貢郊野公園的一處入口，綫路指示牌附近有公厠。

  

走麥理浩徑第3段，起點北潭凹，經牛耳山、嶂上，終點由榕樹澳出向馬鞍山。麥徑第3段起始部分為一段一鼓作氣向上攀300多米的臺階路，到達山頂，可以遠眺HK行山者的至愛SHARP PEAK蚺蛇尖，近処是小島散落的海下灣。山山相連。
 
 
 

 

嶂上，居然有點蘇格蘭北部高地的風貌，平緩，開闊。順著斜坡一路飛奔而下，遇見野生的牛。

 
 
 

 

路上的顔色

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

今年的11月11日，有比光棍節更爲深遠的意義。90年前的11月11日，第一次世界大戰結束。

 

前天在地鐵裏，看見身邊一位商務型男子，黑色西裝的左領子上別著一朵精致的小紅花（如下圖所示），看形態覺得是罌粟花，旁邊還綴有幾瓣綠葉襯托，覺得奇怪，猜想他可能是剛結束某個慈善晚宴，尚未改變裝束的緣故？

 

剛剛上網看Financial Times11月11日的一段採訪視頻，發現記者和被訪問的國際會計師理事會主席David Tweedie爵士的西裝領子上，也別著同樣的小紅花。一Google方知，當年血雨腥風的戰地卻盛開著這種生命力強悍、嬌艷得似沁透鮮血的紅色罌粟花(在中國的西北很多見，我念本科的大學校園也有種植)，紅罌粟(red poppy)於是被後人用作世界大戰停戰紀念日(Rememberance Day)的專用花，

 

Why do we wear poppies on Remembrance Day?

The poem:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders Fields.

- John McCrae

 

她有首我鍾愛的歌"Jikele Maweni"又叫"The Retreat Song"，曾被用作來昂納多主演電影[血鑽]BLOOD DIAMOND的配曲。非常好聽。

    
Jikela emaweni sia hamba,
Jikela emaweni sia hamba,
Jikela emaweni sia hamba,
Jikela emaweni sia hamba

Axents' amakhwenkwe axhentsa kwaba mnandi
Axents' amakwenkwe axentsel'emgondini
A jika madodda a jika kwabamandi
A jika madodda a jikele mgondini

a mia hamba, a mia hamba
a mia hamba, a mia hamba
ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja
ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja

Jikela emaweni sia hamba,
Jikela emaweni sia hamba,
Jikela emaweni sia hamba,
Jikela emaweni sia hamba,

Axents' amakhwenkwe axhentsa kwaba mnandi
Axents' amakwenkwe axentsel'emgondini
A jika madodda a jika kwabamandi
A jika madodda a jikele mgondini

a mia hamba, a mia hamba
a mia hamba, a mia hamba
ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja
ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja

 

 

 

In her dazzling career, Makeba performed with musical legends from around the world — jazz maestros Nina Simone and Dizzy Gillespie, Harry Belafonte, Paul Simon — and sang for world leaders such as John F. Kennedy and Nelson Mandela.

"Her haunting melodies gave voice to the pain of exile and dislocation which she felt for 31 long years. At the same time, her music inspired a powerful sense of hope in all of us," Mandela said in a statement.

He said it was "fitting" that her last moments were spent on stage.

The Pineta Grande clinic in Castel Volturno, near the southern city of Naples, said Makeba died early Monday of a heart attack.

Makeba collapsed on stage Sunday night after singing one of her most famous hits "Pata Pata," her family said in a statement. Her grandson, Nelson Lumumba Lee, was with her as well as her longtime friend, Italian promoter Roberto Meglioli.

"Whilst this great lady was alive she would say: 'I will sing until the last day of my life'," the statement said.

Castel Volturno Mayor Francesco Nuzzo said Makeba sang at a concert in solidarity with six immigrants from Ghana who were shot to death in September in the town, an attack that investigators have blamed on organized crime.

The death of "Mama Africa," as she was known, plunged South Africa into shock and mourning.

"One of the greatest songstresses of our time has ceased to sing," Foreign Affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma said in a statement.

"Throughout her life, Mama Makeba communicated a positive message to the world about the struggle of the people of South Africa and the certainty of victory over the dark forces of apartheid and colonialism through the art of song."

Makeba wrote in her 1987 memoirs that friends and relatives who first encouraged her to perform compared her voice to that of a nightingale. With her distinctive style combining jazz with folk with South African township rhythms, she was often called "The Empress of African Song."

The first African woman to win a Grammy award, Makeba started singing in Sophiatown, a cosmopolitan neighborhood of Johannesburg that was a cultural hotspot in the 1950s before its black residents were forcibly removed by the apartheid government.

She then teamed up with South African jazz trumpeter Hugh Masekela — later her first husband — and her rise to international prominence started when she starred in the anti-apartheid documentary "Come Back, Africa" in 1959.

When she tried to fly home for her mother's funeral the following year, she discovered her passport had been revoked. It was 30 years before she was allowed to return.

In 1963, Makeba appeared before the U.N. Special Committee on Apartheid to call for an international boycott of South Africa. The South African government responded by banning her records, including hits like "Pata Pata," "The Click Song" ("Qongqothwane" in Xhosa), and "Malaika."

