My Days with myself

Exercises to Enhance Memory

2010-12-11T07:39:00.000-08:00

Memory is a tricky thing, isn’t it? It has a way of bailing on us when we need it the most. And as we get older, it only gets worse! But did you know that exercise could change that? Here are some yoga asanas that will help stimulate your brain and nervous system and in turn improve your memory.MediationMeditation improves your concentration and helps you remember things better. “Sit quietly in a comfortable position and count backwards from 50,” says yoga instructor Payal Gidwani-Tiwari. You can start counting from 100 and even 200 with practice.Another form of meditation you can try is Dharana. “Dharana helps you de-clutter your mind,” Payal says. This form of meditation involves focusing your attention and not letting it wander. It can be done by either concentrating on your breathing or by concentrating on the centre of your head.“Pranayam also helps you think better and improves your ability to remember better as it increases the supply of oxygen to your brain,” says Bhavin Thakkar, an instructor of artistic yoga. Pranaym is a kind of breathing technique practised in yoga.You could also try yogamudra or padmasana for better memory. For this, place your hands on your knees with your palms facing upwards and join your index finger to your thumb. Just close your eyes and focus on your breathing.Upavitha konasana (wide legged forward bend)1) Stand with your feet three feet apart and your heels pointing outwards.
2) Now bend forward with a straight back to touch your palm to the ground. If it is your first time, go as far as you can and hold the position. 3) Now get your torso closer to yourself with your palms on your knees and your elbows jutting out. Hold for about five to 10 seconds and slowly return to your original position.SirshasanaTo get to sirshasana, you need to assume balasana or the child’s pose. Here’s how:
Balasana
1) Sit in vajrasana or on your feet with your knees pointing forward.2) Part your legs slightly and bend your torso forward with your hands outstretched or on your sides, to touch the ground. This is balasana.3) Now hold your elbows with your hands. Place the top of your head on the ground with the back of your head resting against your arms.4) Slowly straighten your knees, raise your hips and your legs to form a ‘V’ in the air.5) Now slowly bend your knees close to your chest so that your feet are near your buttocks and balance yourself using your hips.6) Now raise your legs. When you are in the headstand position, try and relax.
Sirshasana
“Make sure 90 per cent of your weight is supported by your arms and elbows and just 10 per cent by your head,” says Bhavin.Viparit karni asana
This is a variation of the sarvangasana. "In this asana, istead of raising your legs to form a 90-degree angle, you make a 60-degree angle with or without the support of a wall,” he explains.1) Lie down on your back.2) Slowly raise your legs and your hips off the ground to form a 60-degree angle with the ground. Support your hips with your hands as you do this.3) Hold for up to ten seconds and return to original position.
(The above yogic poses improve blood circulation to the brain and the heart and helps enhance memory.) Make sure you do all the above asanas under supervision of a yoga trainer.

oh no!! DOCTORS OR EVILS

2010-10-19T00:24:00.000-07:00

A 26-year-old doctor of a private hospital in Navi Mumbai was arrested for allegedly raping a woman admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the hospital, police said. The accused, Vishal Vanne, resident medical officer of Lotus Hospital in Vashi, has been accused of raping the 30-year-old married woman in ICU on Saturday night, police said.

The victim, a resident of Ghansoli in Navi Mumbai, was admitted to the hospital after she complained of giddiness and fatigue. She was initially kept in the general ward, but was later shifted to ICU when her condition turned critical.

"The lady was in a semi-conscious state and could comprehend that she was being raped but could not resist the accused or raise an alarm due to weakness," investigating officer Rajkumar Chapekar said.

The victim narrated the incident to her husband yesterday morning, after which a complaint was lodged. According to police, preliminary medical reports have confirmed rape.

Vanne, who has been employed with the hospital since last December, would be produced before a local court later on Monday.

Meanwhile, the victim's husband has demanded that a case should be registered against the owners of the hospital for security lapse inside the ICU.

"There were no security personnel or nurses inside the ICU. Two other patients inside the unit were fast asleep due to heavy medication. We would investigate into this," Chapekar said.

ANOTHER STORY

A day after a doctor allegedly raped a woman in the intensive care unit of a hospital in Navi Mumbai, a similar case surfaced in the Capital. A 28-year-old woman, suffering from brain tumour, accused a doctor of Aakash Hospital in Malviya Nagar of molesting her thrice on Sunday. The doctor (26)was arrested and terminated from service.

The victim was admitted in the emergency ward of the South Delhi hospital on Saturday night after she complained of high fever.

"The doctor came to conduct a medical check-up around 11 pm. He molested me in the presence of my husband first. We ignored it thinking it was not deliberate," she said.

"After my husband left, the doctor returned and sexually harassed me. On Sunday morning, he repeated the heinous act. No nurse or fellow doctor was accompanying him during the check-ups," the victim added.

Obesity can increase the risk in HIV patients

2009-11-26T05:52:00.000-08:00

The study has shown that antiretroviral therapy may not be as effective on obese HIV patients as it is with people of normal weight. Researchers from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, who conducted the study, insisted that the immune systems among obese people with HIV do not respond as well as it does among normal weight people with HIV. Nancy Crum-Cianflone, MD, who presented the study at the annual meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, said: “Obese patients were found to regain fewer CD4-positive T cells after they start therapy than do people with normal weight,” said Dr. Crum-Cianflone. “These findings don’t align with some of the earlier studies done prior to the advent of modern highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), when patients who were obese did better than those of normal or below-normal weight.” Data collected by the USU’s Infectious Disease Clinical Research Program (IDCRP) from participants in the U.S. Military Natural History Study, was assessed as part of the study. The data had details of 1,119 people, including documented dates of HIV seroconversion between 1986 and 2008. Captain (Dr.) Greg Martin, director of the IDCRP said: “The irony is that in the past we have been concerned that patients with HIV infection were losing too much weight. “Yet this research is showing that there needs to be more of a focus on maintaining a balanced weight without going to the other extreme.” Earlier studies had hinted that when HAART was unavailable, patients who were obese lost CD4 cells more slowly than people who had normal or below-normal weight. Crum-Cianflone mentioned that the introduction of HAART has resulted in immune system recovery, which is measured by an increase in the number of CD4 cells. She concluded that the study also "suggests that low CD4 counts may be another adverse consequence of obesity.

Child labour

2009-06-26T22:48:00.000-07:00

Child labour, or child labor, refers to the employment of children at regular and sustained labour. This practice is considered exploitative by many international organizations and is illegal in many countries. Child labour was utilized to varying extents through most of history, but entered public dispute with the beginning of universal schooling, with changes in working conditions during industrialization, and with the emergence of the concepts of workers' and children's rights.
Child labour is common in some parts of the world, and can be factory work, mining, prostitution, quarrying, agriculture, helping in the parents' business, having one's own small business (for example selling food), or doing odd jobs. Some children work as guides for tourists, sometimes combined with bringing in business for shops and restaurants (where they may also work as waiters). Other children are forced to do tedious and repetitive jobs such as: assembling boxes, polishing shoes, stocking a store's products, or cleaning. However, rather than in factories and sweatshops, most child labour occurs in the informal sector, "selling many things on the streets, at work in agriculture or hidden away in houses—far from the reach of official labour inspectors and from media scrutiny." And all the work that they did was done in all types of weather; and was also done for minimal pay. As long as there is family poverty there will be child labor.
According to UNICEF, there are an estimated 158 million children aged 5 to 14 in child labour worldwide, excluding child domestic labour.

Night-time urination 'raises mortality risk'

2009-04-27T06:30:00.001-07:00

Do you get up frequently to pee at night? Well, it's high time that you consult a doctor, for a new study has revealed that night-time
urination raises a person's mortality risk. Researchers have carried out the study and found that people suffering from nocturia, the need to urinate at least twice during the night, may have a significantly increased risk for mortality, the 'The Journal of Urology' reported. To reach the conclusion, the researchers conducted a comprehensive geriatric assessment of 788 residents 70 years old or older to determine incidence of nocturia. Using data from national health system, they assessed differences in survival stratified by presence or absence of nocturia over three years. They then adjusted the models to control for age, sex, BMI, diabetes, hypertension, history of coronary heart disease, nephropathy, alcohol consumption, and use of tranquilisers, hypnotics or diuretics. The study showed that there was a significantly increased mortality rate in elderly patients living in a Japanese assisted-living facility who suffered from nocturia relative to other residents. The findings are presented at the annual Scientific Meeting of the American Urological Association. "Nighttime urination is not necessarily just a matter of getting older. Patients should talk to their doctor about what may be causing this. There may be a very serious yet treatable condition involved," Anthony Smith, the Spokesman for the American Urological Association, was quoted by the media as saying.

Water, Water Everywhere But Not a Drop to Drink

2009-04-27T06:30:00.000-07:00

Currently, 1.1 billion people don't have access to clean drinking water -- that's one out of every six people on the planet. Today, to commemorate World Water Day, we're featuring three videos on the home page that highlight the urgency and importance of providing clean water and sanitation to every single global citizen.
This video, from YouTube nonprofit partner charity:water, conveys the urgent need to build wells in the Central African Republic by juxtaposing powerful images with Beck's "Time Bomb": Like charity:water, GOOD Magazine is also leveraging pop culture to spur citizens to take action. They've created a three-video series, rooted in familiar water-oriented scenes from iconic films and television, to demonstrate that life without clean water can be a very frightening prospect: And if you're looking for straight facts without the fluff, this brief documentary from the International Red Cross provides specific information about how chronic water and sanitation challenges are affecting Zambia. You can help solve the global water crisis by contributing to these worthy organizations -- and by sharing their messages with your friends.

CUTE BABY CAMEL

2009-03-23T05:57:00.000-07:00

క్యూట్ బేబీ కామేల్

2009-03-23T05:54:00.000-07:00

WOMEN, INTERRUPTED

2009-01-22T03:52:00.000-08:00

IS A WOMEN RAPED EVERY THREE MINUTES OR EVERY SIX MINUTES? IT IS FAR TOO MUCH, WHATEVER IT IS.

The horrific gang rape of a young woman in Noida which falls within the National Capital Region –is yet another gruesome reminder of just how unsafe our national capital is for women. Each time the press headlines any incident the public is outraged, government official’s mouth stock condemnations the police promise thorough investigations and nothing changes. Life goes on. As if it were not enough that this case was unconscionable, the reaction of the sarpanch of the village where the alleged perpetrators hail from, and the stand taken by the Samajwadi Party are outrageous. The sarpanch is quoted to have said that it was just a matter of rape and not such a big deal. The SP called for a bandh, alleging that it was impossible for 10 people to be involved in a gang rape, and that those taken into custody were being framed. It is this callous attitude towards crimes against women that emboldens the perpetrators. In the absence of effective deterrence, and encouraged by the primitive views held by a section of our society, they continue to commit such dastardly acts with impunity.
Delhi is by far the most unsafe city for women in this country. But it is not just here that women are vulnerable to crime, especially of the sexual sort. The National Crime Records Bureau, in its report for 2007, documents that there were 513 reported rape cases in Delhi city. This was way above the number of cases reported in Mumbai, which stood at 171. Bangalore reported 62 cases, Indore 74, Pune 65 and Chennai 46. And this is just a count of those cases that were reported.
There are several instances where rape victims in India do not report the atrocity committed against them for fear of attracting social stigma and for fear of physical safety. This speaks poorly of both our society—which is deeply patriarchal in its attitudes—and our law enforcing machinery. Instead of enabling women who have been victims of sexual assault cope with their trauma, large sections of our society often heap indignity on them.
India aspires to great power status. It prides itself on an impressive economic growth record and increasing international clout. This is perhaps justified given facts about the overall performance f our economy, especially when compared to that of other countries in this time of global economic gloom. However, India’s progress is, and will continue to be, severely stymied if it does not secure the life, security and dignity of one half of its population. No matter how rapidly its economy grows, its prestige will not improve much if its women continue to be treated with scant respect.

A SLOWDOWN IS NOT ALL BAD-- TOMORROW IS ANOTHER DAY

2009-01-09T23:45:00.000-08:00

Words like recession economic slowdown, jobcuts were just a jargon for me, till I had to face the heat one day and joined the thousands who were fired by their companies.
I remember, it was a Wednesday and everything seemed to be going well. I was called by my manager in the evening and was handed over the pink slop. The ground slipped from beneath my feet as my hands trembled and my mind asked, “Where did I go wrong? What was my fault?”
With a heavy heart, I walked towards my home. How would I give this news at home? My wife, my kids and above all my in-laws; would that understand or criticize me as they do often?
On the way home, I watched everyone else with tears in my eyes. Everybody looked so happy…even the sweeper appeared to be laughing at me, saying”You are jobless, But I have a job. I’m still on my feet…But what about you?”
The clouds of insecurity wrapped me like a blanket. I wished I could go back and scream at people in the office. I felt cheated. Why me, I wondered.
I imagined myself sitting with the newspaper, searching for jobs, going to various companies, giving interviews, negotiating salaries…a wind of rejection made my steps heavier.
The salary earned by me was used to pay my kids’ fees, and for household expenses. How would we manage now? I would become a burden on my husband till I managed to find a job. I tried to stop my endless trail of tears, my body shivered and made me stop under a tree.
Looking up at the sky. I said my daily prayer to seek blessings from Him. I saw the sun setting and birds flying back to their nests. Nature appeared to be talking to me at that moment.
The sun will rise again; the birds will fly the next day to search for food for their fledglings; flowers would blossom and spread their fragrance. Tomorrow will come…and it’ll come for me as well. A smile lit my face and dried my tears.
I thought again. New Year was approaching. I now had time to spend with my kids. I could hang out with them, cook goodies they loved to eat, and be with them both physically and mentally (which I was unable to do in all my working life). Side by side, I could begin my, search for a new job, and reach out to better avenues.
There are thousands going through the same mental block…we cannot give up so easily. Recession taught me a lesson; hopes should never die.
I felt as excited as a five-year-old blessed by Santa. The words of Oscar Wilde echoed in my ears, “What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise”

CHIDHOOD OBESITY IS NO LAUCHING MATTER

2008-11-28T07:13:00.000-08:00

How many times have we seen more-than-chubby children, pulled their cheeks lovingly, and exclaimed,”How cute”. It’s time for a reality check. Childhood obesity is on a rapid rise in this country, in keeping with an unhealthy global trend: in 2007, an estimated 22 million children under; the age of five years were overweight according to the world health organization, and more are expected to join the abese club.
In an alarming report presented this week by the American Heart Association, the thickness of the artery walls of teenagers who are abese were reported to resemble the thickness of an average 45 year-old’s artery walls. In other words, evidence was presented that obese children show early warning signs of heart disease. Childhood obesity is also linked to other serious health complications including juvenile diabetes. We can no longer dismiss it as a problem of the West. We might not be grappling with a problem as huge as the US-where childhood obesity is considered an epidemic-or the UK. But trouble is knocking on our doors, as well as those of other developing countries like China, Brazil and Thailand.
A recent ‘Indian Pediatrics’ report makes this point. Unlike in much of the West, where childhood obesity is more prevalent among low-income gro9ups, in India it is a malaise that afflicts the better off. The prevalence of obesity is higher in the upper socio-economic class (4.8 percent) as compared to the lower socio-economic class (1 percent). In urban Delhi, about 37 percent of children are either overweight or obese. Medical experts attribute; the weighty troubles of developing countries to changed attribute the weighty troubles of developing countries to changed dietary habits-read on overdose of fast and processed foods-and a steep drop in levels of physical activity.
An unhealthy diet is partly a function of the greater access and choice that the expanding middle class has. And partly because of the compulsions of modern urban life, where both parents often work and prefer quick and easy processed food options rather than cooking every meal from scratch. City children today are also more inclined to spend leisure as couch or mouse potatoes, which does not help in the battle against the bulge. Concerted efforts involving schools, families and government to tackle juvenile obesity are in the order. For a start policymakers must invest in educating parents, especially mothers about the perils of childhood obesity. And it would be of immense help if we, as society, got over our peculiar proclivity to associate overweight-specially when it concerns children-with ‘well-fed’ and ‘healthy’.

PONDS....THE MIRACLE

2008-10-03T08:04:00.000-07:00

On a verr random day.

Me: Mom, my cream is over and my all other substitutes [ when i don't have the money to buy my cream] is also all over.

Mom: Go buy then.

Me: Mom, I think I will buy this cream.

Mom: No don't change your creams like this. You are supposed to continue use whatever you were using.

Me: Mom, I am approaching 25 and the parlor girl was saying, we are supposed to start using age-defying creams. What do you think? Should I use Pond's age miracle.

Mom: [Looking hard at me] Thats why I told you to get married

:-|

Same day, a verr good friend on chat after seeing me and my sister's pic, [ You will know why he is a verr good friend in the end]

H :Veens, r u twins?
I tht your sis is much younger than you

me: no.. she is 5 yrs younger y?

H: you look like twins.
:)

me: mere age ka pata hi nahin chalta :D

H: yeah
wot do you use santoor soap?
he he

me: ponds age miracle ...santoor is so out of fashion :P

H: ha ha
miracles happen

me: they do they do..

Ahh! well it is not time yet, is it? Pond's age miracle can wait :)

H you are a verr good friend! You know how to make a girl feel really good on a verr bad day :)

BLACK CHOCOLATE IS GOOD FOR HEART

2008-09-24T02:48:00.000-07:00

Chocolate has already been linked to many health benefits, and now, a group of scientists has given chocoholics another reason to savour their favourite sweet by suggesting that dark chocolate prevents heart disease. The Italian study, the first outcome of a large epidemiological investigation, has found new beneficial effects of chocolate in the prevention of cardiovascular disease. According to the researchers, 6.7 grams of chocolate per day represent the ideal amount for a protective effect against inflammation and subsequent cardiovascular disease. The population study was conducted by the Research Laboratories of the Catholic University in Campobasso, in collaboration with the National Cancer Institute of Milan. The findings, published in the last issue of the Journal of Nutrition, official journal of the American So-ciety of Nutrition, come from one of the largest epidemiological studies ever conducted in Europe, the Moli-sani Project, which has enrolled 20,000 inhabitants of the Molise region so far. By studying the participants recruited, researchers focused on the complex mechanism of inflammation. It is known how a chronic inflammatory state represents a risk factor for the development of cardiovascular disease, from myocardial infarction to stroke, just to mention the major diseases. Keeping the inflammation process under control has become a major issue for prevention programs and C reactive protein turned out to be one of the most promising markers, detectable by a simple blood test. The Italian team related the levels of this protein in the blood of examined people with their usual choco-late intake. Out of 11,000, researchers identified 4,849 subjects in good health and free of risk factors (normal cholesterol, blood pressure and other parameters). Among them, 1,317 did not use to eat any chocolate, while 824 used to have chocolate regularly, but just the dark one.

