SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013 • plus@pen.com.qa • www.thepeninsulaqatar.com • 4455 7741

CAMPUS

COMMUNITY

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• PEC celebratesPakistan Daywith fanfare

• CNA-Q holds International businesscompetition

• As ‘telehealth’ grows,experts questioncost benefits

• Mannai Tradinglaunches 2013 GMC Acadia

• Three-dimensional TV, withoutthe glasses

• Learn commonlyused Arabic wordsand their meanings

inside

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The Croods:Mammoth fun, with a message

Doha joined cities across the world in marking the Doha joined cities across the world in marking the Earth Hour to raise awareness about climate change.Earth Hour to raise awareness about climate change.

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Switching off

2 COVER STORYPLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

Safe landing

Doha joined thousands of cities across the world in marking Earth Hour last night as several landmarks in the city switched off their lights for an hour at 8.30pm to raise awareness about

climate change.Skyscrapers in West Bay, which normally glitter with

lights after dark, and many other buildings stood in dark-ness in support of calls for lasting action on climate change and to symbolise their commitment to save the planet.

Restaurant goers got to enjoy a candlelit dinner as hotels sought to underline the difference that small steps to save energy can make to the environment.

The organisers of Earth Hour encourage individuals, organisations and governments to make the switch to renewable energy. This year, they had called on individuals and organisations to adopt simple renewable energy solu-tions and for businesses to have more sustainable practices. Governments are encouraged to promote policies favourable to the production and uptake of renewable energy.

Use of resources increased by an average of 10 percent in 2012 as compared to 2011, and this poses a big challenge to Qatar.

“Water consumption in Qatar increased by nine percent in 2012 in comparison to the previous year. Electricity energy and maximum demand increased by 13 percent during the same period. Therefore, the big challenge for this region is to plan ahead and execute infrastructure energy projects to keep pace with economic growth”, Qatar’s Minister of Energy and Industry, H E Dr Mohammed bin Saleh Al Sada said recently.

Yesterday, many institutions took the initiative to switch of their lights between 8.30pm and 9.30pm, pledging to take action in support of the planet beyond Earth Hour and encouraging the public to take steps for environmental protection.

Ooredoo the first company in Qatar to commit to Earth Hour, in 2009, switched off lights and non-essential systems at its tower in West Bay and its Airport headquarters.

The Aircraft Swing is meant to reduce the risk to aircraft and those on board if the landing gear fails to deploy properly before landing. It is a moveable runway designed for emergency landings that can also be used if the concrete runway is flooded or covered with thick snow.

Switching off lights for

a green future

Pics: Salim Matramkot / Shaival Dalal / Kammutty VP

3

Ooredoo aims to raise awareness on environmental issues and energy con-servation, and inspire positive actions for the environment beyond yesterday’s hour-long move. In addition to its sup-port for Earth Hour, the company sup-ports a wide range of e-waste recycling and other sustainability initiatives.

Al Gassar Resort created a special ambience by turning off lights in all its common areas and lighting candles, an action that reaffirmed its commitment to environmental causes.

Mohamed Sleiman, Assistant Chief Operating Officer, Al Gassar Resort, said: “Participating in Earth Hour was imperative for Al Gassar Resort, a mem-ber of Alfardan Group, especially since the group takes environmental issues very seriously and has plans to take such initiatives further as a serious environ-mental advocate in Qatar and will con-tinuously remain committed to such a sustainable development in the years to come.”

St. Regis Doha, which is an integral component of Al Gassar Resort, also commemorated Earth Hour 2013 in a special way. While hotel guests who wished to remain in their rooms were encouraged to participate by turning off the lights, other guests were invited to a candlelight event held on the beach in support of Earth Hour. Hotel guests and members of the local community came together holding up lit candles, even as lights of the Al Gassar Resort, St Regis Doha and other buildings across Doha’s

skyline went off in unison. The Radisson Blu Hotel, Doha encour-

aged all hotel guests and employees to switch off the lights in all guest rooms and public areas in order to raise aware-ness of the need to take action against climate change. During Earth Hour the hotel was lit with candles, which also created a romantic setting for candlelit dinners. To celebrate Earth Hour, the hotel’s restaurants Maxim and Pier 12 offered a set menu.

