Pour me rapprocher de Marie

Alfredo Kraus – arguably Spain's greatest tenor – sings the aria from Donizetti's Fille du Régiment which translates as "In order to bring Marie closer to me". Better in the French, really.

Memories Enjoyed Because They Focus on Ourselves

One of the more obscure places my C S Lewis reading has taken me is to the Gifford Lectures given at Glasgow by the philosopher Samuel Alexander in 1916-1918, which were published in 1920 as Space, Time and Deity.

The Alexandrine idea that Lewis most frequently drew on was his distinction between contemplation and enjoyment. Alexander argued that it isn't the object of our thought that we enjoy but rather the thought itself:

"... the object of the mind in any mental process is something non-mental, which is contemplated, while the mental process is enjoyed." (Vol. II: 10)

Or, put another way, "... in sensation there is besides the sensum (the object sensed) the mental act of sensing it, and it is this, not the other, which is enjoyed." (Vol. I, 102)

Still on the theme of enjoyment, I rather like this bit on the role of stories and other memories in our lives, especially in so far as they function to keep the focus on what we most enjoy - ourselves:

"The reason why we use introspection so much is that in memory the enjoyed condition is free from those practical urgencies of the present moment which take our attention from ourselves and turn it on the object with which we are concerned and make the accurate record of what we are enjoying difficult or impossible." (Vol. II, 90)

Which all goes to show you can find gems in the most unlikely places.

Tiger Hunt

I don't think you've slept with that one.

We Give Good Bed

Malcolm McComb shows no signs of slowing down as he works out his notice at the South China Morning Post. The latest email marketing campaign – a joint venture with Luxe City Guides – gushes like a fire hydrant that has been rammed by Tiger Woods under the heading "Win LUXE-urious prizes from LUXE City Guides".

If bad wordplay is your thing, then you can win three nights at the Peninsula in Bangkok. All you have to do is write a 50-word review of a hotel, restaurant or shop in Hong Kong or any one of another 11 cities in Asia. But there's a catch: you've got to write the review in "snappy LUXE-style words".

For those of you fortunate enough to be unfamiliar with Luxe's "style", Luxe City Guides' blog is called LUXEtasy (as in ... sorry, absolutely no clue) and its website is "choc (sic) full of unique and useful features just for you ... and a grand-slam of other cool stuff".

Valour overcoming discretion, I clicked the link to the Luxe website, only to be confronted by the following banner headline: We Give Good Bed.

I have a simple challenge for my readers. Write just ten words of utter pap each and I'll stick it together and send it off to our Malcolm. If it proves to be the winning entry, I'll be scrupulously fair and write down the names on a piece of paper. The name to be eaten first by Fletcher (above) will be on the plane to Bangkok.

If you still haven't picked up the Luxe (oops! LUXE) vibe, here's something to help you along – their Tokyo twaddle:

There're tons of designer label faddle, but we show you the exquisite and unique, like ink bar Ito-ya, where you can custom blend your ink to match your hubby's undies, and Ginza Motoji's custom made yukata dressing gowns – you'll never wear terry again, Terry. Just one touch of a button on those famed Japanese wash and blow loos however, and you may never want to leave the lav, let alone your room. Crikey!

SCMP : The Edge of Reason

One of the perks of being in possession of the company's online subscription to the South China Morning Post is that it gives me enough material for an entire conference, as the Psychiatrist remarked to his wife in the Fawlty Towers episode of the same name.

While other newspapers compete with each other to provide well written, thought provoking and original content free of charge over the ether, Hong Kong's finest contents itself with seeking out new depths to plumb, and then pats itself on the back when it finds them.

The latest unguided missile to be shot off by those remarkable people in the SCMP's Marketing & Communications Department is called "Help Us Chart the Future". Rather like the Titanic, the missive was split in two, with one part arriving in November and the other a week later at the beginning of December.

Now, the more attentive of you may recall that the first effort enticed potential respondents by dangling the carrot of a "FREE and IMPORTANT Discussion Group". The accompanying questionnaire asked a few questions about the type of recruitment publications you read, along with the standard personal questions (How old? How rich? How much sex? – you know the thing). They reckoned it would take a minute to complete and they couldn't have been far off.

As for the second effort, I knew something was up when I read that my "valuable opinions" would require "four minutes". Not five minutes, not ten – but four. I have to confess I never got even that far after I came across the following passage, at which point I shouted out like Peter Finch in Network, "I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take it anymore!"

