Author: Ohart

Former NASA astronaut Buzz Aldrin was noticeably absent from a gala kicking off a yearlong celebration of the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing, even though his nonprofit space education foundation is a sponsor and he typically is the star attraction.

Aldrin said he didn’t attend because of objections over the foundation’s current aims and ongoing legal matters associated with the foundation. The former astronaut is locked in a legal battle with family members who say he is suffering from mental decline.

The black-tie Apollo Celebration Gala was held Saturday under a Saturn V rocket at the Kennedy Space Center, featured a panel discussion by astronauts, an awards ceremony, and an auction of space memorabilia.

Hundreds of people attended the sold-out event, including British physicist Brian Cox, who presented Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson with the ShareSpace Foundation’s Innovation award.

Branson, whose company is developing a new generation of commercial spacecraft, said in a recorded video that the Apollo missions influenced his generation.

“Space is still hard, really hard. It still really matters,” Branson said. “There would be no Virgin Galactic, no Virgin Orbit and no spaceship company had it not been for Apollo astronauts and the thousands of talented people who made their mission possible.”

Aldrin, Neil Armstrong and Michael Collins took part in the historic Apollo 11 mission, landing the first two humans on the moon on July 20, 1969. Armstrong was first to walk on the moon, joined soon after by Aldrin while Collins remained in orbit aboard the command module.

Dr. Carolyn Williams of the nonprofit From One Hand To AnOTHER received the foundation’s Education award, and former Johnson Space Center director Gerry Griffin, a flight director for all of the crewed Apollo missions, was honored with the Pioneer award.

“It’s very humbling, it kind of came out of the blue,” Griffin said. “It is so neat to know that we’ve passed the torch that will let this next generation take us to this next step.”

That next step, Griffin said, is a return of Americans to the moon and, eventually, Mars — something former Apollo astronauts Walt Cunningham, Harrison Schmitt, Rusty Schweickart and Tom Stafford discussed during a conversation with Cox.

“We’re sort of going through a second door here. The door isn’t all the way open — we haven’t gone all the way through it — but it’s cracked open,” Schweickart, who flew as the lunar module pilot on Apollo 9, told The Associated Press. “Space is going to be much less expensive to go to, and that’s going to open up not just opportunities for people to fly, but because of the decreased cost, real opportunities for innovators to generate new ideas and to do things that have never been done before.”

Aldrin’s ShareSpace Foundation is one of the sponsors of the annual gala, which raises money for Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts and Mathematics — or STEAM education — and Astronaut Scholarship Foundation scholarships.

Renowned Brazilian pop artist Romero Britto donated artwork from his “Buzz Aldrin Space Series” for the auction, which also included a behind-the-scenes tour of Virgin Galactic in California and autographed space memorabilia. Tickets for the event ranged from $750 to $2,500 per person.

​Aldrin lawsuit

Aldrin sued two of his adult children and a former business manager last month, accusing them of misusing his credit cards, transferring money from an account and slandering him by saying he has dementia. Weeks before that, Andrew and Jan Aldrin filed a petition claiming their 88-year-old father was suffering from memory loss, delusions, paranoia and confusion.

Andrew and Jan Aldrin and business manager Christina Korp are on the foundation’s board and attended the gala. Aldrin’s oldest son, James, isn’t involved in the legal fight.

Buzz Aldrin said in a statement that he didn’t attend “due to the present course of events related to my space initiatives, also current legal matters linked to the ShareSpace Foundation.”

“I formed ShareSpace Foundation in 1998 for the promotion of individual space voyagers,” Aldrin added. “The Foundation is, in my view, now being used to promote quite different objectives.”

Andrew Aldrin acknowledged his father’s absence during the gala.

“We’re sorry Dad can’t be here, I know some of you are disappointed,” Aldrin said. “Ultimately, what we’re about is creating the first generation of Martians.”
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The first-known recording by David Bowie, when he was the 16-year-old singer of a band called The Konrads, is going up for auction.

Omega Auctions in northwestern England said Monday that the reel tape would go on sale Sept. 11, with an expected price of 10,000 pounds ($13,100).

The song, “I Never Dreamed,” was recorded in a studio in 1963 when The Konrads asked Bowie, then known by his given name David Jones, to sing lead vocals.

A harmonious rock ‘n’ roll song in the vein of classic Beatles, “I Never Dreamed” was submitted to record label Decca in an unsuccessful bid for a recording contract.

Konrads drummer David Hadfield said he had “decided that David was the best person to sing it and give the right interpretation. So this became the very first recording of David Jones (Bowie) singing 55 years ago!” he said in a statement.

The tape was recently discovered in a loft, the auction house said.

Bowie left The Konrads shortly afterward and did not achieve stardom until six years later when, already a solo artist, he released “Space Oddity” about the fictional astronaut Major Tom.

Bowie earned a reputation as one of the most innovative voices in rock over a half-century career that experimented with soul, disco, jazz and ambient music.

He died in 2016 from an undisclosed battle with cancer, two days after releasing his final album on his 69th birthday.
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Twenty-five young musicians from around the world have gathered in California to train and perform this month in an international program called iPalpiti, from the Italian word for heartbeats. The training program and performance festival mark a labor of love for Russian-born conductor and musical director Eduard Schmieder, who says that music has the power to break down barriers.

The musicians come from 19 countries, including Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Israel and Italy, and Schmieder says that in their own way, they make the world more peaceful. 

“In our orchestra,” he said, “I will not name the countries on purpose, but there are musicians from the countries which are practically — not practically — but which are at war. And they are sitting next to each other, and they become friends,” he said.

