‘Lionhearted’ Girl Bikes Dad Across India, Inspiring a Nation
A 15-year-old migrant girl pedaled hundreds of miles to bring her injured father back to their home village. India’s cycling federation has taken notice.
NEW DELHI — She was a 15-year-old with a simple mission: bring papa home.
Jyoti Kumari and her dad had nearly no money, no transport, and their village was halfway across India.
And her dad, an out-of-work migrant laborer, was injured and could barely walk.
So Jyoti told her dad: Let me take you home. He thought the idea was crazy but went along with it. She then jumped on a $20 purple bike bought with the last of their savings. With her dad perched on the rear, she pedaled from the outskirts of New Delhi to their home village, 700 miles away.
"Don’t worry, mummy,” she reassured her mother along the way, using borrowed cellphones. “I will get Papa home good.”
During the past two months under India’s coronavirus lockdown, millions of migrant laborers and their families have poured out of India’s cities, desperate and penniless, as they try to get back to their native villages where they can rely on family networks to survive.
Many haven’t made it. Some have been crushed by trains; others run over by trucks. A few have simply collapsed while trudging down a long, hot highway, dead from exhaustion.
But amid all this pain and sadness now emerges a tale of devotion and straight-up grit. The Indian press has seized upon this feel-good story, gushing about Jyoti the “lionhearted.”
And a few days ago, the story got even better.
While resting up in her village, Jyoti received a call from the Cycling Federation of India. Convinced she had the right stuff, Onkar Singh, the federation’s chairman, invited her to New Delhi for a tryout with the national team.
Photo and more...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/22/worl ... 778d3e6de3
AMAZING STORIES
Mother Goose Takes Care Of 47 Babies And Keeps Them All Safe
Mike Digout has never been a big fan of Canadian geese. But this spring his views changed after meeting one remarkable mother goose caring for a very large family.
Since work from home started, Digout has been taking walks along the Saskatchewan riverbank near his home in Saskatoon and bringing along his camera to capture the wildlife that lives there. That's where he first met the geese.
"I was out every night walking on the riverbank looking for beavers and, of course, there was a lot of geese activity as they were coming from the south and looking for a place to nest,” Digout told The Dodo. “It got to be quite entertaining to watch the geese fighting over places to nest and protecting their nests.”
In May, Digout noticed the first batch of goslings had hatched. “They’re so cute when they’re little — like little tennis balls with legs,” Digout said. “So I started taking pictures of the goslings while I was waiting for the beavers to come around.”
One night, Digout was sitting near some reeds along the riverbank when he saw a mother goose with an unusually large group of goslings. One by one, the babies started crawling under her feathers to go to sleep for the night, until he counted 16 fluffy bodies crowded under their mom's protective wings.
“I was stunned that this mom had 16 babies, so I started going back every night looking for this mom and her goslings,” Digout said. “And every day it seemed like she had a bigger group.”
Photos and more...
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/lifestyle/lif ... ailsignout
Mike Digout has never been a big fan of Canadian geese. But this spring his views changed after meeting one remarkable mother goose caring for a very large family.
Since work from home started, Digout has been taking walks along the Saskatchewan riverbank near his home in Saskatoon and bringing along his camera to capture the wildlife that lives there. That's where he first met the geese.
"I was out every night walking on the riverbank looking for beavers and, of course, there was a lot of geese activity as they were coming from the south and looking for a place to nest,” Digout told The Dodo. “It got to be quite entertaining to watch the geese fighting over places to nest and protecting their nests.”
In May, Digout noticed the first batch of goslings had hatched. “They’re so cute when they’re little — like little tennis balls with legs,” Digout said. “So I started taking pictures of the goslings while I was waiting for the beavers to come around.”
One night, Digout was sitting near some reeds along the riverbank when he saw a mother goose with an unusually large group of goslings. One by one, the babies started crawling under her feathers to go to sleep for the night, until he counted 16 fluffy bodies crowded under their mom's protective wings.
“I was stunned that this mom had 16 babies, so I started going back every night looking for this mom and her goslings,” Digout said. “And every day it seemed like she had a bigger group.”
Photos and more...
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/lifestyle/lif ... ailsignout
MIRACLES FROM HEAVEN - Official Trailer (ft. Jennifer Garner)
Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CldGTG6iVrU
Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CldGTG6iVrU
Mom gives birth to child aboard plane
Video:
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/lifestyle/fam ... ailsignout
A woman went into labor while aboard a flight from New Delhi to Bangalore on Wednesday. Luckily, a gynecologist was present to help deliver the baby.
Video:
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/lifestyle/fam ... ailsignout
A woman went into labor while aboard a flight from New Delhi to Bangalore on Wednesday. Luckily, a gynecologist was present to help deliver the baby.
Stunning field patterns seen from above
30 mysterious field patterns seen from above
Modern-day crop circles first appeared in the English countryside in the 1970s, with their intricacy and number steadily increasing over the years. Were they made by aliens, time travellers, strange vortices, or the wind? Are they simply an elaborate hoax created by humans or impressive works of art?
Read on and decide for yourself!
Slide show at:
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/photos/s ... ut#image=1
30 mysterious field patterns seen from above
Modern-day crop circles first appeared in the English countryside in the 1970s, with their intricacy and number steadily increasing over the years. Were they made by aliens, time travellers, strange vortices, or the wind? Are they simply an elaborate hoax created by humans or impressive works of art?
Read on and decide for yourself!
Slide show at:
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/photos/s ... ut#image=1
Woman Swallowed By Python As She Checked On Her Cornfield
The Editors
Women's Health Sun, April 25, 2021, 5:00 AM
Photo credit: Getty Images
Photo credit: Getty Images
A woman in Indonesia was swallowed whole by a python as she checked on her cornfields last week.
According to The Washington Post, citing the Jakarta Post, the woman's name was Wa Tiba, and lived on Muna Island off the coast of Sulawesi.
100 villagers from Persiapan Lawela searched the area and found a 23 foot-long snake with a very swollen belly. The villagers killed the snake, cut it open, and found Wa inside.
A woman in Indonesia was swallowed whole by a python as she checked on her cornfields last week. According to The Washington Post, citing the Jakarta Post, the woman's name was Wa Tiba and lived on Muna Island off the coast of Sulawesi. She left her home Thursday night to visit her cornfield about a half mile from her home.
Reticulated pythons are common in the area, but it was actually wild boars that Wa had been worried about initially because they'd be destroying her crops, according to the Jakarta Post's report.
When Wa didn't return, her sister went out to find her and found Wa's footprints, flashlight, slippers, and machete. On Friday, 100 villagers from Persiapan Lawela searched the area and found a 23 foot-long snake with a very swollen belly. The villagers killed the snake, cut it open, and found Wa inside intact. She probably didn't die inside the snake: A reticulated python secures its prey with a bite, then wraps its body around the victim, squeezing down until the victim cannot breathe, before consuming, according to the Associated Press.
Pythons are the longest snake in the world and usually only eat smaller mammals. However, a similar incident happened last year to a farmer from the nearby village of Salubiro on Sulawesi Island, according to The Washington Post.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/lifesty ... 00564.html
The Editors
Women's Health Sun, April 25, 2021, 5:00 AM
Photo credit: Getty Images
Photo credit: Getty Images
A woman in Indonesia was swallowed whole by a python as she checked on her cornfields last week.
According to The Washington Post, citing the Jakarta Post, the woman's name was Wa Tiba, and lived on Muna Island off the coast of Sulawesi.
100 villagers from Persiapan Lawela searched the area and found a 23 foot-long snake with a very swollen belly. The villagers killed the snake, cut it open, and found Wa inside.
A woman in Indonesia was swallowed whole by a python as she checked on her cornfields last week. According to The Washington Post, citing the Jakarta Post, the woman's name was Wa Tiba and lived on Muna Island off the coast of Sulawesi. She left her home Thursday night to visit her cornfield about a half mile from her home.
Reticulated pythons are common in the area, but it was actually wild boars that Wa had been worried about initially because they'd be destroying her crops, according to the Jakarta Post's report.
When Wa didn't return, her sister went out to find her and found Wa's footprints, flashlight, slippers, and machete. On Friday, 100 villagers from Persiapan Lawela searched the area and found a 23 foot-long snake with a very swollen belly. The villagers killed the snake, cut it open, and found Wa inside intact. She probably didn't die inside the snake: A reticulated python secures its prey with a bite, then wraps its body around the victim, squeezing down until the victim cannot breathe, before consuming, according to the Associated Press.
Pythons are the longest snake in the world and usually only eat smaller mammals. However, a similar incident happened last year to a farmer from the nearby village of Salubiro on Sulawesi Island, according to The Washington Post.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/lifesty ... 00564.html
These Twins Lived Together. In Covid, They Died Together.
The story of Joefred and Ralfred Gregory has resonated widely as India suffered the most virus deaths in a single day of any country during the pandemic.
NEW DELHI — Joefred and Ralfred Gregory moved through life as one.
They went to the same college. They studied the same thing. They wore matching clothes. They trimmed their beards the exact same way.
Identical twins, they were two handsome young men in northern India who above all else really loved each other. And when they both were struck by Covid-19 last month and hospitalized, it was like they shared one sick body.
Hours after Joefred died, Ralfred’s mother told him that his brother was still alive, to keep his spirits up.
But Ralfred sensed his brother was no more and said, from his hospital bed, “Mummy, you’re lying.”
The next day, on May 14, Ralfred died too.
The touching story of the twins who lived and died together has spread fast and wide on Indian social media, puncturing this nation’s numbing statistics — the daily Covid-19 case numbers, the death counts, the infection rates.
This is a country that has suffered so much and keeps suffering. Though India’s overall case numbers have dropped this past week, the deaths keep going up.
On Wednesday, India broke a world record for the most reported Covid deaths in a single day: 4,529. However alarming that number is — three Indians dying every minute because of the coronavirus — experts say that it is just a small fraction of the true toll and that the real numbers are far higher.
Joefred and Ralfred, 24, had a special bond. Though their parents gave them similar names, they said they didn’t raise the twins to copy each other. Still, neighbors said that where you saw one, you saw the other, even after they reached adulthood.
They grew up, along with an older brother, in a one-story bungalow in Meerut, a satellite town of New Delhi. Their parents were teachers at a Christian school. The family was among the few Christians in a mixed, middle-class neighborhood.
As boys, they batted cricket balls together in a vacant lot. Together they hunched over the carrom table, a popular Indian game played on a wooden board.
Joefred was three minutes older. But there were none of those older brother-younger brother issues.
“They were equals,” said their father, Gregory Raymond Raphael. “They argued, yes. But I never saw them hurt each other.”
They went by nicknames: Joefi and Ralfi.
As young men, they studied together: same year, same university in southern India, same subject, computer science. They wore their hair in the same style. They looked like mirror images.
Few people, besides their parents, could tell them apart. They were the same height, around six feet, with the same muscular build. Friends said that at weddings, birthday parties and just about all community events, Joefred and Ralfred not only dressed the same but also stuck together in a crowd.
“It was like they were merged,” said Manoj Kumar, a neighbor and family friend.
“There was immense love between the two of them,” he added.
Both were computer engineers, most recently working from home in Meerut, and on April 24, they came down with fevers at the same time, their father said. The family treated them at home, with some over-the-counter medicine, but began to worry as their condition worsened.
In late April and early May, India was suffering the worst surge of infections that any country had seen since the pandemic began.
So many people were getting infected at the same time, especially in northern India, where Meerut is, that hospitals couldn’t cope. Sick people were being turned away. They were dying in the streets, in the back seats of cars parked in vain outside hospital gates, at home, gasping for air.
There was a deadly shortage of lifesaving oxygen and medicine. It was the Covid nightmare that all nations have feared since the pandemic began, exploding with a fury.
A week into their sons’ illness, the family decided to seek help and found space in Anand Hospital, a private facility with a good reputation not far from their house. Both sons tested positive for Covid and a doctor at the hospital said that by that point, the disease had progressed frighteningly fast.
Both sons had very dangerous lung infections. Both were put on ventilators in the intensive care unit a few beds apart, Joefred in Bed 10, Ralfred in 14.
On the morning of May 13, Joefred, the older twin, was losing his battle. His blood oxygen levels dropped to 48 percent, his father said. Nothing could save him.
The twins’ mother, Soja, was visiting the I.C.U. at that moment. The doctors told her to leave. A few minutes later, around noon, they broke the news that Joefred had died.
The mother, overwhelmed with grief, then went back into the I.C.U. to check on Ralfred, who kept asking, “Where is Joefred? Where is Joefred?”
His mother told him that his brother had been transferred to a bigger hospital. “We thought his condition would get worse if we told him what happened,” his father said.
But Ralfred knew.
He said to his mom, “Mummy, you lied. You tell me the truth.”
But she didn’t.
Ralfred then went into depression, his doctor said. And the next morning, less than 24 hours after his brother died, so did he.
As word spread, leading Indian newspapers ran stories, showing the two brothers side by side in identical suits. Television stations jumped in as well, with their doctor talking about how thoroughly the virus had destroyed their lungs.
Joefred and Ralfred in matching suits.
Of all the thousands of deaths in recent days, these two seemed to really unsettle people, perhaps because the twins were just in their 20s and had looked so healthy, or maybe it was simply their closeness. Their story is as much about love as it is about death. Across social media, people exchanged messages such as “This is so heartbreaking!” and “How devastating it must be for the parents. So young …”
Their father says he feels as if his heart has been torn from his body.
“I keep thinking that maybe I shouldn’t have brought them to the hospital,” he said. “Maybe I should have kept them at home. There is a parental love that the hospital can’t give.”
“But there’s no use of saying, ‘If this could have happened, or that could happened,’” he said. “My children are gone now.”
