tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-46704899083941521482024-02-19T23:19:58.835+08:00Stunning Interesting Facts tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.comBlogger994125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-52822183632335946262015-07-15T08:04:00.001+08:002015-07-15T08:04:15.070+08:00Chinese Companies Accused of Selling Potentially Deadly Plastic Rice<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtI2uqVIBckCmcpT0qD_VZwCu_2tIMrec_1bmkh905DormZnSQdqLoZvx8rvEgYLzB73I-R0142x6PiMXToAwEoN59F8h7XE7sWPHYCgEb-4dqP-T8hhhty25GVj5X4_h86cHqjGxHJ9FK/s1600/550x313xfake-rice-550x313.jpg.pagespeed.ic.tJW4sVNWeW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Chinese Companies Accused of Selling Potentially Deadly Plastic Rice" border="0" height="227" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtI2uqVIBckCmcpT0qD_VZwCu_2tIMrec_1bmkh905DormZnSQdqLoZvx8rvEgYLzB73I-R0142x6PiMXToAwEoN59F8h7XE7sWPHYCgEb-4dqP-T8hhhty25GVj5X4_h86cHqjGxHJ9FK/s400/550x313xfake-rice-550x313.jpg.pagespeed.ic.tJW4sVNWeW.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a>A major food safety scandal involving fake rice recently rocked China; News reports suggested that the grain is produced by mixing the potatoes with industrial synthetic resin. There were rumors of "inexpensive but profitable" rice exported to other Asian countries, including Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, and India as well.<br /><br />The fake grains can hardly be distinguished from natural rice when raw. The only way to identify plastic rice by cooking it - it remains very difficult and hard to digest. One publication explained soup cooked rice with plastic forms a plastic film on top, which burns when heated.<br /><br />Health experts are warning people that the grain, if detected, can wreak havoc on the digestive system. According to an official from the Chinese Restaurant Association, eating three bowls of rice is equivalent plastic consuming one plastic bag!<br /><br />News of fake rice is circulating on social media platforms such as Facebook and mobile messaging app WhatsApp for a few years now. Reports suggest that the rice was initially sold in the Chinese market, mainly in Taiyuan in Shanxi province. Now, people are afraid that it found its way to other countries in Asia. The rice was reportedly sold only in small shops, large supermarkets do not, which makes it more difficult to detect.<br /><br />Hasan Malek, Minister of Domestic Trade and Consumerism Malaysia, said that people should not panic over the news until it was officially confirmed. "The news may be true or not, we do not know," he told Star Online. "We also do not know whether the fake rice has entered the country, but we can not take things lightly and carry out investigations throughout the country."<br /><br />Hasan said that an investigative team will focus on testing rice samples in small shops. "We are conducting our investigation, but I would urge buyers to come forward and report to the ministry if they come across such rice. All reports produced will be treated confidentially." He added that the plastic rice would be difficult to detect if mixed with normal rice.<br /><br />Singapore Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) also reacted to the news. "As part of routine surveillance Ava, the imported rice are regularly inspected and sampled to ensure compliance with our standards and requirements on food safety," a spokesman told The Straits Times. "We have not received any feedback on the fake rice."<br /><br />The fake rice scandal is one of many food safety issues that the Chinese authorities had to deal with. In 2010, a company Shaanxi is involved in adding spice to ordinary rice and passing it off as the more expensive "Wuchang rice. And in 2008, infant milk formula is mixed with a plastic compound called melamine. Six babies died during this time, while 300,000 others suffered from serious kidney problems.<br /><br />We covered some fake Chinese food on Oddity Central as well. Four years ago we posted about in regards to a strong "beef extract" additive used in restaurants to open in cow breeding, and in 2013 had a concrete-filled walnuts.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCsusJpkS2Z0JthHeDdl8UfMTU6Pgar0LOhNyQ9Kwc3v1RdCnWEJr8xib3QGuriNwmrAWcT9BcbckHR_6Cp9zV_0tLYQOs1NO0KsFi5REfGnWxNmbpEYAths_QmqX3zHivTxNnz1BuwQpC/s1600/550x413xfake-rice2-550x413.jpg.pagespeed.ic.TO5Osoa55v.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Chinese Companies Accused of Selling Potentially Deadly Plastic Rice" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCsusJpkS2Z0JthHeDdl8UfMTU6Pgar0LOhNyQ9Kwc3v1RdCnWEJr8xib3QGuriNwmrAWcT9BcbckHR_6Cp9zV_0tLYQOs1NO0KsFi5REfGnWxNmbpEYAths_QmqX3zHivTxNnz1BuwQpC/s400/550x413xfake-rice2-550x413.jpg.pagespeed.ic.TO5Osoa55v.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-17280445761733227732015-07-15T07:58:00.002+08:002015-07-15T07:58:56.848+08:00The Glowing Firefly Squids of Toyama Bay<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3a1sSJY7xZ3qFXdHG-RuAPDGBBLv8eHzaiGXmk2eD9m47eVz7Mlk6bb66XEWzT8XB3MoT1x3Cmyhyphenhyphen0gvlt-qW7sQvOWz3QH_dk-PaNZJehl1gpe81yv03v1yCTkBDytR27Y1dzPP-Uf0p/s1600/550x367xglowing-firefly-squid-550x367.jpg.pagespeed.ic.8MnandknwJ.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Glowing Firefly Squids of Toyama Bay" border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3a1sSJY7xZ3qFXdHG-RuAPDGBBLv8eHzaiGXmk2eD9m47eVz7Mlk6bb66XEWzT8XB3MoT1x3Cmyhyphenhyphen0gvlt-qW7sQvOWz3QH_dk-PaNZJehl1gpe81yv03v1yCTkBDytR27Y1dzPP-Uf0p/s400/550x367xglowing-firefly-squid-550x367.jpg.pagespeed.ic.8MnandknwJ.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
Every year, between March and June, the 14-km coast of Japan Toyama Bay is lit up in blue. The electrifying light show is not man-made; It is a natural phenomenon, caused by thousands of bioluminescent cephalopods known as 'glowing Squids Firefly'. These fascinating creatures usually live in 1,200 ft underwater, but pushed over the waves during th Hotaru (firefly squid) season.<br /><br />Firefly squid, or Watasenia Scintillans, usually about three inches long and covered with photophores. Large photophores are present around their eyes and the tips of their tentacles, while small photophores cover the whole body. The light-producing photophores contain chemicals that are responsible for the squid bioluminescence. Let's have similar photophores, so the squid is named after them.<br /><br />The arrival of Firefly Squid creates a festive atmosphere along the coast - it's almost like an annual reunion of sorts. Thousands of squid can coordinate their deep blue lights flash simultaneously or alternate in endless patterns, creating a twinkling effect. Each pattern serves a different purpose. On-and-off flashes attract small fish, squid where pounce on their powerful tentacles. Counter-illumination allows the squid to blend in with light cascading from the top, protecting them from predators. The creatures mating season 'also coincides with this period; Millions of squid came over in the evening to fertilize and drop their eggs in Toyoma Bay. The season brings thousands of tourists in the region, who flock to the bay to admire the unique display of lights.<br /><br />The Hotaru Bottom fishing port Museum Namerikawa, Toyama Prefecture, is the world's only museum dedicated to the firefly squid. The museum conducts sightseeing tours firefly squid every year between March and May. Sightseeing boat leaving the port shortly after 03:00, making a short trip to fixed nets located about 1 to 2 km offshore. As the fishermen haul in their nets, firefly squid light makes the surface of the sea to glow, making tourists gasp in delight.<br /><br />The museum also has interactive exhibits and a research center to study the mating behavior squids' and sustainable fishing methods. There is a restaurant on the roof that provides a stunning view of Toyama bay, and serves delicacies such as firefly squid tempura. The gift shop squid in freeze-dried, powdered, canned and sweetened varieties.<br /><br />Firefly squid is considered a delicacy in Japan, and there are many ways to eat them - raw, grilled, stewed or tempura. Travel reports the BBC prefer living in pop eyes off freshly caught raw squid and swallow them whole. There's also fresh squid sushi or sashimi to be paired with a couple of glasses of local welfare. Do not expect the dishes to glow in the plate, though!<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE1j4mNg5Km2n1Azn-g4KNO3z6K3siYHbGzJF4AuTrNzP7enqcPINHOEQN1Vnbf-Bk3_JbXeUOpYSm4LqnxzUlZhhAlN_22Tkf6TV3ObDmNwpMOIIaTA1WX_D8r83adEU4GCfmW_-CKesO/s1600/550x366xglowing-firefly-squid4-550x366.jpg.pagespeed.ic.TmYWtYyjMq.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Glowing Firefly Squids of Toyama Bay" border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE1j4mNg5Km2n1Azn-g4KNO3z6K3siYHbGzJF4AuTrNzP7enqcPINHOEQN1Vnbf-Bk3_JbXeUOpYSm4LqnxzUlZhhAlN_22Tkf6TV3ObDmNwpMOIIaTA1WX_D8r83adEU4GCfmW_-CKesO/s400/550x366xglowing-firefly-squid4-550x366.jpg.pagespeed.ic.TmYWtYyjMq.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3w9YUuy5qX5n-45fv-ME3hdO26pVzotJhnZvk3m0JpMSIgnfSFsEMbjRjmLlRqblBPgW0Ay1gH5XUCsM42_Pm3dwHPDx6RhorM4tAZZTMlEyXo0EH2eOvf3VakERtyDzEi1TK33OckDp6/s1600/550x413xglowing-firefly-squid3-550x413.jpg.pagespeed.ic.TMU4eEaX_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Glowing Firefly Squids of Toyama Bay" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3w9YUuy5qX5n-45fv-ME3hdO26pVzotJhnZvk3m0JpMSIgnfSFsEMbjRjmLlRqblBPgW0Ay1gH5XUCsM42_Pm3dwHPDx6RhorM4tAZZTMlEyXo0EH2eOvf3VakERtyDzEi1TK33OckDp6/s400/550x413xglowing-firefly-squid3-550x413.jpg.pagespeed.ic.TMU4eEaX_n.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-83499241167154794252015-07-15T07:55:00.001+08:002015-07-15T07:55:21.794+08:00The Mexican Town Where Women Engage in Bloody Fist Fights to Call the Rain<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmEClGhWWCtT2CvWamj2S95LSyy4QQCV1f_gAyXsXkrW_zqTvV4wWM4ZikkThsVW2O33hU_-T614glmMSGkg1zIRHRz0W9YKClUccrTODo8OZLyyURiy_jAV2VcwzwaJPx1W2cdVQAllQj/s1600/550x357xGuerrero-fighting-festival4-550x357.jpg.pagespeed.ic.C0XEznbKar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Mexican Town Where Women Engage in Bloody Fist Fights to Call the Rain" border="0" height="258" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmEClGhWWCtT2CvWamj2S95LSyy4QQCV1f_gAyXsXkrW_zqTvV4wWM4ZikkThsVW2O33hU_-T614glmMSGkg1zIRHRz0W9YKClUccrTODo8OZLyyURiy_jAV2VcwzwaJPx1W2cdVQAllQj/s400/550x357xGuerrero-fighting-festival4-550x357.jpg.pagespeed.ic.C0XEznbKar.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
Every year, in the month of May, the women from the Nahua village of Guerrero, Mexico, get together to beat the living daylights out of each other. All the blood they spill during the fight is collected in the bucket, and later used to plow and water their lands. The villagers believe that this strange ritual will bring rain and provide a bountiful harvest!<br /><br />The festival, like many others in Mexico, combines Catholic and prehispanic tradition. On the first day, women will wake up early to make large quantities of food. They prepare turkey, chicken, rice, boiled eggs, POZOLE, mole, and tortillas, they take along with them in the yard fighting. On the official site, lay them on the food and decorate the room with flowers and turkey inflated bellies. They recite prayers to the Virgin Mary and the local rain god Tlaloc, after which it is time for the battle to begin.<br /><br />The villagers stood in a circle, forming a ring of sorts, waiting for their opponents to come from neighboring communities. The village of La Esperanza and El Rancho Las Lomas, in particular, have a long standing rivalry - they fight in a field that lies on the border between the two cities. When everyone has arrived, the women will begin to seek out competition, challenging them to fight. The older women, the seasoned warrior, provoke younger girls to get into the ring and spill some blood.<br /><br />When the opponent is decided, the women will get in the ring and face each other, tying up their hair and taking off their jewelry. One of them throws the first punch, the crowd begins to cheer, and pretty soon, a bloody battle was conducted. The woman did not seem to care about winning, all they want is to reveal and collect as many blood as possible. They may ask for a time out to clean their nose bloodied, but they'll get right to the punching when they are done. Men and children sometimes join in as well, and the fighting will continue until dark, after which everyone hugs each other and head back home.<br /><br />Why women are doing all the fighting, and not the people, you ask? According to Vice Magazine, farmers were out tending their land, so the task is left to the women and children.<br /><br />Professor David Delgado of Chapingo University, spent 12 years studying the harvest festival, believes fighting ritual can be traced back to the Aztecs. "It was originally linked to the beginning of the harvest of maize," he explained. "The other important issue here is the symbol. The people here are three communities formed and when one would take to the turf of others, they will compete with one another. So they say that because of their clash, took the god Tlaloc the rain on them. "<br /><br />"Two of these communities started a sort of contest to see who can get water from behind Tlaloc," he added. "Escape to the hill. So they went up and stole the water, but they started fighting for them when they came down. And so they say that the fights are held on this day since then. They every drop of blood is a drop of water, and consequently standing tradition. "<br /><br />The annual parade Tigrada - celebrated in May in the main town of Zitala, Chilapa, and Acatlan - features many other rituals, all centered around praying for rain. People are put in jaguar clothing and beat each other with whips. They also organize dance and other offerings, but the main purpose of the festival is to reveal their blood and offer it in exchange for rain.<br /><br />Believe it or not, it is not only the bloody festival in the world. Each year, the community of Peru holds Takanakuy Chumbivilcas, a festive event where people get to resolve their differences with the old fashioned way, with punches and kicks. However, as the fighting women of Guerrero, combatants shake hands and walk away on good terms after the battle.