In early November, 20 years to the day after the assassination of Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin by a right-wing religious extremist, Amos Gitai's mesmerizing and disturbing new film “Rabin, the Last Day” premiered in Tel Aviv's symphony hall — about 200 yards from the spot where Rabin was shot. It’s no ordinary movie: “Rabin, the Last Day” is a disorienting mixture of drama, documentary and meticulous re-creation, and very little of it takes place on the last day of Rabin’s life. (The title ultimately takes on other meanings.) And in the context of Israel today, not to mention the context of the Middle East and the world, this was no ordinary movie premiere. Gitai is both a living legend of Israeli cinema and a highly controversial cultural figure, and with “Rabin, the Last Day” he seizes the third rail of Israeli politics with both hands. I’m always dubious of all manifestations of the Great Man theory of history, in which destiny is shaped by the rise or fall of a single individual. But political assassinations, by their nature, are disruptive events meant to change the course of history, and even by that standard this one had far-reaching consequences. Rabin and his deputy, Shimon Peres, had gone much further than any previous Israeli leaders toward a permanent settlement of the “Palestinian question,” and with the Oslo Accords had agreed to the general outlines of a historic land-for-peace deal with Yasser Arafat. It’s too simplistic to claim that Rabin’s death undid all that at one stroke, but it certainly began the unraveling. If the Rabin assassination feels like a dim and incomprehensible memory to most Americans, it nonetheless affected our nation’s path into the 21st century in many ways. In retrospect, that was almost certainly the moment when the window for a “two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict came slamming down. Politicians around the world still have to pretend to believe in that possibility, but it's largely a charade. Their real attitude is much closer to Mitt Romney's famous (and apocryphal) line about kicking the can down the road. As Gitai drily told the French newspaper Le Monde in a recent interview, as things stand now, “to say that it would work to place two states side by side is highly theoretical.” I found Gitai's film difficult to watch at first, but then I was completely addicted and even after 153 minutes I wanted to know more. He draws on numerous official sources, including the government commission that investigated the murder and police interviews with the assassin, a 25-year-old religious student named Yigal Amir. In an interview that opens the film, Peres, who was Rabin's lifelong rival, colleague and friend, is asked whether we would live in a different world now if Rabin had not been killed in 1995 — whether the Arabs and Israelis would have made peace. He answers with one syllable, and says it twice: “Ken. Ken.” Yes. Yes. None of that is knowable, of course, but the more you think about it the bigger the questions get. Would the 9/11 attacks have happened? Without that day, of course, the United States does not invade Iraq or Afghanistan, which means that ISIS never comes into existence. But those intriguing hypotheticals are not the explosive element in “Rabin, the Last Day,” or the reason it was made a headline news event in Israel. Gitai comes pretty close to blaming Benjamin Netanyahu, the current Israeli prime minister, for Rabin's murder. In fairness, the filmmaker does not quite put it that way (and for legal reasons, probably can’t). The case he builds against Bibi is about influence and inference, a matter of moral responsibility rather than criminal culpability. In that French interview, he says that the film offered “the occasion to ask a question of Israeli society,” but never says exactly what question he had in mind. This is not a conspiracy theory film, and Gitai never challenges the legal proposition that Amir was more or less a classic “lone nut” who went out to stalk Rabin of his own volition, without much planning or forethought. But Amir’s brand of nuttiness was not isolated and did not exist in a vacuum. Netanyahu was the head of the right-wing Likud party and leader of the parliamentary opposition in 1995. He did not pull the trigger or put the gun in Amir’s hand. He never advocated violence against Rabin or Peres as a way to stop the Oslo peace process, and did not condone the assassination after it happened. But the leitmotif that runs through “Rabin, the Last Day” is that the Israeli religious right viewed the Rabin-Peres government as illegitimate, and the potential land-for-peace deal it had struck with Arafat and the PLO as treasonous. Radical rabbis that Amir knew and trusted had proclaimed the Jewish equivalent of a fatwa against Rabin: He was a traitor to the Jewish people, worse than the most anti-Semitic gentile, and his life was forfeit. Whatever Netanyahu's personal convictions may have been, he fostered that environment of hatred and intolerance and was its principal beneficiary. In the film, we see Netanyahu speaking at rallies where his supporters held up posters calling for the deaths of Rabin, Peres and Arafat and the extermination or expulsion of all Arabs on Israeli-held land. He surely saw the homemade images of Rabin in a keffiyeh, or Palestinian-style headscarf, and the other images, the ones depicting Rabin wearing an SS officer's uniform. He saw people staging a mock funeral for Rabin, carrying a coffin through the streets. He saw all those things and said nothing about any of them. Indeed, he embraced that situation as a political opportunity. Asked by the reporter for Le Monde whether he was making a “terrible charge” against Netanyahu, Gitai did not quite answer yes or no. “This man has unlimited personal ambition, to the point that he is willing to endanger certain essential ingredients of Israeli society,” he responded. “Under his reign, extremely problematic racist tendencies have emerged. At the same time, his capacity to turn everything toward partisan ends risks destroying the collective project that is Israel. That project of creating a place of refuge for the Jews was the political conclusion of a long chain of suffering. It was not a religious project.” Many people on all sides of the issue would disagree with various aspects of that, I’m sure. (We’re talking about the Middle East, which means that nobody will ever agree about anything.) The Israeli religious right would insist that there was a strong religious component to their nation from the beginning. Palestinians and their supporters in the European and American left, on the other hand, might say that there was an element of racism in the State of Israel all along, and that Gitai is clinging to a romantic vision of Israeli identity that has been long discredited. There is some plausibility