Tony Buzan, the mind-mapping guru, has conducted many talks in Singapore. I attended one and found the guru a terribly boring unimagnitive speaker. But I bought his book and found it well written.
He taught Michael Jackson and his children in Bahrain. Here's his interview with the Sunday Times of UK.
I'm extracting from a pdf file and that is why I am not providing the link.
Lena's heading : How they got connected
Until now, Tony Buzan, a wealthy author and educational consultant, has never spoken publicly about his experiences with the family. Talking at his house in a leafy, residential estate high on the banks of the Thames near Marlow, he gives us a considered, first-hand assessment of Jackon's role as a father. He always regarded Jackson as a good friend, remaining silent and loyal to the end.
Buzan’s writings on brain development via a technique he calls mind-mapping have earned
him an international following and the post of “thinker in residence†at Wellington College,
an independent school in Berkshire. He was teaching in Singapore in 2006 when he received
a call from his friend, Sheikh Abdulla bin Hamad al-Khalifa, of the Bahraini royal family.
“Hamad said, ‘A fan of yours would like to speak to you.’ Then an unfamiliar voice came on the line. ‘Hi, it’s Michael.’ He was speaking in his natural voice, not the high whisper he used in public.†Over the next 45 minutes Jackson raved to Buzan about one of his books. He wanted Buzan, he said, to explain his ideas to his children and to “teach them how to thinkâ€.
Lena's heading : Jackson as a father
Buzan promptly flew to Bahrain, checked into a five-star hotel and spent a week commuting
to the Jackson family’s rented palace in the desert. He was met at the gate by Jackson and a
servant, a man Jackson referred to as a “butlerâ€, who acted as a general housekeeper. Buzan
was immediately struck by how attached the children were to their father.
“I would watch them coming and going from the international school every day. They left happy, and came back happy. On their return those three kids could not run any faster from the car to get to hug their daddy.â€
The house itself had been converted into a shrine to Jackson’s cultural enthusiasms. “It felt like the Sistine Chapel, filled with renaissance art. There were giant prints of paintings by the likes of Raphael on every wall.†Bizarrely, the first thing Jackson did on Buzan’s arrival was to quiz him about Leonardo da Vinci. “He was fascinated by the idea of geniuses, from Alexander the Great to Charlie Chaplin and Muhammad Ali, but he didn’t consider himself as one of them. He was very humble. He saw himself as a student.â€
Buzan was surprised to discover that Jackson was an indulgent father, “not one of those hothousing
parents, forever forcing the children to play chess, take dance classes or learn instrumentsâ€. In the evenings they cuddled up together on the sofa to watch DVDs. Alongside the old masters, Jackson had hung larger-than-life-sized photographs of his children, which greatly amused them. “Michael had a massive printing machine.â€
Lena's heading : Prince, Paris and Blanket
The elder children are remarkably focused, according to Buzan. “They are fast learners like their father, who was probably the best pupil I’ve had.†Buzan witnessed no tantrums or raised voices. “The kids seemed to enjoy each other’s company. It’s unusual in groups of three, where tensions can often arise.â€
They are very different personalities. Buzan describes Prince as “a very bright, witty but serious little boy. In a class he would be the child the teachers noticed. He was confident and very quick on reparteeâ€. Paris, by contrast, “was a sedate princess. Very independent, contemplative and self-contained. She was quiet but kind, always offering things. She had great poise and presence and she was very good with the boys'â€.
Four-year-old Blanket was “just wild, a little dynamo, always on the move, tumbling, hanging off the furniture. He was like a mini-Michael. I saw Blanket do lots of dance routinesâ€. In Buzan’s opinion, Jackson was clearly Blanket’s biological father. “He has the same eyes.†He added that his skin was much darker than that of the other children — his complexion made him look Mediterranean.
At mealtimes, there would be “beautiful vegetables, fresh seafood, hummus, fruit juices, no alcohol. The children were respectful but would push the boundaries.â€. Perhaps they were bored: for all his apparent interest in fatherhood, conversation around the table was usually led by Jackson talking about himself and his career.
Lena's heading : Jackson's competitive streaks
“Michael talked a lot about creativity and the process of being a star and about the naysayers in his past who had said you can't do this or that before he did it. He loved a challenge. Thriller had been his ultimate achievement and now people were saying that he couldn’t
repeat it. He felt he could comfortably outdo Thriller.â€
Jackson also opened up to Buzan about his own upbringing. Tellingly, he said nothing about the beatings he endured from Joe, the family patriarch, recently confirmed by his elder brother Marlon. “He talked about how wonderful it was to have Elizabeth Taylor as an auntfigure and Fred Astaire showing him dance moves. How he loved singing and dancing with his family, travelling the world with the Jackson 5.â€
Yet even the loyal Buzan noticed that none of the children mentioned any grandparents, aunts, uncles or cousins — there were no family photographs of the extended Jackson clan.
Nor did they ever mention religion. “Michael would talk to them about many great figures from the past, but I never heard him refer to Jesus.†The children and their father were physically and emotionally sealed from the rest of theworld — a reflection, perhaps, of Jackson’s desire to hide after the public circus around his
acquittal in 2005 of damaging child-molestation charges.
Only once did Jackson allude to any scandals in Buzan’s company. He was still smarting at
accusations that he was a “mad, bad dad†after he had dangled Blanket, then just nine months
old, out of the window of a Berlin hotel room in 2002. “Michael was indignant about that,â€
says Buzan. “He said, ‘I’m a dancer, one of the fittest, strongest people in the theatre. I lift
and carry adults with no difficulty.’ â€
Lena's heading : Prescription drug abuse
The balcony moment has been interpreted by many as a sign that Jackson’s dependence on drugs was clouding his judgment. Buzan saw no evidence of drug abuse in Bahrain, but he often noticed his hypersensitivity to sunlight — he was with Jackson during a car journey when the sun crept around the sides of his shades and momentarily dazzled him. “Michael cried out in pain and involuntarily ducked his head.†Such hypersensitivity is a well-known side-effect of opiate abuse, which shrinks the pupils. A family friend and business associate in Bahrain told us that strong prescription drugs definitely featured during his stay there. In
one highly embarrassing incident for Sheikh Abdulla, Jackson’s host, an aide to the singer was apprehended by customs officials at Manama airport carrying a huge consignment of synthetic opiates. Among them was OxyContin, a cancer medication popularly known as “hillbilly heroinâ€.
