Rare Roman Empire Artifacts Found In Japanese Tomb

Glass jewelry thought to have been made in the Roman Empire has been found in a very unlikely place -- an ancient Japanese tomb.

Researchers from Japan's Nara National Research Institute for Cultural Properties announced Friday that three glass beads recovered from a Fifth Century burial site near Kyoto bear signs of Roman craftsmanship. This suggests that Roman influence reached as far as East Asia.

"They are one of the oldest multilayered glass products found in Japan, and very rare accessories that were believed to be made in the Roman Empire and sent to Japan," researcher Tomomi Tamura told AFP.

The gilt artifacts, which are 5 millimeters in diameter, contained traces of the chemical natron, which Roman craftsmen used to melt glass. A natural salt, natron was also used by the Ancient Egyptians in the preparation of mummies.

Researchers are now interested in finding out how the beads traveled more than 6,000 miles from present-day Italy to Japan.

This is not the first evidence of contact between Eastern and Western civilizations in the ancient world.

In 1954, an archeological dig at Helgo, Sweden unearthed a Sixth Century Buddha statue from northern India. In 2010, 2,000-year-old bones from a Roman cemetery in Italy were found to contain East Asian DNA.

During the reign of emperor Trajan in the early Second Century, the Roman Empire's territory spanned the Mediterranean and stretched from England to Iraq. By the time the artifacts were interred at the Utsukushi burial mound, Rome was in decline, losing much of its territory before ending in 476.

Japan in the Fifth Century is noted for its Kofun burial sites. While it is commonly considered to be part of Japan's Yamato period, Yamato rule at this time was challenged by competing provincial powers.

Race to build first supersonic commercial passenger airliner

Artist's impression of the new supersonic commercial passenger aircraft which will fly at speeds of 2,500 mph

AMERICAN aircraft builders will unveil plans at next month's Farnborough air show for supersonic jets that may be able to fly from London to Sydney in four hours.

Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Gulfstream are in a race to build a successor to Concorde, the first supersonic commercial passenger airliner. It will be aimed initially at the business jet market.



All three companies believe they are close to reduce the sonic boom to a sound described by a Gulfstream engineer last week as 'closer to a puff or plop'.
He said: 'The fact that the big boys are all close confirms industry rumours that a new generation of supersonic planes is now, finally, within reach.
Lighter composite materials, more advanced engines and smaller fuselages could enable new jets to travel about twice as fast as Concorde, which flew at up to 1358mph, according to the Sunday Times.
Passengers will travel at speeds of more than 2,485mph, allowing them to cruise in luxury from London to Sydney, just over 12,000 miles away.
Currently, the fastest subsonic executive jet, Gulfstream's new G650, can fly 7,000 miles at a  646mph and has a top speed of just 704mph.


But its successor , codenamed X-54, will 'prove that an aircraft can be shaped for low sonic boom', reports Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine.
It will be 'sketched out' at Farnborough along with other supersonic prototypes, say show executives.
Last January, NASA released images of a test plane in a wind tunnel which suggested the sonic boom could be virtually silenced using super-thin wings and hidden engines.
Robert Bass, a Texas hedge fund trader, has banked 50 $200,000 deposits for his company's Aerion SBJ supersonic jet after enlisting Nasa's help - even though no delivery dates have been set.
The 12-seat planes are expected to cost $80m each and are being marketed to European and Middle East buyers under the slogan, 'To the USA and back in a working day.'
The challenge is not just technical: builders have to prove to politicians that the supersonic jets will be acceptable to the public.
Concorde's loud boom forced it onto to routes away from land and damaged its commercial chances. It  flew for the last time in November 2003.

Sky-high and abyss-deep: China’s double record-breaker

Docking in progress, CCTV video still

China has reached two technological milestones spanning great depths and heights. In the earth’s orbit, the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft manually docked a space module while under the Pacific, a Jiaolong submersible dived to the bottom of the Marian Trench.
The symbolism behind the scheduling of the two historical events was far from coincidental. The three oceanographers manning the submersible during the 7,000 dive sent greetings to their three fellow “taikonauts” piloting the space capsule, wishing them luck in their mission.
The descent to a depth of 7,015 meters broke the Chinese national diving record. It was the fourth such dive in the mission, which started on June 15. The dive was conducted in heavy rain, according to a Xinhua report.
The space mission was also successful, with the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft undocking and again docking the Tiangong 1 module. For the first time, the procedure was performed manually rather than directed from the mission control center on the ground.
China became the third nation after Russia and the US to master the technology, which is crucial for the nation’s ambitious space program. The country wants to have a domestically-made manned space station operating by 2020.
The docking was the key part of the space mission. China launched the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft, which carried the country’s first female astronaut, last Saturday. The mission will now continue for four more days.

China seeks to develop a completely independent space exploration program. Beijing sees it as part of the country’s growing global influence, as China strives to become the world’s largest economy and take a more prominent political position on the terrestrial stage.

Shenzhou 9 crew members Jing Haipeng, Liu Wang and
Liu Yang.

The Chinese submersible "Jiaolong" 

UC Berkeley Served With 15 Million Lawsuit For Police Brutality On Students

On Wednesday, June 13, 2012 University of California, Berkeley served with 15 million dollar federal lawsuit on behalf of 30 plaintiffs for police brutality and "UCB's political witch hunt" as a result of November 9, 2011 Occupy protest on campus and later arrest.


The lawsuit asks for redress and damages calling the University's actions against the plaintiffs “..UCB’s political witch hunt against protesters.” 

The lawsuit names as defendants UC Berkeley Chancellor, Executive Vice Chancellor, Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs and many others.

Lead plaintiff and BAMN national organizer, Yvette Felarca, stated “We demand justice. Education is a right, and people fighting to defend it should not be met with brutality and a political witchhunt by UC-Berkeley or any other university administration,” She was the first person struck and the target of multiple baton blows in the YouTube video that went viral of November 9 police brutality.

