MikeLigalig.com

It's been a while since my last post here at TB. It's nice to be back.

Bungi gitahi sa doctor, gitestingan.

DOCTOR: sige.. pronounce, luzon, visayas, mindanao

BUNGI: lukon, pasayan, bulinaw..

(giutro napud pagtahi)

DOCTOR: sige.. pronounce, luzon, visayas, mindanao

BUNGI: luzo, visong, gilangaw..
muang ka noktor! nitamot na nuon!

DOCTOR: try nalang kanta ug "one wayticket"

BUNGI: wakwak kikik.. na.. namuang na!

DOCTOR: balik nalang diri. Kanus-a ka makahigayon?

BUNGI: kun dili mangalunges, mangamatez..

Wa ba mo mahihabalo nganung "BHE ang itawag sa mga lalake ngad2 sa ilang mga kaauyaban
1.) BHE-Lat ray geapas sa mga lalake,
2.) BHE-yaan ra dayun humang makuha ilang gusto,and lastly
3.) BHE-ga ray gehuna huna sa mga lalake..

MAO nga kamong mga GIRLS "BHE"careful & "BHE"-ware sa mga boys nga "BHE"song ray giapas. yaw deretso "BHE"kangkang arun dli ta ma "BHE"kugan sa ilang "BHE"tin..."BHE"nuang ra PEACE...

Jimmy goes home from school and finds his lolo sitting in the sala without any pants on. So he goes up to his grandpa and says, “Lolo, do you realize that you’re not wearing any pants?” Grandpa replies, “Yes, Jimmy. I do.” Jimmy then says, “Well, why are you outside without any pants on lolo?” Grandpa looks at Jimmy and responds, “Well, Jimmy, yesterday I sat here without a shirt and I got a stiff neck…this is your grandma’s idea.”

BOY1: brod nanaginip ako, naglalaro daw tayo sa gubat tapos kinuha ka ng gorilya..
BOY2: oh! anong ginawa mo?
BOY1: sabi ko "KUNIN MO NA RIN AKO!!!"
BOY2: anong sabi nya?
BOY1: sabi nya..."BAKIT...ANAK DIN BA KITA???!!!!"

Introduction of candidates:

Ms. Venezuela - ola viola kaserola saranggola tinola arinola ni lola VENEZUELA!

Ms. Norway - anyway highway expressway theres no other way NORWAY!

Ms. Hungary - gutom ka gutom ako gutom tayong lahat HUNGARY!

Ms. Philippines - mula sa lupaing kulang sa bigas, mataas ang gas, sandamakmak ang mandurugas PILIPINAS!

An eco-adventurer arrived back in Britain on Friday after driving round the world in a battered old "biotruck" rescued from a junkyard and powered by used cooking oil.

Andy Pag, 36, scavenged oil from fryers to clock up more than 18,000 miles (29,000 kilometres) travelling through 25 countries in an environmentally-friendly way.

He set off in September 2009 and his adventures included a spell banged up in an Indian jail and falling in love with journalist Christina Ammon, who joined him for the rest of the trip.

Pag, from Croydon in south London, salvaged the 22-year-old school minibus from a scrap yard and used reclaimed materials to transform it into a home on wheels.

The clapped-out vehicle's diesel engine was converted to run on waste cooking oil, stored in a 1,200-litre tank under the bed. It has a 500-watt solar panel on the roof.

Pag and Ammon made it back to the port of Dover on England's southeast tip.

"It was an experiment to see if we could recycle our way around the world. I'm as surprised as anyone that we got around the world without putting any fossil fuel in the tank," said Pag.

"The random acts of kindness have given us an overwhelming faith in how great humankind is."

The couple travelled through parts of Pakistan where militants often attack road convoys.

However, the worst moment came after Pag was arrested on suspicion of terrorism-related offences in India for illegally using a satellite telephone.

"Even when I was locked up in prison, I came across a lot of good people. We would play cricket together and read papers. By rights it was pretty unpleasant but I met some nice people," he said.

"Fortunately, I was only in prison for seven days but it cost thousands in legal fees and set us back six months waiting for it to come to court."

While driving through Indonesia, a year into his trip, he was joined by US freelancer Ammon, who wanted to write about Pag's journey.

Romance blossomed and she stayed with him for the rest of the adventure and the pair are still together.

"The breakdowns were the best bit," she said.

"That's when we met the most interesting, friendly people and had the unique sort of adventures which you can't have travelling any other way."

Pag previously drove from Britain to Timbuktu in Mali in a truck fuelled by cocoa butter extracted from waste chocolate.

Gimingaw nako aning dapita da. Dugay-dugay pud kong wala maka bisita diri.

MADRID (AFP) â€" A German passenger stripped naked on an Iberia flight from Madrid to Frankfurt, forcing the pilot to turn the plane around so he could be removed, the airline said Friday.

"A German passenger took all his clothes off on the plane," on Thursday night, an Iberia spokeswoman said.

"Staff on board tried to dissuade him but he became aggressive and finally locked himself in the toilet. The pilot then decided to turn around and land in Madrid."

Once on the ground, police came on board and "took him away," the spokeswoman said. She said the airline has "no idea" why the man, who was not identified, decided to do what he did.

The passenger cooperated immediately when Guardia Civil police arrived and he was not arrested, said police spokesman Angel Blanco.

The Iberia pilot filed a complaint saying the passenger refused to obey crew instructions to sit down during the flight and then started shouting. But the complaint did not mention him stripping naked.

Police said the man was not drunk and they had no explanation for his behaviour.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110610/od_afp/spaingermanytransportaviationcrimeoffbeat

CEBU, Philippines - Patay diha dayon ang usa ka sakop sa Kuratong Baleleng robbery group ug iyang kapuyo ingon man 3-anyos nga anak human gisulod sa ilang panimalay ug gipamusil diha sa sitio Tacan, barangay Babag II sa dakbayan sa Lapulapu kagahapon sa buntag.

Ang mga biktima mao si Fernando Canillo, 58, kansang tinuod pangalan mao si Bruno Villanueva alyas Tambok nga gituohang ‘keeper’ sa maong grupo kaniadto ug ang kapuyo niini nga si Emma Larano, 40, ug ilang anak nga si Fernando Canillo II nga 3-anyos kinsa pulos namatay.

Usa sa mga batang survivor ang mibutyag kagahapon sa kapolisan nga ang mihimo sa maong krimen mao ang iyang ‘uncle’ apan ang kapolisan wala mobutyag sa pangalan sa maong tawo nga gihinganlan sa mga bata nga posibleng maoy makasulbad sa maong krimen.

Ang managkapuyo gikan pa sa dakbayan sa Ozamis ug mag-usa palang ka tuig nga nagpuyo sa maong dapit. Apan base sa report giingong nagpunay lang og balhin-balhin og pinuy-anan ang maong pamilya gikan sa Ozamis ug sa Manila.

Samaran usab si Ricric Larano, igsuon ni Emma ug ang mga anak ni Canillo sa unang asawa nga nagpangidaron og 4 ug 6-anyos nga batang lalaki.

20 ka basiyo

Base sa pasiunang imbestigasyon sa kapolisan sa dakbayan sa Lapulapu uban usab ni Lapulapu City Police Office Director P/SSupt. Anthony Obenza nasayran nga mga alas 6:35 kagahapon sa buntag pipila ka mga residente sa maong dapit ang nakadungog og butobuto sa armas.

Nadiskobrehan nalang nila nga nagbuy-od na ang mga patay’ng lawas nila ni Fernando, Emma ug sa 3-anyos nga bata.

Samtang dali usab nga gidala sa tambalanan si Ricric Larano sa tambalanan, samtang nakadagan usab sa gawas ang 4 ug 6-anyos nga mga anak ni Villanueva.

Si PO2 Carlos Baluado sa Homicide Section sa kapolisan sa maong dakbayan miingon nga gipamusil ang mga biktima sa sulod sa ilang panimalay.

Adunay 20 ka mga kabhang sa kalibre .45 ang nahipos sa crime scene.

Giingong mao pay pag-abot sa mga biktima gikan sa merkado publiko ug sa ilang pag-abot gisugat sila sa mga kriminal nga luwan sa Toyota Vios nga awto.

Matud pa ni Baluado nga pipila sa mga silingan sa maong dapit ang nakakitang giagbayan pa sa usa sa mga lalaki si Fernando pagsulod sa ilang panimalay ug dangtan pila ka segundos boto na sa armas ang ilang nadunggan.

Human sa buto-buto sa armas nanakay sa usa ka awto dayong pahilayo sa maong dapit ang mga lalaki.

Way trabaho

Nasuta usab sa kapolisan nga walay trabaho si Canillo apan daghan kini og kabtangan ug giingon usab nga nalambigit kini sa financing sa mga sakyanan, natingala karon ang kapolisan nga nakaangkon kini og dakong balay nga gibanabanang mokabat og minilyon ka pesos.

Niadtong bulan sa Disyembre gitukod ang balay ug Enero na mibalhin og puyo ang pamilya niini apan nahibulong silang panagsa lang kining mogawas-gawas, walay trabaho apan kanunay mohatag og pahalipay sa mga drayber ug silingan.

Nadiskubrehan usab sa kapolisan ang daghang mga titulo sa yuta nga naa sa pangalan sa namatay.

Usa sa nakitang posibleng hinungdan sa krimen mao ang tulis tungod kay giingong naabli na ang vault sa magtiayon ug wala na kini sulod ug nagtangag pa ang yawe niini.

Keeper’ sa Kuratong

Si Obenza sa interbyu sa TV Patrol Central Visayas mikompirmar nga kanhi sakop sa Kuratong Baleleng si Villanueva nga lumad nga taga Pampanga ug nalambigit na kini sa mga pagpanulis dinhi sa Cebu ug sa kaulohan.

‘Kini siya (Villanueva) involve ni siya sa tanang mga robbery dinhi sa Cebu and sa Manila,’ matud pa ni Obenza human gikompirmar sa mga kaubanan nila sa Manila ug Mindanao ang litrato sa patay’ng lawas ni Villanueva kagahapon sa hapon.

“He is a former Kuratong member and mitiwalag and joined another group and then gipangita,” dugang pang Obenza. Ang anak sa mga biktima mibutyag usab nga nagbalhin-balhin sila’g puyo sa Manila aron molikay sa ilang “uncle.

Matud pa ni Obenza gikan sa iyang sources nga nalambigit sa pagpanulis sa SM Dasmariñas sa Manila si Villanueva ug nakuhaan kini og hulagway nga nagtabon sa nawong apan ang anak niini mismo mitudlo nga ang maong tawo mao ang iyang daddy. Gidudahan usab nga apil si Villanueva sa pagtulis sa van sa MLhuillier diha sa Lapulapu duha ka higayon sa milabay’ng tuig ug karong tuiga.

Si Obenza nagkanayon nga base sa ilang impormasyon ang wala pagkatarong og bahinay sa ilang natulis ang nakaingon nga misibat si Villanueva sa grupo.

http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=694685&publicationSubCategoryId=101

ROLLING MEADOWS, Ill. â€" Robert Adams craved an ice-cold drink after finishing his shift on a sweltering workday, but not having enough money to buy the burrito he also wanted left him with two obvious choices: Stop at the ATM, or find a bag containing more than $17,000 in cash.

"I wanted to get a large horchata, which is almost like a rice or coconut milk," Adams told the Daily Herald (Arlington Heights) for a story published Wednesday. "I would have grabbed a chorizo burrito, too, but I didn't have enough money."

That changed Monday when the Chicago-area man stood at a Chase ATM in Rolling Meadows, looked down and discovered on the sidewalk near a newspaper box a clear plastic bag containing receipts, checks and $17,021 in cash â€" mostly $20 and $100 bills bound by a rubber band.

"I see this plastic bag. It's clear plastic and it's half full of money," Adams said. "I figure this is a joke. Somebody took some napkins and made it look like money. This has to be a setup. People are going to look at me and start laughing."

Adams said he never had the urge to keep any of the money.

"It's not my money. I shouldn't take it. I don't care if you put another zero on there, I wasn't raised to take money that isn't mine," said Adams, a 54-year-old single man who lives in Arlington Heights and credits his deceased parents for teaching him right from wrong. "If I saw you drop it, I'd say, `Excuse me, sir. I think you dropped something.'"

The word "Chase" was printed on the bag, so Adams carried it inside the nearby branch.

"I walk up to the teller and say, `I think you might have left this outside,'" said Adams, figuring an employee left it behind after restocking the ATM. But employees told him the machine is filled from inside and the money didn't belong to the bank.

Adams then called police, who along with bank officials later determined the money was meant for an ATM in Midlothian and had been under the care of Loomis, an armored truck company. Rolling Meadows police took the money to the station, where it was picked up by a Loomis official.

Loomis officials said they were investigating, but have not said whether Adams will get a reward.

"I really don't know what happens with this situation," Adams said.

Onesimo Santillan, owner of the Senor Taco restaurant where Adams originally was headed to indulge his cravings, said the actions of his longtime customer don't surprise him.

"He has been coming in for years, always orders the same thing, very nice guy," Santillan said. "It's hard to find people like that, honest people."

Rolling Meadows Police Chief Dave Scanlan said Adams did good: "We all said right away that this guy deserves something â€" credit for being an Honest Abe."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110609/ap_on_fe_st/us_odd_found_riches_returned

KANSAS CITY, Missouri (Reuters) â€" A 5-year-old girl could face murder charges in the recent drowning of a toddler in a bathtub, police said on Thursday.

Kansas City police are waiting for a medical examiner's report on how Jermane Johnson Jr., died, but have investigated the death as a homicide, spokesman Darin Snapp said Thursday.

"I've been in law enforcement for 20 years and it's the youngest suspect I can remember," Snapp said. "It's extremely rare."

Johnson, 18 months old, was in a Kansas City house on June 3rd with other children, but the 16-year-old girl who was supposed to be looking after them fell asleep, Snapp said.

Investigators learned through interviews that a 5-year-old girl in the house got irritated at the boy, Snapp said.

"She said she got angry because he would not stop crying and she held him under the water until he stopped crying," Snapp said.

Snapp said a decision on to handle the case will be left up to prosecutors after the medical examiner's report is released.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_kansas_drowning_charge

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. â€" Lightning has struck twice at the Tropicana Casino and Resort, which has lost more than $11 million to just two high-stakes gamblers since April.

Just weeks after a blackjack player beat the casino for $5.8 million, a different gambler won $5.3 million last week.

Yet despite the huge losses, the Tropicana is sticking with its new emphasis on high-stakes table games play, confident that things will eventually run it its favor.

"That's just how it goes sometimes; if you bet more, you can win more," said Tony Rodio, the Tropicana's president and CEO. "We have a strategy of offering the most aggressive and highest table games limits in the Atlantic City market and we're not going to change that. If someone wants to take the shot, we'll take the action."