<br /><br />However, both the violent traditions pale in comparison to GOTMAR Mela, a century-old stone throwing fight between two rival Indian village. Held every year, the event leaves hundreds injured and even death.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZt85kJna-n4twQnLAq2_jdYuV5A_h6ALMdeagt5ZfyeZe-3d1XWyH7pdgypu09U1PfmsifIKF9CD4oa2SOYbndFcZCLvAoYx0Kd6iwlkovQYagv_wV_7WyD7Pm06__a5q425uKQi74SG4/s1600/550x352xGuerrero-fighting-festival2-550x352.jpg.pagespeed.ic.tv_eQEzh09.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Mexican Town Where Women Engage in Bloody Fist Fights to Call the Rain" border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZt85kJna-n4twQnLAq2_jdYuV5A_h6ALMdeagt5ZfyeZe-3d1XWyH7pdgypu09U1PfmsifIKF9CD4oa2SOYbndFcZCLvAoYx0Kd6iwlkovQYagv_wV_7WyD7Pm06__a5q425uKQi74SG4/s400/550x352xGuerrero-fighting-festival2-550x352.jpg.pagespeed.ic.tv_eQEzh09.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkq9Zscw-IYmeeGBVNhJJwA52bwk5OrR966R1xADlWd9Zl6hZXFUeOXlCTaj2C6KSozix62Mt8wjP_1LnQfu-QZnQ673z3sSCILWKv-Ml0DyYlpC68iTu7TRSE4RJpN54KMth5t8LWGX_O/s1600/550x352xGuerrero-fighting-festival-550x352.jpg.pagespeed.ic.mHE17xBSU1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Mexican Town Where Women Engage in Bloody Fist Fights to Call the Rain" border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkq9Zscw-IYmeeGBVNhJJwA52bwk5OrR966R1xADlWd9Zl6hZXFUeOXlCTaj2C6KSozix62Mt8wjP_1LnQfu-QZnQ673z3sSCILWKv-Ml0DyYlpC68iTu7TRSE4RJpN54KMth5t8LWGX_O/s400/550x352xGuerrero-fighting-festival-550x352.jpg.pagespeed.ic.mHE17xBSU1.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-56437423940171801272015-07-14T14:01:00.003+08:002015-07-14T14:01:58.362+08:00Kindhearted Woman Saves 100 Dogs From Being Eaten During Controversial Festival<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7g_JGR8npo852WwxSOQowyxWbAZKBQd3Q0Beyo9WMGeUh3ro0vZqacD0zBwhzAEykxp2EE3l60huBupaEkPA_x3PtBz9-j0qeIhCf8iZe2_AXxhAmXBQTDZpgNCq_otrMka9ctl5fxJD0/s1600/Yang-Xiaoyun3-550x366.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Kindhearted Woman Saves 100 Dogs From Being Eaten During Controversial Festival" border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7g_JGR8npo852WwxSOQowyxWbAZKBQd3Q0Beyo9WMGeUh3ro0vZqacD0zBwhzAEykxp2EE3l60huBupaEkPA_x3PtBz9-j0qeIhCf8iZe2_AXxhAmXBQTDZpgNCq_otrMka9ctl5fxJD0/s400/Yang-Xiaoyun3-550x366.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
A 65-year-old dog lover from China has gone to great lengths to save as many dogs as he possibly could from being eaten during Yulin Dog Meat Festival this year. He managed to pay around $ 1,000 for the issuance of 100 otherwise doomed canines. It may not sound like much, but the media attention his actions taken by the international media also helped raise awareness about the cruel festival, thus increasing the chance that it will be banned in the near future.<br /><br />Yang Xiaoyun, a retired school teacher from Tianjin, China, traveled 1,500 miles from his home in the city of Yulin, to save scores of dogs from being killed and eaten during the Dog Meat Festival. Shared internet portal Netease Chinese show 65-year-old woman walking through a market in which the dogs are kept in cages and payments for different amounts of money for their release . Reports say he ended up paying 7,000 yuan ($ 1,000) to save 100 dogs.<br /><br />It is estimated that around 10,000 dogs were killed and sold as meat during Yulin Dog Meat Festival, an event meant to ring in the summer solstice by promoting the consumption of dog meat. Started in 2010, the dog food festival is gaining in popularity, despite the cultural attitudes toward eating cats and dogs the change for the better in China and throughout Asia. This year, the Yulin caused international outcry, with animal rights organizations, celebrities and millions of individuals worldwide who speak against the display of cruelty and appeal to local governments to ban the festival.<br /><br />As recent efforts Yang Xiaoyun was not enough of a testament to his love for animals, it is revealed that his home in Tianjin is also a shelter for abandoned dogs and cats. Called "Common Home for Stray Animals", Yang's home area of around 1,500 dogs and over 200 cats. He can only afford to feed them steamed corn bread twice a day, and rely on volunteers and donations to function, but he always manages to make ends meat end. They also dedicated steward of medical assistance to animals in need of it.<br /><br />Chinese media reports that the recently rescued 100 dogs were making return trips Tianjin Yang Xiaoyun, to join him shelter.<br /><br />Yang Xiaoyun is one of the few kind souls have taken it upon themselves to help stray animals in China. In the past, we reported about other kindhearted people, like Ha Wenjin, a woman who takes care of the thousands of dogs and cats, Lola Bai, who hasspent the last 15 years of his life caring the stray canines and felines, or Wang Yanfang getting feeds and tends to more than 1,300 dogs per day. It is people like these that will help restore your faith in humanity.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNyteraEtU6uhSOuAVpLbraJmawFxUPzgdj5UVV-QRNVv8GfjaCinVp5iBs3Oi3suaUgCftGAK4onW_vzOVcCGzoTjkQM7tcMHnTIP08wrctwymyFtZBrBsazyFtXHkWSR1H-xrq0NxngL/s1600/Yang-Xiaoyun2-550x366.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Kindhearted Woman Saves 100 Dogs From Being Eaten During Controversial Festival" border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNyteraEtU6uhSOuAVpLbraJmawFxUPzgdj5UVV-QRNVv8GfjaCinVp5iBs3Oi3suaUgCftGAK4onW_vzOVcCGzoTjkQM7tcMHnTIP08wrctwymyFtZBrBsazyFtXHkWSR1H-xrq0NxngL/s400/Yang-Xiaoyun2-550x366.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJ3uhGV5a48gHBvJk8S5M3LAx9Y1ynUl3gJL3eGdkQ6AgFu4JdlVUutKNMRiHJRTo2GkuXF10SJNdcYzuW1yINgBuvNYw7rtzlbik1yrIhaBgA6Fn0QoAlbNz7Y8YhY_sobL9crXrjaskx/s1600/Yang-Xiaoyun-550x366.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Kindhearted Woman Saves 100 Dogs From Being Eaten During Controversial Festival" border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJ3uhGV5a48gHBvJk8S5M3LAx9Y1ynUl3gJL3eGdkQ6AgFu4JdlVUutKNMRiHJRTo2GkuXF10SJNdcYzuW1yINgBuvNYw7rtzlbik1yrIhaBgA6Fn0QoAlbNz7Y8YhY_sobL9crXrjaskx/s400/Yang-Xiaoyun-550x366.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-12495047354588035052015-07-14T13:54:00.002+08:002015-07-14T13:54:59.135+08:00The Man Who Made Millions by Selling Rocks as Pets<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfP198LWX8-wXZV8SnlAfOZDn5hDeQ72UgRy1cYD2qHufh7-07oPb0e_01Q00tOMNChzfc281mJvTtFcUy2XdozEIF9eWqgHSCusVdl5IEtkPTsxj53dkR8N5pYbykzS7QhupPLO_wih7z/s1600/pet-rock4-550x413.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Man Who Made Millions by Selling Rocks as Pets" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfP198LWX8-wXZV8SnlAfOZDn5hDeQ72UgRy1cYD2qHufh7-07oPb0e_01Q00tOMNChzfc281mJvTtFcUy2XdozEIF9eWqgHSCusVdl5IEtkPTsxj53dkR8N5pYbykzS7QhupPLO_wih7z/s400/pet-rock4-550x413.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
Gary Ross Dahl, who died earlier this year at age 78, will always be remembered for inventing the "Pet Rock", a 1970s toy craze department. The brilliant salesman sold True rocks for a living, and managed to make millions through its "ridiculously successful marketing techniques."<br /><br />Even I started His career as an advertising copywriter, entrepreneur Change When Dahl turned his notion of selling pet rocks took off. It all started one night in the mid-'70s, while having a drink at a local bar in Los Gatos, California. People around him are talking about pets, and about how difficult it is to feed, walk and clean up after them.<br /><br />Struck by sudden inspiration, Dahl stated that he had no such problem with his own pets. "I have a pet rock," I told the crowd. And his response was received so well that I began to toy with the idea of eventually setting up a business around it.<br /><br />Dahl found two investors, visited a building supply store, and bought a box of Mexican beach smooth stone for a penny apiece. I know that all I need is to pack each stone beautiful, and they want to sell for a lot more than it was previously valued. After much trial and error, I finally designed a smart cardboard carrying case, complete with air holes for the 'pet' to breathe. The stone is gentle nestled inside the box, on a bed of softwood shavings.<br /><br />Also added a handbook for good measure, which later proved to be a stroke of genius. Containing instructions on the care, feeding, and house training Pet Rocks This little book. "If, when you remove the stones from the STI box and it appears to be excited, to put it in some old newspapers," it read. "Rock will know what the role is for and will require no further instruction. It Stay on paper until you move it."<br /><br />It is this Manual Randy managed to catch the attention of millions, the Pet Rock constructing a nation-wide phenomenon. Dahl's timing was impeccable, rock HAD hit the market at the right time. The Vietnam War and Watergate ended HAD begins. "There was a whole lot of bad news going on," I told the Houston Chronicle in 1999. "People are down. It's not a really good time for the national psyche. I think the Pet Rock is just a good giggle. Everyone who needed a good laugh and the media ate it up. "<br /><br />Then releases STI during Christmas 1975, Dahl worked up to half of the storm, even earning a place in the legendary Tonight Show. Within a few months, 1.5 million rocks are sold at $ 3.95 apiece, and the demand is higher than ever. "I had a phone in each ear," Dahl recalled an interview in 2011. "I taught my PR guy to pretend with me so I could answer my call" Sales Successfully wonderful for a while -. Dahl moved to a big house with a swimming pool and traded his Honda to Mercedes.<br /><br />But his success was too good to last long. As reported by the New York Times, "the simplicity of his incredible proved its undoing." I even had the name of His trademarked product, I can not stop others from selling stones in a box. Lots of people did just that, and took his concept to new levels. There Bicentennial Rock, etched in the American flag. And someone began offering college degrees for Pet Rocks, and $ 3 for a bachelor and $ 10 for a Ph.D. Business Dahl began to suffer, and in the late '70s, I was sued by his investors and ended up paying them six figure judgment.<br /><br />With the money I earned His Pet Rock business, Dahl and his wife designed and built the Carry Nations Saloon in Los Gatos. He later returned to advertising, and even wrote a book called Advertising for Dummies, published in 2001. But I always remembered for the Pet Rock phenomenon. Earned him a good measure of wealth and fame, and he made wary by hordes of inventor who thronged him for advice.<br /><br />"There's a bizarre lunatic fringe who feel I owe them a living," Dahl told AP in 1988. "Sometimes I look back and wonder if my life would not have been simpler if I had not done it." Agreed to his wife: "Over time, however, people came to him with strange ideas, relying on him to do for them what I HAD done himself. And a lot of times They are really, really stupid idea, "he said.<br /><br />"I'm sick of the whole damn thing," I told the Houston Chronicle.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghcJkLpLlkpQc_SUGZ7W-KAlJqkPwvIQmmGyUkO9-O0Ul-KDKwDUkB-UM0jy-qySGiC2IaaRFVgBTSRy2De5MhSWN7oJj6ZHkt_RQs3dBOV7TzR7ooVZQjflGKyuDsHUFsnZHy8qgd5OMF/s1600/pet-rock3-550x442.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Man Who Made Millions by Selling Rocks as Pets" border="0" height="321" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghcJkLpLlkpQc_SUGZ7W-KAlJqkPwvIQmmGyUkO9-O0Ul-KDKwDUkB-UM0jy-qySGiC2IaaRFVgBTSRy2De5MhSWN7oJj6ZHkt_RQs3dBOV7TzR7ooVZQjflGKyuDsHUFsnZHy8qgd5OMF/s400/pet-rock3-550x442.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjygC9wv4WSHdS1CW_p8u7PIbURNLeem1OAs1Y_pVXZ0RnBRNre33X59CpWB5ap0KCALtnuvO3tYnatI5Hn2IUqw0sqp_WQofI__2rIsdzYl8UvBm8pwTfOgWKa7mwEwbfM-JZKUmrP3J5d/s1600/pet-rock-550x423.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The Man Who Made Millions by Selling Rocks as Pets" border="0" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjygC9wv4WSHdS1CW_p8u7PIbURNLeem1OAs1Y_pVXZ0RnBRNre33X59CpWB5ap0KCALtnuvO3tYnatI5Hn2IUqw0sqp_WQofI__2rIsdzYl8UvBm8pwTfOgWKa7mwEwbfM-JZKUmrP3J5d/s400/pet-rock-550x423.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-21341530950324103412015-07-14T13:50:00.002+08:002015-07-14T14:09:00.899+08:00Bon Appetite! 40-Year-Old “Zombie Meat” Sold in Restaurants Across China<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTu4kt4bfaSsjUIHFTNKu5ioRdqEq9ed8mkm2oeTMT3WX7eTtmK4lNza78a7-ge7NbGzDbKPZcBI5c2vvE6366ZYhZw8vyVy0GPNhcrBAX3GFbkG-mZwXQT6ligWHEsh1K9kiT3eG8NjNp/s1600/zombie-meat-550x367.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Bon Appetite! 40-Year-Old “Zombie Meat” Sold in Restaurants Across China" border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTu4kt4bfaSsjUIHFTNKu5ioRdqEq9ed8mkm2oeTMT3WX7eTtmK4lNza78a7-ge7NbGzDbKPZcBI5c2vvE6366ZYhZw8vyVy0GPNhcrBAX3GFbkG-mZwXQT6ligWHEsh1K9kiT3eG8NjNp/s400/zombie-meat-550x367.jpeg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
after rice plastic, concrete-filled walnuts, flavored pork and beef, the latest food scandal in China involves expired meat be at least 30 to 40 years old!<br />
<br />
Officials in the Chinese food safety Have seized more than 100,000 tonnes of meat, worth 3 billion yuan (484 million US dollars), including pork trotters from the 1970s and chicken wings from the 1980s. As the news went viral online, netizens coined the word 'zombie meat' to refer to expired, oxidized meat.<br />
<br />
800 tonnes of illegal meat is confiscated from Hunan province alone, worth an eye-watering 10 million yuan - one of the largest hauls food safety in recent years. 20 illegal gangs have been cracked down and arrested 22 people, including two leaders treats ring.<br />
<br />
"It stank!" Said Zhang Tao, a customs official from Hunan. "The entire truck was full. I almost threw When I opened the door."<br />
<br />
