絕對

教對聯的老師道，對聯是茶餘飯後有趣的話題，並即場示範，在白板寫了一道上聯：

一輪明月

叫我們猜猜下聯看。同學們靜默半晌，老師施施然寫出下聯：

三級艷星

班上頓笑作一團，拍案叫絕。對得多麼工整，卻又那麼狡猾！

老師又謂，對聯歸根於中國人的思維模式：凡事講相對而非絕對。道德標準是先有父慈才有子孝，天地萬物又是陰陽相對，自《易經》已有之。不禁失笑，心想小弟正同時報了貴校的《易經》入門，可真是巧合之極。想到八卦，乾坤震巽離坎兌艮，確又真的是自成四對，暗暗為那皮毛的所謂融匯貫通而沾沾自喜了一會。

中國人有時真是聰明過頭，反被聰明累 -- 早熟地悟出了萬物互相制衡的道理，而過份順應自然，窒礙了科學的發展；文學上講究對仗，令文人窮畢生的精力雕琢造句，留下令世界驚艷的美文，卻走上八股之路。在相對的思維裏追求「絕對」 -- 令人叫絕的對仗 -- 這是自古以來中國人的命運，有時真叫人感到心疼，卻又怪不得誰。

Oxford? Cambridge

NIXON: We've sat in chairs opposite one another, talking for hours, it seems - days on end - and yet I've hardly gotten to know you. One of my people - ah - as part of the preparation of this interview - did a profile of you, and I'm sorry to say - I only got around to reading it tonight. There's some interesting stuff in there. The Methodist background, modest circumstances. Then off to a grand university. Full of richer, posher types. What was it? Oxford?

FROST: Cambridge.

NIXON: Did the snobs there look down on you too?

FROST: I ... I ...

NIXON: Of course they did. That's our tragedy, isn't it, Mr. Frost? No matter how high we get, they still look down at us ...

* * *

Not so much about the snobs but the fine distinction between Oxford and Cambridge...the correction by Frost in the film is so familiarly awkward that I question myself the need for it whenever I make one. And then I question myself why (I questioned myself). Ah I hate the feeling - such much ado about nothing - yet I can't help feeling that tinge of awkwardness.

走訪諸葛亮

剛讀完這本遠流出版的《走訪諸葛亮》。編者謂這是他們頭一趟出版採訪歷史現場的傳記，我也是第一次讀這樣的書，感覺挺新鮮的。書本敘述諸葛亮的一生，而採訪者就一路追蹤其生平故事發生的地點，拍攝遺址和古跡的現貌。圖文並茂，既是傳記，又像旅遊書，讀來津津有味。

三國時代，英雄輩出，其中諸葛亮尤為後世所頌；除受無數的民間祠廟供奉，還有歷代文人以詩詞推崇：有杜甫的「功蓋三分國，名成八陣圖」、「三顧頻煩天下計，兩朝開濟老臣心」，蘇軾的「人也，神也，仙也，吾不知之，真臥龍也」，多不勝舉。

但也許真的是「故國神遊，多情應笑我」，讀畢本書，發現諸葛亮很多流傳千古的故事，甚麼草船借箭，借東風，空城計，經對比其他史料，編者斷定多半是假的；當中精彩細膩的情節，還靠《三國演義》定形。即使是歷史遺跡，亦備受爭議，如隆中及臥龍崗，均有所謂的孔明隱居古跡，令兩地鬧雙胞案。

編者說明要對諸葛亮去神化，並總括其人好完美主義，做事巨細靡遺，神經緊張。雖然其鞠躬盡瘁，死而後矣精神，仍獲認同，但這難免跟傳說的神機妙算，舉重若輕的形象有出入，令我有點失望。然而，編者沒有反駁《三國志》說其「少有逸群之才，英霸之氣，身長八尺，容貌甚偉，時人異焉」，總算為後人留點想像空間。（未知諸葛先生若知道自己的電影角色，最近由金城武飾演會有何感？）

本書還載有其他有趣資料，如諸葛亮的妻子，據載是個醜女。另又附有岳飛書《前出師表》的全文，印刷精美，氣勢不凡，讀來賞心悅目。除卻一些句法令人不習慣外（大概因為由臺灣及內地人編寫），此書為走訪歷史作了不錯的嘗試。

Inspiring

Just a short note on an inspiring story I read in the local newspaper the other day.