Makeba received the Grammy Award for Best Folk Recording in 1966 together with Belafonte for "An Evening With Belafonte/Makeba." The album dealt with the political plight of black South Africans under apartheid.

Thanks to her close relationship with Belafonte, she received star status in the United States and performed for President Kennedy at his birthday party in 1962. But she fell briefly out of favor when she married black power activist Stokely Carmichael — later known as Kwame Ture — and moved to Guinea in the late 1960s.

Besides working with Simone and Gillespie, she also appeared with Paul Simon at his "Graceland" concert in Zimbabwe in 1987.

After three decades abroad, Makeba was invited back to South Africa by Mandela, the anti-apartheid icon, shortly after his release from prison in 1990 as white racist rule crumbled.

"It was like a revival," she said about going home. "My music having been banned for so long, that people still felt the same way about me was too much for me. I just went home and I cried."

Makeba courted controversy by lending support to dictators such as Togo's Gnassingbe Eyadema and Felix Houphouet-Boigny from Ivory Coast, performing at political campaigns for the veteran leaders even as they were violently suppressing the movements for democracy that swept West Africa in the early 90s.

The first person to give her refuge was Guinea's former President Ahmed Sekou Toure who was accused in the slaughtering of 10 percent of the population.

Makeba, though, insisted that her songs were not deliberately political.

"I'm not a political singer," she insisted in an interview with Britain's Guardian newspaper earlier this year. "I don't know what the word means. People think I consciously decided to tell the world what was happening in South Africa. No! I was singing about my life, and in South Africa we always sang about what was happening to us — especially the things that hurt us."

Makeba announced her retirement three years ago, but despite a series of farewell concerts she never stopped performing. When she turned 75 last year, she said she would sing for as long as possible.

Makeba is survived by her grandchildren, Nelson Lumumba Lee and Zenzi Monique Lee, and her great-grandchildren Lindelani, Ayanda and Kwame.

(Associated Press Writer Frances D'Emilio in Rome contributed to this report.)

 

 

 

AMERICA has been painfully conditioned by its past two presidential elections. It was bitterly divided into red and blue states with only a handful in the middle, decided by a handful of votes. On the night of Tuesday November 4th Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential candidate, scrambled the assumptions that have governed American politics for half a generation. An intriguing and—to many—inspiring politician, he will take office in January from the most unpopular president in modern time.

When Mr Obama gave a speech that made him famous, in 2004, decrying “blue states” and “red states”, it seemed unlikely that he would be the one to bridge the divide. But the scale of his victory in this election is substantial: he won at least 333 electoral-college votes and will probably do well in the popular vote, too.

New Hampshire, beloved of John McCain for his primary victories there in 2000 and 2008, went for Mr Obama. Then fell Pennsylvania, a big state where Mr McCain had tried his last strategy. He had hoped to raise economic and personal worries about Mr Obama, then to snatch the state from the Democrats and hold down losses elsewhere. It did not work. Ohio has voted with every Republican candidate to win the White House since Lincoln. When that state went for Mr Obama, the election was, in effect, over. Other formerly Republican states such as Iowa and New Mexico went tumbling Mr Obama’s way. Eventually Florida fell for Mr Obama, too, giving him a substantial victory.

The economy seems to have been crucial to his win. George Bush won re-election in 2004 by emphasising “God, gays and guns”. Hillary Clinton racked up big wins against Mr Obama among the economically distressed but socially conservative “Reagan Democrats”, including many in Ohio and Pennsylvania, painting Mr Obama as an out-of-touch elitist. On election day this week, however, Mr Obama was able to attract such supporters. However much Republicans tried to scare voters about Mr Obama’s old relationship with his anti-American preacher and a passing association with a 1960s terrorist, voters were more concerned about their wallets. They also punished the incumbent party heavily, despite the self-styled “maverick” status of its standard-bearer, Mr McCain.

Mr Obama will have a friendly Congress. The Democrats have padded their majority in the House of Representatives. More symbolically, many Republican brand names were defeated in the Senate: Elizabeth Dole in North Carolina, John Sununu in New Hampshire and Jim Gilmore in Virginia. It seems most unlikely, however, that the Democrats will manage to get 60 seats in the Senate, the number needed to break Republican filibusters. Mitch McConnell, the Senate’s Republican minority leader, just held on to his seat in a tough race in Kentucky.

Mr Obama survived a myriad of onslaughts, notably on his lack of experience and on his elitist and “celebrity” status. But he ran a calm and disciplined campaign, and most importantly managed to assure voters that he would be a safer leader in a time of financial and economic anxieties. Mr McCain, in contrast, fumbled when he mishandled his response to the economic turmoil of the past few weeks. Mr Obama also succeeded in persuading young people and black people to vote. Along with those sceptical working-class whites, and the traditional Democratic bases on the east and west coasts, Mr Obama constructed a comfortable winning coalition.

America has not shifted greatly to the left. Mr Obama, especially with his big Democratic majority in Congress, will have to manage expectations carefully. Democrats will want big pushes to the left. But Mr Obama knows that Bill Clinton lost his congressional majority after two years because he overreached in that direction.

But all that is to come. On Tuesday night celebrations were expected in Chicago, and elsewhere, as America prepared to welcome the first black president-elect of a country born with the ugly birthmark of slavery. It is a remarkable, and historic, achievement.

以上觀點來自經濟學家 The Economic Naturalist: Why Economics Explains Almost Everything