Foto dari Metrotvnews.com

Adik Kandung John Kei Tewas Ditembak - Ada berita terbaru mengenai penembakan yang menewaskan adik kandung tokoh pemuda asal maluku, John Kei. Menurut informasi dari situs-situs berita dan televisi nasional, Adik Kandung John Kei Tewas ditembak oleh dua orang yang tidak dikenal yang lokasinya tidak jauh dari rumahnya. Dan berikut saya berikan informasi dari situs berita metrotvnews.com dan liputan6.com

Metrotvnews.com, Bekasi: Tito Refra Kei, adik kandung tokoh pemuda asal Maluku, John Kei, ditembak dua pria tak dikenal, Jumat (31/5) malam. Tito didor tak jauh dari rumahnya di Perumahan Titian Bekasi, Jawa Barat.

Belum jelas kronologis penembakan Tito. Yang pasti, penyerang menggunakan sepeda motor. Tito menderita luka tembak di bagian wajah dan kini dirawat di Rumah Sakit Ananda Bekasi.

Sumber: http://www.metrotvnews.com/metronews/read/2013/05/31/5/158280/Adik-Kandung-John-Kei-Ditembak

Liputan6.com, Jakarta : Adik kandung John Kei, Tito Refra Kei diduga ditembak pria tak dikenal di lokasi tak jauh dari kediamannya, Perumahan Titian Bekasi, Jawa Barat. Informasi ini dibenarkan oleh kepolisian setempat.
"informasi awal, ada orang tidak dikenal melakukan penembakan terhadap seorang yang bernama Tito Kei," kata Kapolresta Bekasi Kota Kombes Pol Priyo Widhianto saat dihubungi Liputan6.com di Jakarta, Jumat (31/5/2013) malam.
Meski begitu, Priyo belum dapat memberikan keterangan lebih jauh. Priyo juga belum bisa memastikan kondisi pria yang juga menjadi pengacara John Kei ini. "Ini saya masih akan menuju ke TKP," imbuhnya.
Belum diketahui kronologi pasti kejadiannya, berdasarkan informasi yang dihimpun, Tito ditembak di dekat rumahnya oleh dua orang dengan menggunakan sepeda motor di lokasi tak jauh dari rumahnya.

Tito Refra Kei atau yang dikenal dengan Tito Kei itu saat ini maju menjadi calon anggota legislatif dari Partai Amanat Nasional (PAN). Tito dijagokan di daerah pemilihan Papua Barat nomor urut 2. (Ali/Ism)

Sumber: http://news.liputan6.com/read/601819/kapolresta-bekasi-tito-kei-ditembak-orang-tak-dikenal

Harapan saya, semoga kejadian ini tidak membuat keamanan daerah Ibukota Jakarta dan sekitarnya menjadi terganggu, dan turut berduka atas meninggalnya korban.

Harga Tiket Pekan Raya Jakarta (PRJ) 6 Juni 2013 - 7 Juli 2013 - Ajang Jakarta Fair Kemayoran atau yang lebih akrab dengan sebutan PRJ ga terasa udah mau dibuka lagi. Rasanya baru beberapa waktu yang lalu mendengar berita dan melihat foto-foto acara penutupan PRJ 2012, sekarang udah ngeliat lagi berita tentang Pembukaan Pekan Raya Jakarta (PRJ) yang rencanya akan dibuka sekitar satu minggu lagi atau lebih tepatnya tanggal 6 Juni 2013 mendatang.

Harga tiket PRJ 2013 menurut informasi yang saya dapat dari berita8.com masih sama dengan harga tiket PRJ tahun 2012 lalu, yaitu untuk hari senin-jumat dijual dengan harga Rp. 25.000,- dan pada hari sabtu dan minggu atau weekend dijual dengan harga Rp. 30.000,- per orang. Harga yang relatif masih terjangkau dan menurut pengalaman saya pribadi, kita akan mendapatkan pengalaman dan atau hiburan yang setimpal dengan mengeluarkan sejumlah uang untuk tiket masuk PRJ tersebut.

Selain kita dapat menemukan berbagai macam barang yang biasanya akan lebih murah dari harga normal apabila kita membeli diluar PRJ, kita juga dapat mendapatkan hiburan dari band-band top Indonesia. Seperti tahun-tahun sebelumnya event Pekan Raya Jakarta (PRJ) 2013 nanti akan dimeriahkan oleh konser musik non stop dengan 260 band dan penyanyi top Indonesia. Selain itu pengunjung juga berkesempatan mendapatkan doorprize dengan total hadiah 32 unit sepeda motor.

Nah gimana, udah siap-siap belum buat berkunjung ke PRJ ?

Uang Rupiah Buatan Karawang Anti Scan dan Sulit Di Palsukan - Ngomongin tentang uang yuk... :D Apa sih yang terlintas difikiran juragan-juragan pembaca semua ketika mendengar kata uang? Tentu berbeda-beda ya? Mungkin ada yang terlintas uang adalah segalanya... hahaha, ada juga mungkin terlintas dengan uang bisa beli ini dan itu yang kita pengen, namun mungkin juga ada yang biasa-biasa aja bahwa uang bukanlah segalanya gitu kali ya :D dan lain-lain lagi tentunya.

Nah kalau mengenai uang palsu gimana? Tentu sangat menyebalkan sekali ya kalau kita sampai mendapatkan uang palsu, bisa bikin malu pasti misal kita sedang belanja dan tanpa sadar ternyata kita belanja dengan uang palsu dan ternyata orang yang menerima pembayaran dari kita tersebut teliti dan mengetahui bahwa uang yang kita berikan adalah uang palsu. Selain malu, tentu kita bisa juga di curigai sebagai pengedar uang palsu tersebut, dan mungkin saja dilaporkan ke pihak yang berwajib. Dan yang pasti banyak hal yang merugikan kita tentunya.

Nah beberapa saat yang lalu saya membaca berita di detik.com mengenai Uang Rupiah Buatan Karawang yang di klaim sulit untuk dipalsukan dan anti scan. Menurut berita tersebut, "Perusahaan Umum Percetakan Uang Republik Indonesia (Perum Peruri) menjamin produksi kertasnya menggunakan teknologi dan bahan baku khusus. Sehingga, uang kertasnya aman dan sulit dipalsukan".

Sulit di palsukan bukan berarti tidak dapat dipalsukan dong yah berarti? Berarti masih ada kemungkinan untuk dipalsukan. Tapi setidaknya berita tersebut memberi harapan untuk mengurangi tingkat pemalsuan dan peredaran uang palsu. Nah untuk membaca berita lengkap dari detik.com mengenai uang rupiah made-in karawang tersebut anda dapat langsung mengunjungi alamat berikut ini: http://finance.detik.com/read/2013/05/30/105427/2260006/5/uang-rupiah-made-in-karawang-anti-scan-dan-sulit-dipalsukan

by Salman Hameed

[Updated below]

It is hard now to keep up with spectacular science news. Nevertheless, it is sometimes good to pause for a bit to appreciate the way scientists find clues about history. Here are three news items in the same issue of Science that I found riveting. This just reminded me of the crude nature of evolution-creation debates - and how those discussion take place in a parallel dumb universe ("where is the missing link?"; "Evolution is just a theory" etc.).

