Category: Entertainment

JAYAPURA, Indonesia — On the southeastern coast of the city of Jayapura, Petronela Merauje walked from house to house in her floating village inviting women to join her the next morning in the surrounding mangrove forests.

Merauje and the women of her village, Enggros, practice the tradition of Tonotwiyat, which literally means “working in the forest.” For six generations, women from the 700-strong Papuan population there have worked among the mangroves collecting clams, fishing and gathering firewood.

“The customs and culture of Papuans, especially those of us in Enggros village, is that women are not given space and place to speak in traditional meetings, so the tribal elders provide the mangrove forest as our land,” Merauje said. It’s “a place to find food, a place for women to tell stories, and women are active every day and earn a living every day.”

The forest is a short 13 kilometers away from downtown Jayapura, the capital city of Papua, Indonesia’s easternmost province. It’s been known as the women’s forest since 2016, when Enggros’ leader officially changed its name. Long before that, it had already been a space just for women. But as pollution, development and biodiversity loss shrink the forest and stunt plant and animal life, those in the village fear an important part of their traditions and livelihoods will be lost. Efforts to shield it from devastation have begun but are still relatively small.

Women have their own space — but it’s shrinking

One early morning, Merauje and her 15-year-old daughter took a small motorboat toward the forest. Stepping off on Youtefa Bay, mangrove trees all around, they stood chest-deep in the water with buckets in hand, wiggling their feet in the mud to find bia noor, or soft-shell clams. The women collect these for food, along with other fish.

“The women’s forest is our kitchen,” said Berta Sanyi, another woman from Enggros village.

That morning, another woman joined the group looking for firewood, hauling dry logs onto her boat. And three other women joined on a rowboat.

Women from the next village, Tobati, also have a women’s forest nearby. The two Indigenous villages are only 2 kilometers apart, and they’re culturally similar, with Enggros growing out of Tobati’s population decades ago. In the safety of the forest, women of both villages talk about issues at home with one another and share grievances away from the ears of the rest of the village.

Alfred Drunyi, the leader of Drunyi tribe in Enggros, said that having dedicated spaces for women and men is a big part of the village’s culture. There are tribal fines if a man trespasses and enters the forest, and the amount is based on how guilty the community judges the person to be.

“They should pay it with our main treasure, the traditional beads, maybe with some money. But the fines should be given to the women,” Drunyi said.

But Sanyi, 65, who’s been working in the forest since she was just 17, notes that threats to the space come from elsewhere.

Development on the bay has turned acres of forest into large roads, including a 700-meter bridge into Jayapura that passes through Enggros’ pier. Jayapura’s population has exploded in recent decades, and around 400,000 people live in the city — the largest on the island.

In turn, the forest has shrunk. Nearly six decades ago, the mangrove forest in Youtefa Bay was about 514 hectares. Estimates say it’s now less than half that.

“I am so sad when I see the current situation of the forest,” Sanyi said, “because this is where we live.” She said many residents, including her own children, are turning to work in Jayapura instead of maintaining traditions.

Pollution puts traditions and health at risk

Youtefa Bay, where the sea’s brackish water and five rivers in Papua meet, serves as the gathering bowl for the waste that runs through the rivers as they cross through Jayapura.

Plastic bottles, tarpaulins and pieces of wood are seen stuck between the mangrove roots. The water around the mangrove forest is polluted and dark.

After dozens of years being able to feel the clams on the bay with her feet, Sanyi said she now often has to feel through trash first. And once she removes the trash and gets to the muddy ground where the clams live, there are many fewer than there used to be.

Paula Hamadi, 53, said that she never saw the mangrove forest as bad as it is now. For years, she’s been going to the forest almost every day during the low tide in the morning to search for clams.

“It used to be different,” Hamadi said. “From 8 a.m. to 8:30 in the morning, I could get one can. But now, I only get trash.”

The women used to be able to gather enough clams to sell some at the nearest village, but now their small hauls are reserved for eating with their families.

A study in 2020 found that high concentrations of lead from waste from homes and businesses were found at several points in the bay. Lead can be toxic to humans and aquatic organisms, and the study suggests it has contaminated several species that are often consumed by the people of Youtefa Bay.

Other studies also showed that populations of shellfish and crab in the bay were declining, said John Dominggus Kalor, a lecturer on fisheries and marine sciences at Cenderawasih University.

“The threats related to heavy metal contamination, microplastics, and public health are high,” Kalor said. “In the future, it will have an impact on health.”

Some are trying to save the land

Some of the mangrove areas have been destroyed for development, leading to degradation throughout the forest.

Mangroves can absorb the shocks of extreme weather events, like tsunamis, and provide ecosystems with the needed environment to thrive. They also serve social and cultural functions for the women, whose work is mostly done between the mangroves.

“In the future people will say that there used to be a women’s forest here” that disappeared because of development and pollution, said Kalor.

Various efforts to preserve it have been made, including the residents of Enggros village themselves. Merauje and other women from Enggros are trying to start mangrove tree nurseries and, where possible, plant new mangrove trees in the forest area.

“We plant new trees, replace the dead ones, and we also clean up the trash around Youtefa Bay,” Merauje said. “I do that with my friends to conserve, to maintain this forest.”

Beyond efforts to reforest it, Kalor said there also needs to be guarantees that more of the forest won’t be flattened for development in the future.

There is no regional regulation to protect Youtefa Bay and specifically the women’s forests, but Kalor thinks it would help prevent deforestation in the future.

“That should no longer be done in our bay,” he said. 
…

BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA — Argentina produces some of the best football players on the planet and has three World Cup titles to prove it.

Off the field, though, a major power struggle is transpiring between Argentina President Javier Milei and Argentine Football Association president Claudio Tapia.

Tapia opposes Milei’s effort to enable football clubs to become sports limited companies, inspired by the model of the English Premier League. He wants clubs to continue to belong to members — not to private shareholders.

The government threatened to intervene in AFA due to alleged irregularities in Tapia’s reelection to a third term.

Amid this struggle, FIFA and CONMEBOL warned that any government interference in the management of AFA will result in its disaffiliation, and its teams will be marginalized from all competitions.

What did Milei’s decree say?

Milei, a libertarian economist who has pushed economic deregulation, signed a decree last December enabling football clubs organized as civil associations to transform into public limited companies. The former do not pursue a commercial purpose, while PLCs seek profit.

The government also gave sports associations, federations and confederations a period of one year from August to modify their statutes and accept this new form of organization.

The new model is optional and clubs that want to transform into sports corporations will require the vote of two-thirds of their members present at an extraordinary assembly.

Milei said that the time has come to end “poor socialism” in football and predicted a windfall of investment.

What does the federation say?

AFA says its statutes prohibit the affiliation and participation in its tournaments of sports corporations. It won a court order blocking the decree. That ruling was appealed by the government and the Supreme Court will have the last word.

“The clubs need to fulfill the function they fulfill as the civil associations that they are,” Tapia said. “I am convinced that that is its essence. Most clubs have an established statute that civil associations are not to be changed.”

If a club decides to become a public limited company, it will be disaffiliated, AFA warned.

An imperfect model?

Argentina is a renowned producer of football talent — Lionel Messi and Diego Maradona start the list.

Despite the success developing young players, most clubs are forced to let them go earlier to be able to financially sustain not only their professional team, but also other sports and social activities in the club.

In Argentine football “we are 40 years behind,” said Guillermo Tofoni, a FIFA agent who is also an adviser in Milei’s government. “It is played any day, at any time, the tournaments (formats) change, the corruption of the referees. All this combination means that the television networks do not pay what they deserve, and a vicious and non-virtuous circle is generated.”

Argentine football receives less than $100 million a year for television rights, far below the billions of dollars shared by English Premier League clubs.

According to Tofoni, with genuine private capital investment “clubs can keep their players until they are 24, 25 years old, and sell them to the European market when it is convenient, not because they need to.”

Are clubs willing to try it?

So far, Estudiantes La Plata and Talleres de Córdoba are the only clubs publicly in favor of allowing private capital to enter football.

“I am pragmatic, I understand that soccer is a business. They leave us out of business, Argentina, Argentine football is out of business,” Estudiantes president Juan Sebastián Verón said. “Let us not be afraid of growth, of the new, which can take us to a very important place in the future.”

The former Argentina midfielder recently signed a pre-agreement with the American businessman Foster Gillett, who will invest $150 million in the club.

In turn, the American investor will benefit from future sales of players, the commercial exploitation of the stadium’s name and profits from competing in international tournaments. The agreement must be endorsed by the members of “Pincha” in an extraordinary assembly.