Every day, he said, he visits the graveyard.
Beneath a young neem tree, Joefred and Ralfred Gregory are buried in two coffins but one grave.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/19/worl ... 778d3e6de3
The story of Joefred and Ralfred Gregory has resonated widely as India suffered the most virus deaths in a single day of any country during the pandemic.
NEW DELHI — Joefred and Ralfred Gregory moved through life as one.
They went to the same college. They studied the same thing. They wore matching clothes. They trimmed their beards the exact same way.
Identical twins, they were two handsome young men in northern India who above all else really loved each other. And when they both were struck by Covid-19 last month and hospitalized, it was like they shared one sick body.
Hours after Joefred died, Ralfred’s mother told him that his brother was still alive, to keep his spirits up.
But Ralfred sensed his brother was no more and said, from his hospital bed, “Mummy, you’re lying.”
The next day, on May 14, Ralfred died too.
The touching story of the twins who lived and died together has spread fast and wide on Indian social media, puncturing this nation’s numbing statistics — the daily Covid-19 case numbers, the death counts, the infection rates.
This is a country that has suffered so much and keeps suffering. Though India’s overall case numbers have dropped this past week, the deaths keep going up.
On Wednesday, India broke a world record for the most reported Covid deaths in a single day: 4,529. However alarming that number is — three Indians dying every minute because of the coronavirus — experts say that it is just a small fraction of the true toll and that the real numbers are far higher.
Joefred and Ralfred, 24, had a special bond. Though their parents gave them similar names, they said they didn’t raise the twins to copy each other. Still, neighbors said that where you saw one, you saw the other, even after they reached adulthood.
They grew up, along with an older brother, in a one-story bungalow in Meerut, a satellite town of New Delhi. Their parents were teachers at a Christian school. The family was among the few Christians in a mixed, middle-class neighborhood.
As boys, they batted cricket balls together in a vacant lot. Together they hunched over the carrom table, a popular Indian game played on a wooden board.
Joefred was three minutes older. But there were none of those older brother-younger brother issues.
“They were equals,” said their father, Gregory Raymond Raphael. “They argued, yes. But I never saw them hurt each other.”
They went by nicknames: Joefi and Ralfi.
As young men, they studied together: same year, same university in southern India, same subject, computer science. They wore their hair in the same style. They looked like mirror images.
Few people, besides their parents, could tell them apart. They were the same height, around six feet, with the same muscular build. Friends said that at weddings, birthday parties and just about all community events, Joefred and Ralfred not only dressed the same but also stuck together in a crowd.
“It was like they were merged,” said Manoj Kumar, a neighbor and family friend.
“There was immense love between the two of them,” he added.
Both were computer engineers, most recently working from home in Meerut, and on April 24, they came down with fevers at the same time, their father said. The family treated them at home, with some over-the-counter medicine, but began to worry as their condition worsened.
In late April and early May, India was suffering the worst surge of infections that any country had seen since the pandemic began.
So many people were getting infected at the same time, especially in northern India, where Meerut is, that hospitals couldn’t cope. Sick people were being turned away. They were dying in the streets, in the back seats of cars parked in vain outside hospital gates, at home, gasping for air.
There was a deadly shortage of lifesaving oxygen and medicine. It was the Covid nightmare that all nations have feared since the pandemic began, exploding with a fury.
A week into their sons’ illness, the family decided to seek help and found space in Anand Hospital, a private facility with a good reputation not far from their house. Both sons tested positive for Covid and a doctor at the hospital said that by that point, the disease had progressed frighteningly fast.
Both sons had very dangerous lung infections. Both were put on ventilators in the intensive care unit a few beds apart, Joefred in Bed 10, Ralfred in 14.
On the morning of May 13, Joefred, the older twin, was losing his battle. His blood oxygen levels dropped to 48 percent, his father said. Nothing could save him.
The twins’ mother, Soja, was visiting the I.C.U. at that moment. The doctors told her to leave. A few minutes later, around noon, they broke the news that Joefred had died.
The mother, overwhelmed with grief, then went back into the I.C.U. to check on Ralfred, who kept asking, “Where is Joefred? Where is Joefred?”
His mother told him that his brother had been transferred to a bigger hospital. “We thought his condition would get worse if we told him what happened,” his father said.
But Ralfred knew.
He said to his mom, “Mummy, you lied. You tell me the truth.”
But she didn’t.
Ralfred then went into depression, his doctor said. And the next morning, less than 24 hours after his brother died, so did he.
As word spread, leading Indian newspapers ran stories, showing the two brothers side by side in identical suits. Television stations jumped in as well, with their doctor talking about how thoroughly the virus had destroyed their lungs.
Joefred and Ralfred in matching suits.
Of all the thousands of deaths in recent days, these two seemed to really unsettle people, perhaps because the twins were just in their 20s and had looked so healthy, or maybe it was simply their closeness. Their story is as much about love as it is about death. Across social media, people exchanged messages such as “This is so heartbreaking!” and “How devastating it must be for the parents. So young …”
Their father says he feels as if his heart has been torn from his body.
“I keep thinking that maybe I shouldn’t have brought them to the hospital,” he said. “Maybe I should have kept them at home. There is a parental love that the hospital can’t give.”
“But there’s no use of saying, ‘If this could have happened, or that could happened,’” he said. “My children are gone now.”
Every day, he said, he visits the graveyard.
Beneath a young neem tree, Joefred and Ralfred Gregory are buried in two coffins but one grave.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/19/worl ... 778d3e6de3
BBC
Ganges river: India boatman praised for saving baby girl floating in a box
Thu, June 17, 2021, 5:01 AM
The baby girl found in the wooden box
The 21-day-old baby girl has been taken to hospital
A boatman in India's northern Uttar Pradesh state is being praised after he rescued a baby girl found floating in a wooden box in the Ganges river.
Gullu Chaudhary said he was alerted by the cries of the 21-day-old and found her wrapped in a red scarf in the box decorated with images of Hindu deities.
The baby has been taken to hospital and her health is being monitored. She will be sent to a shelter home later.
Officials are investigating how the baby ended up in the river.
They have not speculated on possible motives for the abandonment, but India's gender ratio is one of the worst in the world. Women are often discriminated against socially and girls are seen as a financial burden, particularly among poor communities.
Although most unwanted female foetuses are aborted with help from illegal sex determination clinics, cases of baby girls being killed or abandoned after birth are not uncommon either.
The baby girl in the wooden box
The infant was found in a wooden box decorated with images of Hindu deities
Police said the box had a birth horoscope card which had the time and date of the baby's birth, and mentioned her name as Ganga - the Hindi name for river Ganges.
The state government said it would bear the costs of the baby's nurturing. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath announced that the boatman would be rewarded with government benefits, including a house, for showing a "matchless example of humanity".
Officials in Ghazipur district, where the baby was rescued, told reporters that District Magistrate MP Singh had checked on the baby and that officials were also sent to meet the boatman.
Mr Chaudhary told local reporters that when people on the river bank heard the baby girl's cries, no one stepped forward to help. "But I rushed to rescue her. When I opened the wooden box, I found her."
The incident created a stir as a crowd gathered on the banks of the river. Videos shot at the scene showed the boatman picking up the box from the water and cradling the newborn in his arms.
He then took the baby to his house from where police picked her up and the child welfare officials took her to hospital.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ga ... 49172.html
Ganges river: India boatman praised for saving baby girl floating in a box
Thu, June 17, 2021, 5:01 AM
The baby girl found in the wooden box
The 21-day-old baby girl has been taken to hospital
A boatman in India's northern Uttar Pradesh state is being praised after he rescued a baby girl found floating in a wooden box in the Ganges river.
Gullu Chaudhary said he was alerted by the cries of the 21-day-old and found her wrapped in a red scarf in the box decorated with images of Hindu deities.
The baby has been taken to hospital and her health is being monitored. She will be sent to a shelter home later.
Officials are investigating how the baby ended up in the river.
They have not speculated on possible motives for the abandonment, but India's gender ratio is one of the worst in the world. Women are often discriminated against socially and girls are seen as a financial burden, particularly among poor communities.
Although most unwanted female foetuses are aborted with help from illegal sex determination clinics, cases of baby girls being killed or abandoned after birth are not uncommon either.
The baby girl in the wooden box
The infant was found in a wooden box decorated with images of Hindu deities
Police said the box had a birth horoscope card which had the time and date of the baby's birth, and mentioned her name as Ganga - the Hindi name for river Ganges.
The state government said it would bear the costs of the baby's nurturing. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath announced that the boatman would be rewarded with government benefits, including a house, for showing a "matchless example of humanity".
Officials in Ghazipur district, where the baby was rescued, told reporters that District Magistrate MP Singh had checked on the baby and that officials were also sent to meet the boatman.
Mr Chaudhary told local reporters that when people on the river bank heard the baby girl's cries, no one stepped forward to help. "But I rushed to rescue her. When I opened the wooden box, I found her."
The incident created a stir as a crowd gathered on the banks of the river. Videos shot at the scene showed the boatman picking up the box from the water and cradling the newborn in his arms.
He then took the baby to his house from where police picked her up and the child welfare officials took her to hospital.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ga ... 49172.html
Herd Of Elephants March For 12 Hours To Attend Saviours Funeral
A herd of elephants marched a whole 12 hours to the house of Lawrence Anthony, a man who saved them, after he had died and stayed there, silent for two days.
Preciscley one year after his death, the same herd marched to his house again to pay there respects, this is something science cannot explain.
Lawrence Anthony was a great man, he created the Thula Thula Game Reserve in South Africa and opened its doors to wild elephants.
He was known as ‘The Elephant Whisperer’ and took it in his stride to nurture these huge intelligent animals. He began treating them like children, using words and gestures to let them know they were safe with him.
He focused on the matriarch, since elephant herds are always headed up by one, this was a good way to connect with the rest of the elephants.
He connected very well with one Matriarch called Nana, she and the herd grew very fond of Lawrence and his wife, they would even spend time in their house.
After years of great conservation work as well as building strong bonds with the local elephant herds and other animals, Lawrence, unfortunately, passed away.
Upon his passing, Nana led two elephant herds on a 12-hour journey to Lawrence’s house to pay their respects. They remained outside of the house for two full days as they stood vigil before returning to their lives.
What’s even more amazing is that nobody told the herds about his death, they just knew.
http://35.173.120.241/of-elephants-marc ... s-funeral/
A herd of elephants marched a whole 12 hours to the house of Lawrence Anthony, a man who saved them, after he had died and stayed there, silent for two days.
Preciscley one year after his death, the same herd marched to his house again to pay there respects, this is something science cannot explain.
Lawrence Anthony was a great man, he created the Thula Thula Game Reserve in South Africa and opened its doors to wild elephants.
He was known as ‘The Elephant Whisperer’ and took it in his stride to nurture these huge intelligent animals. He began treating them like children, using words and gestures to let them know they were safe with him.
He focused on the matriarch, since elephant herds are always headed up by one, this was a good way to connect with the rest of the elephants.
He connected very well with one Matriarch called Nana, she and the herd grew very fond of Lawrence and his wife, they would even spend time in their house.
After years of great conservation work as well as building strong bonds with the local elephant herds and other animals, Lawrence, unfortunately, passed away.
Upon his passing, Nana led two elephant herds on a 12-hour journey to Lawrence’s house to pay their respects. They remained outside of the house for two full days as they stood vigil before returning to their lives.
What’s even more amazing is that nobody told the herds about his death, they just knew.
http://35.173.120.241/of-elephants-marc ... s-funeral/
BBC
Quan Hongchan: Chinese teen diving star's village mobbed by fans
Waiyee Yip - BBC News
Mon, August 9, 2021, 2:41 AM
Gold medalist Quan Hongchan of China poses with a Chinese national flag during the medal ceremony for the Women 10m Platform Final.
Many people have been touched by Quan, who said she took up diving to help pay for her mother's medical bills.
China's teen diving sensation Quan Hongchan's family and neighbours have been harassed by tourists hoping to get social media "likes", local media say.
Ever since the 14-year-old won Olympic gold after delivering three perfect-10 dives, fans have rushed to her Maihe village home to take videos and photos.
Some persistent fans are even climbing trees for a better view.
Quan has received massive support online after she said she took up diving to pay her sick mother's bills.
Her story touched many people when she told reporters that she dedicated her Olympic win to her mother, who has been admitted to hospital many times after getting into a traffic accident years ago.
"I want to make enough money to support her," Quan had said in Tokyo.
On China's Twitter-like platform Weibo, the hashtag "how to view Quan Hongchan's home becoming an internet photo hotspot" was viewed more than 25 million times.
There was criticism over the actions of these influencers, who reportedly staked out the rural village in Guangdong province to livestream videos even after midnight.
Others knocked on the door to take selfies with her family members, while some tried to steal jackfruit from her home as souvenirs, local media said.
"If people are going to her house just to get followers, that's despicable. Her mother is sick, she shouldn't be disturbed," one Weibo comment read.
The village has now been closed to visitors as the large crowds violated Covid control measures, reports say.
Due to her years of training, the farmer's daughter said she had never been to a zoo or amusement park.
Her comments prompted a safari and amusement park in Guangzhou to announce free annual membership cards to all Chinese diving team members.
Other businesses and donors have come forth offering cash and gifts, including her favourite spicy street snack latiao - made from flour that is cooked and seasoned. Her father has reportedly declined cash gifts, and thanked donors for their "kind hearts".
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/qu ... 54524.html
Quan Hongchan: Chinese teen diving star's village mobbed by fans
Waiyee Yip - BBC News
Mon, August 9, 2021, 2:41 AM
Gold medalist Quan Hongchan of China poses with a Chinese national flag during the medal ceremony for the Women 10m Platform Final.