Felarca went on to say “We want this to set the precedent for every university administration that they will not attack our right to protest for public education. Through the course of this lawsuit, we will use every means at our disposal, including legal and direct action, to expose UC-Berkeley’s policy of political suppression and win justice”.

The federal complaint was newly amended since it was originally filed with the U.S. District Court last November to add a demand of $7.5 million in compensatory damages for physical and emotional harm and denial of constitutional rights as well as $7.5 million in punitive damages.

After the police brutality on the students of Berkeley campus, hundreds of people emailed complaints to the administration regarding how it managed the situation.

 A Sampling Of Some Of The Letters Sent To The Chancellor's Office:

"The police response you authorized tumed the placement of seven tents on campus property into an occasion for brutality, injury and mass resentment. You ... should stand with the 99% by supporting the Occupy Cal encampment and calls on Wall Street corporations and the super-rich to pay their fair share refunding public education. By authorizing police violence, you are promoting the interests of the 1% including the many UC regents who sit on corporate boards. You have defaulted on your responsibilities to protect students and steward of this University in these difficult times."

Again, Apple gets all the attention

So, why does the world obsess about the newest MacBook Pro and not competing laptops from Hewlett-Packard or Dell?

Let's just say that Apple has an innate sense about good design.

And you can bet Microsoft has uttered this sentiment behind closed doors more than a few times -- thus, the Microsoft-designed Surface tablet announcement this week.

But let's focus on the Retina MacBook Pro for now. That's a design that any PC maker could have feasibly done.

Big 15-inch class laptops fall right into the wheel house of the PC guys. Dell did the XPS 15z. HP has the Envy 15. But neither of those are comparable to the 0.7-inch thick, quad-core Retina Pro.

Vizio seems to be thinking like Apple: they came out with an ultrathin 15-inch laptop around the same time that Apple introduced the Retina MBP. And Vizio's lineup is limited, like Apple's.

One of the few to get close is Vizio with its 4-pound 15.6-inch CT15, which offers resolutions up to 1,920 by 1,080.

And maybe that's the point. Vizio is not a traditional PC maker. It's best known for HDTVs. And it seems to be focused on a different kind of aesthetic than Dell or HP.

We'll see if Vizio can stick it out. Dell, to its credit, has had designs like the Adamo and Latitude z600 (see photo below), but never persevered.

Apple does, sticking with innovative designs like the MacBook Air (introduced way back in 2008) until it finds the design formula and market timing that works.

And it gets all the attention. The company certainly has my attention. The standard 15-inch MacBook Pro never appealed to me. Neither did PCs.

But now Apple has reinvented the 15-inch laptop, which builds on the Air but adds a display to kill for. (Yeah, Retina is a marketing thing but it's also very real. I willfully cave to Apple's hype in this case.)

So, are we going to see something comparable from the PC guys? Sony could do a 15-inch Vaio Z or Lenovo a ThinkPad X1 Carbon. But I'm not holding my breath that they'll set the world on fire.

Look, Mom, no optical drive. Dell did that way back in 2009. And could have persevered with the 0.55-inch thick 16-inch Latitude z600, perfecting the design -- but didn't.

Google slashes price 88% for using Google Maps API

Shortly after Apple dumped Google Maps for iOS, Google announces it's time to dramatically cut the price for others using the online service. Google also gives a plug for its map-based ad service.

Google has announced an 88 percent price cut for those using Google Maps on high-traffic Web sites and services.

The move, which Google Maps API product manager Thor Mitchell announced yesterday, comes a few days before the developer-oriented Google I/O show and two weeks after Apple ditched Google Maps for the upcoming iOS 6.

Google lets others embed Google Maps on their own sites and services through the Google Maps API, or application programming interface. When Google announced new limits to Google Maps usage last October, Mitchell said at the time, "We need to secure its long-term future by ensuring that even when used by the highest volume for-profit sites, the service remains viable."

But other factors entered into the viability equation. Apple is the highest-profile defection, but there have been others, too, as Web sites dumped Google Maps because of high prices and put their weight behind the OpenStreetMap project instead, Google evidently took note.

"We've been listening carefully to feedback, and today we're happy to announce that we're lowering API usage fees and simplifying limits," Mitchell said. "While the Maps API remains free for the vast majority of sites, some developers were worried about the potential costs. In response, we have lowered the online price from US $4 per 1,000 map loads to 50 cents per 1,000 map loads."

Yes, that's a factor of eight cheaper. Mitchell added:

We're beginning to monitor Maps API usage starting today, and, based on current usage, fees will only apply to the top 0.35 percent of sites regularly exceeding the published limits of 25,000 map loads every day for 90 consecutive days. We aren't automating the application of these limits, so if your site consistently uses more than the free maps allowance we'll contact you to discuss your options. Please rest assured that your map will not stop working due to a sudden surge in popularity.

Mitchell also pointed to another service that may have changed Google's thinking: map-based ads that turn its mapping service into a money maker.

"You can generate revenue from your Maps API application using AdSense for Maps, which enables you to display relevant ads on or alongside your map. As with AdSense's text-based ads, the publisher gets some of the resulting ad revenue -- and Google keeps the rest.

Source: cnet

HTC stops sales, operations in Brazil

The company plans to lay off workers at its South American operations and discontinue the wholesale of devices, according to a report.

HTC is pulling out of Brazil after failing to capitalize on the growing market, blog AndroidPIT reported today.

According to the blog, the company is shutting down operations in Brazil, laying off dozens of workers, and stopping the wholesale of its devices. HTC has promised to continue its customer support in the market, AndroidPIT said.

The company did not immediately respond, but an HTC representative told AndroidPIT that the company made the decision after "analyzing the sales numbers."

HTC hasn't been doing well in the U.S. or European markets. U.S. sales hit a wall with Apple's successful bid to see HTC phones held up at the border after a patent infringement claim.