Tapia’s reelection bad news for Milei?

Amid the dispute, Tapia called an election of new AFA authorities a year early. As the only candidate, Tapia was reelected to a third term on October 17, thus ensuring he would continue in office until 2028 — a year after the end of Milei’s term.

“It looks like Venezuela with (President Nicolás) Maduro celebrated Christmas earlier,” said Milei, who a few days later signed a decree that took away social security benefits from AFA.

In turn, the General Inspection of Justice, a body dependent on the Ministry of Justice and in charge of regulating civil associations, challenged Tapia’s reelection and threatened to intervene in the AFA.

However, a civil appeals court upheld the October vote.

What does FIFA and CONMEBOL say?

Both entities are closely following the dispute. In official notes, they indicated that only the local federation can set the statutory framework of the clubs and warned that state interference is a cause for disaffiliation.

“The AFA, and only the AFA, is, in view of the legal framework of FIFA, the only entity competent to decide, through its legitimate associative governing bodies, aspects relating to the legal nature of the clubs affiliated to the same,” FIFA said.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino also congratulated Tapia on his reelection and thanked him for “all his efforts, work and important contribution to the development of our sport.”
…

NEW YORK — The brooding waltz was carefully composed on a sheet of music roughly the size of an index card. The brief, moody number also bore an intriguing name, written at the top in cursive: “Chopin.”

A previously unknown work of music penned by the European master Frederic Chopin appears to have been found at the Morgan Library & Museum in Manhattan.

The untitled and unsigned piece is on display this month at the opulently appointed institution, which had once been the private library of financier J. P. Morgan.

Robinson McClellan, the museum curator who uncovered the manuscript, said it’s the first new work associated with the Romantic era composer to be discovered in nearly a century.

But McClellan concedes that it may never be known whether it is an original Chopin work or merely one written in his hand.

The piece, set in the key of A minor, stands out for its “very stormy, brooding opening section” before transitioning to a melancholy melody more characteristic of Chopin, McClellan explained.

“This is his style. This is his essence,” he said during a recent visit to the museum. “It really feels like him.”

Curator finds composition in collection

McClellan said he came across the work in May as he was going through a collection from the late Arthur Satz, a former president of the New York School of Interior Design. Satz had acquired it from A. Sherrill Whiton Jr., an avid autograph collector who had been director of the school.

McClellan then worked with experts to verify its authenticity.

The paper was found to be consistent with what Chopin favored for manuscripts, and the ink matched a kind typical in the early 19th century when Chopin lived, according to the museum. But a handwriting analysis determined the name “Chopin” written at the top of the sheet was penned by someone else.

Born in Poland, Chopin was considered a musical genius from an early age. He lived in Warsaw and Vienna before settling in Paris, where he died in 1849 at the age of 39, likely of tuberculosis.

He’s buried among a pantheon of artists at the city’s famed Pere Lachaise Cemetery, but his heart, pickled in a jar of alcohol, is housed in a church in Warsaw, in keeping with his deathbed wish for the organ to return to his homeland.

Artur Szklener, director of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute in Warsaw, the Polish capital city where the composer grew up, agreed that the document is consistent with the kinds of ink and paper Chopin used during his early years in Paris.

Chopin expert calls piece ‘little gem’

Musically, the piece evokes the “brilliant style” that made Chopin a luminary in his time, but it also has features unusual for his compositions, Szklener said.

“First of all, it is not a complete work, but rather a certain musical gesture, a theme laced with rather simple piano tricks alluding to a virtuoso style,” Szklener explained in a lengthy statement released after the document was revealed last month.

He and other experts conjecture the piece could have been a work in progress. It may have also been a copy of another’s work, or even co-written with someone else, perhaps a student for a musical exercise.

Jeffrey Kallberg, a University of Pennsylvania music professor and Chopin expert who helped authenticate the document, called the piece a “little gem” that Chopin likely intended as a gift for a friend or wealthy acquaintance.

“Many of the pieces that he gave as gifts were short – kind of like ‘appetizers’ to a full-blown work,” Kallberg said in an email. “And we don’t know for sure whether he intended the piece to see the light of day because he often wrote out the same waltz more than once as a gift.”

David Ludwig, dean of music at The Juilliard School, a performing arts conservatory in Manhattan, agreed the piece has many of the hallmarks of the composer’s style.

“It has the Chopin character of something very lyrical and it has a little bit of darkness as well,” said Ludwig, who was not involved in authenticating the document.

But Ludwig noted that, if it’s authentic, the tightly composed score would be one of Chopin’s shortest known pieces. The waltz clocks in at under a minute long when played on piano, as many of Chopin’s works were intended.

“In terms of the authenticity of it, in a way it doesn’t matter because it sparks our imaginations,” Ludwig said. “A discovery like this highlights the fact that classical music is very much a living art form.”

The Chopin reveal comes after the Leipzig Municipal Libraries in Germany announced in September that it had uncovered a previously unknown piece likely composed by a young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in its collections.
…

NEW YORK — Alice Brock, whose Massachusetts-based eatery helped inspire Arlo Guthrie’s deadpan Thanksgiving standard, Alice’s Restaurant Massacree, has died at age 83.

Her death, just a week before Thanksgiving, was announced Friday by Guthrie on the Facebook page of his own Rising Son Records. Guthrie wrote that she died in Provincetown, Massachusetts, her residence for some 40 years, and referred to her being in failing health. Other details were not immediately available.

“This coming Thanksgiving will be the first without her,” Guthrie wrote. “Alice and I spoke by phone a couple of weeks ago, and she sounded like her old self. We joked around and had a couple of good laughs even though we knew we’d never have another chance to talk together.”

Born Alice May Pelkey in New York City, Brock was a lifelong rebel who was a member of Students for a Democratic Society among other organizations. In the early 1960s, she dropped out of Sarah Lawrence College, moved to Greenwich Village and married Ray Brock, a woodworker who encouraged her to leave New York and resettle in Massachusetts.

Guthrie, son of the celebrated folk musician Woody Guthrie, first met Brock around 1962 when he was attending the Stockbridge School in Massachusetts and she was the librarian. They became friends and stayed in touch after he left school, when he would stay with her and her husband at the converted Stockbridge church that became the Brocks’ main residence.

On Thanksgiving Day, 1965, a simple chore led to Guthrie’s arrest, his eventual avoidance of military service during the Vietnam War and a song that has endured as a protest classic and holiday favorite. Guthrie and his friend Richard Robbins were helping the Brocks throw out trash but ended up tossing it down a hill because they couldn’t find an open dumpster. Police charged them with illegal dumping, briefly jailed them and fined them $50, a seemingly minor offense with major repercussions.

By 1966, Alice Brock was running The Back Room restaurant in Stockbridge, Guthrie was a rising star and his breakout song was an 18-minute talking blues that recounted his arrest and how it made him ineligible for the draft. The chorus was a tribute to Alice — whose restaurant, Guthrie pointed out, was not actually called Alice’s Restaurant — that countless fans have since memorized:

You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant / You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant / Walk right in it’s around the back / Just a half a mile from the railroad track / You can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.

Guthrie assumed his song was too long to catch on commercially, but it soon became a radio perennial and part of the popular culture. Alice’s Restaurant was the title of his million-selling debut album, and the basis of a movie and cookbook of the same name. Alice Brock would write a memoir, My Life as a Restaurant, and collaborate with Guthrie on a children’s book, Mooses Come Walking. At the time of her death, they had been discussing an exhibit dedicated to her at her former Stockton home, now the Guthrie Center, which serves free dinners every Thanksgiving. 

Brock ran three different restaurants at various times, although she would later acknowledge she initially didn’t care much for cooking or for business. She would also cite her professional life as a cause of her marriage breaking up, while disputing rumors that she had been unfaithful to her husband. Her honor was immortalized by Guthrie, who late in Alice’s Restaurant advised: “You can get anything you want” at Alice’s Restaurant, “excepting Alice.”
…

A piece of art that is little more than a banana duct-taped to a wall sold at auction for $6.2 million on Wednesday to cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun, Sotheby’s said, furthering the universal conversation about what constitutes art. 

“Comedian,” by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, first rocked the art world upon its debut at Miami’s Art Basel in 2019, drawing such large crowds that the exhibit had to be taken down for public safety and to protect other works on display. 

At Sotheby’s in New York on Wednesday, it went from a starting price of $800,000 to $5.2 million when the hammer fell about five minutes later, plus a buyer’s premium, or fee. 