Ramada Encore Hotel also switched off its lights, and so did Wyndham Grand Regency Doha.

“While turning off lights can be a challenge for a busy hotel with hun-dreds of guests, we believe the hospital-ity industry can and should be a leader in reducing our impact on the environ-ment,” Ayman Lotfy, General Manager of Wyndham Grand Regency Doha, said in a statement.

Earth Hour began as a single-city ini-tiative in Sydney, Australia in 2007 and has since grown into a global movement. Yesterday, millions of people from more than 7,000 cities and towns in 152 coun-tries switched off their lights for Earth Hour, with Palestine, Tunisia, Suriname and Rwanda joining the event for the first time.

World Wildlife Fund, which organises the annual event, aims to stop the deg-radation of Earth’s natural environment and focus on building a future where people live in harmony with nature. The Peninsula

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

While turning off lights can be a challenge for a busy hotel with hundreds of guests, we believe the hospitality industry can and should be a leader in reducing our impact on the environment.

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 20134 CAMPUS

THE Pakistan Day Festival kic-ked off with much fanfare at Pakistan Education Centre

(PEC) yesterday. The event, held on the lush green and well-lit sports ground, provided an opportunity to families to celebrate Pakistan Day in a fun-filled, traditional manner. The two-day annual festival was inaugu-rated by Muhammad Sarfraz Ahmad Khanzada, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and Chairman, Board of Governors, PEC.

Also present were Head of Chancery Malik Muhammad Farooq, members of the PEC Board of Governors, PEC Principal Nargis Raza Otho, Vice-Principals Rana Naseem Ahmad, Afshan Shahid and Farzana Safdar, Headmistress (KG Section) Qamar Zahra Naqvi, Head of Art and Culture Department Tasneem Javed, Administration Officer Ahsan Rasheed, Heads of Pakistani schools, prominent businessmen and community leaders.

The students of the KG section, clad in colourful traditional clothes, presen-ted a welcome song to greet the guests. Scouts escorted the guests to various stalls at the festival.

More than 65 makeshift stalls featu-ring games, food, garments, jewellery, handicrafts, henna and bangles had been set up. After sunset, thousands more poured in to be part of the festi-val. The face painting stalls attracted scores of children who waited impa-tiently to have their faces painted in different designs and colours. Women and girls had their hands decorated with floral patterns in henna while others took joy in selecting coloured bangles and imitation jewellery. Food stalls offering ‘haleem’, Kashmiri tea, ‘biryani’, ‘dahi bhalay’ and different varieties of kebabs also attracted

PEC celebrates Pakistan Day with fanfare

crowds. Shezan Hotel’s stall, offering mouthwatering barbecued food, was another crowd-puller. Traditional food items like ‘Kulfis’ made of pure ‘khoya,’ ‘Gajar ka halwa’, pakoras and samosas sold like hot cakes at many stalls.

The cultural show presented by students of PEC, Bright Future Pakistani School, Pak Shama School and The TNG School was one of the main attractions. The young artistes entertained guests with dazzling per-formances based on folklore, culture and national songs. Farzana Safdar and Fartash Syed conducted the cultural show by the students.

The Peninsula

Bright Future Pakistani International School, Doha, commemorated Freedom Day with a tribute to the country’s founding father, Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. The events included performance of patriotic songs, native dances and speeches in English and Urdu in honour of Jinnah. Principal Mussarat Irfan, in her speech, recounted the history of Pakistan. She praised the leader and encouraged the students to draw inspiration from him and live by his example of heroism and patriotism, and challenged them to be strong, steadfast and disciplined as they were the foundation blocks who would build a new Pakistan. Students, donned in colourful traditional dresses, waved miniature flags and sang the national anthem with pride and fervour.