Brazil may mark another failed opportunity. Some analysts think Brazil will become the world's fourth most important market for smartphone sales by 2016, eclipsing the U.K. market, The Verge pointed out. Unfortunately for HTC, the company's phones have not faired well in Brazil. HTC had a total market share of 0.11 percent in the first quarter of the year, leaving it behind Nokia, Samsung, Apple, Sony, LG, Motorola, RIM, and ZTE.

SOurce: cnet

Palm Breeze Villa Boracay -Philippines

Hotel Description

THE NO.1 B&B/Inn IN BORACAY ON TRIPADVISOR.COM!!
A beach front luxury boutique hotel. Privacy, attention to detail and friendly personal service.

Perfectly positioned on Boracay's Bulabog Beach, Palm Breeze Villa Boracay is a luxurious beach front resort offering magnificent sea and beach views. The 5-room boutique resort has spacious rooms with modern amenities combined with tropical design. All rooms have flat screen LCD TV's, quiet split-system air conditioning, ensuite bathrooms, refrigerators and in-room safes.
Unlimited free Wi-fi throughout the r esort so you can even check your emails while relaxing by the pool or in the pavilion.

IMPORTANT BOOKING INFORMATION: When you book, you will be sent a Paypal bill to safely pay online using your Paypal bill or any major credit card. Payment to be made in full within a week of booking unless other arrangements are made directly with the hotel.

Average hotel rating 4/6

based on 4 reviews 75% recommend this hotel 75% would stay again

For Booking follow the LINK

RIM considers splitting business in two: paper

BlackBerry maker Research in Motion is considering splitting its business in two, separating its struggling handset manufacturing division from its messaging network, The Sunday Times reported.

RIM, which last month said it had hired JP Morgan and RBC Capital to look at its strategic options, could break off its handset division into a separate listed company or sell it, the British newspaper reported without citing sources.

Potential buyers would include Amazon and Facebook, it reported, adding that RIM's messaging network could also be sold, or opened up to rivals such as Apple and Google to generate income.
An alternative option would be to keep the company together but sell a stake to a larger technology firm such as Microsoft, the newspaper said. (Reuters)

China's space station dream one step closer

China has made history by manually docking a spacecraft in orbit, joining the US and Russia in accomplishing the feat. 

The Shenzhou 9 spacecraft completed its first ever manual docking of a manned spacecraft and an orbiting lab module on Saturday.

This means China is one step closer to its dream of building a space station.

Broadcast live on state television, the space craft undocked for two minutes, traveling 400 metres away from the Tiangong (Heavenly Palace) 1 module.

Its three-person crew, including the country's first woman in Space Liu Yang, then re-connected the two space craft under the manual control of the astronauts.

Rendezvous and docking exercises between the two vessels are an important hurdle in China's efforts to acquire the technological and logistical skills to run a full space lab that can house astronauts for long periods.

The Shenzhou 9 has already conducted an automated docking with Tiangong 1, on June 18, a day after it blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China.
Compared with automated docking, manual docking is more challenging in terms of orbit control, said Xie Jianfeng, a space scientist with the Beijing Aerospace Control Center.
The docking mission is the latest show of China's growing prowess in space and comes while budget restraints and shifting priorities have held back U.S. manned space launches.

 

iTunes syncing comes to Samsung Galaxy phones

Samsung is offering owners of its Galaxy mobile phone range a free app so they can sync their iTunes with the devices. 

The Easy Phone Sync app will be offered to anyone who buys a Galaxy handset – as an incentive to those tied to their Apple iPhones.

The app allows users to transfer iTunes music, photos, videos, podcasts and text messages from an iPhone to an Android handset. However, the app is only available on Samsung handsets.

A spokesman for Samsung UK said: “We know that traditionally iPhone users have been reluctant to switch to an Android device because they couldn't use iTunes to manage their content.

"Easy Phone Sync means people can now enjoy their iTunes content on a Samsung Galaxy phone."

Samsung is heavily pushing its latest model, the Galaxy S3 ahead of the iPhone 5 expected to be released in October of this year.

Before the device went on sale on May 29, it had become the fastest-selling pre-order phone of the year, according to Carphone Warehouse.

Graham Stapleton, Chief Commercial Officer at Carphone Warehouse, said at the time: "Pre-order demand for the new Galaxy S3 has surpassed expectations since the handset was first unveiled two weeks ago. The first 24 hours alone saw thousands placing their pre-order at Carphone Warehouse."

 

Streisand working on first directing project since '96

Singer and actress Barbra Streisand is hoping to get back behind the camera and direct her first movie in 16 years, but has yet to raise all the money for it.
Streisand's spokesman on Thursday confirmed reports that the "Funny Girl" actress wants to direct "Skinny and Cat," a love story about late writer Erskine Caldwell and his late wife, American photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White.
It would be Streisand's first directing project since "The Mirror Has Two Faces" in 1996, and Oscar-winning stars Colin Firth and Cate Blanchett are reportedly attached to play the leads.
Her spokesman said however that the project has not been given the go-ahead yet because of financing issues.
Streisand, 70, who made her directing debut in 1983 with "Yentl," told the Los Angeles Times last week it was proving hard to raise the $20 million financing for the film, which has a script written by Linda Yellen.
The actress is also working on a movie adaptation of the stage musical "Gypsy" in which she would star. Hollywood studio Universal Pictures said in March that "Downton Abbey" creator Julian Fellowes would adapt the Stephen Sondheim and Arthur Laurents musical for the screen, but did not announce a director or a start date for filming.

Guadalajara on a plate

Guadalajara, Mexico’s second largest city, has all the advantages of the country’s capital, Mexico City -- awe-inspiring museums, cutting-edge restaurants, culture, history and well-priced shopping – without the capital’s traffic jams and dense population. In addition, Guadalajara has good public transport, shady tree-lined avenues, competitive prices for accommodation and food, and a long list of attractions to happily occupy any visitor. But to get a genuine feel of the place and its people, focus on Guadalajara’s food and drinks.