to both of those counter-arguments, but whether or not you and I find Gitai’s political arguments acceptable on all levels is beside the point. Gitai is indeed making the case in “Rabin, the Last Day,” as he has throughout his career, for an alternative vision of Israel’s past and Israel’s future. Although the Israeli right often depicts him as a left-wing dissident artist beloved by European radicals, his patriotic credentials are beyond dispute. He learned his craft shooting footage in the Israeli military, and survived a helicopter crash after being downed by a Syrian missile during the Yom Kippur War of 1973. Gitai’s first response in the Le Monde interview, when he is asked why he wanted to make a film about Rabin’s assassination 20 years after the fact, begins this way: “My dear country, which I love very much, is not doing so well.” The existence of this film, and the furious debate it has spawned, stands as proof of Gitai’s fundamental argument that the belligerent nationalism of Bibi Netanyahu is not the only Israel. Discussion of Israel in American politics is so distorted — mostly by the bipartisan agreement that no aspect of Israeli foreign policy may be questioned — that progressives often focus almost exclusively on Israel’s military misdeeds and its flawed human rights record. When it comes to things like the recent military campaign in Gaza, that’s both understandable and necessary. But turn the question around for a minute: Is it even remotely conceivable that a film this scathing and self-critical, a film that asks essential questions about the nature of national identity, could be made in Egypt or Jordan or Syria or the Palestinian territories, and then have its public premiere in the largest concert hall of that nation’s largest city? That tradition of intellectual openness even in times of adversity, of rigorous and (if you’ll forgive the cliché) rabbinical self-scrutiny, is very much under attack. “Those who contributed to the climate of hate that led to the assassination of Rabin today flirt with power,” Gitai told Le Monde. “The danger is that everything that created the original character of Israeli society will finally disappear.” But history, as Gitai and his film both suggest, is a dialectical and paradoxical process that ultimately obeys its own laws. By killing Yitzhak Rabin and the two-state solution, Gitai suggests, the Israeli extreme right has ensured that the only possible outcome, decades or generations from now, will be precisely what it wants to resist: “One state, with equal rights for all its citizens, whatever their religion or their origin.” What lies between then and now? He has no doubt about that, and the pattern is familiar: “Lots of blood will flow, certainly.” “Rabin, the Last Day” is now playing at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema in New York. It opens Feb. 5 in Phoenix, March 11 in Los Angeles and Santa Fe, N.M., and April 14 in Washington, with other cities and home video to follow.
by Claire Lower on Skillet, shared by Andy Orin to Lifehacker
I have long loved IKEA, not just for the LACK units of my college days or the little table I’m sitting at right this moment, but I love them for their food. No trip to the Swedish superstore is complete without a helping of meatballs, but their market is equally worth checking out.
There’s a lot of fine print to read on your medicine labels, and among them is often the disclaimer to not take with grapefruit juice. What’s up with that? This video will tell you.
Looks like a good read but probably will be banned.
PETALING JAYA: The Malays need to break free of the invisible bonds trapping their minds, says political observer M Bakri Musa.
Speaking to FMT a week before the Malaysian launch of his book Liberating the Malay Mind, Bakri said that the problem faced by the Malay community was that they had “closed and trapped their minds both individually and collectively.”
“We’ve been discussing the Malay problem for decades, if not centuries, and chances are that when my grandchildren become grandparents, we will still be discussing it,” said Bakri. “The reason for this is that we’re not addressing the main issue.”
He said the Malays had unwittingly trapped themselves in a mental “prison without walls,”one they would escape from if only they realise it.”
“In the San Diego Zoo, there’s an island surrounded by a moat about five feet wide,” he said. “The reindeer on the island are free to move around. They never cross the moat even though they can jump. They don’t realize they’re being trapped by the moat. They’re physically capable of jumping it, but don’t. And that’s the problem with us. We don’t realise we’re being trapped.
“The worst prison in the world is not a prison with walls and fences. The worst prison is one with no walls. You don’t realize that you’re imprisoned.”
He attributed this mental entrapment first to Malay culture, which he said was shaped by institutions and the educational system and also the national religion. He pointed out that he used the word “religion” instead of “Islam” and explained that this was because he believed Islam as currently practised in Malaysia is not the Islam practised elsewhere and at other times.
“Islam is a great transforming force,” he said. “But the religion we practise, even though we call it Islam, far from transforming and uplifting us, is entrapping our minds.”
He said the Malays’ current understanding of Islam was “completely” at odds with the way it was understood during the classical era, when the religion was a great civilising force.
Bakri also attributed the Malays’ mental imprisonment to the general lack of participation in a “modern economy,” which he said skewed their perception of other races and the outside world. “We are by nature excluded from the mainstream, and that entraps our minds,” he said.
“One of the great things about capitalism, which many people have noticed, is that you look at people differently once you’re in a business and have a commercial enterprise. Now, if you’re not in business, you get government cheques, and you look at non-Malays and foreigners differently. But if you run a business – a restaurant, say — you look at people as potential customers. You want to please them.
“A dollar coming from a Bangladeshi is the same as a dollar coming from a Bumiputera.”
Liberating the Malay Mind, which was published three years ago by ZI Publications, is scheduled for a relaunch here today. In it, Bakri examines Malaysia’s past as well as the current Malay obsession with “Ketuanan Melayu,” which he says has inhibited them and made them uncompetitive.
“If we strive for liberated minds, then we will be tuans even outside Tanah Melayu,” he said.
Here are six of the best photos that readers added to the Consumerist Flickr Pool in the last week, picked for usability in a Consumerist post or for just plain neatness.