Muhammad Sarfraz Ahmad Khanzada, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and Chairman, Board of Governors, PEC, cutting a ribbon to inaugurate the festival. Other distinguished guests are also seen. BELOW: A cultural show.

Freedom Day at BFPIS

5CAMPUS PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

DMIS student excels in judo championship

DOHA Modern Indian School (DMIS) conti-nuously urges its students

to go beyond academics and the results attained in the end are always fruitful. Shibin Sajith (pic-tured) studying in Grade 2-C, won a silver medal in the Qatar Open Sub-Junior Judo Championship. He participated in the 42kg cate-gory on March 16, 2013, at Qatar Women’s Indoor Stadium, Aspire Zone. It was definitely a moment to cherish and the school is extre-mely proud of the student.

‘THE will to win, the desire to succeed, the urge to reach your potential

.......” this is the key to unlocking the door to personal excellence, and this is what students at Doha Modern Indian School are trained for. It was indeed a proud moment for Doha Modern Indian School when one of its students, Prithvi Mohan Raj (pictured) of Grade 2C, won the third position in the Qatar School Olympics organised by Qatar Olympics on March 20, 2013. The student played against opponents from all over Qatar and bagged the third place, which was commendable.

Another laurelfor DMIS

A scout team from MES Indian School, Doha, recently vis-ited the Indian parliament and had the privilege of

watching the procedure of legislation, which is the basis of democracy.

They were able to see Sonia Gandhi, Lalu Prasad, Sushma Swaraj and other prominent parliamentary leaders. “It is the first time in our lives that we were able to enter the Indian parliment,” said Scout Adithya during the visit.

Shakil Ahmed Kakvi, leader of the visiting team, thanked the Minister of New and Renewable Energy, Farooq Abdullah, for giving the team the opportunity of visiting and experienc-ing the working of the parliament.

The team also met the Minister of Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi at his official premises in Akbhar Bhawan, New Delhi. Scout Aadhil PM raised the issue of the higher educa-tion for Indian students living abroad coming to India, receiving the minis-ter’s assurance for the admission of the visiting Scouts in government technical schools.

The minister said: “The visit of the team of scouts to India will help propagate the scheme of my minis-try ‘Know India’, and I will be vis-iting MES Indian School in Qatar shortly”

Arathi, an official from the Ministry, said: “We contacted the Ambassador

of India to Qatar and were able to discover that MES Indian school was one of the oldest and largest schools in the country with a wide range of achievements”

Shakil Ahmed Kakvi expressed gratitude to Ambassador Sanjiv Aurora and his office for their support in turn-ing the trip into a very productive and memorable one.

The team is now on the way to Patna, Bihar, to participate in the Bihar Divas celebrations and to experience incred-ible Bihar. The team also visited the India Gate, the north and south blocks on a sightseeing tour, along with a visit to the parliament.

The Peninsula

A scout team from MES Indian School, Doha, with the Minister of Overseas Indian Affairs, Vayalar Ravi, at his official premises in Akbhar Bhawan, New Delhi.

Scout team from MES school visits parliament

Bhavan’s kindergarten graduation day

THE Kindergarten Graduation Day of Bhavan’s Public School was conducted on March 21, 2013, at the Wakra campus.

Lilly Josephine Beck, Second Secretary, Indian Embassy, was the chief guest. The programme began with a graduation march by the young graduates and officials, followed by a graduation song by students. Principal Dr G Manulal wel-comed the gathering and spoke about the impor-tance of the formative years. Saleem Ponnambath presided over the function and the convocation ceremony commenced with presentation of grad-uation scrolls to students of all 10 sections of KG II. The scrolls were presented by the chief guest, the guests of honour and members of the board of directors. The kindergarten students then presented an infotainment programme, ‘Fun at Kindergarten’. The young graduates then took a graduation oath administered by Anjana Menon, School Administrator. A memento was presented to Ahmed of Al Wakra Sports Club by School Vice Chairman Abdul Kader. Prabhavathi Nambiar, Headmistress proposed a vote of thanks.

