India brides get wooden paddles to beat drunk, abusive husbands

Author:  Agence France Presse Sun, 2017-04-30 20:40 ID:  1493563102377100900 NEW DELHI, India: An Indian state minister has given hundreds of wooden bats to newly-wed brides, urging them to use the paddle as a weapon if their husbands turn alcoholic or abusive. Gopal Bhargava gave the bats — which are used to get dirt out of clothes in traditional laundries — to nearly 700 brides at a mass wedding organized by the government...

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’Godfather’ cast members reunite at New York film fest

Author:  AFP Sun, 2017-04-30 10:14 ID:  1493539133715302300 NEW YORK: Cast members of “The Godfather” movies were reunited in Manhattan Saturday, nearly half a century after the first of the legendary mafia films hit theaters. American filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola reminisced with actors Al Pacino, Robert Duvall, James Caan, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire and Robert de Niro at a panel event organized as part of New York’s Tribeca...

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Artificial womb for super-preemies works with sheep

Author:  AFP Sat, 2017-04-29 03:00 ID:  1493415002253372100 PARIS: An artificial womb filled with clear liquid, successfully tested on pre-natal lambs, could help extremely premature babies avoid death or life-long disability, researchers have reported. “It is designed to continue what naturally occurs in the womb,” said Alan Flake, a fetal surgeon at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and senior author of a study in...

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Full honors for Filipino-American WWII vet who died at 101

Author:  By CHRIS CAROLA | AP Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493389004410619000 ALBANY: Held captive by the Japanese during World War II, Florence Ebersole Smith Finch was tortured and forced to curl up in a 2-foot-by-4-foot box. She endured by repeatedly telling herself: “I will survive.” “And my goodness, she did,” said her daughter, Betty Murphy, of Ithaca, New York, where Finch, a US Coast Guard veteran, will be buried Saturday...

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A robot that picks apples? Replacing humans worries some

Author:  AP Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493367691618681000 WASHINGTON: Harvesting Washington state’s vast fruit orchards each year requires thousands of farmworkers, and many of them work illegally in the United States. That system eventually could change dramatically as at least two companies are rushing to get robotic fruit-picking machines to market. The robotic pickers don’t get tired and can work 24 hours a day. “Human...

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Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan taking TED to India TV

Author:  AFP Fri, 2017-04-28 06:40 ID:  1493358319418396900 CANADA: Indian superstar Shah Rukh Khan charmed a TED Conference crowd Thursday, sharing his life and playfully portraying himself as an aging movie star grappling with the changes around him. Khan’s talk on the TED stage came just months before a version of the big-idea-sharing event makes a television debut in India, where he will play the role of curator Chris...

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West End production first for a Saudi with a passion for theater

Author:  Denise Marray Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493325073614063600 If you had asked Saudi national Soha Khan what career she had in mind as a fresh graduate, she might have said, “maybe journalism or corporate communications.” That would have been logical given that she studied under the King Abdulaziz Scholarship Program for a master’s degree in communications at Grand Valley State University in Michigan. Never would...

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If you are touching your smartphone 1,500 times a week, you are normal

Author:  LISA KAAKI Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493324801714020300 Networks are everywhere and yet most users do not even know that information gathered by Google and Facebook is sold to advertising sites. “The Power of Networks” sheds some light on the issue of digital privacy and gives us an insight into the big ideas driving the social and technical networks we use every day. Many of the materials in this book have been...

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How life twists and turns in unexpected ways

Author:  MANAL SHAKIR Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493324801704020000 “Him, Me, Muhammad Ali” by Randa Jarrar is a collection of short stories, which takes place around the world, from Egypt to New York and in between, revealing charismatic characters, both young and old, who are always resilient. Jarrar is an award-winning author whose novel, “A Map of Home,” published in 2008, won multiple awards and has been translated...

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For real coffee lovers, it is always caffeine and chocolate

Author:  NADA HAMEED Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493324381553976900 “Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death and sweet as love.” — Turkish proverb A three-day coffee and chocolate festival held recently by Caffeine at Emaar Square-Jeddah Gate brought out Jeddawi coffee and chocolate addicts to savor all things C8H10N4O2 (for the uninitiated, that’s caffeine). The Caffeine Festival featured blends of Arabic coffee,...