Bidding soared past the pre-sale high estimate of $1.5 million, Sotheby’s said, with bidders in the room, on the phone and online. 

Sun, the Chinese collector and founder of the cryptocurrency Tron, placed the winning bid over the phone. He paid in crypto and it will be the buyer’s responsibility to replace the banana as it rots, according to Artnet.com. 

“This is not just an artwork,” Sun said in a statement to Sotheby’s. “It represents a cultural phenomenon that bridges the worlds of art, memes, and the cryptocurrency community. I believe this piece will inspire more thought and discussion in the future and will become a part of history.” 

Sun said he would eat the banana, as at least two spectators have done in other galleries on the piece’s trip around the world. 

Cattelan is known for other bold works such as a golden toilet and a sculpture of the pope struck down by a meteorite. 

Art experts said in a Sotheby’s video about the work that it was funny, absurd and a symbol of the excess of the art market, likening it to the Banksy work “Girl with Balloon” that shredded itself during a Sotheby’s auction in London in 2018. 
…

Making decorative gingerbread houses is a Christmas tradition in several countries. A New York City museum has gone a step further by using the humble holiday cookie to construct a stunning tribute to the Big Apple. Aron Ranen has the story.
…

NEW YORK — Arthur Frommer, whose “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day” guidebooks revolutionized leisure travel by convincing average Americans to take budget vacations abroad, has died. He was 95.

Frommer died from complications of pneumonia, his daughter Pauline Frommer said Monday.

“My father opened up the world to so many people,” she said. “He believed deeply that travel could be an enlightening activity and one that did not require a big budget.”

Frommer began writing about travel while serving in the U.S. Army in Europe in the 1950s. When a guidebook he wrote for American soldiers overseas sold out, he launched what became one of the travel industry’s best-known brands, self-publishing “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day” in 1957.

“It struck a chord and became an immediate best-seller,” he recalled in an interview with The Associated Press in 2007, on the 50th anniversary of the book’s debut.

The Frommer’s brand, led today by his daughter Pauline, remains one of the best-known names in the travel industry, with guidebooks to destinations around the world, an influential social media presence, podcasts and a radio show.

Frommer’s philosophy — stay in inns and budget hotels instead of five-star hotels, sightsee on your own using public transportation, eat with locals in small cafes instead of fancy restaurants — changed the way Americans traveled in the mid- to late 20th century. He said budget travel was preferable to luxury travel “because it leads to a more authentic experience.” That message encouraged average people, not just the wealthy, to vacation abroad.

It didn’t hurt that his books hit the market as the rise of jet travel made getting to Europe easier than crossing the Atlantic by ship. The books became so popular that there was a time when you couldn’t visit a place like the Eiffel Tower without spotting Frommer’s guidebooks in the hands of every other American tourist.

Frommer’s advice also became so standard that it’s hard to remember how radical it seemed in the days before discount flights and backpacks. “It was really pioneering stuff,” Tony Wheeler, founder of the Lonely Planet guidebook company, said in an interview in 2013. Before Frommer, Wheeler said, you could find guidebooks “that would tell you everything about the church or the temple ruin. But the idea that you wanted to eat somewhere and find a hotel or get from A to B — well, I’ve got a huge amount of respect for Arthur.”

“Arthur did for travel what Consumer Reports did for everything else,” said Pat Carrier, former owner of The Globe Corner, a travel bookstore in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The final editions of Frommer’s groundbreaking series were titled “Europe from $95 a Day.” The concept no longer made sense when hotels could not be had for less than $100 a night, so the series was discontinued in 2007. But the Frommer publishing empire did not disappear, despite a series of sales that started when Frommer sold the guidebook company to Simon & Schuster. It was later acquired by Wiley Publishing, which in turn sold it to Google in 2012. Google quietly shut the guidebooks down, but Arthur Frommer — in a David vs. Goliath triumph — got his brand back from Google. In November 2013 with his daughter Pauline, he relaunched the print series with dozens of new guidebook titles.

“I never dreamed at my age I’d be working this hard,” he told the AP at the time, age 84.

Frommer also remained a well-known figure in 21st century travel, opinionated to the end of his career, speaking out on his blog and radio show. He hated mega-cruise ships and railed against travel websites where consumers put up their own reviews, saying they were too easily manipulated with phony postings. And he coined the phrase “Trump Slump” in a widely quoted column that predicted a slump in tourism to the U.S. after Donald Trump was elected president.

Frommer was born in Lynchburg, Virginia, and grew up during the Great Depression in Jefferson City, Missouri, the child of a Polish father and Austrian mother. “My father had one job after another, one company after another that went bankrupt,” he recalled. The family moved to New York when he was a teenager. He worked as an office boy at Newsweek, went to New York University and was drafted upon graduating from Yale Law School in 1953. Because he spoke French and Russian, he was sent to work in Army intelligence at a U.S. base in Germany, where the Cold War was heating up.

His first glimpse of Europe was from the window of a military transport plane. Whenever he had a weekend leave or a three-day pass, he’d hop a train to Paris or hitch a ride to England on an Air Force flight. Eventually he wrote “The GI’s Guide to Traveling in Europe,” and a few weeks before his Army stint was up, he had 5,000 copies printed by a typesetter in a German village. They were priced at 50 cents apiece, distributed by the Army newspaper, Stars & Stripes.

Shortly after he returned to New York to practice law at the firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, he received a cable from Europe. “The book was sold out, would I arrange a reprint?” he said.

Soon after he spent his month’s vacation from the law firm doing a civilian version of the guide. “In 30 days I went to 15 different cities, getting up at 4 a.m., running up and down the streets, trying to find good cheap hotels and restaurants,” he recalled.

The resulting book, the very first “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day,” was much more than a list. It was written with a wide-eyed wonder that verged on poetry: “Venice is a fantastic dream,” Frommer wrote. “Try to arrive at night when the wonders of the city can steal upon you piecemeal and slow. … Out of the dark, there appear little clusters of candy-striped mooring poles; a gondola approaches with a lighted lantern hung from its prow.”

Eventually Frommer gave up law to write the guides full-time. Daughter Pauline joined him with his first wife, Hope Arthur, on their trips starting in 1965, when she was 4 months old. “They used to joke that the book should be called ‘Europe on Five Diapers a Day,'” Pauline Frommer said.

In the 1960s, when inflation forced Frommer to change the title of the book to “Europe on 5 and 10 Dollars a Day,” he said “it was as if someone had plunged a knife into my head.”

Asked to summarize the impact of his books in a 2017 Associated Press interview, he said that in the 1950s, “most Americans had been taught that foreign travel was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, especially travel to Europe. They were taught that they were going to a war-torn country where it was risky to stay in any hotel other than a five-star hotel. It was risky to go into anything but a top-notch restaurant. … And I knew that all these warnings were a lot of nonsense.”

He added: “We were pioneers in also suggesting that a different type of American should travel, that you didn’t have to be well-heeled.”

To the end of his life, he said he avoided traveling first class. “I fly economy class and I try to experience the same form of travel, the same experience that the average American and the average citizen of the world encounters,” he said.

As Frommer aged, his daughter Pauline gradually became the force behind the company, promoting the brand, managing the business and even writing some of the content based on her own travels. Her relationship with her father was both tender and respectful, and she summed it up this way in a 2012 email to AP: “It’s wonderful to have a working partner whose mind is a steel trap, and who doesn’t just have smarts, but wisdom. His opinions, whether or not you agree with them, come from his social values. He’s a man who puts ethics at the center of his life, and weaves them into everything he does.”

In addition to Pauline, Frommer’s survivors include his second wife, Roberta Brodfeld, and four grandchildren.
…

ISANTI, Minn. — The young Buddhist lama sat on a throne near an altar decorated with flowers, fruits and golden statues of the Buddha, watching the celebrations of his 18th birthday in silence, with a faint smile. 

Jalue Dorje knew it would be the last big party before he joins a monastery in the Himalayan foothills — thousands of kilometers from his home in a Minneapolis suburb, where he grew up like a typical American teen playing football and listening to rap music. 

But this was not an ordinary coming-of-age celebration. It was an enthronement ceremony for an aspiring spiritual leader who from an early age was recognized by the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan Buddhist leaders as a reincarnated lama. 

From the stage, he saw it all: The young women in white long bearded masks who danced, jumping acrobatically and twirling colorful sticks to wish him luck in a tradition reserved for dignitaries. The banging of drums. The procession of hundreds – from children to elderly — who lined up to bow to him and present him with a “khata” — the white Tibetan ceremonial scarves that symbolize auspiciousness. 