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013 COMMUNITY66

THE College of the North Atlantic–Qatar (CNA-Q) recently held the eighth Annual Business Plan

Competition for the largest contingent of participating teams to date, inclu-ding two teams from Canada.

The two-day competition has become one of the most anticipated events for students of business studies, both at CNA-Q and at CNA in Newfoundland and Labrador, and the competition this year was rigorous. The experience, said Gail Gosse, Dean of School of Business Studies, was a powerful way to put to practice what they had learnt in the classroom and helped them hone addi-tional skills.

“They develop skills of teamwork, time management and critical thinking and also sharpen their presentation skills,” says Gosse. “This is a special project that is fun and leaves each with new friendships and fond memo-ries. We are so pleased that two teams from Newfoundland and Labrador have entered, so we can give this experience back to Canada and so we can show them Qatar. This is truly an interna-tional case competition.”

A case competition is a business case

CNA-Q holds international business competition

The first placed team with the award.

study that is given to a team of four students with no access to the Internet, books or any other support material. The cases are kept a secret until the competition day and each team is given two and a half hours to read the case, analyse it and make a presentation to a panel of judges on how to best exe-cute the solution in the real world of business. This process is repeated over two days of competition, culminating in the emergence of the three top teams.

CNA-Q’s Al MakTab Consultants took first place, and Rock-Solid Consultants from Grand Falls-Windsor campus at CNA in Newfoundland, with only three team members, was second. Third placed was The Anonymous

Consultants team from CNA-Q. An awards ceremony was held to

celebrate all participants and honour the winning teams. The awards were presented by CNA-Q President Dr Ken MacLeod.

Ariba Abdul Ghani of the first-placed team said winning the award was her goal. “This is a dream come true for me! To hold this trophy and have earned it feels just amazing,” said Ghani. Teammate Ruksar Shaikh said she could feel their presentation skills get stronger as the competition went on. “We put in a lot of hard work, but it does pay off. I’m telling you, if you want to be in business, CNA-Q is the place to start!”

The Peninsula

HALQUA Adab-e-Islami Qatar (HAI) held a lite-rary event last Thursday at the office of Indian

Friends’ Circle. The event was presided over by poet Amjad Ali Sarwar, president of Bazm-e-Urdu Qatar, while the guest of honour was Ashfaqur Rahman, a local Urdu scholar. Muzaffar Nayab, joint secre-tary of HAI, initially acted as the compere. Fakhruddin Razi recited some verses of the Quran with Urdu translation to give an auspicious and blessed start to the programme.

In the first part of the session, Dr Faisal Hanif, founder president of Guzargah-e-Khayal Forum and a patron of BUQ, presented his essay titled Sauda and Ghalib, which was well received and appreciated by the audience.

Following the essay, Urdu poet Iftekhar Raghib, general secretary of HAI, conducted the second part of the programme, inviting the poets to present their creations. The local poets who presented their selected works to an applauding audience were: Raqim Azmi, Roase Mumtaz,

Halqua Adab-e-Islami Qatar organises literary event

Athar Azmi, Afroz Alam, Muzaffar Nayab, Jamshed Ansari, Qaisar Masood, Mansoor Azmi, Iftekhar Raghib, Shaukat Ali Naaz, Yusuf Kamal, Fartash Syed, Muhammad Rafique Shad Akolvi, Atiq Anzar, Jalil Nizami, Muhammed Mumtaz Rashed and Amjad Ali Sarwar. Raqim Azmi is a new addition to the ranks of poets in Qatar, who have been proving their worth in many such events in the country.

Following the end of the poetry ses-sion, guest of honor Ashfaqur Rahman expressed his pleasure at being a part of such a literary event and thanked HAI for this and assured it of his con-tribution to the promotion of litera-ture. He also lauded the importance of creative writing.

