Air Attack - Breathing Lessons

City people everywhere have been warned of health hazards on days when pollution is especially bad. In summer it comes in the form of azone, acid aerosols and particulates – known as “the summer haze effect.”

In winter, exhaust and smoke are the bigger problems, fouling the air with nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide. Based on the limited research available so far, the impact appears to be quite modest in both seasons, though slightly longer-lasting in winter.

Conditions can get nastier in Indonesia and Australia, where air quality deteriorates at certain times of the year because of smoke and ash from forest fires, which then drift to Singapore and Malaysia. The island republic and parts of Malaysia, including Kuala Lumpur, were under a pall of bad air again.

What to do ? Medical experts offer some advice. People who suffer from asthma need to be warned in advance of episodes of aor pollution. Those who inhale preventive medication should double the daily dose. It may be best to add a dose at midday, when ozone is most concentrated. Patients who don’t normally take asthma drugs should use anti-inflammatory remedies prescribed for colds.

Naturally they should also avoid exerting themselves on the smoggy streets.

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image source:matanews.com

Discovering an Indigenous Architecture (3)

At the weaving village of Sukarara or Penujak, where the distinctive Lombok pottery is strawfired in the backyards of houses, the same basic architecture can be seen, albeit in a less traditional setting than the villages. But this is probably the perfect compromise, where the villagers are discovering a trade that can help them better their standard of living while preserving their cultural values.

The hotels in Lombok may be uncertain about what “style” the want to adopt, but they are often well sited to take advantage of the natural landscape, often resulting is sweeping views from the hotel verandahs and balconies. The Puri Bunga Cottages while rather non-descript in its architecture, hugs the hill-side to give every individual cottage a breathtaking view of the Senggigi bay and the Lombok sunset.

From the beach front resorts such as the Intan Laguna and the Sheraton, one can see, on a clear morning, the peak of Gunung Agung on Bali as well as a chance to watch local fishermen returning with their daily catch.

Slightly further down at Tanjong Aan, the view gets better. The natural landscape here is near-perfect for development of resorts, and it should not be very long before Tanjung Aan becomes a clone of Bali’s Nusa Dua.

One can only hope that the distinctive architecture of the Sasak villages would not be banished into oblivion.

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image source: SilkWinds 72

Top Five International Film of 2009 – Up (1)

Internationally his was a great year for comedy, with films that mixed face-splitting humor with poignant humanity. While some critics pointed out the lack of essential viewing earlier this year, by December, we’d had films such as “The Hurt Locker,” Inglourious Basterds” and “Star Trek,” all of which constituted quality entertainment, but which just missed the cut for our list.

Of course, there was also plenty of pointless escapism in the form of “Transformers 2,” “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” “Dragon Ball: Evolution” and “GI Joe” – the kind of films that cater to the lowest common denominator.

1. Up (Disney/Pixar Studios)

Like most of Pixar’s creations, “Up” is not only a visual delight, but a mature and poignant story that had audiences in for its full 96-minute running time. The first 15 minutes of “Up” make for perhaps the most heartbreaking scene ever created for a commercially released animated movie.

The relationship between the two main protagonists – a young and chatty Boy Scout named Russell and Carl Fredricksen, a stereotypical grumpy old man with a tragically romantic past – raises the bar even higher (remember “Cars” ?) for the almost invicible Pixar, whose 2008’s “Wall-E” was the pinnacle of artistically courageous and emotionally fulfilling animation.

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Image/sources: Jakarta Globe

A Universal Ideal of Beauty

Chances are the beauty of a young woman’s face would be as recognizable in London as in Tokyo. Compared to her peers, she would have larger eyes relative to the rest of her face, higher cheekbones, a more delicate lower jaw, fuller lips and shorter distances between both nose and mouth and mouth and chin. These are universal characteristics of a beautiful female face, according to an article published in nature.

Researchers in Japan and Britain made three composite faces (based on 224 facial features) from a group of 60 photographs: a whole group average, an average of attractive faces and an exaggeration of the beautiful average. The third composite accentuated the features that distinguished the second face from the first.

In both the Japanese and British studies, viewers preferred the third face to the second, and the first face least of all.

The study also challenges the prevalent theory (first mooted in the last century) that an “average” face is considered more attractive than one with slight distortions from the norm.

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image sources: topbeautyfashion.co.cc

Medicinal Properties of Insects

Eating bugs is nothing new. Ento-enthusiasts have long extolled the virtues of insect cuisine, bugs being cheap, high in protein and readily available. Now they’re also raving about its medicinal properties. The Imperial Herbal Restaurant in Singapore offers dishes featuring scorpions and ants, both of which are high in nutriens.

Although there is no conclusive evidence, both reputedly combat illness as well. According to the restaurant’s proprietor, Mrs. Wang-Lee Tee Eng, scorpion’s poison soothes nerves and eases migraine headaches, while ants cure rheumatism, a condition which causes inflammation of the joints, muscles or ligaments.