What Women Want

2008-08-28T08:10:00.000-07:00

It’s the untold story feminism has made us want more. We are greedy like never before. No comprises, please!
88% FIND TRUE LOVE
Lusty women, passionate women, sigh! Women want the same thing: they want fairytale. They want feel like Cinderella. Love still makes the world go round. Model Amenpreet wahi says one thing that I want the most is a person who loves me unconditionally. Believe me, if you get that one person, your life is perfect. I know many people who want money but what‘s life without that someone special who loves you. My life is beautiful because of my boy friend Raghav. Agrees actor mona singh," I want everything but if I am asked to choose, it would be love."
75%TO BE A TIGERESS AT WORK
When you see a woman pitching fresh ides in every meeting and also canceling dinner dates with her partner or friends for attending an official gathering, she’s a woman who chooses career, hands down. Sarah Jane Dias, model says, "for me, work is my passion. This definitely doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t love to have that special some one but being good at work gives me a high. "Sanya kapoor, a college student says, "if you have a good career, you get good money with which you can shop, socialize, have nice people around and also get a successful man as your partner."
90% A GOOD MARRIAGE!
We’re still traditional. You got it right. We want to be wooed, and then finally get married happily. Atleast, that’s what a majority of the women dream about. Is it easy? TV actor Shilp Saklani says, "For me, there’s nothing more important than a good marriage. Making my married life work is an ambition."
50% GOOD FRIENDS
We all need a shoulder to cry on., The TV soap friends has given us great lessons in love and friendships. When we’re down, the ‘dial-a-friend’ therapy works wonders. Every woman needs friends. Why isn’t sex and the city all about great friendships. " If you have good friends around you, nothing can bother you. They guard you like pillars all the time," says HR consultant Deepti Kalra. Isn’t that what friends are for!
75%TO BE HIGH MAINTAINENCE GIRLS
Show me the money, honey! Yes, that’s what some women love to sing. Gucci bags, Chanel glasses, solitaires, high heels, Armani clothes and a penthouse. Aaah! Now, that’s what women dream of. It’s not only a happy distraction but a reality. "I would like to embark on a shopping spree every now and then, without bothering about my dipping bank balance. This will make me the object of envy for every other woman. Money can buy anything-even a nice guy," says team leader smita kullu.
70% GOOD SEX
We’ve glamourised sex too much! While men are bragging about the amazing sex they are enjoying, women are left asking for more. Women as you know don’t need much time to rev up when it comes to sex. Bad sex is a dampener! So, we were not surprised when 70% women voted for good sex. Actor Sherlyn Chopra says, sex is very important for me. There’s no greater pleasure than a good sex session. I even use sex toys as I think no man can satisfy me completely.
40% TO BE INTELLECTUALS
Actor Tisca Chopra says, "for me, time is the most desirable thing in this world. There re so many places to visit, so many people to meet. I always feel that if I am not living 60 seconds of a minute, I am not doing justice to my life".

Savour the love of your loved ones before it is too late

2008-07-31T07:18:00.000-07:00

“The love of our loved one’s that you miss today or ignore today will never come back.”

Savour the love of your loved ones before it is too late

A busy life had resulted in a situation in which I was not able to spend much time with my family. I returned home late and would find my six-year old daughter already asleep. I would have one drink too many in the night and sleep till late. By the time I woke up next day, my daughter would be gone to school. Sundays were spent in pursuing hobbies.
One Sunday I was going out with my friend’s then my daughter rushed towards me. She was upset that I was leaving her again and was not taking her along. She told me that she was making a special gift for me which would be ready only by the afternoon. She wanted me to return soon so that I could un-wrap it in her presence. But I was held up with my buddies and by the time I came back, it was almost two in the night and my daughter was fast asleep. Nevertheless, I saw a small box and it was light. I shook it from side to side but no sounds came. I hastily un-wrapped the box and found that it was empty. I was a little puzzled and tossed it aside. The next morning, I was woken up early by my daughter who was all ready to go to school. She asked me with a flush of excitement if I had got her gift. I told her that it was an empty box. “But Daddy, I had filled it with a hundred of kisses for you!” she said a little sadly. I had become so involved in my pursuit of pleasure that I had not been able to recognize her hundred kisses.
We are all stuck in the race of success or pleasure and don’t have time for our loved ones. By the times we realize it, it is too late.

He loves you? He loves you not?

2008-07-13T07:08:00.000-07:00

He's dated his fair share of women and has always enjoyed keeping his options open, but lately there's this one woman that has him wondering if she’s ‘the one.’ Here are the ways to know if you are ‘the one’.

He starts thinking about the future and you are in it
It used to be that the future with a woman meant his date on Saturday night, but with you, the future seems infinite. Not only does he plan to see you this weekend, but he wants to see you a year from now as well.

Other priorities take a back seat
He used to train religiously, but lately, if you are free for dinner, he doesn’t mind missing a workout. His workaholic tendency of bringing work home at weekends to get ahead seems a bit excessive to him lately.

He doesn’t mind compromising sometimes
There was a time when it was his way, but with you it’s different. Not that you ask him to, but he doesn't mind missing a night out with the lads to be with you. And he finds himself trying to incorporate you into his plans or altering them to accommodate you.

He loves spending time with you
This one is obvious but important nonetheless. He looks forward to seeing you, and doesn’t care much about what the two of them will be doing. Lately, just going for a walk with you sounds like the best way he could spend an evening.

He doesn't notice other women as much
Did he see that gorgeous babe who just walked by? ‘No’? Although he can’t help noticing a beautiful woman when one walks by, when he’s in love, some of them tend to slip under the radar, while others just pale in comparison to you. Furthermore, he doesn't seem to be flirting half as much as he used to.

You share a great chemistry
He can’t be in love with someone that he has no chemistry with. If he seems to always be on the same wavelength, and think in similar ways, that’s a great sign. If you also generate enough heat to set off a fivealarm fire bell, then you are probably someone that he could fall in love with, if you aren't there already.

He finds your quirks charming
The fact that you carry your passport with you everywhere you go - just in case. You say things that make you different, and he likes it. He can't quite put his finger on why, but it doesn't even matter. He likes you just the way you are.

He cares about you
There is a reason why he doesn't really want to know too much about the girl he had a one-night stand with - he didn't love her. When he's in love with a woman, he wants to know all about her - who she is, what she thinks, what makes her laugh. He truly cares about her and his feelings.

He can't stop thinking about you
Instead, he is consumed by thoughts of you. You just pop into his head for no apparent reason, and he wonders if you think of him half as much as he thinks of you. He wonders what you are up to and even considers calling you.

He's forgotten his ex
More often than not, a break-up is followed by a significant amount of time spent thinking about his ex and wondering whether or not he made the right decision in going their separate ways. Depending on how long the two of them were together, these doubts can resurface again and again. Ever since he met you, the thought of getting back together with his ex is the farthest thing from his mind.

Managing pregnancy risks means healthier babies

2008-06-03T21:57:00.000-07:00

An alternative method for obstetric care has led to lower neonatal intensive care unit admission rates, higher uncomplicated vaginal birth rates and a lower mean Adverse Outcome Index (AOI) score, according to a new study from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and published in this month’s issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
The alternative method, known as Active Management of Risk in Pregnancy at Term, uses “risk-based preventative labor induction to ensure that each pregnant woman enters labor at a gestational age that maximizes her chance for vaginal delivery,” says lead researcher, James M. Nicholson, MD, assistant professor of Family Medicine and Community Health at Penn.

“Over the past decade, the rates of cesarean delivery have climbed above 30 percent,” says Nicholson. “Cesarean delivery, when compared with vaginal delivery, is associated with higher rates of postpartum hemorrhage, major postpartum infection and hospital readmission."'

75 things to do this summer

2008-05-24T04:46:00.000-07:00

1. Carry a loaded squirt gun.

2. Catch fireflies and keep them overnight in a glass jar with a bit of grass and a wax-paper lid.

3. Treat yourself to an ice cream sundae at Gayety's, 3306 Ridge Rd., Lansing; the Brown Cow Ice Cream Parlor, 7347 W. Madison St., Forest Park; or Homer's Restaurant & Ice Cream Parlor, 1237 Green Bay Rd., Wilmette.

4. Play drums Sundays at the Point (Promontory Point) in Hyde Park.

5. Enjoy a day at 95th Street Beach.

6. See a suburban 4th of July parade. Stand when the flag goes by. Yes, every time.

7. Go to the batting cages at the Bunny Hutch in Lincolnwood as often as possible (www.nerfect.
com/bunnyhutch/bh00.html).

8. Go to at least one SummerDance class and bust some crazy moves with abandon.

9. Play the ponies at Arlington Park racetrack (www.arlingtonpark.com).

10. Run flat out.

11. Visit a different city neighborhood every weekend.

12. Do Saturday morning yoga (8 a.m.) at Millennium Park (June 7-Sept. 27; 312-742-1168).

13. Kayak on the Chicago River.

14. Discover 5 great snacks in a neighborhood, by foot with friends, instead of going to Taste of Chicago.

15. Run screaming through a cold sprinkler at a Chicago park.

16. Get box seats ($12) at a Kane County Cougars game (www.kccougars.com).

17. Wake at dawn, pick up the litter in your neighborhood park.

18. See at show at Theater on the Lake (June 11-Aug. 3; 312-742-7994).

19. Get up at 5:30 a.m. and row to the middle of a small, fresh- water lake and fish for bluegills, perch and crappie.

20. Nap at lunch.

21. Reinvigorate your wilted self on a sweltering afternoon with an intense Vietnamese iced coffee.

22. Plant sunflowers in your garden.

23. After a long hot day, get take-out of assorted Middle Eastern/Greek dips with plenty of crusty bread and eat them with a cold cote du rhone with a loved one. Soak your feet in a pan of cold water while eating and pretend you are on the Mediterranean.

24. Walk slower.

25. See a movie at a drive-in.

26. Challenge a chess master at North Avenue Beach.

27. Scream at a garden snake.

28. Go to Great America to check out the new Dark Knight coaster.

29. Eat a brochette of meat washed down with a Coco Rico from one of the trailers in Humboldt Park.

30. Get to Lake Michigan in time to sit and watch the sun rise. Bring a blanket and pillow if you like.

31. Sketch birds.

32. Slow dance to Sinatra's "Summer Wind" in the grass.

33. Eat a pot bin soo (shaved ice, malt, sweet red bean and fruit sundae) at a Korean cafe.

34. Visit the cemetery.

35. Take a martial arts class at Chase Park as part of the Chicago Park District's cheap, comprehensive and convenient programs (www.chicagoparkdistrict.com).

36. Eat an arroz con leche paleta (essentially rice pudding ice cream bar) from a passing vendor.

37. Jump into Lake Michigan.

38. Arrive at Green City Market super early when it's still cool and you can find parking. Sip Intelligentsia coffee while you ponder the lovely meal you will make with your stash.

39. Go to the Drinking and Writing Festival June 14 at the Hopleaf (www.hopleaf.com).

40. See Cirque Shanghai at Navy Pier's Skyline Stage (June 4-Sept. 1; 312-902-1500).

41. Go to Wizard World (June 26-29) at Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont and see world premiere of "Batman: Gotham Knight." (www.wizardworld.com/chicago.html)

42. See fireworks, in person.

43. Write a script for a home movie.

44. Do tai chi.

45. Swing.

46. Get a freshly shaved piragua (shaved ice) from one of the piragua vendors in Humboldt Park.

47. Go to at least one movie in the Chicago Outdoor Film Fest in Grant Park (begins July 15; www.chicagooutdoor
filmfestival.us).

48. During a walk, point out poison ivy to your kids.

49. Spend a couple of hours on the beach beneath the Grosse Point Lighthouse in Evanston. Squint. Pretend you're on Nantucket.

50. Forget the sweltering heat and just groove your behind off to stellar live acts such as Girl Talk, CSS, Santogold, The National and, of course, Radiohead at Lollapalooza (Aug. 1-3).

51. Attend the first night of the Pitchfork Music Festival (June 18; www.pitchforkmusicfestival.com). See Public Enemy play "It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back" in its entirety, in order, start to finish.

52. Go to a good wine store, ask for their nicest rosé. Chill the bottle; drink it on a hot summer afternoon.

53. Win a carnival prize.

54. Enter the Muddy Buddy race Aug. 3 (www.muddybuddy.com).

55. Volunteer for a day on the Red Witch Tall Ship (www.redwitch.com). Consider a life at sea.

56. Get a freshly made lemonade from one of Chicago's South Side "steak and lemonade" joints.

57. Start a long depressing book--"Bleak House," "Sister Carrie"--that will take all summer to read. Read three pages a day.

58. Camp out all night for the first screening of "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (Aug. 15).

59. Picnic by Lake Marmo at the Morton Arboretum in Lisle (www.mortonarb.org).

60. Shoot a round of golf on one of Chicago's terrific public courses. If you don't golf, bring a friend who does and carry the clubs while he/she plays.

61. Open your eyes underwater.

62. Catch minnows in a small lake with youngsters using a net made from an old lace curtain.

63. Avoid cover bands at other block parties and instead see Ted Leo and the Pharmacists rock out the crowd (8:30 p.m. May 31) for just a $5 donation at the Do-Division Street Fest and Sidwalk Sale May 31-June 1.

64. Give a dog a bath outside.

65. Learn a few words or phrases of Japanese, like "That ball was definitely out!"

66. Eat a softshell crab. Good places to find 'em include Hugo's Frog Bar, Mario's, Prosecco, Catch 35 and Shaw's Crab House.

67. Make a white sangria with the first of the season's local peaches.

68. Ice cold tomato slices. Salt. Period.

69. Help your kid put up a lemonade stand. Vow never to pass a lemonade stand.

70. See "The Dark Knight" (July 18). Point to Chicago locations you recognize.

71. Have a Signature Sunset ice cream cone (made with merlot) at Bobtail Ice Cream (www.bobtailicecream.com).

72. Check out the Jeff Koons exhibit, running virtually the entire summer at the Museum of Contemporary Art (www.mcachicago.org).

73. Bike to work, at least once.

74. Take a jewelry-making class at Lill Street Art Center on North Ravenswood (www.lillstreet.com).

75. Take an early morning stroll along North Pier, before the shops open. It's a completely different place then.

Hip fat is good, pot bellies are bad

2008-05-09T23:39:00.000-07:00

Not all body flab is harmful -- hip fat is good but pot bellies are bad, claims a new study.

Previous studies have revealed that subcutaneous fat is merely the lesser of the two evils. Now, researchers in the United States have concluded that it could actually be positively beneficial.

A team at the Joslin Diabetes Centre in Boston has found that the worst kind is actually the excess fat on the internal organs, which causes a pot belly and is known as visceral fat.

According to them, people with visceral fat are more likely to suffer from heart disease and insulin resistance, which leads to type II diabetes, than those who put on fat under their skin on their hips and thighs.

In their study, the researchers, led by C Ronald Kahn, transplanted subcutaneous fat into the bodies of some mice and visceral fat into others.

They found the laboratory mice that had received subcutaneous fat ended up with lighter, leaner bodies and less insulin resistance than the animals that got visceral fat and, crucially, those that received no fat transplant at all.

"That increased body fat has a favourable effect is something I buy into," the New Scientist quoted John Miles of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester as saying.

If subcutaneous fat also has benefits in humans, the results could explain why liposuction, which removes this fat, does not reduce diabetes or other side effects of obesity, according to the researchers.

How subcutaneous fat exerts its positive influence remains a mystery, but Kahn suspects it secretes hormones that speed up metabolism.

MORNING SUN

2008-04-10T07:24:00.000-07:00

Fishermen work the waters off the Montrose Beach pier at sunrise

'Gateway of India will be under water by 2100'

2008-04-01T07:12:00.000-07:00

The Gateway of India will be wiped off the Mumbai skyline. Bhelpuri at Chowpatty will become the stuff of grandmother's tales. No flights will take off from Chhatrapati Shivaji airport. No couple will canoodle at the Marine Drive promenade and even heirs to the bungalow of Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan will not be able to resist being evicted from their home. Ninety-two years from now, all these landmarks of Mumbai will be underwater. That's the apocalypse scenario drawn up in a report titled 'Climate Migrants in South Asia: Estimates and Solutions' that has been commissioned by Greenpeace, a non-government organization. Prepared by climate expert and professor from the humanities department of IIT Chennai, Sudhir Chella Rajan, the report says that a potential increase in temperatures by 4 to 5 degrees due to greenhouse emissions at the current rate would mean a corresponding rise in sea levels of up to five metres by 2100. This, in turn, would imply that approximately 50 million Indians would be rendered homeless and become 'climate migrants'. "The low elevation coastal zone (LECZ), which comprises the coastal region that is less than 10 metres above average sea level, is obviously at direct risk. Even prime commercial properties like the Backbay complex and the Bandra-Kurla complex fall into this category. This means that it's not just the average Koli who will be affected but even Mannat (superstar SRK's Bandra Bandstand bungalow) would be on the wrong side of the coastline once the sea level rises," said Greenpeace activist Shweta Ganesh Kumar. Greenpeace envisages that human migration 92 years hence would be equivalent to 10 times the movement seen during Partition. "This means that even the limited space in your Virar-Churchgate local will be affected," she added. However, Rakesh Kumar from the National Environment Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) felt the figures in the Greenpeace study seemed exaggerated. "This can create a scare in the minds of the people. According to estimates of the intergovernmental panel of climate change (IPCC), the rise in sea levels by 2011 is estimated at one metre. There will be submersion, but only in the low-lying areas. At most, the foundations of buildings near the shore may be weakened due to saline formation," said Kumar. Greenpeace activists, however, are on a mission to raise awareness about the impending doom. Around 40 Greenpeace activists or 'Blue Busters' sporting symbolic blue raincoats hit the city streets on Sunday. Blue cautionary signs, saying 'Climate Change Zone Ahead' with illustrations of drowning individuals bearing a distinct resemblance to traditional traffic signs, were put up along the Bandra Kurla Complex and other areas. Greenpeace Climate and Energy campaigner Brikesh Singh said, "We want to alert Mumbaikars to the blue future they have in store if steps are not taken to fight global warming. If we don't act now, our city of dreams will be caught up in a never-ending nightmare, and we are the last generation that can prevent this from happening." The 'Blue Alert' signs were part of a Greenpeace campaign launched in Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Kochi, Panaji and Puri. "The campaign aims at bringing home the reality of climate change to the common man and empowering people to force their MPs to speak out about the issue of climate change," said Singh. Greenpeace activists will slap token 'eviction-warning' notices on the doors of structures that may be affected. These include the homes of actors Shah Rukh Khan, Rekha and Farhan Akhtar.