From a throne reserved for lamas, he smelled the aroma of Tibetan dishes prepared by his mother over sleepless nights. He heard the monks with shaved heads, in maroon and gold robes like his own, chant sacred mantras. Behind them, his shaggy-haired high school football teammates sang “Happy Birthday” before he cut the first slice of cake. 

One of his buddies gave him shaker bottles for hydrating during training at the gym; another, a gift card to eat at Chipotle Mexican Grill. 

“I was in awe!” Dorje recalled later. “Usually, I’d be at the monk section looking up to whomever was celebrating. But that night it was for me.” 

Watching Monday Night Football and memorizing ancient Buddhist prayers 

Since the Dalai Lama’s recognition, Dorje has spent much of his life training to become a monk, memorizing sacred scriptures, practicing calligraphy and learning the teachings of Buddha. 

After graduation in 2025, he’ll head to northern India to join the Mindrolling Monastery, more than 11,500 kilometers from his home in Columbia Heights. 

Following several years of contemplation and ascetism, he hopes to return to America to teach in the Minnesota Buddhist community. His goal is “to become a leader of peace,” following the example of the Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela and Gandhi. 

“There’s going to be a lot of sacrifice involved,” Dorje said. But he’s not new to sacrifices. 

He remembered all the early mornings reciting ancient prayers and memorizing Buddhist scriptures, often rewarded by his dad with Pokémon cards. 

“As a child, even on the weekend, you’re like: ‘Why don’t I get to sleep more? Why can’t I get up and watch cartoons like other kids.’ But my dad always told me that it’s like planting a seed,” he said, “and one day it’s going to sprout.” 

It all began with the process of identifying a lama, which is based on spiritual signs and visions. Dorje was about four months old when he was identified by Kyabje Trulshik Rinpoche, a venerated master of Tibetan Buddhism and leader of the Nyingma lineage. He was later confirmed by several lamas as the eighth Terchen Taksham Rinpoche — the first one was born in 1655. 

After the Dalai Lama recognized him at age 2, Dorje’s parents took him to meet the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism when he visited Wisconsin in 2010. 

The Dalai Lama cut a lock of Dorje’s hair in a ceremony and advised his parents to let their son stay in the U.S. to perfect his English before sending him to a monastery. 

Dorje is fluent in English and Tibetan. He grew up reading the manga graphic novel series “Buddha,” and is an avid sports fan. He roots for the Timberwolves in basketball, Real Madrid in soccer, and the Atlanta Falcons in football. He even keeps a rookie card of wide receiver Drake London pasted to the back of his phone, which he carried wrapped in his robes during his party. 

On the football field, playing as a left guard, his teammates praised his positivity, often reminding them to have fun and keep losses in perspective. 

“It’s someone to look up to,” said Griffin Hogg, 20, a former player who took Dorje under his wing. He said they learned from each other and credits Dorje with helping him find his spirituality. “I’m more of a relaxed person after getting to know him and understanding his own journey.” 

While Dorje tries to never miss Monday Night Football, he’s always there to help with any event hosted by the local Tibetan community, one of the largest in the United States. 

“He has one foot in the normal high school life. And he has one foot in this amazing Tibetan culture that we have in the state of Minnesota,” said Kate Thomas, one of his tutors and the teachings coordinator at Minneapolis’ Bodhicitta Sangha Heart of Enlightenment Institute. 

“You can see that he’s comfortable playing a role of sitting on a throne, of participating and being honored as a respected person in his community, as a religious figure. And yet, as soon as he has the opportunity, he wants to go and hang out with his high school buddies,” she said. “That’s testimony to his flexibility, his openness of mind.” 

Listening to rap and making Tibetans proud 

For years, he has followed the same routine. He wakes up to recite sacred texts and then attends school, followed by football practice. He returns home for tutoring about Tibetan history and Buddhism. Then he might practice calligraphy or run on a treadmill while listening to BossMan Dlow, Rod Wave and other rappers. 

Although he was officially enthroned in 2019 in India, an estimated 1,000 people gathered at the Tibetan American Foundation of Minnesota for his recent ceremony. 

“He unites us – Jalue is always here for us,” said Zenden Ugen, 21, a family friend and neighbor who performed Tibetan dances at the event. 

“I wish him the best in life because being born and not being able to choose your life must be very hard,” Ugen said. “But he has a responsibility and him being able to take on that responsibility, I’m very inspired by him. I just hope he keeps being who he is.” 

Dorje’s proud uncle, Tashi Lama, saw him grow up and become a Buddhist master. 

“He’s somebody who’s going to be a leader, who’s going to teach compassion and peace and love and harmony among living beings,” he said about his nephew, often referred to as “Rinpoche” — a Tibetan word that means “precious one.” 
…

Los Angeles — Moviegoers were not exactly feeling the Christmas spirit this weekend, or at least not based on their attendance at “Red One” showings. 

The big budget, star-driven action comedy with Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans sold $34.1 million in tickets in its first weekend in theaters, according to studio estimates Sunday. It easily topped a box office populated mostly by holdovers. 

For traditional studios, a $34.1 million debut against a $200 million-plus production budget would be a clear indication of a flop. Some even peg the budget closer to $250 million. But “Red One” is an Amazon MGM Studios release with the luxury of playing the long game rather than relying solely on global box office where Johnson tentpoles often overperform. The film may have a life on Prime Video for years to come. 

“Red One,” in which Johnson plays Santa’s bodyguard, was originally built to go straight-to-streaming. It was greenlit prior to Amazon’s acquisition of MGM. One interpretation of its lifecycle is that the theatrical earnings are not only just a bonus, but an additive gesture toward struggling theaters looking for a consistent stream of new films. 

“Amazon has 250 million plus worldwide subscribers to the platform. It’s similar to the way Netflix, I think, looks at stuff for their platform,” said Kevin Wilson, head of distribution for Amazon MGM Studios. “There’s a there’s a massive value for a movie like this in terms of how many eyeballs you’re going to get.” 

The first major studio holiday release since 2018, “Red One” opened on 4,032 screens, including IMAX and other large formats, on an otherwise quiet weekend for major releases. 

“We’re really happy with the results,” Wilson said. “I think when you look at the theatrical marketplace that’s sometimes unforgiving, especially for original films, this is a good result for us.” 

Since 2020, only seven films that weren’t sequels or based on another piece of intellectual property have opened over $30 million (including “Oppenheimer” and “Nope.”) 

Warner Bros. is handling the overseas release, where it has made an estimated $50 million in two weekends from 75 territories and 14,783 screens. 

Still, it’s certainly not a theatrical hit in North America. Even “Joker: Folie à Deux” made slightly more in its first weekend. “Red One,” directed by Jake Kasdan and produced by Johnson’s Seven Bucks, was roundly rejected by critics, with a dismal 33% Rotten Tomatoes score. Jake Coyle, in his review for The Associated Press, wrote that it “feels like an unwanted high-priced Christmas present.” 

Audiences were kinder than they were to “Joker 2,” giving it an A- CinemaScore, suggesting, perhaps, that the idea of it becoming a perennial holiday favorite is not so off-base. 

“Red One” is also overperforming in the middle of the country, Wilson said, and perhaps will have a nice holdover over Thanksgiving as a different option to the behemoths on the way. 

Sony’s “Venom: The Last Dance” added $7.4 million this weekend’s box office to take second place, bringing its domestic total to $127.6 million. Globally, its total stands at $436.1 million. 

Lionsgate’s “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” landed in third with $5.4 million. That much more modestly budgeted Christmas movie has already nearly doubled its $10 million production budget in two weeks. Fourth place went to A24’s Hugh Grant horror “Heretic,” with $5.2 million, bumping its total gross to $20.4 million. 

Universal and DreamWorks Animation’s “The Wild Robot” rounded out the top five in its eighth weekend in theaters with an additional $4.3 million. The animated film surpassed $300 million worldwide. 

This weekend is a bit of a stopover before the Thanksgiving tentpoles arrive. Next week, “Wicked” and “Gladiator II” face off in theaters with “Moana 2”, which also stars Johnson, sailing in the Wednesday before the holiday. 

“Gladiator II” also got a bit of a head start internationally, where it opened in 63 markets this weekend to gross $87 million. That’s a record for filmmaker Ridley Scott and for an R-rated international release from Paramount. It opens in the U.S. and Canada on Nov. 22. 