The Bangkok Post reports that the Division of Medical Entomology is compiling a list of insect products that have medicinal properties. Among them: dried grubs which relieve pain and increase heart-rate after poisonous bites; cicada larvae which relieve gas, cold sores and measles; and dried hornet’s nest, which kills parasites and relieves gastrointestinal pain. Royal Jelly bee’s pollen is also believed to lower blood pressure and improve skin quality.

Those searching for a tasty meal made of bugs, however, might need to look elsewhere. Scorpions have a chewy texture, while ants have a sour tang like vinegar. It’s an acquired taste.

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image source: free-gourmet-recipes.com

Discovering an Indigenous Architecture (2)

Even more fascinating is the richness of the skill displayed in these apparently simple architectural elements made by people whose primitive lifestyle does not demand of them any form of sophistication. Here is a demonstration of the power of aesthetics in its simple, original form.

Items such as woven rattan mats, bamboo floors and thatched roofs so often found in hotels have their humble beginnings in these rural villages, where the handicraft skills are traditionally a means of survival.

The most prominent feature in the Lomboknese architecture is the curved thatched rice-barn called a “lumbung”. Contructed simply in wood framing, bamboo and rattan floors and walls, this “symbol” of Lombok has been thoroughly exploited as an element of “pastiche” in the design of new resort hotels, although the scale at which the “lumbung” is recreated is completely out of synch with the original form.

Some houses still have their floors built up of dried buffalo dung. The appeal of the Sasak architecture is not attributed to any single feature but the perfect combination of everything manmade and the natural surroundings which in unison paint a landscape that is unpretentiously rich.

The distinctive bell-shaped roof covered in rice thatch from a previous season and the use of the “lumbung” for storage of rice illustrate the harmony of recycling. It is also a rather beautiful and almost sacred depiction of the South-east Asian relationship between man and rice.

There are, indeed signs of “modernization” taking place. Driving along the very narrow, hardly accessible roads and trying to avoid horse-drawn carts (the chief means of public transport, cidomo), one can observe the numerous handicraft and souvenir shops alongside paddy fields or concentrated at village centres. A unique form of interactive theatre is constantly taking place, where visitors from all over the world haggle over the prices of hand-made artifacts while the local people gather to witness this phenomenon of tourist invasion.

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image sources: SilkWinds Magazine
techno code: H4FSG7XWBG8Q

Shopping: Relaxing & Entertaining

Very common in modern society, family become very busy with work and daily routine and sometimes need relaxing activities to balance their routine. To relax by shopping or try to find entertainment have become more and more inadequate.

We can imagine of how many times and energies are wasted by doing the traditional shopping, coming to store and/or hypermarket and got lost in the hundreds of giants shelves, especially when the items we are looking for is very specific and not very common, it will be a major effort to find one. Similar with entertainment, it will be very disappointing to go to club or cinema only to find that the places are not representative and the entertainment is not up to our expectation.

Alternatively, we can turn our choice to online shop which are designed to responds to that kind of requirements, they will provide us with complete information of kind of goods, detailed product specification, info abt shop or manufacturer of the products, and store chain which members are numbered in tenth of thousand of quality shops.

Admittedly, not many online shop can provide such a complete criterias. One of the best online shop is Shopwiki which have more than 30,000 stores chain. This sites provide guidance to shop in many countries and is one that regarded the best.

For specifics products such as LCD TV and Home theater for examples, Shopwikis not only provide us with products picture and prices as in others online shop.

Shopwiki also give us much more choice by categorizing products base on products quality, and also provide us with information regarding the best and worst of one product, such info are very usefull specially if you want to buy LCD TV, HD TV, Home Theater, Blu-Ray and AV Receivers.

It seem that these kind of new shopping ways will become more common in modern society to obtain the products with good quality and correct specifications. The traditional catalogue books, or conventional online shop that only provides picture, prices and basic information only will not adequate in the future. The new concept will provide consumer not only with pics and prices, but also functioning as guidance, information sources, references and encyclopedia, just like Shopwiki !

Review - Edges of The World

Title : The Lost Heart of Asia

By: Colin Thubron

Pages: 374's

Ever since the collapse of the old Soviet Union, the magnetism of Central Asia has become irresistible to travel writers. First, of course, is the opportunity now to wonder around free from the clutches of intourist guides. Then there is the challenge of finding the answer to the fascinating question of what is the become of these five newly independent republics artificially created by Stalin. “Would they hurl themselves into the Islamic furnace,” the author asks, “Or reconvene in a communist mass?”

Finally there is the sheer romance of the place. Who can visit Samarkand – “it conjured no earthly city. It is a heart-stealing sound” – and be unmoved ? The author begins his jurney in Turkmenistan, poorest and wildest of the Central Asian republics, and winds his way leisurely through the rest of them, visiting shrines, encountering people, exploring markets and museums.

Thubron seems to have an affinity for big places. His last two efforts – Among the Russians and his 1987 book on China, Behind the Wall – were wide-ranging travelogues. This one is huge and formless too, like the emerging republics themselves.

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Image source: Asiaweek Magazine