Kerala to get road made with PLASTIC

2008-03-16T07:21:00.000-07:00

It's a road less travelled. Metalled roads, cobbled streets and dirt paths are now passé with a road in Kerala being constructed now with plastic waste. A research centre in Kerala is paving a small stretch of road with plastic waste as part of its experiment to put to good use the huge amount of plastic garbage generated in the state. Though plastic waste has been used in road construction in neighbouring Tamil Nadu and some other states, the method may not suit Kerala because of different soil and climate conditions. Hence the experiment to develop a method suitable to the condition in the state is necessary, according to researchers working on the project. The Kozhikode centre of the National Transportation Planning and Research Centre (NATPAC) is paving a 400-metre stretch of road in Vatakara municipal town, 40 km from here, with plastic waste as part of its demonstration project. "For one and a half years NATPAC conducted experiments on the use of plastic for constructing roads at our highway engineering lab at Thiruvananthapuram. It was successful. "Now we have to prove it on the field," said N. Vijayakumar, coordinator of NATPAC that functions under the Kerala State Council for Science, Technology and Environment. "In Kerala, the soil condition and climate are vastly different from other states. So it is necessary that we conduct a separate study here on roads which have frequent vehicle movement," he said. Tamil Nadu has taken up a pilot project for utilising plastic for road construction. "However, the technology is yet to win approval from bodies like the Indian Roads Congress," said Vijayakumar. "The officials in Kerala are hesitant to experiment," said the NATPAC coordinator, who found it tough to even get a road to experiment with the technology. The use of plastic saves bitumen up to 10 percent in road construction. Around a tonne of shredded plastic is needed to pave one km road with a width of 3.5 metres. The method is to mix plastic with heated granite pieces. The molten plastic covers the granite pieces enhancing its binding property. "Using plastic requires good monitoring. The plastic should be shredded to small pieces and mixed with the aggregate (granite pieces) heated between 160 and 170 degrees Celsius," said Vijayakumar. "The plastic mixed aggregate (granite pieces) have superior binding property. The Central Pollution Control Board has agreed in principle that this technology helps reduce pollution. If adopted this can solve the menace of plastic waste," he added.

Bacteria can fight HIV transmission ????

2008-02-10T06:46:00.000-08:00

A beneficial bacteria, widely found in yogurt, might help the scientists to stop or slow down HIV transmission rate, a recent study has revealed. The research, presented at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in Boston this week, was conducted by physicians and scientists of the University of Washington and the University of Rochester Medical Centre to learn more about how the HIV virus survives and spreads from person to person. The Lactobacillus bacteria, commonly found in the vagina of most women, produce hydrogen per-oxide (H2O2) inside the body which hinders spread of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus, responsible for causing AIDS, the researchers found. According to experts, vagina is one of the most common routes for the viruses causing Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs), including AIDS. "The research opens up some doors. These findings are striking, though preliminary, and should be looked at further," Amneris Luque of Strong Memorial Hospital says.

kilihut

2008-02-03T23:36:00.000-08:00

A hut at about 13,000 feet on Mt. Kilimanjaro.

Sunday

2008-01-31T04:41:00.000-08:00

After making an actioner Zameen and comedy Golmaal, Rohit Shetty is back with a star studded ‘Sunday’, comprising of names like Ajay Devgan, Ayesha Takia, Arshad Warsi and Irrfan Khan in pivotal roles.
A dead body found floating in a lake. Unexplained scratch marks on her neck. Supari killers out to kill her. A taxi driver who yells 'bhoot, bhoot' every time he sees her.
Sehar's (Ayesha Takia) world turns topsy-turvy when she gets a clue about the missing Sunday of her life, which points to a possible violent attack on her. A.C.P Rajvir (Ajay Devgan) takes up the case to sort out the complicated and jumbled up threads of Sehar's life. In the process of solving Sehar's case it comes to light that on Sunday, different people interacted with her and amongst them, one could be the accused.
Then another dead body is found. And the bracelet found near the corpse belongs to Seher. The evidence is mounting and all dingers point ay Seher. And still, Seher does not remember anything. Is Seher really as innocent as she claims to be? A dubbing artiste by day, is she also a serial killer by night? Is her bubbly charm but a mask that hides her darker, menacing self? As Seher desperately fights the fog that clouds her treacherous memory, ACP Rajvir has to fight the fact that the woman he wants to marry may well be a murderer and worse...

Lost often? Your 'brain GPS' at fault

2008-01-21T00:43:00.000-08:00

Do you often get disoriented or lost while trying to find a way through the city streets? Well simply blame it on your brain.

Researchers in Britain have found that two key parts of the brain "talk" to each other and allow people to remember routes as well as plan new ones, but if either of these is not working, the ability to find the way around gets impaired.

While the first part called the hippocampus stores memories about key locations and landmarks, the other brain cells, known as grid cells, provide the internal sense of space and distance, like a GPS system.

According to the researchers, in those people who get lost easily, navigation cells are less efficient at talking to each other, so they get lost. "People who get lost easily don't make good use of their grid cells. These provide us with information about distance, movement and direction while linking to memories about specific landmarks. For each location a specific pattern of cells will send signals to trigger a particular memory.

"For example the entrance to Top Shop on your local high street will have one pattern while another will trigger a memory of St Pancras station. By talking to each other in this way, the cells allow the brain to produce a route it has to follow," lead researcher Dr Hugo Spiers of University College London was quoted by The Sunday Telegraph as saying.

According to them, training the cells can help people navigate more easily and it may explain how a city's cabbies gain the encyclopedic "knowledge" of the roads.

Stuffed toys ease kids' stress

2008-01-15T05:25:00.000-08:00

Caring for a stuffed animal appears to alleviate stress signs in young children exposed to traumatic or stressful life events, Israeli researchers report.

"Shifting attention from oneself to others can be very healthy for individuals under stressful times," Dr Avi Sadeh of Tel Aviv University said.

Sadeh and colleagues tested whether giving war-stressed children a toy to care for would ease the stress reactions from their exposure to the month-long 2006 conflict between the Israeli Defense Forces and Hezbollah in northern Israel and southern Lebanon.

During the last three days of this conflict, the investigators provided 40 boys and 34 girls, who were about five years old on average, with a stuffed, cocker spaniel-type toy, called the Huggy-Puppy, with long legs that enabled the children to wrap the toy around their arms or legs.

The children, who were living with their families in a shelter camp, were told the puppy was sad because he was far from home, didn't have friends, and needed a care from a buddy. Their parents were encouraged to remind them of this responsibility.

Parental reports indicated that nearly 83% of these children had experienced one or more symptom of severe stress, such as separation fears; nervousness or aggression, , the researchers report in the journal Pediatrics.
In assessments three weeks after receiving their puppy, the children with the strongest attachment to their toy had lower stress levels.

Hanuman Returns (animation)

2008-01-06T06:31:00.000-08:00

Okay. We're learning, we're learning. On the one hand, desi animation is getting better, replete with desi monsters and green goblins who are somewhat stylish and Hollywood-like. And on the other, there's that delightful humorous touch which is the essence of Hollywood animation films. For starters, you have a Hanuman as a mischievous little kid who pledges to come back to his earthly mom whenever she needs him, because he's confident he can ‘manipulate' Bhagwan for a trip to Dharti . And if that's not cheeky enough, there's a chimp who talks like Shah Rukh, a bad guy who guffaws like Gabbar and a snake wand that seems to know some of Harry Potter's tricks. Engaging stuff. Of course, the final product is a complete kichdi , partly Hollywood, partly Bollywood, shaken and stirred with dribbles of Indian mythology. But the smartest trick of them all is that Al Gorian twist in the end where doomsday becomes a synonym for global warming and environmental pollution and Hanuman descends in his kid avtar to save Planet Earth from all the plastic and the greenhouse gases that have turned it into a furnace. The desi version of D-Day being a demonic Rahu-Ketu who are swallowing all the fresh air and letting the earth burn up like a volcano. Hanuman, when he's not taming the village bullies, takes on the demons and becomes a hardcore climate warrior, telling all the kids to go green, keep the earth clean. After the Kafkaesque No Smoking, director Anurag Kashyap goes in for a bit of detox and gives the bachchalog a fitting sequel to Hanuman. Are we seeing the emergence of an Indian Superman series?

Looking like what?

2008-01-04T06:34:00.000-08:00

Snow forms a face on a car .........

Happy marriage cuts stress for women

2008-01-02T04:17:00.000-08:00

One of the biggest stressors in a woman's life is a bumpy marriage - the worse the marriage, the higher the stress level but "the better the wedding, the lower the stress level". Yes, according to a study carried out by researchers, a happy marriage cuts stress for working women as they have lower levels of a stress hormone than those in miserable relationships, the Daily Mail reported here on Wednesday. However, it does not make any difference in case of their husbands as men's stress levels are determined mainly by how busy they are at work, not the state of their home life. According to lead researcher Darby Saxbe of University of California, "As far as women are concerned, being happily married appears to bolster physiological recovery from work." "Women in unhappy marriages are coming home from a busy day and, instead of having some time to relax and have a spouse picking up the load of setting the table, getting dinner going, signing forms for the kids, these women may have immediately to launch back into another stressful routine," he said. "Perhaps in happily married couples the demands of domestic life are being shared more equitably between men and women, or at least that may be the case when wives return home from a demanding day at work," Darby added. The researchers came to the conclusion after analysing a data of 60 married parents who were asked how satisfied they were with their marriage and how busy they were at work. They also collected saliva samples from participants in the early morning, afternoon and evening to measure cortisol levels. Women in happy marriages were found to have stronger declines of the hormone than those in less blissful unions while in men, the state of their relationship with their wife appeared to have little influence on levels of cortisol, which were affected far more by how busy they felt at work.

UP AND UP LIKE SPINDLE

2007-12-27T05:24:00.001-08:00

Spindle, a 1989 piece created by artist Dustin Shuler, is photographed in July by Eric Sunada of Los Angeles, at the Cermak Plaza shopping center in Berwyn. A plan to tear down the Spindle was delayed until spring of 2008

A COLOURFUL DUCK

2007-12-17T06:02:00.000-08:00

In the wake of a duck on the Chicago River, a building's reflections makes a psychedelic pattern

Happy birthday, Dilip Kumar

2007-12-15T00:27:00.000-08:00

As veteran actor Dilip Kumar turns 85 today, he looks forward to wife Saira's surprise gift.

Well-read women sleep better than men

2007-12-09T20:55:00.000-08:00

It seems well-read women are more comfortable in bed than men — the more educated a female is, the better she sleeps at night. In case of males, it's just the reverse. Yes, according to a study carried out by a team of international researchers, women have higher rates of insomnia than men and the more they are educated, the more likely they are to sleep through the night. Conversely, the better educated a man is, the less likely he is to get a good night's sleep, the ScienceDaily said. "Globally, women are up to twice as likely to be insomniac as men. But, while higher educational attainment improves women's night time sleep quality, it has the opposite effect on men," the experts said. The researchers came to the conclusion after analysing data from a survey on social trends, involving nearly 40,000 Taiwanese people aged 15 and older. Questions included marital status, employment or occupation, educational attainment, and household income, as well as the number of family members under the age of 15. Insomnia was assessed using criteria developed by the WHO, and scored on a scale of one to five. Overall, insomnia tended to be more common among those who were older, divorced or separated, had low educational attainment, poor health, or low income. Children living at home also increased the rates of insomnia. The findings applied to both sexes. The rates of insomnia were found to be "still significantly higher" among women, who averaged 1.22 more points on the insomnia scale than men. "Social factors undoubtedly play their part," they said. Sex differences in insomnia score were most noticeable for divorced or separated women. "Stress linked to single parenting, low income, or stigma of a marriage break-down could all be possible factors," they said. The team also found that unemployment exerted a greater impact on women's sleep quality, particularly among the married women. "Sex discrimination in the workplace and childcare responsibilities might account for this." But experts found higher educational attainment improved women's night time sleep quality while it had the opposite effect on educated men.

Tickled traumatic

2007-12-07T05:12:00.000-08:00

Parents need to learn the difference between playing with children and torturing them

Tickling your kids: Is it harmless fun? Or borderline abuse? The answer is probably somewhere in between, but experts nationwide are urging parents to think before they "tickle torture."
"It always makes me cringe a little bit when I see babies tickled," says Dr. Charlotte Cowan, a pediatrician. "In older childhood, tickling at some point sometimes can be about adult control and power. And I really don't like it when I hear a child say, 'No, stop that,' and they really mean, 'No, stop that.' "

Think about it: A child could be tickled to the point that he is out of breath and about to wet his pants, laughing so hard that his cries to "stop" are unheeded. Inside, he could be feeling powerless and unprotected.
Keep things fun by remembering these guidelines:
Consider the child's age
"This is something that adults need to take responsibility for," says Janet Price, a child development specialist at Education Development Center in Massachusetts. "With a little baby, you do something for a second, and they might be overwhelmed," says Price. "The younger they are, the shorter the experience should be, especially when they can't talk for themselves."
Parents tickle with the best intentions: They want the child to have fun; they want to bond. Price suggests a short tickle, then turn it into a bear hug instead.
Consider the child
Of course, there are children who truly love to be tickled. "A child who is very outgoing, loves new things, loves to be pushed to the edge, they could come back for more," says Price. "But even with that child, you need to be ready to stop. They could have fun until they're crying." It's up to the adult, in that case, to decide it's gone past the fun point.
And then there are more fearful kids, who dread tickling. Don't think you can convert them. "Some kids are overly sensitive to sensory input, there's a growing number of kids like that," says Price. "It can be really traumatic for those kids."
Keep it brief
Sally Goldberg, a parent coach, prefers to discourage tickling altogether. That said, "There's a time and place for everything," she relents. However, that time should be brief. Keep the tickling of a short enough duration that the child will look forward to it the next time.
This also is a good time to remember the Golden Rule, says Goldberg. "Gee, is that really something I would like somebody to do to me?"
Respect 'no'
"There is a fun and normal side to tickling," says Keith Kanner, a child and adolescent psychoanalyst and host of "Your Family Matters Show" on Fox's San Diego affiliate. Know when to stop. "One hard and fast rule is that when a child says no, take them literally and respond immediately. No matter if they're laughing or having a good time."
Try pretending
Kanner suggests this experiment: Tickle a child for a few seconds. Then just pretend to tickle her. He calls it "anticipatory tickling." "Children will evoke the same laughter-ridden response," he says. "This provides the child with complete control over the situation and all the enjoyable benefits of the parent-child interaction."

Madhuri is back!

2007-12-02T05:41:00.000-08:00

Madhuri Dixit is back, in the city as well as on screen! Yes, the dhak-dhak girl stepped out of the Mumbai international airport at 2.30 am yesterday, her familiar million dollar grin lighting up the early morning. The long-haul flight from her home in Denver, LA, had done nothing to wilt the face that has launched so many Bollywood hits. In fact, Madhuri looked as fresh as a proverbial daisy. At that hour too, the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport is a beehive of activity, and it did not take more than a few seconds for passengers and their relatives to recognise her. “It’s always a warm feeling to touch Mumbai’s soil,” said Madhuri waving out to strangers. “The people, the air, and things around, all have a sense of familiarity. It’s an extremely comforting feeling for me.” She is back for little more than a fortnight. Last time she was here, it was to shoot over seven months for her comeback film Aaja Nachle , produced by the Yashraj banner. This time, she has come to promote the film. “That’s why I did not bring along my sons Arin and Ryan, as I’m here for only 20 days. My husband Ram is joining me later,” she said. Madhuri intends to pack in as much as she can in these 20 days. Visiting reletives, meeting filmmakers and, yes, promoting the film. “I am very proud and happy with the film. And even though I have seen it all, there is still a sense of anxiety, excitement and nervousness before a new release, that’s because the audiences can always spring a surprise,” said the gorgeous actress. The moment she landed, Madhuri asked about the latest buzz in Mumbai on Om Shanti Om and Saawariya . “But I don’t want to be influenced by others’ opinions, so I am going to see both films myself, and very soon, though I don’t know which one I am going to see first. I have worked with Sanjay in Devdas , and I know his mad love for filmmaking. And Shah Rukh Khan, well, he’s been one of my favourite co-stars. I love him and his unbounding energy. I am going to watch OSO for him,” Madhuri revealed. She regretted that she could not get home in time for Diwali, last week. “Diwali in Denver, is a time to gorge on sweets. And I ate so many, put on so many calories, that I was afraid to come back like that,” she reported. “Fortunately, I could get rid of the weight as well. I am coming here to promote my new film and I can’t afford to be seen with any extra flab!”

Fast walking can prolong life

2007-11-28T22:46:00.000-08:00

Researchers who followed the health of nearly 500 older people for almost a decade found that those who walked more quickly were less likely to die over the course of the study.The findings, the researchers said, suggest that gait speed may be a good predictor of long-term survival, even in people who otherwise appear basically healthy. The study was presented at a conference of the Gerontological Society of America.In a related study, appearing in the November issue of The Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, the researchers also found that people whose walking speed improved reduced their risk of death.
"We don't know why," said one of the authors, Stephanie A. Studenski of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. "Did some of these people exercise? Did some of these people have health conditions that were treated and improved?"The study presented at the conference reported that nine years after their gait speed was measured, 77 percent of those people described as slow had died, 50 percent of those considered medium and 27 percent of those considered fast.

HEALTH BEAT: EXERCISE Fast walking can prolong life

2007-11-28T22:42:00.000-08:00

Confess on the Web to ease guilty feelings

2007-09-28T01:26:00.000-07:00

Overcome with guilt about a sordid affair or a secret facelift? A new interactive Web site is giving people an opportunity to anonymously confess their sins online.
Harlequin Enterprises, one of the world's largest publishers of romantic fiction, launched the site for people to post their guilty pleasures, and for others to peruse them.
It is also encouraging those who have confessed their indiscretions to take part in an interactive survey that will form the basis of its annual Romance Report which will be published in January.
"It really spawned from the reality shows and the talk shows and people opening up their lives and crying, not necessarily with the people they love but with strangers because it makes you feel better or it somehow cleanses you of your demons," said Marleah Stout, a spokeswoman for the company.
The Internet already offers a variety of confessional sites ranging from mysecret.tv, launched by a U.S. evangelical network, to postsecret.blogspot.com, a blog and art project in which people write their secrets on hand-made postcards.
But Stout said the site is more geared towards romance.