Stress Relievers

As you climb up the hillside behind Wong Tai Sin the sound of traffic fades to a soft hum. Plunging between trees thick with green, other things fade too - thoughts of meetings you have in the coming week and tasks that need doing.

Hiking is the perfect way to escape for a few hours from the stresses in everyday life. And now that autumn has arrived, the temperatures have dropped to cooler levels perfect for exploring the many trails here.

"I go hiking most weekends," says Chester Chan, who works in the financial industry. "During the week, my life is so hectic. I like to get away and go at a slower pace."

The MacLehose trail behind Wong Tai Sin MTR is one of the most easily accessible. Just follow the Shatin Pass Road uphill, watching for the footpath on your left. The path quickly turns to steep steps that carry you up to the ridge above.

Here the path flattens out, diving through shady clusters of trees as it leads along to the famous peak of Lion Rock.

The views from here are fantastic. Peer down over the edge of the cliff to see the vast hazy expanses of Mongkok and Kowloon bay. And also there you will find the rare thing in Hong Kong – complete silence.

Beyond this the path continues through a forest towards the Shing Mun reservoir. Trees crowd together and plants spread out giant glossy leaves. Occasionally there's a rustle as monkeys swing through the branches above.

When they asked me "What do you think about the level of English in the above three articles?" I shot them one of those looks Tim gives when Gareth's being a cock.

When they asked me "If ClassifiedPost is going to have the content similar to the above three articles, how do you think your reading frequency of ClassifiedPost will be?" I unsheathed my ceremonial paper knife and tried repeatedly to fall on it.

You don't believe me? Check this out.

Gas Free Inspectors

As regular readers will know, the magazine of the Hong Kong Occupational Safety & Health Council, Green Cross, is the source of literary nuggets.

I didn't have to dig too deep this issue for a splendid contribution from the Marine Department – motto We are one in promoting excellence in marine services – entitled "Working in Confined Spaces on Vessels".

As you may imagine, it's pretty exciting stuff, so I'll be quoting just the one sentence in case anyone gets hysterical and comes running after me with a 3 iron and a fire hydrant.

"In order to ensure that a safe atmosphere, the proper ventilation of workplaces and the protection against fumes have been in place before carrying out works, a Code of Practice that outlines the basic elements of the work that shall be carried out by the person in charge of works in order to protect the workers from harm will be drafted for consultation."

Aware no doubt that the prose needs a bit of pepping up, the author starts introducing his own characters in the next paragraph:

"The Code also outlines the basic conditions for a safe atmosphere and the related tests to be conducted by 'Gas Free Inspectors'."

Now that's what you call tongue in cheeks.

A Couple More Years

Top Dr Hook number written by Shel Silverstein and Dennis Locorriere:



"I've been to somewhere and found it was nowhere at all."

Rachel Uchitel's Lawyer Gloria Aldred Speaks

I vehemently deny that my client has been gagged by Tiger. Bound, yes, but never gagged.

Safe Haven?

Amid all the companies who send me emails trying to flog me wine – I don't know why I don't move them into Junk – or spam – I really must unsubscribe from the South China Morning Post (more on them next week by the way) – it's nice to get a little culture in the Inbox.

Haven Books' latest missive was an invitation to attend the party for the release (their word, not mine) of a new Hong Kong guidebook. In an attempt to generate a bit of interest, Haven provided testimonials from half a dozen people I'd never heard of, one, who rejoices in the name Rochelle Sneddon, being the Hong Kong International School's New Parent Mentor Program Person. Every school should have one.

But the plug that really caught my eye was penned by "Sonya Madden, fashion designer", who gushed:

"A one-stop life-simplifier with a huge impact on the value of my time. I'm getting the best advise in town so I don't need to look anywhere else. A household staple!"

If I may offer a bit of advise to Haven Books. Time to get a proofreader?

Meanwhile, the response to my Abba poll was so overwhelming that, like Tiger, I'm sticking another one up.

All Aboard for Baby Blue

One of my favourite lunchtime spots, Baby Blue, formerly of Mei Foo Plaza, has been replaced by a branch of the Yeh Lam Kok chain, which I'm told sells distinctly average "Malaysian" food.

But it's not all bad news for fans of the purveyor of decent nosh and serviceable coffee: it's due to open down the road (the Lai Chi Kok Road, to be precise) later this month. The venue alone should be enough to attract the anoraks who collect comics and drool over pictures of plain Chinese women with small boobs and big make-up licking ice-cream cones: Baby Blue will be opening on the fifth floor of KMB HQ.