Here is the story of the bubonic plague. It was suspected that the Byzantine empire was hit by a bubonic plague that hastened its decline in the 6th century and later. This decline also facilitated the phenomenal expansion of Islam into the Byzantine territories. But do we know that this was a bubonic plague? Well now we do:

The Justinian Plague, which resurfaced regularly between the 6th and 8th centuries, is thought to have assisted the decline of the Roman Empire, but it has, until now, only been speculatively diagnosed as bubonic plague caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Using stringent ancient DNA anticontamination protocols, Harbeck et al. have genotyped new material from the early medieval graveyard at Aschheim, Bavaria, dating from the 6th century. This graveyard contained 438 individuals, often in multiple burials—a sign of crisis. The amount of bacterial material available was scant, but Y. pestis was identified from one individual using five key single-nucleotide polymorphisms identified in recent phylogenies. Genotyping confirmed this isolate as basal to isolates from the 14th-century Black Death and the modern (19th-century) third pandemic and that, like the other pandemics, it originated in China or Mongolia.

Full article at: PLoS Pathogens 9, 10.1371/journal.ppat.1003349 (2013).

Then we have this phenomenal work of decoding of the Neanderthal DNA as well as another hominid group called the Denisovians. What is fascinating is that the researchers can tell not only that humans and Neanderthals interbred (yes - for those outside of Africa, about 2% of the DNA comes from Neanderthals), but that at least in some cases Neanderthal first cousins had offsprings:

Neandertals, the closest known relatives to modern humans, ranged across Europe to western Asia from perhaps 300,000 years ago until about 30,000 years ago. Their overlap in time and space with our ancestors had fueled debate about whether the two species had interbred. Then, in 2010, Pääbo's group published a low-coverage sequence (1.3 copies on average) of DNA from three Neandertal bones from Croatia, which showed interbreeding: About 2% of the DNA in living people from outside Africa originally comes from Neandertals (Science, 7 May 2010, pp. 680 and 710). 

That first Neandertal sequence was a huge accomplishment, as Neandertal DNA made up just a few percent of the DNA in the fossils, the rest being bacterial and other contaminants. Since then, the Leipzig group has found ways to zero in on human genetic material and to get more from degraded ancient DNA by using a sequencing method that starts with single, rather than double, strands of DNA. The approach provided a startlingly detailed view of the Denisovan pinkie bone (Science, 31 August 2012, p. 1028). 

But this powerful technique had yet to be applied to Neandertals. So Pääbo was thrilled when the DNA in the sample taken from the toe bone proved to be 60% Neandertal. The researchers were able to sequence each base 50 times over, on average—enough coverage to ensure the sequence is correct. This approach also provided low coverage of the genome from another fossil, a Neandertal baby's rib, more than 50,000 years old, from a cave in Russia's Caucasus region between the Caspian and Black seas. 

In a 10 p.m. talk to a full house, Pääbo offered some surprising results from the toe bone. For long stretches, the DNA from each parental chromosome is closely matched, strongly suggesting that this Neandertal was the offspring of two first cousins, he said. Comparing the data with those from the fossils from Croatia and the Caucasus showed that these populations were fairly separated from one another. The group also compared the chunks of Neandertal DNA found in living people with each of these three Neandertal samples. The closest match was with the Caucasus population, suggesting that interbreeding with our ancestors most likely occurred closer to that region.

Okay - so scientists, I think, are now invading the privacy of this inter-species relations. Do we really have to know what our ancestors were doing tens of thousands of years ago on those cold nights? ;) 

Actually we do.

Full story here (but you will need subscription). 

Okay - so moving on from our misbehaving ancestors to the shipwrecks carrying marble for temples. What is amazing here is that scientists can not only identify the dates of the shipwreck, but they can tell where the marble was quarried from and where it was headed. This is pretty cool (and Urdu speakers will know why Marble is called Sang-e-Marmar - the stone of the Marmara): 

Sometime between 100 B.C.E and 25 B.C.E., a wooden ship carrying almost 60 tonnes of

stone foundered in Aegean waters just off the coast of Turkey. It went down bearing its entire cargo, including eight massive drum-shaped blocks of white marble. Those blocks fit together to form part of a tapering column that likely stood more than 11 meters tall, plus a square uppermost piece: a Doric column. 

Two thousand years after the ship went down, archaeologists excavating what is now called the Kizilburun shipwreck have figured out exactly where the marble blocks came from and where they were heading, illuminating the marble trade in the Roman province of Asia Minor.
...
Carlson and classical archaeologist William Aylward of the University of Wisconsin, Madison. first set out to learn where the marble came from. As reported in a 2010 study in the American Journal of Archaeology, the team sent out samples of the marble for stable isotope analysis and other tests. The marble's values of the isotopes δ¹³C and δ¹⁸O and its spectroscopic details led them to Marmara Island, known as Proconnesos in Roman times, in the Sea of Marmara, the inland sea connecting the Aegean and Black seas. This island was the site of an important marble quarry when Asia Minor became a Roman province around 130 B.C.E. 

But where was the marble heading? The blocks' size and style suggest that the column was intended for a major public building, most likely a temple. Carlson and Aylward drew up a list of all the Doric-style monumental buildings under construction in the 1st century B.C.E. on coastlines south of the wreck site, the probable direction of travel away from the quarry. Then they searched for sites with a finished lower-column diameter of about 1.73 meters. They concluded that the marble was headed for the Temple of Apollo at Claros, where people in Roman times flocked to seek advice from oracles, just 50 kilometers from the wreck. That finding is "utterly convincing," says architectural historian Lothar Haselberger of the University of Pennsylvania. 

The data show that the quarry workers on Proconnesos were in close contact with the temple builders some 500 kilometers or more away, shaping the marble to the builders' exact specifications. The findings also show that the builders received columns in pieces in small shipments, hinting at a lengthy construction process. This information, says Carlson, "is the missing link that tells us a lot about this process."                   

Read the full story here (yes - subscription will be needed).                  

[Update - May 29th: So scientists can say quite a bit from DNA analyses about what humans and Neanderthals were doing tens of thousands of years ago, but according to the Council of Islamic Ideology in Pakistan, DNA analysis cannot be used as primary evidence in rape cases (it can be used as secondary evidence). Shame for that]. 

Timnas Indonesia vs Belanda 7 Juni 2013 - Kemarin baru saja saya posting informasi mengenai rencana pertandingan Timnas Indonesia vs Suriname dan ternayta saya ketinggalan informasi sepertinya. Karena selain mendapat undangan untuk bertanding dalam laga persahabatan internasionla melawan Suriname, Timnas Indonesia juga akan menjamu salah satu raksasa sepakbola Eropa yang juga merupakan finalis Piala Dunia 2010, yaitu Belanda. Laga persahabatan tersebut rencananya akan dilangsungkan pada tanggal 7 Juni 2013 mendatang di Stadion Utama Gelora Bung Karno, Senayan.

Tentu hal ini merupakan kabar yang sangat menggembirakan bagi para pecinta sepakbola tanah air dan juga bagi para penggemar Timnas Belanda maupun para penggemar pemain-pemain De Oranje, seperti Van Persie dkk. Selain untuk penggemar, tentu hal ini merupakan kesempatan yang baik bagi para pemain Timnas Indonesia untuk menambah pengalaman bertandingnya.