"Although sometimes shocking and unexpected, confessions are also extremely romantic, bringing us closer to the people we love by revealing ourselves to them," said Stout.
But Stout admitted the site is sure to draw plenty of cheating confessions and material that is much racier than most of the material in its romance novels.

The site, www.harlequinromancereport.com, is divided into eight sections -- one for each of the seven deadly sins and another for those hard-to-categorize indiscretions, secrets and fantasies.
Stout said the idea for the confessions site came after the Toronto-based company's highly-publicized casting call last spring for average men, not models, to pose for their book covers.
"It's all about real people and real feelings."

New anti-AIDS drug unveiled in US

2007-09-19T07:09:00.000-07:00

Pharmaceuticals giant Pfizer unveiled a new anti-AIDS drug on Tuesday which could help HIV patients stay healthy for a longer period of time.

Selzentry is the first new class of oral HIV medicines to be introduced in more than 10 years, Pfizer said at an annual medical conference in Chicago.

After a 48-week trial, nearly three times as many patients receiving the drug combined with traditional medication recorded undetectable levels of HIV virus, compared with those just getting the normal treatments.

"The safety and durability of response seen with Selzentry in our study is reassuring. This drug is an important new weapon for clinicians who treat HIV," said Jacob Lalezari, director of Quest Clinical Research, at the University of California.

The US Food and Drug Administration in August approved the use of Selzentry, which is the first in a class of drugs called CCR5 antagonists. They prevent the virus from entering the body's T-cells, rather than fighting the virus once it is already infected the cells.

The drug does not however cure HIV infection or prevent it from being passed to another person, the company warned.
The side-effects are similar to those experienced with other anti-AIDS drugs, including nausea, fatigue, headaches and diarrhea.

Experts believe the eventual sales of the drug could generate 500 million dollars for Pfizer annually by 2011. The company is also seeking permission for worldwide sales.

Google is the real heart of Internet

2007-09-15T23:05:00.000-07:00

Born 10 years ago, the Google Internet search engine has grown into the electronic center of human knowledge by indexing billions of web pages as well as images, books and videos. On September 15, 1997, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two 24 year-old Stanford University students, registered the domain name of "google.com". The word is a variation of 'googol', which refers to the number 10 to the power of 100, a term popularised by US mathematician Edward Kasner. Page and Brin incorporated Google one year later, on September 7, 1998, in a household garage in northern California. News of Google spread largely thanks to the efficient way the search engine classified results through algorithms, and it quickly became one of the most used methods to find information on the Internet. From the beginning Page and Brin considered their role as global Internet researchers was crucial. "We thought research was really important," said Sergey in a recent interview. "The other search engines stopped research on search. They thought that 'if our search engine is only 85% as good as the next guy, it's good enough for us'." To search for Internet documents it is necessary to permanently contact each site and memorize its pages, a colossal task for the Google data bank, which is constantly renewed, allowing the users to search for key words. Google needs several weeks to troll the Internet and renew its data bank. Soon after its launch this search engine became a motor that "absorbed" web pages across the Internet, at a rate of billions per day. Google has become the most popular Internet search engine in the world outside of China, Japan and Russia, handling more than 500 million visits a day. In 2000 Google began to sell ads linked to key words. At the time, as the dot-com bubble was bursting and scores of web-based operations were declaring bankruptcy, Google was making a healthy profit. Google has expanded at a breakneck pace, and currently has some 13,700 employees. The company thrives on a culture of innovation: the best example is that it asks employees to dedicate 20% of their time to develop ideas for the company.

Many moms suffer similar nightmare

2007-09-13T04:59:00.000-07:00

'It was like I lost the baby. I was convinced he was in the bed somewhere'

To 4 a.m. feedings, dawn patrol diaper changes and general kid crankiness, add another middle-of-the-night "joy" of motherhood for new moms: baby-related nightmares -- specifically, imagined horrors that the infant is lost somewhere in her bed.

A new study in the west suburban Westchester-based medical journal Sleep found almost three out of four new mothers suffer from infant-in-distress nightmares. Some 57 percent have the kind that lead researcher Tore Nielsen dubs BIB -- Baby in Bed.

One woman said she suffered from BIB nightmares -- scrambling through the sheets looking for her infant -- a dozen times in 20 days.

Nielsen, of the Hopital du Sacre-Coeur in Montreal, says the nightmares are a normal result of the pressures of new responsibilities, lack of sleep and hormonal changes.

Jessica Ashley of the Northwest Side Old Irving Park neighborhood, said she had BIB for 18 months to two years after her son Ethan was born.

"It was like I lost the baby. I was convinced he was in the bed somewhere," said Ashley, 35, a free-lance writer who blogs for Chicago Moms Blog.

Ashley discovered her grandmother also had BIB for 20 years. While her nightmares have stopped -- her son is now 3 years old -- she wonders if BIB might not be hereditary.

Catherine McNiel, 30, is a Glendale Heights mother who battled BIB.

"I just chalked it up to the constant vigilance that drives mothers -- from the minute you get pregnant, everything is pointed at caring for this child. Even when you're asleep your subconscious is still working," she said.

'Survival mechanisms'

Rosalind Cartwright, a dream researcher with the Sleep Disorders Center at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, says the nightmares may stem from the question, "Am I going to be an adequate mother?"

Such bad dreams can be "survival mechanisms" because they "help diffuse the anxiety for you," said Cartwright, who was not involved in the Canadian study.

In this case, discovering that the baby is not tangled in the covers reassures mothers that their worst nightmares are not real, said Cartwright.

'Crucible' is one of the nice book

2007-09-01T00:34:00.000-07:00

The 13th featured selection in "One Book, One Chicago," is "The Crucible," the Tony Award-winning play about the 17th Century Salem witch hunts and trials that Arthur Miller wrote to hold a mirror up to the anti-communist hysteria of the 1950's.

Fifty-four years later, the themes of mass hysteria, irrational fear and political persecution still ring true, Mayor Daley said.

"After 9/11, a lot of people have looked at the Muslim community, the Arab community in a completely different way and that's really unfortunate. Also, many people are looking at the immigrant community in a completely different way, which is really unfortunate. We can learn from our lessons in history-and maybe we haven't," Daley told a news conference Thursday at the Harold Washington Library.

Apparently referring to modern-day political witch hunts, Daley said, "In the electronic age, anyone can say anything. It's remarkable. You listen to radio and TV and read [Internet blogs] and they'll say anything without any justification. It's amazing. It's a completely different electronic age today. Home videos, everything. People say and do things. It's amazing what can take place. That's why we have to be very careful and review what's happening in America."

Library Commissioner Mary Dempsey called Miller's play a "stark series of questions about who owns truth, what is the meaning of justice and how do we, as a society, handle people who are different than we are."

"The Crucible" premiered in New York in 1953, during the height of the Red Scare. U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy was hunting down communists, black-listing people in show business and holding hearings in Congress to force people to come clean.

Miller was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee and was charged with contempt of Congress when he refused to name names of colleagues who had participated in Communist activities.

The conviction was overturned the following year. Miller was not among those blacklisted. But, the ordeal had a deep and obvious impact.

"I reflect what my heart tells me from the society around me. We are living at a time when there is great uncertainty in this country. I am trying to delve to the bottom of this and come up with a positive answer, but I have to go to hell to meet the devil," Mller was quoted as saying in his testimony before the House committee.

Now, Chicagoans will make the literary trip to hell with Arthur Miller.

Not only that. They'll be able to see the play in action, thanks to a Sept. 13-through-Nov. 11 production by the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, where the mayor's daughter, Nora Daley Conroy, is board member. Steppenwolf actors will also conduct readings at branch libraries across the city.

Steppenwolf's 32nd season is centered around a cornerstone question: What does it mean to be an American? The Crucible will "provide the first lens through which" to answer that question, said David New, associate artistic director of Steppenwolf Theatre.

"We're thrilled in this partnership to encourage the people of Chicago to read the story, yes. But, to deepen their engagement beyond the act of reading into conversation, into coming to the live performance, seeing the story vivified on stage, staying after the performance for a post-show conversation with fellow audience members.

"It's by deepening the engagement with the story and engaging in conversation that we'll together negotiate an interpretation of this tremendous story and begin to address some of the challenging questions this play raises, yes about the witch trial era of Salem, yes about the McCarthy era in the United States, but most importantly about how we live today," New said.

"The Crucible" is the second play to be featured in "One Book, One Chicago." The first play was Lorraine Hansberry's, "A Raisin in the Sun." Never before has a Chicago theater company performed the play in conjunction with the citywide celebration of reading.

Time is ripe for tomato recipes

2007-08-26T02:27:00.000-07:00

Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes. It's that time, when vines are laden and recipes suddenly become scarce.
Today's recipes for Gazpacho (requested by T.H. of Glencoe), Fresh Tomato Soup (requested by A.B. of Joliet) and Eggplant and Tomato Gratin (requested by V.F.B. of Stickney) are exceptional ways to make the most of ripe tomatoes.
Lorraine Wisvader of Romeoville shares a Gazpacho recipe her sister gave her more than 30 years ago. The Gazpacho is perfect accompanied by fresh fruit, Fontina or Muenster cheese and crusty bread.
If you prefer hot soup, the Fresh Tomato Soup, created by Diana Rattray and submitted by Josie Baker of Chicago, is a classic.
Cooking Light's Eggplant and Tomato Gratin, which makes 8 servings, is easy:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Arrange 1 pound eggplant (Japanese eggplant is preferred) in ?206-140?-inch slices in a single layer on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray. Coat slices with cooking spray; sprinkle with ?206-140? teaspoon salt. Bake for 16 minutes, turning eggplant over after 8 minutes. In bowl, combine ½ cup grated fresh Parmesan cheese, 2 teaspoons chopped fresh oregano, ?206-140? teaspoon freshly ground black pepper and 4 minced garlic cloves.
Arrange half of baked eggplant slices in 8-inch square baking dish coated with cooking spray. Arrange 3 plum tomatoes (?206-140?-inch thick slices) over eggplant slices. Top with 1 medium zucchini (?206-140?-inch thick slices). Sprinkle with half of cheese/seasoning mixture. Repeat procedure with remaining baked eggplant slices, plum tomato slices, zucchini slices and remaining cheese mixture. Bake, covered, at 375 degrees for 1 hour. Uncover and bake an additional 10 minutes or until vegetables are tender and cheese is golden.

Gym workouts might be useless

2007-08-18T04:49:00.000-07:00

Slaving away in the gym might just be a waste of time for many, for one in every six persons doesn't get any benefit from it in shedding weight or toning the body, as the receptivity to exercise actually lies in our genes, a Louisiana State University study has found. As part of the study Dr Claude Bouchard and colleagues examined the differing effects on 742 sedentary people from a 20-week exercise programme, in which the intensity was gradually increased. The researchers measured ability to process oxygen, ability to pump blood round the body, pulse rate, blood pressure and insulin resistance in the subjects. The study found that 10-15 per cent of volunteers were 'non-responders' to aerobic exercise. In some volunteers the peak rate at which their muscles could process oxygen increased by up to 40 per cent, while in others there this key measure of cardiovascular fitness, known as 'VO2 max' did not improve at all. "Some people simply respond better to exercise. They have lower heart rates, lower cholesterol, lower blood pressure, better response to insulin and a host of other positive responses. Others who exercise the same amount, simply don't get all the benefits, and it appears to be in the genes," the researchers said. The researchers are now trying to identify which genes are responsible for receptiveness to exercise.

Milk helps in weighty matters

2007-08-09T04:47:00.000-07:00

Drinking milk after heavy weightlifting could help burn more fat, a new Canadian study shows. Milk may be best known for its calcium content in supporting bone health but the latest research shows how it promotes body fat loss and has the ability to aid in muscle growth. Researchers at McMaster University in Ontario took 56 men aged between 18 to 30 years and divided them into three groups. They were put through a rigorous, five-day-per-week weightlifting programme over a 12-week period. Following their workouts, study participants drank either two cups of skim milk, a soy beverage with equivalent amounts of protein and energy or a carbohydrate beverage with an equivalent amount of energy, which was roughly the same as drinking 600 to 700 ml of a typical sports drink. When the study concluded, researchers found that the milk-drinking group had lost nearly twice the amount of fat that the carbohydrate beverage group lost. The study published in the latest issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition showed that those drinking soy lost no fat. At the same time, the gain in muscle was much greater among the milk drinkers than either the soy or carbohydrate beverage study participants. "The loss of fat mass, while expected, was much larger than we thought it would be," said Stuart Phillips, an associate professor at McMaster University. "I think the practical implications of these results are obvious: if you want to gain muscle and lose fat as a result of working out, drink milk."

Why fit people dislike the obese

2007-07-30T23:32:00.000-07:00

Overweight people are often bullied and discriminated against because ancient fears that fat humans may be diseased causes their thinner counterparts to dislike them, say scientists. In a study, reported in the journal Evolution and Human Behaviour, the researchers have found that the mere sight of someone who is overweight can trigger feelings of disgust and nausea similar to encountering rotten food. Since bacteria and viruses are invisible, human brains have evolved to react to outward signs of disease like rashes and wounds, and these signs also include excessive body fat, suggests the study. "Antipathy towards obese people is a powerful and pervasive prejudice in many contemporary populations," the Daily Mail quoted the team from the University of British Columbia as saying. "Our results reveal, for the first time, that this prejudice may be rooted in multiple, independent mechanisms," the research team added. The study showed that feelings of disgust towards the obese were strongest in people with the greatest fear of disease. Participants who agreed with comments like "it really bothers me when people sneeze without covering their mouths" in the questionnaires given were found to be more likely to agree with statements such as "if I were an employer looking to hire, I might avoid hiring a fat person". "The research sounds reasonable enough I suppose; obesity is unhealthy and if there is something in us that helps us avoid ill health I can understand that," television presenter Anne Diamond, who helps people conquer obesity after briefly ballooning to 14st 9lb herself, said. "But I don't believe that in the 21st century we can use it as an excuse for prejudice. Obesity is an illness, but something becoming so common that it will soon be the norm," she added.

To realize the value of ?...?..?.

2007-07-23T02:46:00.000-07:00

To realize
The value of a sister
Ask someone
Who doesn't have one.

To realize
The value of a ten years:
ask a newly
Divorced couple.

To realize
The value of a four years:
Ask a graduate.

To realize
The value of one year:
Ask a student who
Has failed a final exam.

To realize
The value of nine months:
Ask a mother
Who gave birth to a still born.

To realize
The value of one month:
Ask a mother
Who has given birth to
A premature baby.

To realize
The value of one week:

Ask an editor of a weekly newspaper.

To realize
The value of one hour:
Ask the lovers who are waiting to meet.

To realize
The value of one minute:
Ask a person Who has missed the train, bus or plane.

To realize
The value of one second:
Ask a person
Who has survived an accident......

To realize
The value of one millisecond:
Ask the person
Who has won a silver medal in the olympics.

TIME WAITS FOR NO ONE

Treasure every moment you have.
You will treasure it even more when
You can share it with someone special.

To realize
The value of a FRIEND
Lose one.

JUMP! JUMP!! JUMP!!!

2007-07-19T03:07:00.000-07:00

WHERE THERE ARE JUMPING ?

Have milk for a longer life

2007-07-17T02:51:00.000-07:00

Scientists in Britain have found that drinking approximately half a litre of milk every day can keep the heart healthy by protecting it against a range of serious conditions, including heart disease, stroke and type-2 diabetes.

The findings are the latest to emerge from a 25-year study of 2,400 men aged between 45 and 59 in Britain.

One in six who took part in the study was diagnosed with metabolic syndrome - a combination of medical disorders that increases one's risk of cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

All the men filled in a food questionnaire, kept weekly food diaries, and recorded the amount of dairy products they ate.

Those who regularly drank milk and ate dairy products were far less likely to have the syndrome than those who drank and ate little or none, reported the online edition of the Daily Mail .

They were also 62 percent less likely to have the syndrome if they drank approximately half a litre or more of milk a day, and 56 percent less likely if they regularly ate other dairy foods.

The more dairy products a man consumed, the less likely he was to suffer from symptoms of the condition, which includes excess fat around the stomach, the scientists said.

Regular consumption of any type of milk, yoghurt or cheese halves the chances of developing metabolic syndrome, the study showed.

The condition - sometimes called insulin resistance - affects the body's metabolism by increasing cholesterol, blood glucose levels, body fat and blood pressure.

Sufferers have almost double the risk of coronary artery disease and four times the risk of diabetes than those without. They are also almost 50 percent more likely to die early.

Head researcher Peter Elwood of Cardiff University said milk consumption has plummeted over the last 25 years amid concerns about the effect its high saturated fat content may have on health and the heart. But growing evidence suggests this idea is false.

"We are reviewing worldwide studies on the link between dairy (product) consumption and effects on vascular disease, including rates of heart disease and stroke, and there is no doubt in my mind of the benefits.

"The evidence shows a very powerful effect that is totally against public perception that milk and other dairy products are bad for your heart," said Elwood.

Humans remember 4 things at a time

2007-07-12T03:42:00.000-07:00

Psychologists that the University of Oregon say that the capacity of short-term memory is a strong predictor of an individual's IQ level and scholastic achievement. A study conducted by them has shown that an average person can think only about four items at a time, but people with high IQ levels can remember more articles. Professor Edward Awh and Professor Edward Vogel of the university conducted laboratory experiments to test their hypothesis that the memory capacity might be influenced by the complexity of items being stored, something that might cause a four-item limit for most people. The study showed that even when very complex objects had to be remembered, the participants who ranged in age from 18 to 30 years still were able to hold four items in active memory. However, the clarity of those items was not perfect, points out Professor Awh. It was also found that some people had much clearer memories than others. "While it seems reasonable that people who think about more things at once might also have clearer memories than average, we found that this assumption was not the case," Professor Vogel said. Professor Awh, the lead author of the study published in the journal Psychological Science, also says that the same people who can remember a lot of objects at one time do not necessarily have clearer memories of those objects. "Knowing the number of things a person can remember tells you nothing about how clear a person’s memory may be," said Professor Awh. "So even though people with high IQs can think about more things at once, there are not guarantees about how good those memories might be," the researcher added.