With the ground floor already occupied by Yoshinoya and Pizzahut (takeaway and delivery only), it may be only a matter of time before your bus ride is enhanced not just by TV infotainment but by meals on wheels.

Light Up a Life Concert at St John's

The Society for the Promotion of Hospice Care does a great deal of important work in line with its motto "adding life to days when days cannot be added to life". Each year the Society organises a concert at St. John's Cathedral in Central, the focus of which is the lighting of the Christmas tree in memory of those who have been loved and lost.

Half a million Hong Kong dollars are raised at the Christmas Concert, which this year features once again the Filipino Fellowship Choir, the Pro-Musica Chorus supported by the SAR Philharmonic Orchestra, and the stalwart Hong Kong Welsh Male Voice Choir, who'll all be reporting for duty next Tuesday (8 December) at 7.30pm.

Besides the traditional congregational carols and après-show mince pies and mulled wine, there'll be excerpts from Handel's Messiah, including And the Glory of the Lord, For unto us a Child is Born and, of course, the Hallelujah Chorus, as well as a couple of Tagalog numbers.

The boys in the garish scarlet shirts will be giving their own special interpretation to four seasonal songs: Angels We Have Heard on High, the Coventry Carol, The Holly and the Ivy and O Holy Night.

The last-named, written by Adolphe Adam of Postillon de Lonjumeau fame, has been recorded by a whole bunch of singers, including 'N Sync, Celine Dion and Josh Groban. But the definitive version belongs to French tenor Georges Thill.

Tickets are HK$100 in advance from the Cathedral Bookshop or available on the door on the night. It's best not to leave it to the last minute, though, as this event is usually a sell-out.

Tiger Update

How's the lie, Tiger?

I dunno – I leave that to my PR people.

Americans Count Cost of Automobile Addiction

Mind that fire hydrant

If only they stormed out of the house for a quick walk around the neighbourhood like everyone else when they have an argument with the wife ...

McComb Quits SCMP

As reported recently, Malcolm in the Muddle, as he's known from Quarry Bay to Tai Po, is leaving the SCMP (the newspaper with the world's highest most bought/least read ratio) for pastures new.

Given that Malcolm is an advertising man, it's odds on that he'll be returning to the magical world of advertising, where, as Roger Thornhill once put it so succinctly, there are no lies, just expedient exaggerations. So, he's unlikely to encounter too much culture shock when he finally clears his desk in the new year.

"I added value to the company and now it's time for me to move on," was Malcolm's verdict on his 15 months as Director of Marketing & Communications in an article for which Roger Thornhill himself could have supplied the headline, "SCMP hit by talent drain".

In another interview, Malcolm gives us a glimpse of his humbler, more vulnerable side when he admits that his "background, talent, skills and interest are not in sync with what the company focuses on in the immediate term".

A graduate of Tragos Bonnage Wiesendanger Ajroldi, better known – for understandable reasons – as TBWA, Malcolm's parting shot is an attempt to beef up the Classified Post, which has been looking very sorry for itself of late with about as much body to it as Shu Qi.

But unlike the invitation to join the SCMP Readers Panel last December, which came with promises of free wine, musical tickets, restaurant vouchers and spa coupons, this time the carrot for joining the Classified Post Discussion Panel is the chance to "let your voice be heard" on their "FREE and IMPORTANT" panel (capitals in the original).

You know what they say, Malcolm. Pay carrots, get donkeys.

Abba Mania

Whisper it softly, but tomorrow evening I'm donning my Lionels and digging out the platform shoes and heading down to Wan Chai to hear a tribute band from Australia butchering Björn and Benny's songs. In fact, these events being – so I am told – the vocal equivalent of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, most of the butchering will be performed by the audience. Yes, even by me – shrinking violet that I am – who will be singing along to numbers which I think I know, but actually don't, thus pissing off my daughter who does know them.

However, I have the big advantage over her of having been around when Sweden's answer to the Fab Four burst onto the scene in 1974, while she has the cheek to think that the Westlife version of classics such as I Have a Dream is superior to the original.

I mean, blimey, it's like saying that The Dark Knight with Christian Bale and Heath Ledger is better than Batman with Adam West and Burt Ward

Anyway, Ill let you be the judges. (I'm even sticking up a special poll for this.) Here's a live Abba performance from 1979 on Spanish TV:



And here's the Irish lads' miserable cover:



If I'm not posting on Monday, you'll know it's because I'm in rehab.