Schmieder and his wife started this program in 1997 with help from the renowned violinist and conductor Yehudi Menuhin.

Accomplished musicians

Professional musicians whose ages range from the late teens to the 30s take part in the program. They are accomplished, Schmieder said, and include winners of major competitions.

“It’s so great that you have so many sensitive musicians,” said Peter Rainer, a violinist who serves as concertmaster, the link between the musicians and conductor. “They all are very alert and awake and listen to each other” as they work together to perfect their performances, he said.

Turkish viola player Can Sakul says the international group meshes well.

“This is home because when you make good music; it makes you feel like you’re home,” Sakul said during a break from rehearsals in Orange County, California.

Cultural exchange

This is a cultural as well as musical exchange, a Siberian violinist says.

“Here, everyone has their own opinion of music, how to play every composition,” said Russian Semyon Promoe. “It’s very interesting to interact with everybody,” he said, “to play together and to create one opinion for everybody.”

This year, the festival focuses on music from baroque to contemporary, from J. S. Bach and Franz Schubert to the Czech composer Antonin Dvorak and Russia’s Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky. Yet, this music has no geographic boundaries, says a cellist from Ecuador.

“It’s interesting to see where we intersect,” Francisco Vila said, “how many things we have in common. And also the music world … is quite small,” he added, “so you’re only one person away from knowing everyone else.”

He says that through this program, the instrumentalists get to know more about each other as they share the thrill of performing great music. Musicians who have taken part in the annual training and festival make up “a big family,” said Turkish violist Sakul, “so I’m proud to be a part of it,” he added.
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Twenty-five young musicians from around the world have gathered in California to train and perform this month. As VOA’s Mike O’Sullivan reports from Los Angeles, the international program called iPalpiti, from the Italian word for heartbeats, is a labor of love for a Russian-born conductor who says music can break down barriers.
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Jonathan Gold, who became the first restaurant critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for criticism, has died. He was 57.

The Los Angeles Times, where Gold most recently worked, reported that he died Saturday after being diagnosed earlier this month with pancreatic cancer.

“I can’t imagine the city without him. It just feels wrong. I feel like we won’t have our guide, we won’t have the soul,” said Laura Gabbert, who directed City of Gold, a 2015 documentary about the critic. “It’s such a loss. I can’t wrap my head around it still.”

Gold’s reviews first appeared in L.A. Weekly and later in The Times and Gourmet. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2007 while at L.A. Weekly. He was a finalist again in 2011.

“There will never be another like Jonathan Gold, who will forever be our brilliant, indispensable guide through the culinary paradise that is Los Angeles,” Mayor Eric Garcetti said in a statement. “Jonathan earned worldwide acclaim as a food critic, but he possessed the soul of a poet whose words helped readers everywhere understand the history and culture of our city.”

The Times noted Gold’s reviews, appearing in his column called Counter Intelligence, focused on “hole-in-the-wall joints, street food, mom-and-pop shops and ethnic restaurants,” which he preferred to call traditional restaurants.

Known as J. Gold, he had a distinctive style, wearing suspenders, a slightly rumpled button-down shirt, moustache and mop of feathery strawberry blond hair.

Ruth Reichl, who edited Gold at The Times and at Gourmet, called him a trailblazer.

“Jonathan understood that food could be a power for bringing a community together, for understanding other people,” she told the newspaper. “In the early ’80s, no one else was there. He was a trailblazer and he really did change the way that we all write about food.”

Gold also won numerous James Beard Foundation journalism awards during this career. In May, he received the Craig Claiborne Distinguished Restaurant Review Award.

His reviews were compiled into a book, Counter Intelligence: Where to Eat in the Real Los Angeles, in 2000.
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A group of 15 amputees has overcome physical challenges to form a soccer team in the Gaza Strip. A member of the Palestinian Legislative Council has organized what he calls the “Team of Heroes” after watching Turkish and British amputees in a soccer match last year. Arash Arabasadi reports.
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An unusual pop-up museum in Lisbon is delighting social media-focused visitors with colorful and dreamy displays of giant ice creams, marshmallow pools and all things sweet. As VOA’s Mariama Diallo reports, the museum’s founders say its an attraction that strives to put a smile on the faces of all its visitors.
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Not so long ago, someone playing video games into the early morning hours might have been seen as a slacker, someone lacking in ambition. But perceptions are changing with the times. Today, being glued to an X-Box or Play Station and excelling at computer games might pay off, as more and more U.S. universities start offering scholarships aimed at attracting computer gamers. Maria Prus has the story, narrated by Steve Baragona.
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Rapper Common has won three Grammys, a Golden Globe and an Academy Award but a recent visit to a New York City school was “humbling” – mainly because many of the students were too young to know his music.

 

The award-winner showed up at P.S. 111 in midtown Manhattan on Thursday as an ambassador for the Adopt-A-Classroom initiative. He made the surprise appearance with his mother, Dr. Mahalia Hines, to present the school with a $10,000 check.  

 

While Common has a diverse fan base, it probably doesn’t include many fourth and fifth graders. He joked about their reaction when he was introduced, saying the kids looked at him like, “Who is this dude? We don’t know him.”
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Admirers of Neil Armstrong and space exploration have a chance to own artifacts and mementos that belonged to the modest man who became a global hero by becoming the first human to walk on the moon.

The personal collection of Armstrong, who died in his native Ohio in 2012, will be offered for sale in a series of auctions handled by Dallas-based Heritage Auctions, beginning November 1-2 and continuing in May and November 2019.

The collection includes a variety of artifacts from Armstrong’s 1969 lunar landing and private mementos that include pieces of a wing and propeller from the 1903 Wright Brothers Flyer that the astronaut took with him to the moon.