Many people have been touched by Quan, who said she took up diving to help pay for her mother's medical bills.
China's teen diving sensation Quan Hongchan's family and neighbours have been harassed by tourists hoping to get social media "likes", local media say.
Ever since the 14-year-old won Olympic gold after delivering three perfect-10 dives, fans have rushed to her Maihe village home to take videos and photos.
Some persistent fans are even climbing trees for a better view.
Quan has received massive support online after she said she took up diving to pay her sick mother's bills.
Her story touched many people when she told reporters that she dedicated her Olympic win to her mother, who has been admitted to hospital many times after getting into a traffic accident years ago.
"I want to make enough money to support her," Quan had said in Tokyo.
On China's Twitter-like platform Weibo, the hashtag "how to view Quan Hongchan's home becoming an internet photo hotspot" was viewed more than 25 million times.
There was criticism over the actions of these influencers, who reportedly staked out the rural village in Guangdong province to livestream videos even after midnight.
Others knocked on the door to take selfies with her family members, while some tried to steal jackfruit from her home as souvenirs, local media said.
"If people are going to her house just to get followers, that's despicable. Her mother is sick, she shouldn't be disturbed," one Weibo comment read.
The village has now been closed to visitors as the large crowds violated Covid control measures, reports say.
Due to her years of training, the farmer's daughter said she had never been to a zoo or amusement park.
Her comments prompted a safari and amusement park in Guangzhou to announce free annual membership cards to all Chinese diving team members.
Other businesses and donors have come forth offering cash and gifts, including her favourite spicy street snack latiao - made from flour that is cooked and seasoned. Her father has reportedly declined cash gifts, and thanked donors for their "kind hearts".
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/qu ... 54524.html
The Guardian
Hansle Parchment thanks woman who paid for taxi to race where he won Olympic gold
Guardian sport
Wed, August 11, 2021, 11:52 AM
Jamaican hurdler Hansle Parchment has tracked down and thanked a Tokyo 2020 volunteer who paid for his taxi to the Olympic Stadium, where he subsequently won a gold medal.
Parchment told the story in a video posted to social media last weekend, which ended with him meeting the volunteer, whom he called Tiana. He thanked her, showed her the gold medal, gave her a Jamaican Olympic shirt and paid her back the money she had lent.
“You were instrumental in me getting to the final that day,” he told her before they posed for a photo.
Related: Highs, lows and burritos: the Guardian’s standout Tokyo moments
Tiana’s biggest prize may be yet to come though: the Sunday Gleaner reported Jamaica’s minister for tourism intends to host her on a trip to the Caribbean island.
“No matter where in the world she is, we want to reciprocate the kindness shown to one of our own,” Jamaica’s minister for tourism, Edmund Bartlett, told the Sunday Gleaner.
Parchment feared he would miss last Thursday’s 110m hurdles final when he got on the wrong coach and ended up at what he believes was one of the aquatics venues. All the official Tokyo 2020 cars were booked and taking a bus back to the Olympic village and then another to the stadium would have left him struggling to make the start of the final.
“If I had done that, I wouldn’t get there in time to even warm up. I had to find another way. I was trying to get one of the branded cars for the Games to take me, but these people are very strict and adhering to the rules, and I would have to have to book the car from beforehand to get it to leave,” he said on the video posted to social media.
That is when he saw Tiana. “I saw this volunteer and I had to beg, ‘cause of course she is not allowed to do much, and she actually gave me some money to take one of the taxis. And that’s how I was able to get to the warm-up in time, and had enough time to compete,” Parchment said.
Parchment won bronze at the 2012 Olympics but missed the Games in 2016 due to injury. The 31-year-old only finished third in the Jamaican trials for Tokyo and did not win either his heat or semifinal on his way to the final. However, once there he beat a high-quality field in a season-best time of 13.04 seconds to take the Olympic title.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/sports/ ... -165259243.
Hansle Parchment thanks woman who paid for taxi to race where he won Olympic gold
Guardian sport
Wed, August 11, 2021, 11:52 AM
Jamaican hurdler Hansle Parchment has tracked down and thanked a Tokyo 2020 volunteer who paid for his taxi to the Olympic Stadium, where he subsequently won a gold medal.
Parchment told the story in a video posted to social media last weekend, which ended with him meeting the volunteer, whom he called Tiana. He thanked her, showed her the gold medal, gave her a Jamaican Olympic shirt and paid her back the money she had lent.
“You were instrumental in me getting to the final that day,” he told her before they posed for a photo.
Related: Highs, lows and burritos: the Guardian’s standout Tokyo moments
Tiana’s biggest prize may be yet to come though: the Sunday Gleaner reported Jamaica’s minister for tourism intends to host her on a trip to the Caribbean island.
“No matter where in the world she is, we want to reciprocate the kindness shown to one of our own,” Jamaica’s minister for tourism, Edmund Bartlett, told the Sunday Gleaner.
Parchment feared he would miss last Thursday’s 110m hurdles final when he got on the wrong coach and ended up at what he believes was one of the aquatics venues. All the official Tokyo 2020 cars were booked and taking a bus back to the Olympic village and then another to the stadium would have left him struggling to make the start of the final.
“If I had done that, I wouldn’t get there in time to even warm up. I had to find another way. I was trying to get one of the branded cars for the Games to take me, but these people are very strict and adhering to the rules, and I would have to have to book the car from beforehand to get it to leave,” he said on the video posted to social media.
That is when he saw Tiana. “I saw this volunteer and I had to beg, ‘cause of course she is not allowed to do much, and she actually gave me some money to take one of the taxis. And that’s how I was able to get to the warm-up in time, and had enough time to compete,” Parchment said.
Parchment won bronze at the 2012 Olympics but missed the Games in 2016 due to injury. The 31-year-old only finished third in the Jamaican trials for Tokyo and did not win either his heat or semifinal on his way to the final. However, once there he beat a high-quality field in a season-best time of 13.04 seconds to take the Olympic title.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/sports/ ... -165259243.
‘Satan works in mysterious ways’: Newscast on Australian TV interrupted by devil-worshipping ceremony (VIDEO)
20 Aug, 2021 08:36 / Updated 12 hours ago
Australian TV channel ABC has accidentally shown its viewers footage from a Satanic ritual during the middle of a routine newscast. The blunder was linked online to a current court case about teaching Satanism in schools.
The excerpt from the news broadcast, posted by ABC Media Watch on Twitter, begins with anchor Yvonne Yong introducing a story about Queensland’s proposal to make it a criminal offense to injure or kill police dogs and horses.
As Yong pauses awkwardly, the audience sees silent footage of masked officials in suits. The broadcast then unexpectedly cuts to what appears to be the middle of a satanic ritual. A person donning a black robe proclaims “Hail, Satan,” while flanked by a large illuminated upside-down cross.
The broadcast cuts back to Yong, who, after a brief moment of silence, switches to a different story as if nothing had happened.
It is not clear whether the Satanic footage was part of another story, or had come from elsewhere, and ABC has not commented on the matter.
Several people online linked devil-worshippers with members of the Noosa Temple of Satan, which is currently suing Queensland’s Education Department to have religious instruction classes taught in schools.
According to Australian media, the Satanists, led by Robin Bristow, also known as Brother Samael Demo-Gorgon, want the federal government to scrap its religious discrimination bill and replace it with a human rights act.
The Noosa Temple of Satan retweeted the clip, adding that “Satan works in mysterious ways.”
Commenters on social media, meanwhile, joked that the newscast was an “unfair slight on Satanists,” and hoped for the clip to stay with 666 retweets, which it has now surpassed.
https://www.rt.com/news/532575-australi ... orship-tv/
20 Aug, 2021 08:36 / Updated 12 hours ago
Australian TV channel ABC has accidentally shown its viewers footage from a Satanic ritual during the middle of a routine newscast. The blunder was linked online to a current court case about teaching Satanism in schools.
The excerpt from the news broadcast, posted by ABC Media Watch on Twitter, begins with anchor Yvonne Yong introducing a story about Queensland’s proposal to make it a criminal offense to injure or kill police dogs and horses.
As Yong pauses awkwardly, the audience sees silent footage of masked officials in suits. The broadcast then unexpectedly cuts to what appears to be the middle of a satanic ritual. A person donning a black robe proclaims “Hail, Satan,” while flanked by a large illuminated upside-down cross.
The broadcast cuts back to Yong, who, after a brief moment of silence, switches to a different story as if nothing had happened.
It is not clear whether the Satanic footage was part of another story, or had come from elsewhere, and ABC has not commented on the matter.
Several people online linked devil-worshippers with members of the Noosa Temple of Satan, which is currently suing Queensland’s Education Department to have religious instruction classes taught in schools.
According to Australian media, the Satanists, led by Robin Bristow, also known as Brother Samael Demo-Gorgon, want the federal government to scrap its religious discrimination bill and replace it with a human rights act.
The Noosa Temple of Satan retweeted the clip, adding that “Satan works in mysterious ways.”
Commenters on social media, meanwhile, joked that the newscast was an “unfair slight on Satanists,” and hoped for the clip to stay with 666 retweets, which it has now surpassed.
https://www.rt.com/news/532575-australi ... orship-tv/
Archaeologists find skeleton, evidence of Greek in Pompeii
Tue, August 17, 2021, 4:53 AM
ROME (AP) — Archaeologists in the ancient city of Pompeii have discovered a remarkably well-preserved skeleton during excavations of a tomb that also shed light on the cultural life of the city before it was destroyed by a volcanic eruption in AD 79.
A skull bearing tufts of white hair and part of an ear, as well as bones and fabric fragments, were found in the tomb in the necropolis of Porta Sarno, an area not yet open to the public that is located in the east of Pompeii’s urban center. The discovery is unusual since most adults were cremated at the time.
An inscription of the tomb suggested that its owner, a freed slave named Marcus Venerius Secundio, helped organize performances in Greek in Pompeii. Experts said it was the first confirmation that Greek, the language of culture in the Mediterranean, was used alongside Latin.
“That performances in Greek were organized is evidence of the lively and open cultural climate which characterized ancient Pompeii,” the director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, Gabriel Zuchtriegel, said in a statement announcing the discovery.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Zuchtriegel said Marcus Venerius clearly had been able to make a living for himself after he was freed as a slave, given the “monumental" size of his burial tomb. “He didn't become super rich, but certainly he reached a considerable level of wealth," Zuchtriegel said.
The eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD destroyed Pompeii. Excavations over the years have yielded remarkable discoveries of tombs, chariots and brilliantly frescoed homes.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ar ... 11714.html
Tue, August 17, 2021, 4:53 AM
ROME (AP) — Archaeologists in the ancient city of Pompeii have discovered a remarkably well-preserved skeleton during excavations of a tomb that also shed light on the cultural life of the city before it was destroyed by a volcanic eruption in AD 79.
A skull bearing tufts of white hair and part of an ear, as well as bones and fabric fragments, were found in the tomb in the necropolis of Porta Sarno, an area not yet open to the public that is located in the east of Pompeii’s urban center. The discovery is unusual since most adults were cremated at the time.
An inscription of the tomb suggested that its owner, a freed slave named Marcus Venerius Secundio, helped organize performances in Greek in Pompeii. Experts said it was the first confirmation that Greek, the language of culture in the Mediterranean, was used alongside Latin.
“That performances in Greek were organized is evidence of the lively and open cultural climate which characterized ancient Pompeii,” the director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, Gabriel Zuchtriegel, said in a statement announcing the discovery.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Zuchtriegel said Marcus Venerius clearly had been able to make a living for himself after he was freed as a slave, given the “monumental" size of his burial tomb. “He didn't become super rich, but certainly he reached a considerable level of wealth," Zuchtriegel said.
The eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD destroyed Pompeii. Excavations over the years have yielded remarkable discoveries of tombs, chariots and brilliantly frescoed homes.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ar ... 11714.html
Two Circus Elephants Cry With Happiness When Reuniting Each Other After 22 Years Apart
Nothing is precious than a reunion. Many people have to leave their beloved family and friends for some reason. One day, when they have an opportunity to reunite with them, their emotions burst into tears and smiles. They cry but cry out of happiness. And these will probably be the most memorable moments in their life.
It’s amazing to know that elephants also express these feelings. Two former elephants at a circus can’t hide their tears and happiness when seeing their friend after two decades of separation. Time flies, but something stays unchanged. The love for our beloved people.
The heart-warming reunion was captured at Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. Shirley and Jenny (name of the two elephants) recognize each other immediately. The old friends can’t wait to wrap their trunks around each other in a loving embrace. This moment melts the hearts of millions of people on the Internet. Animals sometimes express their true feelings much better than us. That hug can transmit a thousand words.
The friendship between animals is something powerful and mysterious. It can beat all the odds in this life and touch human hearts. Just look at the bond of these two former circus elephants.
It is just an old video but enough to warm our hearts and raise our mood for these uncertain days. Elephants are the most adorable, affectionate, and innocent animals in this world. This nature doesn’t change even when they grow up into giants. Stories and cute moments of these huge animals can always win my heart.
Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-77wtMxT3-M&t=205s
https://yeuque.com/two-circus-elephants ... s-apart-2/
Nothing is precious than a reunion. Many people have to leave their beloved family and friends for some reason. One day, when they have an opportunity to reunite with them, their emotions burst into tears and smiles. They cry but cry out of happiness. And these will probably be the most memorable moments in their life.
It’s amazing to know that elephants also express these feelings. Two former elephants at a circus can’t hide their tears and happiness when seeing their friend after two decades of separation. Time flies, but something stays unchanged. The love for our beloved people.