Paul Dergarabedian, the senior media analyst for Comscore, said that the “Red One” is helping set into motion a momentum leading into the Thanksgiving corridor. 

The upcoming releases, he said, “will finally bring some excitement to what has been a somewhat quiet post-Labor Day moviegoing marketplace.” 

Dergarabedian added that it could be “one of the biggest revenue generating Thanksgiving periods in box office history.” 

Final domestic figures will be released Monday. Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore: 

1. “Red One,” $34.1 million. 

2. “Venom: The Last Dance,” $7.4 million. 

3. “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever,” $5.4 million. 

4. “Heretic,” $5.2 million. 

5. “The Wild Robot,” $4.3 million. 

6. “Smile 2,” $3 million. 

7. “Conclave,” $2.9 million. 

8. “Hello, Love, Again,” $2.3 million. 

9. “A Real Pain,” $2.3 million. 

10. “Anora,” $1.8 million.
    …

Beirut — Hundreds of cultural professionals, including archeologists and academics, called on the United Nations to safeguard war-torn Lebanon’s heritage in a petition published Sunday ahead of a crucial UNESCO meeting.

Several Israeli strikes in recent weeks on Baalbek in the east and Tyre in the south — both strongholds of Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah — hit close to ancient Roman ruins designated as UNESCO World Heritage sites.

The petition, signed by 300 prominent cultural figures, was sent to UNESCO chief Audrey Azoulay a day before a special session in Paris to consider listing Lebanese cultural sites under “enhanced protection.”

It urges UNESCO to protect Baalbek and other heritage sites by establishing “no-target zones” around them, deploying international observers and enforcing measures from the 1954 Hague Convention on cultural heritage in conflict.

“Lebanon’s cultural heritage at large is being endangered by recurrent assaults on ancient cities such as Baalbek, Tyre and Anjar, all UNESCO world heritage sites, as well as on other historic landmarks,” says the petition.

It calls on influential states to push for an end to military action that causes destruction of damage to sites, as well as adding protections or introducing sanctions.

Change Lebanon, the charity behind the petition, said signatories included museum curators, academics, archaeologists and writers in Britain, France, Italy and the United States.

Hezbollah and Israel have been at war since late September, when Israel broadened its focus from fighting Hamas in the Gaza Strip to securing its northern border, even as the Gaza war continues.

Enhanced protection status gives heritage sites “high-level immunity from military attacks”, according to UNESCO.

“Criminal prosecutions and sanctions, conducted by the competent authorities, may apply in cases where individuals do not respect the enhanced protection granted to a cultural property,” it said.

In Baalbek, Israeli strikes on November 6 hit near the city’s Roman temples, according to authorities, destroying a heritage house dating back to the French mandate and damaged the historic site.

The region’s governor said “a missile fell in the car park” of a 1,000-year-old temple, the closest strike since the start of the war.

The ruins host the prestigious Baalbek Festival each year, a landmark event founded in 1956 and now a fixture on the international cultural scene, featuring performances by music legends like Oum Kalthoum, Charles Aznavour and Ella Fitzgerald.
…

BEIRUT — Declassified 1970s-era U.S. spy satellite imagery has led a British-Iraqi archeological team to what they believe is the site of a seventh-century battle that became decisive in the spread of Islam throughout the region.

The Battle of al-Qadisiyah was fought in Mesopotamia — in present-day Iraq — in the A.D. 630s between Arab Muslims and the army of the Sassanid Persian dynasty during a period of Muslim expansion. The Arab army prevailed and continued on its march into Persia, now Iran.

A joint team of archeologists from the U.K.’s Durham University and the University of Al-Qadisiyah stumbled across the site while undertaking a remote sensing survey to map the Darb Zubaydah, a pilgrimage route from Iraq’s Kufa to Mecca in Saudi Arabia built more than 1,000 years ago. The findings were published Tuesday in the journal Antiquity.

While mapping the route, the team noticed that a site some 30 kilometers south of Kufa in Iraq’s southern Najaf province — a desert area with scattered plots of agricultural land — had features that closely matched the description of the al-Qadisiyah battle site described in historic texts.

William Deadman, a specialist in archaeological remote sensing at Durham University, said the Cold War era satellite images are a commonly used tools by archeologists working in the Middle East, because the older images often show features that have been destroyed or altered and would not show up on present-day satellite images.

“The Middle East has developed so much in the last 50 years, both agricultural expansion and urban expansion,” he said. Some of the distinguishing features at the al-Qadisiyah site, such as a distinctive trench, were “much more pristine and clear” in the 1970s images, he said.

A survey on the ground confirmed the findings and convinced the team that they had correctly identified the site.

The key features were a deep trench, two fortresses and an ancient river that was reportedly once forded by elephant-mounted Persian troops, said Jaafar Jotheri, a professor of archeology at the University of Al-Qadisiyah who is part of the team that made the discovery. The survey team also found pottery shards consistent with the time period when the battle took place.

Jotheri said that Iraqis of his generation, who grew up under the rule of Saddam Hussein, were all familiar with the battle in minute detail, down to the names of the generals on both sides.

The battle at the time had political connotations — Iraq was engaged in a devastating war with Iran through much of the 1980s. Saddam pointed to the Battle of Qadisiyah as a harbinger of victory for Iraq.

Like most children growing up in that era, Jotheri said he had watched a popular movie about the battle multiple times as it was on regular rotation on television.

In the post-Saddam era, al-Qadisiyah has become something of a political litmus test. Iraqis’ views of the battle vary depending on their feelings toward Iran, which has expanded its influence in the country since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Saddam.

“There is some political and religious context in this battle, because now, of course, we have religious differences, ethnic differences, political differences in Iraq and we read or we view everything based on our … differences,” Jotheri said. But he added, “We all agree that it is a very important battle, a decisive one, and we all know about it.”

The team plans to begin excavations at the site in the coming year, Jotheri said.

The discovery comes as part of a broader project launched in 2015 to document endangered archaeological sites in the region.

It also comes at the time of a resurgence of archeology in Iraq, a country often referred to as the “cradle of civilization,” but where archeological exploration has been stunted by decades of conflict that halted excavations and led to the looting of tens of thousands of artifacts.

In recent years, the digs have returned and thousands of stolen artifacts have been repatriated. 
…

BANGKOK — In case you can’t get enough of the little pygmy hippo Moo Deng from Thailand, there’s now an official song featuring the internet’s favorite baby animal — released in four languages for her global fans.

The upbeat 50-second song Moodeng Moodeng, available in Thai, English, Chinese and Japanese versions, features simple lyrics like “Moo Deng Moo Deng, boing boing boing/ Mommy Mommy, play with me.” Its music video consists of short clips of the baby hippo bouncing, playing with her keeper or hanging out with her mom, Jona.

The catchy number was produced and written by well-known Thai composer Mueanphet Ammara, and released by one of Thailand’s largest music companies, GMM Music.

Moo Deng — the name literally means “bouncy pork,” a type of meatball, in Thai — became a global phenomenon just a month after she was unveiled on Facebook by the Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Thailand’s southern Chon Buri province.

Fans say her name compliments her chaotic personality. Moo Deng likes to “deng,” or bounce, and her giddy bouncing has appeared all over social media in countless memes. Her image has been used by sports teams and businesses.

The hippo, now 4 months old, has drawn a huge number of visitors to the zoo, which is around a two-hour drive away from the capital of Bangkok. The zoo estimated it has received 3,000 to 5,000 visitors a day on average in the past few months, and it’s selling clothes, bedding and other merchandise based on Moo Deng.

Zoo director Narongwit Chodchoi has said the increasing income from Moo Deng will help its breeding programs for many endangered species like the pygmy hippopotamus, which is threatened by poaching and loss of habitat. The species is native to West Africa and there are only 2,000-3,000 of them left in the wild.

The zoo sits on 800 hectares of land and is home to more than 2,000 animals.

All four versions of the Moo Deng song are available on YouTube and streaming platforms including Spotify and Apple Music.
…

Bela Karolyi, the charismatic if polarizing gymnastics coach who turned young women into champions and the United States into an international power in the sport, has died. He was 82.

USA Gymnastics said Karolyi died Friday. No cause of death was given.

Karolyi and wife, Martha, trained multiple Olympic gold medalists and world champions in the U.S. and Romania, including Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton.

“A big impact and influence on my life,” Comaneci, who was just 14 when Karolyi coached her to gold for Romania at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, posted on Instagram.

Yet Karolyi’s strident methods sometimes came under fire, most pointedly during the height of the Larry Nassar scandal.