Nah bagi anda yang ingin menyaksikan langsung pertandingan antara Timnas Indonesia vs Timnas Belanda tersebut, berikut dapat anda kunjungi halaman yang berisi informasi mengenai loket pembelian Tiket Pertandingan Indonesia vs Belanda tersebut, silakan klik disini untuk mengunjungi halaman tersebut. Harga tiket pertandingan Timnas Indonesia vs Timnas Belanda sendiri dijual dengan harga mulai dari Rp. 50.000,- untuk tribun dan paling mahal adalah tiket untuk VVIP Barat dengan harga Rp. 1.750.000,-

Bagi yang tidak ada waktu untuk menyaksikan pertandingan tersebut secara langsung di Gelora Bung Karno, tidak perlu khawatir karena biasanya SCTV akan menyiarakan siaran langsung pertandingan Timnas Indonesia. Jadi meski tidak bisa hadir langsung di stadion, kita masih tetap dapat memberi dukungan untuk Timnas Indonesia dan juga menyaksikan penampilan para pemain Timnas melalui siaran langsung Timnas Indonesia vs Belanda di SCTV.

Nah sekian dulu informasi untuk kali ini, semoga hasil pertandingan Timnas Indonesia vs Timnas Belanda 7 Juni 2013 mendatang dapat berakhir memuaskan. Dan jika ada informasi yang kurang tepat, mohon koreksi dari pembaca melalui form komentar yang ada di bawah tulisan ini.

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Miris, Juara Kelas Tak Lulus Ujian Nasional (UN) - Ujian Nasional (UN) memang sudah dilalui oleh seluruh siswa SMA/K di Indonesia, dan hasil ujiannya pun baru saja diumumkan beberapa waktu yang lalu. Rasa gembira dan lega tentu kini tengah dirasakan bagi mereka yang mendapatkan hasil seperti yang diharapakan, yaitu "Lulus Ujian Nasional (UN)". Dan sebaliknya, tentu rasa sedih dan bercampur rasa-rasa yang tidak mengenakkan lainnya akan dialami bagi mereka yang ternyata mendapatkan hasil yang diluar harapan.

Salah satunya adalah yang dialami oleh seorang siswa SMA Negri 15 Medan, yang menjadi satu-satunya siswa yang tak Lulus Ujian Nasional (UN). Dan lebih tragisnya lagi adalah, dia adalah siswa yang selalu mendapatkan ranking di kelas. Berikut dapat anda simak informasi lengkapnya yang diambil dari situs detik.com

Jakarta - Seorang siswa SMA Negeri 15 Medan, Sumatera Utara (Sumut), dinyatakan tak lulus dalam Ujian Nasional (UN) padahal selama ini selalu mendapat ranking di kelas. Menduga ada masalah dengan penilaian lembar jawaban UN, mereka pun mengajukan protes.

Pada Rabu (29/5/2013) siang, Gita Saraswati (17) bersama ibunya Dian Permanasari datang ke Dinas Pendidikan Kota Medan, di Jalan Pelita IV. Mereka ingin mengetahui hasil ujian Gita, terutama mata ujian Bahasa Indonesia.

Pada mata ujian Bahasa Indonesia Gita mendapatkan nilai 0,8. Padahal dari 50 soal dalam mata ujian itu, Gita dapat menjawab sebagian besarnya. Bahkan dalam pengerjaan atau simulasi ulang yang dilakukannya di rumah, dia mampu mengerjakan dengan benar 30 soal.

Kendati ingin mengetahui penyebab mengapa dia tidak lulus, tidak bisa dipenuhi Dinas Pendidikan. Sang ibu Dian Permanasari sudah mendatangi berbagai pihak, mulai dari sekolah hingga Universitas Negeri Medan (Unimed) selaku pengawas UN agar anaknya diuji ulang sebab ada peluang error hasil penilaian lembar jawabannya.

“Tetapi tidak dipenuhi,” kata Dian.

Gita yang selama ini berada di lima besar juara di kelas justru menjadi satu-satunya siswa yang tidak lulus UN di sekolahnya. Kini gita dan keluarganya bingung mempertanyakan hasil yang menurut mereka mustahil itu

Sumber: http://news.detik.com/read/2013/05/29/182718/2259571/10/juara-kelas-di-medan-bingung-tidak-lulus-un?9911012

Turut berduka mendengar berita ini, semoga memang ada kekeliruan pada saat penilaian lembar jawaban. Semoga lekas selesai permasalahan ini dan berakhir dengan hasil yang baik.

Sudah cukup lama Timnas Sepakbola Indonesia bisa dibilang tidak terdengar gaungnya belakangan ini. Nah informasi terbaru, rencananya Timnas Indonesia akan diundang ke Suriname untuk menjalani laga persahabatan Internasional dalam rangka memperingati kedatangan masyarakat suku Jawa asal Indonesia ke negara tersebut. Menurut Keuta Umum PSSI Djohar Arifin Husin, tawaran untuk bertanding dalam laga persahabatan tersebut langsung disampaikan oleh pihak asosiasi sepakbola Suriname.

Dan berikut salah satu berita mengenai rencana laga persahabatan Timnas Indonesia vs Suriname yang dapat anda simak.

Jakarta - Timnas Indonesia diundang ke Suriname guna menjalani pertandingan persahabatan internasional dalam rangka memperingati kedatangan masyarakat suku Jawa asal Indonesia ke negara tersebut.

Ketua Umum PSSI Djohar Arifin Husin di Jakarta, Senin (27/5), mengatakan, tawaran untuk menjalani pertandingan persahabatan langsung disampaikan oleh pihak asosiasi sepak bola Suriname.

"Kami setuju dengan permintaan dari Suriname. Pertandingan rencananya dilakukan di sana," katanya di Kantor PSSI Senayan Jakarta.

Suriname bagi Indonesia sudah tidak asing lagi karena banyak masyarakat Indonesia terutama yang berasal dari suku Jawa telah menetap secara turun temurun lebih dari 100 tahun yang lalu. Mereka pertama kali datang dibawa oleh Belanda.

"Menurut presiden asosiasi sepak bola Suriname ada sekitar tujuh persen masyarakat suku Jawa yang tinggal di sana. Mereka juga tetap mempertahankan bahasa Jawa," katanya menambahkan.

Meski sudah setuju dengan tawaran Suriname, Djohar Arifin menegaskan jika hingga saat ini belum dipastikan waktu pelaksanaan pertandingan persahabatan tersebut. Saat ini pihaknya terus melakukan koordinasi dengan asosiasi sepak bola salah satu negara di benua Amerika ini.

Mantan Sekjen KONI itu menegaskan, sebenarnya tidak hanya Suriname yang menawarkan diri untuk menghadapi Timnas Garuda. Hanya saja Djohar belum menjelaskan secara detail negara mana yang berminat menghadapi Indonesia.

Berdasarkan data yang ada, Timnas Garuda sudah dipastikan akan menghadapi Timnas Belanda di Stadion Utama Gelora Bung Karno Jakarta, 7 Juni mendatang. Selain itu beberapa klub asal Inggris juga akan datang ke Indonesia.