A tour should start at the huge food court in the city’s daily market, the Mercado San Juan de Dios (the corner of Avenida Javier Mina and Calzada Independencia). To help choose among the many food sellers, watch where the locals are and grab a stool at those stands. You can feast for days on torta ahogada (a “drowned sandwich” stuffed with fried pork, covered in a spicy tomato and chilli sauce and served with avocado, onions and radishes), birria (slow cooked joint of lamb or goat chopped and served in a tomato based broth with tortillas and salsa), pozole (a stew of either pork or chicken with  corn and assorted vegetables), fish ceviche (made from whatever is fresh that day, marinated in lime juice and served with tostadas (fried tortillas) and crackers, and the Mexican breakfast of eggs, frijoles (home cooked beans), queso (white, crumbling, slightly salty cheese) and tortillas. For those on a tight budget, look out for the filling comida corrida (meal of the day), usually a soup and main course including tortillas, rice, salad and a drink, which is served from about noon onwards.

For cheap street food, it is hard to beat tacos, which are served everywhere. They are usually made with warm, soft tortillas filled with beef, pork, chicken or fish (stands usually specialize in one), with various toppings and salsas. As the sun sets, even more street food appears, including desserts such as churros (deep fried dough covered in sugar) and fruit-filled empanadas (a small enclosed pastry). These genuine Mexican fast food stands stay open until the late hours. 

Available throughout the city are a range of traditional drinks worth sampling. Agua de jamaica is extracted from the hibiscus flower and tastes a little like cranberry juice. The creamier horchata is a sweet blend of rice, sugar, water and cinnamon, and agua de tamarindo, extracted from the tamarind nut, has a sweet but slightly zingy taste. There is also a wide range of fresh juices such as orange, papaya, beetroot and carrot. The ice that is added to many of the drinks is reliably made with filtered water.  

The Mercado San Juan de Dios also sells an array of fresh fruit at very low prices. Often the vendors have samples on offer of sweet and juicy mangos, grapefruit, pineapples and coconuts. Get the food to go and have a picnic in one of the city’s many parks.

Guadalajara, like an increasing number of Mexican towns and cities, also has a farmer’s market. It runs on Fridays and Saturdays in the plaza outside the Templo Expiatorio church (Avenida Diaz de Leon). Old and young Mexicans bring enthusiasm for their food and produce, including the famous mole tamales from the Mexican state of Oaxaca. Tamales are made from ground-up corn, cooked in wrapped husks and filled with meat, vegetables or simply a sauce such as mole (made with a mix of chocolate and chillies). You can also fill up on fresh fennel juice, locally produced honey, Chiapas coffee, Oaxaca chocolate and organic produce. On the same plaza, the indigenous Huichol people sell bags, embroidered clothes and their distinctive jewellery made from minute colourful beads.

The city’s cool cafes and bars are great for freshly made coffee, margaritas, beer, glasses of Mexican red wine and tragos (shots) of tequila. Some are located in refurbished colonial houses and art galleries with inventive décor and they are a great place to watch the artier side of city life. There are a number of excellent spots not far from the city’s main drag, Avenue Chapultepec. La Teteria (Calle Libertad between Calles Robles Gil and Venezuela; 52-1-33-3632-6779) specializes in teas, has outdoor seating and has a great photo gallery at the back. Boccadirosa (Calle Pedro Moreno at the corner of Calle Gregorio Davila; no phone) is an Italian wine/tapas bar with photos, art and sculpture on the walls and free music most weeknights. La Cafeteria serves dinner and drinks in an old house with a wonderful outdoor patio under old, over-hanging trees. Darjeeling Tea Rooms (Calle Morelos between Calles Colonias and Progreso; 52-1-33-301512) is set in a modestly refurbished old house with art on display, located off a tree-filled courtyard. And Chai is a chain of tea and coffee shops with a few locations in the city. The branch on Avenida Vallarta at Chapultepec is housed in an all-white, sofa-filled former colonial house. Most cafes use Mexican coffee from Chiapas or Veracruz and also sell the beans, which vary by strength and are often organic.

The state of Jalisco is the only place in the world that can legally produce the world famous tequila, and the town of Tequila is an easy day trip from Guadalajara, Jalisco’s capital. The main distilleries in Tequila are Jose Cuervo  and Casa Herradura. Both offer tours, tastings and the chance to smell the sweet nectar of the blue agave plants -- the source of tequila -- as they are slowly cooked in huge ovens. Whether travel to Tequila is by local bus or the “tequila train” there is still a stunning view of miles of agave in various stages of harvest.

Tipple on any number of Mexican beers -- Pacifico, Tecate, Bohemia (dark or light), Indio or Corona -- but while in Guadalajara try its locally-brewed beer, Minerva, which produces a pale ale and a stout in addition to the more common lagers. Mexican wine is not widely known but there are a range of reds and whites, mainly grown in the north of Baja California. Its red wine, in particular, can stand up to any good equivalent from Chile or Argentina, and most of the big supermarkets (Soriana, Chedraui, Mega) carry a range. Drinking outdoors is allowed if you want to bring a bottle on your picnic.

Tlaquepaque, a prosperous, arty suburb, 30 minutes away by bus from Guadalajara sells pottery, silver, paintings and furniture on its cobbled streets. There are numerous restaurants to choose among, from high end Mexican cuisine to simple home-cooked tortas. The block-long El Parian (52-1-33-3858-0464), located just off the main plaza, professes to be the world’s biggest cantina, with one big courtyard and more than 10 bars all competing for business with nightly live mariachi music.

About 20 minutes down the road from Tlaquepaque, another suburb, Tonala, is an up and coming artistic neighbourhood known mainly for ceramics. The popular Sunday market takes over most of the town’s main streets and browsing is recommended with a refreshing michelada (beer with ice and a mix of hot sauce, lime, clam and tomato juice) in hand. Salud!

Visit One of the Most Beautiful Islands of Asia-Boracay Island Philippines

 

Boracay is a beautiful island of the Philippines located approximately 315 km (200 miles) south of Manila and 2 km off the northwest tip of Panay Island in the Western Visayas region of the Philippines.