Other items that went to the moon with Armstrong include a U.S. flag, the largest size typically flown during Apollo missions; a United Nations flag; various state flags; and some Robbins Medallions. The sterling silver medallions were paid for by the crews of Apollo missions and were available for purchase only by NASA astronauts. Armstrong’s collection also includes a rare gold medallion.

Among the more personal items to be auctioned are a Purdue University centennial flag from Armstrong’s alma mater that traveled on Apollo 11 and his Boy Scout cap.

Armstrong’s son, Mark Armstrong, said his father never talked to him about what he wanted done with the large amount of items he kept.

“I don’t think he spent much time thinking about it,” Armstrong said. “He did save all the items, so he obviously felt they were worth saving.”

Armstrong, who lives in suburban Cincinnati, said his father did keep all of his “flown” items together.

Faced with the responsibility of conserving, preserving and insuring irreplaceable items and honoring their father’s legacy, Armstrong and his brother, Rick, found that some things needed restoration, and that some required research to be properly identified.

“We felt like the number of people that could help us identify them and give us the historical context was diminishing and that the problem of understanding that context would only get worse over time,” he said.

The Armstrongs turned to Sarasota, Florida-based Collectibles Authentication Guaranty for help with preserving and authenticating the artifacts and memorabilia and chose Heritage Auctions for the sales.

Greg Rohan, president of Heritage Auctions, said it handles numerous categories of collectibles that appeal to various collectors, but items connected with space seem to have a universal appeal.

“Space is one of the very, very few categories that every single person seems to be interested in,” Rohan said. “You show somebody something from the space program, and they are fascinated by it.”

 

Bids can be taken online, by phone or in person.
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The NFL and National Football League Players Association have agreed to halt enforcement of rules regarding the new national anthem policy while the two sides work on a resolution.

The league and its players union issued a joint statement late Thursday, hours after The Associated Press reported that Miami Dolphins players who protest on the field during the anthem could be suspended for up to four games under a team policy issued this week.

“The NFL and NFLPA, through recent discussions, have been working on a resolution to the anthem issue. In order to allow this constructive dialogue to continue, we have come to a standstill agreement on the NFLPA’s grievance and on the NFL’s anthem policy. No new rules relating to the anthem will be issued or enforced for the next several weeks while these confidential discussions are ongoing,” the statement read.

Miami’s nine-page discipline document included a one-sentence section on “Proper Anthem Conduct” and was provided to the AP by a person familiar with the policy who insisted on anonymity because the document is not public. It classifies anthem protests under a large list of “conduct detrimental to the club,” all of which could lead to a paid or unpaid suspension, a fine or both.

Miami’s anthem policy came after the NFL decided in May that teams would be fined if players didn’t stand during “The Star-Spangled Banner” while on the field. The league left it up to teams on how to punish players. None of the team policies had been made public.

Jets acting owner Christopher Johnson said shortly after the league announced its policy that he will not punish his players for any peaceful protests, and would pay any potential fines incurred by the team as a result of his players’ actions.

When the league announced the policy, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell called it a compromise aimed at putting the focus back on football after a tumultuous year in which television ratings dipped nearly 10 percent.

The NFL started requiring players to be on the field for the anthem in 2009, the year it signed a marketing deal with the military.

In 2016, then-49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick began protesting police brutality, social injustice and racial inequality by kneeling during the national anthem and the demonstration spread to other players and teams. It became one of the most controversial and sensitive issues in sports.

Critics led by President Donald Trump called the players unpatriotic and even said NFL owners should fire any player who refused to stand during the anthem. Some players countered that their actions were being misconstrued and that they are seeking social change rather than protesting the anthem itself.

Trump’s criticism led more than 200 players to protest during one weekend, and some kept it up throughout the season.

Kaepernick didn’t play at all last season and hasn’t been picked up by another team. He threw 16 touchdown passes and four interceptions in his final season in 2016. Safety Eric Reid, one of Kaepernick’s former teammates and another protest leader, is also out of work.

Both have filed collusion grievances against the NFL.
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Adrian Cronauer, the U.S. military radio disc jockey immortalized by Robin Williams in the 1987 film Good Morning, Vietnam, has died at 79.

Cronauer was a U.S. Air Force sergeant who became famous in Vietnam in 1965 and 1966 by opening his daily Armed Forces Radio show bellowing, “Goood morning, Vietnam!” He then played rock ’n’ roll records instead of the light, middle-of-the-road music his superiors wanted him to play.

As portrayed by Williams, Cronauer would leap around the studio, dance, make fun of officers, mock official military announcements, and read news bulletins before they could be censored.

Cronauer said he enjoyed the film, but called Williams’ antics show business and a vast exaggeration of who he really was.

“I was always a bit of an iconoclast, as Robin was in the film,” he once said. “But I was not anti-military or anti-establishment. I was anti-stupid. And you certainly ran into a lot of stupidity in the military.”
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Archaeologists in Egypt have discovered an ancient pottery manufacturing workshop dating to more than 4,000 years ago.

Thursday’s statement by the Antiquities Ministry says the workshop is situated close to the Nile River in Aswan province in southern Egypt. It says the workshop, the oldest pottery workshop in the Old Kingdom, belongs to the 4th Dynasty, spanning 2,613 to 2,494 B.C.

The Old Kingdom is also known as the age when pyramid-building flourished.

Inside the workshop, archaeologists found an ancient pottery manufacturing wheel made of a limestone turntable and a hollow base.