Lately it's the Tropicana that's been getting taken.

In April, Bensalem, Pa., gambler Don Johnson beat the casino for $5.8 million at blackjack, part of a spectacular roll that also saw him beat Caesars Atlantic City for more than $4.2 million and the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa for $5 million. His winning story was first reported by The Press of Atlantic City.

Rodio would not identify last week's winner, citing the casino's policy to keep the identities of its players confidential. But he did say it was not Johnson.

Last Wednesday's winner hit big at the craps table, where he was betting $100,000 at a time. He also did well at blackjack and mini-baccarat, Rodio said.

The man left a $150,000 tip for dealers when he was done raking the casino; it was divided up among table games dealers on duty that night.

Billionaire investor Carl Icahn bought the Tropicana out of bankruptcy last year, and has set about trying to regain business it lost under its previous owners, an affiliate of Kentucky-based Columbia Sussex Corp. A centerpiece of that strategy is trying to make up lost ground in a hurry by allowing high-stakes bettors to take their best shot against the casino at table games.

That approach had been serving the Trop well, until Johnson and last week's gambler came into town.

Rodio said the casino has the wherewithal to withstand even multimillion-dollar setbacks like those it recently experienced, adding no layoffs or cutbacks are expected as a result.

"There have been some players that we were big winners with," he said.

Rodio said Icahn planned to call Johnson and personally invite him back to the Tropicana to play again soon.

"Mr. Icahn is personally very supportive of this strategy, and he understands that there are fluctuations with it," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_casino_high_roller

In war, there are winners and losers. Sometimes an army is defeated because they simply faced a larger and more powerful foe. Other times they lose because of some bizarre set of circumstances no one could have foreseen, or because they were simply outwitted by a cunning adversary. Sometimes an army is even dealt a defeat because of bad weather (as happened to the Mongol fleet of Kublai Khan in 1281 AD, which was destroyed by a typhoon as it tried to cross the narrow strait between Korea and Japan.) However, there are also those battles that were lost due to the sheer incompetency of a leader, which is the source for this list.

Of course, even a good military leader can have a bad day. As such, this list is not about leaders who simply lost a battle, but those who either snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory or were classic incompetents that somehow managed to be given command of entire armies. A few are on this list because they are perceived as being far more capable than history demonstrates them to have been; in other words, besides the worst leaders, this list also contains the most overrated leaders who, while competent to a degree, do not rightly deserve the level of credit given to them by history. Finally, this is not a list of Generals only, but of menâ€"some of whom may not even have been in uniformâ€"that made the decisions that ultimately led their armies to utter catastrophe. And so, without further ado, here is my list for the top ten most incompetent, overrated, or just plain unlucky military leaders in history.

10. (Tie)  Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery, U.K.
Okay, not really a bad field commander. In fact, a pretty fair one. The only reason he’s on the list is that, like a British version of Macarthur, he too may be one of the most overrated commanders of World War II. While Monty is creditedâ€"and rightfully soâ€"for his victory at El Alamein, Egypt in October of 1942, it must be remembered he was fighting an exhausted and over-extended German Afrika Korps that lacked significant air support and was running on fumes. The British and their allies, in contrast, massively outnumbered Rommel in almost every category, making victoryâ€"pending some remarkable chain of eventsâ€"eventually inevitable. Unfortunately, unlike his predecessors, Monty choose not to follow up on his victory by pushing the Germans out of Africa immediately, waiting until May of 1943 to finally accomplish what should have been done months earlier. But Egypt wasn’t Monty’s real problem. That came later, first with the over-planned and under-executed landings in Sicily (Patton’s forces beat Monty’s British Army to Messina even though they had twice as far to go), followed by his dismal attempt to capture Caen, France on D-Day. (The city was not taken until July 18, 1944, six weeks after the initial landing.) Then there was Operation Markey Garden in September, 1944, the attempt to take three key bridges in Holland that would make a breakout into the Ruhr Valley possible. Great idea; just poorly implemented, the result being the surrender of 6,000 British paratroopers at Arnhem and  a temporary stalemate that was to last until that next spring. Monty had good intentions; it’s just that he tended to be too timid when aggressiveness was called for, and too aggressive when caution would have been more advisable.

10. (Tie) Field Marshall Erwin Rommel, Germany
This is easily my most controversial pick, and I do it with some reluctance only because of the esteem the “Desert Fox” is looked upon with today. In my defense, I do not maintain that Rommel was a bad General. In fact, considering the circumstances he had to deal withâ€"lack of supplies, harsh conditions, being perpetually outnumberedâ€"he did a remarkable job as arguably Germany’s most successfulâ€"or, at very least, most popularâ€"general. Plus, the fact that he was implicated in the plot to kill Hitlerâ€"though pretty late in the gameâ€"makes him a hero to both sides. However, in terms of actual accomplishments, the man may not quite live up to his reputation. While an aggressive and capable commander, he tended to be abrasive, intolerant, unteachable and rash to the point of foolhardiness, which might be one of the reasons he was defeated by the British in North Africa not once, but twice (the first time at the hands of British General Auchinleck, the second time by Montgomery) and finally pushed off the continent. Afterwards given the task of securing the French coastline from allied invasion (the Atlantic Wall) he oversaw the construction of a formidable barrier of bunkers and gun emplacements that prevented the allies from taking the beaches at Normandy on June 6, 1944 for about half an hour or so, thereby demonstrating the futility of depending on fixed defenses to stop invasions (a lesson the Germans should have remembered from France’s futile efforts to hold the Maginot Line in 1940). Obviously, not all of this could be laid at Rommel’s doorstep as he did have to work under the limitations imposed upon him by der fuehrer, but when one considers his almost legendary reputation, it seems he should have been able to do more to stop the allied advance in France.

9. Admiral Gunichi Mikawa, Japan
This is a case in which a successful commander enjoyed an overwhelming victory, only to almost immediately squander the priceless opportunity it afforded him. Admiral Mikawa was an up-and-coming Japanese admiral known for his intelligence and sound judgment when he assumed command of the Japanese 8th fleet at Rabaul in July of 1942. Just a month later, he was to lead this same fleet to one of Japan’s greatest naval victories of World War Two when, during the night of August 8-9, 1942, he slipped into the waters off Guadalcanal and sent four allied cruisers to the bottom in a little under one hour. In doing so, he left the Marines on Guadalcanal without sea protection and rendered the transports anchored off shore sitting ducks. However, just as complete victoryâ€"and the routing of the American forces on Guadalcanalâ€"was all but imminent, the Admiral inexplicably broke off the attack and headed for home, thereby saving the U.S. Navy from further humiliation and destruction. Had the man shown a bit more aggressiveness and sank the hapless transports, very likely the U.S. would have been forced to evacuate the Solomon Islands and the war would have been extended by months or, possibly, as long as a year. Rightfully criticized by his superiors for his timely blunder, he was given increasingly smaller and more isolated commands throughout the remainder of the war until being forcefully retired by the Japanese Navy in June of 1945, three months before the war ended. Not a bad officer, but an officer with bad timing.

8. Saddam Hussein, Iraq
People don’t normally think of the Butcher of Baghdad as a military leader (though he liked to wear uniforms), but for the twenty-four years he called the shots in Iraq, that’s exactly what he was. Like Hitler, every military operation was overseen by him personally and in great detail, though, again like Hitler, he left the day-to-day tactical operations to a group of hand-picked incompetents known more for their loyalty to him than for their battlefield prowess. Consider that during his reign, Saddam oversaw three major conflicts (the invasion of Iran and Persian Gulf I & II) all of which he lost soundly (although the Iranian conflict dragged on for 8 long years before Saddam finally sued for peace.) His inept defense of Kuwait in 1991 against U.S. and coalition forces almost cost him his entire armyâ€"not to mention his headâ€"while the follow-up war just eleven years later (the U.S. led invasion of Iraq in 2003) cost him both. Perhaps his best idea was convincing the world he had WMD in an effort to discourage an invasion, thereby encouraging the very conquest he was trying to avoid. Worst, he forgot to tell his own generals his WMDs were merely a figment of his imagination, much to their consternation as they were counting on using them to slow the American march on Baghdad. Truly it could be said that no American military commander ever had a better ally than the madman from Tikrit.

7. General George McClellan, USA
While there were a host of bad generals serving on both sides during the American Civil Warâ€"mostly on the Union side unfortunatelyâ€"the one that usually gets the most credit for dragging out the war as long as he did is Union General George McClellan. McClellan wasn’t the worst general in the Union armyâ€"that title probably belongs to men like Joe Hooker or Ambrose Burnsideâ€"but he was the most cautious which, in war, can be as dangerous as being too bold. In command of the Union Army from November, 1861 until he was dismissed by Lincoln after the bloody and inconclusive Battle of Antietam in September, 1862, McClellan was famous for his take it slow approach that resulted in interminable delays and missed opportunities to hit the rebels hard and potentially shorten the war. To his credit, some of his biographers write that McClellan was hesitant to commit to battle out of concern for the lives of his menâ€"which is admirableâ€"but missing opportunities to potentially and soundly defeat the smaller Confederate Army on several occasions may have inadvertently extended the war by years, actually resulting in an even greater loss of life than might have been experienced had he simply been more aggressive. The man’s personal contempt for Lincoln was also unwise (he once refused to see the president when he visited his home in Washington, claiming he had gone to bed and could not be disturbed) while his political ambitionsâ€"he ran against Lincoln in the 1864 presidential electionâ€"made him more of a publicity-hound than the type of quality commander the Union Army needed. Again, not a terrible generalâ€"just the wrong man for the job.

6. General Robert Georges Nivelle, France
What Douglas Haig was for the British Expeditionary Force in France during the First World War (see no. 5), Robert Nivelle was for France. A French artillery officer who took command of the French Army in December of 1916, he immediately set about doing very little but sit by and watch his men and the Huns slaughter each other on an unimaginable scale. At the Battle of Verdun (21 February to 18 December, 1916) Nivelle went through French troops like pork through a sausage factory, racking up an impressive half a million casualties before it was all over. But it was his ill-fated and poorly planned “Nivelle Offensive” in the spring of 1917 that was his undoing. Promising a quick and decisive victory over the Germans, in April of 1917 Nivelle sent over a million French soldiers against a German army half its size and got his proverbial butt kicked. By the time the French government finally pulled the plug on the thing three weeks later, over a quarter million French had been killed or wounded and the army was on the verge of wholesale mutiny. It was only his quick sacking that prevented the French soldiers from turning on their own officers and the whole allied front from collapsing, handing victory to the Germans by default. (On the other hand, had the Germans won in the summer of 1917, there would have been no Hitler and no Second World War and history would have taken a much different track. Oh well…) Unlike his British counterpart, Sir Douglas Haig, Nivelle did not return home a hero but slinked off to some outpost in Africaâ€"the French equivalent of being sent to Siberiaâ€"to finish out what little was left of his career. He died in 1924 and was buried with full military honors…and then promptly forgotten.

We all know what the little guys are for and who’s responsible for making them, but  the baby makers are packing a lot more than just the half the DNA package to make a new human being.  Here are some surprising facts which are going to make you look at the little fella’s in a completely different light.

10. Fertility at the Speed of Light
Human sperm travels at the staggering rate of up to 4 millimeters per minute, but many are as slow as 1 millimeter per minute.  You have to put this into perspective; human sperm are only 55 millionths of a millimeter or 55 microns in length, so a millimeter is a pretty big deal to the mini-me’s.

The average length of the journey to the fallopian tubes is 175 millimeters, which means the Road Runners of the team can get there in 45 minutes, but in practice the journey takes anything up to 3 days.

9.  A 25% Shot at the Title
Even a fertile couple with no conception issues and practicing unprotected sex with ejaculation in the female have only a 1â€"in-4 chance of conceiving.  If you wear jockey shorts to keep the meat and two veg neatly packaged, instead of those airy boxer shorts, your chances start dwindling rapidly.

Human reproduction is notoriously fickle and very inefficient; in fact, it’s a wonder any of us got here to begin with.

8. Sperm are Like Men â€" No Sense of Direction
One of the reasons for sperm taking so long to find the egg is because they have no sense of direction.  There are chemical signatures released by the egg to act as a “guide” to the sperm, but have you ever known of a man to take directions from a woman?

Only 1 in 5 sperm will start swimming in the right direction after ejaculation, which accounts for that age old bedroom debate about who will be sleeping in the sticky patch after making love.

7. Your Biological Clock is Ticking â€" Not Yours, Girls â€" The Guys!
The biological alarm clock may be ticking for women, but they have a much longer lie in life’s fertility bed than men do; for guys the biological alarm goes off much earlier. Women enter menopause sometime in middle age, but guys start a rapid decline in the quantity and quality of their sperm when they hit the ripe old age of 25!

6. New York vs. Los Angeles
Gangsta rappers may have their West coast/east coast rivalry, but there is one thing there is no dispute over.  For reasons no-one understands, New York men have a 50% increased sperm count than guys from Los Angeles.  Go Giants!

5. Never Get Stuck in Reverse
Sperm can only swim in one direction â€" forwards.

4. Size Does Matter
The sperm of a fruit fly can be as long as the body of the male fly, about 1.1 mm. On the other hand, of the vast number of mammals, humans included, have one of the smallest sperm cells, measuring only 40 microns long. Rats produce one of the largest sperm at 170 microns long.

If there was a prize for biggest sperm in nature, it would go to Drosophila bifurca, a tiny fruit fly whose coiled sperm would measure more than 2 inches long if straightened out. That’s 1,000 times longer than an average human sperm. (Source)

“To put that into perspective, if humans made sperm that long and you took a six-foot man and stood him on the goal line of a football field, his sperm would stretch out to the 40-yard line,” said Adam Bjork, a Ph.D. student at Syracuse University in New York.

3.  Time to Mature
Sperm take 2 ½ months to grow to maturity in the testes.  The question then becomes where are all these little guys hanging out down there?  The sperm nursery and warehouse is the epididymis which found on top of the testes.

2. How Come There is Enough Room for All the Little Guys Down There?
The majority of ejaculate is not sperm; sperm only accounts for around 5% of your population juice, with the rest being made up of fluids which contain a combination of nutrients and protective substrate to help the little guys on their way to the egg.

1. Eat Your Veggies
How healthy a man is has a direct bearing on his fertility.  Eating fresh fruit and vegetables, avoiding junk food and maintaining a healthy weight, lots of fresh air and exercise, taking vitamin supplements, getting plenty early nights and abstaining from tobacco and alcohol, are all guaranteed to give a man a higher sperm count.  Not only will he produce more sperm, but they will be much more energetic and thus more likely to be The One â€" the only issue with this is your offspring are likely to be very boring.

http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-things-you-didnt-know-about-sperm.php

For these folks, if their wedding day(s) weren’t the happiest days of their lives, then something is seriously wrong. If you thought your wedding was astronomical, try these top ten of the most extravagant weddings to date ranging from $2 million to $78 million dollars where broadcasting your wedding vows to the world is as important as showing the lining of your wallet.

10. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes ($2 million)
They’re still together, almost 6 years later, Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes and they come in at number 10 on the top ten list of grandest weddings of all time. After Tom proposed to Katie on the top of the Eiffel Tower, 19 months before the wedding date, they were married in Italy at the 15th century castle, Odescalchi Castle in Rome on November 18th, 2006. Giorgio Armani designed all the apparel for the bridal party and Andrea Boccelli gave a musical performance.  The wedding was attended by 150 guests. The couple honeymooned in Maldives following the elaborate wedding event.

9. Paul McCartney and Heather Mills ($3 million)
Fireworks, grand feasting and dancers dressed in Indian costume performed for Paul McCartney and Heather Mill’s wedding in 2001. The $3 million dollar wedding ceremony took place in County, Monaghan, Ireland. The ceremony was held in St. Salvador’s Church and the reception took place at Castle Leslie with 300 guests. Heather Mills wore a dress she herself fashioned and carried roses named after her husband. Following their affair they honeymooned at a private island in Seychelles. They spent their first evening on a $20 million yacht for $19,000 a night.

8. Liza Minnelli and David Gest ($3.5 million)
Held at the Manhattan’s Collegiate Church in 2002, with a sum total of 850 wedding guests, the wedding was a monumental event with guests including Natalie Cole singing “Unforgettable”, a 60-piece orchestra also kept the guests entertained along with Tony Bennett. The wedding included a $40,000 6-foot, 12-tier cake, a staff of 500 and a bill of over $700,000 in flowers.

7. Elizabeth Hurley & Arun Nayar ($7 million)
Wed on June 29, 2006, Elizabeth Hurley and Arun Nayar, an Indian businessman married in a 15th century castle in Sudeley Castle in Gloucestershire in Britain. The festivities lasted for 8 days across the 2 continents of Europe and Asia. The proceedings began at Sudeley and then the wedding party traveled to Umaid Bhawan Palace in Jodhpur, India. The palace suite cost $10,000 a night.

6. Delphine Arnault and Alessandro Vallarino Gancia ($7 million)
Who said a bride isn’t worth it, especially when she’s the daughter of the wealthy French businessman, Bernard Arnault? A father coined the ‘pope of fashion’ in France too means of course, a fancy dress, in fact, one so fancy that it was fashioned by the famous designer, John Galliano. It certainly was a price you’d not find on the racks at David’s Bridal either. Add to a wealthy bride a wealthy groom with a family with a wine dynasty business and you’ve got a splendid party, with of course, plenty of fine wines. They couple wed in 2005 at the Cote d’ Azur in France. The venue was decorated with 5,000 white roses. Harper’s Bazaar called it the “Wedding of the Year”.

5. Wayne Rooney & Coleen McLoughlin ($15 million)
Okay if that previous wedding bill wasn’t enough to impress you, try doubling that with a few little extras and you’ve got the wedding of Wayne Rooney and Coleen McLaughlin at $15 million. Colleen McLoughlin, a television presenter/product endorser plus a Manchester United/England football star resulted not only in an expensive wedding but an interesting one at that. The 4 day wedding ceremony took place in Villa Durazzo in Portofino Italy on June 12, 2008. With stunning views of the Italian Rivera on a yacht with 64 guests flown in on five different private jets, the ambiance was beautiful. After spending almost $4 million dollars on a dress designed by Georgia Chapman’s Marchesa label, guests had to wonder if the budget had run out after being served pizza for the reception. In the end, they were able to cut costs of $5 million by allowing Britain’s OK! Magazine to publish exclusive information and pictures about the event, that is, after the pizza was served.

4. Vikram Chatwal and Priva Sachdey ($20 million)
Let’s make it an even 20 after 15, that is, $20 mil, and then everything will be up to par for the wedding of Vikram Chatwal, son of a New York hotel magnet and a jet-setting hotelier and actor and for his model/actress/investment banker bride, Priya Sachdey (who ever said a man couldn’t have it all). The wedding took place on February 18th, 2006 and is known as one of the most luxurious weddings ever in all of India. Bill Clinton was on the guest list along with many other well-known, high-powered people. The wedding took place over 10 days and was spread across 3 cities in India (Mumbai, Udaipur, and Delhi). There were 600 guests from 26 countries who were all retrieved for the event on chartered jets.

3. Miss Yugoslavia Aleksandra Kokotovic and Andrey Melnichenko ($30 million)
Topping a $20 million dollar wedding isn’t easy but for Miss Yugoslavia Aleksandra Kokotovic and Andrey Melnichenko, it wasn’t hard with a $30 million dollar extravaganza that made history in world famous weddings. Andrey Melnichenko, the Russian billionaire and founder of MDM Bank and the Serbian model, Miss Yugoslavia Aleksandra Kokotovic married in Cote D’ Azur, France on September 3rd,  2005. There were performances by Christina Aguilera and Whitney Houston for a full house of guests of the rich and famous. The singers alone cost $3.6 million each to perform.

2. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum and Princess Salama ($44.5 million)
The Arabs really know how to have a wedding party and especially the ruler of Dubai who married Princess Salama in 1981. The wedding earned a place in the Forbes list of “Billionaire Weddings”. A stadium was built just for the occasion to entertain 20,000 guests for 7 days of luxury.

1. Vanisha Mittal & Amit Bhatia ($78 million)
The Indians, however, outshined the Arabs on November 18th, 2004 when Vanisha Mittal & Amit Bhatia wed in what is recorded as the most expensive wedding in history. 1,000 guests from around the world attended after each had received a 20-page silver card to the event which included all the lavish details the entire venue that lasted for 5 days. The party took place at the finest chateau and garden in France, the 17th century, Vaux le Vicomte. The bride, Vanisha Mittal, daughter to the steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal and Amit Bhatia, the investment banker wed in sheer riches. A performance by Kylie Minogue the pop singer was the high-lighted attraction to the event. 100 different dishes were prepared by a top Calcutta Chef and the wine cost $1.5 million. The costs of everything else we’ll leave to your imagination!

Weddings are a happy time for all, especially for the guests who were able to attend the top ten most expensive weddings in history. Of these wedding events, the real two questions are who is still together and who will be next to top the list?

http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-most-expensive-weddings.php

Most of us are familiar with the dangers of illegal drugs. Along with the risk of addiction, severe health problems and other unwanted side effects, there is also the danger that a drug user will face punishment if caught. Depending on the drug and area, this punishment can involve anything from a warning to a lengthy jail sentence. But things weren’t always that way. Many drugs that are severely restricted today were once commonplace and completely legal. In fact, not only were these drugs available, they were actually recommended and promoted by healthcare professionals, often with unfortunate results. Here are ten of them:

10. Opium
Its usage is much older, but this form of dried juice from the opium poppy became popular in the United States during the 19th Century. Back then, it was freely prescribed by doctors and even available at grocery stores. Chinese laborers had brought the practice of opium smoking to the West during the mid-nineteenth century, and laudanum, a solution of opium and alcohol, was also popular. Opium was often given to women to treat menstrual cramps and to infants to help with teething pain. Around the turn of the 20th Century, most opium addicts were older women.

San Francisco first banned opium dens in 1875, and California restricted opium possession in 1907.  The 1914 Harrison Narcotics Tax Act effectively outlawed the drug throughout America. Today, drugs derived from the opium poppy, such as morphine and codeine, are legal but heavily restricted.

9. Marijuana
Usage of the cannabis plant, from which the psychoactive drug marijuana is derived, was unrestricted in America until the early twentieth century. In fact, in 1619 a Virginia law required farmers to grow native hemp on their plantations in order to produce textiles! Ironically, given its later reputation, the earliest state to ban the plant was California in 1913. Federal laws passed in 1937 restricted marijuana usage to the medicinal, and later laws in the 1950s introduced mandatory sentencing for possession, with the justification that marijuana was a ‘gateway drug’ into heavier narcotics.

Medical marijuana is now legal in over a dozen states, although still prohibited by federal law. The current administration has indicated that federal laws involving medical marijuana will not be enforced in these states. (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/07/13/national/main5154550.shtml)

8. Methamphetamine
Nowadays a popular target for public service announcements, methamphetamine was first created by a Japanese chemist in 1893. In 1944, it was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in the US to treat a selection of medical conditions including narcolepsy, alcoholism, mild depression, and even seasonal allergies. By the 1950s, this legal medication had become popular under the name of Methedrine, but abuse had also become common. Passed in 1970, the Controlled Substances Act severely restricted its usage, although meth is still available under the name of Desoxyn for very limited uses.

Bad news for the congested: since the 1980s, there have also been strict crackdowns on several legal cold-and-flu drugs that can be used to produce methamphetamine, like ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. These previously over-the-counter medications now often require ID to purchase.

7. Peyote
Mescaline, a hallucinogenic chemical derived from the peyote cactus, has been used by Native American religious ceremonies for thousands of years. Peyote use was outlawed in several US states in the 1920s and 30s, but remained legal in most of the US throughout the 1960s and was often shipped interstate to interested parties.

Mescaline was restricted by Congress under the 1970 Controlled Substances Act. Currently, members of the federally-recognized Native American Church are exempt from criminal penalties for peyote use, as long as further state restrictions do not apply.

6. Cocaine
Many famous people of the early 20th century, including Sigmund Freud and the Pope, were cocaine users. Although cocaine is derived from the coca plant, which has been in use for at least 3000 years, its modern incarnation only appeared around the 1860s. Available in many forms, including dissolved into wine, it was prescribed by doctors to treat depression and morphine addiction.

In America, it was popular as a treatment for coughs and pain, and was famously included in early versions of Coca-Cola. Although technically restricted by the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act in 1914, prosecution for cocaine usage was rare, and only became common after it was listed a controlled substance in 1970.

5. LSD
The psychedelic effects of LSD, or ‘acid’, were discovered by accident in 1943, after the Swiss scientist who invented the chemical accidentally absorbed some through his skin. During the 1950s the US Army, along with the CIA, researched the uses of LSD as a potential ‘truth drug’ for use in brainwashing. Their experiments involved giving LSD to everyone from CIA agents to prostitutes, and recording the results. Soon, psychiatrists also became interested in its potential therapeutic benefits. Although LSD was still being imported from Switzerland at this time, the drug’s formula could be purchased for a small sum from the US patent office, after which a user could synthesize LSD himself.

In 1966, after widespread abuse and ill-effects caused in part by people making the drug incorrectly, LSD was outlawed in California. In 1970, it was listed by Congress as a Schedule I substance, meaning it has no recognized medicinal or therapeutic uses.

4. GHB
Famous these days as a ‘date rape’ drug, GHB is a naturally-occurring neurochemical that produces a depressant, pain-relieving effect. A lab-made version was synthesized in the 1960s and was used widely in Europe as an anesthetic, particularly in childbirth. In the 1980s, it became popular among body builders as a legal sleep aid, and eventually as a legal recreational drug. After GHB became associated with abuse and accidental deaths, the FDA cracked down on its sale in 1990. It was not listed federally as a controlled substance (illegal to possess as well as to sell) until 2000 when, like LSD, it became a Schedule 1 drug. However, GHB has recently been approved as a heavily-controlled treatment for narcolepsy.

3. Magic Mushrooms
Also known as shrooms, magic mushrooms are fungi native to Asia and the Americas that contain psilocybin, a compound that produces an LSD-like effect in users. Magic mushrooms have been in use for millennia, but as recently as the early 20th century Western academics were still arguing whether or not they existed. Use among Westerners was popularized in the 1950s after an article on the subject appeared in Life Magazine. In the 1960s, psychologist Timothy Leary and many others promoted these mushrooms for psychological use.

Possession of psilocybin-containing mushrooms was outlawed in 1968. However, since the mushroom spores do not contain psilocybin, spores are still legal in most states.

2. Ecstasy
MDMA, or ecstasy, was legal in the United States as recently as 1984. Synthesized and patented in 1912 by a chemist working for pharmaceutical company Merck, it was largely forgotten until the mid 1970s, when Berkeley professor Alexander Shulgin popularized it for use in psychotherapy. Shulgin claimed that it could help psychiatric patients achieve greater introspection and more openness with their therapists. Ecstasy also became popular in non-therapeutic settings, particularly nightclubs, and in 1985 was put under an ‘emergency ban’ and became a Schedule I controlled drug.

1. Heroin
First synthesized in 1874, heroin was first created as a non-addictive alternative to morphine. The word ‘heroin’ is actually a brand name created by the pharmaceutical company that invented it, Bayer. In the early 20th century, it was also marketed in the US as a treatment for coughs and as a kind of old-fashioned methadone program for morphine users.

Unfortunately, the drug turned out to be more addictive than morphine. After hundreds of thousands of Americans saw their sore throats relieved only to be replaced with crippling addiction, heroin usage was severely restricted in the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914, and outlawed altogether in 1924.

http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-drugs-that-used-to-be-legal.php

For those who extra income, please check this site: http://www.ivp-m8m.com/index.php

It's cheaper than other networking business. Basaha lang and site then PM if interested.
Thanks.

LONDON (AFP) â€" A Nepalese soldier in the British army has been given a top bravery award by Queen Elizabeth II for his heroics in Afghanistan, where he single-handedly saw off more than 30 Taliban fighters.

Corporal Dipprasad Pun, 31, said he thought he was going to die and so had nothing to lose in taking on the attackers who overran his checkpoint.

He was awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross (CGC), which is given in recognition of acts of conspicuous gallantry during active operations against the enemy.

Pun fired more than 400 rounds, launched 17 grenades and detonated a mine to repel the Taliban assault on his checkpoint near Babaji in Helmand Province, southern Afghanistan, last September.

Surrounded, the enemy opened fired from all sides and for 15 minutes Pun remained under continuous attack, including from rocket-propelled grenades and AK47 guns.

At one point, unable to shoot, he used his machine gun tripod to knock down a militant who was climbing the walls of the compound.

Two insurgents were still attacking by the time he ran out of ammunition, but he set off a Claymore mine to repel them.

Pun was given his medal in a ceremony at Buckingham Palace in London on Wednesday.

The CGC is second only to the Victoria Cross -- the highest honour for bravery in the face of the enemy.

"There wasn't any choice but to fight. The Taliban were all around the checkpoint. I was alone," he said.

"I had so many of them around me that I thought I was definitely going to die so I thought I'd kill as many of them as I could before they killed me.

"After that I thought nobody can kill us now -- when we met the enemy I wasn't scared."