Cash

2007-07-12T03:40:00.000-07:00

Three diamonds, two heists, four murders, one double-cross, one double-crosser who is triple-crossed, one misunderstanding, one fatal error called trust and beneath it all, friendship and love. Welcome to the world: Of the cash, By the cash, For the cash.
A set of three unique diamonds, mined in India in 1779, almost ruined the career of Divya Gupta (Soha Ali Khan) in 2005. This set of three has travelled around the world over the past few centuries. Sometimes as a set, sometimes as single stones. From India to France in 1881 to England in 1901 to... well, its difficult to trace the exact journey of these three. Two of them surfaced in 1986 and were promptly acquired by the mafia. They are currently with a man who is the undisputed CEO of mafia operations in South Africa. His name, or so his passport says, is Mr. Francis Augustine D'mello (Dan Castellaneta). This man desperately needs the third to complete the set. The estimated price of the set: 100 crores (Rupees 10 million). All his work, dirty or clean, legal or illegal, right or wrong, big or small is done under the supervision of his most trusted man: Vikram Singh Goyal a.k.a. The Mint (Sunil Shetty)(word is that he is one of the coolest around and is actually quite a refreshing personality) Not even Mint knows that his boss has the two diamonds that are etched in history.
When Sanjeev Khanna (Feroz Khan) 79 year old father died, he had no idea hell would break loose. His lawyer called him and told him a short story. A story about how the missing third diamond was always with his father. Sanjeev being an honest citizen decided to give the diamond to the Indian authorities. Being in South Africa, he straight went to the Indian Embassy in Cape Town. He handed over the diamond to the embassy and walked out. For him the chapter was over. But for a wild bunch of people, some in SA and some in India, the story had just began.
The game begins. Now they have to rob the diamond back from Mint and put it in the embassy before the police and Ajay's girl find out the truth. But there is also a lot more that they find out. The fact that Ajay made Sashank and Akshay work together and made Raj do by himself. The fact that they ended up helping each other. The fact that they still were best friends. The fact that Sania actually loved Raj and not Akshay and Sashank. The fact that Sashank now had to get them together. And the fact that Divya was soon finding clues that this robbery had something to do with someone she might know eventually it is Ajay and Raj's Best friend Esha (Dia Mirza). At least till the point the diamond was returned. But Sania didn't. She was kidnapped by Mint.
The three diamonds set out for India. But the guys made sure of one thing: They would not reach India before they completed their respective stories, become heroes and got hot on the heals of the cool Mint. Cash is a forthcoming movie which is scheduled to be released sometime in 2007.

Brain development protein identified

2007-07-09T03:31:00.000-07:00

Scientists at Children’s National Medical Center have identified a fundamental protein that is instrumental in the development and repair of the brain. The signalling activity of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) protein is significant for myelination and remyelination, the processes essential to the creation and repair of the brain’s white matter. The groundbreaking discovery in mouse models may lead to inventions for the enhancement of healthy brain development, and improvement in treatments for brain disorders in both children and adults. “By understanding the fundamental mechanisms of brain development, we get closer to finding clear instructions to repairing developmental brain disorders and injuries,” Dr. Vittorio Gallo, Director, Center for Neuroscience Research, Children’s Research Institute at Children’s National Medical Center, was quoted by Nature as saying. “Our breakthrough at the level of laboratory research will soon translate to the bedsides where they care for newborns,” he added. When white matter is injured or defective, the essential functions of information relay are impaired, according to the background information in a paper, to be published in the August issue of Nature Neuroscience. The paper further links underdeveloped white matter or white matter injuries to conditions including mental retardation, cerebral palsy, and multiple sclerosis. “If we can marry whole body cooling with new approaches that boost the activity of this essential protein, we may be able to slow down injury and enhance myelination,” said Dr. Gallo. “Some day we may be able to repair brain damage and subsequent affects such as mental retardation, developmental disabilities or other disorders that result from incomplete myelination or white matter damage,” he added. During the study, the researchers found that when enhanced EGFR protein was inserted in mice, they showed enhanced myelination/remyelination. Whereas, upon using an EGFR protein with reduced biological activity they observed a decrease in these processes.

Marigold

2007-07-09T03:28:00.000-07:00

"Marigold"is being publicized as a romantic musical comedy, which encapsulates the elements of both, Bollywood and Hollywood. The story is that of an American actress (Ali Larter) who gets stranded in India without any money. In order to earn some capital and thus find her way back to her motherland, she opts for a small role in a Bollywood musical. It is then that she comes across the film’s choreographer Prem (Salman Khan) and consequently begins her exploratory expedition as she experiences the filmi world of Bollywood.
Marigold (also known as Marigold: An Adventure in India) is a 2007 romantic musical comedy about an American actress who becomes engrossed in the Bollywood film industry after visiting India. Director Willard Carrol intended the film to brige "the gap between Indian and American cinema."
The film follows the story of Marigold Lexton, an American actress who gets stranded in Mumbai and lands a minor role in a Bollywood musical. She meets Prem, the film's choreographer, and undergoes a personal transformation as she experiences Bollywood firsthand.
Preity Zinta was offered a role but turned it down..

BEAUTIFUL CATCH

2007-07-06T03:15:00.000-07:00

Cubs center fielder Angel Pagan grabs some vine leaves but not the ball

Apne

2007-07-06T03:12:00.000-07:00

Anil Sharma currently working on 'Apne' which has an ensemble casting of father and sons, Dharmendra, Sunny and Bobby Deol. The movie is being shot in India and Thailand and must be ready for release by July this year.
Baldev Choudhary (Dharmendra) is an ex-boxer. He has had a stain in his boxing career. Now he wants to wash it with his son Angad's (Sunny Deol) success.
However, financial crunch and various other obstacles keep on preventing him from attempting to achieve his dream. Angad does excel in his career but somehow Baldev cannot fulfill his dream he faces many obstacles. He knows who is blocking his chances to wash the stain. An opportunity beckons Baldev in the form of a TV. Show. He trains a local boy to get into a grand boxing show. Everything goes well. But, he fails once again. He is ditched for a better coach at the last minute. Baldev's younger son Karan (Bobby Deol) is a musician. He has just launched his first music album. He is closely watching the plight of his father. He knows what his father's dream is.
Karan works hard and wins all through. His hard work and determination fetch him success. He wins the national title and goes on to win many contests all over the world. He faces the test of his life. He is going to fight with the current world heavy champion. The match goes fine. Karan fights hard and heading towards a historical victory. But he is tricked and ends up paralyzed in a hospital bed. Baldev, is now about to loose his son. He feels guilty for bringing him to this stage. He wants to kill himself.
Apne is a story of a struggle of a family. It is expected to be an emotional drama with a lot of action and thrill. Apne is releasing in this June/July.

'Capitalism is bad for men's health'

2007-07-02T03:49:00.000-07:00

Communism may be oppressive, but it seems as though capitalism is bad for men’s health, according to a recent study which found significant increases in mortality rates after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The life expectancy for men freed from the Iron Curtain dropped by six years between 1991 and 1994 amid social disruption, physical hardships and economic instability. The degree to which men were affected depended upon how rough the transition to capitalism was and how much income inequality increased, the new study from the University of Michigan found. And they were significantly more likely to be impacted by the transition than women, the study found. “The inequalities in status and resources that can come with capitalism does lead males to behave in ways that are detrimental to men’s health,” lead author Daniel Kruger said. Bamboo socks for smelly feet: Now there is a cure for smelly and pongy feet — special socks made of bamboo fibre. The item is the first eco-friendly sock to go on general sale, and experts have forecasted that it is the sign of one of the biggest revolutions to take place in the world of clothing. The socks are made of the silky material, which is softer, more durable and absorbent than cotton, and contains a natural substance that destroys smell-making bacteria. Supermarket chain Asda plans to sell the socks for less than £2 , and is planning to use it in knickers, T-shirts, sheets and towels. The fabric is made from cellulose produced by boiling or steaming bamboo poles and the smell-destroying agent bamboo-kin is still effective after 50 washes. Hoarding habit a brain disorder: A new study has revealed that hoarders have a brain disorder resulting in an all-consuming compulsion to collect that often cuts them off from society and damages their relationships. A sub-type of obsessive-compulsive disorder, hoarding is the compulsion to collect and store items considered by most people to be worthless or useless. Little is known about what causes hoarding, but like many mental disorders, it is believed in part to have a genetic cause. In some cases, a significant life event can trigger the behaviour. It may also be present in persons with dementia. In severe cases, it can get so out of control it can endanger lives — as in the case of a Houston woman who died in a 2006 fire as her clutter-filled home hindered rescue efforts.

Beautiful sunset

2007-07-02T03:44:00.000-07:00

Tanner Lesco, 15, drives for a lay-up in front of a scenic sunset at United Nations Park in Cheyenne, Wyo.

TO REALIZE THE VALUE

2007-07-02T03:20:00.000-07:00

To realize

the value of

Wear protective sunglasses

2007-06-22T04:37:00.000-07:00

Fashionable sunglasses offer little or no protection from harmful rays emitted by the sun and people using sunglasses just for their brand name or style may even risk blindness, warn scientists in Britain. The sun emits harmful ultraviolet rays and prolonged exposure to this radiation may severely affect the skin, eyes or the immune system. But teenagers and young adults often choose sunglasses purely on the basis of their price and style without cross checking their safety standards. A survey by the College of Optometrists in Britain showed that 63 percent of those questioned were more influenced by how sunglasses looked and how much they cost than by the protection they offered, said the online edition of Daily Mail. This rose to 80 percent amongst respondents in the under-25 age group - with many keen to emulate the brands and styles of glasses worn by celebrities in glossy magazines. Worryingly, one in seven of the 1,500 surveyed did not wear sunglasses at all. "It is particularly worrying that younger people have so little regard for their eyes when up to 80 percent of exposure to UV rays over a person's lifetime occurs before the age of 18," said Susan Blakeney, optometric adviser at the College of Optometrists. Experts added that people with light-coloured eyes were more at risk from damage caused by ultraviolet rays if they failed to wear good-quality sunglasses. Although all brands legally sold have to meet basic standards, there are plenty of fakes of expensive and fashionable brands in the market that do not comply, the scientists noted. Wearing poor-quality sunglasses could damage the eyes and increase the risk of cataracts, which can lead to blindness later in life, they said. The researchers suggested a simple quality test before buying sunglasses- hold them at arm's length and tilt them slightly. Focus on an object in the distance, move them up and down and see if there is any distortion, especially at the lens edges. If the lenses are of high quality, there should be no movement.

Bipasha Corrects Eyesight to Host 7 Wonders Ceremony

2007-06-22T04:32:00.000-07:00

Indian actress Bipasha Basu was so thrilled to be named one of the hosts of next month's "New 7 Wonders of the World" event in Lisbon, Portugal, that she got contact lenses so she could read her lines.
The thought of having to read from a teleprompter at the globally telecast event finally pushed her to deal with her myopia or nearsightedness, the Bollywood heartthrob told The Times of India newspaper in an interview published Thursday.
"This is the first time that the seven wonders are being reconsidered. To be part of this is to be part of history," said Basu. "And I wouldn't have missed it for anything in the world, certainly not for being shortsighted."
More than 50 million people have already cast their votes in the massive global poll. In the top 10 are Greece's Acropolis, Mexico's Chichen Itza pyramid, Paris' Eiffel Tower, Brazil's Statue of Christ The Redeemer, India's Taj Mahal and Jordan's Petra.
The Egyptian pyramids are the only surviving structures from the original list of seven architectural marvels.
Basu said she would be honored and flattered to share the stage with Hollywood stars Ben Kingsley and Hillary Swank, also scheduled to speak at the function on July 7.
"I've got myself contact lenses. All these years I stubbornly resisted them," Basu told the newspaper.
Model-turned-actresss Basu has acted in more than 22 movies since she entered the movie industry five years ago.
Her recent hit films include "Dhoom 2," or "Big Bang 2," a Bollywood version of Shakespeare's Othello called "Omkara," and "Corporate."
She is dating Bollywood leading man John Abraham.

CHECK CRUEITY TOWARDS DRAUGHT ANIMALS

2007-06-18T04:09:00.000-07:00

In the scorching summer months, it is distressing to observe cartsmen and tongawallas, with heavy loads on thjeir vehicles, making the draught animals vulnerable to slun stroke, heat, dehydration and exhaustion. Preventioin of Cruelty to Draught and Pack Animals Rules,1965, prohibits carrying loads by animals exceeding the prescribed limits which varies according to the size of the animal and type of vehicle (with or without pneumatic tyres).

The rules also provide that in any area where the ambient temperature exceeds 37 degrees Celsius between 12 noon and 3 pm, no person shall use or cause to use any animal drawing any vehicle or carrying any load.

The policemen are callously negligent about rules framed to prevent cruelty towards draught animals. The shortstaffed law enforcement agencies and animal welfare organisations have failed to make use of the powers conferred on them to apprehend violators of these rules.

The animal welfare organisations should therefore hold seminars to apprise traffic police about these rules.

These organisations, sustaining on paltry funds, are unable to monitor adherence to these rules. Police helpllines like those established in Major towns, if set up in all districts, can facilitate help to these animals in distress.

Casual checking by traffic police during their routine duty on roads and crossings can deter the rampant infringement of rules.

Since the animals cannot represent their case, it is imperative that we humans should speak up for them.

GLOBAL WARNING, A COMMON CONCERN

2007-06-13T05:18:00.000-07:00

Inspite of using motor vehicles, we should develop a habit of walking or cycling. Which is the most clean and eco-friendly. Leaving the fuss and prestige behind, we should go and opt for walk or the cycle as the mode of transport as it is the most clean, eco-friendly and inexpensive mode of tranportation. Deforestation is the major cause of concern, especially in the hills. In that case we should join our hands together and should stop promoting the illegal constructions at the cost of our rich forests. If not much, we can at least plant trees in and around our area and can also look after that they are growing and growing well. We understand that, being the fastest growing economy in the world, our need of energy is obviously growing day by day. Therefore, we, the common man can afford to conserve energy in order to reduce the burden for more energy on our govrenment.

If we work together under the joint effor, little changes in our daily habits can bring some difference (if not much) to the climate. We should try and look for the alternatives, so that we can contribute. We should learn to listen, understand and execute what our government wants us to do in order to helpl mother nature maintain her cool. Don't forget, it will be we only, who will be paying for our mistakes and irresponsible behaviour.

Jhoom Barabar Jhoom

2007-06-13T04:53:00.000-07:00

Barabar Jhoom is a forthcoming Bollywood film starring Abhishek Bachchan, Preity Zinta, Lara Dutta and Bobby Deol. It is directed by Shaad Ali who has directed hits like Saathiya (2002) and Bunty Aur Babli (2005). The film will be produced by Aditya Chopra and Yash Chopra under Yash Raj Films. The film will release on June 15, 2007.
Shooting began in the second half of 2006 in London and included a shooting schedule in Paris, France. Many images from the set show shooting being conducted at Waterloo Station, London. Some shooting took place in Agra, near the Taj Mahal. The choreography has been done by Vaibhavi Merchant. Filming has taken place in numerous locations along Green Lanes, Harringay in North London.

Concern over breast cancer among men ?

2007-06-11T03:45:00.000-07:00

Breast cancer cases among men may be less than in women, but it is definitely causing a concern with doctors blaming it on the sheer lack of awareness. Genetic disorder, obesity, alcohol intake, prior exposure to radiation, family history are some of the factors that has led to the spread of this rare disease. According to the Delhi Cancer Registry more than three per cent of breast cancer deaths in 2001 were reported among men, which is more than the deaths occurred due to small intestinal cancer and thyroid. Every year about 75,000 new cases of breast cancer are reported in India, out of which a small but increasing number is from men, said Sidharth Sahni, Consultant in the Surgical Oncology Department at Artemis Health Institute in Gurgaon. "Cases of breast cancer in men is a reality and cannot be ignored. For many, breast cancer among men may sound bizarre as they compare it with women breast cancer," he said. Men have all the same types of tissue in their breasts as women. "But they have fewer ducts and globules and these are not as developed as those in women. This is why the cases are less reported among men," he added. According to Dr P K Julka, Professor of Oncology at AIIMS, Asian men are less susceptible to breast cancer, as compared to African American or Caucasian. He said that one per cent of his patients were men in the past two years. "There is no need for panic. The cases have not risen dramatically. There is just a slight rise. But men should know they could be at risk and shouldn't think that it is just a women's disease," Julka said. Julka said unmarried men could also be affected with the disease. Infertile men or those whose liver has been damaged by liquor or due to other reasons, possibly through hormonal imbalances, could be affected with the problem, he said. The oncologist said the Klinefelter's syndrome or chromosomal abnormality increases the risk of developing breast cancer by 50 per cent in men. He said those who have genetic disorder should be careful as they could also be at high risk. "They should take it seriously when they see a painless lump or when they find bleeding from their nipple or discharge," he added. Surgery is usually the common treatment followed by radiotherapy and chemotherapy and hormonal therapy. "It is not right to say that this is confined to urban area only. We have seen an equal number of patients from rural areas too," Julka said. Among men the cases are reported at the age of 60, while symptoms among women are seen at a younger age. Doctors said hormonal imbalances and altered testicular function have been found to be the reason for all breast cancer deaths. Gauri Kapoor, senior consultant in the Department of Surgical Oncology at Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute, said though it is a rare disease, they have seen many cases in the past few years. "Most men are not even aware that they could also be affected with breast cancer and as they are not able to recognise the symptoms, they generally come for treatment at a very late stage when the cancer reaches their chest wall," she said.

Harmful effect of excessive laptop use

2007-06-11T03:42:00.000-07:00

Corporate hi-fliers who rarely step out without their data-loaded laptops will hate this, but doctors in Mumbai believe the device is a growing source of ill-health. Tingling sensation in the fingers, strained tendons and sore shoulders are the price young and ambitious are paying for clicking non-stop on their laptops, according to a study done by occupational therapists in Mumbai. "Busy office-goers are using laptops way over the recommended two-hour period," says S R Pingle of the Indian Association of Occupational Health, studying the habits of executives in two leading corporate houses. The laptop craze is growing at an amazing pace in the Mumbai, especially after the advent of affordable brands a couple of years back. Corporate or self-employed persons can be seen glued to the LCD screen not just in airports, but even in crowded first-class compartments of trains. Hep B-schoolers, jet-setting executives and self-assured corporate honchos refuse to step out to work — or even that cursory chotta sa break — without the convenience and connectivity of a laptop. In the West, the dependence has grown even further. An international survey carried in Time magazine last week showed that one in five holidayers usually take their laptops along even on vacations. The favourite excuse as the Mumbai study found was that essential office data is stored on the laptop. "Laptops are meant to be used for a short-time period, but executives are using them instead of their desktop computers in offices as well as homes," adds Pingle. While the erudite crowd that logs on to laptops understand ergonomics (the science of fitting workplace equipment to maximise a worker's productivity), few seem to understand the damage done by excessive laptop usage. Take Navi Mumbai resident Vijay Habbu (50), who is self-admittedly "laptop dependent". A senior executive in a corporate house, Habbu says he uses his laptop for over nine hours every day. "I had developed a ganglion (bunching of nerves) on my wrist, working on the computer, which got further aggravated when I shifted to regularly using the laptop," says Habbu. Nailing the diagnosis wasn't too difficult for him. "There was a clear correlation. When I was on leave and didn't use the laptop, I had no complaints," he says. The problem is that laptops are not ergonomically designed to be used for prolonged hours. "The keys in a laptop are cramped. Moreover, most computer users haven't learnt typing and tend to use one or two fingers which puts pressure on the hand," explains Pingle. Those who slouch over their laptops for long hours particularly complain of back and neck spasms or posture-related problems, says consultant and upper-limb surgeon at Bombay Hospital Parag Munshi. "Many also come in with strained tendons as their wrists are flexed in extreme positions," he says. The Cornell University Ergonomics website has a basic explanation as to why prolonged use of laptops can be tough on the body. "The reason is simple — with a fixed design, if the keyboard is in an optimal position for the user, the screen isn't and if the screen is optimal the keyboard isn't." Hearteningly, timely interventions can bring a lot of relief. "Since I can't work without my laptop, I always carry an external mouse which I attach to my system," says 45-year-old managerial executive Karunidhi. Habbu, too, agrees that the move to an external mouse has given him 20% relief, though he still occasionally pops in pain-killers. Doctors say preventive measures can keep away pain. "Such problems are usually caused by recurrent movements for prolonged periods. People should try and maintain the position of neck and back in neutral position," advises KEM Hospital's head of orthopaedic department Dr V J Lahiri. Munshi, who calls the laptop-related ailments "transient and temporary", says frequent users need conservative management which includes rest as well as "correct posture".