Mostafa al-Waziri, secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, says the discovery is “rare” and reveals more about the development of pottery manufacturing and the daily lives of ancient Egyptians during that time in history.
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Bruce Springsteen propped himself on top of Billy Joel’s piano to sing a duet with The Piano Man, who was celebrating his 100th concert at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday night.

Joel told the energetic crowd he had a guest coming onstage who has won a Grammy, Oscar and Tony. Springsteen emerged, surprising the feverish and fanatic audience, who loudly cheered “BRUCE.”

“Congratulations, Billy, on your 100th show,” Springsteen yelled.

“Ready, Billy?” he asked, as Joel began to play while sitting at the piano.

Springsteen encouraged the crowd to cheer louder and then sang “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out.” He jumped onto Joel’s piano — making it on his second try — and sat on it while Joel played and the piano slowly spun. Springsteen then rocked his guitar for “Born to Run.”

Joel, 69, and Springsteen, 68, hugged after their two-song performance, and The Boss kissed Joel on his head as he walked offstage.

A banner celebrating Joel’s 100th performance at MSG rose to the ceiling near the top of the two-hour-plus concert. Joel started performing a monthly residency at the arena in 2014. No artist has performed at the famed venue more than Joel.

“Good evening to you, New York City,” said Joel, whose 2-year-old daughter, Della Rose Joel, sat on his lap. “I want to thank you all for coming to our show.”

Joel was excited throughout his set, going from piano to harmonica to guitar. He put on his sunglasses while he passionately sang “New York State of Mind” and twirled his microphone stand in the air and danced happily after singing “Uptown Girl.”

He said he had to think of a special song to sing to celebrate his new milestone, and then performed “This Is the Time.”

“Maybe it’ll hit me later,” he said of his new feat.

Earlier on Wednesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo proclaimed July 18, 2018, as “Billy Joel Day.” Joel, who was born in the Bronx, first performed at MSG on December 14, 1978. His piano is on display in front of the venue.
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Brian McCarty is a war photographer. But his pictures are not of bombed-out buildings or mangled bodies. His images show the horrors of war through the eyes of children and re-created with toy tanks and tiny dolls. Faith Lapidus has his story.
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The American Accordionists’ Association celebrates its 80th anniversary this year, gathering in Alexandria, Virginia, to showcase performers of all ages and abilities. From Alexandria, VOA’s Jill Craig has more.
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The fossilized skeleton of a ferocious Tyrannosaurus Rex dinosaur will be on exhibit next year in the new fossil hall at the Museum of Natural History in Washington. Excavated in Montana, it is one of the largest and most complete T-rex skeletons ever discovered. The dinosaur, called the Nation’s T-rex, will become part of a larger showcase that explores billions of years of life on earth. VOAs Deborah Block takes us on a sneak peak.
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The London fashion world didn’t know quite what hit it when Alexander McQueen’s disheveled models staggered down the runway at his 1995 “Highland Rape” show, their Scottish-inspired clothing ripped to expose breasts and nether regions. 

It was exactly the reaction that McQueen, then in his 20s and subsisting on fast food and unemployment checks, was seeking. “I don’t want a show where you come out feeling like you’ve just had Sunday lunch,” he said at the time. “I want you to come out either feeling repulsed or exhilarated.”

McQueen would go on to provoke, repulse, inspire and exhilarate — often simultaneously — until he was 40, when he tragically took his life.

How did a taxi driver’s son from working-class London make the unlikely journey to the top of the fashion world, and what made him end it all at the height of his powers?

For filmmakers Ian Bonhote and Peter Ettedgui, the two questions proved irresistible. Their resulting documentary, McQueen, opens this week.

Fashion is a compelling subject for documentaries; few subjects are so enticingly visual. But the challenge is always to peel away the well-polished, and well-guarded, facade.

“The fashion world is a bubble,” said Ettedgui, who wrote and co-directed the film. “They don’t necessarily take kindly to outsiders coming in and revealing their secrets.”

Candid interviews

The filmmakers approached close to 200 sources, Bonhote said. Finding footage was painstaking work, but they were fortunate to secure key parts of McQueen’s most dramatic runway shows, along with some strikingly candid interviews with the designer — a rarity at fashion shows. 

They also found some valuable archival footage, including some private footage that McQueen and his associates captured for fun, trying out a new camera as they traveled to Paris for the designer’s new, high-profile post at Givenchy in 1996. They looked like grinning kids taking their parents’ car for a spin. 

The filmmakers were also able to convince some key McQueen family members to speak, namely his older sister, Janet, and her son, Gary, a designer himself who worked for his uncle. And they interview some of McQueen’s former colleagues, though not all. Sarah Burton, who succeeded McQueen at his namesake label, doesn’t appear.

At the heart of the film, though, is McQueen’s work and the way his bracing talent reverberated through the fashion establishment. Watching now, one can almost feel the gasps in the audience as the designer places model Shalom Harlow on a revolving platform in a plain tulle dress in his show No. 13, then has two robots spray yellow and black paint on her as she turns and turns. It was a mesmerizing effect that brought McQueen himself to tears.

​Film’s divisions

The film is divided into chapters, each focusing on a particularly influential McQueen show. The first, Jack the Ripper Stalks His Victims in 1992, was originally his final project at Central Saint Martin’s, the well-known London fashion school.

Even getting to the school was unlikely. The young Lee McQueen (he reverted to his middle name, Alexander, later because it sounded posh) was supposed to become “a mechanic or something,” but he was obsessed with drawing clothes. His mother encouraged him to knock on doors on Savile Row for an apprenticeship, and there, he became a superb craftsman.