When the disgraced former USA Gymnastics team doctor was effectively given a life sentence after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting gymnasts and other athletes with his hands under the guise of medical treatment, over a dozen former gymnasts came forward saying the Karolyis were part of a system that created an oppressive culture that allowed Nassar’s behavior to run unchecked for years.

While the Karolyis denied responsibility — telling CNN in 2018 they were unaware of Nassar’s behavior — the revelations led to them receding from the spotlight. USA Gymnastics eventually exited an agreement to continue to train at the Karolyi Ranch north of Houston, though only after American star Simone Biles took the organization to task for having them train at a site where many experienced sexual abuse.

The Karolyis receded from the spotlight in the aftermath after spending 30-plus years as a guiding force in American gymnastics, often basking in success while brushing with controversy in equal measure.

The Karolyis defected from Romania to the United States in 1981. Three years later Bela helped guide Retton — all of 16 — to the Olympic all-around title at the 1984 Games in Los Angeles. At the 1996 Games in Atlanta, he memorably helped an injured Kerri Strug off the floor after Strug’s vault secured the team gold for the Americans.

Karolyi briefly became the national team coordinator for USA Gymnastics women’s elite program in 1999 and incorporated a semi-centralized system that eventually turned the Americans into the sport’s gold standard. It did not come without a cost. He was removed from the position after the 2000 Olympics when it became apparent his leadership style simply would not work, though he remained around the sport after Martha took over for her husband in 2001.

While the Karolyis approach helped the U.S. become a superpower — an American woman has won each of the last six Olympic titles and the U.S. women earned the team gold at the 2012 and 2016 games under Martha Karolyi’s leadership — their methods came under fire.

Dominique Moceanu, part of the “Magnificent 7” team that won gold in Atlanta, talked extensively about her corrosive relationship with the Karolyis following her retirement. In her 2012 memoir, Moceanu wrote Bela Karolyi verbally abused her in front of her teammates on multiple occasions.

“His harsh words and critical demeanor often weighed heavily on me,” Moceanu posted on X Saturday. “While our relationship was fraught with difficulty, some of these moments of hardship helped me forge and define my own path.”

Some of Karolyi’s most famous students were always among his staunchest defenders. When Strug got married, she and Karolyi took a photo recreating their famous scene from the 1996 Olympics, when he carried her onto the medals podium after she vaulted on a badly sprained ankle.

Being a gymnastics pied piper was never Karolyi’s intent. Born in Clug, Hungary, (now Romania) on September 13, 1942, he wanted to be a teacher, getting into coaching in college simply so he could spend more time with Martha.

After graduating, the couple moved to a small coal-mining town in Transylvania. Looking for a way to keep their students warm and entertained during the long, harsh winters, Karolyi dragged out some old mats and he and his wife taught the children gymnastics.

The students showed off their skills to their parents, and the exhibitions soon caught the eye of the Romanian government, which hired the Karolyis to coach the women’s national team at a time when the sport was done almost exclusively by adult women, not young girls.

Karolyi changed all that, though, bringing a team to the Montreal Olympics with only one gymnast older than 14.

It was in Montreal, of course, where the world got its first real glimpse of Karolyi. When a solemn, dark-haired sprite named Nadia Comaneci enchanted the world with the first perfect 10 in Olympic history, a feat she would duplicate six times, Karolyi was there to wrap her in one of his trademark bear hugs.

Romania, which had won only three bronzes in Olympic gymnastics before 1976, left Montreal with seven medals, including Comaneci’s golds in the all-around, balance beam and uneven bars, and the team silver. Comaneci became an international sensation, the first person to appear on the covers of Sports Illustrated, Time and Newsweek in the same week.

Four years later, however, Karolyi was in disgrace.

He was incensed by the judging at the Moscow Olympics, which he thought cost Comaneci a second all-around gold, and the Romanian government was horrified that he had embarrassed the Soviet hosts.

“Suddenly, from a position where we’ve been praised and considered the foremost athletes in the country, I was stigmatized,” he once said. “I thought they could put me away for political misconduct.”

When he and Martha took the Romanian team to New York for an exhibition in March 1981, they were tipped off that they were going to be punished upon their return. Despite not speaking any English and with their then-6-year-old daughter, Andrea, still in Romania, they decided to defect.

“We knew what kind of risks we were taking, because nobody was guaranteeing us anything,” Martha Karolyi once said. “We started out with a suitcase and a little motel room. From there, it’s gradually improved.”

The couple made their way to California, where they learned English by watching television and Bela did odd jobs. A chance encounter with Olympic gold medalist Bart Conner — who would later marry Comaneci — at the Los Angeles airport a few months later led to the Karolyis’ first coaching job in the United States.

Within a year, their daughter had arrived in the U.S. and the Karolyis had their own gym in Houston. It soon became the center of American gymnastics, turning out eight national champions in 13 years.

Three years after the Karolyis left Romania, Retton became the first American to win the Olympic all-around title, scoring a perfect 10 on vault to claim gold at the 1984 Games in Los Angeles. Retton also posted the highest score in the team competition as the Americans won the silver, their first team medal since 1948.

Four years later, Phoebe Mills, another Karolyi gymnast, won a bronze on balance beam. It was the first individual medal for an American woman at a non-boycotted games. And in 1991, Kim Zmeskal — “the little Kimbo,” as Bela Karolyi called her — became the first American to win the world all-around title.

“My biggest contribution was giving the kids the faith that they can be the best among the best,” Karolyi once said. “I knew that if the Americans could understand they were not inferior … then they can be groomed like international, highly visible athletes.”

But as Karolyi’s resume grew, so did the criticism.

Other coaches were irritated by his brash personality and ability to always find his way into the spotlight. When Retton won gold, Karolyi leaped a barrier — he had an equipment manager’s credential, not a coach’s — so he could scoop Retton up in a hug — right in front of the TV cameras, of course.

He could be a harsh taskmaster, calling his gymnasts names, taunting them for their weight and pushing them to their limits.

Even those warm embraces weren’t always quite what they seemed.

“A lot of those big bear hugs came with the whisper of ‘Not so good,’ in our ears,” Retton wrote.

Yet Retton and Comaneci remained close with Karolyi, making appearances with him at gymnastics events or sitting with him at competitions. Zmeskal had her wedding at the Karolyi ranch.

Karolyi briefly retired after the 1992 Games in Barcelona, where he led the Americans to their first team medal, a bronze, at a non-boycotted Olympics in 44 years. But he kept his gym and summer camps, and by 1994 was again coaching elite-level gymnasts after Zmeskal asked him to help in her attempt to make the Atlanta Games.

Zmeskal didn’t make the Atlanta squad. But two of Karolyi’s other gymnasts, Strug and Moceanu, did, and it was Strug who provided one of the signature moments of the Olympics.

The Americans went into their final event in team finals, vault, trying to hold off Russia for their first-ever title at an Olympics or world championships. Despite injuring her left ankle when she fell on her first vault attempt, Strug went ahead with her second attempt, believing — wrongly — the Americans needed her score to clinch the gold.

With Karolyi shouting, “You can do it!” Strug sprinted down the runway, soared high above the vault and landed on both feet — ensuring it was a clean vault — before pulling her left leg up. After saluting the judges, she fell to her knees and had to be carried off the podium. Tests would later show she had two torn ligaments in her ankle.

As the rest of the Americans gathered on the podium to receive their gold medals, Karolyi carried Strug back into the arena, cradling her in his arms.

But even that drew criticism. Many said Karolyi never should have encouraged Strug to vault on her injured ankle in the first place and then should have stayed out of the spotlight rather than carrying her to the podium.

“Bela is a very tough coach and he gets criticism for that,” Strug said at the time. “But that’s what it takes to become a champion. I don’t think it’s really right that everyone tries to find the faults of Bela. Anything in life, to be successful, you’ve got to work really hard.”

The Karolyis retired again after the Atlanta Olympics. But after the U.S. women finished last in the medal round at the 1997 world championships, USA Gymnastics asked Bela Karolyi to come back.

He agreed — but only if he could implement a semi-centralized training system. Rather than a patchwork system of individual coaches who had their own philosophies, Karolyi would oversee the entire U.S. program. Gymnasts could still train with their own coaches, but there would be regular national team camps to ensure they were meeting established training and performance standards.

Though the idea was sound, Karolyi was not the right person to be in charge. Coaches who had been his equal chafed at his heavy-handedness, and were annoyed by his grandstanding. Gymnasts resented his bluster and demands.

By the time the Americans left the Sydney Olympics, about the only thing everyone agreed on was that Karolyi needed to step away.