Cheeni Kum

2007-06-11T03:39:00.000-07:00

Cheeni Kum (literally, less sugar) is a Bollywood film being made by advertising executive and debutant director Balkrishnan. The story is being touted as a sarcastic love story.
Amitabh Bachchan is playing the role of the old man and Tabu is playing the role of a young woman. This happens to be the first new movie to be signed by Amitabh after recovering from his illness in 2006.
The film's shoot has started on 6 April 2006 and is supposed to be completed in 3 months. Ilaiyaraaja is composing the score for the film and it marks his return to Bollywood film music after a long break. A part of the film is shot at Qutub Minar in New Delhi.

For sharp memory, eat chocolates

2007-05-31T03:38:00.000-07:00

A chemical found in chocolate, tea, grapes and blueberries may boost memory by improving blood flow in the brain especially in combination with exercise, latest research suggests. The study, published in the American Journal of Neuroscience, was conducted on mice. The scientists now plan to study the effects of the chemical epicatechin on memory and brain blood flow in aged animals and then humans, combined with mild exercise. The food chemical epicatechin is one of a group of chemicals known as flavanols found in certain food items including chocolate, tea, grapes and blueberries. Earlier studies have already shown that the antioxidant compound flavanol could help improve cardiovascular health. Now the researchers, led by Henriette van Praag, working with chocolate firm Mars, compared mice that were fed a normal diet with those that were fed a diet supplemented with epicatechin. Half the mice in each group were allowed to run on a wheel for two hours each day and were trained to find a platform hidden in a pool of water, a month later. Those mice that exercised and ate the epicatechin diet remembered the location of the platform longer than the other mice. The epicatechin-fed mice who did not exercise also showed enhanced memory, but to a lesser degree. The mice on the special diet appeared to have greater blood vessel growth in certain parts of their brain, along with more mature brain nerve cells, the online edition of BBC News reported. "This is important because it identifies a single natural chemical with memory-enhancing effects, suggesting it may be possible to optimise brain function by combining exercise and dietary supplementation," Mark Mattson, a doctor at the US National Institute on Ageing, said. However, nutritionists warned chocolate is high in fat and sugar, which may undo any potential benefits. They recommended a diet rich in fruit and vegetables, with perhaps a small amount of chocolate.

ELECT A MATURE, HONEST PERSON AS PRESIDENT

2007-05-28T04:26:00.000-07:00

Presidential election is about two months away. Poliical parties are in the process of finalising their candidates for thre top job. Many distinguished names are in the air, including that of incumbent President APJ Abdul Kalam, Lok Sabha speaker Som Nath Chaterji, Vice president Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, renowed Infosy chief Narayan Murthy, energy minister Sk Shinde, learned scholar Dr Karan Singh and a new entrant in the fray, foreign minister Pranab Mukherji. Undoubtedly they are all renowned and respected figures. In the din of electing next President, it needs to be kept in mind that the moment, the society in general and polity in particular are so polarised that only some mature person of integraity, totally apolitical and honest should be elected as the First Citizen of India. Through the above named worthies are all honourable personalities, yet APJ Abdul Kalam and Narayan Murthay are the most suitable. They are above controversies, apolitical and incorruptible.
Alternatively, political parties should reach consensus a;nd elect the next President uanimoulsy to avoid bitterness and unwanted divisions among various sections of people.

McDonald's says it's up to breakfast challenges

2007-05-25T04:35:00.000-07:00

McDonald's Corp. said Thursday that it is prepared to defend the Egg McMuffin's 30-year reign as breakfast champion from an old rival and as many as three fast-food challengers.Jim Skinner, McDonald's chief executive, told shareholders attending its annual meeting at the company's Oak Brook headquarters that the chain is exploring expanding its dollar menu, currently limited to lunch items, to include the first meal of the day. That would counter Burger King's $1 breakfast menu and its version of the Egg McMuffin, a ham omelet sandwich.Breakfast is the fastest-growing category in the restaurant business, expanding at about 9 percent per year, as time-pressed consumers opt to grab something on the go rather than fix breakfast at home. McDonald's holds about a 40 percent market share in the breakfast category.In addition to Burger King, McDonald's soon could be facing increased competition from Subway, Taco Bell and Wendy's, all of which are testing breakfast products.Wendy's has said that its breakfast test, at 160 restaurants, is to be expanded to 20 percent to 30 percent of its 6,600 restaurants by the end of the year.Subway is testing a toasted breakfast sandwich at 7,000 outlets that offer breakfast, while Taco Bell is testing a breakfast program in four markets. No date has been set for either to expand nationally.Taco Bell spokesman Rob Poetsch said the chain, which is offering breakfast burritos and soft tacos, wants to "distinguish ourselves from the biscuit and muffin crowd."McDonald's is facing competition at breakfast from Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks, which are better known for their coffee than their food.Ralph Alvarez , McDonald's chief operating officer, warned the newcomers would find it is more difficult to deliver breakfast than it is to develop the menu."Breakfast is not as easy as it appears," he said, citing a host of challenges ranging from staffing and training to choosing restaurant locations."Driver's don't make left turns," he said, explaining that breakfast diners are in such a hurry they might stop at only the most convenient locations.Bob Goldin, executive vice president of Technomic Inc., a food research and consulting company, said the challengers are not likely to have much impact on McDonald's breakfast business."McDonald's is going to fiercely defend its well-earned turf," he said. "It has earned a tremendous amount of equity in the business that is going to be tough to dent."In addition, Goldin noted that the company is going to become more formidable when it rolls out a 24-hour breakfast menu.McDonald's is testing grill systems in Romeoville that would allow its operators to offer breakfast around the clock, rather than the current system that requires them to stop breakfast to make way for its burgers."We feel pretty good about breakfast," said Don Thompson, president of McDonald's USA.The comments about breakfast came as the world's largest restaurant chain, which slowed growth in 2003 to about 1 percent annually to focus efforts on expanding sales at existing restaurants, is planning to increase the speed of its expansion to about 1.3 percent annually. The company is planning to add 800 new restaurants and remodel 2,000 worldwide this year.Most of that growth is to be concentrated in Russia and China, where the mantra has become "better and bigger," said Tim Fenton, head of McDonald's Asia, Middle East and Africa business. The company plans to add 100 restaurants, a 12 percent growth rate, this year in China, where it runs about 800 outlets.In the U.S., growth is to be limited to about 200 new restaurants, said Matthew Paull, executive vice president and chief financial officer. McDonald's operates 13,800 units domestically. ---------- jschmeltzer@tribune.com

Babies can tell between languages

2007-05-25T04:33:00.000-07:00

At four months, babies may be too young to speak or crawl, but they can certainly tell when a speaker has switched to a different language – with only visual cues. Researcher Whitney Weikum from the University of British Columbia found that infants are able to discern when a different language is spoken by watching the shapes and rhythm of the speaker's mouth and face movements. The findings suggest that babies growing up in a bilingual environment advantageously maintain the discrimination abilities needed for separating and learning multiple languages. As a part of the study Weikum and colleagues tested three groups of infants – ages four, six and eight months – from monolingual English homes and two groups of infants –ages six and eight months – from bilingual homes. They showed each group silent video clips of three bilingual French-English speakers, who recited sentences first in English or French, and then switched to the other language. Their findings suggest that visual information alone will prompt the babies at four and six months to pay closer attention and watch the video for a longer period when the speakers switch languages. "We already know that babies can tell languages apart using auditory cues. But this is the first study to show that young babies are prepared to tell languages apart using only visual information," says Weikum. The researchers found that six-month-old babies from both bilingual French-English and monolingual English homes could tell the languages apart visually. These groups would watch the video clips for a significantly longer period if the speaker switched languages. However, by eight months, only babies from a bilingual French-English home and familiar with both languages were able to tell the languages apart visually. "This suggests that by eight months, only babies learning more than one language need to maintain this ability. Babies who only hear and see one language don't need this ability, and their sensitivity to visual language information from other languages declines."

MOST INFLUENCE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD:SONIA IN, BUSH OUT

2007-05-05T03:46:00.000-07:00

Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, steel baron Lakshmi Mittal and Pepsico CEO Indra Nooyi figure in Time magazine’s coveted list of 100 most influential people, which also includes Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.
But missing from the list for the first time in four years is US President George W. Bush.
In a write up on Gandhi, who is also on the cover of the magazine’s Asia edition, Time says in the 16 years since the death of her husband, she had become the face of the country’s most famous family and as leader of the Congress party, she has managed the largest political party in the country and steered it to victory.
When her party won national elections in 2004, she was offered the post for prime minister; she listened to her “inner voice” and turned it down, and anointed the economist Manmohan Singh in her stead, the magazine recalled.
For ordinary Indians, this act of renunciation held tremendous mythic resonance. Though Singh is Prime Minister, it is Sonia (60), who is the kingmaker.
The list also features Queen Elizabeth II, Sudanese President Mohamed Omar Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir, acting Cuban President Raul Castro, Iranian Supreme leader Atyatollah Ali Khamenei, Chinese President Hu Jintao, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and Pope Benedict XVI.
Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barrack Obama, who are fighting for Democratic nomination for the next year’s US presidential election, secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and outspoken and staunch critic of President Bush, house speaker Nancy Pelosi are among the Americans who find their names on the list.
This year’s list features people from 27 countries, including 29 women and 71 men. But Americans predominate, constituting 54 among the 100 and Britain follows with ten.
Releasing the list, deputy managing editor Adi Iqnatius said the list contains both people who had good effect and evil influence in the world and that explains bin Laden being on the list.
Replying to question, Iqnatius agreed that the selection is subjective, adding that there were several other influential people. But the magazine had to make the make the selection, which is based on varied criteria.
Initially, the list had 1000 names, which were pared down to 100. But he conceded that predominance of Americans could be due to the fact that the magazine is located in New York.
Time magazine compares Lakshmi Mittal, CEO of Arcelor Mittal, with Scottish-American Industrialist Andrew Carnegie, who consolidated steel industry in the US and is widely respected as a philanthropist, saying Mittal appears to reincarnation of Carnegie.
“Both gave notoriously glamorous parties. Carnegie was, and Mittal is, famously generous and charitable, although Mittal has given millions of dollars without fanfare to tsunami relief and other causes,” Time said of the two steel magnates.
Yet arguably, Mittal (56) overshadows Carnegie in some ways. Carnegie’s US Steel was the first American company to achieve a 1 billion dollar market capitalisation. Arcelor Mittal seems likely to become the world’s first 100 billion dollar market-cap steel company, the write up notes.
The geographic scope of Arcelor Mittal, with 320,000 employees in 60 countries, also vastly exceeds the US Steel’s.
In a write-up on Nooyi, Time magazine said, the shocking thing isn’t who she is but the world she has inherited. “Globalism was not new when she joined PepsiCo more than a decade ago but the global part has changed. As Pepsi’s strategist, she’s a former management consultant, Nooyi helped position PepsiCo for growth in China, the Middle East and her native India,” the write up notes.

Doing good makes you feel good

2007-05-05T03:26:00.000-07:00

Now you have more than one reason to tell the world why your friend is one in a million – that is, if you are one of those who feel friendship is all about caring and sharing. A study suggests that being good to others adds meaning to your life, and makes you happy. Michael Steger, a psychologist at the University of Louisville in Kentucky, has always been amazed by how differently people lead their lives. Pat Tillman, for example, left the NFL to enlist in the Army and fight in Iraq and later Afghanistan (where he was killed), Steger said, but Paris Hilton continually pursues “a public life of shallowness.” Steger couldn’t help but wonder which behaviour makes people happier – seeking pleasure or doing good? To find out, he and his colleagues asked a group of 65 undergraduates to complete an online survey each day for three weeks that assessed how times they participated in hedonic, or pleasure-seeking behaviours, versus meaningful activities, such as helping others, listening to friends’ problems and/or pursuing one’s life goals. The surveys asked the subjects how much purpose they felt their lives had each day and whether they felt happy or sad. The subjects also completed two sets of questionnaires at the beginning and end of the study to assess how they felt about their lives more generally. They found that the more people participated in meaningful activities, the happier they were and the more purposeful their lives felt. Pleasure-seeking behaviours, on the other hand, did not make people happier. Realising that some people may feel guilty about reporting pleasure-seeking behaviours, Steger and his colleagues then modified the survey questions slightly to make them seem less exceptionable, and asked a new group of students to perform the study again, this time over a four-week period. The psychologists got the same results. “A lot of times we think that happiness comes about because you get things for yourself,” said Richard Ryan, a psychologist at the University of Rochester, who was not involved in the study. “But it turns out that in a paradoxical way, giving gets you more, and I think that’s an important message in a culture that’s pretty often getting messages to the opposite effect.” In order to make sure that the relationship between happiness and doing good wasn’t the other way around – that happiness instead leads people to do good things – the researchers looked at which tended to come first. They found that the subjects became happier after they did something good, suggesting that happiness does, in fact, come about as a result of doing good things. The results of the study, to be published in the Journal of Research in Personality, present an “enormously optimistic picture of people, that as a cynic, I was very happy to see,” said Steger.

'Time is running out'

2007-05-05T03:25:00.000-07:00

From nuclear power to reforestation to better toasters, the world now has a game plan from climate experts for fighting global warming, a report their chief scientist says will have a ''profound influence'' on coming negotiations.
American officials questioned the economic cost, and the Chinese questioned whether fast results could be achieved. But a leading expert said there was little choice.
''If we continue doing what we are doing now, we are in deep trouble,'' said Ogunlade Davidson, co-chairman of the U.N.-sponsored group that produced the report, approved by consensus by more than 120 nations Friday at the end of a weeklong meeting.
A summary said the world must significantly cut emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by sharply improving energy efficiency in buildings, vehicles and even kitchen appliances; shifting from fossil fuels to nuclear, wind, solar and other renewable energy sources; saving forests as ''carbon sinks,'' and capping agricultural emissions. The document says the world has the technology and wealth to act in time to avoid a sharp rise in temperatures.
The assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change builds on reports by two other IPCC working groups issued earlier this year. The Working Group III study looks in detail at the most promising technologies for reining in the heat-trapping gases and at policies, such as taxes or quotas on carbon emissions, that might encourage development of the technologies. It also looks at how much that might cost economies.
It estimates the world must stabilize the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by 2015 at 445 parts per million to keep global temperatures from rising 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above preindustrial levels. Scientists fear temperatures higher than that might cause severe damage. Current atmospheric concentrations are thought to have passed 400 parts per million.
''Time is running out,'' said Olav Hohmeyer, a German delegate.
Global talks resume in December.

Good Boy, Bad Boy

2007-05-04T05:18:00.003-07:00

Good Boy, Bad Boy is a Bollywood film scheduled to be released in 2007 and the film is directed by Ashwini Chaudhary. The movie stars Emraan Hashmi, Isha Sharvani, Tusshar Kapoor, Tanushree Dutta and Paresh Rawal. This film is produced by Subhash Ghai under the banner of Mukta Arts Ltd. Chilean-Indian model Jennifer Mayani is also the film playing the role of Jenny.
Rajan Malhotra is a proverbial bookworm, forever lost in studies and completely oblivious to the frolicking of a college dude. He hails from a well to do background and his parents are constantly worried due to his somber nature and his lack of interest in any extra curricular activities.
While Raju Malhotra has absolutely no time for studies as playing notorious pranks on others takes up most of his time on a daily basis. His father constantly ridicules him for his wayward ways...

Heat Is On

2007-05-04T05:09:00.000-07:00

Our goal is to pursue growth with monetary stability" is typically a standard line in most official statements on monetary policy. Quite significantly, the growth objective played a noticeably subordinate role in the RBI's annual monetary policy, released by RBI governor Y V Reddy a few days ago. This is consistent with the recent policy measures announced by the central bank. These measures have all been designed to bring inflation under control, even at the cost of a possibly lower rate of growth in the short run. Perhaps, the pursuit of growth is not the main concern of policy-makers today because the Indian economy has been growing remarkably rapidly over a fairly long period of time. More importantly, the economy has been growing pretty much on its own without much assistance from government. During much of this period, growth was accompanied with price stability. However, in recent months, the economy has been exhibiting classic signs of 'overheating' with high growth accompanied by a rate of inflation that has now exceeded 6 per cent. In somewhat simplistic terms, 'overheating' occurs when excess demand in the economy pushes up prices because supply falls short of demand. This phenomenon is most likely to occur when an economy is growing very fast, and that too over a sustained period. A very likely consequence of this sustained high rate of growth is that industries begin to operate at close to full capacity, and so are not able to increase supply in the short run even though they realise that there is sufficient demand in the economy to mop up additional quantities. Even in sectors where industries operate below capacity, infrastructural cons-traints may prevent any expansion of output. Governments and central banks have limited policy options in correcting an overheated economy. Since an excess of demand over supply is the root cause of overheating, corrective measures must either reduce demand or increase supply. But, if it is the absence of adequate capacity that is constraining supply, then there is very little that government can do to increase supply, at least in the short run. In recent months, the surge in food prices accounts for a large component of the overall inflation. Government has adopted some limited steps to augment food supply. The ban on export of food items will have some beneficial impact on domestic food supply, although the quantitative effect may be limited since current wheat exports have not been very high in any case. In addition, only the more expensive varieties of wheat are typically exported, and hence there may not be any increase in domestic supply of the more common varieties of wheat. Government has also taken some direct steps to abate the price rise. Most important of these has been reduction in the prices of petroleum and diesel. Fuel is an important component of the overall price index, and so any reduction in fuel prices has an immediate direct impact on prices. Moreover, any reduction in their prices has an important indirect effect since this reduces transportation costs. This in turn brings down the cost of a wide variety of items of common consumption. The RBI's recent efforts have focused on controlling aggregate demand. And it is here that some fine-tuning becomes necessary. Efforts to reduce the availability of credit are the textbook remedy to curtail aggregate demand. However, a large reduction in credit supply may constrain the expansion plans of entrepreneurs and thereby have a negative effect on the prospects of long-run growth. Increasing globalisation also creates its own problems for monetary policies designed to curb inflation. Indeed, Reddy has identified the surge in net inflows of foreign exchange as the main concern of monetary policy today. We have now accumulated an excessively large stock of foreign exchange reserves. The continuing inflow of foreign exchange essentially means that the world demand for rupees exceeds its supply. If the RBI does not intervene in the foreign exchange market, this excess demand would cause the rupee to appreciate relative to other foreign currencies. Any appreciation in the external value of the rupee makes Indian exports less competitive in foreign markets, and hence reduces exports. As readers probably know, the rupee has appreciated almost 10 per cent against the dollar in recent times. Not surprisingly, the Indian export sector has not been doing too well during this period.