Boracay beautiful beaches - the famous white beaches of the island of Boracay regularly appear in those, "Best beaches of the World" lists. Although unchecked tourist development did have the authorities declare the beaches contaminated and unsafe, the beaches have since been found to be at acceptable levels of pollution and look pristine (You can look, but don't touch).

Boracay is a beautiful island,accessible for all types of bugets.Here u can find a numerous hotels,luxury villas and budget accommodation.

 

Leisure activities

Leisure activities available on or near Boracay include scuba diving, snorkeling, windsurfing, kiteboarding, cliff diving, and beach relaxation.

Boracay is the site of a 18-hole par 72 golf course designed by Graham Marsh.In addition, as of 2010, Boracay has in excess of 350 beach resorts offering more than 2,000 rooms ranging in quality from five-star to budget accommodation.In addition, Boracay offers a wide range of restaurants, bars, pubs, and nightclubs.

Events

Boracay is one competitive venue for the Asian Windsurfing Tour, with the week-long Boracay International Funboard Cup competition usually held in January on Bulabog Beach. In 2010, the event dates are January 25 – 31.^[CNNGo, a division of CNN focused on travel/lifestyle/entertainment, selected the Boracay International Funboard Competition on the weekend of January 22–24 as one of its 52 weekend recommendations for 2010.
The well-known Ati-Atihan Festival takes place each January in Kalibo on nearby Panay island. A much smaller Ati-Atihan festival is celebrated on Boracay, usually in the second or third week of January.
Dragon boat races are held annually on Boracay under the auspices of the Philippine Dragon Boat Federation, with teams coming from around the Philippines and from other Asian nations to compete. The races usually take place sometime in April or May. The 2012 Boracay Edition of the PDBF International Club Crew Challenge to is scheduled for April 26–28, 2012.
The Boracay Open Asian Beach Ultimate Tournament, an ultimate frisbee event, has been held annually since 2003, usually during summer.

Transportation

Boracay island is separated from Panay island by a narrow strait. The island is located opposite the barangay of Caticlan in the municipality of Malay, Aklan. Transportation across the strait is provided by boats operating from the Caticlan jetty port
 

Enjoy some beautiful pictures from Boracay Island:

Karissa Jackson ’14 to spend year in Russia as Boren Scholar

When Karissa Jackson ’14 was a high school student in Fort Knox, Ky., she checked a box on her ROTC scholarship application that offered a chance to get more funding for college. The catch? She would have to study a “critical language.” The language turned out to be Russian, and although she is no longer in ROTC, her passion for Russian is unabated.

In May, she learned that she will spend a year in Moscow as Centre’s first Boren Scholar, studying the language she so loves.

Boren awards support undergraduate study abroad in areas deemed critical to U.S. national security. Jackson was one of just 161 Boren Scholars named from a pool of 1,014 applications. The award is named for David L. Boren, who as a U.S. senator was the principal author of the legislation that created the National Security Education Program, a federal initiative to develop foreign language and international skills in support of U.S. national security.

What appeals to Jackson about Russian? Partly it’s the language’s complexity and difficulty, she says.

“It doesn’t feel like work when I’m studying Russian,” says Jackson. “It’s like a giant game with a lot of parts. If you get one sentence right it feels like, ‘Aha, I got it!’”

The Boren award will enable her to take classes at Moscow Humanities University. She will also study human rights issues among Moscow’s growing migrant worker population through an internship with the International Office of Migration, an intergovernmental organization.

“Russia does not have the best record in human rights,” she notes. “And women migrants are more susceptible to human rights violations. I’m going to try to give them a voice.”

The daughter of an Army family, Jackson credits her frequent moves growing up with helping to ease any apprehension she might otherwise feel about spending a year more than 5,000 miles from home. Her military background also helped shape her long-held career goal in national security.

It’s a goal that was nearly derailed, however, when she was diagnosed with narcolepsy last year. The treatment meant she lost both her ROTC scholarship and her dreams of becoming an Air Force foreign area officer.

“It was a very dark time in my life,” she admits. “I was losing all of my money for college. All of my dreams and all of my career aspirations were down the drain. I knew without a doubt that I wanted to be a foreign area officer in the Air Force, and then that all disappeared.”

Because she had had to commute to the University of Kentucky for her ROTC classes, it had not been much of a burden to also pick up the Russian language classes she needed. (Centre’s limited Russian offerings had stopped by the time she enrolled.) After she lost her ROTC scholarship—the whole reason she was studying Russian—she decided to continue anyway.

Late in the spring she learned that those Russian classes had been worth it when she was named a Boren Scholar. “I realized that there are other ways to serve the country than in the military,” she says. Her new goal is to be a foreign service officer.

It might seem odd to choose a college that does not offer a language essential to your scholarship, but not to Jackson. She’d wanted to attend Centre since visiting the campus as a high school junior. A summer as a Governor’s Scholar at Centre clinched it. She is now especially grateful for her college choice.

“The whole reason I found out about [the narcolepsy] was because my professors reported it,” she says. “They knew it wasn’t because I didn’t care that I was falling asleep in class. I just can’t imagine a big state school paying that much attention to someone sleeping in class. It’s just one of those Centre things.”

Jackson’s year in Russia will not be her first experience in the country. Last summer she spent three weeks in Kazan, the capital city of Tatarstan, in Western Russia, as part of a program at Arizona State’s Critical Language Institute. This summer she returns for another two months in Kazan before moving Moscow.

“It was the best,” she says of her experience last summer. “Everything was an adventure. When you’re living in another country, the way you can apply your language skills is just incomparable. You can’t do it in a classroom. And it was so much fun.”

Original source here.

Mary Edwards, 100, Still a School Governor on Anglesey after 75 years

A 100-year-old former county council mayor is believed to be the longest-serving school governor in the UK.

Mary Augusta Edwards, from Bethel, Anglesey, is also thought to be the UK's oldest community councillor.