Want to see your pictures on our site? Our Flickr pool is the place where Consumerist readers upload photos for possible use in future Consumerist posts. Just be a registered Flickr user, go here, and click “Join Group?” up on the top right. Choose your best photos, then click “send to group” on the individual images you want to add to the pool.
The new flight will operate daily, with the inaugural departing San Francisco at 11:25pm on June 1 and arriving at Singapore Changi at 6:45am two days later. On the return, the flight will depart SIN at 8:45am and arrive at San Francisco at 9:15am, so it’ll be possible to make connections throughout the US in both directions. The early morning Singapore departure may make Southeast Asia connections difficult without an overnight in Singapore, but there are certainly worse places to spend the night.
The new flight will be operated by United’s 787-9 Dreamliner, with 48 lie-flat seats in business, 88 seats in Economy Plus and 116 regular economy seats. All of the airline’s 787-9s are equipped with seat-back entertainment and Wi-Fi. The flight is scheduled for 16 hours, 20 minutes on the outbound and 15 hours, 30 minutes on the return.
Availability for the inaugural flight.
Round-trip fares from San Francisco appear to run around $900 in economy or $4,700 in business. You may be able to save a bit by flying from another city and connecting at SFO — economy flights from Newark will run you about $850 round-trip, for example, which is a relative steal for a 22,000-mile journey.
United has loaded some economy awards, but business-class award seats are not yet available. You’ll need to redeem 80,000 miles round-trip for economy or 140,000 round-trip for business class. Given the relatively low economy fares, however, you’ll probably be better off paying cash.
As part of this announcement, United shared that it will discontinue service between Tokyo and Singapore on June 2, though ANA operates United codeshare flights on that route, and Singapore Airlines operates Narita service as well.
To mark the long-awaited (and dreamed-of) return of beloved cultural phenomena The X-Files, Agent Carter and The Walking Dead to the small screen, FOX International Channels has launched the first-ever FOX-themed Breakout Room in Southeast Asia. Located at Nu Sentral, the Breakout Room allows fans of the 3 series to immerse themselves in their TV addictions in a way they’ve only ever fantasized about.
Dubbed ‘Breakout, Code Name: FOX’ – the Breakout Room is the result of FOX working hand-in-hand with game designers and ‘escape room’ masters to afford the surreal experience of being a part of The X-Files, Agent Carter and The Walking Dead, all at once! The ultimate objective of the game is for fans to revel in a surrealistic and immersive movie-like ‘escaperience’.
Participants of Breakout, Code Name: FOX are catapulted into the mysterious universe of The X-Files as members of Peggy Carter’s covert government agency (the Strategic Scientific Reserve, or SSR) in a world filled with The Walking Dead’s zombies. Wrap your head around THAT!
The game comprises a multi-sectioned chamber that can accommodate up to 8 participants. Players are assigned different roles based on characters from the 3 shows, with each having a special skill of their own. Participants are required to complete 8 puzzles, each in a limited amount of time, in order to advance into another part of the room. The game must be completed within 45 minutes, so players have to be on their toes and light on their feet.
What to expect
Chaos within your own group of friends, in a uniquely hilarious way. Some might not be able to carry out their roles well, which may cause everyone to go absolutely mental – especially when it comes to decoding algorithms and codes that require lots of thinking. If you worry that your friends will not fully participate because they’re too busy tweeting or Instagramming the über-cool props around you, fret not – handphones and cameras are strictly prohibited inside the rooms. Have fun!
Breakout – Code Name: FOX Where: Level 4, Nu Sentral Shopping Mall When: Now until 23 February
Site: http://www.breakout.com.my/nu/
Our brains are lazy, easily lured away from productivity to timesinks like Facebook and Twitter. Make use of this mental laziness by carefully curating the icons on your phone’s home screen.
Heathrow official boards aborted transatlantic flight to test air after eight people fall ill; airline confiscates all luggage for unexplained 'checks' --Mystery surrounds why passengers' luggage was confiscated for 'checks' | 27 Jan 2016 | Mystery still surrounds why a flight attendant collapsed and seven other people were taken ill during a mid-air drama above the Atlantic. Panicked passengers told of the scary moment a plea went out for any doctors onboard before the captain of the American Airlines flight declared a 'medical emergency' and returned to London. Emergency vehicles were scrambled and, once on the ground, the aborted Los Angeles-bound flight was escorted to the terminal before passengers were told to remain in their seats. It has since emerged that those onboard were not allowed to disembark until tests had been carried out for any 'elevated levels of substances' in the cabin air - analysis that yielded no answers. All luggage was then confiscated for 'checks' by American Airlines and Heathrow authorities, but passengers were kept in the dark as to the motive for doing so.
LOS ANGELES: Abe Vigoda, the sad-faced star of Francis Ford Coppola’s classic film “The Godfather,” died Tuesday at 94, his manager told AFP.
The actor died at the home of his daughter, Carol Vigoda Fuchs, in New Jersey.
“She went to get him something to drink and when she came back he was gone,” said manager Sid Craig, who represented him for decades.
Vigoda apparently died of old age.
“He didn’t seem particularly sick or tired. I don t think Abe was ever sick,” Craig added.
Vigoda was born in New York City to Russian Jewish immigrant parents. His father was a tailor.
The actor cut his teeth on Broadway. But arguably his greatest on-screen impact came when Vigoda played sunken-eyed mafioso Sal Tessio in “The Godfather.”
He was also famous for playing detective Phil Fish on television’s “Barney Miller.” The character was so popular it was spun off into its own series, “Fish.”
In his later years, the twice-married Vigoda was mistakenly reported to have died on several occasions, becoming a running social media joke.