ACCORDING TO Yang Bo, deputy director of the customs bureau in Changsha, the smuggled meat is not inspected or quarantined. Most of it comes from stockpiles of food prepared in the US, smuggled through Vietnam and Hong Kong, with low-cost unrefrigerated truck. This causes the meat to rot and smell during the journey. When it reaches China, the meat is refrozen and sent to various provinces across the country. Such as meat Bo Said that can carry bird flu, foot and mouth disease, as well as mad cow disease.<br />
<br />
"Frozen food smugglers have a network covering the whole country so any crackdown needs to be a multi-province effort, especially in the main battlefields of Hunan, Guangdong, Guangxi, and Yunnan," I added. "Concentrated efforts will be focused on the leadership of the gang to take the problem from the root and ensure the safety and health of consumers."<br />
<br />
But that's a lot easier said than done - Insiders say that despite crackdowns and arrests, the trade continues to thrive. It costs only 17 yuan (2.74 US dollars) per year to store a ton of expired frozen meat, and the income is insane. So there will always be criminals willing to smuggle zombie meat. Make sure you smooth and organized gang transactions - They offer one-stop-shop for consumers, the inclusion of finding suppliers, Organising transportation, customs clearance, and delivery.<br />
<br />
Surprisingly, rotten, stinky, expired meat has plenty of customers, mostly in smaller cities restaurants Where inspection procedures are lax. Zombie doubts meat can not be sold directly to consumers because it is oxidized and appear black. But restaurants are reliable for preparing the meat so that customers can not really tell the difference. At least two million tonnes of decades-old beef is believed to be consumed by unsuspecting Chinese consumers every year! That sounds scary, but many netizens are promising to find me inhumane situations. Someone jokingly commented: "Waiter, I'll have a 1980 cut of beef, and a '82 Coke."<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC8ZIHAygTIVMjM32q0WqCG9Z1DmBvNbuZbCDgykvZfKZWY_OYgYpI8hO71M5irUtq5lzb4acftrdEdIps52lZutLotNaSU4rthcLDq6aI9erw-qaAwjY12mQJa9GHbCf9VDJpFjCyDrlB/s1600/zombie-meat2-550x367.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Bon Appetite! 40-Year-Old “Zombie Meat” Sold in Restaurants Across China" border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC8ZIHAygTIVMjM32q0WqCG9Z1DmBvNbuZbCDgykvZfKZWY_OYgYpI8hO71M5irUtq5lzb4acftrdEdIps52lZutLotNaSU4rthcLDq6aI9erw-qaAwjY12mQJa9GHbCf9VDJpFjCyDrlB/s400/zombie-meat2-550x367.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQlrRpDUFs66iqz4vaNmUQQ7j6ZJJvbsBbVKm7mJgMD_pQfnUjjt86GklwKEJX3hX13swRHpH82Csi_e4ptl48dYQWjWJ8FmTBnfXwpkuuPQdQzPdDGojylexgEkxnlTYy1RMfz6_0Od_6/s1600/zombie-meat3-550x367.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Bon Appetite! 40-Year-Old “Zombie Meat” Sold in Restaurants Across China" border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQlrRpDUFs66iqz4vaNmUQQ7j6ZJJvbsBbVKm7mJgMD_pQfnUjjt86GklwKEJX3hX13swRHpH82Csi_e4ptl48dYQWjWJ8FmTBnfXwpkuuPQdQzPdDGojylexgEkxnlTYy1RMfz6_0Od_6/s400/zombie-meat3-550x367.jpg" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-49629818774208744902015-07-14T13:47:00.003+08:002015-07-14T13:47:26.791+08:00African Pastor Turns Woman’s Hair into Delicious Food for His Congregation<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4kutYqFbLp_BrbbubvDtdnOhCzbCxqLV3eMBN2ANAKk7Nd7EWVj0WRbKgp-pMW-UwRR-IXg7B6NTmGFrV1RG0nxjrCNQ5qiEySxDXX1agQPAqgr4iIxKqLZxe-X4BcsiC4C4rvv8pSc5C/s1600/eating-hair-550x733.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="African Pastor Turns Woman’s Hair into Delicious Food for His Congregation" border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4kutYqFbLp_BrbbubvDtdnOhCzbCxqLV3eMBN2ANAKk7Nd7EWVj0WRbKgp-pMW-UwRR-IXg7B6NTmGFrV1RG0nxjrCNQ5qiEySxDXX1agQPAqgr4iIxKqLZxe-X4BcsiC4C4rvv8pSc5C/s400/eating-hair-550x733.jpg" title="" width="300" /></a></div>
A shepherd of the sheep from South Africa, who made headlines for former prayer for His Society Until they got, now in the news again for turning hair of a young woman having her followers foods straight and eat it on its head mule.<br /><br />Page pictures posted on Facebook End Times Ministries Apostles' show pastors, prophets Mnguni Penuel, Putting His Hands girls. He was a member of the Society was no holding her hair found their hands and whos attempt to eat it. These pictures are captioned. "Man of God held in a woman's head from God Thapelo Mabopane and became her hair to the children food for men and women of God who eat Everything depends on what we say we bring life Due we speak to them. "<br /><br />News Reports Early service Suggest Less Na, Na Mnguni ordered a piece meal Become fabric. Immediately congregants began to chew on it. During a service in May I speak with them about Adam and Eve and What if they were naked in the Garden of Eden. I mentioned in Genesis 2:25, "Having no clothes on them, they stand with nothing requiring them to shelter from the heat or cold or to hide any part of their body going out of sight."<br /><br />I TOLD Help God that they later could even change time, and that when people started sweating and started taking their clothes off. Their behavior in response to a shepherd, says it is a sign of recovery. Everyone in the Church, I have insisted, healed and delivered from evil.<br /><br />Controversial sermon shepherd Has drawn criticism online. "It should win a world record for stupidity," wrote one user Nairaland forum.<br /><br />"Madness in the Church season 5," wrote another. "As artificial hair that is now a delicious meal in South Africa."<br /><br />Believe it or not, these stunts are not uncommon exactly the new generations the African Church. Last year, Pastor Lesego Daniel, Rabboni Ministries Centre, SAID His followers eat grass to grow in God Coming more. Which they did ... whostinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-1522877000196193902014-11-22T10:19:00.001+08:002014-11-22T10:19:47.042+08:00World's Biggest Liar<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi__yVZNOAGo0HXDqfgBiwN5hGxWWABg0Qq5u7Y6i3Zvf6YhpiiUAm0h3g_pgNnAPmZnbd4xyVmL_PJkAVqSwpBoUfB8X1pP-iuzQji-FmoiIdx9j1SKmhrs5Clme-xGDigR4FrPrQjUaCa/s1600/kemp111_3114168b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="World's Biggest Liar" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi__yVZNOAGo0HXDqfgBiwN5hGxWWABg0Qq5u7Y6i3Zvf6YhpiiUAm0h3g_pgNnAPmZnbd4xyVmL_PJkAVqSwpBoUfB8X1pP-iuzQji-FmoiIdx9j1SKmhrs5Clme-xGDigR4FrPrQjUaCa/s1600/kemp111_3114168b.jpg" height="398" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">The World's Biggest Liar competition is held every November at the Bridge Inn, </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santon_Bridge" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Santon Bridge">Santon Bridge</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">, in memory of Will Ritson (1808–1890), a </span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_house" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Public house">pub</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landlord#Licensed_victualler" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Landlord">landlord</a><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-3" style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-3" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[3]</a></sup><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> from </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasdale" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Wasdale">Wasdale</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">, who was well known for his "</span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_tale" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Tall tale">tall tales</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">".</span><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-king_4-0" style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-king-4" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[4]</a></sup><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> One of Ritson's most famous fibs was that </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnip" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Turnip">turnips</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> grew so large in the </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_District" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Lake District">Lake District</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> that people carved them out to make cow sheds.</span><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-king_4-1" style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-king-4" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[4]</a></sup></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">The World's Biggest Liar competition is held every November at the Bridge Inn, </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santon_Bridge" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Santon Bridge">Santon Bridge</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">, in memory of Will Ritson (1808–1890), a </span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_house" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Public house">pub</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landlord#Licensed_victualler" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Landlord">landlord</a><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-3" style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-3" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[3]</a></sup><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> from </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wasdale" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Wasdale">Wasdale</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">, who was well known for his "</span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_tale" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Tall tale">tall tales</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;">".</span><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-king_4-0" style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-king-4" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[4]</a></sup><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> One of Ritson's most famous fibs was that </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnip" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Turnip">turnips</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> grew so large in the </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_District" style="background: none rgb(255, 255, 255); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; text-decoration: none;" title="Lake District">Lake District</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"> that people carved them out to make cow sheds.</span><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-king_4-1" style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-king-4" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[4]</a></sup></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.5em;">
In 2003, Abrie Krueger of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="South Africa">South Africa</a> was named the world's biggest liar after telling a story about how he was crowned King of the Wasdale Valley. This marked the first time that a foreigner had won the competition, which was marked with allegations of Krueger having cheated.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-5" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-5" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[5]</a></sup> A <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bishop_of_Carlisle" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Bishop of Carlisle">Bishop of Carlisle</a><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-6" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-6" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[6]</a></sup> was supposed to have once won the competition with the shortest-ever speech; he simply said, "I have never told a lie in my life."<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-7" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-7" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[7]</a></sup></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.5em;">
Comedienne <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sue_Perkins" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Sue Perkins">Sue Perkins</a> won the competition in 2006, marking the first time in the event's history that a woman won the competition.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-perkins_1-1" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-perkins-1" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[1]</a></sup> Her winning tall tale was about how the<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozone_layer" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Ozone layer">ozone layer</a> became damaged, ice caps melted and people had to be taken to work on camels.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-perkins_1-2" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-perkins-1" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[1]</a></sup></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.5em;">
In 2008, John "Johnny Liar" Graham won the competition for the seventh time after telling the judges a story of a magical ride to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotland" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Scotland">Scotland</a> in a <a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheelie_bin" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Wheelie bin">wheelie bin</a> that went under the sea.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-king_4-2" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-king-4" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[4]</a></sup> The previous year Graham's winning lie was that a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="World War II">World War II</a> German submarine had invaded Britain to capture <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_television" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Digital television">digital television</a> decoders.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-china_2-1" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-china-2" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[2]</a></sup></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.5em;">
