NEWSMAKERS in New York

LOVE THE BEAR, HATE THE MERCHANDISE Behind every big star, there's a star-maker who propelled their rise to fame. So was the Berlin Zoo's financial director Gerald Uhlich to Knut, the world's most famous polar bear. It was Uhlich who positioned the orphaned cub as mascot for the global movement against climate change. Knut T-shirts, toys, pop songs, and a bestselling children's book all followed -- the cub even posed opposite Leonardo DiCaprio on the May cover of Vanity Fair. In fact, 2007 was the most profitable year in the Berlin Zoo's 163-year history. But some suggest the cult of Knut has gone too far. "We have 14,000 animals," says zoo co-director Bernhard Blaszkiewitz. "It has become a bit of a theatre." The zoo recently decided not to renew Uhlich's contract. "I have nothing to be ashamed of," Uhlich says, calling the split "amicable." Knut, meanwhile, recently celebrated his first birthday amid yet more ballyhoo. It remains to be seen whether the bear will retain his fame -- or plummet to the D-list. HASSAN ASKARI

THE HANUKKAH HERO When two young New Yorkers, Walter Adler and Maria Parsheva, both 23, returned a "Merry Christmas" greeting recently with "Happy Hanukkah" on a Brooklyn subway train, the group of 10 revellers turned on the Jewish couple. "You dirty Jews, you killed Jesus on Hanukkah. You should all die," they yelled. The slurs were accompanied by a torrent of fists. What happened next was nothing short of a Hanukkah miracle. As other passengers put on blinders to the skirmish, a lone rider, 20-year-old Bangladeshi Muslim Hassan Askari, came to the couple's defence -- receiving two black eyes for his help. Askari's intervention allowed Adler to pull the emergency brake, and the assailants were apprehended at the next stop. The culprits, some of whom have previous charges of assaulting minorities, could face serious jail time. As for Askari, a college student, he shrugged off the Muslim-rescuing-Jews-in-peril headlines that his courageous action provoked. "My religion teaches me to help my fellow man," Askari says. "Everyone's the same to me." LUCY KIBAKI

A SLAP IN THE FACE OF GOOD GOVERNMENT Celebrating Kenya's independence day should have been a good photo op for President Mwai Kibaki, trailing in polls for his country's national election. Instead it turned into a nightmare when his notoriously haughty wife Lucy publicly slapped an official after he introduced her as "Lucy Wambui," a reference to Mary Wambui, widely believed to be Mwai Kibaki's secret second wife. Then the media were outraged when security forces deleted images of the attack. Lucy Kibaki's outburst has refocused attention away from Mwai's achievements of economic growth and free primary education, and toward how the rich 76-year-old politician has failed to tackle the corruption, graft and misuse of power endemic in Kenya, even though he won the 2002 election by promising to cut out the rot. With 68 per cent of businesses reporting they were victims of corruption and other economic crimes, voters may give Kibaki a slap in elections next week. TRE MERRITT

LIKE A CHIP OFF THE OLD CROCKETT Legend has it that 19th-century American folk hero Davy Crockett killed a bear when he was just three years old. The King of the Wild Frontier has a modern-day heir apparent. On Dec. 9, five-year-old Tre Merritt -- who claims ancestry from the great frontiersman -- killed a black bear weighing 200 kg. Armed with a youth rifle, the Arkansas boy was hunting with his grandfather when the bear crossed their path. "When [the bear] got in the open, I whistled at him and he stopped and I said, 'Shoot, Tre,' " recalls Mike Merritt, Tre's grandfather. It wasn't the boy's first kill -- he's been shooting since he was 2?, and felled three deer last year, Tre's family says. His grandfather suspects he may even have surpassed Crockett's legendary feat. "Tre is five and really killed a bear," he boasts. "I really doubt if Davy killed one when he was three." GEORGINA CHAPMAN

WEDDING BY DESIGN It's a wrap for waif-like British fashion designer Georgina Chapman and movie mogul Harvey Weinstein. After a two-year courtship, the pair wed at Weinstein's opulent Westport, Conn., estate on the weekend. The hot-headed Weinstein, who produced such titles as Shakespeare in Love, Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction, married the former model in a ceremony overlooking the water on a snowy Saturday evening. The guests included actresses Cameron Diaz and Jennifer Lopez, film director Quentin Tarantino, American Vogue editor Anna Wintour and media tycoon Rupert Murdoch. Others, who couldn't make it through the snow, gave video tributes: they included Bill and Hillary Clinton, Gwyneth Paltrow and George Clooney. Weinstein, 55, proposed a month ago to the 31-year-old Chapman, who was unknown before last year's award season when she designed gowns for Renee Zellweger, Cate Blanchett and Scarlett Johansson among others, all of whom coincidentally have recently worked under Weinstein. Seems her designs combined nice form with a function. OSCAR NIEMEYER

THE MASTER OF THE CURVE TURNS 100 While working on a new cultural centre for the Spanish city of Avila, Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer paused last weekend for a matter he considered of little importance: observing his 100th birthday. Although he avers that sketching building designs is getting more difficult, he has no interest in stopping -- he recently completed a theatre across the bay from Rio de Janeiro. Niemeyer began his illustrious career in the 1930s, assigned by Brazil's president Getulio Vargas to assist Swiss architect Le Corbusier, who flew in on a zeppelin to create a government building. Niemeyer developed an architecture of shapely curves partly inspired, he says, by Brazilian women (his office is located in a busty Rio structure nicknamed the Mae West building). The man who in the late 1950s designed Brazil's ersatz capital, Brasilia, is also responsible for the design (with Le Corbusier) of the United Nations headquarters in New York City. He's now working on a new city for Algeria. His seven-decade career has made him almost mystical. "Age is not important," he says. "Time is not important." EDOARDO CONTINI

UNCOVERING A MOBSTER AND HIS UNDERWEAR Italian mobsters take note: the next time an urge for pizza strikes, resist. For months, Camorra clan boss Edoardo Contini holed up in a small Naples apartment to evade authorities, communicating only with visiting Mafia associates via handwritten notes known as pizzini. The accused godfather didn't use the Internet or make phone calls, and hadn't seen his wife in a year. But in the end, it was his stomach that gave him away. A police bugging operation stumbled on a conversation in which the mobster gave away his location when he discussed food with an elderly woman in the building. When police stormed the apartment, though, they discovered more than just a hungry mobster. After a laundry trail led authorities to Sicilian Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano last year, Contini had a constant supply of new underwear delivered rather than sending laundry out; in addition to his famed designer outfits, police found a pile of used underwear inside the apartment. Police scored another coup this month when they killed Mafia boss Daniele Emmanuello, who was fleeing in his pyjamas -- and eating his pizzini. MARINA NEMAT

A BRAVE WOMAN'S 'STRENGTH OF MIND' Her nightmare began at age 16, when she complained to her teacher in post-revolutionary Tehran because math classes were being replaced with Islamic studies. What followed would have broken most people. Marina Nemat's teacher informed on her and authorities in the government of Ayatollah Khomeini sentenced her to face a firing squad. She only escaped death when a revolutionary guard rescued her -- but at a price. He demanded a forced wedding. He was killed by rivals and Nemat finally married a childhood sweetheart and escaped to Canada. Nemat, who this year recounted her trials in an internationally bestselling memoir, last week received the first-ever Human Dignity prize, awarded by the European Parliament. In naming the 42-year-old Toronto-area resident the prize's first honouree, the parliament heralded her "strength of mind despite her experiences." An understatement if ever there was one.