Mrs Edwards, who ran her late husband's GP surgery, has served at Bodorgan School for 75 years and was awarded the MBE back in 1974.

Headteacher Robin Griffiths said: "I wouldn't be without her - she would make a good prime minister." Mrs Edwards' contribution to public life on the island began in 1936 when she became a school governor.

She became a widow at age 31 but was able to keep her husband's surgery open until 1948 by using locum doctors. She herself was a nurse.

In that year she was elected to represent Bodorgan on former Aethwy District Council and was twice chairman before it disappeared under reorganisation in 1974, the year she was awarded the MBE.

Her public service continued with her becoming an Anglesey county councillor until 1996, serving as mayor in 1976-77. The great-grandmother of seven said she decided to enter public life to show her appreciation for the kindnesses shown to her.

She said: "I thought it was time to put something back and to help people have amenities which I had not had in those early days, including electricity and sewerage." Throughout all this time, she continued as a governor at the local school where one of her three children attended.

Mr Griffiths said he was the sixth headteacher Mrs Edwards has worked with at the school, which currently has 34 pupils aged from four to 11.

Original source here.

Marine Biologist to Appear on ‘Virginia Farming’

Professor of biology and Sweet Briar’s resident “shark man” John Morrissey will appear on “Virginia Farming” at 7:30 p.m. Friday, June 22 on the public television station WVPT. “Virginia Farming” is a weekly news series for and about the agricultural industry and is produced at WVPT’s studio in Harrisonburg.

The show will be rebroadcast on WVPT at noon June 23 and 11 a.m. June 24. “Virginia Farming” also airs at 11:30 a.m. Saturdays on Blue Ridge PBS stations and at other times on Richmond’s WCVE stations and West Virginia Public Broadcasting. Viewing times are available on the stations’ websites.

Morrissey, a marine biologist, will be discussing the plight of cownose rays with the show’s host, Amy Roscher. Wondering what Morrissey and cownose rays — a species often seen swimming tranquilly around “touch tanks” at public aquariums — have to do with Virginia farmers? The short answer is, some people want to begin harvesting the rays for their meat.

Every summer the rays migrate in huge numbers into the Chesapeake Bay, where they are thought to compete for commercially valuable shellfish such as oysters and clams. Establishing a fishery for the rays to control their numbers is one proposed solution to this perceived threat to the watermen’s livelihood. But Morrissey believes such a fishery could put the cownose rays in far more danger than they pose to the fishes they prey on.

He will discuss why he thinks so, and talk about the research he and current and former Sweet Briar students are conducting in an effort to change the minds of those who want to see cownose rays on dinner plates across Virginia.

Original source here.

Paige Triola ’14 Explores Environmental Conservation in the Costa Rican Rainforest

“It’s really humid, it’s extremely green, and it just looks like every square inch is taken up by some sort of living thing,” she says. “It was also very noisy. The birds were squawking their heads off.”

Triola spent the spring semester in Costa Rica, studying at the School for Field Studies (SFS) in a town called Atenas, which is about an hour west of San Jose. The program is called the Sustainable Development Studies Semester, and it involves examining the effects of globalization on agriculture, biodiversity protection, economic development, population growth, and other issues. The program focuses specifically on Costa Rica, whose recent social and economic changes have challenged the country to protect its diverse ecosystems while keeping pace with competitive global markets.


“You’re in the rainforest, or on top of a volcano,” she says, noting that her surroundings continually amazed her. “This is the kind of thing I see on National Geographic, not in real life!”A biology major, Triola took courses in natural resource management, tropical ecology, Spanish language and culture, and economics. She learned a lot about ecosystems and how they function, but she says it was not the typical classroom experience.

For each course, Triola had to partner with another student to conduct a field experiment, which involved collecting data from wildlife and creating reports. She recalls sitting on a stump in the Monteverde Cloud Forest and picking berries off a witheringia bush, then counting the seeds inside each and every berry. “That was crazy,” she says.

She also recalls viewing a wild hummingbird up close after her professor caught it in a “mist net,” chasing after poison dart frogs, and jumping out of her skin when “some kind of rainforest turkey” unexpectedly ran across her path. Through all of it, Triola says she was ravenous to learn more about the rich wildlife surrounding her.


When she wasn’t in the classroom or the rainforest (though the two often coincided), Triola and the other students traveled frequently. The group spent seven days on an island in Nicaragua called Ometepe, then went to Granada. The students visited a banana plantation, coffee farms, and volcanoes, usually focusing on seeing organic sites versus commercial ones.“I probably annoyed my professors a lot, because I was the kid asking questions every two seconds, and I kept touching everything in the forest,” she says.

Back at the SFS center, the group often took the 50-minute walk into town, where the students would go to relax and grab gelato, and where they also volunteered. Triola pitched in with the town’s recycling program, helped teach kids English, and did chores at a turtle shelter.


“Going to Costa Rica and seeing all their conservation efforts, I think that inspired which direction my career will go. I’m starting to look into conservation. I’m excited about it,” she says. “I might even want to get a job where I travel a lot outside the country.”In all, she feels the experience has given her a career focus she didn’t have before.

Back on campus, Triola will serve as an SFS representative, sharing her experience with other students and convincing them that getting out of their comfort zones is totally worth it. “It was scary,” she says, “but I’m so glad I did it.”

Original source here.

Best Delegate Ranks CMC Model UN Team 7th on List of World Division Top 25 Teams

Educational company Best Delegate has ranked which college Model UN teams are the best on the circuit, and CMC is on that list––ranked 7th on the list of World Division Top 25 teams for 2011-12.

“This marks a great finish to the end of a very successful year for our program,” said CMC World Model UN President Ajay Sridhar, who graduated from the College last Saturday.

Claremont McKenna’s rise shows that with dedicated training and balanced scheduling, a small liberal arts college can rise to national prominence in a circuit populated by much bigger universities, notes Best Delegate.