Britain's Major General Nicholas Carter, who was commander of allied forces in southern Afghanistan during Pun's deployment, praised his efforts.

"The CGC does not get handed out lightly. It was a most remarkable achievement," he said.

1. Yogurt
Mmmm. This creamy, tangy snack is loaded with calcium -- and studies show that calcium may curtail weight gain by hindering the absorption of fat in the small intestine.

2. Eggs
Turn breakfast into a fat-burning morning boost by skipping the stack of pancakes and feasting on a couple of eggs instead. According to a study, huevos beat out carbs when it came to helping folks feel full longer and helping them beat back snack attacks later in the day.

3. Pistachios
Nuts may be high in fat, but it's the healthful unsaturated kind of fat found in pistachios. And like all nuts, pistachios offer lots of hunger-curbing protein and fiber. All of these qualities together explain why adding pistachios to the diet helped dieters in a study curb their appetites and lose more weight.

4. Grapefruit
Of all the foods rumored to boost weight loss, grapefruit is likely the most famous. And research confirms that this fruit's get-slim celebrity status is for real. One study in particular revealed that eating half a grapefruit before each meal helped dieters shed more pounds than people who skipped the tart appetizer.

5. Avocado
This green goddess of heavenly, creamy taste can help you whittle your waist. It's true! Researchers suspect that the unsaturated fat in avocados may ratchet up body levels of the hunger-halting hormone called leptin -- a hormone that lets your brain know that you're full, so you stop eating.

6. Mushrooms
If you want to try an easy and tasty calorie-cutting trick, then replace the meat in your favorite recipes with mushrooms. You'll automatically cut about 420 calories out of a meal, partly because you'll skip all the belly-padding saturated fat contained in meat.

7. Olive Oil
This rich-tasting oil found in salad dressings and marinades contains a hunger-busting monounsaturated fat called oleic acid -- which triggers a complicated process in the gut that ultimately tells your brain you're full and makes you want to stop eating.

8. Whole Grains
Ready to trade your belly bulge for a flat tummy? Then toss your refined grains into the garbage, and eat more whole grains instead. Research shows this one move can help whittle your middle. We're talking brown rice, quinoa, steel-cut oats, whole-grain cereal, and 100% whole-wheat bread and pasta.

9. Red Pepper
Add some heat to your meals and you'll boost not only the taste but also the effectiveness of your weight loss diet. A dash of cayenne pepper or some diced jalapeno or red peppers will do the trick. They all contain capsaicin -- the heat-inducing compound in red peppers that, according to research, tamps down appetite and curbs food intake later in the day.

10. Fava Beans
Creamy and hearty, fava beans are a lean protein source bursting with flavonoids. And in a 14-year study, these special antioxidants were shown to help hinder the accumulation of extra belly fat.

11. Rice with Veggies
Adding some high-fiber vegetables like broccoli, carrots, and kale to your rice will obviously help lower the calorie count. But not only that. Adding veggies to rice at lunchtime appears to slow stomach emptying, according to research. The end result? You feel full longer. In fact, people in a study ate much less at dinner when they added veggies to their rice at lunch.

LONDON (AFP) â€" Christians have long celebrated Jesus Christ's Last Supper on Maundy Thursday but new research released Monday claims to show it took place on the Wednesday before the crucifixion.

Professor Colin Humphreys, a scientist at the University of Cambridge, believes it is all due to a calendar mix-up -- and asserts his findings strengthen the case for finally introducing a fixed date for Easter.

Humphreys uses a combination of biblical, historical and astronomical research to try to pinpoint the precise nature and timing of Jesus's final meal with his disciples before his death.

Researchers have long been puzzled by an apparent inconsistency in the Bible.

While Matthew, Mark and Luke all say the Last Supper coincided with the start of the Jewish festival of Passover, John claims it took place before Passover.

Humphreys has concluded in a new book, "The Mystery Of The Last Supper", that Jesus -- along with Matthew, Mark and Luke -- may have been using a different calendar to John.

"Whatever you think about the Bible, the fact is that Jewish people would never mistake the Passover meal for another meal, so for the Gospels to contradict themselves in this regard is really hard to understand," Humphreys said.

"Many biblical scholars say that, for this reason, you can't trust the Gospels at all. But if we use science and the Gospels hand in hand, we can actually prove that there was no contradiction."

In Humphreys' theory, Jesus went by an old-fashioned Jewish calendar rather than the official lunar calendar which was in widespread use at the time of his death and is still in use today.

This would put the Passover meal -- and the Last Supper -- on the Wednesday, explaining how such a large number of events took place between the meal and the crucifixion.

It would follow that Jesus' arrest, interrogation and separate trials did not all take place in the space of one night but in fact occurred over a longer period.

Humphreys believes a date could therefore be ascribed to Easter in our modern solar calendar, and working on the basis that the crucifixion took place on April 3, Easter Day would be on April 5.

CEBU CITY -- A fire that hit a mall and sent smoke into an adjacent hotel tested Cebu City firefighters’ ability to deal with high-rise emergencies.

The fire itself was short-lived. The Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) received the alarm at 3:04 p.m. and said the flames were put out by 3:14 p.m.

Do you know where to buy the cheapest rice in Cebu City? Join our discussion on Facebook.

But thick, black smoke stayed inside the Robinson’s Place and parts of the adjacent Cebu Midtown Hotel for up to four hours. Firefighters were kept busy rescuing shoppers, employees and hotel guests who were trapped inside.

At least 20 people were sent to hospitals, for minor injuries and smoke inhalation.

Hotel employee Ronald Kintanar was also treated for bruises and minor injuries, after he fell while trying to descend from the second floor, using a rope.

Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama said he will ask the management of Robinson’s Place to explain reports from those rescued that they heard no fire alarm, which was why they got trapped inside the building.

However, Cebu City Fire Marshall Aderson Comar said the fire apparently didn’t raise the temperature enough to trigger an alarm.

“The alarm has a certain temperature level; if it reaches the required temperature, that is the time the fire alarm will sound,” he explained.

Comar said the thick smoke accumulated because the mall had few openings. Firefighters broke some of the structure’s glass walls to let the smoke out faster.

Comar, who went all the way to the 10th floor of the building to see to it that no one was trapped, said that only the basement and first floors of the mall were damaged.

Damage to property was initially estimated at P160,000, but investigators have yet to confirm this, as well as the cause of the fire.

The BFP received the call for help at 3:04 p.m. from Emerit Gaciano Jr., who is the head of the mall’s security department.

Apart from the BFP, fire teams from the Cebu City Fire Station, Filipino-Chinese Brigade, Mandaue Fire Station and some barangays rushed to Fuente Osmeña to help put out the fire.

At least 10 fire trucks converged at the site.

No flames were visible outside the building, only thick smoke.

Some employees and hotel guests came out on the rooftop of the mall and were helped down by firefighters.

SFO1 Vivencio Talle said that according to an initial investigation, a electrical short circuit in one of the first-floor boutiques may have started the fire. That still has to be verified.

Most of the outlets on that floorâ€"including an Internet café, several boutiques, a Jollibee branch and a Cebu Pacific ticketing outletâ€"suffered “water damage.”

Comar said at least 20 people who were brought to different hospitals for treatment of slight injuries, but mostly because of smoke inhalation.

The smoke cleared only around 7 p.m.

Maryann Arubo, a resident from Davao City, was one of the guests rescued by the firefighters. She was with her two children in their hotel room, but they were unaware there was a fire since they heard no alarms.

When she opened the window and saw smoke enter the room, that’s when Arubo rushed out with the children and fortunately saw firefighters, who helped them out.

Belinda Banal from Kuwait was with her son Paul inside their room. They were also rescued by FO1 Fulbert Navarro from the Special Rescue Unit, who held a ladder for them. Banal and her son had to descend from the mall’s roof.

A total of 50 guests were rescued.

In an interview with reporters, Mayor Rama said he will also ask the Office of the Building Official to investigate and see if requirements on fire prevention were met.

The mayor also instructed the Cebu City Police Office to deploy police officers to the mall, to prevent looting.

Cebu City Police Office Chief Melvin Buenafe said they are ready to coordinate with the security personnel of the mall and the hotel, in order to guard the building while the BFP’s investigation proceeds.

CEBU CITY -- Several people were trapped inside a shopping center and a hotel in this city after a fire broke out at a boutique inside the mall Sunday afternoon.

The fire started around 3 p.m. at Bench store, which is located at the second floor of the Robinson's Mall. An explosion reportedly occurred, causing the fire. The ceiling of the boutique collapsed.

Do you know where to buy the cheapest rice in Cebu City? Join our discussion on Facebook.

The Cebu City Fire Department received the fire alarm past 3 p.m. It said the fire spread to the Midtown Hotel, which is located just beside the Robinson's Mall, near Fuente Osmena this city.

Among those trapped were people who were inside the mall when the fire broke out, as well as those who were inside the elevator at the Midtown Hotel. Most of those trapped were employees of the department store.

Rescue operation is ongoing as of this posting Sunday for those employees trapped inside an elevator. Customers at the mall, however, were all safe.

Several guests at the Midtown Hotel, meanwhile, were already rescued, but radio reports said others are still in their rented rooms.

Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama, who went to the fire scene to monitor the situation, earlier said he is helping equip the firefighters with needed equipment to put out the blaze.

The firefighters had difficulty penetrating the area due to narrow alleys and thick smoke, particularly at the mall's third floor, he added.

The fire is not yet under control, but the blaze is already confined at the mall. Firefighters have broken the windows to be able to get into the building.

Susette Abellanosa, owner of Simply Fab store in Robinson’s Mall, said she was on her way to Simala Church in southern Cebu when she was informed by her employees about the fire.

Her employees, who opted to stay inside the building because they wanted to save whatever items from their store, were later rescued, Abellanosa told Sun.Star.

She said she will go inside the mall once allowed to gather whatever is left.

Mayor Rama earlier told the store owners to wait for the firefighter's advice. They were also told to bring flash lights once they go inside.

Rama said the firefighters are trying hard to declare the fire under control.

But while the firefighters were busy putting out the fire at the mall, another fire broke out at a residential area in Salinas Driver, Barangay Lahug this city.

Some of the firefighters were shortly pulled out from Robinson’s to respond to the fire in Lahug. They, however, were told to go back a few minutes later, as residents at Salinas Driver were able to put the fire under control, radio reports said.

A member of the opposition urged President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III today to “get to the bottom” of Senator Panfilo Lacson’s alleged use of fake travel documents.

Zambales Rep. Mitos Magsaysay said the Aquino administration should not condone the act “[since] a sitting senator violated the law of using fake documents.”

She said if Aquino fails to give this proper attention “then he is definitely coddling wrongful acts as long as it is done by his allies. Nasaan ngayon ang matuwid na daan?”

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and Philippine consulates abroad earlier said they did not issue any travel document to Senator Panfilo Lacson.

In a letter dated March 31, Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Rafael Seguis told Justice Secretary Leila de Lima “the DFA’s Property Division said that Philippine Travel Document with Serial Number 34258 is still with the department and has not yet been sent out to any particular post.”

Lacson supposedly used the travel document to return back to the country after more than a year in hiding.

“The Philippine Consulates General in Hong Kong, Macau, Xiamen and Guangzhou have denied issuing a travel document to Senator Lacson,” Seguis added.

The consulates there also stressed that the travel document with the same serial number “is not within the series of Philippine Travel Documents issued to them.”

Malacañang said it will already leave the matter to the Department of Justice.

The Bureau of Customs (BOC) destroyed Friday P300-million worth of counterfeit items in its bid to address smuggling and erase the country’s reputation as dumping ground of fake items.

Customs Commissioner Angelito Alvarez said today’s condemnation of fake goods, which include imitations of Energizer batteries and various articles of popular brands like Louis Vuitton, Channel, Gucci, Lacoste, Breitling and Nike, is one of the biggest that the agency conducted.

These items were imported by Multikarat Enterprises and Portwings Trading in violation of the country’s Intellectual Property Law.

Alvarez has ordered the immediate prosecution of people, both the private individuals and their cohorts in BOC, involved in the smuggling of these goods, to stress the agency’s stand that “smuggling (is) unprofitable and corruption (is) a shameful crime.”

“(This) stems from our desire to rid the country of the stigma of being referred to as a dumping ground for fake goods,” he said.

Relatively, Customs Intelligence and Investigation Service Director Filomeno Vicencio Jr. is hopeful that the agency’s strengthened anti-smuggling drive “would go a long way in planting the seed of fear and uncertainty in the hearts and minds of smugglers of fake consumer items.”

“Importation of counterfeit commodities is a serious concern not only because of its negative effect on the country’s reputation but also because of the way it discourages brand owners from investing in the country,” he added.

By U.S. News Agency / Asian

South Korea ranked third out of Asian nations according to an English Proficiency Index announced on March 30 by Education First, a global education center.

Korea, with an overall ranking of 13th, overtook Japan (at 14th) and Taiwan at (25th).

From 2007 to 2009, Education First conducted online English tests on 2.3 million working adults all from over the world. English proficiency was tested in four categories â€" grammar, vocabulary, reading and listening.

Among Asian countries, Korea’s 54.19 points followed only Malaysia (9th) with 55.54 points and Hong Kong (12th) with 54.44 points. Koreans’ English proficiency can be considered relatively high considering that Korea’s official language is not English. Malaysia and Hong Kong, however, use English as one of their official languages.

The overall English proficiency of an average Korean adult also rated “above average.” South Korea placed among the top tier nations by ranking 13 out of 44 non-native countries.

English education is important in Korea, Education First says, citing Korea’s efforts to promote early English education in public schools and the emphasis on English education in private education.

In Asia’s case, the gap between nations in English proficiency was largely affected by the level of political stability and economic power of the country as well as the educational zeal of the people. Overall English ability was highest in Northern European countries such as Norway, the Netherlands and Denmark, with Sweden and Finland following closely behind.

In places where the public education system is relatively weak, the English proficiency of the people also rated poorly. Argentina, ranking 16th in total, scored highest among Central and South American nations with 53.49 points.

By U.S. News Agency / Asian

Jollibee Foods Corporation (JFC) has suspended Mang Inasal’s ad placements on TV5′s Willing Willie following the child abuse controversy involving a six-year old boy who was asked to dance on the show, reports Inquirer.net.

JFC’s Corporate Media team announced the decision on its Facebook page on Saturday, April 2, 2011: “Mang Inasal will be holding off their ad placements from Willing Willie this week. We will continue to monitor the issue and await the results of the investigation. The whole JFC group, will remain committed to upholding the welfare of children. â€" JFC Corporate Media.”