Every morning, almost on autopilot, I make a smoothie — tossing spinach, a nub of pungent ginger, a generous squeeze of lemon, and apple into my blender, along with a splash of coconut water. Then came the morning when I opened the fridge and realized I was completely out of apples, so I took to the freezer, hoping I had something lurking in there that would work as a worthy and delicious substitution. Perhaps, weeks prior, a more industrious version of myself stuck something in the freezer that could work here.
There, tucked in the corner next to the bag of broccoli and a half-eaten container of Talenti sorbet, was just the thing that would save this potential smoothie fiasco.
KOTA KINABALU: Speculation is rife that Labuan, which was declared a free port by the British in 1942 and had the status restored in 1950 after it was terminated during Japanese Occupation, may lose the status again under a revision to Budget 2016.
Labuan MP Rozman Isli, troubled by the speculation, disclosed that he had sent a note to the Federal Territories Ministry seeking urgent clarification on the future of the island, which was designated as an International Offshore Financial Centre (IOFC). “Labuan would be doomed if its free port status was scrapped.
“It will be a double blow. The scrapping of the island’s free port status will further aggravate its economic woes.”
Labuan, pointed out the MP, has already been hit hard by the crude oil market plunging from over USD100 per barrel to less than USD30 per barrel. “This has led to business shrinking by 40 per cent. Thousands have left the island after having been retrenched and not having any alternative jobs readily available.
“Jobs are not easy to come by in Labuan outside the oil and gas industry. Most of the IOFC activities are being carried out in Kuala Lumpur and not in Labuan.”
Rozman hastened to add that speculation on the future of Labuan should not be taken too seriously at the moment. “Wait for a government announcement.”
He recalled that talk of Labuan losing its free port status first surfaced in 2011 when then Federal Territories Minister Raja Nong Chik complained that the Federal Government was losing a lot of revenue allegedly due to smuggling activities conducted from the island.
Taking away Labuan’s free port status, warned Labuan Chinese Chamber of Commerce (LCCC) Chairman Wong Kii Yii, was like “pulling the carpet from under our feet. Maintaining the free port status was one of the promises of the Federal Government when the island was turned into a Federal Territory”.
He pointed out that Labuan was the oldest free port in the country, with the other two being Langkawi and Tioman. “Penang lost its free port status when it became industrialized.
“We don’t have industries like Penang. If Langkawi and Tioman are allowed to maintain their free port status, there’s no reason why Labuan should be stripped of the status. If the Federal Government wants to abolish this status, it should be discussed with all stakeholders.”
Wong ventured that instead of targeting Labuan under revisions to Budget 2016, the Federal Government should exercise financial prudence. “The BR1M payout of RM5.9 billion to 4.7 million households and 2.7 million individuals can be used to subsidize water and electricity charges, fuel prices and provide educational aid for more than 20 million people.”
Elsewhere, the LCCC Chief urged the Federal Government to scrap projects in the country that are not urgent or that have no high impact for the people. “This is one way to tackle the fall in government revenue from oil and gas.”
Garlic has once again been singled out for its health virtues by recent American research, published in the Journal of Nutrition.
The World Health Organization (WHO) recognizes the use of garlic as an adjuvant to the dietary management of hyperlipidemia (a high level of lipids in the blood), in the prevention of age-related vascular changes (atherosclerosis) and in mild cases of hypertension.
“This study is another demonstration of the benefits of this supplement in reducing the accumulation of soft plaque and preventing the formation of new plaque in the arteries, which can cause heart disease,” said Matthew J. Budoff, a lead researcher at LA BioMed. This plaque is often rich in lipids (cholesterol). Over time, it obstructs blood vessels and restricts blood flow.
Causes include lifestyle factors (smoking, obesity, stress, lack of exercise, oral contraception, alcoholism), genetic factors (family history of stroke, being male, menopause), metabolic disease (high cholesterol, diabetes, gout) and high blood pressure.
The researchers studied 55 patients aged 40 to 75 diagnosed with metabolic conditions such as high blood pressure, obesity and cardiovascular risk factors. Participants were screened at the start of the study to measure coronary plaque volumes, as well as the volume of fat and calcium in their arteries. Then, over the course of a year, one group took a placebo while the other group was given a 2.4 mg dose of aged garlic extract per day.
One year later, the “garlic eaters” had slowed the total accumulation of plaque by 80%, reduced its density and seen plaque levels regress.
Other health benefits of garlic include antibacterial and antifungal properties, which can be useful in cases of gastroenteritis or fungal infections caused by candida albicans.
KUALA LUMPUR: Kedah is not just another state and while Prime Minister Najib Razak may be able to “buy” the leaders of Umno, he cannot buy the people, said former Umno Langkawi member Anina Saadudin.
Posting a message on her Facebook page yesterday, Anina said the people of Kedah wanted a menteri besar with integrity, who was smart, pragmatic, and with wide intentional connections so the state could excel economically.
No other leader in the state was able to move Kedah forward as successfully as the current MB, said Anina, likening the love Kedahans had for Mukhriz to that of the Kelantanese for the late Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat.
The outspoken Anina was commenting on the call by several Umno Kedah division chiefs to have Mukhriz removed as the state’s MB and Umno chief.
“The people in Kedah voted BN (Barisan Nasional) back as the state government in the last general election as they were promised Mukhriz as the MB.
“If Mukhriz is removed, Umno will be labeled a liar, leveraging on Mukhriz’s name just to win the election and when the mission was accomplished, replacing him as MB by someone who was not given the mandate by the Rakyat.”