Paul Burrows from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essex" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Essex">Essex</a> won the competition in 2010. He told a story of how the lakes and mountains of the Cumbrian countryside had been stolen from the county of Essex, leaving it as flat as it is today.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-8" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-8" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[8]</a></sup></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.5em;">
The 2011 winner is Glen Boylan. His story involved betting on a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snail" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Snail">snail</a> race with <a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Charles" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none;" title="Prince Charles">Prince Charles</a> (who advised him to remove the shell to make it more aerodynamic) and losing because his opponents cheated with battery-operated snails.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-wsj_9-0" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-wsj-9" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[9]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-newsandstar_10-0" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-newsandstar-10" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[10]</a></sup></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-top: 0.5em;">
2013 saw Mike Naylor win for the third time of his Lying career. Naylor, a 57 year old man from Wasdale told a story about Wassie, the monster that lives in Wastwater, the local lake. <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-11" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1; unicode-bidi: -webkit-isolate;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Biggest_Liar#cite_note-11" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap;">[11]</a></sup></div>
</div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-52637244736604122392014-11-11T10:36:00.002+08:002014-11-11T10:36:32.182+08:00Bishop Rock: The Smallest Island in the World<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9M0OY_eXr98erjTjqhJDSBqjxp9hBoIVAnpSe3IB3Wz5aEn9oBc9x76vAY7gu8Ma6BjT6Du9mJD10we9KmlD0RRH6LQ60KCYSrl_tdZGwbH3VSGWAfmJnV46KFgoThYi-29BXm8a7Rr69/s1600/bishop-rock-66.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Bishop Rock: The Smallest Island in the World" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9M0OY_eXr98erjTjqhJDSBqjxp9hBoIVAnpSe3IB3Wz5aEn9oBc9x76vAY7gu8Ma6BjT6Du9mJD10we9KmlD0RRH6LQ60KCYSrl_tdZGwbH3VSGWAfmJnV46KFgoThYi-29BXm8a7Rr69/s1600/bishop-rock-66.jpg" height="424" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
Bishop Rock is a small rocky ledge jutting out of the sea, 4 miles west of the Isles of Scilly in Cornwall. The rock rises from a depth of 45 meter to expose a tip 46 meters long by 16 meters wide. On this narrow ledge stands a lighthouse, which makes Bishop Rock the world's smallest island with a building on it, as recognized by the Guinness Book of Records.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
The rocks around the Scilly Isles caused the wreck of many ships over the years. When Sir Cloudesley Shovel's squadron of the British Fleet sank in 1707 along with 2,000 men, the Elder Brethren of Trinity House decided that the lighting of the Scilly Isles, which at that time consisted of only the old lighthouse at St. Agnes, was inadequate, and resolved to build a lighthouse on the most westerly danger, the Bishop Rock.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
James Walker, Engineer in Chief to Trinity House, was against building a solid granite tower on Bishop Rock arguing that the rock ledge was too small and the elements too powerful. He claimed that such a tower would not withstand the tremendous force of the seas, demonstrating that the wind pressures here sometimes exceeded 7,000 lb per square foot.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
So in 1847, it was decided to erect a screw-pile lighthouse at a cost of £12,000. The first task was to sink cast iron legs into the solid granite, braced and stayed with wrought iron rods. The idea was that the waves would crash right through the piles instead of slamming into a solid masonry tower. Within two years the structure was complete and all that was required was a lighting apparatus. Before it could be completed the following season, a heavy gale swept away the whole structure on the evening of 5th February 1850.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
James Walker shrugged off the news and this time turned to the idea of a granite tower. It was a dangerous task, becase the sea was rough and the island too small. The workmen had to be housed on a small nearby uninhabited islet, where living quarters and workshops were erected. The men were carried to and from the site as the weather permitted All the granite were brought over from the mainland to the island depot where it was shaped and numbered before being sent to the rock. After seven years labour the tower was finally completed in 1858.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22px;">
In the old days the 49-meter lighthouse had to rely on paraffin vapour lamps and, before that, candles. Today there are generators and batteries and a helipad was built in 1976. Bishop Rock was converted to automatic operation in 1991 and the last keepers left the lighthouse in December 1992. Today the lighthouse has ten floors, and up to four visitors can stay here for a week to three weeks.</div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-21673178882829519982014-11-11T10:27:00.002+08:002014-11-11T10:27:39.674+08:00French Cafe Charges Rude Customers More Than Double<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPtCcbK3Zh1jG1fcR0sUBFjXSFQlMvbORbkJt4ecsYdPl-FJS8uQjQay4wmJZV5lJvtgadYTjFpD3b_AaHtNPeBmdiMlTMViOaOG2ob2OsDPANRrJdxJVOYyqseYwSlLaoK9HFxrM6A4XW/s1600/French-Cafe-Charges-Rude-Customers.0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="French Cafe Charges Rude Customers More Than Double" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPtCcbK3Zh1jG1fcR0sUBFjXSFQlMvbORbkJt4ecsYdPl-FJS8uQjQay4wmJZV5lJvtgadYTjFpD3b_AaHtNPeBmdiMlTMViOaOG2ob2OsDPANRrJdxJVOYyqseYwSlLaoK9HFxrM6A4XW/s1600/French-Cafe-Charges-Rude-Customers.0.jpg" height="480" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<br /><br />Here's a cafe that's being proactive about customer behavior towards waitstaff: A Nice-Matinreporter tweeted a photo of the menu at La Petite Syrah in Nice, France, where customers who order their coffee politely are charged significantly less than those who don't. Customers who order their coffee with a "bonjour" and a "s'il vous plaît" (hello and please, respectively) are charged €1.40 ($1.93 USD). A coffee ordered with no greeting but with "s'il vous plaît" costs €4.25 ($5.85), and a coffee ordered simply as "un café" costs €7 ($9.63).<br /><br />The cafe owner tells the Local that the tiered pricing structure started as a joke, a response to "very stressed" and "sometimes rude" lunch customers. "I know people say that French service can be rude," he adds "but it's also true that customers can be rude when they're busy." Apparently there has been an improvement in customer attitude. This isn't the first time a cafe or restaurant owner has used pricing to incentivize better behavior in a restaurant. Earlier this year a restaurant in Beirut began offering 10% discount to any customers who would surrender their phones and socialize. Similarly, last year Eva Restaurant in Los Angeles offered a 5% discount to guests who "checked" their phones.tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-27209280731882539402014-11-11T10:23:00.001+08:002014-11-11T10:23:12.100+08:00An Island within a Lake on an Island within a Lake on an Island<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikkxLCRO3YISXMl4jemEdzD1lY-KSUF7DUmBH0Z4aZiLa2oV2QUBwyACs9-Gbyao-weJXY1uNW2zrL6JH1OR4KVKmrBIO_BM4i1IJfJbXlwacDj-kpFdLTVXCaqCEtnbB-PszjV0I65OUl/s1600/Taal+Volcano-Tagaytay.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="An Island within a Lake on an Island within a Lake on an Island" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikkxLCRO3YISXMl4jemEdzD1lY-KSUF7DUmBH0Z4aZiLa2oV2QUBwyACs9-Gbyao-weJXY1uNW2zrL6JH1OR4KVKmrBIO_BM4i1IJfJbXlwacDj-kpFdLTVXCaqCEtnbB-PszjV0I65OUl/s1600/Taal+Volcano-Tagaytay.jpg" height="448" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19.2000007629395px; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19.2000007629395px; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: justify;">
Vulcan Point in the Philippines is the world's largest island within a lake (Main Crater Lake) that is situated on an island (Volcano Island, aka Taal Island) located in a lake (Lake Taal) within an island (Luzon). It also happens to be one of the cones of the active Taal Volcano, so Vulcan Point is also the world’s largest volcano in a lake (Main Crater Lake) on a volcano (Taal Volcano). And Main Crater Lake also happens to be the largest lake on an island (Volcano Island) in a lake (Lake Taal) on an island (Luzon). Got that?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19.2000007629395px; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: justify;">
Actually, Vulcan Point is relatively tiny, but it and its parent volcano, Taal Volcano, are popular tourist destinations, due to the spectacular views afforded by their geography, not to mention some clever marketing: “One of the curiosities of Taal Volcano is not just the fact that the volcano has a lake inside its crater but that there is yet another island on that lake. Apparently, it is just one of the many cones of Taal Volcano. The name of the island is Vulcan Point. It is not particularly large; in fact, one would probably have difficulty erecting a house in such a small piece of land. This is often marketed in a rather amusing way—‘an island within a lake, on an island within a lake on an island’” (<a href="http://www.worldwanderings.net/2010/03/23/vulcan-point/" style="color: grey;">source</a>).</div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19.2000007629395px; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: justify;">
“Taal Volcano is a complex volcano on the island of Luzon in the Philippines. Historical eruptions are concentrated on Volcano Island, an island near the middle of Lake Taal. The lake partially fills Taal Caldera, which was formed by prehistoric very powerful eruptions. Viewed from Tagaytay Ridge, Taal Volcano and Lake presents one of the most picturesque and attractive views in the Philippines. It is located about 50 km (31 miles) from the capital of the country, the city of Manila. The volcano had several violent eruptions in the past causing loss of life in the island and the populated areas surrounding the lake, with the death toll estimated at around 5,000 to 6,000. Because of its proximity to populated areas and its eruptive history, the volcano was designated a Decade Volcano, worthy of close study to prevent future natural disasters. It is one of the active volcanoes in the Philippines and part of the Pacific ring of fire...The 1911 eruption drastically changed the floor of the main crater. Before the eruption, the crater was above sea level. Vulcan Point was the remnant of the old crater floor that is surrounded by a lake about 2 kilometers (2,000 m) across, called Main Crater Lake. Vulcan Point is cited in the Philippines as the world's largest island within a lake on an island within a lake on an island, i.e., Vulcan Point within Crater Lake, on Taal Island within Lake Taal, on the island of Luzon” </div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-36753311131598632052014-10-28T12:16:00.001+08:002014-10-28T12:16:25.343+08:00The world’s oldest cosmetic face cream<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4_-WBXgi7rO8DwuTTpR44pWfsS5yzgiHQswXeUG4CIVDZ3vMJ7kHtkLbipjaqtQH9DuXdN-GPBDl2j_7ei5UAfkV7hLm1rP9deugbGFdBtDCo-E-hCIAwWETzJmBLBaCNAblS47dGjw_I/s1600/news-graphics-200_1038634a.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="The world’s oldest cosmetic face cream" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4_-WBXgi7rO8DwuTTpR44pWfsS5yzgiHQswXeUG4CIVDZ3vMJ7kHtkLbipjaqtQH9DuXdN-GPBDl2j_7ei5UAfkV7hLm1rP9deugbGFdBtDCo-E-hCIAwWETzJmBLBaCNAblS47dGjw_I/s1600/news-graphics-200_1038634a.jpeg" height="303" title="" width="400" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