Ada tiga klub yang dijadwalkan melawan Timnas Indonesia (selection) yaitu Arsenal, Chelsea dan Liverpool. Tiga klub elit Liga Utama Inggris ini akan menjalani pertandingan secara berurutan mulai Juni hingga Juli nanti.

Khusus untuk menghadapi Belanda, Timnas Garuda yang saat ini dilatih oleh Jacksen F Tiago akan mulai menjalani pelatnas di Jakarta, 3 Juni nanti. Ada 21 pemain yang dipanggil. Mereka berasal dari kompetisi Indonesia Super League (ISL) dan Indonesia Premier League (IPL).

Penulis: /ARD

Sumber:ANT

Source: http://www.beritasatu.com/sepakbola/116253-timnas-indonesia-akan-bertandang-ke-suriname.html

Nah bagaimana menurut anda? Dapatkah Timnas Indonesia memenangi laga persahbatan melawan Timnas Suriname nanti? Kalau saya pribadi sih bilang "iya dooong" hehehe :D

100 Domain Gratis - Hari ini saya ingin berbagi informasi mengenai domain gratis. Untuk yang sedang ingin memiliki sebuah domain namun belum memiliki biaya untuk pendaftarannya atau mungkin belum yakin ingin membeli domain karena khawatir belum bisa memaksimalkannya kelak, anda dapat menggunakan domain gratis dari cu.cc. Melalui cu.cc ini kita bisa mendaftarkan hingga 100 nama domain secara gratis.

Melalui cu.cc ini kita bisa mendapatkan domain dengan format namadomain.cu.cc selama nama yang kita inginkan tersebut belum didaftar oleh orang lain. Seperti layanan-layanan domain gratis yang sebelumnya pernah ada (misal co.cc, uni.cc, co.tv, dll.), dengan domain cu.cc ini kita bisa merubah alamat blogspot yang kita memiliki, bisa juga menggunakan nameserver, atau sekedar untuk url forwarding pun juga bisa.

Cara pendaftaran domain gratis di cu.cc pun cukup mudah, cukup cari nama domain yang kita inginkan, jika masih tersedia kita cukup mengisi form registrasi (jika belum daftar) atau login (jika sudah daftar), dan kita dapat langsung mendaftarkan nama domain yang kita inginkan tersebut. Pendaftaran domain gratis di cu.cc ini dapat dilakukan langsung untuk 2 tahun dengan biaya "0" alias gratis. Untuk setelah 2 tahun selanjutnya saya sendiri belum mengetahui apakah akan tetap gratis atau berubah.

Nah sekian dulu informasi yang dapat saya bagikan kali ini, jika ada informasi yang kurang jelas atau ada informasi tambahan dari para pembaca, bisa anda sampaikan melalui form komentar yang tersedia dibawah tulisan ini.

by Salman Hameed

Over the years I have had numerous posts on Saudi Arabia - and a vast majority of them have been unflattering. Much of it justified as many of these posts have been critical of Saudi government's handing out of death penalties for petty things as well as for laws against women (yes - women still cannot drive in Saudi Arabia and need a male guardian's signature to obtain a passport).

But then there is some good news as well. About a year ago, a 25-year old medical student, Muath Alduhishy, started up Scientific Saudi and now its team has expanded to 6 members. Out of a population of 26 million, Saudi Arabia has 6 million Facebook users and has the second-highest ratio of internet users per population in the Middle East (after Iran). Therefore, there is enormous potential in Scientific Saudi.
Alduhishy, started a Facebook dedicated for science communication in Arabic. The page is titled

Here is an interview with Muath Alduhishy conducted by Mohammad Yahia of the excellent House of Wisdom blog:

1)      How did the idea for Scientific Saudi come about and how long have you been online?  

The idea of Scientific Saudi started over a year ago, when I noticed the high prevalence of English-speaking scientific groups in the social media, namely Facebook, while I couldn’t find any in the Arabic-speaking world of Facebook. 

However, there are plenty of pseudoscientific groups, which in lieu of providing updated, credible and verified scientific articles and news, they broadcast common factoids that have been circulating the internet since its establishment or, in other cases, they are religious-oriented groups that uses science as a means to support their spiritual believes. 

I couldn’t find any credible Arabic-speaking group that’s passionate to communicate science purely for the sake of educating and informing people about the astonishing and mind-blowing advances and breakthroughs that happen every day in the research centres and universities, as it was the case with the numerous English-speaking scientific groups that I’ve come across, albeit I did found a couple of amazing Arabic scientific groups later on, but they are extremely scarce and have negligible impact in terms of the quantity of fans. 

At this moment, I realised that it’s my duty to bridge the gap, or at least to attempt to do so, due to the fact that I have always been passionate about science and I’ve been nurturing my passion for years through listening to scientific shows and podcasts and subscribing to scientific publications, such as your sister science publication Scientific American, hence the name Scientific Saudi. 

I started the group by myself as a Facebook page at the end of July 2012. It was just an ad hoc step. I had no grand plan or long-term strategy at that time. I had this idea for a while so I wanted to do something about it. From the first day, I made a pledge to myself to distinguish my page by not publishing anything without a credible, and, where possible, peer-reviewed reference, and to preserve the intellectual rights of any materials or persons presented in the group. I know it seemed a bit extreme and overly ideal commitment, especially that I publish new posts every day, but I did strictly adhere to it and still do, with a few exceptions. Also, I request from every contributor to adhere to this golden rule of mine. 

Today, we have pages on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube as well as an official website. We have over 30,000 followers in the aforementioned social networking websites, which is still a considerably scant number compared to the overwhelmingly ubiquitous religious, celebrities and trivia pages.

2)      What are your plans to expand on what you have right now?We are currently in the phase of expansion and development, which means focusing on increasing our impact and spreading further out. We are being gradually recognized in the world of social media as it’s evident in your reach to us. Also, we are interested in collaborating the efforts with other scientific groups and with individuals who share the same passion as us. You can read more about our goals as well as our mission and message here http://www.scientificsaudi.com/about-16051606-160615811606.html

And of course, a question on evolution also shows up:

5)      I see you have several articles on Darwin and evolution – topics that are often thorny in the Arab world, and might be especially so in Saudi Arabia. How do you handle these topics? And has there ever been a backlash against you for your coverage of these topics? 

This is a good question, I have to say. However, before I answer it, you should know that we are committed to not discuss religion or politics in our published work, which is really an unprecedented proposition in the Arabic-speaking world. Most of the Arabic scientific speakers and communicators, albeit they are few, have strong religious tendencies. 

I, myself, have no problem with that at all, but the problem is that many of them handle scientific theories that might contradict with their religious views with an unscientific mentality. I was listening the other day to a highly regarded scientific communicator in the Islamic world talking about Darwin’s evolution theory as if it was a ‘conspiracy’ to dehumanise people, and that it has no plausible scientific basis. He clearly has no clue how significant is the evidence that supports this theory, or at least he appears so. 

Now to answer your question, yes, we do care greatly about scientifically and objectively explaining such major theories that shaped our current knowledge of the world. Darwin’s theory of evolution, in particular, is supported by a significant amount of evidence from different fields of science, and that’s what we care about here as a scientific group. Of course this means we will deal with a backlash from some of our readers, and we did, but we are still willing to answer every inquiry they have about such theories without judgment or reject. In fact, we have witnessed people who strongly disbelieve that humans have ever passed the stratosphere, others think that the big bang theory is just an absurd lie, and some who think that stem cells technology is a myth. If we are afraid of any backlash in the group, then we should quit science. 