At the peak of his career, Lau was a giant in the printing industry, owning 5 factories, 10 homes, 3 Mercedes and a junk. Hit by SARS in 2003, his firm went bankrupt overnight. He was unemployed for 4 years until he did street cleaning last year. Salute to his ability to put aside his ego to take up a perfectly respectable job but which he probably never dreamt of doing before.

When he tried to apply for jobs with other printers, his former industry competitors thought it was a joke. Not computer literate, he took the trouble to learn from scratch and can now send e-mails. He secured an opportunity with a printer in the Mainland by e-mail.

I think of Churchill's quote during World War II: "If you are going through hell, keep going.". Lau has done it.

難得糊塗

歲晚收爐，索性偷懶，自己不寫，借人家寫的，放在這兒。黃明樂的精彩文章，如當頭棒喝；金融海嘯中，最緊要保持身心康泰，難得糊塗，共勉之。

http://wongminglok.blogspot.com/2009/01/blog-post_24.html

American Wife

Just finished this novel by Curtis Sittenfeld. It's some 500 pages, and I must confess I haven't for ages read a novel that long from the beginning to the end.

The story is told by the voice of Alice Blackwell, the main character of the book and who, basically, is Laura Bush in disguise. As written in the blurb: "American Wife is a work of fiction loosely inspired by the life of an American first lady. Her husband, his parents, and certain prominent members of his administration are recognizable. All other characters in the novel are products of the author's imagination, as are the incidents concerning them."

I suppose guys will find this book essentially feminine. There are detailed accounts of the psychology of a female at different stages of her life - as a child, a teenager, a young lady, a single woman, a married woman, a mother, a first lady. Alice is certainly reflective in character, perhaps because the novel is written in the first person narrative; but even readers (females) who are less of a ponderer than Alice are likely to find certain thought processes described in the book strikingly familiar - the sort of helplessness when stuck with an awkward date, the kind of shock when discovering certain truths about a family member, the estrangement when revisiting a place one used to live in, and so on - the author has done an impressive job in making Alice real.

So far so good for a book that is purely a novel, but the fact that Alice is actually based on Laura Bush gives the work a different perspective. Readers will inevitably compare the characters and incidents with the real ones under the Bush administration, but because there is only so much information available regarding public figures, it becomes impossible to judge whether a particular thing in the book is made up or not. Credit must be given to the research work done behind the scenes - the author quoted 5 reference books in her acknowledgments. However, one would ask: why write a novel based on Laura Bush? No hints are given in the author's acknowledgments, nor in the publisher's blurb. Perhaps it is just an experiment. But where political figures are involved, anything becomes political - is the author, after taking us through the life of Alice, inviting readers to review the Bush years in a more humanizing light? And to read this novel at this time, when Obama has just been elected as US President, gives it an interesting nuance.

The latter part of the book has a lot of descriptions on the frustration or irritation felt by Alice as a first lady when her statements are misquoted, or when friends betray her by revealing secrets or even untrue stories about her life. As readers start to sympathize with how difficult it is to be a first lady, the irony is, this novel may itself be an accomplice in betraying Laura Bush - I imagine the first lady will not be pleased when she reads about the various imagined incidents in the novel which, when mingled with other facts, suggest they may also be real? I hope she will take the book with good humour.

首爾驚艷

走在香港水泄不通的街上，與途人肩摩接踵，還要跟遞在面前的宣傳單張搏鬥的時候，我就像患上幽閉恐懼癥，差點沒尖叫出來。我不愛人多的地方；沒有空間使我窒息。

首爾的仁寺洞古董商街，卻令我對人多擠逼的地方另眼相看。那是一個由數條街道組成的地區，大概旺角般大小，美術館、古董店、工藝品店密集。這樣的一個沒有時裝、沒有最潮電子玩意的地方，要是放在香港，必定門可羅雀。但在首爾的周末傍晚，這樣的地區局然跟香港的旺角一般熱鬧，人來人往，像個盛大的嘉年華。

其中一棟名叫 Ssamzie Market 的建築物，內有數十家工藝品店，各樓層以斜道連接起來，本身就是一件藝術品。廣場上有畫家為遊人即場作人像素描；店鋪貨品各具特色；人們熙來攘往，不令人感到窒息，只覺目不暇給，別具氣氛。香港的西九，能同樣成功嗎？

離開古董商街時，忽見小巷外有指往畫廊的牌示；小巷內的畫廊尚能生存，足見首爾藝術行業的蓬勃。夜幕低垂，望著牌示，忽然想起：驀然回首，那人卻在、燈火闌珊處。