The world’s oldest cosmetic face cream has been found by archaeologists by excavating a Roman Temple on the banks of river Thames and what leaves one perplexed is that the cream still has the finger marks of its last user, 2000 years back!! The cream is contained in a 5cm by 6cm tightly sealed cylindrical tin can, which seemingly was deliberately hidden and was found at the bottom of a sealed ditch in Southwark, about 2 (two) miles south of central London. <br /><br />The site lies on the point where three roads namely Walting St from Dover, Saint St from Chichester and bridgehead road over Thames meet. This ancient site bears the foundations of two Roman-Celtic temples, a guest house, an outdoor area suitable for mass worship, plinths for statues and a stone pillar. <br /><br />This complex has been a store of discoveries. Last year, it revealed a stone tablet with the earliest known inscription bearing the Roman name of London. Known to be the first religious complex in London, it unfolds the rare evidence of organized religion in London 2000 years back.<br /><br />Since the excavation is now at the stage of completion, this site will be used as a housing complex.<br />Nansi Rosenberg, a senior archaeological consultant of the project feels lucky to have a marshy site in London where the contents of this sealed box must have been retained and the metal preserved from corroding. Though, they are still not sure whether the cream was medicinal, cosmetic or entirely ritualistic. She even adds that the discoveries have just begun and there are more to be made as they piece together the jigsaw puzzle they have excavated.<br /><br />Talking about the latest discovery, Opened at the Museum of London, this tin can revealed a pungent smelling white-cream. According to Liz Barham, whoever used this ointment last has applied it to something with their fingers and has used the lid as a dish to take the ointment out. The cream is currently undergoing scientific analysis and guesses are that it must have been used as a beauty treatment or even face paint in temple ritual.<br /><br />Federico Nappo, an expert on ancient Roman cosmetics of Pompeii calls it an extraordinary discovery. He assumes that it is likely for the cream to contain animal fats as Romans used to use donkey’s milk for skin treatment. Yet he believes that it should not be tough to find out the cream’s composition.<br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-17963540645017546432014-08-20T17:59:00.002+08:002014-08-20T17:59:40.029+08:00Dancing Plague of 1518<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7dlONq2BMyNJ-shO49I6LK6o6v2RGlOjlLqH6e57g_ZvbJi1GMPJlWz8Y7G2lQRAvTxyL9ezbof-unxXMFCiZ0bcc9FCKcB3NgJMtc13btIzTMCTTpG1typBgc1KN9dqGDP4oDS9k3-QU/s1600/Dancing_Plague_1518.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Dancing Plague of 1518" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7dlONq2BMyNJ-shO49I6LK6o6v2RGlOjlLqH6e57g_ZvbJi1GMPJlWz8Y7G2lQRAvTxyL9ezbof-unxXMFCiZ0bcc9FCKcB3NgJMtc13btIzTMCTTpG1typBgc1KN9dqGDP4oDS9k3-QU/s1600/Dancing_Plague_1518.jpg" height="566" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />The Dancing Plague (or Dance Epidemic) of 1518 was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg, Alsace (then part of the Holy Roman Empire) in July 1518. Numerous people took to dancing for days without rest, and, over the period of about one month, some of those affected died of heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion.<br />
<br />The outbreak began in July 1518, when a woman, Frau Troffea, began to dance fervently in a street in Strasbourg. This lasted somewhere between four to six days. Within a week, 34 others had joined, and within a month, there were around 400 dancers. Some of these people eventually died from heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion.<br /><br />Historical documents, including "physician notes, cathedral sermons, local and regional chronicles, and even notes issued by the Strasbourg city council" are clear that the victims danced.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dancing_Plague_of_1518#cite_note-Discovery_Viegas-1"></a> It is not known why these people danced, some even to their deaths. <br /><br />As the dancing plague worsened, concerned nobles sought the advice of local physicians, who ruled out astrological and supernatural causes, instead announcing that the plague was a "natural disease" caused by "hot blood." However, instead of prescribing bleeding, authorities encouraged more dancing, in part by opening two guildhalls and a grain market, and even constructing a wooden stage. The authorities did this because they believed that the dancers would recover only if they danced continuously night and day. To increase the effectiveness of the cure, authorities even paid for musicians to keep the afflicted moving. Some of the dancers were taken to a shrine, where they sought a cure for their affliction.[citation needed] Historian John Waller stated that a marathon runner could not have lasted the intense workout that the men and women died from hundreds of years ago.tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-63610478381444088592014-08-20T17:52:00.001+08:002014-08-20T17:52:20.046+08:00Russell Brand says no to Katy Perry's $44 million fortune in 'amicable' divorce<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlCLxly6F9mxezIY9BGU67PZ7JOQd9WCfAHcor4JUH37bW-YHkPjrI2qZg-7cHsvWWbjSLw7y_N_7gugy3RaZwKFxXZIaed5dGvUWzrXLlxHDh2reiYBG6PccNjQ_950z0txxFQEH0KzsH/s1600/531701-katy-perry-amp-russell-brand.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Russell Brand says no to Katy Perry's $44 million fortune in 'amicable' divorce" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlCLxly6F9mxezIY9BGU67PZ7JOQd9WCfAHcor4JUH37bW-YHkPjrI2qZg-7cHsvWWbjSLw7y_N_7gugy3RaZwKFxXZIaed5dGvUWzrXLlxHDh2reiYBG6PccNjQ_950z0txxFQEH0KzsH/s1600/531701-katy-perry-amp-russell-brand.jpg" height="360" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />WHEN you're legally entitled to half your ex-wife's $US44 million fortune, ($40.87 million) it's rare that a divorce would ever be amicable, but somehow Russell Brand is playing the nice guy. <br /><br />Lawyers for the couple finalised the divorce papers on Tuesday, but Brand reportedly doesn't want a cent from Perry's fortune.<br /><br />The couple, who married in October 2010, did not sign a pre-nup meaning everything they earned during their 14-month marriage is combined and halved. <br /><br />According to Forbes magazine, the Firework singer earned a whopping $44 million between May 2010 and May 2011 and Brand is legally entitled to $20 million of it.<br /><br />But The Get Him To The Greek actor has reportedly done the honourable thing by his higher-earning ex-wife and won't touch a dime.<br /><br />"This divorce is as amicable as it gets, and Russell was a mensch (Yiddish for a good person)," a source told gossip website TMZ. <br /><br />Reports of marital strife plagued the couple in the months prior to their December 2011 divorce, but Brand says he still holds a candle for his former wife.<br /><br />“I’ll always adore her and I know we’ll remain friends,” he said in a statement.tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-12366609246219917452014-08-20T17:47:00.001+08:002014-08-20T17:47:53.671+08:00Tree of 40 Fruit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEIzLKkkZz7ggiy6eDi4k94Onl1CjMZfOcF_d0pA4LcB-QF29JoIitX_rrKJa9XUPVwnFUtl0GqCrV8sKiTKt81GJEQa4NosCtfcHmGjd1Fh8_HuZPpKlOM-6VCq15gqRtKVLDkbvVl4tJ/s1600/Tree-for-web-rect-989x700.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Tree of 40 Fruit" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEIzLKkkZz7ggiy6eDi4k94Onl1CjMZfOcF_d0pA4LcB-QF29JoIitX_rrKJa9XUPVwnFUtl0GqCrV8sKiTKt81GJEQa4NosCtfcHmGjd1Fh8_HuZPpKlOM-6VCq15gqRtKVLDkbvVl4tJ/s1600/Tree-for-web-rect-989x700.jpg" height="451" title="" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Sam Aken is an art professor at the University Of Syracuse, US. After growing up on a farm, he became an artist and it’s with these two that he has been able to develop the unbelievable Tree of 40 Fruit. In 2008, the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station was shutting down an orchard due to funding problems. The orchard was home to a number of antique, heirloom and native stone fruit varieties; some of which were about 150 to 200 years old. Losing this orchard would have meant the extinction of these rare fruits. Aken bought this orchard and dedicated the years that followed learning ways to graft parts of these trees onto one single fruit tree; in a project he called “Tree of 40 Fruit”.<br /><br />He worked with over 250 varieties and developed a timeline that showed when each fruit blossomed in relation to others. He started by grafting few of these onto the root structure of a working tree. Two years later, he used the chip grafting method to add more varieties as separate branches. The chip grafting technique helped him take a sliver from a fruit tree (including the bud), insert it into an incision made on the working tree and tape the sliver into place. This is left to heal over winter. If the branch grows well, it’s pruned back so that it can grow as a normal branch on the tree. <br /> <br /> Five years later and after grafting several branches, Aken has his first tree of 40 fruits. The tree looks normal most of the year but during spring, a stunning patchwork of white, red, pink, and purple blossoms. These then turn into peaches, plums, almonds, nectarines, cherries and apricots during the summer. They are all unique and rare varieties. The plant is not only beautiful; it preserves the world’s diversity of stone fruit. They are grown for commercial use mostly and are selected depending on their largeness, their look and taste. This therefore means that out of hundreds of stone fruits grown all over the world, only a few are commercially viable.<br /> <br /> Aken has been able to grow 16 trees so far and they can be found in museums, private art collections and community centers around the US. He picked the stone fruits inter-compatibility and diversity. He also added garlic and peppermint to keep away the deers. His plan is to grow this variety of trees in a city setting. Does he eat the fruits or what happens to them afterwards?<br /> “I've been told by people that have [a tree] at their home that it provides the perfect amount and perfect variety of fruit. So rather than having one variety that produces more than you know what to do with, it provides good amounts of each of the 40 varieties. Since all of these fruit ripen at different times, from July through October, you also aren't inundated. Personally, I give away most of the fruit that comes from my trees,” he said.<br /><br />tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-79021358347918362062014-06-05T13:38:00.001+08:002014-06-05T13:38:53.070+08:00Chasing Bugs<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL-tTwawXp5mcUnVeMGqpCmaR_Da_IdO3XPZXGDa5RjFWRnVeUWS2swr2XuivkJi9pCnurQi7KPSD0POwFDU3wSnh7VjyCHVzt0DG5BIpeLUIGABQP1KAuRmyCeSMLOgvpgJIoePJC4iS5/s1600/2661718938_3f926dfc69.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL-tTwawXp5mcUnVeMGqpCmaR_Da_IdO3XPZXGDa5RjFWRnVeUWS2swr2XuivkJi9pCnurQi7KPSD0POwFDU3wSnh7VjyCHVzt0DG5BIpeLUIGABQP1KAuRmyCeSMLOgvpgJIoePJC4iS5/s1600/2661718938_3f926dfc69.jpg" height="596" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Remember the first time you ever saw an ant hill? That parade of black insects pouring in and out of a small sand mound...most of us stopped, looked and then moved on to other parts of the playground. E. O. Wilson is the kid who never took his eyes off the mound.<br /><br />He grew up to revolutionize the fields of entomology, sociobiology and conservationist thought. E. O. (E is for Edward, O is for Osborne) got a nod from Time Magazine on their list of the 25 Most Influential People in America and picked up a few Pulitzers along the way. But before all that he was just an eight-year-old boy in the South whose nickname was 'Bugs.'<br /><br />Ed and Robert Krulwich spoke a few years ago at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan about Ed's early insect-philia and how it blossomed. Ed tells Robert about the time he figured out how to make hundreds of ants trace his name and the time he convinced an ant colony one of their ants was dead when it was anything but.<br /><br />If you like this conversation, stay tuned for Season 5. We are working on a whole show devoted to people falling in (and out of) love with science. Can't wait? Bugs crawling on your skin now? Re-visit Ed and other ant enthusiasts in our Emergence episode.tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-10142081969781111782014-06-05T13:28:00.003+08:002014-06-05T13:28:56.507+08:00Brazilian man has 10 operations on his eyes so he can look Asian<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcALdD0bWVuaNGfaHiMoPy1W-bl2yurwuHOG3CRbcekg_TaMn21V28cb83_FhemoMX5wpLcvzxxRt0bOORUXASl1ZXHcaJYFCB0vZLa7MxD9S66t6Ikyv02hjLJeS4nGMGGizJAkgcPBUc/s1600/ad_136622342.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcALdD0bWVuaNGfaHiMoPy1W-bl2yurwuHOG3CRbcekg_TaMn21V28cb83_FhemoMX5wpLcvzxxRt0bOORUXASl1ZXHcaJYFCB0vZLa7MxD9S66t6Ikyv02hjLJeS4nGMGGizJAkgcPBUc/s1600/ad_136622342.jpg" height="384" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />A man obsessed with Korean culture has gone to extraordinary lengths to look Asian after having 10 plastic surgery operations to change his appearance. <br /><br />Xiahn, 25, who was originally known as Max, became fixated on Korean culture following a year of study in the country.<br /><br />Xiahn, who goes by the pseudonym Oriental Gaucho online, watched hours of Korean soap operas and listened to K-Pop constantly – and in time became overcome with the desire to have plastic surgery so that he would look like a native Korean.<br /><br />‘As you know, there are thousands of Asian eye styles,’ Xiahn told Metro.co.uk. ‘I had one major surgery on my eyes and then small procedures to reach the correct appearance.’<br /><br />Now Xiahn has plans to move to South Korea as soon as he has he can.<br /><br />Reports of his transformation have preceded him, and reactions have been mixed. Some like it and some don’t, he says, just like ‘any other thing in this world.’<br /><br />Despite the drastic transformation though, Xiahn still feels Brazilian, thanks to the country’s diversity: ‘There are many mixed Brazilian people. For me a Korean person looks Brazilian as much as a German person or any other person that has born here.’<br /><br />‘So even though I’ve changed the shape of my eyes, I am still Brazilian.’<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzyc4-TMWfxNBJCZbO8cVsAzhOeyQO3XbnDG4eI8anSyLIoF2qs0f_ZfL3rkvDmJKEL5Lfmv27XUHWHr5PXhCeBCM-rnwdrxhLw8h9JnIuALBd41YsBetXE4UF2uZVRPVPtBSX7XOvtSLU/s1600/ad_136622344.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzyc4-TMWfxNBJCZbO8cVsAzhOeyQO3XbnDG4eI8anSyLIoF2qs0f_ZfL3rkvDmJKEL5Lfmv27XUHWHr5PXhCeBCM-rnwdrxhLw8h9JnIuALBd41YsBetXE4UF2uZVRPVPtBSX7XOvtSLU/s1600/ad_136622344.jpg" height="424" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk4sc1wkTs0C7qAiXb6IZnCH_ilnGkkFQNoqxmCIJykpwN6UB5mm8k3zz4qo3zZ3G5k0nJ1JTC0W6Qn2pkOjh038e4a1SCbLAFDx-rWFBd2jAp2CFj_Tp4SK63Ie8LrqIshxwiZxfnoi_8/s1600/ad_136622347.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk4sc1wkTs0C7qAiXb6IZnCH_ilnGkkFQNoqxmCIJykpwN6UB5mm8k3zz4qo3zZ3G5k0nJ1JTC0W6Qn2pkOjh038e4a1SCbLAFDx-rWFBd2jAp2CFj_Tp4SK63Ie8LrqIshxwiZxfnoi_8/s1600/ad_136622347.jpg" height="640" width="424" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheYpOK3sbR7tb0Ic-z6zAu0xISc2D3kudOl8ZHzCdgLpclCWoOJLOIqR-8ZwAvb_oG_dDTqaiNAUs7-PrGXKoYDf7RN3IMGIiHrkbz-R8hAsS3d5xAglk6QZlrTZ3uuWAk6k1z93oo2k-j/s1600/ad_136622348.