The heart-warming reunion was captured at Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. Shirley and Jenny (name of the two elephants) recognize each other immediately. The old friends can’t wait to wrap their trunks around each other in a loving embrace. This moment melts the hearts of millions of people on the Internet. Animals sometimes express their true feelings much better than us. That hug can transmit a thousand words.
The friendship between animals is something powerful and mysterious. It can beat all the odds in this life and touch human hearts. Just look at the bond of these two former circus elephants.
It is just an old video but enough to warm our hearts and raise our mood for these uncertain days. Elephants are the most adorable, affectionate, and innocent animals in this world. This nature doesn’t change even when they grow up into giants. Stories and cute moments of these huge animals can always win my heart.
Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-77wtMxT3-M&t=205s
https://yeuque.com/two-circus-elephants ... s-apart-2/
Baby Born 19 Weeks Early Defies Long Odds and Astonishes Doctors
Curtis Means, now 16 months old, reflects a troubling trend of premature births across the United States, a problem that some research has associated with climate change.
Curtis Means and his mother, Michelle Butler. Curtis was certified this week as the world’s most premature infant to live to a first birthday.Credit...Andrea Mabry/University of Alabama at Birmingham University Relations
Michelle Butler was 21 weeks pregnant with twins — a boy and a girl — when she felt contractions.
As her sister drove her to the hospital, Ms. Butler prayed for them to stop.
But the contractions persisted and on July 5, 2020, at about 1 p.m., the babies, C’Asya Zy-Nell and Curtis Zy-Keith Means, were born. She was told that the infants, who each weighed under a pound, had less than a 1 percent chance of survival. They were quickly placed on ventilators.
C’Asya died less than a day later. Ms. Butler, 35, said she had held her in her arms, prayed for her and told her she loved her.
But Curtis hung on. He was trying to breathe on his own and his heart rate was improving, showing a resilience that shocked longtime nurses and doctors at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
“He was striking even from the first breath,” said Dr. Brian Sims, a neonatologist at the hospital who cared for Curtis. “He just showed that he was going to be a strong, strong fellow from Day 1.”
Curtis was released in April, after 275 days in the neonatal intensive care unit. On Wednesday, Guinness World Records named Curtis, who was born 132 days early, the world’s most premature infant to live to a first birthday. He is now 16 months old.
Babies born that premature seldom live more than a day, Dr. Sims said.
“The truth is no baby has survived at this age,” he said. “We say less than 1 percent, but it’s really closer to zero.”
Curtis’s early birth reflects the persistently high frequency of premature births in the United States, where the yearly rate of preterm births hovers at about 10 percent, according to the March of Dimes. In Alabama, the rate was 12.5 percent in 2019, according to the organization.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/13/us/p ... 778d3e6de3
Curtis Means, now 16 months old, reflects a troubling trend of premature births across the United States, a problem that some research has associated with climate change.
Curtis Means and his mother, Michelle Butler. Curtis was certified this week as the world’s most premature infant to live to a first birthday.Credit...Andrea Mabry/University of Alabama at Birmingham University Relations
Michelle Butler was 21 weeks pregnant with twins — a boy and a girl — when she felt contractions.
As her sister drove her to the hospital, Ms. Butler prayed for them to stop.
But the contractions persisted and on July 5, 2020, at about 1 p.m., the babies, C’Asya Zy-Nell and Curtis Zy-Keith Means, were born. She was told that the infants, who each weighed under a pound, had less than a 1 percent chance of survival. They were quickly placed on ventilators.
C’Asya died less than a day later. Ms. Butler, 35, said she had held her in her arms, prayed for her and told her she loved her.
But Curtis hung on. He was trying to breathe on his own and his heart rate was improving, showing a resilience that shocked longtime nurses and doctors at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
“He was striking even from the first breath,” said Dr. Brian Sims, a neonatologist at the hospital who cared for Curtis. “He just showed that he was going to be a strong, strong fellow from Day 1.”
Curtis was released in April, after 275 days in the neonatal intensive care unit. On Wednesday, Guinness World Records named Curtis, who was born 132 days early, the world’s most premature infant to live to a first birthday. He is now 16 months old.
Babies born that premature seldom live more than a day, Dr. Sims said.
“The truth is no baby has survived at this age,” he said. “We say less than 1 percent, but it’s really closer to zero.”
Curtis’s early birth reflects the persistently high frequency of premature births in the United States, where the yearly rate of preterm births hovers at about 10 percent, according to the March of Dimes. In Alabama, the rate was 12.5 percent in 2019, according to the organization.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/13/us/p ... 778d3e6de3
Re: AMAZING STORIES
The Telegraph
Faceless yogi living in Himalayas ‘controlled’ Indian stock exchange for years
Samaan Lateef
Sun, February 13, 2022, 3:30 PM
Chitra Ramkrishna - Michael Nagle/Bloomberg
A mysterious yogi living in the Himalayan mountains controlled India’s $4 trillion (£2.9 trillion) national stock exchange for years, according to an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
The spiritual guide, whose identity is unknown, treated the institution’s former chief executive as “a puppet in his hands”, according to the investigation, giving her instructions on everything from job appointments to business plans and projections, and even employee performance appraisals.
The investigation revealed 20 years’ worth of emails between the yogi and Chitra Ramkrishna, who says she first met the guru on the banks of the River Ganges and had sought his advice on “many personal and professional matters” ever since.
Ms Ramkrishna was eventually forced out of her role at the stock exchange in a mismanagement scandal involving an executive appointment she made on the guru’s advice.
On Feb 11, SEBI penalised Ms Ramkrishna for allowing “her decisions on various aspects of the functioning of the stock exchange to be influenced by that unknown person”, whose identity its investigators were unable to confirm.
Ms Ramkrishna told the SEBI she believed her guide was now living mostly in the Himalayas, but that she communicated with him by email, since “their spiritual powers do not require them to have any physical co-ordinates”.
The former chief executive and four other stock exchange officials were fined a total of $1 million (£738,000) and barred from involvement with any market infrastructure institution for three years.
Yogi’s guidance sought on colleague’s promotion
Ms Ramkrishna was appointed managing director of the National Stock Exchange of India in 2009 and was promoted to chief executive in 2013.
That year, she appointed Anand Subramanian, who at the time was little known in the industry, as the exchange’s chief operating officer on a part-time basis. He was awarded an annual salary of $223,000 (£164,000), despite claiming that his last drawn salary had been just $20,000 (£14,754). His pay rose to $664,000 (£490,000) over the next two years, in accordance with the yogi’s instructions.
The investigation also revealed emails from 2015 in which Ms Ramkrishna sought guidance from the yogi on a promotion for Mr Subramanian and how to hand over some of the operations to him.
“I seek your guidance on the path forward on this Swami [master], if this meets with your Highness’ approval,” Ms Ramkrishna wrote.
However, between 2015 and 2016, SEBI received multiple allegations of mismanagement against Ms Ramkrishna. She was ultimately ousted in 2016 for her role in a trading scam and abuse of power in the appointment of Mr Subramanian. She received $5.8 million (£4.3 million) as pending dues and salary on her departure.
The SEBI investigation said that Ms Ramkrishna failed to maintain confidentiality, personal integrity and honesty in discharging her duties and that she engaged in acts discreditable to her responsibilities as the chief executive of the National Stock Exchange.
Ms Ramkrishna said that her relationship with the yogi was “spiritual in nature” and that her exchanges with him did not compromise her integrity.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/fa ... 54517.html
Faceless yogi living in Himalayas ‘controlled’ Indian stock exchange for years
Samaan Lateef
Sun, February 13, 2022, 3:30 PM
Chitra Ramkrishna - Michael Nagle/Bloomberg
A mysterious yogi living in the Himalayan mountains controlled India’s $4 trillion (£2.9 trillion) national stock exchange for years, according to an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
The spiritual guide, whose identity is unknown, treated the institution’s former chief executive as “a puppet in his hands”, according to the investigation, giving her instructions on everything from job appointments to business plans and projections, and even employee performance appraisals.
The investigation revealed 20 years’ worth of emails between the yogi and Chitra Ramkrishna, who says she first met the guru on the banks of the River Ganges and had sought his advice on “many personal and professional matters” ever since.
Ms Ramkrishna was eventually forced out of her role at the stock exchange in a mismanagement scandal involving an executive appointment she made on the guru’s advice.
On Feb 11, SEBI penalised Ms Ramkrishna for allowing “her decisions on various aspects of the functioning of the stock exchange to be influenced by that unknown person”, whose identity its investigators were unable to confirm.
Ms Ramkrishna told the SEBI she believed her guide was now living mostly in the Himalayas, but that she communicated with him by email, since “their spiritual powers do not require them to have any physical co-ordinates”.
The former chief executive and four other stock exchange officials were fined a total of $1 million (£738,000) and barred from involvement with any market infrastructure institution for three years.
Yogi’s guidance sought on colleague’s promotion
Ms Ramkrishna was appointed managing director of the National Stock Exchange of India in 2009 and was promoted to chief executive in 2013.
That year, she appointed Anand Subramanian, who at the time was little known in the industry, as the exchange’s chief operating officer on a part-time basis. He was awarded an annual salary of $223,000 (£164,000), despite claiming that his last drawn salary had been just $20,000 (£14,754). His pay rose to $664,000 (£490,000) over the next two years, in accordance with the yogi’s instructions.
The investigation also revealed emails from 2015 in which Ms Ramkrishna sought guidance from the yogi on a promotion for Mr Subramanian and how to hand over some of the operations to him.
“I seek your guidance on the path forward on this Swami [master], if this meets with your Highness’ approval,” Ms Ramkrishna wrote.
However, between 2015 and 2016, SEBI received multiple allegations of mismanagement against Ms Ramkrishna. She was ultimately ousted in 2016 for her role in a trading scam and abuse of power in the appointment of Mr Subramanian. She received $5.8 million (£4.3 million) as pending dues and salary on her departure.
The SEBI investigation said that Ms Ramkrishna failed to maintain confidentiality, personal integrity and honesty in discharging her duties and that she engaged in acts discreditable to her responsibilities as the chief executive of the National Stock Exchange.
Ms Ramkrishna said that her relationship with the yogi was “spiritual in nature” and that her exchanges with him did not compromise her integrity.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/fa ... 54517.html
Re: AMAZING STORIES
Liberia taxi driver: How returning $50,000 changed Emmanuel Tuloe's life
The story of what happened to Liberian Emmanuel Tuloe has the quality of a modern fable.
The 19-year-old, dressed in a school uniform of sky blue shirt and navy shorts, looks incongruous in a class full of pupils at least six years younger than him.
But the one-time primary school dropout is happy.
Last year, he was struggling to earn a living as a motorbike taxi driver when he found $50,000 (£40,000) in a mix of US and Liberian notes, wrapped in a plastic bag by the side of the road.
He could have easily pocketed this life-changing amount. But he gave it to his aunt to look after and when the rightful owner appealed on national radio for help in finding the cash, Emmanuel came forward.
Mocked by some for his honesty - people laughed at him saying he would die poor - his act earned him generous rewards including a place at Ricks Institute, one of Liberia's most prestigious schools.
President George Weah handed him $10,000 and a local media owner also gave him cash, some of which was raised from viewers and listeners. And the owner of the money that was found donated $1,500-worth of goods.
On top of those and perhaps most significantly, a college in the US reacted by offering him a full scholarship once he had completed his secondary education.
'Enjoying the academic discipline'
And that is what he is focused on at Ricks, a boarding school set up 135 years ago for the elite of Liberian society descended from the freed slaves who founded the country. Its two-storey buildings sit on a beautiful, lush campus 6km (3.5 miles) from the Atlantic coast.
"I am enjoying the school, not because Ricks has a big name but because of the academic and moral disciplines," Emmanuel said, chuckling and playing with the collar of his shirt as he talked.
Like many Liberian children from a poor rural background are forced to do, he dropped out of school at the age of nine in order to earn some money to help his family out. This was shortly after his father had died in a drowning accident and he went to live with his aunt.
He became a motorbike taxi driver just a couple of years later.
After such a long time out of education, he needs a lot of extra support at school.
When Emmanuel first joined the sixth-grade class "he was feeling a bit inferior; he could not voice himself in the classroom, but day-by-day we worked on him", his main class teacher Tamba Bangbeor explained to the BBC.
"Academically, he came with a low foundation, so we tried to put him in the enrichment programme. That has been helping him."
He now has six years of secondary school ahead of him and will be 25 when he graduates. But he does not mind the age gap with his classmates and describes them as "friendly".
Emmanuel also enjoys boarding, saying that "dormitory life is good because this is a way of learning to live on your own someday".
Looking at the future, he wants to study accounting at university "to prepare myself to help guide the use of the country's money".
His prudence and honesty were seen as examples to follow in a country where allegations of corruption are rife and where officials are often accused of stealing state resources.
'Good to be honest'
Reflecting on the way that some people made fun of him for returning the money, he acknowledges that he could have used the funds to improve his material situation "but it was never going to get me the opportunity I now have".
Emmanuel thanked God for giving him the rewards and he was also "grateful to my parents for teaching me to be honest".
"And my message to all young people is: It's good to be honest; don't take what does not belong to you."
The teachers at Ricks appreciate Emmanuel being there.
"Not only have we recently benefitted from his honesty as a school, he's the second-choice goalkeeper for the school's football team, " Mr Bangbeor said of the die-hard Chelsea fan, who plays in the team alongside students closer to his age.
Emmanuel's classmates also welcome him being there.
Bethlene Kelley, 11, called him "a great friend that we like sharing with and caring for because he's quiet and doesn't talk too much. [He is] loyal, respectful and truthful".
Caleb Cooper, 12 appreciates Emmanuel for his conduct in class and in the dormitory.