He stepped aside and was replaced by his wife. Martha Karolyi’s standards were just as high — if not higher — than her husband’s, but on the surface, she was more willing to listen to other opinions.

“She’s more diplomatic. Absolutely,” Bela Karolyi said before the 2012 Olympics. “I’m wild. The opposite.” 
…

ARLINGTON, TEXAS — Jake Paul beat boxing legend Mike Tyson by unanimous decision to win an intergenerational heavyweight battle in Texas on Friday that failed to live up to its enormous hype.

The bout between the 27-year-old social media influencer-turned-prizefighter Paul and the 58-year-old former heavyweight champion Tyson was streamed live on Netflix and played out in front of a sold-out crowd at AT&T Stadium in Arlington.

Those fans were left largely disappointed as Tyson showed his age and was never able to generate any offense against his younger opponent, landing just 18 punches to Paul’s 78.

“First and foremost, Mike Tyson — it’s an honor to be able to fight him,” said Paul. “It was as tough and hard as I thought it would be.”

Tyson, who wore a knee brace, never mounted much of a challenge after being wobbled by some left hands in the third round but did enough defensively to avoid taking any serious damage.

He acknowledged after the contest to fighting through a leg injury.

“Yeah, but I can’t use that as an excuse. If I did, I wouldn’t be in here,” Tyson said. “I knew he was a good fighter. He was prepared, I came to fight. I didn’t prove nothing to anybody, only to myself. I’m not one of those guys that live to please the world. I’m just happy with what I can do.”

Tyson, one of the most fearsome heavyweight champions during his heyday in the late 1980s and early 1990s, was in his first professional fight in nearly 20 years. He was noncommittal when asked if he would return to the ring again.

“I don’t know. It depends on the situation,” he said.

Paul (11-1) said he can now fight anyone he wants, possibly even Mexican Canelo Alvarez, after being the main attraction in the mega event that brought out a star-studded crowd and 72,300 fight fans.

“This is the biggest event, over 120 million people on Netflix,” he said. “We crashed the site, the biggest U.S. boxing gate, $20 million, in U.S. history, and everyone is next on the list.”

Taylor beats Serrano

In the co-main event earlier in the evening, Ireland’s Katie Taylor retained her super lightweight title by beating Puerto Rico’s Amanda Serrano in a controversial unanimous decision after a violent affair.

Serrano came forward throughout the fight, but their heads crashed together hard in the early stages, resulting in a deep cut over Serrano’s right eye. The referee later took a point off Taylor for head butts.

In the end all three judges scored it 95-94 for Taylor, who denied accusations from Serrano’s corner that she was fighting dirty.

Taylor won the pair’s previous meeting, at New York’s Madison Square Garden in April 2022, and said there would be a third meeting.
…

OME, Japan — Deep in a dark warehouse the sake sleeps, stored in rows of giant tanks, each holding more than 10,000 liters of the Japanese rice wine that is the product of brewing techniques dating back more than 1,000 years.

Junichiro Ozawa, the 18th-generation head of Ozawa Brewery, founded in 1702, hopes sake-brewing will win recognition as a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage, when the decision is made next month.

“We always think about the people who’re enjoying our sake when we make it. I’m now so excited, imagining the faces of all the people around the world,” he told reporters Wednesday during a tour of his brewery on the pastoral outskirts of Tokyo.

Sake, the drink of choice for the nobility in “The Tale of Genji” — Japan’s most celebrated work of literature — has been widening its appeal, boosted by the growing international popularity of Japanese cuisine.

Sake exports from Japan total more than 41 billion yen ($265 million) a year, with the biggest destinations being the U.S. and China, according to the Japan Sake and Shochu Makers Association.

That’s up from about 22 billion yen in 2018. But exports still make up a tiny fraction of overall sake production in Japan. Brazil, Mexico and Southeast Asia, as well as France and the rest of Europe, all places where Japanese restaurants are gaining popularity, are starting to take a liking to sake.

What’s key to sake-making, which takes about two months, including fermentation and pressing, are the rice and the water.

For a product to be categorized Japanese sake, the rice must be Japanese. The relatively soft quality of freshwater in Japan, like the supplies provided by the two wells at Ozawa Brewery, is also critical.

Among Ozawa’s sake is the full-bodied aromatic Junmai Daiginjo, one of the top offerings, with 15% alcohol content and costing about 3,630 yen ($23) for a 720-milliliter bottle.

Karakuti Nigorizake is unrefined sake, murky and not clear like usual sake, with 17% alcohol content and a rugged no-nonsense taste. It sells for 2,420 yen ($16) for a 1,800 milliliter bottle.

The religious connotations of sake are evident at the brewery. The big cedar-leaves ball hanging under the eaves is a symbol of a shrine for the god of sake-making. In Japan, sake is used to purify and to celebrate. Sips from a cup signify the sealing of a marriage.

“Sake is not just an alcoholic beverage. It is Japanese culture itself,” said Hitoshi Utsunomiya, director of the Japan Sake and Shochu Makers Association.

The UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage designation is given to not just historical monuments but also practices passed down generations, such as oral traditions, performing arts, rituals and festivals.

It’s not meant to be used for commercial purposes. But sake officials make no secret of their hope that it will boost global sales, helping the tradition stay alive amid competition from beer, wine and other modern beverages.

Among previous Intangible Cultural Heritage inclusions are Kabuki theater and Gagaku court music from Japan, as well as Sona, which are drawings on sand in Angola; the Chinese zither called guqin and Cremonese violin craftsmanship from Italy. Washoku, or Japanese cuisine, won the honors in 2013.

One reason for sake’s growing popularity around the world is that its smooth flavor goes well with varieties of food, including sushi, spicy Asian and Western dishes, says Max Del Vita, a certified sake sommelier and co-founder of The Sake Company, an import and distribution retailer in Singapore.

“These brewers are cultural stewards, passing down techniques through generations and blending ancient practices with quiet innovation,” he told The Associated Press. “Sake is more than a drink. It is a living embodiment of Japan’s seasonal rhythms, community values and artistic heritage.” 
…

CHANGCHUN, China — Crouch through the small metal door and walk down the dark tunnel, and even before you step into the abandoned air raid shelter, the air reverberates with pounding techno beats. Young Chinese holding booze and cigarettes shake and sway in a red-lit passageway, below a big screen rolling through quotations from Chairman Mao.

This is an underground rave in China, part of a subculture growing in hidden corners of the nation’s cities, even as its political and cultural mainstream grow increasingly controlled, staid and predictable.

For Chinese ravers, these gatherings — often called “ye di,” or “wild dances” — not only offer a rare space for unfettered fun, but signal resistance to the narrowly prescribed future a rigid society expects for them.

By day, Xing Long works in the office of a state-owned company in Changchun, an industrial city in China’s northeastern rust belt region.

By night, he’s a DJ and underground rave organizer, a side gig that offers an escape from the humdrum of reviewing corporate contracts.

“My job cannot make me feel I fulfilled my values,” he said. “Going to work is like executing a prewritten program.”

Chinese young people face intense pressure and high expectations from the society around them. In recent years, facing bleak economic prospects, Chinese youth culture has been swept by a series of viral slang terms to describe frustration and hopelessness: ” 996 ” — the brutal 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week work schedule many companies ask of employees. “Involution” — an endless treadmill of pointless competition that fresh graduates face. ” Lying flat” — the growing trend among young people of giving up all ambition and aiming to do as little as possible.

Techno dance parties are an escape from all that for people like Xing. Every time he walks into a rave, the 31-year-old said, his brain “jolts awake like a bang.”

Xing first learned about techno music from a documentary made by the American media company Vice.

“My eyes brightened up when I heard it,” he said. “I should’ve listened to this kind of music earlier.”

Xing began going to raves in Shenzhen, a southern city with a population of 17 million, but when he moved home in 2021 he realized no one else was organizing them.

“I want this city to have an underground techno music scene,” he said. “I want to listen to it myself, so I want to make it happen.”

Xing said that the underground techno scene fascinated him because it’s “real” even if not perfect, bad, not in the right order, or broken.

“It’s not a beautiful thing that was deliberately produced into a mold to present to the mainstream.”

In recent years, space for culture and creativity has been shrinking in China as the authorities have ramped up censorship of concerts, shows, and other cultural events. Comedians have been silenced after joking about topics considered politically sensitive. A growing number of independent bookstores and creative spaces have shut down under pressure, while state-sanctioned media promotes uplifting, often saccharine narratives.