Sridhar says CMC finished its season as the top ranked liberal arts Model UN program, as well as the top ranked program on the West Coast––ahead of UC Berkeley (#13), UCLA (#21), and Stanford (#22). “For this, we are very proud,” Sridhar says.

Original source here.

Fastest gigapixel camera prototype built

Added by Saimah Hanif
Technology Correspondent, SAM Daily Times

Engineers in the United States have built a prototype gigapixel camera the size of a bedside cabinet that can capture an image in a single snapshot with 1,000 times more detail than today's devices.


It is not the world's first gigapixel camera, but it is the smallest and fastest and opens up prospects for improving airport security, military surveillance and even online sports coverage, its developers say.

A pixel is a small light point in a digital image, concentrations of which together form a picture.

Today's cameras capture images measured in megapixels -- a million pixels -- normally between eight and 40 for an average consumer device. A thousand megapixels make a gigapixel, which is thus comprised of a billion pixels.

Most of today's gigapixel images are made by digitally merging several megapixel pictures.

"Our camera records a one gigapixel image in less than a 10th of a second."

Gigapixel imaging captures details that are invisible to the human eye and can later be examined by zooming in without losing clarity.The optical system consists of a six-centimeter ball-shaped lens surrounded by an array of 98 micro-cameras each with a 14-megapixel sensor.

"The electronic system shrinks by a factor of four in the next generation."

In use today are highly specialized gigapixel astronomical telescopes and airborne surveillance systems, which are comparatively large and have a narrow field of view, said Brady of Duke University in North Carolina. There are also some film-based gigapixel cameras.

"Our technology is most interesting as the first demonstration of high pixel count and wide field of view imaging at finite focal ranges," said Brady.

The cost of such a camera today would be similar to that of a high-resolution digital movie camera, he said -- about $100,000 to $250,000 (80,000 to 200,000 euros).

But as the electronics improve, the price should become affordable for professional and serious amateur photographers within about five years, followed soon thereafter by hand-held gigapixel cameras entering into widespread use.

Brady said the technology could be used, for example, to stream sporting events over the Internet - enabling viewers to zoom in and watch the game from whatever perspective and resolution they choose.

Lover Reborn (Black Dagger Brotherhood, #10) by J.R. Ward

#1 New York Times bestselling author J. R. Ward’s “different, creative, dark, violent, and flat-out amazing”* Black Dagger Brotherhood continues as a vampire warrior crosses the line between life and death…into a world of dark dreams and darker desires.

Ever since the death of his shellan, Tohrment is a heartbroken shadow of the vampire leader he once was. Brought back to the Brotherhood by a self-serving fallen angel, he fights again with ruthless vengeance- and is unprepared for a new tragedy. Seeing his beloved in dreams—trapped in a cold, desolate netherworld—he turns to the angel to save his former mate, only to despair at the path he himself must take to set her free. As war with the lessers rages, and a new clan of vampires vies for the Blind King’s throne, Tohr struggles between an unforgettable past, and a future that he doesn’t know he can live with… but can’t seem to turn away from.

Stonehenge was built to unify Britain, researchers conclude

Building Stonehenge was a way to unify the people of Stone Age Britain, researchers have concluded.

Teams working on the Stonehenge Riverside Project believe the circle was built after a long period of conflict between east and west Britain.


"When Stonehenge was built, there was a growing island-wide culture--the same styles of houses, pottery and other material forms were used from Orkney to the south coast. This was very different to the regionalism of previous centuries," Dr. Mike Parker Pearson, project leader and archaeology professor at the University of Sheffield, said in a written statement. "Stonehenge itself was a massive undertaking, requiring the labor of thousands to move stones from as far away as west Wales, shaping them and erecting them. Just the work itself, requiring everyone literally to pull together, would have been an act of unification.”

Is Pearson right? One thing's for sure: this isn't the first explanation for the strange circle of giant stones just north of Salisbury, England.

One theory holds that the monument was erected as an acoustic environment, designed in order to support certain sound illusions. Another holds that it was a place of healing, and other studies have questioned whether the monument was an ancient observatory or a place of sacrifice?

But the Stonehenge Riverside Project research team rejected these and other previous theories. As support for their "unification" theory, the researchers point to the social and economic climate in Britain between 3,000 B.C. and 2,500 B.C.--the period during which Stonehenge was erected. Plus, the monument is situated on a series of natural landforms, with the stones arranged so the land draws a line between the directions of the summer solstice sunrise and midwinter sunset. This alignment was meaningful to communities at that time, the researchers said.

"When we stumbled across this extraordinary natural arrangement of the sun’s path being marked in the land, we realized that prehistoric people selected this place to build Stonehenge because of its pre-ordained significance,” Pearson said in the statement. “Perhaps they saw this place as the center of the world."

Many people traveled to Stonehenge this month in celebration of the summer solstice.


"At Stonehenge itself, the principal axis appears to be in the opposite direction to midsummer sunrise, towards midsummer sunset, framed by the monument’s largest stone setting, the great trilithon," Pearson said.

This new research has been published in Pearson’s book "Stonehenge: Exploring the Greatest Stone Age Mystery."

Pathfinder (2007)

Pathfinder is a 2007 epic action film directed by Marcus Nispel, distributed by 20th Century Fox, and stars Karl Urban, Clancy Brown, Ralf Möller, Moon Bloodgood, Russell Means, Jay Tavare, and Nathaniel Arcand. It is a loose remake of an Oscar-nominated 1987 Norwegian movie of the same name although the geographic setting and peoples involved are very different.
Pathfinder takes place in "Vinland" (the Eastern Seaboard of Pre-Columbian North America) and the story involves a fictional conflict between the Native Americans and Viking marauders from across the Atlantic Ocean, who have come to the Americas in search of colonization. The time period it is set in is around two centuries before the first known Continental European contact with the New World, which academics generally agree occurred with Leif Ericson around 1000 AD.
Pathfinder received a widely negative critical reception upon release and was not successful at the box office, although the film did enjoy much better home video sales whereby the studio recouped its costs and the film gained a small cult following. It was also adapted into a graphic novel by Dark Horse Comics.