In his presidential address, Amjad Ali Sarwar spoke of the characteris-tics of constructive poetry and appre-ciated all the poets’ creativity. He also

praised the essay of Dr Faisal Hanif. The president of HAI, Abu Urooj

Khaleel Ahmad, offered a vote of thanks. Other prominent Urdu lovers who attended the session were: Mohammed Sulaiman Dehlavi, Syed Abdul Hye, Dr Ataur Rahman Nadwi, Ghufran Siddiqui, Firoz Khan, Abdur Rab Umri, Shamsuddin Rahimi, Rizwan Ahmad, Syed Reza and Muhammed Ghause.

The Peninsula

THE Institution of Engineers (India) is conducting a seminar on ‘Information Technology and

Cybersecurity’ with ictQatar on March 26, 2013, at 6pm at Oryx Rotana Hotel. Khalid Al Hashmi, Director, Qcert, ictQa-tar, will be the guest of honour and Indian Ambassador Sanjiv Arora will be the chief guest. Samir K Pawaskar, Cyber Compliance Manager, Qcert, ictQatar, will be the guest speaker. Please contact 77873526 for registration or visit www.iei.qa.

Institution of Engineers seminar on March 26

Registration begins for medical camp

REGISTRATION HAS begun for the 12th annual free medical camp for low-income Asian expatriates

to be organised jointly by Indian Islamic Association Qatar (IIAQ) and the Qatar Chapter of Indian Medical Association under the auspices of the Supreme Council of Health and Hamad Medical Corporation. The camp will be set up on Friday, April 12, at Tariq Bin Ziyad Independent School for Boys at Salata Al Jadeed. IIA volunteers are registering deserving individuals by visiting labour camps and residences of low-income expatriates. Registration will also be done directly at the camp office at the office of IIAQ in Mansoura. Ooredoo is the main sponsor of the camp.

Poets at the literary event.

HEALTH 7

Health Tipsfrom DOCTOR

Heartburn is a burning sensation in your chest, just behind your breastbone. Heartburn pain is often worse when lying down or bending over. Occasional heartburn is common and no cause

for alarm. Most people can manage the discomfort of heartburn on their own with lifestyle changes and over-the-counter medications.

More frequent heartburn that interferes with your daily routine may be a symptom of something more serious that requires help from a doctor.

Symptoms of heartburn include a burning pain in the chest that usually occurs after eating and may occur at night and pain that worsens when lying down or bending over. Normally when you swallow, your lower esophageal sphincter a circular band of muscle around the bottom part of your esophagus relaxes to allow food and liquid to flow down into your sto-mach. Then it closes again.

However, if the lower esophageal sphincter relaxes abnormally or weakens, stomach acid can flow back up into your esophagus, causing heartburn. The acid backup may be worse when you’re bent over or lying down.

Certain foods and drinks can trigger heartburn in some people, including alcohol, black pepper, chocolate, coffee, fatty food, fried food, ketchup, mustard, onions, orange juice, peppermint, soft drinks, tomato sauce and vinegar.

Heartburn that occurs fre-quently and interferes with your routine is considered gas-troesophageal reflux disease (GERD). GERD treatment may require prescription medications and, occasionally, surgery or other procedures. GERD can damage the esophagus and cause serious complications.

You may find heartburn relief by making small changes. Consider trying to:

• Maintain a healthy weight. Excess pounds put pres-sure on your abdomen, pushing up your stomach and causing acid to back up into your esophagus. If your weight is healthy, work to maintain it

• Avoid tight-fitting clothing. Clothes that fit tightly around your waist put pressure on your abdomen and the lower esophageal sphincter.

• Avoid foods and drinks that trigger heartburn. Everyone has specific triggers. Common triggers such as fatty or fried foods, tomato sauce, alcohol, chocolate, mint, garlic, onion, and caffeine may make heartburn worse. Avoid foods you know will trigger your heartburn.