According to Inquirer.net, JFC’s media representative Pauline Lao sent a letter to Froilan Grate of the Facebook group Para Kay Jan-jan (Shame on you Willie Revillame) saying the company is “aware of the issues and the various sentiments raised” following the March 12 episode where six-year old contestant Jan-Jan Estrada was egged on to dance, simulating a striptease, in exchange for P10,000 in prize money.

“We trust that the appropriate and expert institutions will also respond and look into this matter with urgency,” Lao told Inquirer.net. Lao also clarified that JFC’s other fastfood chains such as Jollibee, Chowking, Greenwich and Red Ribbon, do not have ad placements on the show.

Activist lawyer Ipat Luna has also called on other advertisers to pull out of Revillame’s show. Luna’s letter was also sent to Oishi, Yakult, Unilever, Bench, Camella-Vista Land Company, CDO Karne Norte, Belo Medical Group, and Cebuana Lhuillier.

Oishi has responded to the letter and said, “While we, as advertisers, do not control the actual execution and their artists during the show, we also want to do our part to avoid these unfortunate incidents.” They also described the incident as “regretful” and is reviewing possible actions which can yield positive results.

The Movie and Television Review and Classification Board’s (MTRCB) hearing has been scheduled to review the episode for appropriate action. Froilan Grate of the Facebook group Para Kay Jan-jan (Shame on you Willie Revillame), has also posted the names and contact details of the company heads of the advertisers on Willing Willie to urge the public to let them know of their sentiments against the show.

 

A Filipino inventor has developed a handy radiation shield gadget which he claims cannot only detect radiation at home but also ward off this deadly atmospheric pollutant.

The inventor, Rod Brutas, said he invented the anti-radiation device in 2003 but lack of funds and support prevented him from going into mass production.

He said he is looking for a financier, domestic or foreign, to bank roll in the mass production of his invention at a time when the Philippines and the rest of the global community are being threatened with radioactive contamination from Japan’s leaking nuclear power plant.

Brutas, a born-again Christian pastor, describes his invention as “God’s gift to me and I thank the Lord for giving such talent in the field of invention.”

“I’m ready to share my God-given knowledge to the Filipinos and all humanity,” he said.

The gadget, which is similar in size with that a mobile phone, can be carried around anywhere, anytime, Brutas said.

He demonstrated to this writer how his radiation shield device works. The demonstration was held at the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) in Taguig City Tuesday.

During the demonstration, Brutas held in his hand a small antenna that sways sideways, tracking down any radiation presence inside the room.

After a few seconds, the antenna points to his right, an indication the device had detected small amount of radiation which Brutas said “came from the lighted fluorescent bulbs.”

He said appliances such as computers, television sets and fluorescent bulbs emit some amount of radiation.

“But once you have the device called radiation shield, radiation is contained once the device points to the left,” Brutas said.

Brutas’ invention has been dormant for over seven years now but the recent nuclear accidents in Japan following an earthquake and tsunami have sent global scare of radioactive fallout.

For one, the damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant has taken an alarming possible breach of radioactive contaminated water in the area but could surge beyond the territorial waters of Japan.

Reports said that radioactivity was recorded at 1,250 times higher than normal with the dumping of large amounts of potentially corrosive seawater onto the reactors.

The radiation shield device invented by Brutas may yet be the ultimate solution of protecting from any radiation from Japanese reactors damaged by the recent earthquake and tsunami that hit the Land of the Rising Sun.

Despite some signs of hope in the past week at Japan’s troubled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, conditions have taken an increasingly alarming turn, with a possible breach at one of the reactors and highly radioactive water found leaking from that and two other reactors.

By U.S. News Agency / Asian

Renowned Filipino artist Ronald Ventura’s painting “Grayground” has sold for HK$ 8,420,000 or P46,995,832.65 at the Sotheby’s Modern and Contemporary Southeast Asian Paintings auction held on April 4 in Hong Kong.

The graphite, oil, and acrylic on canvas piece, which measures 60 inches by 155 3/4 inches (nearly four meters long), set a new auction record and beat Filipina artist Geraldine Javier’s oil-on-canvas Ella Amo’ Apasionadamente y Fue Correspondida (For She Loved Fiercely, And She is Well Loved), which raked in HK$1,460,000 in an auction last year.

With more than 10 awards to his name, the University of Santo Tomas fine arts graduate is currently the country’s top-selling Filipino artist. Venturas have been selling for five to six dollar digits in auction houses abroad.

Other Filipino artists whose work was sold at the auction include Ronald Caringal, Lynard Paras, Kiko Escora, Janet Balbarona, Rodel Tapaya, Andres Barrioquinto, Marina Cruz, Arturo Sanchez, Nona Garcia, Jon Jaylo, Danilo E. Dalena, MM Yu, Wawi Navarroza, Onib Olmedo, among others.

By U.S. News Agency / Asian

One of the biggest foreign investments snared so far by the administration of Philippine President Aquino is about to bear fruit with the impending completion of Coca-Cola’s bottling plant in the province of Misamis Oriental.

According to officials of Coca-Cola Bottlers Philippines Inc., the facility-one of the largest in the region and rivaling its main facility in Sta. Rosa, Laguna, in size-was the centerpiece of the US$1-billion investment program committed by the company to the government during the President’s US visit last year.

Part of the resources used for the purchase of the 11-hectare property in the town of Villanueva and the construction of the facilities came from the initial investment committed through former President Arroyo in 2009.

The rest, including the purchase of machinery and equipment, as well as employee training, were taken from the fresh investment last year.

“The construction of our Villanueva Plant in Misamis Oriental is on track and should be operational in a couple of months,” said Coca-Cola’s country CEO Bill Schultz. “This will be one of our largest plants in the region and is expected to generate significant employment opportunities in the area.”

According to the Coca-Cola official, the Philippines ranked on the top 10 of all markets globally for the company’s beverage products.

Last year, Coca-Cola Philippines recorded double-digit growth, led by its flagship brand Coca-Cola. The company also recently expanded a no-added preservatives formulation of the Minute Maid Pulpy brand with real pulp and juice.

“We remain committed to the Philippines, where we will celebrate 100 years in business in 2012, and uphold our confidence in the Philippine economy and the continued growth of our brands,” Schultz said.

The Coca-Cola Co., which operates 23 plants and 47 sales offices with more than 7,000 employees across the Philippines, will focus the rest of the investment on marketing and logistics.

“We also continue to invest in the community. Currently The Coca-Cola Co. has built 80 Little Red Schoolhouses in remote areas in the Philippines, benefiting over 40,000 students,” Schultz said. “Now the Coca-Cola Foundation is working at constructing an additional 20 Little Red Schoolhouses to reach our goal of 100 Little Red Schoolhouses by 2012, the 100th year anniversary of Coca-Cola in the Philippines.”

Coca-Cola has been in the Philippines since the beginning of the 20th century and has been locally producing its flagship product since 1927, with the country subsequently receiving the first non-US national Coca-Cola bottling and distribution franchise.

America's 20 Most Miserable Cities

California has never looked less golden, with eight of its cities making the top 20 on our annual list.
 
Arnold Schwarzenegger was sworn in as the governor of California at the end of 2003 amid a wave of optimism that his independent thinking and fresh ideas would revive a state stumbling after the recall of Gov. Gray Davis.

The good vibes are a distant memory: The Governator exited office last month with the state facing a crippling checklist of problems including massive budget deficits, high unemployment, plunging home prices, rampant crime and sky-high taxes. Schwarzenegger's approval ratings hit 22% last year, a record low for any sitting California governor.

California's troubles helped it land eight of the 20 spots on our annual list of America's Most Miserable Cities, with Stockton ranking first for the second time in three years.

Located in the state's Central Valley, Stockton has been ravaged by the housing bust. Median home prices in the city tripled between 1998 and 2005, when they peaked at $431,000. Now they are back to where they started, as the median price is forecast to be $142,000 this year, according to research firm Economy.com, a decline of 67% from 2005. Foreclosure filings affected 6.9% of homes last year in the Stockton area, the seventh-highest rate in the nation, according to online foreclosure marketplace RealtyTrac.

Stockton's violent crime and unemployment rates also rank among the 10 worst in the country, although violent crime was down 10% in the latest figures from the FBI. Jobless rates are expected to decline or stay flat in most U.S. metro areas in 2011, but in Stockton, unemployment is projected to rise to 18.1% in 2011 after averaging 17.2% in 2010, according to Economy.com.

Stockton has issues that it needs to address, but an article like this is the equivalent of bayoneting the wounded," says Bob Deis, Stockton city manager. "I find it unfair, and it does everybody a disservice. The people of Stockton are warm. The sense of community is fantastic. You have to come here and talk to leaders. The data is the data, but there is a richer story here."

There are many ways to gauge misery. The most famous is the Misery Index developed by economist Arthur Okun, which adds unemployment and inflation rates together. Okun's index shows the U.S. is still is in the dumps despite the recent gains in the economy: It averaged 11.3 in 2010 (blame a 9.6% unemployment rate and not inflation), the highest annual rate since 1984.

Our list of America's Most Miserable Cities goes a step further: We consider a total of 10 factors, things that people gripe about around the water cooler every day. Most are serious issues, including unemployment, crime and taxes. A few we factor in are not as critical, but still elevate people's blood pressure, like the weather, commute times and how the local sports team is doing.

One of the biggest issues causing Americans angst the past four years is the value of their homes. To account for that we tweaked the methodology for this year's list and considered foreclosure rates and the change in home prices over the past three years. Click here for a more detailed rundown of our methodology.

Florida and California have ample sunshine in common, but also massive housing problems that have millions of residents stuck with underwater mortgages. The two states are home to 16 of the top 20 metros in terms of home foreclosure rates in 2010. The metro area with the most foreclosure filings (171,704) and fifth-highest rate (7.1%) last year is Miami, which ranks No. 2 on our list of Most Miserable Cities.

The good weather and lack of a state income tax are the only things that kept Miami out of the top spot. In addition to housing problems (prices are down 50% over three years), corruption is off the charts, with 404 government officials convicted of crimes this decade in South Florida. Factor in violent crime rates among the worst in the country and long commutes, and it's easy to understand why Miami has steadily moved up our list, from No. 9 in 2009 to No. 6 last year to the runner-up spot this year.

California cities take the next three spots: Merced (No. 3), Modesto (No. 4) and Sacramento (No. 5). Each has struggled with declining home prices, high unemployment and high crime rates, in addition to the problems all Californians face, like high sales and income taxes and service cuts to help close massive budget shortfalls.

The Golden State has never looked less golden. "If I even mention California, they throw me out of the office," says Ron Pollina, president of site selection firm Pollina Corporate Real Estate. "Every company hates California."

Last year's most miserable city, Cleveland, fell back to No. 10 this year despite the stomach punch delivered by LeBron James when he announced his exit from Cleveland on national television last summer. Cleveland's unemployment rate rose slightly in 2010 to an average of 9.3%, but the city's unemployment rank improved relative to other cities, thanks to soaring job losses across the U.S. Cleveland benefited from a housing market that never overheated and therefore hasn't crashed as much as many other metros. Yet Cleveland was the only city to rank in the bottom half of each of the 10 categories we considered.

Two of the 10 largest metro areas make the list. Chicago ranks seventh on the strength of its long commutes (30.7 minutes on average--eighth-worst in the U.S.) and high sales tax (9.75%---tied for the highest). The Windy City also ranks in the bottom quartile on weather, crime, foreclosures and home price trends.

President Obama's (relatively) new home also makes the cut at No. 16. Washington, D.C., has one of the healthiest economies, but problems abound. Traffic is a nightmare, with commute times averaging 33.4 minutes--only New York is worse. Income tax rates are among the highest in the country and home prices are down 27% over three years.

And it does not get much more miserable than the sports scene in Washington. Beltway fans should be grateful for the NHL's Capitals, their only major pro team to finish out of the basement in the last two seasons. The Nationals (MLB), Redskins (NFL) and Wizards (NBA) have all finished in last place in their respective divisions the past two years.

No. 1 Stockton, California
Unemployment has averaged 14.3% the past three years, which is third worst in the country among the 200 largest metro areas. The housing market collapsed as well, with home prices down 58% over the same time. All the California cities on the list are struggling with the inherent problems the state is facing, including high sales and income taxes and service cuts to help close massive budget shortfalls.

No. 2 Miami, Florida
The sun and lack of a state income tax are the only things keeping Miami out of the top spot. Foreclosures hit one in 14 homes last year. Corruption is also off the charts, with 404 government officials convicted of crimes this decade in South Florida.

No. 3 Merced, California
The economic downturn and busted housing market hit Merced harder than any other area in the country. Average unemployment of 16.2% since 2008 is the highest in the U.S., as is the city's 64% drop in median home prices.

No. 4 Modesto, California
The median home was valued at $275,000 in 2006; today it is $95,000. And don't leave your car on the street in Modesto, where 3,712 vehicles were stolen in 2009, making for the second-highest auto theft rate in the country. It ranked first in four of the previous five years

No. 5 Sacramento, California
No state taxes $50,000 of income like California, with a rate of 9.55% for that middle-class tax bracket. Sacramento is a one-team sports town, and that team has been awful in recent years. The NBA's Kings have won just 26% of their games the past two-plus seasons.

No. 6 Memphis, Tennessee
Tennessee is one of nine states without an income tax (it does tax dividends and interest income), yet it hits residents with one of the highest sales tax rates in the U.S. at 9.25%. Violent crime was down 5% in 2009 according to the FBI, but still is tops in the country.

No. 7 Chicago, Illinois
Baseball's Cubs used to be lovable losers, but $140 million payrolls and 102 years and counting without a World Series title is miserable. Chicago had the highest sales tax among big cities at 10.25%, but it was rolled back to 9.75% last year and now matches Los Angeles and Oakland for the top rate.

No. 8 West Palm Beach, Florida
The West Palm-Boca Raton area might sound glamorous with its beaches and million-dollar ocean-front homes. The reality is much different as the median home is worth $225,000, down 39% the past three years. Prices are expected to fall a further 22% this year as foreclosures continue to affect the housing market. Unemployment was recently at 12.3%.

No. 9 Vallejo, California
This one-time Navy town became the largest California city to file for bankruptcy when it entered Chapter 9 protection in 2008. Unemployment is expected to average 12.5% this year, up from 4.9% five years ago.

No. 10 Cleveland, Ohio
Last year's most miserable city drops back thanks to a housing market that never overheated and therefore hasn't crashed like many other metros'. The weather is lousy, corruption persistent and it's a tortured sports market, with no championships since 1964. LeBron James' departure delivered the latest cruel blow last summer.

No. 11 Flint, Michigan
Weather, crime and unemployment are some of the top misery factors in the birthplace of General Motors. Flint's downward spiral is tied to GM's pullout from the city; GM employment in Flint has fallen from 80,000 in the 1970s to less than 8,000 today.