"He doesn't steal from friends," Caleb said laughing.
"If Emmanuel finds something that does not belong to him, he reports it to the teacher. If the teacher is not around, he puts it on their desk," he said.
And from the life Emmanuel left behind, motorcycle taxi drivers do not appear to begrudge his new prospects.
One of them, Lawrence Fleming, 30, told the BBC he dropped out of school in the ninth grade as a teen and he had closely followed Emmanuel's story.
"It's a good thing that Emmanuel has gone back to school, we thank God for him," he said.
Standing by his Chinese-made Boxer motorcycle at the busy crossroads town of Brewerville, west of Monrovia, he passed on a word of advice.
"Let him remain in school for his future and the future of his children… he now has an opportunity that some of us don't have."
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-60915170
The story of what happened to Liberian Emmanuel Tuloe has the quality of a modern fable.
The 19-year-old, dressed in a school uniform of sky blue shirt and navy shorts, looks incongruous in a class full of pupils at least six years younger than him.
But the one-time primary school dropout is happy.
Last year, he was struggling to earn a living as a motorbike taxi driver when he found $50,000 (£40,000) in a mix of US and Liberian notes, wrapped in a plastic bag by the side of the road.
He could have easily pocketed this life-changing amount. But he gave it to his aunt to look after and when the rightful owner appealed on national radio for help in finding the cash, Emmanuel came forward.
Mocked by some for his honesty - people laughed at him saying he would die poor - his act earned him generous rewards including a place at Ricks Institute, one of Liberia's most prestigious schools.
President George Weah handed him $10,000 and a local media owner also gave him cash, some of which was raised from viewers and listeners. And the owner of the money that was found donated $1,500-worth of goods.
On top of those and perhaps most significantly, a college in the US reacted by offering him a full scholarship once he had completed his secondary education.
'Enjoying the academic discipline'
And that is what he is focused on at Ricks, a boarding school set up 135 years ago for the elite of Liberian society descended from the freed slaves who founded the country. Its two-storey buildings sit on a beautiful, lush campus 6km (3.5 miles) from the Atlantic coast.
"I am enjoying the school, not because Ricks has a big name but because of the academic and moral disciplines," Emmanuel said, chuckling and playing with the collar of his shirt as he talked.
Like many Liberian children from a poor rural background are forced to do, he dropped out of school at the age of nine in order to earn some money to help his family out. This was shortly after his father had died in a drowning accident and he went to live with his aunt.
He became a motorbike taxi driver just a couple of years later.
After such a long time out of education, he needs a lot of extra support at school.
When Emmanuel first joined the sixth-grade class "he was feeling a bit inferior; he could not voice himself in the classroom, but day-by-day we worked on him", his main class teacher Tamba Bangbeor explained to the BBC.
"Academically, he came with a low foundation, so we tried to put him in the enrichment programme. That has been helping him."
He now has six years of secondary school ahead of him and will be 25 when he graduates. But he does not mind the age gap with his classmates and describes them as "friendly".
Emmanuel also enjoys boarding, saying that "dormitory life is good because this is a way of learning to live on your own someday".
Looking at the future, he wants to study accounting at university "to prepare myself to help guide the use of the country's money".
His prudence and honesty were seen as examples to follow in a country where allegations of corruption are rife and where officials are often accused of stealing state resources.
'Good to be honest'
Reflecting on the way that some people made fun of him for returning the money, he acknowledges that he could have used the funds to improve his material situation "but it was never going to get me the opportunity I now have".
Emmanuel thanked God for giving him the rewards and he was also "grateful to my parents for teaching me to be honest".
"And my message to all young people is: It's good to be honest; don't take what does not belong to you."
The teachers at Ricks appreciate Emmanuel being there.
"Not only have we recently benefitted from his honesty as a school, he's the second-choice goalkeeper for the school's football team, " Mr Bangbeor said of the die-hard Chelsea fan, who plays in the team alongside students closer to his age.
Emmanuel's classmates also welcome him being there.
Bethlene Kelley, 11, called him "a great friend that we like sharing with and caring for because he's quiet and doesn't talk too much. [He is] loyal, respectful and truthful".
Caleb Cooper, 12 appreciates Emmanuel for his conduct in class and in the dormitory.
"He doesn't steal from friends," Caleb said laughing.
"If Emmanuel finds something that does not belong to him, he reports it to the teacher. If the teacher is not around, he puts it on their desk," he said.
And from the life Emmanuel left behind, motorcycle taxi drivers do not appear to begrudge his new prospects.
One of them, Lawrence Fleming, 30, told the BBC he dropped out of school in the ninth grade as a teen and he had closely followed Emmanuel's story.
"It's a good thing that Emmanuel has gone back to school, we thank God for him," he said.
Standing by his Chinese-made Boxer motorcycle at the busy crossroads town of Brewerville, west of Monrovia, he passed on a word of advice.
"Let him remain in school for his future and the future of his children… he now has an opportunity that some of us don't have."
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-60915170
Re: AMAZING STORIES
BBC
Mali nonuplets in perfect health on first birthday - father
Wed, May 4, 2022, 6:12 AM
The nonuplets
Only two other sets of nonuplets have ever been recorded in history, but none of them survived past a few days
The world's only nonuplets - nine babies born at the same time - are "in perfect health" as they celebrate their first birthday, their father has told the BBC.
"They're all crawling now. Some are sitting up and can even walk if they hold on to something," said Abdelkader Arby, an officer in the Malian army.
They are still in the care of the clinic in Morocco where they were born.
He said their mother Halima Cissé, 26, was also doing well.
"It's not easy but it's great. Even if it's tiring at times, when you look at all the babies in perfect health, [in a line] from right to left we're relieved. We forget everything," he told BBC Afrique.
He has just returned to Morocco for the first time in six months, along with their elder daughter, Souda, aged three.
"I'm overwhelmed to be reunited with all my family - my wife, the children and me."
They will just have a small birthday celebration with the nurses and a few people from their apartment building, Mr Arby said.
"Nothing is better than the first year. We will remember this great moment we are going to experience."
The babies broke the Guinness World Record for the most children delivered in a single birth to survive.
Ahead of the birth, Mrs Cissé was flown to Morocco by the Malian government for specialist care.
Multiple births are risky and mothers with more than four foetuses at a time are advised to terminate some in countries where abortion is legal.
There are also risks the babies could develop health problems due to their premature birth, such as sepsis and cerebral palsy.
Mrs Cissé and the children are currently living in what their father described as a "medicalised flat" that belongs to the owners of the Ain Borja clinic in Casablanca where the babies were born.
"There are nurses who are here, in addition to my wife, who help to take care of the children," Mr Arby said.
"The clinic has given them a menu which says what to give them to eat at all times - night and day," he continued.
Parents of the nonuplets
Abdelkader Arby (pictured alongside his wife) says raising the babies is not easy
The babies - five girls and four boys - were born at 30 weeks according to Mali's health minister, Fanta Siby. They weighed between 500g and 1kg (1.1lb and 2.2lb), Professor Youssef Alaoui, medical director of the Ain Borja clinic told the AFP news agency at the time of birth.
They were delivered by Caesarean section.
Their boys are called Mohammed VI, Oumar, Elhadji, Bah, while the girls are named Kadidia, Fatouma, Hawa, Adama and Oumou.
Each one has a unique personality, their father said.
"They all have different characters. Some are quiet, while other make more noise and cry a lot. Some want to be picked up all the time. They are all very different, which is entirely normal."
Mr Arby also thanked the Malian government for its help.
"The Malian state has put everything in place for the care and treatment of the nine babies and their mother. It's not at all easy, but it's beautiful and something that is comforting," he said.
They have not yet been to Mali, but they are already very popular in the country, their father said.
"Everyone is very keen to see the babies with their own eyes - their family, friends, our home village, the whole country."
He also has a message for couples trying to have children: "I hope God blesses everyone who doesn't yet have children - that they can have what we, the parents of nonuplets currently have. It's beautiful, a real treasure."
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ma ... 36850.html
Mali nonuplets in perfect health on first birthday - father
Wed, May 4, 2022, 6:12 AM
The nonuplets
Only two other sets of nonuplets have ever been recorded in history, but none of them survived past a few days
The world's only nonuplets - nine babies born at the same time - are "in perfect health" as they celebrate their first birthday, their father has told the BBC.
"They're all crawling now. Some are sitting up and can even walk if they hold on to something," said Abdelkader Arby, an officer in the Malian army.
They are still in the care of the clinic in Morocco where they were born.
He said their mother Halima Cissé, 26, was also doing well.
"It's not easy but it's great. Even if it's tiring at times, when you look at all the babies in perfect health, [in a line] from right to left we're relieved. We forget everything," he told BBC Afrique.
He has just returned to Morocco for the first time in six months, along with their elder daughter, Souda, aged three.
"I'm overwhelmed to be reunited with all my family - my wife, the children and me."
They will just have a small birthday celebration with the nurses and a few people from their apartment building, Mr Arby said.
"Nothing is better than the first year. We will remember this great moment we are going to experience."
The babies broke the Guinness World Record for the most children delivered in a single birth to survive.
Ahead of the birth, Mrs Cissé was flown to Morocco by the Malian government for specialist care.
Multiple births are risky and mothers with more than four foetuses at a time are advised to terminate some in countries where abortion is legal.
There are also risks the babies could develop health problems due to their premature birth, such as sepsis and cerebral palsy.
Mrs Cissé and the children are currently living in what their father described as a "medicalised flat" that belongs to the owners of the Ain Borja clinic in Casablanca where the babies were born.
"There are nurses who are here, in addition to my wife, who help to take care of the children," Mr Arby said.
"The clinic has given them a menu which says what to give them to eat at all times - night and day," he continued.
Parents of the nonuplets
Abdelkader Arby (pictured alongside his wife) says raising the babies is not easy
The babies - five girls and four boys - were born at 30 weeks according to Mali's health minister, Fanta Siby. They weighed between 500g and 1kg (1.1lb and 2.2lb), Professor Youssef Alaoui, medical director of the Ain Borja clinic told the AFP news agency at the time of birth.
They were delivered by Caesarean section.
Their boys are called Mohammed VI, Oumar, Elhadji, Bah, while the girls are named Kadidia, Fatouma, Hawa, Adama and Oumou.
Each one has a unique personality, their father said.
"They all have different characters. Some are quiet, while other make more noise and cry a lot. Some want to be picked up all the time. They are all very different, which is entirely normal."
Mr Arby also thanked the Malian government for its help.
"The Malian state has put everything in place for the care and treatment of the nine babies and their mother. It's not at all easy, but it's beautiful and something that is comforting," he said.
They have not yet been to Mali, but they are already very popular in the country, their father said.
"Everyone is very keen to see the babies with their own eyes - their family, friends, our home village, the whole country."
He also has a message for couples trying to have children: "I hope God blesses everyone who doesn't yet have children - that they can have what we, the parents of nonuplets currently have. It's beautiful, a real treasure."
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ma ... 36850.html
Re: AMAZING STORIES
Photo of the above articleswamidada wrote: ↑Sun May 08, 2022 8:15 pm BBC
Mali nonuplets in perfect health on first birthday - father
Wed, May 4, 2022, 6:12 AM
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ma ... 36850.html
Only two other sets of nonuplets have ever been recorded in history, but none of them survived past a few days
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Elderly Indian couple sue son and daughter-in-law for ‘failing to provide a grandchild’
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar
Thu, May 12, 2022, 7:05 AM
An elderly couple in India is suing their only child and his wife for the bizarre reason that they failed to provide them with a grandchild.
Sanjiv Ranjan Prasad and his wife Sadhana Prasad, residents of Haridwar city in the northern state of Uttarakhand, have moved court and are seeking a compensation of Rs 50m (£530,000) from the couple if they are unable to have a child within the next year.
Mr Prasad has cited financial struggles for suing his son after he got married in 2016 with the “hopes of having a grandchild”. He also alleged that his daughter-in-law and her family control his son’s finances and have prevented them from having a child.
“We didn't care about gender, just wanted a grandchild,” Mr Prasad told news agency ANI.
Women in India are expected, and often forced, to bear children within a few years of their marriage. Traditional families in India have patriarchal setups with expectations of a male child even though the sex ratio remains skewed in many parts of the country.
Mr Prasad claimed he had to spend all his money on his son’s education in the US and is presently undergoing a financial crisis.
“I gave my son all my money, got him trained in America. I don’t have any money now. We have taken a loan from the bank to build a house. We’re troubled financially and personally (sic),” he added.
“We have demanded Rs 25m (£264, 366) each from the son and the daughter-in-law,” Mr Prasad continued.
In a petition filed before the court on 7 May, Mr Prasad claimed he spent nearly Rs 20m (£258,322) to raise his only child, a sum that was more than they could afford.
Mr Prasad bought an expensive car for the couple with loaned money and also paid Rs 500,000 (£5,285) for the couple’s honeymoon in Thailand, the petition stated.
He claimed that his son, who is a pilot with a commercial airline, moved to southern India’s Hyderabad city, bought a house in his wife’s name and ceased communication with his parents.
When Mr Prasad pressed his son for a grandchild, he alleged in the petition that the couple “pretended” to be separated as they both live in different cities due to their professions.
AK Srivastava, the advocate representing Mr Prasad and his wife, argued that the elderly couple are seeking compensation for financial and emotional loss.
“The couple has the freedom to not give birth to a child, which is why we are asking to be compensated. The amount is just given the money Mr Prasad has spent on his son’s upbringing,” he told The Independent.
“Such new cases are important as they lead to the formation of new laws,” he added.
The matter will be heard in court on 17 May.