However, it should be noted that if an opponent of any theory of science brought a plausible scientific evidence against it, then we are willing to adopt the evidence without hesitation. In short, science is our language in this group.

Read the full interview here.

I generally like my double entendres to be a little more lighthearted, but such is not the case. This is just a quick note to let you know that I'll need to take a break from the blog this week to attend to some pressing family matters. I will be back before you know it, and I want to wish all of you a happy and thoughtful Memorial Day. 

Live Streaming TV Online Gratis - Internet memang sangat membantu memudahkan kita dalam melakukan segala hal. Sumber informasi yang tiada batas kalau boleh saya menyebutnya. Bagaimana tidak, hampir semua informasi yang kita butuhkan dapat kita temukan melalui internet. Berita terbaru, informasi terkini, dan hal-hal lainnya hampir dipastikan bisa kita temukan di internet, tak terkecuali untuk menonton tv online.

Memang benar, nonton tv sebenarnya tidak perlu repot-repot melalui internet. Namun dalam kondisi tertentu, nonton tv via internet terkadang sangat dibutuhkan. Seperti misal ketika mati lampu, dalam perjalanan, atau sedang di lokasi / tempat yang kebetulan disana tidak ada televisi dan lain sebagainya, tentu dengan adanya layanan tv online bisa sangat membantu ketika kita sedang ingin menonton acara favorit kita melalui PC/Laptop yang terhubung dengan internet. Hampir semua stasin tv yang ada di Indonesia, semua kini sudah menyediakan layanan untuk live streaming, selain itu juga banyak juga situs-situs yang menyediakan layanan live streaming stasiun tv yang ada di Indonesia tersebut.

Tidak hanya itu, berawal dari rasa penasaran ingin menyaksikan tayangan siaran langsung Liga Jepang, saya searching di internet dan menemukan sebuah situs yang menyediakan layanan streaming yang ternyata tidak hanya tayangan live streaming J-League saja yang dapat kita saksikan. Situs tersebut menyediakan banyak sekali tayangan dari stasiun-stasiun tv yang mungkin hanya bisa kita saksikan melalui tv berbayar jika tidak melalui internet. Jika saya perhatikan, hampir semua tayangan di situs tersebut adalah tayangan olahraga.

Benar-benar sangat membantu dan menyenangkan sekali, karena melalui situs tersebut kini saya yang kebetulan sangat menggemari olahraga sepakbola dapat menyaksikan tayangan-tayangan sepakbola yang tidak ditayangkan di stasiun tv lokal. Rasanya sudah seperti berlangganan layanan tv berbayar :D
Nah andapun juga dapat menikmati hal yang sama dengan mengunjungi situs ini: www.livestream365.com.
Atau jika ada yang mengetahui informasi situs yang serupa dengan situs tersebut, kiranya dapat berbagi informasi melalui kotak komentar yang tersedia dibawah tulisan ini ;)

by Salman Hameed

From this past March, here is Glenn Greenwald talking about 'endless war' and growing Presidential powers in the US. The first part of the talk is about 40 minutes, and then he sits down for a discussion with Hampshire College faculty member, Falguni Sheth. The whole session is fantastic - but his discussion of Wikileaks is particularly worthwhile. For our purposes, there is a discussion of how the narrative of endless war allows the government to expand its power and how such things become normalized (for example, for many young adults, they don't even know pre-9/11 US). In any case, here is the talk:

 Your auto insurance policy probably has clauses specifying whether you are covered for damage from missiles, falling objects, riots, civil war, earthquakes, hail, radioactive contamination, discharge of a nuclear weapon. But it’s time once again to check that it also addresses whether you are insured against accidentally driving onto the set of a “Fast & Furious” movie.

If you blundered into the shooting of “Fast & Furious 6,” for instance, you are almost surely walking now: If the flip-your-car-over speedsters didn’t wreck your vehicle, the giant tank surely did.

Most of the familiar faces are back for this latest bacchanalia of reckless driving, including Vin Diesel as Dominic Toretto. Toretto is relaxing in fair-weather retirement, living off the big score of the previous movie in the franchise, when he is called back into service, as it were, by Luke Hobbs, the federal agent who both pursues and admires him and his band of renegades.

Hobbs is again played by Dwayne Johnson and his biceps, which get enough camera time that you expect the closing credits to include two arm wranglers, one for each. Mr. Johnson has seemingly been in every movie released in the last two years and has a reality television show, “The Hero,” coming on TNT. But he knows how to deploy his half-dozen expressions — the sly grin, the single-eyebrow arch — and is still a welcome sight, where other actors might by this point be overexposed.

He also doesn’t hijack this movie the way his character did in the recent “G.I. Joe: Retaliation.” “F&F 6” is still primarily about Toretto and his buddies. It is no spoiler to say that Michelle Rodriguez, seemingly killed off in an earlier film, returns as Letty Ortiz (she’s in the opening credits), Toretto’s tough-as-nails love interest. The gimmick here is that she’s now working for the opposition, mercenaries led by Owen Shaw (Luke Evans). Oh, and she has amnesia and doesn’t remember Toretto.

That provides just enough plot to propel the movie from car chase to car chase. The real question here is whether Justin Lin, the director of this film and three of its predecessors, can top himself. The climactic sequence of his “Fast Five” involved a preposterous scene in which racecars towed a giant bank vault through the streets at high speed.

Here Mr. Lin offers two tricks. The bad guys have flip cars, sleek machines whose armor-plated front ends are designed so that when they strike another vehicle, it goes spinning through the air. And in a later chase, Shaw and friends pull out a formidable tank that turns any vehicle it encounters into squished scrap metal.

These flashy smashies and a climactic sequence, in which the good guys try to prevent Shaw from taking off in an airliner by tethering their cars to it, make the movie a satisfying thrill ride, at least on a par with the earlier installments. A nice twist near the end is well disguised, and a coda hints at what’s to come in Part 7.

“Fast & Furious 6” is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). It’s a dangerous-driving clinic.

Fast & Furious 6

Opens on Friday nationwide.

Directed by Justin Lin; written by Chris Morgan, based on characters created by Gary Scott Thompson; director of photography, Stephen F. Windon; edited by Christian Wagner and Kelly Matsumoto; music by Lucas Vidal; production design by Jan Roelfs; costumes by Sanja Milkovic Hays; produced by Neil H. Moritz, Clayton Townsend and Vin Diesel; released by Universal Pictures. Running time: 2 hours 8 minutes.

WITH: Vin Diesel (Dominic Toretto), Paul Walker (Brian O’Conner), Dwayne Johnson (Luke Hobbs), Michelle Rodriguez (Letty Ortiz), Jordana Brewster (Mia Toretto), Tyrese Gibson (Roman Pearce), Chris Bridges, a k a Ludacris (Tej Parker), Sung Kang (Han Lue), Luke Evans (Owen Shaw), Gina Carano (Riley), John Ortiz (Braga), Gal Gadot (Gisele Harabo) and Elsa Pataky (Elena Neves).