She was referring to rumours that Kedah Umno Deputy Chairman Ahmad Bashah Md Hanifah who last week urged Najib to have Mukhriz removed for failing to administer the state government, was eyeing the post.
According to Anina, Ahmad Bashah whose term as a Senator is to end this April, was working hard for the MB post, as it was promised to him by Najib.
She however warned Najib against poking the beehive as the people of Kedah were not for sale and his last days as the country’s number one, she added, should be spent on “fixing” the party’s failure in holding on to Selangor, Penang, and Kelantan.
“Don’t interfere in BN’s stronghold as that would not be a smart move.”
An exploration of Southeast Asia would not be complete without a sampling of some of its notoriously eyebrow-raising street food. A small selection of the region’s widely-available hawker dishes is not for the faint-hearted; they challenge outsiders’ perception of what is edible – but also offer a unique glimpse into diverse local cultures, traditions and beliefs. And some of them are actually quite toothsome. Read on to discover the often-overlooked page of ASEAN’s thick street food menu:
Fried spiders (Cambodia)
Arachnids are a popular snack throughout Cambodia, but especially in the town of Skuon, which has been dubbed ‘Spider Village’ due to its gastronomic fondness for spiders. The most-widely available spider is a species of tarantula (known locally as ‘a-ping’), each roughly the size of a human palm. They are deep-fried and enjoyed as a crunchy and savoury snack throughout the day by both locals and tourists. Even celebrity chef Andrew Zimmern has professed his love of fried spiders, comparing them to soft-shelled crabs for their sweet and nutty texture.
Balut (Philippines, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam)
Arguably the most well-known ‘weird’ ASEAN street food, balut is a fertilised duck egg delicacy widely associated with the Philippines. To enjoy it, just peel the top part of the hard-boiled egg and sip the warm broth surrounding the partially-formed embryo, before digging into the meaty contents (the embryo, egg yolk and albumin) – with a dash of salt, vinegar or soy sauce. Balut is high in protein, but claims that it makes for an excellent aphrodisiac should be taken with a pinch of salt.
Grasshoppers and silk worms (Thailand)
Commonly found in large piles in open-air markets and on street-corner pushcarts, fried insects are widely enjoyed in Thailand. Among the variety of insects on offer, the most popular are grasshoppers, crickets, silk worms, scorpions and termites. All are deep fried and eaten with a sprinkling of soy sauce, salt or vinegar (not unlike balut) and most can lay claim to tasting slightly similar to crispy chicken. They are also rich in protein and other vitamins, and can be a great alternative to other snacks, like chips or popcorn (no kidding!)
Crickets and ants (Myanmar)
Prized delicacies in Myanmar, crickets and ants are valued for both their taste and nutritional value. Myanmar crickets, which are large and most plentiful during the winter season, are deep-fried and taste quite similar to shrimp. There are also plenty of ants to choose from, the more popular ones being “palu” (a type of winged ant).
Raw duck blood (Vietnam and Laos)
‘Tiết canh’ is a traditional Vietnamese dish made with the raw blood of a variety of animals, but the most popular variant is ‘tiết canh vit’, which is made from raw duck blood. It’s easy to prepare: blood from a freshly-culled duck is drained into a bowl and mixed with fish sauce to prevent premature coagulation. The concoction is then blended into a mixture of cooked duck innards, peanuts, lime juice and a variety of herbs, including coriander and Vietnamese mint leaves.
* Based on an article published in the premier ASEAN travel portal, www.GOASEAN.com
For those of you dealing with too much snow, a creative inspiration for you. Bartz Snow Sculptures near Minneapolis does one magnificent snow sculpture a year and uses proceeds from donations to provide clean water to Haiti.
Yep, that Octopus is 100% solid snow and is estimated to weigh 300,000 pounds.
KUALA LUMPUR: Police have found the black BMW car involved in a hit-and-run accident that killed three Thaipusam devotees on the North-South highway this morning while they were walking to Batu Caves from Senawang, Negeri Sembilan.
Three others were seriously injured.
The driver, a man in his 20s, is being sought by police.
Depty Supt S Markandran of KL traffic police urged members of the public with information on the car as well as witnesses to the incident to come forward and assist police with investigations.
“Those who have information on the car owner are urged to come to the nearest police station or contact the traffic operations room at 03-2071 9999,” he said.
NST Online reported that police found the black BMW, which had been left abandoned near the Lekas Expressway, at about 1pm today. A search had been carried out based on a registration plate which was found at the scene of the accident.
Markandran was quoted as saying that the car’s records showed that it belongs to a 50-year-old woman who hails from Penang.
He said Penang police had met the car owner. “The woman told us that the car was driven by her son who stays in Kuala Lumpur. However, the family refused to give full cooperation to the police to get more details on her son,” he is reported to have said at a press conference today.
Police have named the three victims as Saravanan Krishnan, 45; Kannan Chinnakanoo, 51; and Papa Sinnah, 53. Those injured were Mageswaran Palanisamy, 40, and Darrshen Devara, 18. Another injured woman has not been identified.
A black BMW car crashed into them near Sri Petaling here this morning. Police said the driver sped off after the accident.
A fatwa issued by Saudi Arabia’s top cleric prohibiting chess in Islam and equating it with gambling has caused a stir on social media. In a video of a television programme posted online, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdulaziz al-Sheikh appears categorical when asked about the board game in Islam....
Here are ten of the best photos that readers added to the Consumerist Flickr Pool in the last week, picked for usability in a Consumerist post or for just plain neatness.
Want to see your pictures on our site? Our Flickr pool is the place where Consumerist readers upload photos for possible use in future Consumerist posts. Just be a registered Flickr user, go here, and click “Join Group?” up on the top right. Choose your best photos, then click “send to group” on the individual images you want to add to the pool.