Isabella Blow, a prominent fashion figure, bought up his entire Jack the Ripper collection and helped him make his way. But it’s clear that, as an associate says: “No one discovered Alexander McQueen. Alexander McQueen discovered himself.”

At first, there was no money. A friend describes how the two went to McDonald’s after a major show, dropped the food on the floor, but had to pick it up and eat it because they couldn’t afford to buy more.

Things changed radically when luxury conglomerate LVMH hired McQueen for Givenchy. But McQueen didn’t just sit back and enjoy his financial windfall — he poured it back into his own label. back home. It was a time of enormous pressure; McQueen says in one interview that he produced an astounding 14 collections in a year.

For a man often called the “bad boy” or “enfant terrible” of fashion, there was much else to learn about McQueen, the filmmakers say. Among the things that surprised them: his sheer technical craftsmanship, and a constantly developing business savvy.

‘Tender at times’

They were also struck by how McQueen’s personality contrasted with the myth. “He had this reputation for being abrasive, punk,” said Ettedgui. “But what we see in the archive is McQueen with friends, with his parents, even his beloved dogs, being very human and very tender at times.”

At the end of his life, two deaths devastated McQueen. Blow took her life in 2007 — we see him at her funeral, looking destroyed. And in early 2010, McQueen’s beloved mother died. Only days later, on the eve of her funeral, the designer killed himself.

The filmmakers can only speculate why McQueen, who struggled with drug addiction, took his life. “Fashion does come with a very unique set of pressures,” said Ettedgui. But, he added, “people we spoke to said, ‘Don’t try to make him a victim, because ultimately the person who put the most pressure on McQueen was McQueen.”

Bonhote also noted the designer’s ambivalence about the world he had chosen, clearly expressed in shows like his famous 2001 Voss, in which he forced the assembled fashion world to literally stare at itself for long minutes into a mirrored cube — which in turn represented an insane asylum.

“To some degree, he was always a misfit in the world he found himself in,” Bonhote said.
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An entire generation has been born since Nelson Mandela’s 1990 release from a South African prison, where he spent almost three decades for his anti-apartheid activism.

Ndaba Mandela wants to make sure those young people understand his grandfather’s role – and his values – in fighting for racial equality and later in trying to heal divisions as South Africa’s first black president.

“That is the very reason why I wrote this book,” Ndaba Mandela says of “Going to the Mountain” (Hachette). His goal with the memoir – released last month, in time for Wednesday’s 100th anniversary of the late leader’s birth – is to show the elder Mandela “not as this huge, great icon” but as a supportive grandfather figure they might relate to.

The 35-year-old shared views of his grandfather – who died in late 2013 at age 95 – both in the book and in a recent visit to VOA headquarters here. Ndaba describes him as “courageous” and “fearless” in his quest to end South Africa’s white minority rule, but says that commitment came at great personal cost.

“That is a man who went against the system, who sacrificed his family, sacrificed his own life for the greater good of his people,” Ndaba tells VOA, alluding to his grandfather’s 27 years in detention.

It’s a complicated, extended family, given Mandela’s three marriages and five children. Ndaba’s father was Makgatho Mandela, “the Old Man’s second son by his first wife, Evelyn Ntoko Mase,” he writes, using a term of affection.  

Mandela was imprisoned while that son grew up and became a street hustler in Soweto. Ndaba says his own childhood was chaotic and impoverished, with his parents caught up in alcohol and sometimes fighting bitterly.

“A lot of the time, I would eat at my neighbors’ house, you know, when my parents couldn’t afford to get dinner for me,” he says. “… By any standard, I grew up in a broken home.”

In 1989, 7-year-old Ndaba met his grandfather at Victor Verster Prison, from which the leader was freed several months later. The boy was 11 when he moved in with Mandela and his staff in a house in Johannesburg’s Houghton suburb. He would spend much of the next two decades there – being cared about, and then caring for, the Old Man.

Subtitled “Life Lessons From My Grandfather,” the book explores the older man’s motivations and approaches.

Among those lessons:

“Nonviolence is a strategy,” Ndaba writes, quoting the Old Man. His grandfather subscribed to Gandhi’s strategy “of noncooperation and peaceful but unstoppable resistance. … He was a judicious leader who understood the power of doing the right thing until it overwhelms the wrong thing.”

Education is essential. Nelson Mandela “valued education because it was something that was stripped away” from blacks, says Ndaba, who admits he himself at one point “didn’t perform well at school” and had “a rocky adolescence.” Like his grandfather, he went on to earn a college degree.

Weeks after becoming president in 1994, Mandela established what became the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, donating about a third of his presidential salary every year, his grandson writes. As the elder man had told parliament, “The emancipation of people from poverty and deprivation is most centrally linked” to quality education.

Respect your heritage. The phrase “going to the mountain” refers to ceremonial circumcision – a monthlong rite of passage for young men in the Xhosa ethnic group. Ndaba was almost 21 when he underwent cutting and related psychological and spiritual testing. It was a turning point in his relationship with his grandfather, who then “expected critical thinking and welcomed civilized disagreements,” he writes. “… From the time I was a kid, I knew I could depend on him. This is when he knew he could depend on me.”

Don’t expect change all at once. When Ndaba eventually realized that his grandfather had orchestrated his parents’ separation and also kept them away from him, he writes, “I struggled to forgive him.”

Ndaba’s mother, Zondi, was already gravely ill when he learned that she had HIV/AIDS. She died of its complications in 2003, though a family press release attributed her death to pneumonia.