Source: http://movies.nytimes.com/2013/05/24/movies/fast-furious-6-with-vin-diesel-and-dwayne-johnson.html?_r=0

Someone sent me a video link last summer, showing someone spiral cutting a hot dog. The wienercision was done by Blake Smith from Chow.com, and I remember wondering if this technique would work with parboiled Italian sausage.

Oh, it worked. It worked real good. By the way, I was going to provide a link to the aforementioned video, but Blake ended the demo by putting ketchup on his hot dog, so forget it. Okay, fine, since I did steal his technique, here you go.

Not only does this look very cool, the technique also provides a significantly greater amount of surface area, and when you’re talking about grilling meat, it’s all about the surface area. You could brush barbecue sauce on an un-helixed Italian sausage, but here you’re literally flavoring the sausage inside and out. 

And if you're skeptical about how well barbecue sauce goes with Italian sausage, take it from someone who ate one; it’s a match made in backyard barbecue heaven. I’d like to wish all you a safe and very festive Memorial Day weekend, and I hope you “spring” these curly “Q” sausages on your guests. Enjoy!

View the complete recipe

The Hangover Part III opens on an elegant slow-motion shot of some guards running urgently, to the strains of classical music, through the corridors of a Thai prison. They make their way to a gate beyond which we see, still in slow motion, an elaborate, cataclysmic riot already in full progress. Amid the total chaos, they make their way to the cell of goofball Chinese gangster Leslie Chow (Ken Jeong) and discover that he has fled, Shawshank Redemption–style. Purely on the surface, it’s a beautifully put-together scene — aestheticized and shot with uncommon cinematic grace. And right there is pretty much everything that’s wrong with The Hangover Part III.

Allow me to explain. The plot of this third installment in the guys'-night-out-gone-wrong franchise goes like this: Our heroes from the earlier films — alpha male horndog Phil (Bradley Cooper, who doesn’t really look like he wants to be here), straight-laced trouble magnet Stu (Ed Helms), and perpetual afterthought Doug (Justin Bartha) have to get the tubby, emotionally stunted black sheep Alan (Zach Galifianakis, looking healthier than usual) to a facility where he’s going to presumably get treatment for the fact that he lives at home and acts like a 12-year-old. To convince him to go, the three friends agree to make the drive with Alan. Along the way, they’re attacked and accosted by drug kingpin Marshall (John Goodman). Turns out the recently escaped Chow once made off with Marshall’s gold. No one can find him, but Marshall is convinced our heroes, and particularly Alan, who is still friends with Chow, can. So, he holds Doug hostage and threatens to kill him unless Phil, Stu, and Alan locate Chow and return him, and the gold, to Marshall. So off the Wolfpack goes to Vegas to try to track their man down.

Are you laughing yet?? No?? Let’s leave to one side the fact that The Hangover Part III inexplicably chooses to make Chow the focus of its story — Jeong is a terrific actor, but his character was always the weakest part of this franchise, the main point of his appearance in the first entry being its utter randomness. The film seems to relish the fact that it’s not trying particularly hard to be funny. There are set pieces galore here — a debauched penthouse party, an attempt to rappel down the side of Caesar’s Palace using a rope fashioned out of bedsheets, and a limo chasing a parasailing fugitive through the streets of Vegas. There are even some mildly chuckle-worthy moments during these set pieces — as when Alan gets stuck between the E and S in the Caesar’s Palace sign. But director Todd Phillips seems more interested in staging the action than in mining any genuine humor from it.

This is nothing short of a tragedy, at least for those of us who like the Hangover movies. One of Phillips’s great strengths as a filmmaker has always been the fact that he eschews the point-and-shoot style of most comedy directors today. There’s an old-fashioned smoothness and power to his images, which is why in many ways the first Hangover, with its noir-ish, mystery-plot structure, worked so well. Phillips brought to his comedy formal signifiers from other genres, like slow-motion and tracking shots and bird’s-eye points of view. It’s a self-conscious way of directing, to be sure, but it’s not gratuitous: The stylized depiction of Vegas early in The Hangover matched the jacked-up, sexed-up ambitions of the characters; while the nocturnal, otherworldly quality of the film enhanced their terrifying uncertainty. So that you weren’t just waiting for the next gag, you were genuinely sucked into the plot. (Okay, at least some of us were. I’ll admit that not everybody’s as keen on The Hangover as I was.) But this time, the director’s grandiosity gets the better of him. The Hangover Part III amps up the style and the action, but it forgets the jokes.

It truly is surprising how barren the movie is of humor. There’s one funny exchange early on that relates to Stu’s sexual travails in the second Hangover film; later, there are some bits involving Melissa McCarthy as a pawn-shop owner who sparks some chemistry with Alan. And that’s about it. Indeed, the film’s unfunniness may be the joke. Consider some of the advertising for the film, with posters showing Ed Helms carrying a seemingly lifeless Jeong with the words “It all ends here.” “Wouldn’t it be funny,” you imagine the writers and the director asking, “if we went totally genre and forgot about the comedy altogether?” So, this Hangover actually has a body count; as in, people die in this movie. “But that IS the joke!!” you can hear the filmmakers insisting. “But it’s not funny!” you want to yell back.

Actually, I lied when I said those aforementioned gags were the only jokes. There is one very funny bit, and it comes courtesy of the end credits' stinger, which has our characters waking up, Hangover 1 and 2-style, from yet another debauched party with something clearly amiss. But ironically, coming this late in the game, the moment feels like a slap in the face. It’s a taunting reminder of the movie we might have had, instead of this turgid, unfunny catastrophe.


Source: http://www.vulture.com/2013/05/movie-review-the-hangover-3.html

Kellie Pickler may not have won American Idol, but she crushed the competition on Dancing With the Stars! The 26-year-old country singer was named the winner of Season 16 of the ABC reality dance competition on Tuesday, May 21.

"I'm overwhelmed with joy," Pickler told Us Weekly after the show. "I'm kind of speechless for the first time! Usually I can't be quiet! Usually I'm just spitting out words left and right, and now I don't know what to say."


In the first-ever finale with four finalists, Pickler beat out Disney star Zendaya, Baltimore Ravens wide receiver Jacoby Jones and Olympic gymnast Aly Raisman for the coveted Mirror Ball trophy.

"I was shocked to have made it this far," the "Best Days of Your Life" singer explained to Us. "We've made so many memories out here on this dance floor and in the studio. We've all worked so hard to be her, and it's just overwhelming. But in a great way."

Pickler's husband Kyle Jacobs was also overwhelmed by his wife's victory -- and shed a few tears!

"I was like, 'Baby, were you crying?' And he was like, 'Oh, I had something in my eye. I got some confetti in my eye . . . ' He was so proud," she shared. "The first thing he said tonight was, 'Baby, I love you and I'm so proud of you. You did it.'"

And Pickler won't be hanging up her dancing shoes just yet. "I told him that if he didn't take dance classes with me, I'd have to find a rent-a-husband!" she joked.

But that won't be necessary! Jacobs told Us that he will "man up" and dance with his wife. "I'll definitely have to take a dance class," the songwriter said. "We're going to take them together."

PHOTOS: Incredible DWTS body makeovers

"For a girl who has never danced, to win Dancing with the Stars is absolutely phenomenal," he added. "As her husband, I could not be more proud."

In honor of Pickler's time on Dancing With the Stars, the couple even named their new puppy "Tango."