KUALA LUMPUR: When Malaysian oil giant Petronas announced sharp spending cuts and described a dismal outlook this week, it was confirmation for millions that they will struggle to make ends meet this year amid high costs, a plunging currency and fewer jobs.
The country’s only Fortune 500 company, state-owned Petroliam Nasional Bhd, drove Malaysia’s modernisation push in the last two decades that was symbolically crowned by its construction of the world’s tallest twin towers in the heart of Kuala Lumpur.
But as the oil boom turns to bust, Petronas— and with it Southeast Asia’s third-largest economy— is slowing down, and Malaysians are bracing for hard times. The company is one of Malaysia’s biggest employers, and accounts for nearly a third of the government’s oil and gas-related revenue.
All this piles pressure on Prime Minister Najib Razak, whose popularity has already been battered by rising costs, a new goods and services tax aimed at plugging the fiscal hole, and a scandal over millions of dollars mysteriously deposited in his personal bank account.
It could also fuel social unrest in a country where thousands took to the streets last year calling on Najib to resign.
“It’s going to be challenging this year given the falling oil price,” said Michael Wan, a Singapore-based Credit Suisse economist. “Unemployment will rise. A lot of it will come from the oil and gas side. You put that with lower commodity prices and a weaker ringgit, all in all it points to weaker private consumption this year.”
A slump in oil prices to below $30 per barrel is squeezing Malaysia’s finances, along with the drop in ringgit, the worst-performing Asian currency last year, when it lost around a quarter of its value against the dollar.
Petronas’ business review, announced on Tuesday, includes a plan to cut its spending by up to 50 billion ringgit ($11.4 billion) over the next four years.
“Take two jobs, grow vegetables”
As falling commodity prices, sluggish growth and dollar outflows take their toll on a region battered by the 1997/8 financial crisis, Malaysia is emerging as Southeast Asia’s weakest link.
Spreading the pain across the economy, Najib is expected to cut government expenditure when he revises the 2016 budget next week to reflect the slide in oil prices.
Consumer confidence was already at a 10-year low in the third quarter, according to a Nielsen survey, and private consumption is slowing. The country posted its slowest growth in more than two years in the third quarter of 2015.
Another worry is rising debt, one reason cited by Moody’s for cutting Malaysia’s sovereign ratings outlook.
Household debt has risen by more than 15 percentage points of GDP since 2009 to around 87 per cent as of end-2014, levels similar to more advanced, higher-income economies, Moody’s said.
Petronas said this week that contract jobs in the company’s non-core businesses would be affected. Other companies in the oil and gas sector are also cutting jobs as they pull back from projects to save costs.
The country’s unemployment rate rose to 3.2 per cent in November, from 3.1 per cent in the prior month, Malaysia’s department of statistics said on Friday.
“Employees in oil and gas are trying to switch, especially in the support functions. They are going to be flooding into other industries,” said Guru Mani, country manager for recruitment firm Reed Global.
A senior cabinet minister was widely ridiculed last month for suggesting that Malaysians should take two jobs to meet their rising costs, as were others who advised people to grow their own vegetables and avoid road tolls to save money.
“When ministers tell the people to wake up earlier in the morning to avoid tolls, get multiple jobs and grow their own vegetables, it’s clear they are disconnected from their people,” said Shen Lim, who works as a video producer in Kuala Lumpur.
The public scorn poured on Najib’s cabinet will be a setback for the long-ruling UMNO alliance, which needs to build support ahead of a general election due in 2018.
UMNO scraped to a narrow victory in the 2013 poll— losing the popular while still winning a majority of seats in parliament— but that was in better economic times.
Still, many people do appear to be trying the two-job idea.
Ride-hailing app Uber expects to sign up 100,000 new Malaysian drivers in 2016 as they look for additional income.
“The flexible, part-time model means … it creates economic opportunities in a very challenging time,” said Uber General Manager Leon Foong.
KUALA LUMPUR: Moody's Investors Service has placed the ratings of Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) and six south and south east Asian exploration and production (E&P) and integrated oil companies on review for downgrade.
As the government works to revise a budget that assumed the price of crude would not fall below US$48 per barrel, one thing has become abundantly clear: we cannot rely on oil as the source of the country’s wealth any more.
Analysts from all over the world have warned that the price of oil is unlikely to see a rebound this year. As it is, the barrel that holds the oil is now more valuable than the oil itself.
It is no exaggeration to say that Petronas is the backbone of Malaysia’s economy. Contributions from the oil giant make up about a third of the government’s annual income, and in some years have made up to 45% of the budget. With the severe drop in oil prices, this means that Petronas is unable to contribute anything near to what the government needs to operate, especially with so many ambitious projects in the pipeline, from the KL-SG high speed rail to the Greater Klang Valley project.
We can’t do anything about the falling price of oil. We can, however, start to be serious about investing in a sustainable future without oil. That future lies in green energy and its role in taking the world into a 21st century power system.
Green energy is still an untapped source of power in Malaysia. While more and more houses are being fitted with solar panels on their roofs, prohibitive costs against installing one prevent the majority of the population from accessing a way to power their homes off the grid. Ironically enough, we are the third-largest producer of solar equipment worldwide- Malaysia hosts the factories of the world’s largest solar equipment manufacturing companies, namely, America’s First Solar, Japan’s Panasonic, Korea’s Hanwha Q Cells, and Silicon Valley start-up Solexel to name a few.