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheYpOK3sbR7tb0Ic-z6zAu0xISc2D3kudOl8ZHzCdgLpclCWoOJLOIqR-8ZwAvb_oG_dDTqaiNAUs7-PrGXKoYDf7RN3IMGIiHrkbz-R8hAsS3d5xAglk6QZlrTZ3uuWAk6k1z93oo2k-j/s1600/ad_136622348.jpg" height="424" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-55412052557231924182014-06-04T16:15:00.000+08:002014-06-04T16:15:14.211+08:001.8-Million-Year-Old Skull Debunks Idea that Multiple Ancient Human Species Co-Existed on Earth<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzIUaBu3ZPFhmJ5KeJ349vuqimgYL5uf-xIUlV2vFBsU-yIkTEFbiLvr7mHbp26q9SNmqKuXxlKsxm0G4XuYvF-npMOTIbcA6ewbsdBg6iH9T8XJepC5PbaJZJpg-MRkPJBGxBIipWtuO3/s1600/human-evolution.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzIUaBu3ZPFhmJ5KeJ349vuqimgYL5uf-xIUlV2vFBsU-yIkTEFbiLvr7mHbp26q9SNmqKuXxlKsxm0G4XuYvF-npMOTIbcA6ewbsdBg6iH9T8XJepC5PbaJZJpg-MRkPJBGxBIipWtuO3/s1600/human-evolution.jpg" height="550" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />In a completely lucky and unexpected discovery, scientists have found a complete skull from a human ancestor believed to be 1.8 million years old, according to a press release.<br /><br />Known as Skull 5, the skull is entirely intact and has a long face, large teeth and a small brain case. Its characteristics and condition make it different from other Homo genuses (habilis, rudolfensis, erectus, etc.) and also suggests those different human species did not roam the Earth at the same time nearly two million years ago.<br /><br />The skull was found at a site in Dmanisi, Georgia, but the area is not fully excavated and already it has provided researchers with a rare study opportunity. Skull 5 was found along with four other human fossils, a variety of animal remains and some stone tools, all believed to be from the same timeframe.<br /><br />Skull 5 has the features of an early human, but also changes a widely accepted perspective. Photo courtesy of Georgian National Museum.<br /><br />David Lordkipanidze, of the Georgian National Museum in Tbilisi, Georgia, and colleagues in Switzerland, Israel and the United States, published their findings Friday in the journal Science.<br /><br />"Had the braincase and the face of Skull 5 been found as separate fossils at different sites in Africa, they might have been attributed to different species," said co-author Christoph Zollikofer, of the Anthropological Institute and Museum in Zurich, Switzerland.<br /><br />Skull 5's various physical traits can be linked to several Homo species, including some whose fossils found in Africa to date back 2.4 millions years ago and those found in Asia and Europe 1.2 to 1.8 millions years ago.<br /><br />"[The Dmanisi finds] look quite different from one another, so it's tempting to publish them as different species," said Zollikofer. "Yet we know that these individuals came from the same location and the same geological time, so they could, in principle, represent a single population of a single species."<br /><br />The traits of the Dmanisi finds support what has already been accepted in human evolutionary studies. The small brain case, the large teeth, but what is special about Skull 5 is that it changes the perspective of a long-accepted theory about early humans.<br /><br />"Furthermore, since we see a similar pattern and range of variation in the African fossil record... it is sensible to assume that there was a single Homo species at that time in Africa," Zollikofer said. "And since the Dmanisi hominids are so similar to the African ones, we further assume that they both represent the same species."tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-29383858080199694252014-05-27T08:45:00.002+08:002014-05-27T08:45:37.807+08:00Man Drives 20 Hours, Saves 11 Sochi Strays<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGy4Rau5GcSrkginCp6owPDXP1JB6xMIQrOyjydBTOS_ZmeEMbD16tyYR_m-fx5YXhkDTcRaPSLyY_bnBCldUQaA7lIof-kmHj_qgA86myncNTjhMaRHju6JtpLa2ynGddc12uguVKfhzx/s1600/8b57b555ef209f2cbbc3a4f7ee4810f0c37e097cea52a83cffe95a7001bd7613.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGy4Rau5GcSrkginCp6owPDXP1JB6xMIQrOyjydBTOS_ZmeEMbD16tyYR_m-fx5YXhkDTcRaPSLyY_bnBCldUQaA7lIof-kmHj_qgA86myncNTjhMaRHju6JtpLa2ynGddc12uguVKfhzx/s1600/8b57b555ef209f2cbbc3a4f7ee4810f0c37e097cea52a83cffe95a7001bd7613.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></div>
<br />One man, infuriated by Sochi’s program to exterminate thousands of stray dogs in preparation for the Olympic Games, took the rescue effort into his own hands. Igor Airapetyan drove for 20 hours over 990 miles from Moscow to Sochi to adopt 11 homeless dogs. His jam-packed car was caught on tape by a local news station:<br />"The Olympics have always been a symbol of peace, wars have been halted for the duration of the Olympics. But in Russia, the Olympics are built on blood,"Airapetyan told Radio Free Europe.<br /><br />Now, Airapetyan is back in Moscow and trying to find homes for the dogs he rescued in Sochi. He hopes to spotlight animal cruelty in Russia in Sochi and elsewhere.<br /><br />"I went there not only to pick up these 10 dogs but also to draw attention to this issue, to rally people and get them organized," Airapetyan told RFE. "In the future, I would like to unite animal-protection groups so people can act in a consolidated manner with joint information resources."tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-58620522387732540092014-05-27T08:42:00.001+08:002014-05-27T08:42:17.780+08:00Teens chase down kidnapper's car on their BIKES and save five-year-old girl <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvQEOiR67DBrmh4IVFFTLAN6tPRo5aS75yuiQLYRn7_449rRqAnH7Ux5J0RBotv1T5eOBlEM-cYJwjTx0UpyatvmbvQmCNX47xa-oy1Y8SSOfzqmmP21X1Hk1uw08QlauKUprClg8WKbrU/s1600/article-2362102-1AC92EBF000005DC-271_634x352.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvQEOiR67DBrmh4IVFFTLAN6tPRo5aS75yuiQLYRn7_449rRqAnH7Ux5J0RBotv1T5eOBlEM-cYJwjTx0UpyatvmbvQmCNX47xa-oy1Y8SSOfzqmmP21X1Hk1uw08QlauKUprClg8WKbrU/s1600/article-2362102-1AC92EBF000005DC-271_634x352.jpg" height="354" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Two Pennsylvania teens are being hailed as heroes after they chased down a man in a car who had snatched a five-year-old girl from her grandmother's front yard - on their bikes. <br /><br />Jocelyn Rojas, five, was missing for two hours yesterday when Temar Boggs and a friend saw the child in a car near Lancaster Township and gave chase.<br /><br />After Boggs, 15, and his friend had been tailing the vehicle for 15 minutes, the driver let the little girl out of the car and sped off.<br /><br />Now that the little girl is safely back with her family, police are focusing on finding the suspect.<br /><br />Jocelyn Rojas was playing in the front yard of her grandmother's home on the 100 block of Jennings Drive in Lancaster Township when she disappeared at about 4:35pm Thursday.<br /><br />The family notified police and officers sprang into action, blocking off streets and scouring the area with canine units. Police showed Jocelyn's picture around the neighborhood and Boggs and his friend joined more than 100 first responders searching for the girl.<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6el0eBhf6j4w_SF8pD8T6ODRbRJRbDlV0nMbvMxXfIvXuMrcJCdq7xbhQAFnIf7aDzh_WSPlK12EjViXqxAj34KtYDNb2yes0i4MX38ASxSPEksEh8O1h20p-hYDS3Fu6zcgyv09BYxH3/s1600/article-2362102-1AC92EC3000005DC-191_634x342.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6el0eBhf6j4w_SF8pD8T6ODRbRJRbDlV0nMbvMxXfIvXuMrcJCdq7xbhQAFnIf7aDzh_WSPlK12EjViXqxAj34KtYDNb2yes0i4MX38ASxSPEksEh8O1h20p-hYDS3Fu6zcgyv09BYxH3/s1600/article-2362102-1AC92EC3000005DC-191_634x342.jpg" height="344" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />Boggs spottted the girl in the abductor's car and he and his friend began to follow the car.<br /><br />The high school student said the little girl ran towards him when she got out of the car.<br /><br />'If he wasn't going to stop, I was probably going to like, jump on the car,' Boggs told ABC6.<br /><br />Boggs said the suspect would turn around to see if they were still following him after they began to give chase.<br /><br />'As soon as the guy started noticing that we were chasing him, he stopped at the end of the hill and let her out, and she ran to me and said that she needed her mom,' he said.<br /><br />Boggs took the little girl to the police and they contacted her frantic mother and family.<br /><br />Police say the teens may have scared the abductor into giving the girl up and their bravery is being praised by the girl's family and police.<br /><br />Sergeant Jeff Jones told WGAL, 'It is possible this individual saw the boys following him and it is possible he got nervous. We don't know that for sure; I'd sure like to find out,' he said.<br /><br />Jocelyn Rojas' grandmother Tracey Clay was overcome with gratitude to Boggs.<br /><br />'Thank you. You're our hero,' she said hugging and kissing him.<br /><br />'He's our hero. I mean, there's no words to say,' she told WGAL.<br /><br />'You see the amber alerts and you think, "I feel for that family." But when you're in that situation. Oh my god, it's horrible,' she said.<br /><br />'It’s just something you don’t wish on anybody. Horrible, horrible thoughts flashed through my mind.'<br /><br />Police say the male suspect drove the girl in a maroon, burgundy or purple-colored sedan, most likely a Chevy, almost half a mile from her home.<br /><br />The latest reports say he had offered to buy the child ice-cream and had driven towards an ice-cream parlor.<br /><br />It's not clear where the man had taken Jocelyn in the intervening hours between the discovery she was missing and Temar Boggs' spotting of her in the kidnapper's car. <br /><br />WGAL reports the man was wearing green shoes and green pants with a red and white striped shirt at the time of the abduction, and that he walks with a limp. He is believed to be aged between 50 and 70 years old.<br /></div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-73877704596499980282014-05-27T08:37:00.001+08:002014-05-27T08:37:19.576+08:00The Happiest Prisoners<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbjGPFedloi6CAiiTo84UZdd4BiDWiPyMmAelrJhqwGAYEbdFU4qsSt1EgZPWsNi76vmyCZzuQztgrKJ0ZMHUrlwlfwLUswkM4AxEnBKw6DNjo7pzEdRr84SUP5cZTqGO1QiDQblqqlXPK/s1600/POWLead.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbjGPFedloi6CAiiTo84UZdd4BiDWiPyMmAelrJhqwGAYEbdFU4qsSt1EgZPWsNi76vmyCZzuQztgrKJ0ZMHUrlwlfwLUswkM4AxEnBKw6DNjo7pzEdRr84SUP5cZTqGO1QiDQblqqlXPK/s1600/POWLead.jpg" height="238" width="640" /></a></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></strong></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">In the shadow of Mount Baldy, where lodgepole pine and trembling aspen compete for space in Alberta’s spectacular Kananaskis Country, all that remains of a Second World War prisoner of war camp are weedy building foundations, a rundown guard tower and a restored commandant’s cabin. Here and at 25 other locations across Canada, 35,046 German soldiers, sailors, airmen and potential insurgents were incarcerated under a program one later called “the best thing that happened to me.”</strong></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
It’s how many of them felt about their time here; and it’s partly why more than 6,000 wanted to stay after the war ended.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
The first camps were created to lock up some 358 individuals of questionable loyalty living in Canada and rounded up by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police soon after war was declared in 1939. But as the invasion of Britain loomed in June 1940, the Churchill government asked Canada to accept 7,000 enemy aliens and PoWs from British camps. That was followed by a thousand Luftwaffe PoWs in January 1941 and several thousand soldiers captured in the North Africa campaign.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Camps were spread from Alberta to New Brunswick, but the largest by far were at Lethbridge and Medicine Hat in Alberta which were purpose-built to house 12,500 prisoners each. With 350-man dormitories, each site boasted two 3,000-man recreation halls, six educational huts, six workshops and six dining halls.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Games and entertainment weren’t overlooked either. Inside Lethbridge’s Camp 133 there were regular soccer tournaments. Prisoners enjoyed handball, boxing, wrestling, gymnastics, tennis, skating and more. In November 1944, it was reported to the Red Cross that the internees had a 45-piece orchestra, a 55-piece band and several smaller musical groups. In accordance with Geneva Convention rules, PoWs were permitted to wear uniforms and insignia in camp and were provided the best winter garb.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
And they were given jobs. In 1943, Canada’s Minister of Labour authorized employment, primarily on farms and in logging camps. Employers would pay the government $2.50 per day per worker, from which they could deduct room and board. Trust grew: many farmers housed them off camp for days at a stretch. By 1945, over 11,000 PoWs were at work, including 2,200 working the sugar beet fields around Lethbridge. Many became like family to the farmers.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Lethbridge resident Doran Degenstein recalls his late father’s experience as a member of the Veterans Guard of Canada at that camp. “He spoke fondly of his time with the PoWs,” he says. “They respected him.” When supervising field work, Degenstein says “he would leave his rifle on the seat of the truck and would often ask a prisoner to move the truck ahead with his loaded rifle still on the seat.” That’s the sort of trust that built with some of the prisoners.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
John Melady, in his book Escape From Canada: The Untold Story Of German PoWs In Canada 1939-1945, writes of German Corporal Leo Hoecker reminiscing about his bush camp work in Ontario. Hoecker was an avid hunter. “So the Veterans Guards often used to loan us their rifles and off we’d go,” he said, “because we were trusted like that.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
There were several escape attempts however—after all, it is part of a PoW’s duty. Eva Colmers, whose father was captured in North Africa in 1943 and spent three years in the Lethbridge camp, said there were over 600 reported attempts. Colmers wrote and directed The Enemy Within, a documentary on German PoWs in Canada produced by the National Film Board of Canada in 2003.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