Currently.att.yahoo.com/news/elderly-indian-couple-sue-son-120543306.html
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar
Thu, May 12, 2022, 7:05 AM
An elderly couple in India is suing their only child and his wife for the bizarre reason that they failed to provide them with a grandchild.
Sanjiv Ranjan Prasad and his wife Sadhana Prasad, residents of Haridwar city in the northern state of Uttarakhand, have moved court and are seeking a compensation of Rs 50m (£530,000) from the couple if they are unable to have a child within the next year.
Mr Prasad has cited financial struggles for suing his son after he got married in 2016 with the “hopes of having a grandchild”. He also alleged that his daughter-in-law and her family control his son’s finances and have prevented them from having a child.
“We didn't care about gender, just wanted a grandchild,” Mr Prasad told news agency ANI.
Women in India are expected, and often forced, to bear children within a few years of their marriage. Traditional families in India have patriarchal setups with expectations of a male child even though the sex ratio remains skewed in many parts of the country.
Mr Prasad claimed he had to spend all his money on his son’s education in the US and is presently undergoing a financial crisis.
“I gave my son all my money, got him trained in America. I don’t have any money now. We have taken a loan from the bank to build a house. We’re troubled financially and personally (sic),” he added.
“We have demanded Rs 25m (£264, 366) each from the son and the daughter-in-law,” Mr Prasad continued.
In a petition filed before the court on 7 May, Mr Prasad claimed he spent nearly Rs 20m (£258,322) to raise his only child, a sum that was more than they could afford.
Mr Prasad bought an expensive car for the couple with loaned money and also paid Rs 500,000 (£5,285) for the couple’s honeymoon in Thailand, the petition stated.
He claimed that his son, who is a pilot with a commercial airline, moved to southern India’s Hyderabad city, bought a house in his wife’s name and ceased communication with his parents.
When Mr Prasad pressed his son for a grandchild, he alleged in the petition that the couple “pretended” to be separated as they both live in different cities due to their professions.
AK Srivastava, the advocate representing Mr Prasad and his wife, argued that the elderly couple are seeking compensation for financial and emotional loss.
“The couple has the freedom to not give birth to a child, which is why we are asking to be compensated. The amount is just given the money Mr Prasad has spent on his son’s upbringing,” he told The Independent.
“Such new cases are important as they lead to the formation of new laws,” he added.
The matter will be heard in court on 17 May.
Currently.att.yahoo.com/news/elderly-indian-couple-sue-son-120543306.html
Re: AMAZING STORIES
USA TODAY
At over 7 feet tall, Turkish woman confirmed as world's tallest living woman
Gabriela Miranda, USA TODAY
Wed, October 13, 2021, 9:50 AM
Rumeysa Gelgi stands at 7 feet tall and 0.7 inches and has once again broken a Guinness World Record, this time for the tallest living woman. At just 18, Turkey's Gelgi was titled the tallest teenager living in 2014, according to The Guinness World Records.
"Her indomitable spirit and pride at standing out from the crowd is an inspiration. The category of tallest living woman is not one that changes hands very often, so I'm excited to share this news with the world," Craig Glenday, Editor-in-Chief of the Guinness World Records said.
Gelgi has an extremely rare condition known as Weaver syndrome which causes accelerated growth amongst other abnormalities including skeletal maturation. Although Gelgi mostly uses a wheelchair, she can use a walker for short periods of time.
As she racks up world records, Gelgi also spreads awareness and understanding about Weaver syndrome. She said she's fortunate that while people are intrigued by her height, most who pass her on the streets are kind.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ov ... 52165.html
At over 7 feet tall, Turkish woman confirmed as world's tallest living woman
Gabriela Miranda, USA TODAY
Wed, October 13, 2021, 9:50 AM
Rumeysa Gelgi stands at 7 feet tall and 0.7 inches and has once again broken a Guinness World Record, this time for the tallest living woman. At just 18, Turkey's Gelgi was titled the tallest teenager living in 2014, according to The Guinness World Records.
"Her indomitable spirit and pride at standing out from the crowd is an inspiration. The category of tallest living woman is not one that changes hands very often, so I'm excited to share this news with the world," Craig Glenday, Editor-in-Chief of the Guinness World Records said.
Gelgi has an extremely rare condition known as Weaver syndrome which causes accelerated growth amongst other abnormalities including skeletal maturation. Although Gelgi mostly uses a wheelchair, she can use a walker for short periods of time.
As she racks up world records, Gelgi also spreads awareness and understanding about Weaver syndrome. She said she's fortunate that while people are intrigued by her height, most who pass her on the streets are kind.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ov ... 52165.html
Re: AMAZING STORIES
Photos of the above article
Rumeysa Gelgi has a condition known as Weaver syndrome which causes accelerated growth amongst other abnormalities including skeletal maturation.
With her parents
Re: AMAZING STORIES
World's oldest man celebrates birthday in Venezuela
Sat, May 28, 2022, 11:47 AM
STORY: Friends and family attended a birthday mass celebrated to commemorate Perez Mora’s life. After blowing out the candles, the party continued outside the church.
Perez Mora, who enjoys good health and a cup of strong aguardiente liquor every day, has 41 grandchildren, 18 great-grandchildren, and 12 great-great-grandchildren, Guinness said in a press release.
Perez Mora became the world's oldest person after Saturnino de la Fuente Garcia, who was born on Feb. 11, 1909 in Spain, died in January at age 112 years and 341 days old.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/wo ... 46085.html
Sat, May 28, 2022, 11:47 AM
STORY: Friends and family attended a birthday mass celebrated to commemorate Perez Mora’s life. After blowing out the candles, the party continued outside the church.
Perez Mora, who enjoys good health and a cup of strong aguardiente liquor every day, has 41 grandchildren, 18 great-grandchildren, and 12 great-great-grandchildren, Guinness said in a press release.
Perez Mora became the world's oldest person after Saturnino de la Fuente Garcia, who was born on Feb. 11, 1909 in Spain, died in January at age 112 years and 341 days old.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/wo ... 46085.html
Crop Circles Were Made by Supernatural Forces. Named Doug and Dave
Intricate patterns carved in fields across England in the 1980s were a viral phenomenon long before the internet fed us such prankster curiosities daily.
A crop circle in England, photographed in May.Credit...Stonehenge Dronescapes
By Peter Wilson
June 12, 2022
CONHOLT, England — Standing hip-high in a large wheat field in southern England, one can make out an odd series of depressions in the swaying green crop, where some of the wheat has been pushed down lower than the rest.
It is only by looking at the field from high above that the real picture is revealed: The whirls and sharp angles that have been pressed into the wheat form an intricate pattern including a series of four circles orbiting a larger circle, all within a bigger jagged-edged disk that looks like a huge bicycle gear.
These strange markings in a farm district called Conholt, near the border of Hampshire and Wiltshire counties, are a crop circle, a rare current example of the mysterious patterns that regularly intrigued people around the world in the 1980s and ’90s, prompting speculation about alien visitors, ancient spiritual forces, weather anomalies, secret weapons tests and other theories.
The once-rapid flow of circles that sprouted in this part of England and spread to fields from California to Australia has now slowed to a trickle. When this particular example appeared overnight on May 22, it was the only known example in England.
Three decades after the height of the crop circle craze, the phenomenon has taken on a new significance as a reminder that even before the era of social media and the internet, hoaxes were able to spread virally around the world and true believers could cling stubbornly to conspiracy theories despite a lack of evidence — or even the existence of evidence to the contrary.
In the case of crop circles, the most important contradictory evidence emerged on Sept. 9, 1991, when the British newspaper Today ran a front-page story under the headline “Men who conned the world,” revealing that two mischievous friends from Southampton had secretly made more than 200 of the patterns over the previous decade.
Doug Bower, then 67, and his friend Dave Chorley, 62, admitted to a reporter, Graham Brough, that in the late 1970s they had begun using planks of wood with ropes attached to each end to stamp circles in crops by holding the ropes in their hands and pressing the planks underfoot. They had then watched with amusement as their anonymous antics eventually attracted media attention and began being copied by imitators around the world.
Doug Bower, left, and Dave Chorley in 1991.Credit...Shutterstock
Mr. Bower and Mr. Chorley’s exploits are the inspiration for “The Perfect Golden Circle,” a new novel by the British writer Benjamin Myers. Set in 1989, it follows two friends who roam the English summer nights creating increasingly complex crop patterns.
The real-life pranksters phoned the newspaper to come clean, according to Mr. Brough, now 62, who says he verified their claims by checking an archive of more than 200 crop circle designs stored in a shed behind Mr. Bower’s home. The designs were clearly aged and matched the patterns they had made over the years, Mr. Brough said.
“I spent a week getting them to show me how they had done it all, and I have never laughed as much in my life,” he recalled. “The prevailing wisdom at the time was that aliens were about to land any day, but it had all been kicked off by these two blokes who’d have a couple of pints at their favorite pub and then head out into the night to have a bit of fun.”
“The so-called experts were adamant that humans could not possibly have made these circles, but Doug and Dave showed me how they did it,” Mr. Brough continued. “They stomped down the crop without breaking the actual wheat shafts and used ropes tied to a central stake to make the circles and a bit of wire hanging down from a baseball cap like a gun sight to line things up and make sure their lines were straight.”
The newspaper filmed the two men creating a pattern in a field in Kent and then showed it to Pat Delgado, a co-author of big-selling books on the mystery, who said it had definitely been made by a nonhuman “higher intelligence.”
The newspaper quoted Mr. Delgado declaring that “In no way could this be a hoax.”
“Delgado said that not only was it 100 percent made by aliens, but he could sense that the aliens had just left,” Mr. Brough said.
“When I told him the truth and brought in Doug and Dave, he recognized them straight away because over the years they had often been among the first people to turn up to look at a new crop circle. He said, ‘Oh my God, that’s why you two were always there!’ and he admitted he had been pranked.”
Mr. Delgado’s co-author Colin Andrews, a retired electrical engineer for a British regional council, quickly convinced him to retract his admission that he had been fooled, arguing that the pranksters could not have produced the blizzard of patterns that had appeared around the world.
Mr. Chorley at work.Credit...Shutterstock
True Believers
“The people who wanted to keep believing in aliens and everything else just ignored the evidence, no matter how obvious it was,” said Rob Irving, who had begun emulating the two pranksters’ work in 1989 and befriended them after they went public.
Mr. Irving and a small group of friends formed the Circlemakers, who considered themselves a conceptual art collective rather than pranksters and were intrigued by the power that the anonymous creations held over the imaginations of millions of people.
“We took the baton from Doug and Dave and became the most active group making circles,” said Mr. Irving, 65, who now lectures in art and creativity at the University of Gloucestershire. “The power of the art came from the mystery, and Doug forever regretted coming forward because the mystery was lost.”
In its heyday there were probably five groups creating crop circles, Mr. Irving said, but there was conflict between those motivated by art and creativity and other crop artists who bragged about their work or even had their own paranormal theories about the origins of some circles.
Some members of Mr. Irving’s group used their skills to branch into lucrative work creating images for paying customers, earning tens of thousands of dollars for creating huge logos and symbols on crops, grass or sand for brands including Nike, Mitsubishi and Hello Kitty.
Nobody has come forward to admit making the latest circle in Conholt, which Mr. Irving described as “quite a nice design without being mind-blowing.”
While Mr. Irving liked to create circles that could be viewed by the public from nearby hills or other vantage points, the few crop artists who are still active tend to focus on an internet audience, contacting drone photographers as soon as they complete their work.
That can draw crowds of onlookers, like the dozens who stomped through fields in Conholt to view the latest design, much to the anger of the farmer on an adjoining property.
“The tourists can cause even more destruction than the original circle,” said the farmer, who would not give her name. She said the owner of the damaged field had considered mowing over the design to deter visitors “but then they would be losing even more wheat.”
“It is just so irresponsible to be trespassing and destroying food in the middle of a global wheat shortage, so if it was me I would be looking to prosecute,” she said.
A crop circle in a cornfield in southern Germany in 2014.Credit...Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/DPA, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Only one creator of crop circles has been prosecuted in Britain for vandalism, in November 2000, after he sent a photo of himself making a pattern to a “ufologist” to prove that it had not been made by aliens; the photo was passed on to the police.
Mr. Andrews, the co-author of Mr. Delgado’s books on crop circles, said he has also been tempted to give the police details of people like Mr. Irving, who he believes have cruelly deceived the public and investigators like himself.
Mr. Andrews, 76, claims to have invented the term “crop circles” after first viewing one in July 1983 and admits he has since made a good living from the phenomenon, having sold hundreds of thousands of books and traveled the world, giving up to three paid lectures or public appearances a week.
He said his invitations to speak “tailed off straight away” after the confessions by Mr. Bower and Mr. Chorley, but he continues to monitor crop circles and insists he is “more convinced than ever” that there are nonhuman causes.
“Where is the proof that all of them are man-made?” said Mr. Andrews, quickly adding that even if they are all man-made, he believes the people making the circles have unwittingly “been prompted by an independent nonhuman mind.”
Having suggested in the 1980s that the circles were created by fluctuations in the Earth’s natural magnetic forces, Mr. Andrews now believes that a God or “high level of nature” is sending us a signal (that the planet is heading for chaos).
“The mystery is still out there,” said Mr. Andrews, who now lives in Guilford, Conn.
A crop circle in Wiltshire, England, in 1990.Credit...Colin Andrews
Jeffrey Wilson, a founder of the Independent Crop Circle Researchers’ Association in the United States, noted with some skepticism that there is no scientific evidence for Mr. Andrews’s theory of “divine inspiration” but said his own view is that about one in five crop circles are not made by humans.
A former science teacher who now works as a data analyst in the retail sector in southern Ohio, Mr. Wilson, 52, insists that circles of nonhuman origin can be distinguished by things such as higher radiation levels and physical changes in plants.