Yet underground raves are free from all those limitations because they sprout in gray zones. Hidden from public view, they skirt formal approval processes, neither supported nor suppressed by the state.

Feng Zhe, 27, a rave organizer in Shenyang, a northeastern city about 400 miles from Beijing, said raves are about “refusing to be disciplined by society.”

“This is probably not how the world functions nowadays,” he said, adding that societies want to make people follow their rules and be useful but “underground culture is useless.”

“Most people are going to be repressed,” Feng said.

But for most rave organizers, the real meaning of underground rave culture is simply having fun. Loong Wu, a 26-year-old art student, started organizing raves in 2021 during COVID-19 lockdowns out of boredom.

“My original intention was just to break through the boredom,” she said. “When you are truly enjoying it, you don’t think about meanings.”

On one recent Saturday night, civil servants, students, an ex-firefighter, girls with dyed hair, and a man with a full-face mask and goggles filed into a bar tucked behind a flower shop in downtown Changchun to attend one of Xing’s raves.

They danced to fast-paced industrial techno spun by Du Jizhe, a local part-time DJ who works in HR by day.

He said it’s the natural soundtrack of auto manufacturing cities like Changchun and Detroit, which prides itself on being the birthplace of techno. For Du, techno evokes childhood memories of the auto factory where his father worked.

“Techno is basically industrial noise like hammering and mechanical sounds,” Du said “These noises exert a subtle influence on people’s ears in industrial cities.”

Chen Xiangyu, a fashion student in an oversized black T-shirt with hair dyed blond, a black leather choker, a lip piercing, and smoky eye makeup, said raves are a pure release.

“The first time I came, I thought to myself, I don’t know anyone, no one knows me, so nobody’s paying any attention to how I dance, so long as I’m happy, it’s all good,” she said. “I shouldn’t care too much about what others think.”

Even at raves, illegal drugs are rarely seen in China, but promoters still face risks from authorities who have little patience for unapproved social gatherings.

Advertisements promoting raves are often cryptic, with only a date, a DJ line-up, and the cost of admission. Sometimes, the location won’t be revealed until an hour ahead of the party. Some organizers require guests to cover their phone’s camera with a sticker.

Loong Wu said her requirements for a rave spot were no CCTV cameras, no security, and no nearby residents. Even those aren’t a guarantee — local police once busted one of her raves in an industrial port.

“It was pathetic how few such places exist in the city,” she said.

Frustrated with how hard it was to find a good rave spot, she once organized a public party where she put her DJ equipment on a cart and pushed it through city streets as revelers danced alongside.

“Restrictions exist for sure, but that’s exactly why we need to create our own scene,” she said. “We always need ‘wild dances.’ We always need to dance outside of set rules.” 
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ROME — The ancient Roman Colosseum will be the venue of gladiator fights — albeit staged — for the first time in two millennia under a $1.5 million sponsorship deal with Airbnb that aims to promote “a more conscious tourism.”

But some visitors to the monument Thursday, as well as housing activists, were skeptical about the value of the arrangement, citing ongoing controversies in many cities over the role of short-term rental platforms in fueling overtourism and limiting affordable housing for residents and students.

Under the deal announced by Airbnb and the Colosseum on Wednesday, the sponsorship by the short-term rental giant will cover the renewal of an educational program inside the ancient Roman amphitheater covering the history of the structure and gladiators.

Eight of the platform’s users and their plus-ones will be able to participate in faux gladiator fights after the Colosseum’s closing time on May 7-8, taking the same underground route used by gladiators in ancient Rome to reach the arena. People can apply for the experience on November 27 at no cost, and the “gladiators” will be chosen by lottery.

The superintendent of the Colosseum Archaeological Park, Alfonsina Russo, told The Associated Press that the deal is in conjunction with the release of Ridley Scott’s new film “Gladiators II,” which opened in Italy on Thursday.

Russo characterized the sponsorship arrangement as one of the many such deals to help finance projects at the park.

The Italian fashion brand Tod’s, for example, has funded a multimillion renovation of the Roman monument, including a cleaning, replacing the locking system of arches with new gates and redoing the subterranean areas.

Alberto Campailla, the coordinator of the Nonna Roma nonprofit organization that focuses on housing and food for the poor, called the campaign with Airbnb “a disgrace,” and a form of “touristification.”

Airbnb and other platforms offering short-term rentals “are literally driving people out of not only the city center, but also the outskirts and suburban neighborhoods,” Campailla said.

Tourists from other European cities grappling with overtourism also took issue with the deal.

“It seems to me that the purpose of the Colosseum today is to be a tourist attraction, but not to create an amusement park within it,” said Jaime Montero, a tourist visiting from Madrid. “In the end, tourism eats the essence of the cities, here in Rome, as in other capitals.”

Visiting from Naples, Salvatore Di Matteo saw the deal as “yet another takeover of the territory” by big companies.

“If they start to touch sacred monuments such as the Colosseum here in Rome, it is obviously something that should make us think and is, in any case, a bit worrying,” he said.

The Colosseum is the most important and largest amphitheater constructed by the ancient Romans. Built in the 1st century, it was the center of popular entertainment, hosting hunts and gladiator games, until the 6th century. 
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LONDON — British writer Samantha Harvey won the Booker Prize for fiction on Tuesday with “Orbital,” a short, wonder-filled novel set aboard the International Space Station that ponders the beauty and fragility of the Earth.

Harvey was awarded the 50,000-pound ($64,000) prize for what she has called a “space pastoral” about six orbiting astronauts, which she began writing during COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. The confined characters loop through 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets over the course of a day, trapped in one another’s company and transfixed by the globe’s ever-changing vistas.

“To look at the Earth from space is like a child looking into a mirror and realizing for the first time that the person in the mirror is herself,” said Harvey, who researched her novel by reading books by astronauts and watching the space station’s live camera. “What we do to the Earth we do to ourselves.”

She said the novel “is not exactly about climate change, but implied in the view of the Earth is the fact of human-made climate change.”

She dedicated the prize to everyone who speaks “for and not against the Earth, for and not against the dignity of other humans, other life.”

“All the people who speak for and call for and work for peace — this is for you,” she said.

Writer and artist Edmund de Waal, who chaired the five-member judging panel, called “Orbital” a “miraculous novel” that “makes our world strange and new for us.”

Gaby Wood, chief executive of the Booker Prize Foundation, noted that “in a year of geopolitical crisis, likely to be the warmest year in recorded history,” the winning book was “hopeful, timely and timeless.”

Harvey, who has written four previous novels and a memoir about insomnia, is the first British writer since 2020 to win the Booker. The prize is open to English-language writers of any nationality and has a reputation for transforming writers’ careers. Previous winners include Ian McEwan, Margaret Atwood, Salman Rushdie and Hilary Mantel.

De Waal praised the “crystalline” writing and “capaciousness” of Harvey’s succinct novel — at 136 pages in its U.K. paperback edition, one of the shortest-ever Booker winners.

“This is a book that repays slow reading,” he said.

He said the judges spent a full day picking their winner and came to a unanimous conclusion. Harvey beat five other finalists from Canada, the United States, Australia and the Netherlands, chosen from among 156 novels submitted by publishers.

American writer Percival Everett had been the bookies’ favorite to win with “James,” which reimagines Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn” from the point of view of its main Black character, the enslaved man Jim.

The other finalists were American writer Rachel Kushner’s spy story “Creation Lake”; Canadian Anne Michaels’ poetic novel “Held”; Charlotte Wood’s Australian saga “Stone Yard Devotional”; and “The Safekeep” by Yael van der Wouden, the first Dutch author to be shortlisted for the Booker.

Harvey is the first female Booker winner since 2019, though one of five women on this year’s shortlist, the largest number in the prize’s 55-year history. De Waal said issues such as the gender or nationality of the authors were “background noise” that did not influence the judges.

“There was absolutely no question of box ticking or of agendas or of anything else. It was simply about the novel,” he said before the awards ceremony at Old Billingsgate, a grand former Victorian fish market in central London.

Founded in 1969, the Booker Prize is open to novels originally written in English published in the U.K. or Ireland. Last year’s winner was Irish writer Paul Lynch for post-democratic dystopia “Prophet Song.”

Lynch handed Harvey her Booker trophy at the ceremony, warning her that her life was about to change dramatically because of the Booker publicity boost.

Harvey said she was “overwhelmed” but remained down-to-earth about spending her prize money.

She said she’d disburse “some of it on tax. I want to buy a new bike. And then the rest — I want to go to Japan.”
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