• Eat smaller meals. Avoid overeating by eating smaller meals.

• Don’t lie down after a meal. Wait at least three hours after eating before lying down or going to bed.

• Don’t smoke. Smoking decreases the lower esopha-geal sphincter’s ability to function properly.

Seek immediate help if you experience severe chest pain, especially when combined with other signs and symptoms such as difficulty breathing or jaw or arm pain. Chest pain may be a symptom of a heart attack.

Dr Eiman Said AhmedGeneral Practitioner

Healthspring World Clinic

Heartburn

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

By Ben Hirschler

Monitoring patients at home using modern technology, so-called ‘tele-health’, is tipped as the next big thing in healthcare, but a new study by

British researchers suggests it may not be worth the extra expense.

The findings will fuel controversy over the eco-nomic case for telehealth, which many information technology and telecoms companies are betting on as a multibillion-dollar market opportunity.

Martin Knapp, professor of social policy at the London School of Economics, one of the leaders of the study, said the disappointing results did not mean telehealth was a waste of time but did suggest it needed to be better targeted.

In some cases, smarter technology and a scal-ing up of programmes might help improve the outcome, he added.

“We have got to find ways of better adjusting the equipment to suit the circumstances of the individual patient,” he said in an interview. “Just at the moment we don’t find the advantage that people had hoped for.”

Knapp and colleagues tested the cost-effective-ness of telehealth compared with standard care over 12 months in 965 patients with three long-term conditions: heart failure, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or diabetes.

Just over half the patients received equipment to allow them to measure things like blood pres-sure and blood glucose levels at home. They then transmitted their readings electronically to a

healthcare professional.The pay-off, however, was marginal. The

researchers found that the cost per quality adjusted life year (QALY) - a standard measure of quantity and quality of life - of telehealth when added to usual care was 92,000 pounds ($139,200).

That is well above the 30,000 pounds that Britain’s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) uses as a benchmark for assessing if medical interventions are worth using on the state-run health service.

“Telehealth does not seem to be a cost effective addition to standard support and treatment,” the study authors concluded in their report in the British Medical Journal on Friday.

BRITAIN ENTHUSIASTICThe study used data from the Whole System

Demonstrator programme, a wide-ranging assess-ment of telehealth backed by the British govern-ment that has already triggered controversy.

British health minister Jeremy Hunt cited encouraging results from the programme last November when he announced plans to roll out telehealth to 100,000 people with long-term con-ditions in 2013 and have 3 million on the system by 2017.

Hunt’s plan will make Britain second only to the United States as an adopter of technology to monitor patients at home and the UK department of health has claimed it could save up to 1.2 billion pounds over five years.

But several medical experts have questioned whether the programme really shows that tel-ehealth improves quality of life and Knapp said the savings being forecast were “optimistic”.

Many companies, from medical equipment firms to developers of smartphone apps, are already vying for a piece of a market that has been talked about for 20 years but is now finally gaining traction.

According to PricewaterhouseCoopers the worldwide market for mobile communications and devices used in healthcare will reach about $23 billion by 2017, up from $4.5 billion forecast for 2013. Telecom network operators will be the biggest winners, grabbing roughly half of those sales, which explains the growing focus of com-panies like Telefonica on healthcare. The balance will be shared by a raft of other players, such as General Electric, Microsoft, Cisco, Intel, Philips and Siemens. Reuters

As ‘telehealth’ grows, experts question cost benefits

A new study is claiming that kids who drink whole milk as opposed to skim milk stand a better chance of not becoming obese later in life.

Experts do agree that milk is a valuable source of cal-cium and vitamin D for growing children, which helps build up young bones. The debate over the healthy benefits of skim milk versus whole milk has taken another turn after a study published in Archives of Disease in Childhood determined that youngsters who drink whole milk opposed to skim milk have a better chance of

preventing obesity. For years both the American Heart Association and the American Academy of Paediatrics have advocated the substitution of skim or low fat milk to whole milk. Their reaso-ning involves the higher cholesterol content found in whole milk compared to low fat milk. Both associations suggest that a child should switch from whole milk to skim milk around the age of two. Children younger than two years old can utilize the extra fat and cholesterol for body and brain development.