He said his group has about 40 volunteers ready to investigate circles, but a drop off in U.S. sightings since peaks in 1996 and 2003-04 means “we have not been able to go into a field to investigate a circle since September 2012, in Chillicothe, Ohio.”
“We still just don’t have enough information for a valid hypothesis, so anyone who tells you they know how circles are being made is lying to you,” Mr. Wilson said.
Stephan Lewandowsky, a professor of psychology at the University of Bristol in Britain, said Mr. Andrews’s theory that a hidden hand is prompting people to make circles is an example of how “conspiratorial cognition and conspiracy theories are self-sealing.”
“If you puncture a hole in a theory with new evidence, like proof that people are making crop circles, it will seal itself by incorporating the new evidence or flipping it on its head,” Dr. Lewandowsky said.
“And,” he continued, “if you point out that there is no evidence for a theory, they will say, ‘Exactly! That shows how hard the deep state is working to cover it up,’ or the lack of alien sightings just proves how advanced the aliens are because they are invisible.”
Dr. Lewandowsky noted that this kind of thinking long predates social media. “What is going on is that some people feel they have lost control, and instead of admitting that we live in a world we can’t control they take comfort from believing that there is agency involved and someone who can be blamed, whether it is mass shootings being faked by actors, or 5G causing Covid, or whatever,” he said.
The difference now, Dr. Lewandowsky said, “is that while it took years for people to pay attention to crop circles and for the idea to spread, the internet sends ideas around the world within days.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/12/styl ... 778d3e6de3
A crop circle in England, photographed in May.Credit...Stonehenge Dronescapes
By Peter Wilson
June 12, 2022
CONHOLT, England — Standing hip-high in a large wheat field in southern England, one can make out an odd series of depressions in the swaying green crop, where some of the wheat has been pushed down lower than the rest.
It is only by looking at the field from high above that the real picture is revealed: The whirls and sharp angles that have been pressed into the wheat form an intricate pattern including a series of four circles orbiting a larger circle, all within a bigger jagged-edged disk that looks like a huge bicycle gear.
These strange markings in a farm district called Conholt, near the border of Hampshire and Wiltshire counties, are a crop circle, a rare current example of the mysterious patterns that regularly intrigued people around the world in the 1980s and ’90s, prompting speculation about alien visitors, ancient spiritual forces, weather anomalies, secret weapons tests and other theories.
The once-rapid flow of circles that sprouted in this part of England and spread to fields from California to Australia has now slowed to a trickle. When this particular example appeared overnight on May 22, it was the only known example in England.
Three decades after the height of the crop circle craze, the phenomenon has taken on a new significance as a reminder that even before the era of social media and the internet, hoaxes were able to spread virally around the world and true believers could cling stubbornly to conspiracy theories despite a lack of evidence — or even the existence of evidence to the contrary.
In the case of crop circles, the most important contradictory evidence emerged on Sept. 9, 1991, when the British newspaper Today ran a front-page story under the headline “Men who conned the world,” revealing that two mischievous friends from Southampton had secretly made more than 200 of the patterns over the previous decade.
Doug Bower, then 67, and his friend Dave Chorley, 62, admitted to a reporter, Graham Brough, that in the late 1970s they had begun using planks of wood with ropes attached to each end to stamp circles in crops by holding the ropes in their hands and pressing the planks underfoot. They had then watched with amusement as their anonymous antics eventually attracted media attention and began being copied by imitators around the world.
Doug Bower, left, and Dave Chorley in 1991.Credit...Shutterstock
Mr. Bower and Mr. Chorley’s exploits are the inspiration for “The Perfect Golden Circle,” a new novel by the British writer Benjamin Myers. Set in 1989, it follows two friends who roam the English summer nights creating increasingly complex crop patterns.
The real-life pranksters phoned the newspaper to come clean, according to Mr. Brough, now 62, who says he verified their claims by checking an archive of more than 200 crop circle designs stored in a shed behind Mr. Bower’s home. The designs were clearly aged and matched the patterns they had made over the years, Mr. Brough said.
“I spent a week getting them to show me how they had done it all, and I have never laughed as much in my life,” he recalled. “The prevailing wisdom at the time was that aliens were about to land any day, but it had all been kicked off by these two blokes who’d have a couple of pints at their favorite pub and then head out into the night to have a bit of fun.”
“The so-called experts were adamant that humans could not possibly have made these circles, but Doug and Dave showed me how they did it,” Mr. Brough continued. “They stomped down the crop without breaking the actual wheat shafts and used ropes tied to a central stake to make the circles and a bit of wire hanging down from a baseball cap like a gun sight to line things up and make sure their lines were straight.”
The newspaper filmed the two men creating a pattern in a field in Kent and then showed it to Pat Delgado, a co-author of big-selling books on the mystery, who said it had definitely been made by a nonhuman “higher intelligence.”
The newspaper quoted Mr. Delgado declaring that “In no way could this be a hoax.”
“Delgado said that not only was it 100 percent made by aliens, but he could sense that the aliens had just left,” Mr. Brough said.
“When I told him the truth and brought in Doug and Dave, he recognized them straight away because over the years they had often been among the first people to turn up to look at a new crop circle. He said, ‘Oh my God, that’s why you two were always there!’ and he admitted he had been pranked.”
Mr. Delgado’s co-author Colin Andrews, a retired electrical engineer for a British regional council, quickly convinced him to retract his admission that he had been fooled, arguing that the pranksters could not have produced the blizzard of patterns that had appeared around the world.
Mr. Chorley at work.Credit...Shutterstock
True Believers
“The people who wanted to keep believing in aliens and everything else just ignored the evidence, no matter how obvious it was,” said Rob Irving, who had begun emulating the two pranksters’ work in 1989 and befriended them after they went public.
Mr. Irving and a small group of friends formed the Circlemakers, who considered themselves a conceptual art collective rather than pranksters and were intrigued by the power that the anonymous creations held over the imaginations of millions of people.
“We took the baton from Doug and Dave and became the most active group making circles,” said Mr. Irving, 65, who now lectures in art and creativity at the University of Gloucestershire. “The power of the art came from the mystery, and Doug forever regretted coming forward because the mystery was lost.”
In its heyday there were probably five groups creating crop circles, Mr. Irving said, but there was conflict between those motivated by art and creativity and other crop artists who bragged about their work or even had their own paranormal theories about the origins of some circles.
Some members of Mr. Irving’s group used their skills to branch into lucrative work creating images for paying customers, earning tens of thousands of dollars for creating huge logos and symbols on crops, grass or sand for brands including Nike, Mitsubishi and Hello Kitty.
Nobody has come forward to admit making the latest circle in Conholt, which Mr. Irving described as “quite a nice design without being mind-blowing.”
While Mr. Irving liked to create circles that could be viewed by the public from nearby hills or other vantage points, the few crop artists who are still active tend to focus on an internet audience, contacting drone photographers as soon as they complete their work.
That can draw crowds of onlookers, like the dozens who stomped through fields in Conholt to view the latest design, much to the anger of the farmer on an adjoining property.
“The tourists can cause even more destruction than the original circle,” said the farmer, who would not give her name. She said the owner of the damaged field had considered mowing over the design to deter visitors “but then they would be losing even more wheat.”
“It is just so irresponsible to be trespassing and destroying food in the middle of a global wheat shortage, so if it was me I would be looking to prosecute,” she said.
A crop circle in a cornfield in southern Germany in 2014.Credit...Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/DPA, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Only one creator of crop circles has been prosecuted in Britain for vandalism, in November 2000, after he sent a photo of himself making a pattern to a “ufologist” to prove that it had not been made by aliens; the photo was passed on to the police.
Mr. Andrews, the co-author of Mr. Delgado’s books on crop circles, said he has also been tempted to give the police details of people like Mr. Irving, who he believes have cruelly deceived the public and investigators like himself.
Mr. Andrews, 76, claims to have invented the term “crop circles” after first viewing one in July 1983 and admits he has since made a good living from the phenomenon, having sold hundreds of thousands of books and traveled the world, giving up to three paid lectures or public appearances a week.
He said his invitations to speak “tailed off straight away” after the confessions by Mr. Bower and Mr. Chorley, but he continues to monitor crop circles and insists he is “more convinced than ever” that there are nonhuman causes.
“Where is the proof that all of them are man-made?” said Mr. Andrews, quickly adding that even if they are all man-made, he believes the people making the circles have unwittingly “been prompted by an independent nonhuman mind.”
Having suggested in the 1980s that the circles were created by fluctuations in the Earth’s natural magnetic forces, Mr. Andrews now believes that a God or “high level of nature” is sending us a signal (that the planet is heading for chaos).
“The mystery is still out there,” said Mr. Andrews, who now lives in Guilford, Conn.
A crop circle in Wiltshire, England, in 1990.Credit...Colin Andrews
Jeffrey Wilson, a founder of the Independent Crop Circle Researchers’ Association in the United States, noted with some skepticism that there is no scientific evidence for Mr. Andrews’s theory of “divine inspiration” but said his own view is that about one in five crop circles are not made by humans.
A former science teacher who now works as a data analyst in the retail sector in southern Ohio, Mr. Wilson, 52, insists that circles of nonhuman origin can be distinguished by things such as higher radiation levels and physical changes in plants.
He said his group has about 40 volunteers ready to investigate circles, but a drop off in U.S. sightings since peaks in 1996 and 2003-04 means “we have not been able to go into a field to investigate a circle since September 2012, in Chillicothe, Ohio.”
“We still just don’t have enough information for a valid hypothesis, so anyone who tells you they know how circles are being made is lying to you,” Mr. Wilson said.
Stephan Lewandowsky, a professor of psychology at the University of Bristol in Britain, said Mr. Andrews’s theory that a hidden hand is prompting people to make circles is an example of how “conspiratorial cognition and conspiracy theories are self-sealing.”
“If you puncture a hole in a theory with new evidence, like proof that people are making crop circles, it will seal itself by incorporating the new evidence or flipping it on its head,” Dr. Lewandowsky said.
“And,” he continued, “if you point out that there is no evidence for a theory, they will say, ‘Exactly! That shows how hard the deep state is working to cover it up,’ or the lack of alien sightings just proves how advanced the aliens are because they are invisible.”
Dr. Lewandowsky noted that this kind of thinking long predates social media. “What is going on is that some people feel they have lost control, and instead of admitting that we live in a world we can’t control they take comfort from believing that there is agency involved and someone who can be blamed, whether it is mass shootings being faked by actors, or 5G causing Covid, or whatever,” he said.
The difference now, Dr. Lewandowsky said, “is that while it took years for people to pay attention to crop circles and for the idea to spread, the internet sends ideas around the world within days.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/12/styl ... 778d3e6de3
Re: AMAZING STORIES
Miami Herald
Abandoned mosque emerges from shrinking reservoir in drought-stricken India
Screengrab from Manmauji Baba's YouTube video
Aspen Pflughoeft
Thu, September 8, 2022 at 5:19 PM
An abandoned mosque resurfaced from the bottom of a shrinking reservoir in India, video footage shows.
The structure – rising 30 feet above the ground at the peak of its dome – sits entirely exposed on the muddy ground of the Phulwaria Dam reservoir in Bihar, a northeastern state in India, Kashmir Media Service reported.
The mosque boasts three archway entrances with matching domes on top, video footage from Manmauji Baba shows. The brick facade looks dark brown at the base, fading to light tan at the top. Eight towers shoot out above the remarkably well-preserved building as water laps nearby, videos show.
Locals say the mosque is called Noori Masjid and could be up to 120 years old, local outlet Dainik Bhaskar reported.
A large population used to live around the mosque, Dainik Bhaskar reported. Ruins of other buildings litter the landscape of the drying reservoir, video shows.
That changed in the 1980s with the Phulwaria Dam, Kashmir Media Service reported. Locals were forced to leave and move to other nearby villages, abandoning the mosque, the outlet reported.
In the 30 years since the reservoir submerged the mosque, its towers and domes were occasionally visible, but the rest of the structure remained submerged, Kashmir Media Service reported.
This year, however, Bihar received 40% less rainfall than usual by mid-August and is experiencing drought conditions, Indian Express reported. It could be one of the state’s driest seasons in the last 50 years, the outlet reported.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ab ... 06445.html
Abandoned mosque emerges from shrinking reservoir in drought-stricken India
Screengrab from Manmauji Baba's YouTube video
Aspen Pflughoeft
Thu, September 8, 2022 at 5:19 PM
An abandoned mosque resurfaced from the bottom of a shrinking reservoir in India, video footage shows.
The structure – rising 30 feet above the ground at the peak of its dome – sits entirely exposed on the muddy ground of the Phulwaria Dam reservoir in Bihar, a northeastern state in India, Kashmir Media Service reported.
The mosque boasts three archway entrances with matching domes on top, video footage from Manmauji Baba shows. The brick facade looks dark brown at the base, fading to light tan at the top. Eight towers shoot out above the remarkably well-preserved building as water laps nearby, videos show.
Locals say the mosque is called Noori Masjid and could be up to 120 years old, local outlet Dainik Bhaskar reported.
A large population used to live around the mosque, Dainik Bhaskar reported. Ruins of other buildings litter the landscape of the drying reservoir, video shows.
That changed in the 1980s with the Phulwaria Dam, Kashmir Media Service reported. Locals were forced to leave and move to other nearby villages, abandoning the mosque, the outlet reported.
In the 30 years since the reservoir submerged the mosque, its towers and domes were occasionally visible, but the rest of the structure remained submerged, Kashmir Media Service reported.