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Annyeong haseyo! from South Korea

Author:  LULWA SHALHOUB Fri, 2017-04-28 03:00 ID:  1493323870483927600 It was the season of cheerful cherry blossoms and soft cool breeze, April — the perfect time to visit and tour South Korea. Flying from Jeddah via Dubai International Airport for a layover to catch a direct eight-and-a-hal-hour flight to Seoul totaled 16 hours of travel time. Visiting five cities within a week in South Korea is challenging and can be hectic,...

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In Muslim Indonesia, tiny Jewish community lives on

Author:  AFP Thu, 2017-04-27 06:09 ID:  1493276242899549200 INDONESIA: In a remote corner of the Indonesian archipelago, a modest synagogue stands in a tiny Jewish community that has found acceptance despite rising intolerance in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country. The red-roofed building on Sulawesi island is the only synagogue in the nation of 255 million people. Here, unlike other parts of the country, the...

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Twitter gets lift from uptick in user numbers

Author:  AFP Wed, 2017-04-26 18:01 ID:  1493219383363086300 WASHINGTON: Twitter shares shot higher Wednesday after its quarterly update showed improving growth in user numbers, offsetting concerns over a decline in revenue and another net loss for the social network. The first quarter results came in better than most forecasts for Twitter, which has struggled to keep pace in the fast-moving world of social media. The closely...

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Cairo ‘cargotecture’ company transforms shipping containers into homes

Author:  Reuters Tue, 2017-04-25 13:44 ID:  1493117978213624200 CAIRO: An Egyptian design duo has begun re-purposing old steel shipping containers, transforming them into living spaces, shops and restaurants in an effort to introduce residents of overcrowded Cairo to cheaper and more versatile properties. Qubix, a year-old company founded by Youssef Farag and Karim Rafla, delivered its first order in August after months spent...

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Elissa wins big at first Arab Nation Music Awards

Author:  ARAB NEWS Tue, 2017-04-25 03:00 ID:  1493070477249409700 JEDDAH: Lebanese diva Elissa was a big winner at the first edition of the Arab Nation Music Awards ceremony, held in Beirut on Sunday. It was a first-of-its-kind Middle East awards ceremony that represented the regional talent, and covered musical stars from North Africa to the Levant and the Gulf. The ceremony was attended by several political and media personalities...

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Whale and boat collisions may be more common: Study

Author:  AP Sun, 2017-04-23 03:00 ID:  1492959883288817100 PORTLAND, Maine: A group of marine scientists says collisions of whales and boats off of the New England coast may be more common than previously thought. The scientists focused on the humpback whale population in the southern Gulf of Maine, a body of water off of Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine. They found that almost 15 percent of the whales, which come to...

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British treasure found in piano

Author:  AFP Fri, 2017-04-21 14:55 ID:  1492850375927932000 LONDON: A British school and a piano tuner are to share the reward after hundreds of gold and silver coins from the Victorian era were found under the keys of a piano. The hoard of 913 sovereigns and half sovereigns --dating from 1847 to 1915 — was found before Christmas in Shropshire, central England, and might be the largest of the kind in Britain. On Thursday,...

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500kg Egyptian sheds half her weight after India surgery

Author:  AFP Fri, 2017-04-21 08:35 ID:  1492753546198919100 MUMBAI: The “world’s heaviest woman” has shed half her weight — around a quarter of a ton — in the two months she’s been in India for treatment, doctors said. Egyptian national Eman Ahmed Abd El Aty weighed 500 kilogrammes (1,100 pounds) when she arrived in Mumbai in February on a specially modified plane to undergo emergency weight-loss surgery. In videos provided...

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Cultural icons complement ancient Spain’s focus on open borders, free trade

Author:  THARIK HUSSAIN Fri, 2017-04-21 03:00 ID:  1492728048384467600 “Many of the traits on which modern Europe prides itself came to it from Muslim Spain. Diplomacy, free trade, open borders, the techniques of academic research, of anthropology, etiquette, fashion, various types of medicine, hospitals, all came from this great city of cities (Cordoba)…” — Prince Charles, Prince of Wales and heir to the British throne As...

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