A team of researchers led by Professor Mark Deboer followed a sample population of 10,700 children from age two to four. At the end of the two years the children and their parents answered surveys pertaining to which kinds of milk they preferred. The results showed that children who drank 2 percent milk had a lower Body Mass Index (BMI) than those who drank 1 percent or skim. The study also showed that two year olds who began with a healthy weight and drank 1 percent milk gained a 57 percent chance of becoming obese when older. QNA

Skim milk consumption in children can lead to obesity: Study

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s as

the b

ack

story o

f T

he F

lin

tsto

nes,

befo

re

that

modern S

tone A

ge fam

ily

got,

well, m

odern.

Lik

e F

red,

Wilm

a a

nd P

ebble

s, t

he

heroes of

this

cute

an

imate

d com

-edy are an

imal-

pelt

-wearin

g proto

-hum

an

s.

Un

like th

e prota

gon

ists

of

the o

ld H

anna-B

arbera c

arto

on,

how

-ever,

hun

ter-g

ath

erers G

rug C

rood

(voic

e o

f N

icola

s C

age)

an

d h

is w

ife,

Ugga (

Cath

erin

e K

eener),

don’t

liv

e i

n

an a

menit

y-fi

lled h

ouse

but

in a

dark

, depress

ing c

ave.

They’r

e r

ais

ing t

heir

k

ids —

E

ep (E

mm

a S

ton

e),

T

hun

k

(Cla

rk D

uke)

and S

andy (

Randy T

hom

) —

as

best

they c

an, consi

derin

g t

here’s

no I

nte

rnet.

Roun

din

g out

the cla

n is

U

gga’s

eld

erly

, un

ple

asa

nt

moth

er.

Voic

ed b

y

Clo

ris

Leachm

an

, th

e c

haracte

r c

on

-tr

ibute

s noth

ing t

o t

he e

volu

tion o

f th

e

shrew

ish m

oth

er-i

n-l

aw

ste

reoty

pe o

f si

tcom

fam

e.

This

worl

d is

a s

cary p

lace, filled w

ith

saber-t

ooth

ed t

igers

and o

ther d

anger-

ous

beast

ies.

That’s

one n

ice t

hin

g a

bout

this

film

. B

ecause of

the prehis

toric

sett

ing,

the fi

lmm

akers w

ere f

ree t

o

imagin

e a

ll s

orts

of

wondrous,

exti

nct

crit

ters,

of

whic

h t

here i

s no e

vid

ence

in t

he f

oss

il r

ecord.

A s

warm

of ti

ny r

ed b

irds,

for e

xam

-ple

, w

hose

carniv

orous

appeti

tes

seem

to

pla

ce t

hem

as

clo

ser c

ousi

ns

to p

ira-

nhas

than t

o p

arakeets

, figures

prom

i-nentl

y in t

he p

lot

and is

a v

isual tr

eat.

S

o i

s a c

olo

ny o

f angry b

lue m

onkeys.

A

t ti

mes,

the fi

lm’s

3-D

vis

ion

of

the

PLU

S |

SU

ND

AY

24

MA

RC

H 2

013

HO

LLY

WO

OD

NE

WS

MO

VIE

89

BO

LLY

WO

OD

NE

WS

Tech

nolo

gy m

akes

act

ion

safe

r, no

t eas

ier:

Hrith

ik R

osha

n

Technolo

gy m

ay h

ave m

ade a

cti

on s

afe

r b

ut

not

easi

er,

says

Bollyw

ood

acto

r H

rit

hik

Rosh

an

, kn

ow

n a

s m

uch f

or h

is s

uperbly

execute

d

acti

on s

tunts

in fi

lms

and a

ds

as

for h

is a

cti

ng.

