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The Hindu : y>

Mitra Academy, Arakere, conducted its 7th annual sport meet “Sporttag 2009” . International swimmer Shreesh Reddy declared the sports meet open and received the salute. He stressed the importance of sports and competition in every student’s life. He shared many anecdotes and told the students to chase dreams and realise them. The Ekalavya awardee also said that participation in competitions was very important to enhance one’s skills.

The theme at this year’s sports meet was “The Sun”. The tiny tots of kindergarten participated in the “sunflower” march past. A “sunflower” display by the primary students was the highlight of the day. Parents and teachers too participated in interesting events. Principal Jayanthi Vijaygopal congratulated the prize winners and expressed her happiness over the successful conduct of the meet.

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The Hindu : SUDHINDR.A.B.

Debate and dialogue are exciting platforms for verbal contests.

WORD WONDERS: The winners

Children in the age group of eight to 12 displayed their oratorical as well as debating skills at Verbattle Beginner held in the city recently. The debate and dialogue competition saw enthusiastic participation and teams from 30 schools vying for the top honours.

In the final round, the moderator narrated a story to the children and they had to debate for or against the story based on their understanding of the story. It was a rigorous six-round debate with the final round open to questions from judges.Winners and prizes

Aarushi Mohan and Devyani Ramamoorthy from Vidhyashilp Academy were declared the winners. They received a cash prize of Rs. 30,000 and bicycles.

Siddharth Saxena and Sharan Roy of Inventure Academy and Abhishek Jaikumar and Tapan from Carmel High School were the runners up. They were given cash prizes of Rs. 5,000 each, and bicycles.

“There is no other platform that is available to us which is as dynamic and exciting as this competition. This is my first debate competition outside school and I am really thrilled with the kind of exposure I have received today. I have a great story to share with my friends and teachers when I get back to school. We are glad that a competition as unique as this is being held for children of my age group.It is a tremendous learning experience for us,” remarked Devyani.

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The Hindu : y>Holiday packages from Resorts World Sentosa

picturesque There’s a golf course near the resort

Resorts World Sentosa, the integrated resort on Singapore’s Sentosa Island houses Universal Studios theme park, the world’s largest marine life park and six unique hotels.

A luxury spa, a casino and an array of entertainment, dining and shopping options complete its offerings.

Various complementary facilities are located near the resort, including two championship golf courses on the island, Singapore’s largest shopping mall — Vivocity and Singapore’s largest nightspot— St.James Power Station, across the harbour. The Resort is a 20-minute drive from the Singapore Changi International Airport.

Resorts World Sentosa’s holiday packages, Universal Studios Singapore tickets and hotel reservations will be launched by the end of the year. Visitwww.rwsentosa.com

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The Hindu :

Actor Ranvir Shorey piled on 15 kilos for his role in Fatso

Balancing act He takes up some films for money and some for the love of cinema

When every other actor is working out to show off six-pack or eight-pack abs, Ranvir Shorey has stopped working out. He also feasted on ice creams and helped himself to mugs of beer to pile on 15 kgs for a film. “I was muscular but the role demanded that I look just fat. Rajat (Kapoor) asked me to stop exercising and put on as much weight as I can in a year,” says Ranvir.

The film, tentatively titled “Fatso”, was screened last weekend at the South Asian Film Festival in New York. It’s the second time Ranvir is being directed by Rajat Kapoor, after “Mithya”. The two have worked together in plays and films (including “Bheja Fry”) and Ranvir admits Rajat brings out the best in him. “We share the same sensibilities; both of us believe in films rooted in reality. I trust him unconditionally and he, in return, trusts me to do my best.”

“Fatso” is a story about five friends and their relationships. The Indian release is being worked out with a new title. Looking back, Ranvir says: “The eating part was good. In between I had other film commitments that I had to complete when I was still in shape. When I started bloating, my friends wondered what the hell was happening to me. My blood pressure shot up and my breathing got heavier. I didn’t feel energetic and had acidity. Trust me, it didn’t feel great to be unfit.”