The time is ripe to put meaningful investment into green energy – solar, wind, sea – and to stop relying on finite natural resources that are ultimately contributing to global warming. Advances in green energy are beginning to bear fruit in the United States, with electric car manufacturing company Tesla recently announcing the creation of the Powerwall, a battery that will store power from solar panels to power your home off the grid, available in 7 to 10 kilowatt-hour sizes.
If we do not attempt to catch up now, a post-TPPA economy will see such technologies become more readily available to Malaysians, but imported from countries like the United States and Australia, which have had the foresight to invest time and research resources into creating a more sustainable future. It would be exceedingly ironic given that the equipment used by these countries is produced here, right in Kulim and Chemor, because we offer low cost but good work.
One must also note that a post-TPPA economy will likely be an ideas economy, and a country with no new ideas, especially in a field as important as renewable energy, will not have much to offer in that new reality. New ideas will mean job creation and new business potential. We have the expertise- it is now a matter of deciding that we should use that expertise for the greater good of the country.
It will take time and consistent commitment from the government for a surge of development in green energy to happen. Whoever leads us after GE14 must recognise this.
iOS/Android: Microsoft has certainly invested heavily in making its services more useful lately. In a recent update to Outlook, Microsoft has added the ability to schedule Skype calls that automatically begin at the designated time.
KUALA LUMPUR: Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) plans to cut spending by up to RM50 billion ($11.4 billion) over the next four years and review its business structure in response to the profit-sapping slump in oil prices.
The state-owned Malaysian company brings in nearly half of the Southeast Asian country’s oil revenue and its woes are bound to add pressure to an economy already reeling from a slide in the ringgit and political uncertainty after a scandal surrounding state investor 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB).
Petronas said in November that it would cut its 2016 dividend to the government by nearly 40 percent after a 91 percent drop in profit, with analysts suggesting the payout could be trimmed back again in future.
Petronas made its announcement on spending cuts in an internal memo, a copy of which was seen by Reuters.
“We will go through another round of CAPEX (capital expenditure) and OPEX (operating expenditure) review to target cuts up to RM50 billion over the next four years. This means that we are going to have to defer some of our projects,” CEO Wan Zulkiflee Wan Ariffin said in the memo dated Monday.
In February last year Petronas said it planned to cut capital spending by 10 percent and operating expenses by up to 30 percent in 2015. It also said at the time that it would cut 2016 capital spending by 15 percent. Its 2014 capital expenditure was about RM65 billion.
“We have also made a strategic decision to begin a review of Petronas’ business operating model for better efficiency in response to the external environment,” Wan Zulkiflee said in the memo. The review will result in a change to the organization’s structure, details of which will be disclosed in March.
Contract jobs in the company’s non-core businesses will be affected, he said.
In an emailed statement late on Tuesday, Petronas said it has circulated an internal communication on its efforts to cut costs to address the impact of the continuous fall in crude oil prices, but it did not provide details.
Oil prices have dropped by more than 70 percent in the past 18 months as the world’s crude producers have exceeded demand by more than a million barrels a day.
Oil and gas projects worth $380 billion have been postponed or canceled since 2014 as companies make drastic cost cuts to survive the oil downturn. The retreat has included the axing of $170 billion of projects planned for 2016 to 2020, energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie said last week.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, facing lower revenue from the energy sector, is expected to make changes to the 2016 budget this month to adjust for falling oil prices..
The budget assumed oil at $48 a barrel. Global oil benchmark Brent crude is now trading near $29.
Moody’s analyst Vikas Halan said that Petronas could be forced to reduce dividends further if it reported a loss or forecast more constraints on its cashflow.
“Given their track record on reducing their dividend substantially, we can assume some further reduction, given the extent of decline in oil prices,” said Halan.
Petronas might not exit businesses after the review but it could lower investments in some operations, Halan added.
Wow, what does that say about the education system here? Seriously, a 13 year old girl thinks legs might "grow" back. I can't believe she would say that, it has to be mom trying to garner sympathy.
PETALING JAYA: 13-year-old Siti Nuraisyah Sahrin, recovering from the horror of losing her left foot and right leg in an accident, asked her mother if there was any possibility her limbs would grow back again.
In a Facebook post uploaded by Friends of BN, Nuraisyah was reported to have asked, “Ibu, boleh ke kaki saya tumbuh balik?” (Mum, will my legs grow back?).
Wishing her all the best in her long road to recovery, Friends of BN has appealed to members of the public to help ease the financial burdens of Nuraisyah’s family by making donations to Maimunah binti Md Razalli, her mother, through her Maybank bank account: 1620 4999 0205.
In a report by The Star Online, the teen’s mother commented on how brave Nuraisyah was but admitted that as a mother she herself was struggling to be strong after seeing how much her daughter was suffering.
“She is so brave. But as a mother, it is hard for me to be strong. It breaks my heart to see my daughter going through so much.
“No mother would want her child to suffer like this. My heart is broken.”
According to a report by Bernama, Nuraisyah and her stepsister Shamin Amirah Roslan, 14, were on a motorcycle heading home at 3pm, Monday, when a Perodua Kancil, believed to have overtaken them, grazed their machine, causing both girls to be thrown onto the road.
Sabak Bernam Police Chief Supt Nor Azmi Isa said, “Siti Nuraisyah fell right in the middle of the road and before she knew it a lorry from the opposite direction ran over her legs, while her stepsister only sustained a sprained ankle.”
Recovering in Tengku Ampuan Rahimah Hospital in Klang presently, the girl’s stepfather Roslan Sardi, 40, told The Star Online he regretted having moved the family back to Sabak Bernam village from Port Klang late last year because if he had stayed put, Nuraisyah would not have been involved in the accident.