No. 12 Toledo, Ohio
A recent economic analysis of the Toledo metro forecast that employment would not return to pre-recession levels until after 2025. Unemployment has averaged 10.6% during the past three years.

No. 13 Fort Lauderdale, Florida
The party has slowed down at this popular vacation destination. The area's economy sagged 7% between 2007 and 2009, and it has been one of the hardest-hit areas in the country with foreclosures.

No. 14 Youngstown, Ohio
Youngstown has been on a steady decline since the steel mills started closing in the 1970s. Empty buildings continue to plague the city, with the vacancy rate 20 times the national average. This helped drive the average sales price for a home down to around $17,000 last year.

No. 15 Detroit, Michigan
Crime, unemployment and foreclosures are among the many problems bedeviling Detroit. Motown has closed 59 schools the past two years, and a recent study suggested that the city will need to close half of the remaining 142 public schools over the next two years. The moves would lead to high school class sizes of 62 students.

No. 16 Washington, District of Columbia
Washington has one of the healthiest economies in the country, thanks to spending by the federal government, but only New York area residents have worse commutes. And those Washington Redskins? Truly miserable.

No. 17 Fresno, California
Despite the ongoing economic recovery, unemployment is forecast to average 16% next year in Fresno, the highest rate among the 75 largest metro areas in the U.S.

No. 18 Salinas, California
Salinas has arguably the best weather in the country, but it can't mask other problems. Home prices have fallen a staggering 61% over the past three years.

No. 19 Jacksonville, Florida
In addition to high crime and foreclosures, Jacksonville's lone pro sports team has caused residents misery. The NFL's Jaguars have just one playoff win the past decade. Fans lashed out at owner Wayne Weaver when he announced that coach Jack Del Rio would be back in 2011 for a ninth season.

No. 20 Bakersfield, California
The residents of Bakersfield are among the most uneducated in the country, with only 15% possessing a college degree and 70% a high school diploma. The U.S. averages are 28% and 85%, respectively.

America's Most Affordable Cities

Omaha is tops when it comes to home affordability and making ends meet.
 
Billionaire Warren Buffett has made Omaha, Neb., synonymous with savvy stock investing, but the city is also highly attractive for those seeking an affordable lifestyle. In fact, the Midwestern metro ranks No. 1 on our Best Bargain Cities list.

To compile our bargain city list, we started with the 50 largest U.S. Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) and then compiled a mix of data aimed at handicapping the overall affordability of living in each.

We looked at the current median asking price of homes on the market in each city, using data from Altos Research, a San Francisco-based real estate research firm. We got the median salaries of workers with bachelor's degrees or higher from PayScale.com and compared it to a cost-of-living index from Moody's Economy.com (the cost-of-living index factors in transportation, insurance, food, utilities and other factors). Finally, we factored in the latest unemployment rates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to reflect the relative strength of local economies.

The result is a list of the top 15 urban affordability hot spots.

Omaha Stakes
As the home of major corporations like Union Pacific ( UNP - news - people ), ConAgra Foods ( CAG - news - people ) and Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway ( BRK - news - people ), Omaha boasts inexpensive real estate, a low cost of living and an unemployment rate little more than half the national average.

"Its home prices have stayed steady through the recession, owing to the fact that they never saw the inflation of the bubble era," explains Tara-Nicholle Nelson, consumer educator for Trulia.com. "In Omaha, it seems to be steady as she goes."

The Midwest dominated our bargain city list. Other heartland metropolises offering good deals include Indianapolis, Ind. (No.4); Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn. (No. 7); Oklahoma's namesake city (No. 9) and Tulsa (No. 15); and Ohio's three largest metros, Cincinnati (No. 5), Cleveland (No. and Columbus (No. 13).

Indianapolis, Kansas City and Ohio's three enclaves have real estate deals available at low price points. Although Oklahoma City and Tulsa offer some of the lowest median salaries among the 50 MSAs ranked, their home costs are also near the bottom, making both cities highly affordable.

At $249,000, the current median asking price for homes in Minneapolis-St. Paul remains higher than those of its neighbors on our list. The Twin Cities make up for it in quality of life, touting low unemployment rates and a healthy cost of living vs. salary.

"Minneapolis-St. Paul has very strong institutions of medical research and higher education, a highly educated population and a desirable amenity base," says Stuart Gabriel, director of the Ziman Center for real estate at the University of California Los Angeles.

"Minneapolis has weathered the downturn better than most places and its prospects continue to look relatively bright," says Gabriel, who has researched the quality of life as it relates to real estate economics.

Motor City ... Rocks?
Surprising but true, Detroit, the Michigan metro known best for cars, crime and urban decay, took third place on our list.

Detroit is a rough place with a staggering 13.3% unemployment rate and a high per capita crime rate, according to Federal Bureau of Investigation data. Its foreclosure rate is among the 10 highest in the U.S. There were 45,000 Real Estate Owned (REO) residences in the Motor City as of last November, according to online foreclosure site RealtyTrac.

That said, if you have a college degree under your belt and a steady job to show up to, your money gets great mileage in Detroit. The median salary for degree-toting workers is $60,600 (15th out of the 50 cities) while the cost of living remains super cheap (second out of 50).

With a median asking price of $132,635, Detroit homes are dirt-cheap. Gabriel warns that "the low house prices in Detroit are no accident. They're a reflection of depressed land values, depressed amenities, depressed employment."

In other words, don't expect this overall housing market's value to rise anytime soon. Some experts believe it may even depreciate further in 2011. Detroit is a deal only for stably employed residents looking to buy a long-term home.

Couple that with a blossoming arts community and the tentative hope that Detroit's auto industry is resurrecting itself, and this city is a haven for pioneering bargain-hunters.

Other metros ripe for a homemade deal? The Northeast blue-collar hubs of Buffalo, N.Y. (No. 2) and Pittsburgh, Pa., (No. 6); southern belle, Raleigh, N.C., (No. 11); and two Lone Star cities, Houston (No. 10) and Dallas (No. 14).

1. Omaha, Nebraska
Asking Price Rank: 9
Salary Rank: 43
Cost-of-Living Rank: 5
Unemployment Rank: 1

2. Buffalo, New York
Asking Price Rank: 2
Salary Rank: 47
Cost-of-Living Rank: 1
Unemployment Rank: 12

3. Detroit, Michigan
Asking Price Rank: 1
Salary Rank: 15
Cost-of-Living Rank: 2
Unemployment Rank: 48

4. Indianapolis, Indiana
Asking Price Rank: 7
Salary Rank: 31
Cost-of-Living Rank: 4
Unemployment Rank: 24

5. Cincinnati, Ohio
Asking Price Rank: 4
Salary Rank: 25
Cost-of-Living Rank: 6
Unemployment Rank: 32

6. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Asking Price Rank: 5
Salary Rank: 41
Cost-of-Living Rank: 9
Unemployment Rank: 13

7. Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota
Asking Price Rank: 28
Salary Rank: 17
Cost-of-Living Rank: 19
Unemployment Rank: 5

8. Cleveland, Ohio
Asking Price Rank: 6
Salary Rank: 34
Cost-of-Living Rank: 3
Unemployment Rank: 27

9. Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Asking Price Rank: 8
Salary Rank: 50
Cost-of-Living Rank: 10
Unemployment Rank: 4

10. Houston, Texas
Asking Price Rank: 20
Salary Rank: 5
Cost-of-Living Rank: 29
Unemployment Rank: 19

11. Raleigh, North Carolina
Asking Price Rank: 29
Salary Rank: 11
Cost-of-Living Rank: 24
Unemployment Rank: 14

12. Columbus, Ohio
Asking Price Rank: 13
Salary Rank: 37
Cost-of-Living Rank: 8
Unemployment Rank: 21

13. Kansas City, Missouri
Asking Price Rank: 12
Salary Rank: 30
Cost-of-Living Rank: 13
Unemployment Rank: 25

14. Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas
Asking Price Rank: 22
Salary Rank: 13
Cost-of-Living Rank: 30
Unemployment Rank: 17

15. Tulsa, Oklahoma
Asking Price Rank: 11
Salary Rank: 44
Cost-of-Living Rank: 12
Unemployment Rank: 16

Earlier this year Sauter Carbon Offset Design unveiled its Super Nova 60 megayacht  â€" a design which harnesses energy from a variety of sustainable sources including solar, wind and waves to produce "the world’s first carbon neutral megayacht." Now the company has gone one step further with plans for its Ocean Empire Life Support Vessel (LSV). This 144-foot Catamaran design adds hydroponic farming to its array of sustainable technologies making it, according to the designers, the world’s first totally self-sufficient zero carbon LSV ... meaning it could theoretically stay at sea indefinitely.

The Ocean Empire LSV is a 44 m (144 ft) long Superyacht Catamaran that achieves its total self sufficiency thanks to two hydroponic farms measuring a total of 30 m2 (323 ft2), fishing facilities to harvest the ocean’s bounty, and by harnessing energy from a variety of sustainable sources.

The first and foremost sustainable energy source is the Sun, which lights the two hydroponic farms and is also harnessed via a 400 m2 (4,305 ft2) 70 kW SunPower solar array. To capture wind power, an auxiliary 80 m2 (861 ft2) 200 kW automated skysail is used that can drive the Ocean Empire to over 18 knots and is also used to charge the vessel’s GM ESS2 battery systems.

Lastly, Motion Damping Regeneration (MDR) technology is used to capture energy from the waves. The company says the MDR system is basically an adjustable tuned mass dampener (ATMD) like those used in skyscrapers, such as Taipei 101, to reduce their swaying motion. In the case of the Ocean Empire, the yacht’s 16 tons of batteries are the mass, while linear generators produce up to 50 kWs of electricity as they dampen the motion of the vessel.

The Ocean Empire LSV also packs a Daimler Turbo Compound DD16 BlueTec diesel electric engine capable of producing 350 kW.

“The Ocean Empire LSV leads the way in freeing the Superyacht community from its strict dependence on unsustainable resources by being the first to harness the renewable collective resources ever present in the Earths Biosphere,” says Richard Sauter, head of design at Sauter Carbon Offset Design.

The company says the Ocean Empire uses existing OEM products meaning it will cost little more than conventional superyachts, while providing a range of operation ranging from carbon neutral to zero carbon cruising. Additionally, when the vessel is plugged into shore power it is capable of feeding 360 MW-h of electricity into the grid. Sauter Design says this is enough to make up to 12,000 nautical miles of carbon neutral voyages every year.

So how much for this ocean going independence and environmentally-friendly peace of mind? Sauter says prices for the Ocean Empire LSV, which is designed as a charter vessel that can house 10 guests in addition to eight crew, start at around US$17 million.

Sauter Carbon Offset Design will build the vessel to order with delivery taking around 18 months.

A YOUNG Filipina from Buckhorn High School in Madison County, Alabama has been awarded as Waff 48 Star Student for her impressive performance in the field of art.

Waff is a television network affiliate for Huntsville, Alabama and is broadcasting on channel 48.

Greet your friends and families this Sinulog season. Sun.Star covers Sinulog 2011 live!

Andrea Arrojado, 16, spent her earlier school years in the Philippines, studying in Cebu Bradford School, 7th Day Adventist Center, and St. Alphonsus Catholic School. The Arrojado family moved to the United States in 2009.

Bob Arrojado, Andrea's father, said that they used to live in Upper Camputhaw Purok 4 in Cebu City.

Waff 48 News said: "There are many facets to this quiet young lady with a sweet smile, but her art teacher simply sums her up in one word: Impressive."

Andrea is now a high school sophomore in Buckhorn High School. She excels not only in her art classes but in other subjects as well.

MANILA -- If it were up to Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago, candidates for any public position will have to pass an IQ test before running for office.

At a speech at the Philippine National Police headquarters Monday, Santiago said the 1987 Constitution should be changed to raise the standards for public officials.

At present, the constitution only requires candidates to be able to read and write. This was at odds with a law that makes a college degree a requirement for candidates to the police force, the lawmaker added.

She said chiefs of police must be required to have postgraduate degrees before being promoted, while dubbing that the current situation as "absurd".

"First, we must weed out the idiots. Then, we should weed out those who do not have a college degree. The world has changed, and leaders are required to possess analytical and critical faculties," she pointed out.

MANILA -- The airline ground attendant who was berated by a neophyte party-list lawmaker has filed an ethics complaint at the House of Representatives on Monday.

Before trooping to the Batasan Pambansa, Philippine Airlines (PAL) Customer Service Agent 3 Sara Bonnin-Ocampo also filed a criminal complaint at the Office of the Ombudsman for grave slander.

She also flied serious misconduct and conduct unbecoming of a high ranking official against Alliance of Volunteer Educators (AVE) party-list Representative Eulogio “Amang” Magsaysay.

The complaint, filed at the House Committee on Ethics, is for grave abuse of authority, conduct unbecoming of a high ranking official, and solicitation of favor for personal gain using his public office.

According to Ocampo, the legislator called him a “menopausal bitch” after she failed to grant his request of seating beside his 10 and 13-year-old sons in a Los Angeles-bound flight last month.

Ocampo’s lawyer Bernadette Carasco said Magsaysay has not personally apologized to her client and has only asked for forgiveness through the media.

“Mag-apologize siya sa korte kasi korte ang magkakaron ng determination kung ano yung liabilities niya. This is a case that is very capable of repetition baka nga bago siya nakarating sa client ko, marami na siyang na-injure and baka marami pa siyang ma-injure in the future,” Carasco told reporters.

For his part, Magsaysay said he would apologize personally to the airline employee if given the chance.

“I'm willing to apologize anytime, anywhere. Since, reportedly, she has brought it to the House Ethics Committee, I just have to wait for further developments,” Magsaysay said in a text message.
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/breaking-news/ethics-complaint-vs-lawmaker-filed

A million people in the Philippines are more at risk from deadly deluges after expensive flood warning equipment was stolen, likely by scavengers for scrap metal, meteorologists warned Tuesday.

The state weather service said it had sought the help of police and local governments to help guard the rest of the sensors, which it suspects are being cannibalised by poor locals who sell them for scrap and quick cash.

A million people have been left without advance warning of flash floods after the theft of the sensors at Agno river and its Tarlac river tributary, said Ranny Ragasa, a member of the technical staff at the weather service.

"When there are heavy rains, 30 towns could easily go under water," said Ragasa, who mans the weather service's monitoring centre on the bank of the Agno.

Ragasa told AFP by phone that thefts of grounding rods for the sensors had occurred at five stations of the Agno and Tarlac since December.

"It's possible they sold the metal for scrap, not knowing how important these are to the operation of our stations," he said.

"These systems are worth millions of dollars," he said. "Repairing them would cost the government thousands (of dollars), but they might have sold for 200 pesos ($4.50) a kilogramme (2.2 pounds) at the scrapyard."