Once he completed “Fatso”, the onus was on him to lose the excess baggage. “Losing the flab was tough. I had to cut down on carbs and get back to workouts. I am practicing Kalaripayattu, swimming and doing aerobic exercises these days. I am…More

The Hindu : y>Do those four-legged loveable, loyal creatures cause a rift? Hardly, discovers BINDU TOBBY.On the contrary, dogs fill homes with fondness

Photo: Murali Kumar K.UNCONDITIONAL Furry friends effortlessly add to our lives lots of warmth, expecting almost nothing in return

When I recently came across an article “Do dogs cause divorce?” , I read it out aloud since I couldn’t believe my eyes. When I did that, I also couldn’t believe my ears. Dogs — those lovable, licking, wagging, energy-boosters; and a cause for divorce? What theory could be contorted enough to reach such a conclusion? Seething and shaking I read on how the author’s friend had two dogs, who became such favourites of his wife that in course of time they not just booted him out the conjugal bed but also out the door leading finally to their divorce…

Says Priya Mascarenhas, married for the last three years, who lives in New York, with their dog Taylor “There are a lot more reasons for people to divorce and dogs are definitely not one of it! Taylor is very non-judgmental — hence he makes us see how trivial our small fights are or how unimportant the need to be always right is. His joy is his 9 O’clock four small biscuits or a scoop of peanut butter slathered over a plastic chew toy. Taylor constantly keeps things in perspective for us as a couple and as individuals.” She adds: “As for hubby, Taylor is his go-to guy if he can’t go to sleep. And Taylor although hates being held and smothered — will let him hold on to him until he goes to sleep, keeping his eyes open and without moving a muscle! I’ve learnt the ability to just quietly and simply ‘be there’ without a motive from Taylor. He teaches us so much each day and only adds to the love we share!”

Agrees Amrita…More

The Hindu :

This fortnight at indiaplaza.in

The Fly (1986)

Cast: Jeff Goldblum, Geena Davis, John Getz, Les Carlson, George Chuvalo

Director: David Cronenberg

Screenwriter: Charles Edward Pogue, David Cronenberg Cinematographer: Mark IrwinComposer: Howard Shore

Price: Rs. 499

Director David Cronenberg describes “The Fly” as a romantic comedy. One’s first instinct is to wonder what Cronenberg was smoking when he made that comment, considering “The Fly” created a creature-feature template and also has one of the most famous tag lines of the Eighties, “Be afraid. Be very afraid”. However, after the initial reaction of stupefied disbelief, when one thinks about the film, one figures out where Cronenberg is coming from.

“The Fly” is a romance, has some of the smartest, wittiest lines, a gloriously gory horror flick and a gut-wrenching tragedy. The fact that the genre switches happen so smoothly and so seamlessly is one of the movie’s greatest strengths. Throw in extraordinarily clever writing, brilliant acting, the sure hand of an auteur and drop-dead gorgeous leads and voila, a celluloid classic is ready to be served.

The movie starts with a pretty journalist Veronica Quaife meeting brilliantly nerdy scientist Seth Brundle at a scientific convention. Seth persuades her to come to his lab to see his invention, a genetic transportation machine.

Veronica is duly impressed even though when she first sees the machine, she mistakes it for a designer phone booth! While the machine works perfectly with inanimate objects, it is stumped when teleporting living beings. Veronica and Seth fall in love; he is able to crack the “flesh” code and successfully teleports a baboon.

When he decides to try it himself, however, the experiment goes terribly wrong as there is literally a fly in the ointment and the computer splices the two together. In the beginning Seth enjoys all the positive aspects of the transportation with an almost superhuman energy. But then things start to come apart and Veronica…More

The Hindu :

Coffee brims with health benefits, say researchers

Prevent diseases By drinking a few cups of coffee daily

Not only is coffee aromatic and delicious, it’s good for you. Who says? None other than the Harvard Medical School. Once considered questionable for your health, it turns out that the beloved beverage is actually healthful in moderation. That means a few cups a day. Harvard researchers say drinking coffee may help prevent diseases such as:

Cancer: Some studies have found coffee drinkers have lower rates of colon and rectal cancers and are 50 per cent less likely to get liver cancer than coffee abstainers.

Type 2 diabetes: Heavy coffee drinkers may be half as likely to get diabetes as those who drink little or no coffee because coffee is thought to contain chemicals that lower blood sugar. Coffee may also increase your resting metabolism rate, which could help prevent diabetes.

Parkinson’s disease: Coffee seems to help protect men from Parkinson’s disease, but not women. The difference might be due to estrogen.

Heart disease: Coffee is not linked to the development of heart disease. In the past few years, Harvard scientists say, coffee has been shown to be safe even for heart attack survivors. Scientists think antioxidants in coffee may reduce inflammation and protect blood vessel walls.

Life span: Recent studies suggest that drinking coffee decreases the risk of premature death, especially in women. Women who drank at least five to seven cups a week had a death rate 26 per cent lower than non-consumers, a large investigation by researchers in Spain and at Harvard Medical School found.