After the war, it wouldn’t be until December 1946 before all prisoners were repatriated. The British government requested that all PoWs—even the 6,000 who asked to remain in Canada—be returned to the U.K. for work and gradual processing back to Germany under the Geneva Convention.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Colmers interviewed a dozen who did return and settle some years after the war. When asked why they had wanted to stay in Canada, many said they faced an uncertain future in bombed-out Germany. Would there be jobs, could we study, would we have a house? “Particularly those who had no parents, family or homes left, for them the most familiar feeling of a place of belonging was Canada,” she says. That was reinforced, she reckoned, by the sense of a “fatherly respectful relationship with the Veterans Guards” who had seen and experienced war before (most guards were First World War veterans).</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Moreover, she says, for many, when they heard for the first time about the wartime atrocities in Germany, it contributed to their reprehension towards their native country. “They were disgusted with what went on,” she adds.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
One who came back feeling that way is Siegfried Osterwoldt—an ex-artillery lieutenant who was captured at el Alamein in 1942. He and his wife Eva purchased their comfortable 1950s Edmonton bungalow just a few years after coming back. He recalls his thoughts when the war ended. “First, I wanted to go home from here and see how things were,” he says. “And they were miserable. The spirit of people being nice to each other had disappeared.” He says everyone was on the black market trying to feed themselves, working only for themselves.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
“The spirit of sharing that had been preached by the Nazi regime, which was good, didn’t exist anymore,” he says. “Things were good in the first few years. In 1933-35 the unemployed were busy again; people could eat and everyone was happy. And then afterward the bad things took over.” He says he soon felt that “Hitler and his clique had lied to us all these years and I had it up to here,” he says, holding his forefinger to his chin. “I’d had enough of politics. I wanted to get out.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Osterwoldt’s wartime prison had been Wainwright, Alta., a camp for officers, where he was reasonably content. “I got all the books I needed to study what I wanted. The barbed wire didn’t bother me.” Study served him well; when he and Eva, who was also fed up with wartime Europe, returned to Canada in 1953 despite both having jobs in postwar Germany, he soon landed a job as a land surveyor in Edmonton where they raised their family. Leaving their parents was hard, but “we have no regrets,” he says. “Deep in my heart, I am more Canadian than German because we’ve lived here for over 50 years now.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Those who wanted to stay polarized some Canadians. “Letters to the editor, newspaper editorials, radio commentators all reflected the view that not all prisoners should be sent back to Germany,” writes Melady. “Those who had ‘proven themselves’ in farms and factories were often mentioned as desirable citizens.” But countering that was some understandable hard opposition, for example a resolution against any German PoWs staying was passed by the Canadian Legion at its 1946 dominion convention.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
But the Osterwoldts’ stories are typical of returnees. The Lethbridge Herald of Dec. 10, 1996, reported an interview with Harry Pohl, a merchant seaman who was captured at the age of 19. He recalled working on a local farm near Brooks, Alta., as a PoW. When he got home to Hamburg he said to his new wife, “I’m going back to Canada,” and she agreed. He returned in 1951 to work on the same farm, and said he knew of at least 36 others who returned to southern Alberta.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Another southern Alberta PoW who worked the farms, Alfred Weiss, went one better—he came back and bought the farm in Picture Butte he had worked on. He recalled in a 2008 interview with the Galt Museum in Lethbridge, “living in the granary” during the war.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Many wanted to return but couldn’t find a way. Ex-PoW Rudolf Ries worked on the farm of Joe and Mary Kacer. Years later their daughter Bessie recalled in an interview in the April 8, 1996, Lethbridge Herald, “He was like one of the family. Ries had his own small house on the farm; he didn’t have to return to camp each night, had meals with the family.” Joe Kacer said when he drove him back to camp on his final day on the farm in November 1946 “it was a sad parting.” However, many have since returned to spend vacations.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Not all worked as farmers. Horst Liebeck was a Luftwaffe fighter pilot shot down over England, captured and sent to the Heron Bay camp on Lake Superior. He escaped from there but was recaptured. Liebeck returned to Canada after the war and became a Canadian citizen on Feb. 21, 1958, becoming a successful builder in Brantford, Ont. An entrepreneur, he was also granted the Canadian franchise for German chocolate firm Bauer Chocolate and planned a plant in Brantford or Kitchener, according to the Sept. 14, 1960, Lethbridge Herald. “When war broke out I was drafted from university,” he said. “I did not enjoy the war or being a soldier—I just loved to fly.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Melady tells of former German PoW Ed Billet, who told him “before we came here, most PoWs thought Canada was all bush, Indians and so on. We knew Canadians were good fighters and good pilots, but we did not know much else about them.” Billet went on to say they were delighted with the beauty of the bush that surrounded their camp at Gravenhurst, Ont. “I discovered the real beauty of Canada,” he said. “This country is at its best to anybody who is willing to open his eyes to the unlimited opportunity it still offers. That was why I came here to live.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Melady also interviewed Siegfried Bruse, a former U-boat officer who, with another ex-PoW, Luftwaffe officer Tony Kleimaker, operated a large and successful real estate firm in North Bay, Ont. “I like Canadians,” Bruse told him. “They made my life as pleasant as possible from the day I came here as a prisoner. Later, when I returned as a landed immigrant, I knew this was my country. There was also the feeling that you could create something here, that you could achieve what you wished in this land.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Horst Braun, a former U-boat wireless operator, feels the same. He enjoyed his time in camp. “Then when I was sent to a bush camp, I appreciated Canada all the more,” he told Melady. He worked for a timber company in northern Ontario. When the war was over and he was sent back to Germany he said, “I was terribly homesick for Canada! I couldn’t wait to get back here.” He was fortunate: a Canadian co-worker sponsored his return. “He was one of the Canadians whom I met at the time who made me appreciate what a wonderful country this is,” he said.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Another northern Ontario bush camp worker and ex-U-boat crewmember was Paul Mengelburg, whose U-26 submarine was depth-charged off the northwestern coast of Ireland in 1940. Now 95, he was eventually sent to Camp 101 at Angler, Ont., to work in the bush at Longlac, where he now lives. Upon his initial return to Germany, he says he applied to work as a river policeman on the Rhine, but was prevented “because I was a Nazi,” he says. “My mind was then made up to come back.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Fortunately, he says a farmer for whom he worked during the war in Glencoe, Ont., before going to Longlac, offered to sponsor him in 1951. “I worked there for a while, then went to Toronto and worked for International Harvester on Bathurst [Street],” he says. After a vacation to revisit Longlac in the summer of 1955, he says “I pulled the plug and came here.” He worked as a heavy duty mechanic at Kimberly-Clark in the bush repairing tractors.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Asked if the immigration authorities questioned his political leanings, Mengelburg says, “No, they had everything in black and white in a big book. They had all the records.” He now occasionally guest lectures at the university in Thunder Bay he says, about what happened in Germany and his life in Canada.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Precious few of the returnees survive. But the widows’ memories of their husbands’ enthusiasm for the country that imprisoned them remain.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Ruth Altendorf, whose late husband Heinz was shot down over North Africa, says, “his greatest piece of luck was being sent to Canada as a prisoner of war.” She says he was repatriated to Germany after the war, “where we met, married and lived for the next 10 years in Bad Godesberg, a beautiful town along the Rhine River.” Heinz worked in the personnel department of the American embassy and life was as good as it can be after a war. “Our two daughters were born there, and perhaps we would never have left were it not for Heinz telling us stories about Canada. In fact, he sparked a minor exodus: in the space of five years, 11 family members left for Canada.” Heinz and Ruth lived in Toronto, Brampton and Waterloo, before moving to Harrison Hot Springs, B.C., where she still resides.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Colmers says she’s glad she made the documentary. “So few Canadians know about the German PoWs in Canada,” she says. “And particularly they don’t know about [the PoWs’] fondness for Canadians.” She feels the film is timeless because she hears about treatment of prisoners by other countries. “They should learn how you can tremendously influence the enemy by treating them fairly.”</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #282828; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 21.996000289916992px; margin-bottom: 22px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
Most of the camp buildings are now gone, the trees and wildflowers reclaiming the land. But clearly the memories and fondness of the PoWs and their families for their adopted homeland live on.</div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-59578434648587948782014-05-24T16:01:00.002+08:002014-05-24T16:01:14.488+08:00U.S. family tries living without China<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0pLfYj87wVK371khs_7c4ql1mK4V_7ugfIYfJtROWI6K-3xm7BbRfqH6vDaN3nKtGgmisQkq1Ze5RI03Szg0uBbGQsWzBeEZ94kdCwQfG9e9gnhkz1XS2M2n-V44b0fBLJ4KMovFi740g/s1600/00080282e94111842a2b01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0pLfYj87wVK371khs_7c4ql1mK4V_7ugfIYfJtROWI6K-3xm7BbRfqH6vDaN3nKtGgmisQkq1Ze5RI03Szg0uBbGQsWzBeEZ94kdCwQfG9e9gnhkz1XS2M2n-V44b0fBLJ4KMovFi740g/s1600/00080282e94111842a2b01.jpg" height="422" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Lamps, birthday candles, mouse traps and flip-flops. Such is the stuff that binds the modern American family to the global economy, author Sara Bongiorni discovers during a year of boycotting anything made in China.<br /><br />In "A Year Without 'Made in China,'" (Wiley, $24.95) Bongiorni tells how she and her family found that such formerly simple acts as finding new shoes, buying a birthday toy and fixing a drawer became ordeals without the Asian giant.<br /><br />Bongiorni takes pains to say she does not have a protectionist agenda and, despite the occasional worry about the loss of U.S. jobs to overseas factories, she has nothing against China. Her goal was simply to make Americans aware of how deeply tied they are to the international trading system.<br /><br />"I wanted our story to be a friendly, nonjudgmental look at the ways ordinary people are connected to the global economy," she said in an interview before the book appears in July.<br /><br />As a business journalist in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Bongiorni wrote about international trade for a decade. "I used to see the Commerce Department trade statistics, the billions of dollars, and think it had nothing to do with me," she said.<br /><br />The reality was far different.<br /><br />As the year unfolded, "the boycott made me rethink the distance between China and me. In pushing China out of our lives, I got an eye-popping view of how far China had pushed in," she wrote.<br /><br />About 15 percent of the $1.7 trillion in goods the United States imported in 2006 came from China, economist Joel Naroff writes in the foreword. Much of that is the manufactured stuff that fills Wal-Mart and other retailers -- the necessities and frivolities sought by lower- and middle-income Americans.<br /><br />Lower prices have been one benefit of Beijing's rise and make it very hard for consumers to forswear Chinese imports.<br /><br />LEGOS, LAMPS<br /><br />And hard it was.<br /><br />For all of 2005, minor purchases required dogged detective work as Bongiorni scoured catalogues and read labels.<br /><br />She repeatedly struck out trying to buy inexpensive shoes for her son, and even the chic local boutique that sold fancy European labels had gone out of business. So she shelled out $68 for Italian sneakers from a catalogue.<br /><br />Broken appliances gathered dust because the spare parts came from China. And, with the Asian country having a near lock on the toy aisles, her 4-year-old son grew tired of taking Danish-made Legos to birthday parties as gifts.<br /><br />The family resorted to snapping mouse traps when the gentler catch and release kind came from, you guessed it, China.<br /><br />Bongiorni got a lesson in the global economy after products advertised as Made in USA turned out to have Chinese parts. She decided to keep a lamp with just this problem after speaking to the manufacturer and learning how China is "eating the lunch" of the few U.S lamp producers left.