'Google best workplace for MBA grads'

2007-05-04T05:06:00.000-07:00

After jumping from 129th in 2005 to 2nd in 2006 and to Numero Uno this year, Google, the most popular search engine is now the most popular place to work for MBA students, thus ending McKinsey & Company's 12-year reign. Google also appears in the top ten in all industry rankings (from investment banking to healthcare). Below some of the key findings of The Universum IDEAL(TM) Employer Survey- MBA Edition 2007 conducted by Universum, global employer branding leader helping companies, through research and consulting, understand and develop their Employer Brand Image and Employer Value Proposition. 5,451 MBA students participated in the MBA Edition of The Universum IDEAL Employer(TM) Survey, making it the largest survey of its kind. Students were asked to rank their IDEAL(TM) Employers as well as to answer questions about their career expectations, including IDEAL Employer characteristics, preferred location, salary expectations, top industries and best internships communications preferences. Despite Google's new strength as the overall IDEAL(TM) employer, McKinsey is still the number 1 employer among men MBAs. Goldman Sachs (3) maintained its position in the top 10. Bain & Co. (4), BCG (5), Apple (6), Microsoft (7), GE (8), Nike (9) and Bank of America (10) round out the list. McKinsey maintains its 1st position as the top employer in management consulting. Google jumped to the fourth position, preceded by BCG (number 2) and Bain & Company (number 3). Goldman Sachs still number 1 among students choosing a career in investment banking followed by Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers, JPMorgan IB and Merrill Lynch. Bank of America replaced Citigroup as the number 1 IDEAL employer among MBA students interested in commercial banking. IT companies went up overall. Google maintained its number 1 position. Apple (6) moved up from seventh position in 2006, while Microsoft (7) jumped from the 16th position. Procter & Gamble, Google, PepsiCo, Nike and BCG make the top 5 for students interested in consumer goods. Starbucks pushed 8 positions from 15th to 7th. GE is still the number 1 among students who selected engineering/manufacturing followed by Toyota, Apple, J&J and BCG. Intel, number 2 in 2006, fell 15 positions while companies like Honeywell and Boeing pushed up in the top 10.

Diabetes may hit male fertility

2007-05-04T05:05:00.000-07:00

Diabetes may be damaging men's sperm, which could affect their fertility, British researchers said. In one of the first studies to compare DNA in sperm from diabetic and non-diabetic men, the researchers found more DNA damage in sperm cells of men with diabetes — a possible sign of reduced fertility. Researchers at Queen's University in Belfast, Northern Ireland, studied sperm from 27 men with type-1 diabetes, with an average age of 34, and 29 non-diabetic men of similar age. They found that while semen volume was lower in diabetic men, all other measures including sperm concentration, output, form, structure and ability to move appeared normal. But when they looked at the DNA, they found much more damage in the sperm of diabetic men. Sperm damage can impair male fertility and has been associated in couples with a history of miscarriages, they wrote in the journal Human Reproduction. They recruited their volunteers from a centre for endocrinology in Belfast and among men who had sought to have their fertility tested. Type-1 diabetes, also called juvenile diabetes, is caused when the body mistakenly destroys cells in the pancreas that secrete insulin. The more common type-2 diabetes is linked with obesity, poor diet and lack of exercise. Because the volunteers who were not diabetic were men seeking fertility treatment, the researchers said they may also have more damaged sperm than the average man. "Any significant differences demonstrated between diabetic men and this control group would be of even greater significance if compared with a fertile population," they wrote. The researchers said the study was small and more research was needed to understand just how diabetes damages sperm and what it might mean

GROUP WEDDING

2007-05-02T03:39:00.000-07:00

Couples at a group wedding in Nanjing in China's eastern Jiangsu Province. The week-long May Day holiday introduced by China's government in 1999 has proven to be a popular time for couples to get married.

Eat pistachios for a healthy heart

2007-05-02T03:38:00.000-07:00

Eating pistachio nuts could keep heart disease at bay, says a study.
One of the oldest edible nuts on the planet, the pistachio nut is believed to have originated in the Middle East where it grew wild for thousands of years. The nuts are now available across the globe in roasted, salted, shelled and unsalted forms.
Like all nuts, pistachios are an excellent source of protein. They are thought to be rich in nutrients that appear to lower cholesterol and keep arteries healthy, reported the online edition of Daily Mail.
Penny Kris-Etherton and other researchers at the Pennsylvania State University asked volunteers to supplement a low fat diet with pistachios. Some ate 1.5 ounces of the nut a day, while others had double that amount, either alone as a snack or incorporating them into cereal, muffins and pesto sauce. A third group did not eat any pistachios.
After just a month, cholesterol levels were significantly lower among the pistachio eaters. Those who ate the most nuts experienced the biggest decrease in cholesterol, the researchers said.
A handful or two of pistachio nuts a day could keep heart disease at bay, the study suggests.
"Our study has shown that pistachios, eaten with a healthy heart diet, may decrease a person's cardiovascular disease risk profile," Etherton said.
Pistachios are rich in an antioxidant called lutein, usually found in green leafy vegetables and brightly coloured fruit. Present at higher levels in the pistachio than other nuts, lutein helps prevent cholesterol from clogging up arteries.
Experts say it is best to eat unsalted rather than salted pistachios as too much salt can raise blood pressure. However, both types should have the same effect on cholesterol.

Delhi's first water baby surfaces

2007-05-02T03:31:00.002-07:00

The normal versus caesarean delivery debate now has a new angle to it: Water. Water birthing, a procedure in which a woman delivers in a basin or tub of warm water, is becoming increasingly popular in the west. It recently made its first inroad in Delhi when a city hospital conducted its first ‘experiment’ with water birth. And doctors at the hospital say one of the factors that caused them to try it out, albeit with the mother’s consent, is the rising rate of C-secs in the city. Charlotte Walter, a city-based British national, delivered underwater at Phoenix Hospital in Greater Kailash under the supervision of gynaecologist and infertility expert Dr Urvashi Sehgal on April 28. Both mother and baby – a bonny girl who weighed 2.9 kilograms at birth – are reported to be doing fine. Charlotte, according to Dr Sehgal, was in labour for five hours. "The rates of caesarean sections in the city are higher than ever before. This is a situation which has been bothering me for quite a while and I believe one important factor in this is the fear of prolonged labour pain. Water birthing can go a long way in assuring women who go for voluntary C-secs to ensure better health for themselves and their babies," Dr Sehgal said. The hospital had been toying with the idea of water birthing for three years now, said child birth educator Divya Deshpande, who works with the hospital. "Initially we did not have the infrastructure. The pool is a little different from a normal one because the height has to be enough for the women to be completely submerged to get the buoyancy," said Divya.

400 kids fall ill after inhaling paint

2007-05-02T03:31:00.001-07:00

The owner of a furniture company has been arrested for allegedly using benzene-laden paint which resulted in the hospitalisation of over 400 school students in northeast China's Liaoning Province. Investigators said the owner of Panjin Yixian School Facility factory tried to cut cost by using paint meant for outdoor use on furniture supplied to the Shalingzhen School since April 24. The fumes caused sickness among the children who complained nausea, headaches, dizziness and weakness of limbs. Ten children were reported to be still in the hospital on Tuesday, all of them in a stable condition. Tests by the Panjin Bureau of Quality and Technical Supervision (PBQTS) showed that benzene concentration emitted from the desks and chairs was 1.12 times higher than the recommended safety level. Officials also examined unsold furniture in the factory and found that benzene concentration was 9.7 times higher than the safety level. Earlier, tests by the PBQTS indicated formaldehyde concentrations in the classrooms were double the legal limit of 0.1 milligrams per cubic meter. But officials said the symptoms of formaldehyde poisoning, sore throat, coughing and irritation of eyes, were different to the symptoms suffered by the school children. The local government has directed the primary section of the school to suspend classes.

Ta Ra Rum Pum

2007-05-02T03:27:00.000-07:00

Siddharth Anand's Ta Ra Rum Pum plays on every human's ultimate fantasy to conquer against all odds and take home the trophy. Here the trophy stands as a metaphor for the realisation of one's most precious dreams. And that is precisely what makes Ta Ra Rum Pum a universal subject to identify with and feel for.
After the runaway success of Salaam Namaste, director Siddharth Anand’s Ta Ra Rum Pum is a YashChopra Production. Needless to say, this one has Saif Ali Khan and Rani Mukherjee in the lead. The film carries a social message for all without losing the commercial aspect of Yash Raj films. Ta Ra Rum Pum’s story is about love, inspiration and the 'never say die' spirit.
Saif plays Ranveer aka RV in the film. He starts out as a pit stop tyre changer and goes on to make it big with the help of Harry (Jaaved Jaffery), his manager. No Egglactly from Jaaved this time. He is seen a meticulously crafted serious role. He falls in love with Shona aka Radhika (Rani Mukherjee). He gets an opportunity to show some moves along with Radhika in the romantic numbers. Success follows soon and he becomes the number 1 race car driver in U.S.A. as well as the proud father of two kids, Priya (Angelina Idnani) and Ranveer (Ali Haji).
Mr Hero beomes irresponsible and takes a huge loan to buy a Merc and a lavish house. Fate changes and Saif has great fall from his career heights due to an accident. He is left jobless and bankrupt. Mad in love, Radhika had left her education incomplete and the consequence is that she has to work in a low profile job.
Vishal-Shekhar are back to give another hit to the masses with their melody. The soundtrack offers no surprises and has a typical Yash Raj feel in all its songs.
Saif Ali Khan indispensable. His spontaneity is utterly disarming and distracting. He plays RV -- a huge racing star, with amusement as if to say 'big deal' not losing his boyishness even during stressful times. Rani enacts the role of the mother/wife proficiently. Jaaved Jaaferi is first-rate in a serious role. Bharat Dabholkar is efficient. Victor Banerjee suits the character. Shruti Seth is alright. Angelina Idnani and Ali Haji are adorable. Director Siddharth Raj Anand is only getting better with every film.
Overall, Ta Ra Rum Pum is a feel-good family entertainer with good looking actors, thrilling car chases, playful melodies (Vishal-Shekhar) and pretty

One more PUMPKIN

2007-05-01T03:45:00.000-07:00

Justin and Lia Watt of Plainfield are waiting for The Great Pumpkin and hoping for a great Bears season!

CHIRANJEEVI - THE REAL "MEGASTAR"

2007-04-30T05:14:00.000-07:00

Chiranjeevi, the Megastar of Tollywood today, was born on 22 Aug 1955 in "Mogaltur", a small village in 'West Godavari' District in Andhra Pradesh to sri Venkat Rao and Anjana Devi. He grew up in his native village with his grand parents, while his family was else where because of his father's occupation. The sense of descipline and hard work which he still embraces were introduced at a very young age in his life and the tough childhood he had being the eldest in his family have helped him to handle many such events of higher proportion with great expertise in the later stages of his life.
Little did he imagine, even in the wildest of his dreams, that he would, one day, be a Megastar and rule the Telugu Film Industry. Years later, this youngster called "Chiru" in the Film Industry , with his hard work and dedication to his proffession, could make it really big in the field hitting the limelight, with an unparallel fan following emulating his every act, word, dress and dance. What makes this ordinary human being such an extraordinary one - god knows!
After graduation, Chiranjeevi moved to Madras to seek a career in his chosen field of acting in the Film Industry. To get himself ready for the stage, he joined in an acting school in Madras. After struggling for some time, he took to acting by appearing in small roles in films like "Pranam Kareedu" and "Punadhi Rallu". He, from that modest beginning to this date, has acted in 132 films. Throughout his career he has been through a lot of ups and downs but every time he came back with extra persevrance and won his way through people's hearts with wonderful performances in his films. Chiranjeevi got married to Surekha, the daughter of veteran actor sri "Allu Ramalingaiah". Chiru has always been a family man - being blessed with two daughters Sushmita & Srija and a son Ramcharan Tej.
And as Chiru becomes the most popular hero, he has lived a royal life, travelled widely from one country to another around the world almost every time in the delightful company of filmi celebreties who act, sing and dance with him. He acted in a lot of best movies to date and had been able to deliver splendid action-packed movies. With all these talents in him, it isn't a big surprise to know that he has been one of the highest paid movie actors in the Indian Film Industry. Be it actor, star or megastar - Chiranjeevi has been acknowledged as being one of the most successful actors in the history of the Telugu Motion Picture Industry. We, in our site, would like to highlight the remarkable work Chiranjeevi has shared with the movie-going-public for the last 20 years. ENJOY!
As Chiranjeevi completes 20 years of his entry into the films and in all the achievements and honors, there's no sign of pride but he's still going successfully with a string of hit films. Chiru tells his fan association: " Among the many skilled performers who toil in front of the camera, only a few are excellent actors. A fewer still are those with the vague and elusive traits we call star quality. At the intersection of these groups is the most selected group of all, a tiny number among whom Chiranjeevi stands out. The reality is - i am an actor. My fans perceive me as a Megastar".
Above all, on Oct 02 1998 he started Chiranjeevi Eye & Blood Bank and Charitable Trust to give back to the people whatever he could on the humanitarian ground thus demonstrating a new dimension in his personality.

WONDERFUL DOG

2007-04-29T05:23:00.000-07:00

Australia win third successive World Cup title

2007-04-29T05:13:00.000-07:00

Ricky Ponting's team created history on Saturday by winning the Cricket World Cup for the third consecutive time, and fourth overall. Winners in 1999, 2003 and 1987, Australia cruised to an easy win against Sri Lanka in the ninth edition of the tournament at Barbados in West Indies.
Man of the Match Adam Gilchrist's record-breaking innings powered his team to a momentous total of 282 runs in the stipulated 38 overs at the Kensington Oval. In reply, though the Sri Lankans showed grit and guts initially, the defending champions restricted them to 215 for eight in the rain-inflicted match.
Sri Lanka, champions in 1996, were set a revised target of 269 off 36 overs under the Duckworth-Lewis system after rain halted play for 12 minutes during their run chase.
Gilchrist and fellow left-hander Matthew Hayden's stand of 172 was a new first-wicket record for a World Cup final, surpassing the 129 shared by England's Mike Brearley and Geoff Boycott during the West Indies' 92-run win at Lord's in 1979.
This was ace speedster Glenn McGrath's last match, his fourth successive World Cup outing. The 37-year-old bowler, who was declared the Man of the Tournament, could not have hoped for a better farewell.
Sri Lanka innings
Unlike holders Australia, the Lankans lost the first wicket early. In the first ball of the third over, Gilchrist caught the ball behind the stumps to dismiss Upul Tharanga off Nathan Bracken. The opener, who hit a four off the first delivery of the innings, returned to the pavilion for an insignificant score.
Sanath Jayasuriya and Kumar Sangakkara maintained a 116-run stand as the latter completed his 40th ODI half-century in the 20th over. But, soon Brad Hogg despatched the wicketkeeper-batsmen for 54.
Michael Clarke scalped the key wicket of Jayasuriya under overcast skies. The ball, keeping very low, turned away from him and dashed into the off stump as the batsman walked back at 63 off 67 balls.
Shane Watson trapped the valuable wicket of skipper Mahela Jayawardene, and with it Lanka's hope of a 1996 redux became grim.
The next three overs cost Sri Lanka a wicket each, but by then, the winner was all but declared. In the 30th over, McGrath and Clarke effected the run out of Dilshan (14). Clarke despatched Chamara Silva in the next for 21. Arnold made his exit from the show, also his last international match, in the 32nd over off McGrath's bowling for a forgettable score.
After the last delivery of the 33rd over, with hopeless natural light, the Aussies made a huddle and started celebrating their still-unofficial-victory, only to the annoyance of the field umpires. Aleem Dar, even suggested that the teams come back on Sunday and complete the remaining three overs.
Jayawardene came to the field to talk to Bucknor and Bowden. The stands for the presentation ceremony had been brought in and packed off with equal speed. It was finally decided that the match would continue, despite abject darkness.
In the last ball of the 33rd over, Gilchrist stumped Malinga off Andrew Symonds's delivery. The decision was left to the third umpire, who took a considerable time before declaring the obvious.
Two overs and four runs later, two-time champions Australia were declared winners of the 2007 Cup.
Australia innings
Electing to bat, Australia were off to a good start as openers Gilchrist and Hayden compiled a 100-run partnership within 17 overs.
In the 21st over, Gilchrist struck a scintillating century off just 72 balls - the fastest in a World Cup final. It was his 15th ODI century which included thirteen boundaries and eight sixes.
Skipper Mahela Jayawardene grabbed a catch at cover dismissing Hayden off Lasith Malinga's bowling. The batsman walked back for 38. Dilhara Fernando followed suit to uproot centurion Gilchrist after a splendid show with the bat. He hammered 149 off 104 before giving an easy catch to Chamara Silva at midwicket.
Ricky Ponting was run out in Andrew Symonds' attempt to take a run which was not there in the 36th over. The skipper hit 37 off 42 balls. Malinga struck back to remove Shane Watson in the next over for a paltry score.
After a rain-delayed toss, the World Cup final match between Sri Lanka and Australia was reduced by 12 overs due to heavy showers for over two hours.
The revised playing conditions meant that three bowlers would be permitted to bowl a maximum of eight overs each while two a maximum of seven.
Sri Lanka played in their second World Cup final following their win over Australia in 1996, 11 years ago.
Teams
Australia: Matthew Hayden, Adam Gilchrist (wicketkeeper), Ricky Ponting (captain), Michael Clarke, Andrew Symonds, Michael Hussey, Shane Watson, Brad Hogg, Nathan Bracken, Shaun Tait, Glenn McGrath.
Sri Lanka: Upul Tharanga, Sanath Jayasuriya, Kumar Sangakkara (wicketkeeper), Mahela Jaywardene (captain), Chamara Silva, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Russel Arnold, Chaminda Vaas, Lasith Malinga, Muttiah Muralitharan, Dilhara Fernando.