It’s not only Harvard researchers who are touting the brew’s benefits. Last month, a study led by Neal Freedman of the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, showed that people with chronic hepatitis C and advanced liver disease who drank three or more cups of coffee a day cut their risk of the disease…More

The Hindu : y>There are not too many validated treatments for asthma. But a shallow breathing technique has provided relief

I don’t often write about alternative remedies for serious medical conditions. Most have little more than anecdotal support, and few have been found effective in well-designed clinical trials. Such trials randomly assign patients to one of twoor more treatments and, wherever possible, assess the results without telling either the patients or evaluators who received which treatment.

Describing an alternative treatment for asthma does not yet have top clinical ratings. Wiebe, 58, of Woodstock, N.Y., is a well-known maker of violins and cellos with a 48-year history of severe asthma that was treated with bronchodilators and steroids for two decades. Ten years ago, Wiebe noticed gradually worsening vision problems, eventually diagnosed as a form of macular degeneration caused by the steroids. Two leading retina specialists told him to stop using the drugs if he wanted to preserve his sight.

He did, and endured several terrifying trips to the emergency room when asthma attacks raged out of control and forced him to resume steroids temporarily to stay alive. Nothing else he tried seemed to work.

Someone told him about the Buteyko method, a shallow-breathing technique developed in 1952 by a Russian doctor, Konstantin Buteyko. Wiebe watched a video demonstration on YouTube and mimicked the instructions shown.

Ordinarily, during an asthma attack, people panic and breathe quickly and as deeply as they can, blowing off more and more carbon dioxide. Breathing rate is controlled not by the amount of oxygen in the blood but by the amount of carbon dioxide, the gas that regulates the acid-base level of the blood. Buteyko concluded that hyperventilation — breathing too fast and too deeply — could be the underlying cause of asthma, making it worse by lowering the level of carbon dioxide in the blood so much that the airways constrict to conserve it.

This technique may…More

The Hindu : y>P.R. Vasantha holds up the flag for the fast-disappearing vegetarian hotels

One of the factors that made Bangalore famous across the country, till a few years ago, were the famous vegetarian restaurants, which not many cities across the country could boast of. MTR, situated near Lalbagh, used to be a major tourist attractionwith a conducted tour of the kitchen.

Woodlands, Brindavan and Broadway hotels were popular haunts of vegetarians. Malleswaram and Basavangudi were famous for several vegetarian restaurants.

For those in a perpetual hurry, the Darshinis sprung up to allow people to have food in quick time.

Now, the picture is changing fast.

The old restaurants are still doing business, though these places are gradually giving way to new enterprises such as Chicken Paradise, Tandoor Hut and others.

On the outskirts of the city, vegetarian restaurants are conspicuous by their absence.

Even as the western world turns vegetarian, and when restaurants and aircraft carriers abroad have started to provide pure vegetarian food, it is a matter of concern that vegetarianism is disappearing from old outposts like Bangalore.

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The Hindu :

After a creative flood at the Fashion Week, here are some trends that are set to trickle into the mainstream

Photo: AFPHIGH STYLE Emphasis was on no-fuss clothes

It’s been a week of fashion madness in the national capital. From minimalism man Wendell Rodricks who opened the show with his Cubist interpretation of form and fabric to narrative fantasist Rohit Bal who closed the pageant with his regal ‘Yasas’, the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week saw the best of talent from Mumbai and New Delhi renew bonds to prove there was no creative crunch in the country.

“People are now buying with their brains,” a top buyer from the West had remarked three seasons ago. Though depression chic is passé today, designers are still serving up styles that could last seasons. Take the dress, for instance. A gazillion copies of the simple structured / draped dress have spawned in recent times, a trend that could last well beyond Spring-Summer 2010. Almost every designer — even the likes of Ritu Kumar, known for her ethnic silhouettes — did plenty of dresses.

“But the operative word is re-interpret,” says talented designer Nachiket Barve, whose ‘Toxin’ rocked the ramp. “Fresh drapes and fresher accents can make a simple dress look haute. That’s what designers have done. We’ll be seeing more dresses in the months ahead and there’ll be street-savvy interpretations too.”Easygoing

With jauntiness becoming a defining quality this season, designer Malini Ramani lays emphasis on no-fuss clothes. “I’d recommend playful, easy-going outfits. And that’s what I’ve done for my upcoming collection for Chennai too. Though I’m not a trend person, I know clothes that look simple and cool are here to stay.”

Designer Namrata Joshipura sees the resurgence of sheer. “Yes, transparency is in. It lends lightness — in terms of volume and colour. And, I also see the emergence of a slightly futuristic fashion sensibility. Not robotic…More