Ndaba writes that Mandela tried to address the country’s AIDS epidemic in 1991 by promoting safe-sex education, but backed off when accusations that he was “encouraging promiscuity” threatened his political prospects. When Ndaba’s father succumbed to the same disease in early 2005, Mandela called a press conference “to announce that my son has died of AIDS.”

“It’s impossible to overstate what this meant to the millions of people who live in fear of seeking help or disclosing their HIV status and to the millions more people who loved them,” writes Ndaba Mandela, now an ambassador for UNAIDS, the United Nations effort to curb the disease.   

Show leadership through service. Mandela was a man of “integrity, humility,” one who “dived into public service,” his grandson says. “A leader is not someone who says, ‘Look at me, I’m the best’ – a leader is there to serve.”

For Ndaba, service comes through Africa Rising, a nonprofit that he and cousin Kweku Mandela formed in 2009 to improve the continent’s socioeconomics. “We need to empower young Africans,” he says, “to give them a heightened sense of pride and confidence in being African.”

This report originated in VOA’s English to Africa Service.
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Desk jockeys in eye-wateringly tight spandex will blur the line between fantasy and reality this week as they invade San Diego for the world’s largest celebration of pop culture fandom.

The 49th Comic-Con International will revel in movies, TV and — yes — comic books, as fans in pitch-perfect monster, alien and manga costumes swelter in the southern Californian heat over five surreal days.

Where fandom abounds, controversy is never far behind. And the big bone of contention this year is Disney’s decision not to bring its Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) to Comic-Con, despite a record-breaking year with Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War and Ant-Man and the Wasp.

“It’s going to be an interesting year this year,” said SyFy Wire editor-in-chief Adam Swiderski in a video preview of the Wednesday to Sunday get-together at the city’s harborfront convention center.

“A lot of the big players like Marvel, Star Wars and Game of Thrones, who dominated past cons, aren’t going to be there, which gives other properties an opportunity to step into the spotlight.”

Since its humble beginnings in 1970 as the Golden State Comic Book Convention, a gathering of a few dozen geeks who swapped superhero magazines, Comic-Con has exploded in popularity.

Each July, it attracts around 130,000 cosplayers, movie executives, sci-fi fans and bloggers to a feast on all manner of panels, screenings and other attractions.

‘Scare Diego’

Described by Rolling Stone as the “Super Bowl of people who don’t like watching the Super Bowl,” Comic-Con’s beating heart is the 6,500-seat Hall H, where a cornucopia of stars hawk their latest work.

Devotees have been known to wait for days to be among the first to get into the sprawling arena, taking turns with family members and other fans for toilet breaks and sleep.

New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. kick off proceedings Wednesday with “Scare Diego,” where fans will enjoy insights into It: Chapter Two and the frankly terrifying-looking The Nun.

The convention has traditionally persuaded most of the big studios to turn up for detailed presentations of their highly anticipated slates of upcoming movies — but not this year.

Disney is presumably saving its biggest treats for its own biennial D23 fan convention, and Universal’s segment is dedicated to just two movies — M. Night Shyamalan’s Glass and David Gordon Green’s Halloween.

Elsewhere, Paramount brings its spinoff Transformers film Bumblebee and Fox has a Deadpool 2 celebration and preview for its Predator reboot.

Sony presents Venom, and the animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, neither of which are considered part of the MCU, although Marvel was part of the production team.

That cedes the center stage to Warner Bros., which is expected to pull out all the stops in its two-hour Saturday spot.

The schedule is kept tightly under wraps, but insiders say there will almost certainly be thrills and spills from Aquaman, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, the new Fantastic Beasts movie and Shazam!

‘Crazy busy’

“This is a fun room. It’s going to be crazy busy for Warner Bros., like it always is,” said James Riley of the SDConCast podcast.

“But without the pull of the evening Marvel panel to generate such a fervor for the line … we have a feeling this is actually going to be an easy day to get into Hall H.”

The television side of the Comic-Con gets increasingly bigger as the stars follow the voluminous torrent of cash into TV productions funded on a scale never seen before.

This year’s Hall H is expected to be more notable than ever for its small-screen content, despite the absence of HBO’s big-hitters.

“Several other networks will be showing off new and returning series in a hope to cut through the cluttered landscape and maintain, or possibly grow, viewership,” said Lesley Goldberg of The Hollywood Reporter.

AMC has the pick of the convention with a debut appearance from Better Call Saul alongside a 10th anniversary reunion panel for Breaking Bad and a discussion on acclaimed graphic novel adaption Preacher.

The Walking Dead, the most successful show in U.S. cable television history, is back ahead of season nine, expected to debut in October, and there is a panel for its sister show, Fear the Walking Dead.

Other studios plying their TV wares include YouTube Originals and Fox, while SyFy stages what promises to be an emotional farewell to the Sharknado franchise.

Marvel’s movie people might be largely absent, but the studio boasts numerous panels and other event for its TV output, including Cloak & Dagger, Iron Fist and Marvel’s Avengers: Black Panther’s Quest.
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Go-Go’s guitarist Jane Wiedlin has five simple words of advice for female rock bands — “Write. Write. Write. Write. Write,” she said.

 

“I think the world needs a lot more women that are really taking charge of their whole career and image, instead of women being picked by men and then songs get written for them and players played for them,” Wiedlin said. “I just would like to see a little bit more wholly, self-realized female artists. I know there’s some out there. But I want more.”

 

Wiedlin joined other members of her pioneering all-female band on a Broadway stage last week to welcome “Head Over Heels,” the musical based on the band’s infectious hits. They treated the audience to a two-song set at curtain call.