This year, however, Bihar received 40% less rainfall than usual by mid-August and is experiencing drought conditions, Indian Express reported. It could be one of the state’s driest seasons in the last 50 years, the outlet reported.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/ab ... 06445.html
Re: AMAZING STORIES
The temple that became a refuge for the flood-stricken
Muhammad Akbar Notezai Published September 11, 2022 Updated about 23
FLOOD-HIT people take refuge inside the Baba Madhodas temple in Kachhi district.—Dawn
QUETTA: Tucked in the Kachhi district of Balochistan, the tiny village of Jalal Khan is still reeling from the flooding that destroyed houses and left mass destruction in its wake.
The village was cut off from the rest of the province due to inundation in the Nari, Bolan, and Lehri rivers, leaving the residents of the remote area to fend for themselves.
During these testing times, the local Hindu community opened the doors of the Baba Madhodas Mandir to the flood-hit people and their livestock.
According to locals, Baba Madhodas was a pre-partition Hindu dervish (saint) equally cherished by Muslims and Hindus of the area. “He used to travel on camel,” says Iltaf Buzdar, a frequent visitor to the village from Bhag Nari tehsil.
Mr Buzdar says as per the stories narrated by his parents, the saint transcended religious boundaries. “He would think of people through the prism of humanity instead of their caste and creed,” he quotes his parents.
The worship place — frequented by Hindu worshippers from across Balochistan — is made of concrete and covers a large area. Since it is located on high ground, it remained relatively safe from the floodwaters and could serve as a sanctuary to the flood-hit people in their bleakest hour.
Most members of the Hindu community in Jalal Khan have migrated to other cities of Kachhi for employment and other opportunities, but a couple of families remain on the temple premises to look after it.
Rattan Kumar, 55, a shopkeeper in the Bhag Nari tehsil, is in charge of the temple at present. “There are over one hundred rooms in the temple as a large number of people from all over Balochistan and Sindh come here for pilgrimage every year,” he tells Dawn.
It’s not like the temple did not bear the brunt of abnormal rains. Sawan Kumar, Rattan’s son, told Dawn a few rooms were damaged, but overall the structure remained safe. At least 200-300 people, mostly Muslims, and their livestock were given refuge on the premises and looked after by Hindu families.
Initially, the area was completely cut off from the rest of the district. The displaced said they were provided rations via helicopter sorties, but after their moved to the temple, they were being fed by the Hindu community.
Israr Mugheri is a doctor in Jalal Khan. Since his arrival, he has set up a medical camp inside the temple. “Besides locals, Hindus have also housed the goats and sheep along with other domesticated animals,” he told with Dawn. “There were announcements on the loudspeaker by the local Hindus, calling upon Muslims to rush to the temple to take refuge,” he adds.
Those who took refuge there say they are indebted to the local community for coming to their aid and providing them food and shelter during this difficult hour.
For locals, opening the temple to the survivors of the flood was a gesture of humanity and religious harmony, which has been their tradition of centuries.
Published in Dawn, September 11th, 2022
https://www.dawn.com/news/1709467/the-t ... d-stricken
Muhammad Akbar Notezai Published September 11, 2022 Updated about 23
FLOOD-HIT people take refuge inside the Baba Madhodas temple in Kachhi district.—Dawn
QUETTA: Tucked in the Kachhi district of Balochistan, the tiny village of Jalal Khan is still reeling from the flooding that destroyed houses and left mass destruction in its wake.
The village was cut off from the rest of the province due to inundation in the Nari, Bolan, and Lehri rivers, leaving the residents of the remote area to fend for themselves.
During these testing times, the local Hindu community opened the doors of the Baba Madhodas Mandir to the flood-hit people and their livestock.
According to locals, Baba Madhodas was a pre-partition Hindu dervish (saint) equally cherished by Muslims and Hindus of the area. “He used to travel on camel,” says Iltaf Buzdar, a frequent visitor to the village from Bhag Nari tehsil.
Mr Buzdar says as per the stories narrated by his parents, the saint transcended religious boundaries. “He would think of people through the prism of humanity instead of their caste and creed,” he quotes his parents.
The worship place — frequented by Hindu worshippers from across Balochistan — is made of concrete and covers a large area. Since it is located on high ground, it remained relatively safe from the floodwaters and could serve as a sanctuary to the flood-hit people in their bleakest hour.
Most members of the Hindu community in Jalal Khan have migrated to other cities of Kachhi for employment and other opportunities, but a couple of families remain on the temple premises to look after it.
Rattan Kumar, 55, a shopkeeper in the Bhag Nari tehsil, is in charge of the temple at present. “There are over one hundred rooms in the temple as a large number of people from all over Balochistan and Sindh come here for pilgrimage every year,” he tells Dawn.
It’s not like the temple did not bear the brunt of abnormal rains. Sawan Kumar, Rattan’s son, told Dawn a few rooms were damaged, but overall the structure remained safe. At least 200-300 people, mostly Muslims, and their livestock were given refuge on the premises and looked after by Hindu families.
Initially, the area was completely cut off from the rest of the district. The displaced said they were provided rations via helicopter sorties, but after their moved to the temple, they were being fed by the Hindu community.
Israr Mugheri is a doctor in Jalal Khan. Since his arrival, he has set up a medical camp inside the temple. “Besides locals, Hindus have also housed the goats and sheep along with other domesticated animals,” he told with Dawn. “There were announcements on the loudspeaker by the local Hindus, calling upon Muslims to rush to the temple to take refuge,” he adds.
Those who took refuge there say they are indebted to the local community for coming to their aid and providing them food and shelter during this difficult hour.
For locals, opening the temple to the survivors of the flood was a gesture of humanity and religious harmony, which has been their tradition of centuries.
Published in Dawn, September 11th, 2022
https://www.dawn.com/news/1709467/the-t ... d-stricken
After Temporary Break, Line to View Queen’s Coffin Is Reopened
Would-be mourners in line to pay their respects — known as the Queue — will probably have to wait 24 hours, the British government said, after it reached capacity on Friday.
Watch Line to See Queen Elizabeth's Coffin Reaches 5 Miles video at:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/16/worl ... 778d3e6de3
LONDON — The line was three miles long on Thursday. By Friday, it had grown to five miles. Then, in the morning, an update from the government: The line was full.
Would-be mourners wanting to view the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II lying in state in Westminster Hall would be turned away for at least six hours, starting at about 9:50 a.m.
“We are sorry for any inconvenience,” the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said in its post on Twitter. “Please do not attempt to join the queue until it re-opens.”
Officials reversed course just after 5 p.m. in London, but the reopening was tempered with an ominous announcement from the government: People at the back of the line should expect to spend 24 hours before finally reaching the queen. Overnight temperatures, officials warned, would be cold.
The closure of the line served to prove a broader point: After the queen’s coffin was put on public display in London on Wednesday evening, the line — known in Britain simply as the Queue — has become something of a phenomenon.
Hundreds of thousands of people have ignored stories about the arduous wait to join the monumentally long, slow-moving line stretching through London along the River Thames, as they sought to pay their respects at the coffin before the queen’s funeral on Monday morning.
The line was kept closed for nearly an hour beyond the initial six-hour period, and even a separate path for those requiring easier access reached capacity on Friday, officials said at around 1:30 p.m. London time.
The death a week ago of Elizabeth, Britain’s longest-reigning monarch, has upended much of the normal programming in the country, and Monday will be a hastily declared public holiday.
But amid the solemnity and memorials, the Queue has emerged as an object of fascination, a miles-long stretch of ever-moving people trudging day and night alongside the Thames and past many of London’s landmarks.
Mourners lining up near Tower Bridge on Friday to pay their respects following the death of the queen last week. Credit...Alkis Konstantinidis/Reuters
“It reminds you of how beautiful London is. Makes you feel really quite proud,” said Sujata Mahendran, who lined up overnight on Thursday with her husband. “This is not a gathering — this is respect.”
The Queue has affirmed the cliché about the affinity of Britons for lining up, and jokes about the wait were common even among those shuffling patiently along.
With nothing to do but wait — and wait — many approached what has amounted to a public test of endurance with determination and a sense of camaraderie. Line buddies, strangers brought together by the moment, offered each other snacks and shared life stories.
Portable bathrooms and drinking stations have been set up along the route and attendants have handed out wristbands to maintain order, allowing people to peel off at the cafes and bars along the route, a handful of which are staying open overnight. With the line continually edging forward, sleep is in short supply.
For those who are less patient, listings for the wristbands that designate a spot in line were being sold on eBay for as much as $400.
Some royalists and fans of the queen have been moved by the sheer dedication and symbolic expression of grief represented by the Queue. (As of Friday morning, the estimated wait time for people at the back of the line was 14 hours.)
Sarah Allchorne had traveled alone from Kent and whiled away the time listening to podcasts and chatting with Ms. Mahendran. “Would I do this for another one? I’m not sure,” Ms. Allchorne said.
But, she noted, the queen had “given so much.”
The former soccer player David Beckham said that he had spent about 12 hours in the line, telling reporters that he had wanted to celebrate the life of the queen during the wait. “Something like this today is meant to be shared together,” he said.
The English soccer star David Beckham left Westminster Hall on Friday after waiting in line for about 12 hours. Credit...Louisa Gouliamaki/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Others expressed amazement that anyone would be willing to suffer through the grueling experience to walk past a closed coffin for a second or two.
By Friday morning, the line had spilled into Southwark Park, across the river and several miles east of the coffin’s location in Westminster Hall, prompting the decision to at least temporarily stop people from joining.
Despite pleas that no more people join, footage circulating on social media appeared to show that a queue for the Queue — in true British tradition — had already formed outside the gates to the park.
Officials have been posting live updates about the length of the line. They warned from the start that people would be turned away if officials believed mourners would not make it to Westminster before 6:30 a.m. on Monday. That is when the viewings will come to an end, with the funeral starting about four and a half hours later.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/16/worl ... 778d3e6de3
Watch Line to See Queen Elizabeth's Coffin Reaches 5 Miles video at:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/16/worl ... 778d3e6de3
LONDON — The line was three miles long on Thursday. By Friday, it had grown to five miles. Then, in the morning, an update from the government: The line was full.
Would-be mourners wanting to view the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II lying in state in Westminster Hall would be turned away for at least six hours, starting at about 9:50 a.m.
“We are sorry for any inconvenience,” the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said in its post on Twitter. “Please do not attempt to join the queue until it re-opens.”
Officials reversed course just after 5 p.m. in London, but the reopening was tempered with an ominous announcement from the government: People at the back of the line should expect to spend 24 hours before finally reaching the queen. Overnight temperatures, officials warned, would be cold.
The closure of the line served to prove a broader point: After the queen’s coffin was put on public display in London on Wednesday evening, the line — known in Britain simply as the Queue — has become something of a phenomenon.
Hundreds of thousands of people have ignored stories about the arduous wait to join the monumentally long, slow-moving line stretching through London along the River Thames, as they sought to pay their respects at the coffin before the queen’s funeral on Monday morning.
The line was kept closed for nearly an hour beyond the initial six-hour period, and even a separate path for those requiring easier access reached capacity on Friday, officials said at around 1:30 p.m. London time.
The death a week ago of Elizabeth, Britain’s longest-reigning monarch, has upended much of the normal programming in the country, and Monday will be a hastily declared public holiday.
But amid the solemnity and memorials, the Queue has emerged as an object of fascination, a miles-long stretch of ever-moving people trudging day and night alongside the Thames and past many of London’s landmarks.
Mourners lining up near Tower Bridge on Friday to pay their respects following the death of the queen last week. Credit...Alkis Konstantinidis/Reuters
“It reminds you of how beautiful London is. Makes you feel really quite proud,” said Sujata Mahendran, who lined up overnight on Thursday with her husband. “This is not a gathering — this is respect.”
The Queue has affirmed the cliché about the affinity of Britons for lining up, and jokes about the wait were common even among those shuffling patiently along.
With nothing to do but wait — and wait — many approached what has amounted to a public test of endurance with determination and a sense of camaraderie. Line buddies, strangers brought together by the moment, offered each other snacks and shared life stories.
Portable bathrooms and drinking stations have been set up along the route and attendants have handed out wristbands to maintain order, allowing people to peel off at the cafes and bars along the route, a handful of which are staying open overnight. With the line continually edging forward, sleep is in short supply.
For those who are less patient, listings for the wristbands that designate a spot in line were being sold on eBay for as much as $400.
Some royalists and fans of the queen have been moved by the sheer dedication and symbolic expression of grief represented by the Queue. (As of Friday morning, the estimated wait time for people at the back of the line was 14 hours.)
Sarah Allchorne had traveled alone from Kent and whiled away the time listening to podcasts and chatting with Ms. Mahendran. “Would I do this for another one? I’m not sure,” Ms. Allchorne said.
But, she noted, the queen had “given so much.”
The former soccer player David Beckham said that he had spent about 12 hours in the line, telling reporters that he had wanted to celebrate the life of the queen during the wait. “Something like this today is meant to be shared together,” he said.
The English soccer star David Beckham left Westminster Hall on Friday after waiting in line for about 12 hours. Credit...Louisa Gouliamaki/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Others expressed amazement that anyone would be willing to suffer through the grueling experience to walk past a closed coffin for a second or two.
By Friday morning, the line had spilled into Southwark Park, across the river and several miles east of the coffin’s location in Westminster Hall, prompting the decision to at least temporarily stop people from joining.
Despite pleas that no more people join, footage circulating on social media appeared to show that a queue for the Queue — in true British tradition — had already formed outside the gates to the park.
Officials have been posting live updates about the length of the line. They warned from the start that people would be turned away if officials believed mourners would not make it to Westminster before 6:30 a.m. on Monday. That is when the viewings will come to an end, with the funeral starting about four and a half hours later.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/16/worl ... 778d3e6de3