Roman jewellery found in ancient Japan tomb

Glass jewellery believed to have been made by Roman craftsmen has been found in an ancient tomb in Japan, researchers said Friday, in a sign the empire's influence may have reached the edge of Asia.

Tests have revealed three glass beads discovered in the Fifth Century "Utsukushi" burial mound in Nagaoka, near Kyoto, were probably made some time between the first and the fourth century, the Nara National Research Institute for Cultural Properties said.
The government-backed institute has recently finished analysing components of the glass beads, measuring five millimetres (0.2 inches) in diametre, with tiny fragments of gilt attached.
It found that the light yellow beads were made with natron, a chemical used to melt glass by craftsmen in the empire, which succeeded the Roman Republic in 27 BC and was ultimately ended by the Fall of Constantinople in 1453.
The beads, which have a hole through the middle, were made with a multilayering technique -- a relatively sophisticated method in which craftsmen piled up layers of glass, often sandwiching gold leaf in between.
"They are one of the oldest multilayered glass products found in Japan, and very rare accessories that were believed to be made in the Roman Empire and sent to Japan," said Tomomi Tamura, a researcher at the institute.
The Roman Empire was concentrated around the Mediterranean Sea and stretched northwards to occupy present-day England. The finding in Japan, some 10,000 kilometres (6,000 miles) from Italy, may shed some light on how far east its influence reached, Tamura said.
"It will also lead to further studies on how they could have got all the way to Japan," she said.

Highly endangered Sumatran rhino in rare captivity birth

A Sumatran rhinoceros, one of the world's most endangered species, was born in an Indonesian National Park on Saturday in what is only the fifth known birth in captivity for the species in over 100 years.


The mother, Ratu, delivered the male calf after a nearly 16-month pregnancy at Way Kambas National Park in Lampung province, said Novianto Bambang, director of biodiversity conservation at the Forestry Ministry.

“This is a historic birth because Sumatran rhinos are on the brink of extinction,” Bambang said. He said both mother and calf are doing well.

The U.S.-based International Rhino Foundation called the first birth of a Sumatran rhino at an Indonesian facility “monumental” and said it was one of the most significant advances in conservation efforts for the species.

There are an estimated 200 Sumatran rhinos living in the wild in small groups in Indonesia and Malaysia, half the number of 15 years ago. Another 10 live in captivity, including Ratu and four others in a rhino sanctuary at the Way Kambas National Park.

Ratu, who was born in the wild, had miscarried twice. She was paired with Andalas, who was born in the United States and brought to Indonesia in 2007.

The first captive birth of a Sumatran rhino was recorded at the Calcutta Zoo in 1889. The three others, including Andalas, occurred at the Cincinnati Zoo in the United States.

Sumatran rhinos are the smallest rhino species, standing little more than 4 feet (120 centimeters) at the shoulder. They are the most endangered of all rhinoceros species because of their rapid rate of decline.

An estimated 70 percent of the Sumatran rhino population has been lost since 1985, mainly to poaching and the loss of their tropical habitat in Malaysia and Indonesia.

Blind players get chance to shine

A memorable moment for the players as they enter the field in Gdansk

GDANSK June 23: As Germany and Greece braced for their crunch Euro 2012 quarter-final on Friday, two teams of blind players showed off their skills in a match meant to show that lack of sight should be no barrier to sport.

Organised as part of the “Respect” campaign run by European football’s governing body UEFA, the five-a-side game was held on the same pitch where the professionals of Germany and Greece were due to kick off less than two hours later.

“The issue of disability has been sidelined, almost like it’s the secret bit of football that no-one’s thought about,” Joyce Cook, head of the British-based group Centre for Access to Football in Europe, said.

“It’s a breath of fresh air that UEFA’s stepped in. It’s about players, fans and beyond that, about diversity and access for disabled people, who get a raw deal in so many areas of life.”

Wearing black eye-covers which help level the playing field between blind and partially-sighted players, the teams from Polish football hubs Wroclaw and Chorzow battled it out 2-2 over two seven-minute halves.

Goalkeepers in blind football are sighted and do not wear eye-covers.

I have no plans to quit, says Serena

(Reuters) - Serena Williams has good news for women's tennis - she has no plans to quit the sport and neither, as far as she knows, does sister Venus.

"I have no intention of stopping, and I don't think she does either," the 13-times grand-slam winner who, with her older sister has been one of the biggest characters in women's tennis for a decade and a half, said on Saturday.

"I enjoy being out there on the court so much and I've been having so much fun, so it's been great."

Despite her upbeat language, the 30-year-old American, who made a shock first-round exit at the French Open last month, seemed gloomy at a news conference at Wimbledon where she will begin the task of trying to win a fifth title next week.

Venus, who already has five, has slipped down the world rankings since being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. She lasted until the second round at Roland Garros but Serena's opening-match defeat by Frenchwoman Virginie Razzano was the biggest upset of the tournament.

Serena, dressed all in black and less talkative than usual, said on Saturday that the Paris loss would not affect her confidence for Wimbledon, which begins on Monday.

"I think losing makes me even more motivated," said Serena, who will play Czech Barbora Zahlavova Strycova in the first round.

Alonso's double send Spain into semi-finals

Spain waltzed past a feeble France side in Donetsk to set up a Euro 2012 semi-final meeting with Portugal.
Xabi Alonso, on his 100th appearance for his country, headed in a Jordi Alba cross after 20 minutes.
France struggled to make a mark and only conjured a rare threat when right-back Mathieu Debuchy headed a Franck Ribery cross over.
Spain comfortably saw out a one-sided game and sealed the win with a 91st-minute Alonso penalty.


Much had been expected of a game between two of Europe's heavyweights, but it proved a mismatch as Spain easily dispatched a France side lacking intensity and invention.
Victory gave Spain their first win over France in a competitive game and kept them on course for a third successive tournament triumph to follow Euro 2008 and the 2010 World Cup.

Alonso heads Spain in front