The Lion by Joseph Kessel -- book , movie , Pamela Franklin , and a marvellous bookshop in West Hollywood

I'd like to recommend a novel called  The Lion
(the French title is Le Lion)  by Joseph Kessel.

Peter Green translated the novel into English,
and, in 1962, it was made into a movie
with William Holden, Trevor Howard,
and Capucine.

The young girl (the main human character)
is named Patricia, in the book.
In the film, however, she is called Tina,
and her role is played by Pamela Franklin.

The novel is set in East Africa, in Kenya.

Patricia is a young girl living in the African wilderness,
and she has a special friendship with King,
a magnificent lion she regards as all her own, since
she raised King from the time he was a cub.

Sort of like Peter Pan, Patricia is living in her own
faraway-from-everything Paradise.
She doesn't want to grow up.
(And who would want to grow up,
if they were living Patricia's
Heidi-in-Africa blissful life?.......)

But, the world -- reality -- some would call it fate --
intrudes, as it always does, and what follows
is heart-rending, unforgettable.
It will make you weep, and it will haunt you.

And, somehow, it made me think of that poem
by W B Yeats, "The Stolen Child":

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping
 than you can understand. 

As mentioned earlier, the role of the young girl 

in the movie (she's in the photo above with the lion)

was given to Pamela Franklin.

♥ At the end of this post, I'll give a link

for the full movie on youtube.

Don't worry about the Portuguese title

because the movie is in English.

Pamela Franklin later married fellow actor Harvey Jason.
Together with Louis, one of their sons, her husband
co-owns a very interesting and wonderful bookshop called
♥ Mystery Pier Books, Inc.
in West Hollywood,
California, USA.

♥ The link to their bookstore can be found
at the end of this blog post, and it contains
the address and telephone number.
So, do visit whenever
you're in that part of the US.

Meanwhile, try to get a copy of  "The Lion"
by Joseph Kessel, and read it as soon as you can,
and you can also watch the movie on youtube
(see the links below).

Plus, here is a novel which is also set in Kenya,
and is connected to lions.
It is a poignant, shimmering story of
mystery, suspense, murder, reincarnation,
and the eternal power of love...

♥ Link to the above e-book on Amazon Kindle:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008ZPVTCK

♥  Further, to read a sample for free --

i.e.    8  chapters

of the novel

"I met you in that past life A"

you can click on the link below: ♥

http://serene-journey-to-happiness.blogspot.sg/2013/06/read-them-here-for-free-first-8.html

Enjoy!    ♥

Links  re.  "The Lion"  by Joseph Kessel:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lion_(novel)  (contains spoilers!)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heidi

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_Franklin

♥ http://www.mysterypierbooks.com/  (the bookstore is co-owned by Pamela Franklin's family)

http://www.allmovie.com/movie/v99711  (for the poster & photos of the movie)

♥ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLKxk18RID0

(The above link is for the "The Lion" 1962 movie.

Name of the youtube movie:

O LEÃO ( 1962) Willian Holden, Capucine e Trevor Howard espetaculares

(Even though the above title is in Portuguese,
the movie is in English)

Name of the youtube channel:
ArlindoDuplo

♥

Red Panda

I came across red pandas recently on the internet, and would like to share some information about them here.

When people hear the word "panda", they usually think about the giant panda (see the photo below) which is black and white.

Above photo by J. Patrick Fischer

Link to the above photo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Grosser_Panda.JPG

However, the red panda looks quite different.

The red panda is small -- slightly bigger than a house cat,
and has a long bushy tail.

In fact, when zoologist Frederic Cuvier described the red panda in 1825, he gave it the name ailurus fulgens. which means "shining cat" or "fire-coloured cat".

(As per this Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_panda under "Phylogenetics":

Ailurus, (from Ancient Greek αἴλουρος, "cat"), 

based on superficial similarities with domestic cats. 

The specific epithet is the Latin adjective fulgens, "shining".

Ailurus fulgens.  It reminds me of the name Fulgencio (for men) and the name Fulgencia (for women).  Both Fulgencio and Fulgencia mean "shining/glowing".

http://www.behindthename.com/name/fulgencio

http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/0/Fulgencia

Anyway, the red panda is incredibly cute and cuddly!!
I want to give it a bunch of hugs.
Wish I had one as a pet...
See the pictures and video below.

Above photo by Greg Hume

Link to the above photo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:RedPandaFullBody.JPG

Above photo by Carlos Delgado; CC-BY-SA

Link to the above photo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ailurus_fulgens_-_01.jpg

And here's a very cute and short (a bit less than 2 minutes)
video on youtube:

Name of the above youtube video:
Red Panda playing in the snow

Name of youtube channel:
Mmovies21

Link to above youtube video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6GaPkkGZGw

Links to more information about the red panda:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_panda

http://library.sandiegozoo.org/factsheets/red_panda/red_panda.htm

About the Panda

Thinking about the panda bear recently, I started wondering about its name.

What's the origin of the word "panda"?  Which language does it come from?

I looked it up, and it seems a bit of a mystery.  No one really knows.

But here's some information I found:

"Name

No conclusive explanation of the origin of the word panda has been found. The closest candidate is the Nepali word ponya, possibly referring to the adapted wrist bone of the red panda, which is native to Nepal. The Western world originally applied this name to the red panda. Until 1901, when it was erroneously stated to be related to the red panda, the giant panda was known as "black and white cat-footed animal" (Ailuropus melanoleucus).^[99]

In most encyclopedic sources, the name "panda" or "common panda" originally referred to the lesser-known red panda,^[100]thus necessitating the inclusion of "giant" and "lesser/red" prefixes in front of the names."

Perhaps the word "panda" is from the Chinese language?  Turns out that the answer is No.

In China, one of the most popular names for this cuddly bear is "dàxióngmāo (大熊貓 literally "giant bear cat")."

Now, let's move on from this bear's name to its babies -- its cubs.

When a panda cub is born, what is its colour?

Is it 

a) black and white

b) white

c) black

d) grey 

e) brown

f) bamboo-green

I hope you didn't choose any of the above.

A panda cub, when born, has a colour which has four letters. 

_ _ _ _  

(Hint 1: There is only one vowel.

 Hint 2:  Part of the word can make you go "ouch"!!

 Hint 3: Think about " _ _ _  curl").

Further, here's another piece of information.  "The giant panda produces the proportionally smallest baby of any placental mammal."

When a panda cub is born, it arrives  "weighing only 90 to 130 grams (3.2 to 4.6 ounces), or about 1/800th of the mother's weight."

To give you a rough idea of the tiny weight of a newborn panda cub, think about an apple.  A smallish apple is about 100 grams!!

Link to the above apple photo:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Apple_03.jpg

Link to the Wikipedia article giving the above information regarding pandas:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_panda

And now, here's a short (about 1 minute) and sweet video by CCTV News.

Its title: 

So Cute! Panda asks for hug to get down from tree!

By the way, just in case, here's the link for the above panda video on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVywPAjtppg

Do you know the cats in this video?

Here's a lovely video about cats.

Some of the cats are famous -- very well known indeed.

Plus, the video contains a short quiz about these cats.

The answers to the trivia quiz questions are shown at the end of the video.

Here's the link to the above video on youtube, just in case!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40XfBHsTfSg

♥