"If you're living in poverty, the temptation to steal is always there."

At least half a million people were affected during the last major flooding of the Agno basin during the height of Typhoon Parma in October 2009, Ragasa said.

Parma killed more than 400 people, according to government data.

Gunmen believed to be robbers shot to death five bed salesmen on a troubled southern Philippine island that is a haven for Islamic militants, authorities said Tuesday.

The men were transporting bed cushions and pillows when at least two armed men opened fire on their van on Basilan island on Monday, military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Randolph Cabangbang said.

Many armed gangs operate on Basilan, including Al Qaeda-linked militants blamed for the country's worst terrorist attacks. Kidnappings and murders plague the island.

But the scale of Monday's assault shocked even local officials, with Basilan deputy governor Al Rasheed Sakalahul expressing outrage.

"This is terrible. Five merchants were killed in this senseless attack. We are doing everything to identify the killers and the police are investigating this case," Sakalahul said.

Regional police chief Bienvenido Latag said the motive for the attack was still being determined, but initial investigations showed it could be robbery.

Thirty-six people have been arrested in the Philippines for illegally selling Internet sex to web users in the United States, authorities said Tuesday.

The 36 were arrested in a raid on Monday on a supposed Internet cafe that was actually being used to sell pictures and videos of naked women to US clients, said local police officer Myra Sapa.

Those detained would chat with clients via online messaging, posing as women and offering to disrobe and perform live sex acts in front of a webcam, said Sapa, based in the northern city of Dinalupihan where the raid took place.

"They would talk about sex and nudity until they convinced their clients to give them their credit card account number. Then they would send pictures and videos," she said.

"They pretended that they were these people on the videos. But it was not them. They were giving pre-recorded videos."

It was not known who the actual women on the videos were, said Sapa, adding they were not among those arrested in the raid.

The 36 face charges of distributing obscene material and for trafficking of women, Sapa said. If found guilty, they face years in jail.

Sapa said some men were among the 36 detained, and they had been posing as women when chatting online to the US clients. However she said the majority of those detained were women.

Cybersex dens, where women also disrobe and perform sex acts in return for payment from foreign viewers over the Internet, have become a growing problem in the impoverished Philippines, according to law enforcers and social workers.

The National Bureau of Investigation's computer crimes chief, Migdonio Congzon, told AFP in a recent interview that authorities were conducting raids on cybersex dens almost every week.

However the number of people arrested in Monday's raid made it one of the biggest to have been reported in the Philippines.

The Philippines, the world's biggest rice importer last year, plans to sharply cut its imports of the grain this year, the head of the state grains agency said Tuesday.

National Food Authority administrator Angelito Banayo, asked about rice import plans for the year, told reporters: "Much much lower, probably not even half -- probably one third." He would not give specific figures.

The size of Philippine rice imports means the country's trading plans affect global prices of the commodity.

The government is set to decide on the actual rice import volume on Friday, and the first tenders will probably be made next month, Banayo said.

Banayo said the government planned to cut imports because it already had a lot of rice stored from previous years.

The agriculture ministry set an import ceiling of 1.5 million tonnes of the cereal last year, but data from the grains agency's website said 2.13 million tonnes of rice were actually shipped into the country in 2010.

The data did not specify if the tenders for all these shipments were also made last year, or if some were made earlier.

Other officials from the grains agency contacted by AFP declined to comment on the discrepancy.

You've counted calories and walked and walked, but your skinny jeans still don't fit. What gives? We turned to the experts for tips on how to rev up your metabolism, increase lean muscle mass and avoid eating those extra calories that end up being stored as fat.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Skimping on Protein
Women lose about 5 pounds of muscle every decade (and gain an average of 15 pounds of fat), says Wayne Westcott, PhD, coauthor of Get Stronger, Feel Younger. Protein helps you build lean muscle, so make sure you're getting enough: If you're in your 30s, aim for 50 to 56 grams daily; in your 40s, you need 56 to 62 grams daily. Good sources include tuna and chicken breast (6 oz of either will give you 45 grams of protein).

Don't Make These Mistakes: Skipping Strength Training
Want to burn calories and fat even when you're sitting still? Then you need to increase your resting metabolic rate, and strength training (such as with light weights or resistance bands) is the key. Strength-train three times a week and you'll reduce your body fat percentage in about 10 weeks, says Dr. Westcott.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Underestimating How Much You Eat (and Overestimating How Much You Move)
Women tend to underestimate their daily intake by about 800 calories, says Elizabeth Somer, RD, author of 10 Habits That Mess Up a Woman's Diet. And a University of Florida study found that 47 percent of exercisers claimed they were working out at a moderate intensity, yet only 15 percent of them actually were. Keep a food and exercise journal so you can track your eating and exercise habits precisely.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Thinking Little Nibbles Don't Count
Whether it's grabbing candy off a colleagues desk or finishing your kid's fries, every bite averages about 25 calories. Have four extra bites a day and you'll gain a pound a month, Somer says. Stop mindless munching by only eating when food is on a plate or in a single-serving container.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Consuming Too Few Calories
Yes, cutting calories is crucial to weight loss, but go too low and your body goes into starvation mode, which slows your metabolism, says Kathy McManus, RD, director of the department of nutrition at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Never eat less than 1,200 calories a day. To figure out how many calories you need to maintain your current weight, go to caloriecontrol.org/calcalcs.html. If you want to lose a pound a week, subtract 500 calories.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Not Planning Ahead
Just saying you're going to watch what you eat or start exercising more isn't going to work unless you think about how those changes are going to fit into your day, says Libby Mills, RD, a lifestyle coach in Philadelphia. If you want to stick to an exercise plan, for example, write workout sessions in your planner and stash sneakers in your car. Or if you're going out to dinner and know you want to splurge a little, cut back on snacks that day.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Not Working Out Hard Enough
To really torch fat and calories, you need to step up the intensity of your exercise. Turn your stroll into a power walk two to three times a week by alternating between 30 to 90 seconds of fast walking and 90 to 120 seconds of slower walking.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Doing the Same Workout All the Time
Mixing up your routine is key to burning the most fat and calories, says Brad Schoenfeld, a certified strength and conditioning specialist and author of Sculpting Her Body Perfect. Otherwise, your body adapts to the workout and goes on autopilot so you don't get as much out of it. So walk one day, do a DVD the next, then try a dance or aerobics class.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Feeding Your Emotions
When the line between physical and emotional hunger gets blurred, you can end up inhaling hundreds of extra calories. Think before you bite. Ask yourself, "Am I really hungry? Or am I just bored or upset?" If you're not sure, have a glass of water and wait at least 20 minutes. If you're still hungry, eat something healthy or a small amount of a food you're craving. "You're more likely to limit what you eat once you've waited it out," says Mills.

Don't Make These Mistakes: Buying Into Quick Fixes
No pill, drink or fad diet is going to magically peel off the pounds. To lose weight (and keep it off), you need to make changes to your overall diet and exercise habitsâ€"and be patient.

5 Tips to Keep You Motivated: Set Short- and Long-term Goals
Make them realistic so you don't get discouraged. Want to lose 20 pounds? Aim for five this month.

5 Tips to Keep You Motivated: Reward Yourself
Put a dollar in a jar every day you exercise for 30 minutes. Soon you'll be able to treat yourself to a new book or a manicure.

5 Tips to Keep You Motivated: Be Flexible
If the only exercise you do is outdoor walking, you'll end up doing nothing if it rains all week. Always have a backup plan.

5 Tips to Keep You Motivated: See the Old You
Dig out a photograph of yourself during a time when you liked your weight and appearance. Hang it on the fridge or in your bathroom.

5 Tips to Keep You Motivated: Build a Support System
Pair up with a friend who has time to meet for walks, share low-cal recipes and offer advice when you're tempted to stray.

5 Moves to Burn Fat: Stationary Lunge (Works Legs and Butt)
Try the workout on the following slides 2 to 3 times a week. All you need is a pair of dumbbells (3 to 5 pounds). Depending on your starting fitness level, do 1 to 3 sets of 8 to 12 repetitions for each move.

Stand with feet together with a dumbbell in each hand, hands at sides, palms facing thighs. Step right foot forward 1 to 2 feet and raise heel of left foot. Keeping torso tall, abs contracted and back straight, lower body toward floor until right thigh is about parallel to floor and left knee is almost touching floor. Check that right knee is aligned over ankle; if it's jutting past toes, separate feet more. Lift body back up and repeat. After one set, switch legs.

5 Moves to Burn Fat: Dumbbell Incline Press (Works Chest)
Sit on an incline bench with feet flat on floor. (You can also position a step bench so one end is higher than the other and lie face up on bench with head at higher end. Or sit in a reclining chair and tilt it back to a 45-degree angle.) Hold dumbbells in each hand and lift elbows to shoulder height. Palms should be facing forward. Without locking elbows, press weights up toward ceiling. Lower and repeat.

5 Moves to Burn Fat: Dumbbell Pull-over (Works Back, Shoulders)
Lie with feet flat on floor. Grasp a dumbbell with both hands and lift arms so hands are directly over chest, elbows slightly bent. Contract your abs; slowly lower dumbbell over and behind head until it almost touches the floor. Return to starting position and repeat.

5 Moves to Burn Fat: Trunk Extension (Works Lower Back)
Lie on your stomach, hands clasped loosely beneath chin. Keeping feet on floor and head in line with spine, lift upper body a few inches off floor. Lower and repeat.

5 Moves to Burn Fat: Crossover Curls (Works Abdominals)
Lie on your back with feet on floor, hip-width apart, and right hand behind head. Extend left arm toward right leg. Lift upper back off floor and turn torso to right, reaching left hand to outside of right knee and directing left shoulder toward right knee. Come back down and repeat. After one set, switch sides.

Remember how, during your teens and 20s, you could eat practically anything and not gain a pound? Now that you're hovering around middle age, you've probably found that's just not the case anymore. Part of the problem is that your metabolism decreases as a result of other age-related factors, like decrease in muscle mass. However, there's no need to give in to a bigger pant size just yet! Read on for eight ways to rev up your metabolism and keep those unwanted pounds from your waistline.

Do Intervals
Mixing in fast-paced intervals raises your metabolic rate higher than doing a steady cardio workout, and will continue to do so up to an hour after you’re done, says Kristin McGee, a trainer and Pilates instructor whose client list includes Tina Fey and Bethenny Frankel. An Australian study also found that women who did intervals while they were biking lost three times as much fat as those who worked out at a steady pace. If you’re a walker, simply walk at your normal pace for 1 to 2 minutes, then speed-walk for 30 to 60 seconds. Repeat the sequence 10 to 15 times.

Opt for Caffeine
It’s time to hit Starbucks. A study published in the journal Physiology & Behavior shows that coffee drinkers have a 16 percent higher metabolic rate than those who abstain or drink decaf joe, because caffeine increases your heart rate and stimulates your central nervous system. Spread out the cups over your entire day to keep your metabolism running at a boosted rateâ€"just be sure to have your last cup by early afternoon so you can hit the pillow with no problems later on.

Add Some Ice
Though the increase is modest, there is some evidence that drinking cold water can cause a slight surge in metabolic rate. Since your body maintains a core temperature around 98.6°F, cold water will be brought to that temperature after being consumed and calories are burned during the warming process. Discovery Health deduced that you can burn up to 70 extra calories a day if you follow the common rule of drinking eight 8-ounce glasses of cold water per day. Need another reason to up your water intake? Researchers at the University of Utah found that participants who drank half of the recommended amount of water per day (four 8-ounce glasses), not only showed signs of dehydration, they also experienced a 2% decrease in calories burned per day.

Eat a Big Breakfast
It’s time to nix the oatmeal with skim milk. Instead, start your day with a fatty breakfast, including eggs and even a piece of bacon, suggests Molly Bray, PhD, lead author of a recent study showing that a fat-filled morning meal will jumpstart your metabolism for the day faster than a lowfat, low-calorie breakfast. Another study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology found that people who eat 22 to 55 percent of their total calories at breakfast gain 1.7 pounds over four years. That’s not bad considering those who eat 0 to 11 percent of their calories in the morning gain nearly 3 pounds.

Drink Green Tea
Not only does green tea contain enough antioxidants to keep colds and the flu at bay, but it also does wonders for your metabolism, according to a study published in the journal Phytomedicine. Researchers found that people who drank the equivalent of three to five cups daily for three months shaved 5 percent off their body weight. Green tea contains ECGC, a plant compound that stimulates your metabolism, says Rania Batayneh, MPH, a nutritionist in private practice in San Francisco and Portland, Oregon, and founder of Essential Nutrition consulting.

Don't Skimp on Dairy
Calcium-rich foods and drinks, including milk, yogurt and cheese, increase the rate at which fat turns into waste, says a study by researchers at the University of Copenhagen published in the The Journal of Nutrition. It doesn’t matter what form of dairy product you’re consuming as long as the serving size is adequate (keep it lowfat!)â€"either a full glass of lowfat milk or 6 ounces of yogurt is perfect. Also, the study noted that you have to actually ingest the calcium in its natural form; supplements don’t work due to differences in the chemical makeup.

Build More Muscle
Gaining lean muscle mass boosts your metabolism and makes losing weight much easier, McGee says. If you add just 5 pounds of muscle to your body, you’ll burn up to 150 more calories per day without even working out those muscles. And, you can burn an average of 600 calories per hour during your cardio workout thanks to that extra muscle mass. “Muscle burns more calories than fat does, even at rest, so any strength-training activities to build lean muscle are excellent,” McGee says. The key is to challenge all your muscles and do a full-body strength-training workout, hitting your core, arms, legs, back and chest.

Pick Up Heavier Weights
By using heavy weights at a very slow rateâ€"twice as slow as would feel naturalâ€"you break down your muscles (you’ll know the weights are heavy enough and the workout slow enough if you start to shake after just a few lifts or squats). Researchers at Wayne State University found that when your body repairs those overworked muscles, it causes your metabolism to increase for up to three days after the workout.

Tyreke Evans half court game-winning buzzer beater Sacramento Kings vs. Memphis Grizzlies

Can you imagine being stucked for 4 hours in the port terminal waiting for your departure only to learn in the last minute that it's been delayed for 2 hours?
That's what I endured last Sunday when me and my family went home after spending christmas in Bohol. Arrrrrrrggggggggggghhhhhhh!!!.

MODERN PHILOSOPHIES

1. If your father is poor, it's your fate. But if your father-in-law is poor, it is your stupidity.
2. Love your neighbor but don't get caught.
3. The wise never marry. When they do, they become otherwise.
4. Love is photogenic. It needs darkness to develop.
5. Your future depends on your dreams. So, go to sleep.
6. Children in backseats cause accidents. Accidents in backseats cause children.
7. Save water. Shower with a partner.