“I transferred all my children to a primary and secondary school in Sabak Bernam, hoping for a more tranquil life back in the village.
“Now, I regret the decision. My daughter might not be like this if we stayed where we were,” the news portal quoted him as saying.
Meanwhile Nuraisyah, has put up a brave front and told visitors after her surgery that although her “wounds hurt”, she wanted to walk again.
According to Roslan, the girl’s left foot and right leg was crushed too badly to be reattached, leaving the doctors no choice but to amputate her left foot below the ankle and her right leg below her knee.
“All of us are prepared to support her throughout her recovery, and I want to get her a wheelchair and prosthetic legs to help her walk in the near future,” Roslan said.
A spokesman from the Sabak Bernam district police headquarters have meanwhile confirmed that both the drivers of the Perodua Kancil and lorry, lodged police reports yesterday and had their statements taken.
You’ve probably heard the old “eat the frog” advice , which says you should tackle your most dreaded task first thing in the morning. This works well for some of us, but there’s a solid case to be made for eating the frog later.
They look like drugs, they’re regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, but Frontline‘s new investigation found that supplements are very, very different.
Frontline, The New York Times, and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation joined efforts to investigate the world of vitamins and supplements to take a closer look at how they’re marketed and regulated in a special called Supplements & Safety that aired Tuesday night. It raised some interesting, somewhat troubling questions about the $50-billion-plus business.
You can watch the entire episode here, but we’ve pulled out a few things we think you should be aware of before you reach for a health supplement.
1. “The FDA does not do any review of dietary supplements before they come onto the market, and I think that all consumers need to understand this,” FDA acting commissioner Stephen Ostroff, M.D., told Frontline.
2. Manufacturers of supplements do need to show that they are using good manufacturing processes, and the FDA does inspections for this, but because there is no formal registration system that is required, the FDA says they only do “inspections of the [manufacturers] we know about.”
3. Acting commissioner Ostroff says his agency sees a higher proportion of inspections that have “substantial problems” with supplements than in other categories they regulate. The acting commissioner told Frontline that this is “cause for concern” because “this isn’t about us and it isn’t about the companies, it’s about the consumers.”
4. Doctors contacted by Frontline were critical of the FDA’s system for reporting potential problems with supplements. Two doctors who attempted to report possible patient harm told Frontline that they had difficultly getting the FDA to take them seriously.
One described being disconnected from the FDA’s MedWatch hotline twice before finally getting someone on the phone. Though the doctor chose not to be interviewed on camera, Frontline says he described his interaction with the FDA this way: “[The FDA operator] was acting as if I was telling her that aliens put messages in my Cheerios.”
Another doctor spoke on camera about her colleague’s attempts to report multiple cases of liver failure.
“They told one of our liver doctors that they thought she was a prankster,” said Dr. Linda Wong, transplant surgeon at the University of Hawaii.
Dr. Pieter Cohen of the department of medicine at Harvard Medical School told Frontline that there is “no effective system to detect harm from supplements.”
5. Industry representatives stressed the safety and effectiveness of supplements, but also acknowledged that there were issues.
“There may be some supply chain issues we need to be mindful of,” said Daniel Fabricant, Ph.D., a supplements industry spokesman and former FDA regulator. When speaking about his former position with the FDA he told Frontline the agency “threw the book” at manufacturers who didn’t adhere to standards.
7. Doctors from the well-respected Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia were concerned about the quality of supplements. When they tried to obtain independent verification what was in various supplements, they ran into problems. Most manufacturers didn’t even respond to their requests, Dr. Paul Offit told Frontline. Even when they did send test results, they were often not especially flattering.
“Often, [manufacturers] would send us certificates of analysis where whats on the label wasn’t even close to what was in the bottle,” Offit said.
In the end, only 35 supplements met the hospital’s quality standards, says Frontline.
Haha, yeah, I'm so sure that the polis were just about to break down the door when info came out. Hahaha.
SHAH ALAM: The police’s attempt to launch a surprise raid on gambling dens last night was foiled after NGO Jaringan Melayu Malaysia held a press conference earlier that day complaining about the existence of the illegal activities.
Selangor police chief Abdul Samah Mat expressed his disappointment over JMM’s move, which he said failed to take into account the possible effect it would have on the police’s work.
“We appreciate the information they provided us with but to do it through a press conference was not proper,” Abdul Samah told reporters at the Shah Alam police station this morning.
He said during the raid conducted around Ampang last night, the gambling dens operators, aware of what the police had planned, proceeded to shut down their premises.
“We will take action should they resume their operations,” added Abdul Samah, warning that JMM had now placed themselves in danger by coming out with the revelation.
Yesterday, the Malay group submitted proof of the existence of a gambling kingpin, whom they referred to as a ‘Datuk Seri’, operating an illegal gambling den in the Ampang area.
JMM president, Azwanddin Hamzah also said the police had not acted on their earlier reports about illegal activities there.
PETALING JAYA: The Malays need to break free of the invisible bonds trapping their minds, says political observer M Bakri Musa.
LOS ANGELES: Abe Vigoda, the sad-faced star of Francis Ford Coppola’s classic film “The Godfather,” died Tuesday at 94, his manager told AFP.
KOTA KINABALU: Speculation is rife that Labuan, which was declared a free port by the British in 1942 and had the status restored in 1950 after it was terminated during Japanese Occupation, may lose the status again under a revision to Budget 2016.
Garlic has once again been singled out for its health virtues by recent American research, published in the Journal of Nutrition.
KUALA LUMPUR: Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) plans to cut spending by up to RM50 billion ($11.4 billion) over the next four years and review its business structure in response to the profit-sapping slump in oil prices.