"It's not official!" Jacobs said. "But it's Tango for right now."


Source: http://www.usmagazine.com/entertainment/news/kellie-pickler-wins-dancing-with-the-stars-my-husband-cried-2013225

by Salman Hameed

If you are a US citizen, you cannot review a manuscript even if only one of the co-authors works for the Iranian government. Oh - and these sanctions apply even if the journal is base in the Netherlands:

Scientific journals are being asked to help tighten U.S. trade sanctions on Iran. On 30

April, the Dutch publishing behemoth Elsevier of the Netherlands sent a note to its editorial network saying that all U.S. editors and U.S. reviewers must "avoid" handling manuscripts if they include an author employed by the government of Iran. Under a policy that went into effect in March -- reflecting changes in a law passed by the U.S. Congress in December -- even companies like Elsevier not based in the United States must prevent their U.S. personnel from interacting with the Iranian government. 

The sanctions, aimed at punishing Iran for its pursuit of nuclear technology, have been broadened somewhat from previous rules issued by the enforcement agency, the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), a division of the Treasury Department. 

According to a treasury official, OFAC has not changed its "general license" policy for journals; it still allows them to publish articles authored by nongovernmental scientists from Iran and other sanctioned countries. The new wrinkle is that OFAC insists that all U.S. citizens, no matter who employs them, comply with the sanctions against papers authored by governmental researchers. That apparently prompted Elsevier to issue a warning to its employees.

This is insane. What stops complete insanity is the small concession that these sanctions do not (yet) apply on academic and research institutes and on non-governmental hospital and clinical settings. But remember, that it takes only one co-author in a governmental institutions (such as oil and gas) to trigger the sanctions. So what should the journal editors do? 

In a note to editors (a copy of which was obtained by ScienceInsider), Elsevier gives advice on what a manager should do if he or she can't find a non-U.S. person to work on a paper that requires special handling: "Please reject the manuscript outright." According to the note, the rejection should apologize to the submitter and explain that because of U.S. sanctions, "we are unfortunately unable to handle your manuscript."

Shameful. Read the full story here.

And all of this is beside the point that the US led sanctions of Iran on nuclear issue are, of course, hypocritical. Obama won (or more accurately, "was awarded") the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize for, amongst other illusions, the promise of the reduction of nuclear weapons. Instead, he has decided to cut non-proliferation funding in favor of more nuclear warheads:

Under the 2014 proposal, the Energy Department’s nuclear weapons activities funding — which includes modernization efforts for bomber-based and missile-based warheads — would be increased roughly 7 percent, or around $500 million, above the current level of $7.227 billion for these activities. 

The department’s nonproliferation programs, aimed at diminishing the security threat posed by fissile materials in other countries that can be used for nuclear weapons, would be cut by roughly 20 percent, or $460 million, below the current level of $2.45 billion, the officials said.

In combination with the expansive use of drones under Obama's watch, it is not surprising that there is now a petition to revoke Obama's Nobel Peace Prize (you can sign it here). Also read this Salon article Celebrating Our "Warrior President" by Glenn Greenwald.

In the mean time, I hope that these sanctions on science publications ignored by other publishers. This has happened before:

OFAC tangled with scientific journals almost a decade ago when it proposed much harsher restrictions on communications from Iran. That led to an organized protest by the American Institute of Physics, the Association of American Publishers, and others, resulting in the current understanding: OFAC permits the exhange of scientific but not government-sponsored communications from Iran. 

You’ll have to excuse the smaller than usual blog post, but I just flew across country, and boy are my arms tired…sorry, not arms, I meant jokes. 

Anyway, I’m back at my mom’s for a few weeks to help her out after some shoulder surgery, and despite a very late, turbulent, and sleepless flight, I had just enough energy left to post this marble potatoes video.

I generally try to stick with ingredients that can be found at any large grocery store, and I hope that’s the case here, but to be honest I really didn’t care, as these were just too damn cute not to film. If at all possible, I hope you give this a try soon. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

4 stripes bacon, sliced

1 pound marble potatoes

salt and pepper to taste

2 tsp chopped rosemary

1 tbsp rice vinegar, or any vinegar

View the complete recipe

Thank you to all my blogster followers for all your thoughts and prayers as my community of Moore, OK - in which I live and work in, has been horribly affected by the tornado that passed through on May 20^th.  This tornado developed and came fast giving the community little warning and not much time to prepare.  It also came earlier in the day than most tornados come.  It came at a time when people were still at work and children were still in school.  The commotion of what was coming our way started around 2:00 p.m.  Parents were rushing up to our school in a mad frantic to check their child out.  With so many parents and such a mad dash to get students with their parents, the office staff was calling the student’s names out over the intercom one right after another as students were running down the halls to their parents.   As the storm got closer and closer the school was then put on a lockdown.  It was too dangerous for parents to leave with their child.  So parents came down to their child's classroom to be with their child and take cover with them during the storm.  As the tornado alarms sounded teachers, staff, students, parents, etc. all followed the tornado procedures we have practiced so many times before.  I had nine of my first grade students left at this time.  I then had my students take cover on the interior wall of my classroom.  (It’s times like these that you are so thankful you don’t have any windows in your classroom!)  As my students were taking cover I began pushing all the student desks over their bodies.  I was preparing just in case something were to happen to our building, any flying debris, etc. – hoping that the desks would take most of the hit, not the small bodies huddled closely underneath them.  Just as we were all settled into our positions we lost all power and the room became pitch dark.  Luckily I had a flashlight and my iPad right by my side.  As we were all huddled in the dark waiting for the unknown to happen our wonderful principal, Michelle McNear, was very calmly guiding us, talking to us, telling the students to be calm and listen to their teachers,  and also telling everyone how much she loved them over the intercom system.  One of the last announcements she made before the intercom system stopped working was to tell us that in about 30 seconds it was going to get really loud and our ears were going to pop, but to stay in our tornado positions.  I can’t say enough how wonderful and calm our principal was as she stood in front of a wall of glass windows, with an F4 or F5 tornado about 100 yards from our building, guiding us all through what was about to come.  (Below is a picture our principal took of the tornado as she was looking out the glass windows of our school).  She was definitely right we could hear a loud sound – almost like a train close by.  As scared as I was on the inside I knew I could not let my little first graders hear or see the fear I had.  I knew I had to stay strong for them.  So as we were all huddled in position we were all laughing and cracking jokes.  As much as I wanted everyone to be silent so I could listen to what was going on outside – I knew laughing and jokes were the way to go.  Then, I did what I knew I had to do – start praying!  Not only was I praying but I could hear and see my little first graders start praying. Then, by a miracle it all became quiet…no rain or hail sounds.   I decided to see if I could get any kind of information on my iPad as to where the tornado was.  I was able to pull up the streaming video of the tornado coverage to see that the storm had passed by our school - Wayland Bonds Elementary.  I was so relieved and felt so blessed that it had missed our school – but I didn’t feel 100% secure, because the video I was watching was showing the tornado heading in a path right by my house.  So I texted my husband who was home with my dog to make sure he was taking cover and to tell him that I loved him.  Luckily the tornado not only missed our school, but also my house.  It was less than a mile away.  Below is a video my husband took as the tornado made its way in the area behind our house.  