McGrath 5th in all time great bowlers

2007-04-29T05:02:00.000-07:00

Glenn McGrath, who retired from international cricket after Australia's cricket World Cup win against Sri Lanka on Saturday, finished his career in fifth place in the all-time LG-ICC Player Rankings for ODI bowlers.McGrath, who was named as Player of the Tournament after taking 26 wickets, is one of only five players to have ever reached 900 rating points, the mark of a true great.The New South Wales bowler reached his highest rating of 903 points during the seven-match ODI series against South Africa in March 2002.The only players ahead of him in the all-time list are fast bowlers Joel Garner of the West Indies, New Zealand's Richard Hadlee and South Africa's Shaun Pollock, along with Sri Lanka spin-wizard Muttiah Muralidaran.McGrath's haul of wickets in the tournament that ended with Australia's record-breaking third successive triumph in the event, is the biggest haul in a single Cricket World Cup.The 37-year-old paceman, who was a part of victorious teams in 1999, 2003, and the latest one in the Caribbean, as well as the 1996 tournament, where Australia lost in the final to Sri Lanka, finished with 71 wickets from 39 matches spread over the four events.He was well clear of his nearest rival Wasim Akram of Pakistan, who captured 55 wickets in 38 matches.In 250 ODIs, McGrath has taken 381 wickets at an average of just over 22 runs each.The 37 year-old also finishes his career in fifth spot in the all-time LG ICC Player Rankings for Test bowlers, achieving his highest rating of 914 rating points during the Ashes series against England in 2001. In the all-time list for Test bowlers, England's fast-medium genius Sydney Barnes, who played for England for 13 years from 1901, tops the table.Barnes only played 27 Tests during his career but in that time he captured 189 wickets at an average of 16.43 and achieved the highest rating of any bowler in history when he reached 932 points in February 1914.Barnes' predecessor in the England team George Lohmann is in second spot while Pakistan legend Imran Khan is in third position while Muralidaran lies fourth.In 124 Tests, McGrath took 563 wickets at 21.64, with only his former team-mate Shane Warne (708) and Muralidaran (674) ahead of him in the success stakes.

Gol Gappa

2007-04-28T04:46:00.000-07:00

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup All Purpose Flour1 cup Semolinapinch Milk(for making dough)½ tsp. Baking Soda2 tbsps. Clarified Butter Salt to tasteVegetable Oil for frying(for deep frying)pinch Gorbanzo Beans(boiled, according to need)½ cup tamarind(seedless, soaked in 1Â½ cup water)½ tsp. Black Salt½ tsp. Dry Ginger(powder)½ tsp. All spice powder1½ tsps. Red Chilies(powder)

DIRECTIONS:(FOR DOUGH)

With the maida, sooji, baking powder and salt make a dough by adding milk.
Roll small rotis and cut into small size circles using a cutter.
Deep fry all of them on low heat.
(FOR CHUTNEY)
Add all ingredients in tamarind soaked water and stir well.
(FOR SERVING)
serve Gol Gappa with chutney and chana.

Absolut truth? Ads say so

2007-04-28T04:23:00.000-07:00

On Planet Absolut, the Curse of the Billy Goat is lifted and the Chicago Cubs win the World Series ... well, at least play in the World Series.Not only that, but politicians are identified by the length of their noses and men get pregnant.In New York, images of fine art replace the ads that dominate the electronic billboards surrounding Times Square.Such are the intimations of a $33 million to $35 million advertising campaign soon to be unveiled by Swedish vodkamaker Absolut, the premium vodka that dominates the world market but is losing market share in the U.S."Our consumers are intelligent and we hope they have a gut reaction that sparks conversations and challenges them to think about their vision of an 'Absolut' world," said Tim Murphy, senior brand director of New York-based Absolut Spirits Co.The billboard ads should jar some discussions in Chicago between Cubs and White Sox fans over the meaning of a Billy Goat sitting in a stadium's empty stands.Cubs fans will be able to say the goat is seated in Wrigley Field awaiting the start of this fall's Series. Cubs haters, however, could just as easily propose that in an Absolut World the curse lives on because of the empty seats.The Goat part of the campaign will debut on a billboard across from Wrigley Field on July 1 and will be joined by hundreds of billboards around Chicago and suburbs -- "except the South Side.""That's Sox country," said Jeremy Miller, a spokesman for the ad agency TBWA/Chiat/Day/New York, which developed the campaign. (The ad agency apparently understands that you don't put a Cubs billboard south of Roosevelt Road.)'Seeing with fresh eyes'Rob Smiley, the agency's creative director, said the campaign is "not necessarily about perfection, but about making the world better by seeing it with fresh eyes."Most of the outdoor advertising is tailored to local markets. The Billy Goat billboard only appears in Chicago, for example.Absolut's global campaign kicks off May 15 with a television commercial depicting a "pillow fight" battle between protesters and police on a street in Uruguay. It is to be rolled out in 12 international markets, including Germany, where it will debut on Friday.In addition to New York and Chicago, localized versions of the Absolut campaign will appear in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami and Las Vegas.

Are you a night owl?

2007-04-28T04:22:00.000-07:00

Have you stayed awake for hours at night, struggling for some much-needed sleep? Well, anxiety or stress need not be blamed every time, for researchers have found a genetic mutation responsible for making you a 'night owl'. A genetic mutation called the "after-hours gene" may explain why some people are night owls, it is revealed in the journal Science on Friday. The 'night owl syndrome' makes it quite difficult to function in a world where the normal pattern dictates night as the time for sleep. But the latest discovery could also hold clues for pharmacologists working to develop drugs to help people adjust to shift work or jet lag, reports the Telegraph. There are further implications for the study of causes of some psychiatric disorders. The altered gene, named "after hours" or Afh, is a variant of a gene called Fbxl3, which had not been linked to the body clock that keeps our metabolism, digestion and sleep patterns in tune with the rising and setting of the Sun. By monitoring laboratory mice, scientists noticed that instead of following the typical 24-hour pattern some animals had body clocks that stretched to a 27-hour day. It was then discovered that their DNA had the after-hours version of the Fbxl3 gene, one of a large family that controls the breakdown of specific proteins within body cells. In other research, scientists have identified a part of the brain that affects how we deal with seasonal change. The research will help our understanding of the causes and consequences of seasonal affective disorder and could also shed light on why we crave more food in winter. Gerald Lincoln, of Edinburgh University's Centre for Reproductive Biology, said: "Surprisingly, the circannual body clock works on a 10-month cycle. "We reset our body calendar every summer, when increased light inhibits the production of melatonin. This could explain why sunshine makes us feel happier." Symptoms of delayed sleep phase syndrome (DSPS), popularly called the 'night owl' syndrome include the inability to fall asleep at night and excessive daytime sleepiness. If this problem continues over a three or four-month period, DSPS is probably the cause. This syndrome makes it difficult to function in a world where the normal pattern dictates night as the time for sleep. Because DSPS can cause employment, relationship and other difficulties, it can lead to unhappiness and depression.

$100 laptop to cost $175

2007-04-28T04:19:00.000-07:00

The founder of the ambitious $100 laptop project, which plans to give inexpensive computers to schoolchildren in developing countries, has revealed that the machine for now costs $175, and it will be able to run Windows in addition to its homegrown, open-source interface. Nicholas Negroponte, the former director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab who now heads the non-profit One Laptop Per Child project, updated analysts and journalists on where the effort stands, saying "we are perhaps at the most critical stage of OLPC's life." That's partly because at least seven nations have expressed interest in being in the initial wave to buy the little green-and-white "XO" computers — Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, Pakistan, Thailand, Nigeria and Libya — but it remains unclear which ones will be first to pony up the cash. The project needs orders for 3 million machines so its manufacturing and distribution effort can get rolling. The ever-optimistic Negroponte didn't sound worried, however: He expects mass production to begin by October, and he said many other countries, including Peru and Russia, have been inquiring about taking part. The XO machines will be made by Quanta Computer Inc, the world's leading manufacturer of portable computers. Quanta agreed to take a profit of about $3 per machine, less than what it gets from mainstream PC companies, Negroponte said. Even so, the machine — which boasts extremely low electricity consumption, a pulley for hand-generated power, built-in wireless networking and a screen with indoor and outdoor reading modes — now costs $175. The One Laptop project takes an additional $1 to fund its distribution efforts. Negroponte’s team has always stressed that $100 was a long-term target for the machines, but recently publicized figures had put it in the $150 range. Negroponte says the cost should drop about 25 percent per year as the project unfolds.

Indian mangoes land in US after 18 years

2007-04-28T04:14:00.000-07:00

The first batch of 150 boxes of choicest Alphonso and Kesari mangoes in 18 years arrived here from India to the delight of Indians who had been lusting for luscious fruit for years. "But they would have to wait for a few more days before they can buy them in the market as the fruit needs to be ripened before being released for sale," said Bhaskar Savani who is distributor and was personally present at the airport when the Air-India flight bringing the cargo landed late on Friday night. The formal launch of the mangoes will be done in Washington DC on May 1, he said. Mangoes from Mexico and other central American countries are available in the United States but Indians often complain that they do not taste like the ones India produces. Nor do the Americans have the number of varieties available back home. Savani said the distributors expect Langra, Chausa, Mallika and Dussheri to follow to give consumers a choice of varieties. The distributors are in negotiations with Costco chian, which sells merchandise in bulk, for distributing the mangoes and some fast food chains have shown interest in retailing mango shakes. The US had stopped import of mangoes from India 18 years ago as it felt Indian farmers were using too much pesticide. It has taken sustained negotiations over several years to get the fruit back into the US market. The US Department of Agriculture has imposed the condition that the mangoes would be irradiated to ensure that no exotic plant diseases are introduced in the country. However, irradiation also increases the shelf life of the fruit. The distributors say that they expect a huge and ever increasing demand for the Indian mangoes with the rising Indian population here and locals developing taste for Indian varieties. India is the largest producer of mangoes in the world, accounting for more than 50 per cent of the total output. It has some 1000 varieties.

smuggle people scam Rs 8,00,000 per person

2007-04-28T04:12:00.000-07:00

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Babubhai Katara, arrested for allegedly trying to smuggle people abroad, has told police that he was paid Rs 800,000 for every person he helped to go abroad illegally, with his aide and travel agents pocketing most of the money made in the deals. "I was given only Rs 800,000. I really don't know if they charged Rs 3 or 4 million for sending people abroad with me," Katara told officers interrogating him. He stated this when confronted with statements of his aide Rajender Gampa and some travel agents that they used to charge Rs 3 to 4 million from each person who flew abroad in the company of the MP on the latter's family's passports. Police say they have evidence that Katara and his associates were involved in flying out at least 12 people to the US and Britain. The Gujarat politician had personally taken six people with him. "They have fooled me," a police official quoted the MP as telling investigators during interrogation. "Though he was paid a handsome amount, it were the agents and others involved in the human trafficking racket who arranged for the passports and clients and so took a larger share of the booty," a senior police official told the media. "Our investigations show that these travel agents were in some kind of agreement with the MPs and paid them a fixed amount every time they smuggled out a client abroad. Katara was given Rs 800,000. The rest of the money was distributed among the MP's aides and agents," the officer added. Katara, who had reportedly earned around Rs 3.5 million through human trafficking, was apparently not aware that Sunder Lal Yadav, a travel agent, earned more than him simply by arranging the clients and documents. The investigating officer also revealed that travel agents identified people who could cough up Rs 3 million to travel abroad. The agents had a wide and well-organised network spread through the small towns and cities in Punjab to the big cities in Andhra Pradesh. The Crime Branch of Delhi Police, which is conducting the investigation, has identified five travel agents involved in the racket. Three are from Punjab (Joginder Singh, Santhu Masih and Harbhajan Singh), Hyderabad and New Delhi. The racket came into light April 18 when Katara was arrested at the airport here while trying to fly out a woman, Paramjeet Kaur, and a 15-year-old boy Amarjeet Singh on the passports of his wife and son.

Alcohol more harmful for women

2007-04-25T05:40:00.000-07:00

The brain-damaging effects of alcohol strike women more quickly than men, a new study conducted in Russia confirms. Female alcoholics performed worse on a number of tests of neurocognitive function compared with males, Barbara Flannery from RTI International in Baltimore and her colleagues found. However, Flannery cautioned that the findings aren’t good news for alcohol-dependent men. “Women are vulnerable to the extent to which they will experience the negative consequences of alcohol abuse and alcoholism more rapidly than men, but men will also experience it — the same kinds of effects,” she said. Other physiological effects of alcoholism, such as heart and liver damage, are known to occur more quickly in women than in men, a phenomenon known as “telescoping,” Flannery and her team note in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. To determine whether the same occurs in the brain, they had 78 alcoholic men and 24 alcoholic women, between the ages of 18 and 40, complete a series of brain function tests. Sixty-eight non-alcoholic men and women also took part in the study as a control group. The duration of alcohol use was significantly longer for men than women, at about 15 and 11 years, respectively, as was the duration of alcohol dependence, at 8 and 5 years. A greater percentage of men were college educated and employed full time. However, women reported binge drinking significantly more often than men, at 91% vs 72%. Before completing the tests, all of the alcoholics had been abstinent from alcohol for three to four weeks. Compared with the alcoholic men, the researchers found that alcoholic women performed worse on tests of visual working memory, cognitive flexibility, and spatial planning and problem solving

Flannery pointed out that women metabolise alcohol quite differently than men do. A woman will experience the alcohol effects faster than a man of the same weight. One reason is that men have more water in their bodies, which better dilutes alcohol’s effects. Women may also have less of an enzyme that converts alcohol into an inactive substance. “I think it’s important that women understand this,” Flannery said, and it’s also important to remember that alcoholism is underdiagnosed in men and women. More studies should be done in different populations, she added, to confirm the results

Happy wedding

2007-04-22T04:05:00.000-07:00

Newly-wed couple Abhishek and Aishwarya come out after offering prayers at the Tirupati temple near Chennai.

India's rupee hurts exporters

2007-04-22T04:04:00.000-07:00

India's rupee is showing new muscle as it scales nine-year highs against the dollar, alarming exporters who sell most of their goods to the United States. India's Federation of Indian Export Organisations says the appreciation of the rupee has "severely eroded the profitability of exporters." The partially convertible rupee has risen by around 11 percent against the dollar since last July, helped by inflows from investors eager to invest in India's booming economy. "Its appreciation reflects the underlying strength of the Indian economy and, of course, (broad-based) dollar weakness," said Deepak Lalwani, director at London-based Astaire Securities. But until lately, dealers say, the central bank had been intervening by selling rupees to make sure the Indian currency does not rise too quickly, and to keep a lid on export prices. Now though, market players say, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has eased off from intervention as it seeks to wrestle down inflation in Asia's fourth-largest economy, which is growing by around nine percent. "The bank has its eye firmly on (capping) inflation," said DK Joshi, principal economist at Indian credit rating agency Crisil.

'Drinking tea can prevent skin cancer'

2007-04-22T03:55:00.000-07:00

Drinking at least two cups of tea daily can protect you from developing skin cancer, says a new study, but scientists call for more research to strengthen the findings. Tea's disease-fighting properties appear to protect the body against Squamous cell carcinomas and Basal cell carcinomas - most common forms of skin cancers usually caused by too much exposure to the sun's rays - that grow slowly over a period of months or even years, the researchers say. Squamous cell carcinomas normally appear on the face and turn into an ulcer-like growth that doesn't heal. Basal cell carcinomas normally show up as a painless lump that gradually expands in size. Although they do not normally spread through the body, they still need be removed through surgery. In the latest study, carried out at Dartmouth Medical School in New Hampshire in the US, the scientists analysed over 1,400 patients aged between 25 and 74 years with one of the two types of tumour, reported the online edition of Daily Mail. They compared their diet, drinking habits and lifestyle with a similar group who did not have cancer. They found that regular tea drinkers were 65 percent less likely to have squamous cell carcinoma and almost 80 percent less at risk of a basal cell carcinoma. The biggest benefits were seen among long-term drinkers, especially those who downed several cups a day for more than 40 years. Judy Rees, who led the research, said: "The constituents of tea have been investigated for their activity against a variety of diseases and cancers. But the most potent appear to be polyphenols." These are antioxidants that block the damaging effects in the body of molecules known as free radicals. But she stressed more research was needed to confirm it is the tea and not some other lifestyle factor which is protecting against the illness.

LARA’s RUN ENDS

2007-04-22T03:52:00.000-07:00

Umpire Rudi Koertzen picks the bails up while West Indies captain Brian Lara walks off after being run out against England during the Super-Eight ICC World Cup cricket match at the Kensington Oval in Bridgetown, Barbados, on Saturday. Lara scored 18 runs in his final international cricket match.

Delhii Heights

2007-04-21T04:34:00.000-07:00

Abi [Jimmy Shergill] and Suhana [Neha Dhupia] are a newly-wed couple who live in a building complex called Delhii Heights. They work for rival companies. In the same society live Timmy [Om Puri], his wife Ruby [Kamini Khana] and their daughter Sweety. Abi’s friend Bobby [Rohit Roy] and his wife Saima [Simone Singh] also live in the same complex.
Then there is Lucky [Vivek Shauq], a cricket bookie, a hilarious character in itself. Also, there are four boys, residents of Delhii Heights, who keep running after girls and pulling each others' legs.
The material hasn’t been explored to the optimum. An exciting screenplay would’ve only taken the graph of the film upwards. Also, a number of scenes are unnecessary and seem forced in the narrative. The writing lacks vision.
Jimmy Shergill is a complete natural. Neha Dhupia evidently seems conscious of the camera at all times, and Rohit Roy manages to emote.
Music [Rabbi Shergill] is pleasant. ‘Tere Bin’ is the best track of the enterprise; its one number you carry home after the show has concluded. Cinematography is striking. Dialogues don’t leave much of an impact.
Overall, Delhii Heights, a movie which you won’t enjoy...