 

“Head Over Heels” weaves the Go-Go’s tunes — “We Got the Beat,” “Our Lips Are Sealed,” and other hits with deep cuts and lead singer Belinda Carlisle’s subsequent singles — to tell an updated take on Sir Philip Sidney’s “Arcadia.” It’s an Elizabethan tale about a royal family trying to escape an oracle’s prophecy of doom, using Shakespearean conventions and reveals and mistaken identities.

“The fact that we actually made it to Broadway feels like it’s kind of a miracle. And also, super unlikely for a band that started 40 years ago as a punk rock band. So, it’s pretty thrilling,” Wiedlin said.

 

The Grammy-nominated Go-Go’s helped pave the way for future female artists and notably sang and played their own songs, but Carlisle stops short of feeling like a role model.

 

“I don’t like that term. I don’t think we’ve ever thought of ourselves as role models. We just did the work and got on with it,” she said. “It’s weird that there aren’t more Go-Go’s that have come along. I don’t know why, but for whatever reason.”

 

The Go-Go’s have no plans to tour, but Wiedlin claims it’s not the end of the band.

 

“In 2016, we did a no-more-touring tour, and basically, we announced we were not going to be touring anymore, which for some reason most people thought that meant we were breaking up. But we’re not broken up,” Wiedlin said.

 

She said the band will continue to work together, and separately, as well as perform in situations she deems, “exciting.” And having time can lead to cool projects, like the Broadway show.

 

“We were all to the point where touring is just a bit too much, so we are very happy to be focused on the musical ‘Head Over Heels’ right now,” she said. “There’s plenty of stuff in the future for us, both together and apart.”
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Amid olive trees and plenty of ABBA tunes, the musical world of “Mamma Mia” took over a London theater on Monday for the film sequel’s world premiere with Oscar winner Meryl Streep and pop diva Cher among the attendees.

Ten years after the movie version of the hit theater musical, “Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again” sees old faces return and new ones join the ABBA sing-along set on a picturesque Greek island where stars belt out tracks by the hugely popular Swedish band.

The plot follows on from the first film, which grossed over $600 million at the box office, but this time has flashbacks explaining how Meryl Streep’s character Donna arrived in Greece.

While fans have highly anticipated the sequel, ABBA founding members Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus said they were not so keen on the idea at first.

“We were kind of protective of the first one because we were very proud of it, it was very good and it became kind of a cult movie … and we thought what’s the point of risking … taking away from that legacy, so we were reluctant,” Ulvaeus told Reuters.

But the film writers’ idea of making the movie a sequel and prequel at the same time helped change their minds, he said.

“I laughed out loud many times when I read (the script’s first draft). It was funny, it was moving so we said go ahead and here we are.”

Chanting “Waterloo,” “Super Trouper” and “Dancing Queen,” fans cheered as Streep, Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, Amanda Seyfried and Christine Baranski – who starred in the 2008 film – arrived.

The sequel’s cast additions include Lily James, who plays the younger Donna, and Cher, who portrays Donna’s mother.

“I don’t know what I was expecting but I walked onto the set and I just thought everyone’s just having fun,” Cher said.

Like the first film, the sequel has plenty of colorful and comic scenes. It also has touching moments, cast members said.

“It’s a great time for this movie to be out in the world, because we’re all feeling a little down about the world right now,” Baranski said. “I think people are going to be transported to this beautiful Greek island with all these beloved characters and all these fabulous songs.”

“Mamma Mia!” the musical originated more than 20 years ago and has gone on to have productions around the world with generations of fans still singing and dancing to ABBA songs some 40 years after their release.

“It’s so humbling and I’m grateful but I cannot say I understand quite how that happened. It’s kind of a miracle,” Ulvaeus said of the band’s success. “Never in our wildest dreams did we think that these songs that we wrote would last for such a long time.”
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Stevie Nicks cried on her living room floor when she first saw LeAnn Rimes perform “Borrowed” on her TV in 2013.

 

The song, about an intimate, yet fleeting romance between Rimes and her lover, came out on Rimes’ “Spitfire” album when Nicks became enamored with it. The Fleetwood Mac singer knew then that she wanted to sing it with Rimes someday.

 

“It was very easy for me to try to be in that same sad, deeply tragic, passionate place where she was when she wrote that song because I had been there. I had lived there for a long time,” Nicks said in an interview with The Associated Press from Mexico, where she was on vacation.

 

Nicks heard from mutual friend and producer Darrell Brown, who co-wrote “Borrowed,” that Rimes was planning to touch up some of her hits for her “Re-Imagined” EP, and she jumped at the chance to record a duet version with Rimes.

 

“Being able to have another artist really kind of get you on so many levels in that authenticity and from that space is really magical,” said Rimes.

 

The new version, released last month, balances Nicks’ soft croon to Rimes’ striking vocals. Like in the previous version, a cool and fading steel guitar compliments the rhythmic melody and calming percussion.

 

Even though Nicks has been singing and recording long before Rimes was on the scene, she said working with her is like going to singing college.

 

“She doesn’t brush over anything,” said 70-year-old Nicks. “You have to sing every single word with her; otherwise it won’t be a good duet because she would leave you in the dust.”

 

Rimes, 35, became a star as a teen and launched hits such as “Blue,” “How Do I Live” and “Can’t Fight the Moonlight.” She won the best new artist Grammy at age 14.

 

Both singers come from different musical backgrounds. Nicks is a rock ‘n’ roll magnate from Phoenix and Rimes has country roots in Texas, but their voices reflect on a shared passion where heartbreak isn’t bound by place, time or genre.

 

Rimes said she came up with the idea for the song during an emotionally troubling moment on an airplane when she noticed someone reading a tabloid magazine with her on the cover. She started to cry when the stranger’s husband came to her comfort.