Boring Others into Submission

"And wherefore not? A reasonable reason,
If good, is none the worse for repetition;
If bad, the best way 's certainly to tease on,
And amplify: you lose much by concision,
Whereas insisting in or out of season
Convinces all men, even a politician;
Or—what is just the same—it wearies out.
So the end 's gain'd, what signifies the route?"
(Don Juan, Canto 15, Stanza LI)

Now why did I think of this as, in the latest of shifting alliances that characterise Hong Kong "politics" (the word being used loosely and with apologies to Bernard Crick), the lawyers jump into bed with the whackos, leaving the completely clueless on the sidelines? Or not.

Born for Opposition

"Opposition is true friendship." So wrote William Blake (most famous today as the man who penned the words for England's national song – "Jerusalem", naturally enough) in his Marriage of Heaven and Hell. Owen Barfield – lawyer, writer and friend of C S Lewis, who looked after, or tried to look after, the great man's financial affairs – used this epigram when dedicating his 1928 book Poetic Diction to his contemporary at Oxford.

Theirs was an unusual friendship. Lewis put his debt to Barfield on record by calling him the best of his unofficial teachers in his dedication to his 1936 Allegory of Love, while portraying him in his autobiography Surprised by Joy as a man "who disagrees with you about everything" and "has read all the right books but has got the wrong thing out of every one".

In his immensely enjoyable satirical romp Don Juan, Byron half seriously (was he ever entirely serious? like all the greatest wits, he was rarely purely flippant) seeks to justify the length of his poem by pointing out that opposition requires more words than flattery:

A modest hope – but modesty 's my forte,
And pride my feeble: – let us ramble on.
I meant to make this poem very short,
But now I can't tell where it may not run.
No doubt, if I had wish'd to pay my court
To critics, or to hail the setting sun
Of tyranny of all kinds, my concision
Were more; – but I was born for opposition.

(Canto 15, stanza XXII)

Opposition, or conflict, as he generally refers to it, is also a quality that Alasdair MacIntyre focuses on in After Virtue. He quotes fellow philosopher John Anderson as saying that we should not ask of a social institution "What end or purpose does it serve?" but rather "Of what conflicts is it the scene?", Anderson's insight being that "it is through conflict and sometimes only through conflict that we learn what our ends and purposes are". (163-4)

It is MacIntyre's contention that traditions, vital traditions, will embody conflict. He takes as an example an institution dear to his heart (he worked at enough of them) – the university:

"... when an institution is the bearer of a tradition of practice or practices, its common life will be partly, but in a centrally important way, constituted by a continuous argument as to what a university is and ought to be ... Traditions, when vital, embody continuities of conflict. Indeed when a tradition becomes Burkean*, it is always dying or dead." (222)

* Seen as an anti-rational, stale traditionalism that worships the past and seeks stability at the expense of human flourishing.

In a tantalising passage towards the end of After Virtue, MacIntyre appears to offer a re-evaluation of conflict; or at any rate to offer a scenario in which a type of conflict is depicted as its own worst enemy, allowing pluralism (and multiculturalism?) to render it invisible and thus, we may take it, impotent:

"... Marx was fundamentally right in seeing conflict and not consensus at the heart of modern social structure. It is not just that we live too much by a variety and multiplicity of fragmented concepts; it is that these are used at one and the same time to express rival and incompatible social ideals and policies and to furnish us with a pluralist political rhetoric whose function is to conceal the depth of our conflicts." (253)

2012 Clichés

From the moment at the beginning of the film when the camera zooms in on the battered black Penguin Classic that the hero, also black but considerably less battered, is reading, as his taxi – a 1960s Jaguar – lurches over the potholes on its way to the copper mine at Nigga Donga in India, you know that you're going to be in for one hell of a scary ride.

When you descend into the bowels of the earth in a rickety lift with the hero, who rejoices in the name Chiwetel Ejiofor, and a handsome Indian astrophysicist with a beautiful wife and a chess-playing son, you know that this is going to be a gut-wrenching experience. As you're taken on a Cook's tour from India to Paris via Washington DC, Canada, China (or is it Tibet?) and London, you realise that this movie is going to be Uttar Pradesh.

2012 is a film that sets the bar so low that a cameo by an Arnold Schwarzenegger look-alike provides the highlight. The clichés come so fast that you end up wishing you will be vapourised at the halfway mark with Woody Harrelson, who plays the loony libertarian who may not have a regular pay check coming in but who knows everything from how to run his own radio station from a camper van to how to read the lines he's been given while keeping a straight face.