<br /><br />Since the boycott's end, Bongiorni has chosen a middle ground. Her family seeks alternatives but accepts Chinese products when most practical. But one habit from the boycott remains: It required her to think hard about what she buys.<br /><br />"Shopping became meaningful," she said.tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-37539103197297487112014-05-23T10:55:00.002+08:002014-05-23T10:55:36.461+08:00Whales Can't Taste Anything But Salt<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2cWcwqPzeebijc3bykzztS6VNs5oTrmirOxd6ghZBK-uOpmFm3EDRR2n7k-52UKEWADWjF6EPgABVUxg4rPJwvbDy6ggZXk08SnV3YURMKsu3Se3srUWRt83jgBQ_CTeuVOxP3G8SML_D/s1600/ocean-whales-underwater-wide.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2cWcwqPzeebijc3bykzztS6VNs5oTrmirOxd6ghZBK-uOpmFm3EDRR2n7k-52UKEWADWjF6EPgABVUxg4rPJwvbDy6ggZXk08SnV3YURMKsu3Se3srUWRt83jgBQ_CTeuVOxP3G8SML_D/s1600/ocean-whales-underwater-wide.jpg" height="400" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Tastes are a privilege. The oral sensations not only satisfy foodies, but also on a primal level, protect animals from toxic substances. Yet cetaceans—whales and dolphins—may lack this crucial ability, according to a new study. Mutations in a cetacean ancestor obliterated their basic machinery for four of the five primary tastes, making them the first group of mammals to have lost the majority of this sensory system.<br /><br />The five primary tastes are sweet, bitter, umami (savory), sour, and salty. These flavors are recognized by taste receptors—proteins that coat neurons embedded in the tongue. For the most part, taste receptor genes present across all vertebrates.<br /><br />Except, it seems, cetaceans. Researchers uncovered a massive loss of taste receptors in these animals by screening the genomes of 15 species. The investigation spanned the two major lineages of cetaceans: Krill-loving baleen whales—such as bowheads and minkes—were surveyed along with those with teeth, like bottlenose dolphins and sperm whales.<br /><br />The taste genes weren’t gone per se, but were irreparably damaged by mutations, the team reports online this month in Genome Biology and Evolution. Genes encode proteins, which in turn execute certain functions in cells. Certain errors in the code can derail protein production—at which point the gene becomes a “pseudogene” or a lingering shell of a trait forgotten. Identical pseudogene corpses were discovered across the different cetacean species for sweet, bitter, umami, and sour taste receptors. Salty tastes were the only exception.<br /><br />“The loss of bitter taste is a complete surprise, because natural toxins typically taste bitter,” says zoologist Huabin Zhao of Wuhan University in China who led the study. All whales likely descend from raccoon-esque raoellids, a group of herbivorous land mammals that transitioned to the sea where they became fish eaters. Plants range in flavors—from sugary apples to tart, poisonous rhubarb leaves—and to survive, primitive animals learned the taste cues that signal whether food is delicious or dangerous. Based on the findings, taste dissipated after this common ancestor became fully aquatic—53 million years ago—but before the group split 36 million years ago into toothed and baleen whales.<br /><br />“Pseudogenes arise when a trait is no longer needed,” says evolutionary biologist Jianzhi Zhang of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, who was not involved in the study. “So it still raises the question as to why whales could afford to lose four of the five primary tastes.” The retention of salty taste receptors suggests that they have other vital roles, such as maintaining sodium levels and blood pressure.<br /><br />But dulled taste perception might be dangerous if noxious substances spill into the water. Orcas have unwittingly migrated into oil spills, while algal toxins created by fertilizer runoff consistently seep into the fish prey of dolphins living off the Florida coast.<br /><br />“When you have a sense of taste, it dictates whether you swallow or not,” says Danielle Reed, a geneticist at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was not involved with the current work, but co-authored a 2012 paper that found the first genetic inklings that umami and sweet taste receptors were missing in cetaceans, albeit in only one species—bottlenose dolphins.<br /><br />Flavors are typically released by chewing, but cetaceans tend to swallow their food whole. “The message seems clear. If you don’t chew your food and prefer swallowing food whole, then taste really becomes irrelevant,” Reed says.tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-80532908421545947272014-05-22T08:16:00.003+08:002014-05-22T08:16:36.729+08:00This 9-Year-Old Built A Nonprofit, No-Kill Animal Shelter Out Of His Garage To Help Stray Animals<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXDMR0KQxQzJaFodYAlaO7cems8VRhnCFml4GKUa1r6IP_kZd7p9h48m67bfmMAr_40WnQ8y3Cgejzimdl4T4KYuLyGBxCx5M4mBy5I8vZLmfHSytVzTD36zVbgu_e2LDi7XVObApPCCKU/s1600/slide_349458_3738226_free.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXDMR0KQxQzJaFodYAlaO7cems8VRhnCFml4GKUa1r6IP_kZd7p9h48m67bfmMAr_40WnQ8y3Cgejzimdl4T4KYuLyGBxCx5M4mBy5I8vZLmfHSytVzTD36zVbgu_e2LDi7XVObApPCCKU/s1600/slide_349458_3738226_free.jpg" height="426" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Ken, 9, has grown up dreaming about someday having a shelter to help the stray animals that live near his home, but he never dreamed he could reach his goal so soon.<br /><br />Ken did his best to help the local stray dogs and cats he came across near his home in the Philippines, he frequently spent time with them and offered them food, but he longed for the funds to open a no-kill shelter where he could really help his furry friends, according to The Happy Animals Club website.<div>
<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTNtitSbK6kzSDpOxzjNuug7QjyeS5wUi-vIMYtZuPqFLpx81qJxcI6N9fjnoYqCoAsgh5I_UjUpNczrKYzeCYpi96unRnFg3sZDz1NlqlsX3OAzvgyPhjlU89G2ev3QF3rokWZpxiQy1l/s1600/slide_349458_3738106_free.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTNtitSbK6kzSDpOxzjNuug7QjyeS5wUi-vIMYtZuPqFLpx81qJxcI6N9fjnoYqCoAsgh5I_UjUpNczrKYzeCYpi96unRnFg3sZDz1NlqlsX3OAzvgyPhjlU89G2ev3QF3rokWZpxiQy1l/s1600/slide_349458_3738106_free.jpg" height="426" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />Then, a few months ago, photos of Ken with three strays made their way onto the Internet, and people from all over the world began to donate money.<br /><br />"We got enough money to get the dogs I was feeding off the street, feed them high quality canned food, and provide them with veterinary care," he wrote on his website.<br /><br />Ken and his father were also able to build a temporary shelter for the three dogs, named Blackie, Brownie and White Puppy, in their garage. Ken named it The Happy Animals Club.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2NxVtJn8Pfi0hphnTVglDmBxHKe1dtTaTjUa_sUWiXVz6GJug3rhO44KBNEz0Z-HEvLNu4Lpiy6NLeXgZcKo56Q43SQ_Qu9DLuauAsGE1RCoVLCbNfRaGgc-mhfJ4-hW3dyZBVqtmQOoO/s1600/slide_349458_3738117_free.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2NxVtJn8Pfi0hphnTVglDmBxHKe1dtTaTjUa_sUWiXVz6GJug3rhO44KBNEz0Z-HEvLNu4Lpiy6NLeXgZcKo56Q43SQ_Qu9DLuauAsGE1RCoVLCbNfRaGgc-mhfJ4-hW3dyZBVqtmQOoO/s1600/slide_349458_3738117_free.jpg" height="426" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
"They gained a LOT of weight, their open wounds healed, and their fur grew back," Ken wrote. "They also learned not to be scared of humans."<br /><br />He plans to put the pups up for adoption soon.<br /><br />Thanks to the donations, earlier this month Ken was able to sign a one-year lease for a space where he can continue to create a nonprofit, no-kill animal shelter for street animals. He hopes to have it up and running soon.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb46BK1d8XE-PSd0ILD4_7xraPj9_dCUzOSM0GM4mnEg3E7EZ-Sg-kHRON8ww1vQ3ZIYny6SSVof28bkD2pMSoMkjcZlw912bN6RVgq87NMlzDo05Mw5NF0d6Tlqk7NA5Q4P_-3QdrHKY0/s1600/slide_349458_3738110_free.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb46BK1d8XE-PSd0ILD4_7xraPj9_dCUzOSM0GM4mnEg3E7EZ-Sg-kHRON8ww1vQ3ZIYny6SSVof28bkD2pMSoMkjcZlw912bN6RVgq87NMlzDo05Mw5NF0d6Tlqk7NA5Q4P_-3QdrHKY0/s1600/slide_349458_3738110_free.jpg" height="426" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCt4BAuZWZdFAth51iTOsvkgLT1hVYFN9CVmZNsaWfBnqgoogF132bL2KrV5ODmERiwopF9mCA_OBIA-Yg5jlsWHeBmxJ5rO7J0GrnLrijcwYn0Rx15ozwkYV2RgFm9t5n3GCerX6RmTuZ/s1600/slide_349458_3738233_free.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCt4BAuZWZdFAth51iTOsvkgLT1hVYFN9CVmZNsaWfBnqgoogF132bL2KrV5ODmERiwopF9mCA_OBIA-Yg5jlsWHeBmxJ5rO7J0GrnLrijcwYn0Rx15ozwkYV2RgFm9t5n3GCerX6RmTuZ/s1600/slide_349458_3738233_free.jpg" height="426" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4670489908394152148.post-87856867107441020682014-05-22T08:05:00.003+08:002014-05-22T08:05:40.227+08:00Miracle mum brings premature baby son back to life with two hours of loving cuddles after doctors pronounce him dead <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3WOrj8RtrYbZe14eNVW5bcW_qWl2A5-K_ySvAG08ISfW5s2GrmQwVwZoj7aUB4CPVZq8lykmZVFZtAvmk241nYEDshyphenhypheniedJPhgdC19LgAPGMlLnJ0aR9J_fmL0sPUOnyoBEmSIOkH1Eje/s1600/article-1306283-0AEB63DB000005DC-154_468x452.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3WOrj8RtrYbZe14eNVW5bcW_qWl2A5-K_ySvAG08ISfW5s2GrmQwVwZoj7aUB4CPVZq8lykmZVFZtAvmk241nYEDshyphenhypheniedJPhgdC19LgAPGMlLnJ0aR9J_fmL0sPUOnyoBEmSIOkH1Eje/s1600/article-1306283-0AEB63DB000005DC-154_468x452.jpg" height="618" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />It was a final chance to say goodbye for grieving mother Kate Ogg after doctors gave up hope of saving her premature baby.<br /><br />She tearfully told her lifeless son - born at 27 weeks weighing 2lb - how much she loved him and cuddled him tightly, not wanting to let him go.<br /><br />Although little Jamie's twin sister Emily had been delivered successfully, doctors had given Mrs Ogg the news all mothers dread - that after 20 minutes of battling to get her son to breathe, they had declared him dead.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXkOccNl3XxxXFT6Loes9wAtkNN3-BE72ZwmRh4roPeaS9voEeYqsBSBQXYldwZ1_PCVLQrwbOeltD1_M8A6zOwIVjq0ljzji5zIwp6dcMqbg9Vdam6ftMXCkw4yJQX85TcXMqd9pzw0VZ/s1600/article-1306283-0AECB534000005DC-937_468x387.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXkOccNl3XxxXFT6Loes9wAtkNN3-BE72ZwmRh4roPeaS9voEeYqsBSBQXYldwZ1_PCVLQrwbOeltD1_M8A6zOwIVjq0ljzji5zIwp6dcMqbg9Vdam6ftMXCkw4yJQX85TcXMqd9pzw0VZ/s1600/article-1306283-0AECB534000005DC-937_468x387.jpg" height="528" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />Having given up on a miracle, Mrs Ogg unwrapped the baby from his blanket and held him against her skin. And then an extraordinary thing happened.<br /><br />After two hours of being hugged, touched and spoken to by his mother, the little boy began showing signs of life.<br /><br />At first, it was just a gasp for air that was dismissed by doctors as a reflex action.<br /><br />But then the startled mother fed him a little breast milk on her finger and he started breathing normally.<br /><br />'I thought, "Oh my God, what's going on",' said Mrs Ogg.<br /><br />'A short time later he opened his eyes. It was a miracle. Then he held out his hand and grabbed my finger.<br /><br />'He opened his eyes and moved his head from side to side. The doctor kept shaking his head saying, "I don't believe it, I don't believe it".'<br /><br /><br />The Australian mother spoke publicly for the first time yesterday to highlight the importance of skin-on-skin care for sick babies, which is being used at an increasing number of British hospitals.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr5HukYxeqhj-2gM1JQge63cQyrK4hkhvMmNy3Kv_Bru80bAHURHeJTacWLAjwsK9l3coV9Aa4Zuq0lxrI5kIc4ensxeaJP2PoCFtFnGI4VVhhLdUUq3vyx3QxZLKYpfyiP_0jyCupvO3l/s1600/article-1306283-0AEB63BF000005DC-92_468x415.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr5HukYxeqhj-2gM1JQge63cQyrK4hkhvMmNy3Kv_Bru80bAHURHeJTacWLAjwsK9l3coV9Aa4Zuq0lxrI5kIc4ensxeaJP2PoCFtFnGI4VVhhLdUUq3vyx3QxZLKYpfyiP_0jyCupvO3l/s1600/article-1306283-0AEB63BF000005DC-92_468x415.jpg" height="564" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />In most cases, babies are rushed off to intensive care if there is a serious problem during the birth.<br /><br />But the 'kangaroo care' technique, named after the way kangaroos hold their young in a pouch next to their bodies, allows the mother to act as a human incubator to keep babies warm, stimulated and fed.<br /><br />Pre-term and low birth-weight babies treated with the skin-to-skin method have also been shown to have lower infection rates, less severe illness, improved sleep patterns and are at reduced risk of hypothermia.<br /><br />Mrs Ogg and her husband David told how doctors gave up on saving their son after a three-hour labour in a Sydney hospital in March.<br /><br />'The doctor asked me had we chosen a name for our son,' said Mrs Ogg. 'I said, "Jamie", and he turned around with my son already wrapped up and said, "We've lost Jamie, he didn't make it, sorry".<br /><br />'It was the worse feeling I've ever felt. I unwrapped Jamie from his blanket. He was very limp.<br /><br /><br />'I took my gown off and arranged him on my chest with his head over my arm and just held him. He wasn't moving at all and we just started talking to him.<br /><br />'We told him what his name was and that he had a sister. We told him the things we wanted to do with him throughout his life.<br /><br />'Jamie occasionally gasped for air, which doctors said was a reflex action. But then I felt him move as if he were startled, then he started gasping more and more regularly.<br /><br />'I gave Jamie some breast milk on my finger, he took it and started regular breathing.'<br /><br />Mrs Ogg held her son, now five months old and fully recovered, as she spoke on the Australian TV show Today Tonight.<br /><br />Her husband added: 'Luckily I've got a very strong, very smart wife.<br /><br />'She instinctively did what she did. If she hadn't done that, Jamie probably wouldn't be here.'<br /></div>
tinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11040525412773945317noreply@blogger.com0