 

“I honestly feel like that guy was an angel,” she said. “Some things came over me at that moment and I just remember thinking that title (“Borrowed”) to myself.”

 

The first line of the song came to Rimes: “I know you’re not mine. Only borrowed.” From there, she took it to the studio where she fleshed out the rest of the tune.

 

“It’s a very honest, authentic moment and capturing a piece of me that I really didn’t know existed until I wrote this song,” said Rimes.

 

Rimes is currently on a summer tour and Nicks is hitting the road with Fleetwood Mac in the fall. Both singers said they hope to perform the song together someday.

 

“I would love to do a record with LeAnn,” said Nicks. “I’m hoping that for some reason we’ll get to go onstage and sing this song together.”
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Scarlett Johansson’s decision to pull out of a film role playing an American gangster who was born a woman but identified as male could kickstart a drive to get more transgender actors on screen, film insiders and LGBT campaigners said on Monday.

Hollywood star Johansson had agreed to play Dante “Tex” Gill in the film Rub & Tug, but last week said she had decided to leave the role after realizing the casting was “insensitive.”

Her initial casting sparked a backlash on social media as the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community criticized the lack of opportunities for transgender actors.

“Trans exclusion in the media is endemic and not something that’s going to change without pressure on the industry,” said Lily Madigan, a transgender activist and women’s rights official for Britain’s opposition Labour Party.

“My hope is the attention brought to the issue by this recent event will be enough to kick-start a more diverse casting standard,” Madigan told Reuters.

Hollywood has long favored casting non-transgender actors in gender fluid roles, including Jared Leto who won an Oscar for playing a transgender woman in Dallas Buyers Club, and Jeffrey Tambor who has nabbed several awards for playing a father who transitions to a woman in the television series Transparent.

Juno Roche, an author and transgender rights campaigner, said there would be “absolute outrage” if a white actor was cast to play a black person.

“It just seems completely illogical,” she said of casting of Johansson as Gill, a real-life crime kingpin who used a massage parlor as a front for prostitution during the 1970s and 1980s.

None of the 109 movies released by Hollywood’s seven biggest studios in 2017 included a transgender character, according to data from U.S-based LGBTQ advocacy group GLAAD.

“One of the issues we tend to have is people who are openly trans only being considered for trans role,” said Ian Manborde, equality and diversity organizer at Equity, a Britain-based trade union for actors and performers.

“The issue is that some people [who have transitioned] might not want to identify or self-identify as trans. There is still a stigma within the sector,” he said, adding that Equity planned to advise industry employers on how to treat transgender actors.

Filming has yet to begin on Rub & Tug and no replacement for Johansson was immediately announced.

“I can now only hope that the part goes to a trans person or — at the very least — someone who identifies as a member of the LGBTQI [queer and intersex] community,” said Rebecca Root, one of the only openly transgender actresses in Britain.

From the Johansson controversy to Chilean actress Daniela Vega becoming the first transgender presenter at the Oscars and a Cannes Film Festival award for Girl — about a transgender teenage girl’s quest to become a ballerina — this year has seen debates on transgender representation in film come to the fore.
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Rapper Cardi B earned a leading 10 nominations on Monday for the MTV Video Music Awards (VMA), reflecting a break-out year that has seen her become one of the industry’s most successful and sought-after performers.

The New York singer, 25, earned nominations in all the top categories, including both best artist and best new artist, as well as best video, collaboration and choreography mostly for her work with Bruno Mars on “Finesse.”

Cardi B, who shot to fame in August 2017 with her brash female empowerment song “Bodak Yellow,” led a VMA contenders field that included Drake, Camila Cabello, Beyonce and husband Jay-Z.

Performing as The Carters, the power music duo earned eight nominations for their “APES**T” video, which was shot inside the Louvre in Paris against the backdrop of some of the world’s most famous art works.

Childish Gambino, the music stage name of actor Donald Glover, earned seven nominations for his hard-hitting video “This Is America” about black identity and police brutality.

Cardi B and Bruno Mars, The Carters, and Childish Gambino will face off for the top prize — video of the year — against Ariana Grande’s “No Tears Left to Cry,” Camila Cabello’s “Havana,” and Drake’s “God’s Plan.”

Monday’s nominations reflected the popularity of rap, which in 2017 surpassed rock as the most dominant music genre in the United States, and R&B.

Pop singer Taylor Swift managed only three nominations, all in technical categories, for “Look What You Made Me Do,” despite her album “Reputation” being the biggest seller in the United States in 2017.

Britain’s Ed Sheeran got four nominations, including song of the year, for his romantic ballad “Perfect,” which was a worldwide hit.

The fan-voted, youth-oriented VMA awards ceremony with a reputation for irreverence and outrageous stunts will be broadcast live on MTV from New York City on August 20.
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Novak Djokovic of Serbia has won his first Wimbledon title since 2015, defeating South Africa’s Kevin Anderson in straight sets 6-2, 6-2, 7-6.

It is Dkokovic’s fourth Wimbledon championship and his first Grand Slam title since winning the French open two years ago.

Anderson, seeded number eight, was playing two days after a grueling more than six and a half hour semifinal showdown with American John Isner. Anderson had earlier upset defending champion Roger Federer in a five set win in the quarterfinals.

For the 12th seeded Dkovovic, it is his 13th career Grand Slam title.

In the Women’s final Saturday, Angelique Kerber of Germany defeated seven time champion American Serena Williams in straight sets, 6-3, 6-3.

It was Williams’ first Grand Slam final since coming back to the tour after giving birth to her daughter last September.

 
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