As compensation for being made to dress up like Lord Baden Powell auditioning for ZZ Top, Woody is given one of the best lines before he exits in what I believe was called a solar climax – a great ball of fire to you and me. When he gets a call from the white hero, John Cusack, asking him where he keeps the map that has the location of the bunker with the space ships in which people with a billion Euros to spare will escape the coming global devastation, Woody replies, "It's on the 'Conspiracy' shelf – between Roswell and Marilyn Monroe."

But, in an incredible twist, it turns out that they're not space ships after all; they're – wait for it – real ships, as in the ones that float in water, in anticipation of the mother and father of all tsunamis that's set to envelop the Himalayas. And what's more, they've been built by the Chinese at breakneck speed under Mount Everest. ("Don't mention Tibet! I mentioned it once but I think I got away with it.") So, not only are they incredibly well built – like everything with "Made in China" stamped on it – they're also guaranteed to ensure that the movie gets shown in Chinese cinemas and goes on to break all box-office records there.

Meanwhile, in a world where you're beginning to say along with Long John that "Them that dies'll be the lucky ones", the White House has morphed to Bleak House via Black House thanks to a performance by Danny Glover that makes Jimmy Carter look strong, credible and statesmanlike. Not only is he the weakest POTUS in history, he has a daughter who rejoices in the name of Thandie Newton and who has the hots for Chiwetel Ejiofor because he's the only guy she's ever met with a weirder name than her own.

"I read 2,000 books in high school and never had a girlfriend," says the geologist, now rock hard and close to eruption.

"I didn't kiss a guy till I was in my twenties," the art historian replies, shuddering as the phallus-shaped ark emerges from a head-on collision with the north face of Everest with nothing more than a cracked helmet.

Yes, they do call them "arks" and, yes, they do carry animals – we see giraffe and elephant swinging from helicopters as they fly over K2. And, yes, the cruise liner that Chiwetel's Dad is employed as a crooner on is called Genesis, and, yes, John Cusack's boy is called Noah. And, yes, Noah's evil stepfather – a bespectacled plastic surgeon who dresses like a dentist – is called Gordon, while Cusack – a failed writer with an Internet addiction – is given the manly name Jackson. Call a man Gordon and you know his fate's been sealed and he won't ever get to beget with Jackson's ex.

Think Gordon, and you think losers like Gordon Liddy and Gordon Brown. Think Jackson, and you think winners like Jackson Pollock and Michael Jackson. Combine them both and what do you get?

A monster like Gordon Jackson.

After Virtue

After Virtue: a Study in Moral Theory, by Scottish philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, was first recommended to me by my PhD supervisor many years ago. Regrettably, along with a number of other suggestions he made, I didn't take him up on this one at the time. However, if you're reading this, Guy, you'll be pleased to know I've finally got round to reading it courtesy of the excellent Hong Kong Public Libraries.

First published in 1981, with a second, corrected edition coming out four years later after MacIntyre had had the opportunity to take on board criticism from his peers, After Virtue is in truth a bit of a curate's egg. To stretch the metaphor a bit, it is, though, a free range egg rather than the product of intensive battery farming. It is thought provoking, quirky and learned; it ranges over a wide variety of subjects; it is generally well written with a surprisingly light touch despite occasional lapses into obscurity.

In essence, the book is a defence of Aristotle (indeed, an attempt to reinstate his moral scheme - minus the slavery) and a rebuttal of Nietzsche, or at least a rebuttal of Nietzsche's take on Aristotle. MacIntyre traces one of his major targets, ethical "emotivism", according to which moral judgments are merely expressions of how we feel about a matter, back to the eighteenth century and an "Enlightenment" that failed to provide an objective basis for moral judgments. After Virtue is MacIntyre's attempt to rehabilitate a moral way of looking at life:

"... I am not merely contending that morality is not what it once was, but also and more importantly that what was once morality has to some large degree disappeared – and that this marks a degeneration, a grave cultural loss." (22)

So who exactly is living "after virtue"? It is that type of liberal individual who has renounced allegiance to all traditions (echoes of Karl Popper here) and who thereby leaves little room for the virtues.

In the middle section, there is a highly enjoyable attack on what the author calls the fiction of managerial effectiveness, with the manager as actor cast in the central role.

"It is histrionic success which gives power and authority in our culture. The most effective bureaucrat is the best actor." (107)

After Virtue is as much a celebration of excellence and a treatise against mediocrity as a philosophical tome. In the age of Celebrity Big Brother and the Chief Executive's Policy Address, it has, then, its place.

Scholesy Shows Frogs How to Do It

No faffing about from the little ginger fellow: