Robert Redford, journalist

He did not just play a journalist: The actor has reporting chops and inspired my career, Ravi Velloor writes.

By Ravi Velloor
Foreign Editor
velloor@sph.com.sg

 

It is not often that I go to the movies these days, but this month I made time to catch two Hollywood productions: The Company You Keep, starring Robert Redford, and The Great Gatsby, the latter more out of curiosity to see if Leonardo DiCaprio did better than the 1974 version featuring Redford. He did not, to my relief.

Why the loyalty to Redford?

It has nothing to do with his acting, or his looks, but reaches back to teenage days and early 1976, when I received my monthly copy of National Geographic magazine with Redford's article, Riding the Outlaw Trail.

Nobel winner F. W. de Klerk on Nelson Mandela and what makes a good leader

The friendly, gum-chewing elderly gentleman sitting across from me was easy to talk to, so much so I nearly forgot I was interviewing a Nobel Peace Laureate.

By Rupali Karekar
Assistant to Editor
rupsk@sph.com.sg

 

The friendly, gum-chewing elderly gentleman sitting across from me was easy to talk to, so much so I nearly forgot I was interviewing a Nobel Peace Laureate.

Mr Frederick Willem de Klerk – better known as F.W. de Klerk – was South Africa’s President when he released anti-apartheid leader and the world’s most famous prisoner, Mr Nelson Mandela, in 1990.

Three years later, he and the famously gentle and soft-spoken Mr Mandela were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their role in dismantling their country’s racial segregation policy.

Careless in Beijing

“To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose both looks like carelessness.” So spoke caustic Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance Of Being Earnest. To paraphrase the great Wilde, “To lose one iPhone may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose two looks like carelessness.” I am guilty [...]

By Ho Ai Li
China Correspondent
hoaili@sph.com.sg

 

“To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose both looks like carelessness.” So spoke caustic Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance Of Being Earnest.

To paraphrase the great Wilde, “To lose one iPhone may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose two looks like carelessness.”

I am guilty as charged.

On the Beach (Boys)

Irene Hoe experiences some Good Vibrations at the Beach Boys' first concert in Singapore.

By Irene Hoe

irenehoe@gmail.com

 

The Beach Boys put on a Fun, Fun, Fun performance in their first Singapore concert. -- ST PHOTO: JOHN LUI

Good Vibrations reverberated through the Singapore Indoor Stadium last night as the Beach Boys turned this patch of sand into Surfin' USA.

It was the Sixties again and I must have been all of 15 (Radio Singapore was kinda conservative) when I first heard the Beach Boys ask Do you love me, Surfer Girl? and fell in love with Brian Wilson, Carl Wilson, Dennis Wilson, Mike Love and Al Jardine.

Remember commercial icons

Loh Keng Fatt reflects on whether the closure of iconic commercial establishments deserve a place in national memory.

By Loh Keng Fatt
Copy Editor
kengfatt@sph.com.sg

 

Yet another iconic food hangout - the McDonald's in King Albert Park - is going to close.

Even as some folks bemoan the loss of heritage places like Bukit Brown cemetary, it is a little-reported fact that other places - arguably also landmarks - are not spared the winds of so-called progress.

Massages: Who kneads them?

Joel Cooper gets wound up over 'relaxing' spa treatments

By Joel Cooper
Copy Editor
jacooper@sph.com.sg

 

I like nothing better than to relax, unwind and feel the tension ebb from my tired body.

What I’m not so keen on is having scorching wax dribbled onto my face, then ripped off with what feels like Scotch Tape.

Yet, this was my punishment for vanity after I let my wife talk me into going for a facial.

Is Tintin the world's most unethical journalist?

As the phone tapping inquiry heats up, Joel Cooper asks why one shameless hack is still refusing to mend his ways.

By Joel Cooper
Copy Editor
jacooper@sph.com.sg

 

Hacking phones, bribing cops - it seems nothing is off limits for the sleazy tabloid pack.

But despite the growing backlash, one particularly sordid and unethical journalist has so far managed to escape unscathed.

Don't be fooled by his boyish charm and innocent looking white dog.

Winehouse, Cobain and the 'curse' of the 27 Club

After singer Amy Winehouse is found to have died of alcohol poisoning, Joel Cooper asks: Why do so many stars die at 27?

By Joel Cooper
Copy Editor
jacooper@sph.com.sg

 

When Amy Winehouse was found dead in her London flat in July, fans were devastated but maybe not that surprised.

It was no secret that the British soul diva with the towering beehive hairdo and even bigger talent had been fighting a losing battle against various addictions.

Her best known song was titled Rehab and the press had cruelly nicknamed her Wino – a reference to her debauched lifestyle, which was fuelled by a destructive on-off relationship with her junkie former husband Blake Fielder-Civil.

Life lessons in homeschooling

Carmelita Miki Kwek on what homeschooling has taught her

By Carmelita Miki Kwek
Online Journalist
mikikwek@sph.com.sg

 

A lot of adults talk about the ‘rat race’ of corporate life, but I don’t know anything about that. I’m not eighteen yet - I just finished my A-level equivalents, and I’ve only had an office job for about four weeks (and don’t my bosses and supervisors know it).

But I do know about the educational system.

I used to attend a mission school in Singapore. My parents began homeschooling my sister and me when we relocated to Shanghai in 2003.

Harry Potter: My moral codebook

Ashutosh Ravikrishnan shares the life lessons he learnt from the Harry Potter series

By Ashutosh Ravikrishnan
Web Journalist
dufflover@gmail.com

 

'I'm going to bed before either of you come up with another clever idea to get us all killed  - or worse, expelled.'

Hermione Granger, 11, a first-year student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, had just returned to her dormitory with her friends, Ron Weasley and Harry Potter, after accidentally discovering a three-headed dog in an area out of bounds to all students.

To a nine-year-old me then, it seemed that getting expelled would be worse than getting killed.