The Rolling Stones said it best, “You, you make a dead man cum.”  A 38 year old female mortuary worker is being held on $250,000 bond after becoming pregnant by one of her clients-a dead man.  The alleged crime took place at the Mourning Glory Mortuary just outside of Lexington, Missouri.  Police have charged Felicity Marmaduke with desecration of the dead and necrophilia.

According to a statement made to police by Marmaduke, the alleged victim experienced a post mortem erection while being bathed.  Being alone, Marmaduke straddled the dead man and proceeded have sex with him.  Much to her surprise, the alleged victim came to orgasm after several minutes.  A few weeks later, Marmaduke had a positive pregnancy test while receiving a routine medical exam.  Upon telling her doctor the circumstances leading to the conception, the police were notified.  Marmaduke was arrested without incident at her dilapidated trailer home a few blocks from the mortuary.

In a bizarre twist, Marmaduke plans to sue the dead man’s estate for child support.

http://www.deadseriousnews.com/?p=524

One day a man saw a old lady, stranded on the side of the road, but even in the dim light of day, he could see she needed help. So he pulled up in front of her Mercedes and got out. His Pontiac was still sputtering when he approached her.  Even with the smile on his face, she was worried. No one had stopped to help for the last hour or so. Was he going to hurt her? He didn't look safe; he looked poor and hungry.  He could see that she was frightened, standing out there in the cold. He knew how she felt. It was that chill which only fear can put in you.

He said, 'I'm here to help you, ma'am. Why don't you wait in the car where it's warm? By the way, my name is Bryan Anderson.' Well, all she had was a flat tire, but for an old lady, that was bad enough. Bryan crawled under the car looking for a place to put the jack, skinning his knuckles a time or two. Soon he was able to change the tire. But he had to get dirty and his hands hurt.

As he was tightening up the lug nuts, she rolled down the window and began to talk to him. She told him that she was from St. Louis and was only just passing through. She couldn't thank him enough for coming to her aid. Bryan just smiled as he closed her trunk. The lady asked how much she owed him. Any amount would have been all right with her. She already imagined all the awful things that could have happened had he not stopped.

Bryan never thought twice about being paid. This was not a job to him. This was helping someone in need, and God knows there were plenty, who had given him a hand in the past. He had lived his whole life that way, and it never occurred to him to act any other way.  He told her that if she really wanted to pay him back, the next time she saw someone who needed help, she could give that person the assistance they needed, and Bryan added, 'And think of me.' He waited until she started her car and drove off. It had been a cold and depressing day, but he felt good as he headed for home, disappearing into the twilight. 

A few miles down the road the lady saw a small cafe. She went in to grab a bite to eat, and take the chill off before she made the last leg of her trip home. It was a dingy looking restaurant. Outside were two old gas pumps. The whole scene was unfamiliar to her. The waitress came over and brought a clean towel to wipe her wet hair. She had a sweet smile, one that even being on her feet for the whole day couldn't erase. The lady noticed the waitress was nearly eight months pregnant, but she never let the strain and aches change her attitude. The old lady wondered how someone who had so little could be so giving to a stranger. Then she remembered Bryan.

After the lady finished her meal, she paid with a hundred dollar bill. The waitress quickly went to get change f or her hundred dollar bill, but the old lady had slipped right out the door. She was gone by the time the waitress came back. The waitress wondered where the lady could be. Then she noticed something written on the napkin.

There were tears in her eyes when she read what the lady wrote: 'You don't owe me anything. I have been there too. Somebody once helped me out, the way I'm helping you. If you really want to pay me back, here is what you do: Do not let this chain of love end with you.' Under the napkin were four more $100 bills. Well, there were tables to clear, sugar bowls to fill, and people to serve, but the waitress made it through another day. That night when she got home from work and climbed into bed, she was thinking about the money and what the lady had written. How could the lady have known how much she and her husband needed it? With the baby due next month, it was going to be hard....

She knew how worried her husband was, and as he lay sleeping next to her, she gave him a soft kiss and whispered soft and low, 'Everything's going to be all right. I love you, Bryan Anderson.'

There is an old saying that goes: "What goes around comes around"...

tanpiro spring


balilihan plaza


during the reconstruction of mt. carmel hill belfry


mt. carmel parish church interior


the magsija swimming pool (before)


magsija road leading to canangcaan, corella


magsija road leading to canangcaan, corella


cristo rey statue


mt. carmel church ceiling paintings


mt. carmel church ceiling paintings and altar


carmel academy (BACS member school)


the newly renovated balilihan public market


BAITEC formerly puyat gym

Three teenagers who survived at least 50 days adrift in the Pacific in an aluminium dinghy said Wednesday their odyssey began when they went searching for more vodka after partying on the beach.

The boys, from the remote territory of Tokelau, who lived off rainwater and a seagull they captured during the ordeal, said they talked constantly about food as they prayed for rescuers to find them.

Edward Nasau, 14, denied reports that he and Samuel Perez and Filo Filo, both 15, had set off to find a girl from a neighbouring island who they had met earlier in the day.

"No, they are just rumours," he told reporters in Samoa, where the trio are waiting to return home later this month after a New Zealand fishing boat last week plucked them from the water.

"We were drinking and I was hanging out with other kids," he said. "Then they (Perez and Filo) came and we decided to go look for some more."

The boys, whose survival has been hailed as a miracle, said it was not until they had been at sea for two weeks that they admitted they were lost.

They were eventually found about 1,420 kilometres (880 miles) from their island home.

Nasau said while they saw no land while they were adrift, they did spot a boat one night "but it was too far to make the effort to wave them down".

Perez said his greatest fear was that his grandmother would become sick with worry and have a heart attack.

"Otherwise we slept most of the time, did some swimming and we talked", he said, prompting Nasau to interject: "And the talking was mostly about food."

They said they were looking forward to a meal of coconut crab and taro, a potato-like vegetable, when they got back to Tokelau, a New Zealand-administered territory of about 1,400 people.

Their home island of Atafu held memorial services in their absence, assuming they were dead and Nasau said a huge welcome party was planned for their return.

It was initially believed the boys left Atafu on October 5, based on search reports, but the Fiji navy, which transferred them from the fishing boat, said it could have been as early as September 24.

Nasau's uncle Kuresa Nasau, a senior official in Tokelau, said everyone at home was overjoyed at their survival.

"The reality that they are here with us is a miracle," he said.

He said the boys initially feared they would be censured over the teenage escapade that went wrong so dramatically.

"Meeting the boys for the first time was a joyous occasion. But there were moments of awkwardness," he said.

"Before they came to the room to see us for the first time, they were scared because of what they did. They were expecting me to give them scorn but there was never any of that we were just glad they were found."

The trio received treatment for severe dehydration in Fiji after their rescue but Kuresa Nasau said he was concerned the ordeal had left mental scars.

The boys would be taken to each village in Tokelau after their return so they could acknowledge the islanders' prayers and support for them, he said.

The official said he hoped everyone had learned a lesson from what had happened.

"It is something we do not wish to encourage," he said.

Communist rebels hijacked a bus in the Philippines Wednesday, triggering a high-speed chase and a gunbattle in which four people were killed, police said.

The attack came on the same day that rebel and government negotiators met in Hong Kong in a bid to jumpstart peace talks that have been stalled since 2004.

The New People's Army (NPA) rebels boarded the bus near San Francisco town, 200 kilometres (138 miles) south of Manila, and directed the driver to an area under their control, provincial police chief Superintendent Erickson Velasquez said.

Police and military personnel who were alerted to the hijack gave chase and the speeding bus was eventually stopped at an army checkpoint in a remote coastal area, Velasquez said in a statement.

The rebels fought back, triggering a gunbattle that left four people dead and two others wounded, according to Velasquez.

No details were immediately available as to the identity of those killed and wounded.

Authorities were also unable to say how long the chase lasted or how many people were on the bus when it was hijacked.

The 5,000-strong NPA is the armed unit of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), which has been waging a Maoist rebellion since 1969 that has left thousands of people dead.

President Benigno Aquino, who came to power in June, has called for peace with the rebels, urging them to disarm and disband before being reintegrated into mainstream society.

It was unclear how Wednesday's attack could affect the prospects of resuming peace talks, and negotiators from both sides were not immediately available for comment.

A private equity fund controlled by the Chinese government will become the Philippines' largest ferry operator as a result of deals announced by two major Philippine shipping firms on Wednesday.

Shipping line Negros Navigation will buy a 93.2-percent stake in Aboitiz Transport System (ATS), operator of the country's largest ferry service, for 105 million dollars, the firms said in a statement.

The merger will make Negros Navigation the biggest ferry operator in the Philippines, with 31 vessels.

At the same time, China-ASEAN Marine BV will take a controlling stake in Negros Navigation through an equity infusion, Aboitiz officials said.

China-ASEAN Marine is a wholly owned unit of the China-ASEAN Investment Cooperation Fund, a Dutch-based private equity fund launched by the China Export-Import Bank, the joint statement said.

The fund, announced by Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao last year, targets infrastructure, energy and natural resource investment opportunities in the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

The twin deals are expected to be completed in January next year, the statement said.

The size of China-ASEAN Marine's equity infusion into Negros Navigation, a privately held Philippine firm, was not disclosed.

However Erramon Aboitiz, chief executive of ATS's listed parent firm, Aboitiz Equity Ventures, said China-ASEAN Investment Cooperation Fund would become Negros Navigation's largest shareholder.

"We are very pleased to transfer the ownership of ATS to Nenaco and its principal shareholders, the Chinese-ASEAN Investment Cooperation Fund," Aboitiz said in a separate statement.

Nenaco chief executive Sulficio Tagud said his company now operated eight vessels in 13 ports, while ATS operated 18 vessels in 19 ports.

"With a strong balance sheet, the joint team is confident that the increased resources of the combined company will enable us to provide innovative services, enhanced frequency and improved customer care," Tagud said.

The Philippines is highly dependent on shipping for transporting cargo and people between its 7,107 islands.

LOS ANGELES - Leslie Nielsen, who traded in his dramatic persona for inspired bumbling as a hapless doctor in "Airplane!" and the accident-prone detective Frank Drebin in "The Naked Gun" comedies, died on Sunday in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He was 84.

The Canadian-born actor died from complications from pneumonia at a hospital near his home at 5:34 p.m., surrounded by his wife, Barbaree, and friends, his agent John S. Kelly said in a statement.

"We are saddened by the passing of beloved actor Leslie Nielsen, probably best remembered as Lt. Frank Drebin in 'The Naked Gun' series of pictures, but who enjoyed a more than 60-year career in motion pictures and television," said Kelly.

Nielsen came to Hollywood in the mid-1950s after performing in 150 live television dramas in New York. With a craggily handsome face, blond hair and 6-foot-2 height, he seemed ideal for a movie leading man.

Nielsen first performed as the king of France in the Paramount operetta "The Vagabond King" with Kathryn Grayson.

The film â€" he called it "The Vagabond Turkey" â€" flopped, but MGM signed him to a seven-year contract.

His first film for that studio was auspicious â€" as the space ship commander in the science fiction classic "Forbidden Planet." He found his best dramatic role as the captain of an overturned ocean liner in the 1972 disaster movie, "The Poseidon Adventure."

He became known as a serious actor, although behind the camera he was a prankster. That was an aspect of his personality never exploited, however, until "Airplane!" was released in 1980 and became a huge hit.

As the doctor aboard a plane in which the pilots, and some of the passengers, become violently ill, Nielsen says they must get to a hospital right away.

"A hospital? What is it?" a flight attendant asks, inquiring about the illness.

"It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now," Nielsen deadpans.

When he asks a passenger if he can fly the plane, the man replies, "Surely you can't be serious."

Nielsen responds: "I am serious, and don't call me Shirley."

Critics argued he was being cast against type, but Nielsen disagreed.

"I've always been cast against type before," he said, adding comedy was what he'd really always wanted to do.

It was what he would do for most of the rest of his career, appearing in such comedies as "Repossessed" (a takeoff on the demonic possession movies like "The Exorcist") and "Mr. Magoo," in which he played the title role of the good-natured bumbler.

Nielsen did play Debbie Reynolds' sweetheart in the popular "Tammy and the Bachelor," a loanout to Universal, and he became well known to baby boomers for his role as the Revolutionary War fighter Francis Marion in the Disney TV adventure series "The Swamp Fox."

Unhappy with his roles at MGM, he asked to be released from his contract. As a freelancer, he appeared in a series of undistinguished movies.

"I played a lot of leaders, autocratic sorts; perhaps it was my Canadian accent," he reasoned.

Meanwhile, he remained active in television in guest roles. He also starred in his own series, "The New Breed," "The Protectors" and "Bracken's World," but all were short-lived.

Then "Airplane!" captivated audiences and changed everything.

Producers-directors-writers Jim Abrahams, David and Jerry Zucker had hired Robert Stack, Peter Graves, Lloyd Bridges and Nielsen to spoof their heroic TV images in a satire of flight-in-jeopardy movies.

After the movie's success, the filmmaking trio cast their newfound comic star as Detective Drebin in a TV series, "Police Squad," which trashed the cliches of "Dragnet" and other cop shows. Despite good reviews, NBC canceled it after only four episodes.

"It didn't belong on TV," Nielsen later commented. "It had the kind of humor you had to pay attention to."

The Zuckers and Abraham converted the series into a feature film, "The Naked Gun," with George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson and Priscilla Presley as Nielsen's co-stars. Its huge success led to sequels "The Naked Gun 2 1/2" and "The Naked Gun 33 1/3."

His later movies included "All I Want for Christmas," "Dracula: Dead and Loving It" and "Spy Hard."

Between films he often turned serious, touring with his one-man show on the life of the great defense lawyer, Clarence Darrow.

Nielsen was born Feb. 11, 1926 in Regina, Saskatchewan.

He grew up 200 miles south of the Arctic Circle at Fort Norman, where his father was an officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The parents had three sons, and Nielsen once recalled, "There were 15 people in the village, including five of us. If my father arrested somebody in the winter, he'd have to wait until the thaw to turn him in."

The elder Nielsen was a troubled man who beat his wife and sons, and Leslie longed to escape. As soon as he graduated from high school at 17, he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force, even though he was legally deaf (he wore hearing aids most of his life.)

After the war, Nielsen worked as a disc jockey at a Calgary radio station, then studied at a Toronto radio school operated by Lorne Greene, who would go on to star on the hit TV series "Bonanza." A scholarship to the Neighborhood Playhouse brought him to New York, where he immersed himself in live television.

Nielsen also was married to: Monica Boyer, 1950-1955; Sandy Ullman, 1958-74; and Brooks Oliver, 1981-85.

Nielsen and his second wife had two daughters, Thea and Maura.