 

This is a picture of the tornado outside the windows of our school - Wayland Bonds Elementary.

 

 

 

This is the tornado passing just north of my house.

 

This is my husband taking the video from our backyard.

 

There is tons of debris surrounding my house and surrounding neighborhoods.  This is a picture of a large piece of metal-no telling what this is from.

 

 

The storm came through three days before our last day of school.  Since schools and family homes were hit in our school district, as well as all the down power lines, closed streets, etc. School could not continue for the remainder of the year.  Due to the circumstances, school was officially over May 20th.  As days passed and the power came back on and roads were open, the school district had an "End of School - Back to School Night."  Parents and students could come to their school to grab their belongings and say good-bye to their teacher.  It was a great way to put a since of closer to the school year. 

 

 

This is a picture of the goodies and supplies my students picked up when they came back to visit me!  Visit my blog post End of the School Year Student Gifts to see what I put in each student's sand pail.

 

 

Those schools of Briarwood and Plaza Towers that were hit during the storm had their students meet at a surrounding school.  Our school of Wayland Bonds hosted all the Briarwood staff, students and parents.  Our amazing PTA parents as well as generous donators put together backpacks filled with stuffed animals and other goodies for all the Briarwood students.

 

 

It was amazing to see not only all the backpacks and stuffed animals that were donated and put together in just a few short days, but food, gift cards, etc. were also donated to those families. 

May 20^th was a sad and very long day.  Not only did we spend hours up at the school waiting for parents to pick up their children, but it also took hours for me to make it back to my house.  I feel so blessed to have all my family, friends, students, and belongings spared by the horrible storm.  Unfortunately, not everyone can say that.  Some of the families at our school were affected by the tornado.  Please continue to pray for those families that have not only been affected by the loss of their belongings – but for the people and animals they may have lost.  Thanks again for all your thoughts and prayers!

 

...

To read the content of this post, please click on the link below:
http://www.inspiremeasap.blogspot.com/2013/05/plan-this-field-trip-now.html

by Salman Hameed

If you happen to be in Madison next Sunday, you can attend a panel on Contemporary Fantasy and Science Fiction from the Muslim World as part of Wiscon' 37. Here are the details from the Islam and Science Fiction website:

A lot has happened since One Thousand and One Nights. Come and hear panelists discuss contemporary fantasy and science fiction from the Muslim world! We’ll talk about works by Muslim authors from different countries, both those available in English and those still awaiting translation. We welcome audience participation, so come with questions; we’ll bring our reading experience and boundless enthusiasm. A dystopian Cairo, a water planet and a magic library await you!

Location:    Concourse  Hotel, Capitol A Room
Schedule:    May 26, 2013 Sun, 2:30-3:45 pm
Panelists:   Muhammad Aurangzeb Ahmad, Amal El-Mohtar, Anwesha Maity, Sofia Samatar
Hashtag:    #MuslimFSF

by Salman Hameed

Hydrogen gas swirling around the black hole at the center of our Galaxy as seen in radio waves

There is often heated rhetoric around science and religion debates. Some focus on showing the incompatibility of science and religion while some others find evidence of science in scriptures. But often the beauty of nature - as nature - gets left out. In fact, in 99% of the cases, science and religion have nothing to say to each other. In that spirit, here is a fantastic news story of the discovery of a Magnetar - a highly magnetized neutron star - very close to the central black hole of our own galaxy, the Milky Way. We are quite far from the central black hole (about 30,000 light years away) and don't have to worry about it. However, what is really cool is the fact that there is a gas cloud, G2, heading straight (actually it will be spiraling in) into Sagittarius A* - the supermassive black hole at the center of our Galaxy. The cloud is about 3 times as massive as the Earth and it is expected to swallowed some time between September of this year and March 2014. Now this is so cool that we (as in astronomers) can pinpoint such events with this kind of accuracy!

What does it have anything to with science and religion? Nothing. And that is the way it ought to be. Of course, if we (as in humans) were in the cloud that will be swallowed by Sagittarius A*, then there would be have been a lot of discussion of science, religion, and the meaning of our drift into the central black hole. Otherwise, thirty-thousand light years away, it is just a cool event.

Here is the story from this week's Nature:

The magnetar’s accidental discovery is a by-product of astronomers’ excitement about the arrival of the gas cloud, dubbed G2. The cloud, which is about three times the mass of Earth, was first spotted near Sgr A* in 2012 (and was later found in 2002 data). Its arrival would deliver insight into how objects accrete into the swirling disk of material around a black hole, as well as offering the first chance for astronomers to measure the time that it takes for objects to be captured and swallowed up.

Every flicker of emissions from Sgr A* sparks a flurry of speculation, intensifying the usual cycle of observation and coordinated follow-up that characterizes high-energy astronomy. Many telescope directors are scheduling additional monitoring of the Galactic Centre. The VLA, for example, is already scanning radio frequencies around Sgr A* every two months, and will do so every month once G2 arrives.

Read the full story here (may need subscription to access it).

And here is a short video that includes a simulation of what will happen to the cloud when it encounters the black hole:

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الرحيق المختوم: تحتوي هذه الصفحة على نسخة وورد، ومصورة pdf، والكترونية مفهرسة من كتاب الرحيق المختوم، مع ترجمته إلى 13 لغة عالمية؛ فلقد حظيت سيرة صاحب الرسالة العظمى - صلى الله عليه وسلم - باهتمام العلماء والمحدثين والكتاب والمؤرخين، المتقدمين منهم والمتأخرين، وكل من هؤلاء الأعلام يغوص في ثبج هذا البحر الزاخر، ويستصفي منه يتيم الجوهر ونفيس الدرر.
فمنهم من عني باستخلاص دلائل الإعجاز والخصائص النبوية، ومنهم من صمد إلى الإبانة عن أحداث الغزوات وتفاصيل المعارك، ومنهم من أفاض في ذكر فقهها واستخلاص أحكامها وعبرها، ومنهم من استجلى مواقف عظمة هذه النفس الزكية.
ولا تزال وستبقى سيرة هذا النبي الكريم - صلى الله عليه وسلم - ملهمة لأولي الأقلام اللامعة والدراسات العميقة، للاستهداء بهديها والتأسي بصاحبها صلى الله عليه وسلم.
وممن أسهم في هذا المضمار ونهل من هذا المعين الصافي الشيخ صفي الرحمن المباركفوري - رحمه الله - في كتابنا هذا؛ حيث كتب عن السيرة فصولاً مضيئة، وموازنات فريدة، وربط الأحداث ببعضها ربطاً متماسكاً بأسلوب بديع أخاذ، حيث استخلص من كتب الأقدمين فوائد بلورها في إيجاز غير مخل، وتطويل غير ممل، فجاء كافياً وافياً.
وفي زماننا هذا الذي أضحى الناس فيه يلهثون وراء مناهج فاسدة ويسلكون سبلاً معوجة .. تبرز أهمية دراسة السيرة العطرة؛ لتوضح لنا معالم الطريق المستقيم، وعظمة هذا النبي الكريم، عسى أن يكون هذا باعثاً لنا على إصلاح ما أفسده بعدنا عن المنهج الإلهي، والتأسي بمنقذ البشرية من الضلال والتيه صلى الله عليه وسلم.

تأليف : صفي الرحمن المباركفوري

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