Acti

on in B

ollyw

ood fi

lms

was

of

the d

his

hoom

, d

his

hoom

varie

ty t

ill th

e

1990s,

but

advanced t

echnolo

gy a

nd increase

d u

se o

f sp

ecia

l eff

ects

brought

in a

new

tw

ist.

“A

cti

on i

s not

easi

er (

wit

h b

ett

er t

echnolo

gy).

Maybe i

t is

sa

fer,”

the a

cto

r s

aid

over p

hone f

rom

Mum

bai.

Hri

thik

has

done fi

lms

like M

issi

on

Ka

shm

ir, K

rris

h, D

hoom

2 a

nd A

gn

eep

ath

, all o

f w

hic

h g

ave h

im a

mple

scope t

o d

em

onst

rate

the d

aredevilry t

hat

has

won h

im s

o m

any f

ans.

He r

ecentl

y w

rapped u

p t

he a

cti

on-p

acked K

rris

h

3, and e

ven jum

ped o

ff a

cliff

in B

ali f

or a

n a

d f

or a

erate

d d

rin

k M

ounta

in

Dew

. In

his

vie

w, acto

rs

and fi

lmm

akers

who d

abble

in a

cti

on h

ave m

any

advanta

ges

now

, esp

ecia

lly w

ith t

he b

oom

in d

em

and f

or fi

lms

like R

ow

dy

Ra

thore

, D

ab

an

gg, D

on

: T

he C

ha

se B

egin

s A

ga

in a

nd R

A.O

ne.

“There i

s a l

ot

more t

hat

you c

an v

isualise

now

than b

efo

re.

There i

s a l

ot

more s

cope f

or y

ou t

o t

hin

k o

ut

of

the b

ox,

and t

hin

gs

whic

h w

ere

unim

agin

able

a f

ew

years

back a

re n

ow

poss

ible

.“I

n t

hat

regard y

ou c

an s

ay,

yes

(technolo

gy h

as

made a

cti

on e

asi

er).

W

hen it

com

es

dow

n t

o d

oin

g t

hem

, th

ere is

alw

ays

som

e a

drenaline p

um

p-

ing a

nd t

here is

nervousn

ess

,” s

aid

Hrit

hik

, w

ho is

fit

as

the p

roverbia

l fiddle

.A

t 39,

an

d a

fter o

ver a

decade o

f m

akin

g h

is w

ay t

o t

he A

-lis

ters

of

Bollyw

ood, H

rit

hik

, so

n o

f vete

ran a

cto

r-fi

lmm

aker R

akesh

Rosh

an, believes

success

com

es

when “

dream

s tu

rn t

o c

hallenges”

. “O

nce y

ou liv

e e

nough o

f life

, you r

ealise

that

all t

hose

dream

s th

at

you a

re a

fraid

of

are o

nly

chal-

lenges.

So, I

call t

hem

challenges

and it

will m

ake y

ou n

ervous,

whic

h is

full

of good e

nergy. T

he a

nxie

ty a

nd n

ervousn

ess

is

good for y

ou. It

is

all o

f th

is

that

has

got

me w

here I

am

today. I

have r

eached t

his

pla

ce o

nly

wit

h t

his

kin

d o

f philoso

phy,

” sa

id t

he a

cto

r, w

ho u

sed t

o s

tam

mer o

nce u

pon a

tim

e.

Hrit

hik

, now

a f

ath

er o

f tw

o, m

ade a

blo

ckbust

er d

ebut

wit

h K

ah

o N

aa

...

Pya

ar

Ha

i in

2000. H

e t

hen c

em

ente

d h

is s

pot

in t

he indust

ry w

ith p

roje

cts

like K

ab

hi

Kh

ush

i K

ab

hie

Gh

am

, K

oi.

..M

il G

aya

, D

hoom

2,

Jod

ha

a A

kb

ar,

Zin

da

gi N

a M

ilegi D

ob

ara

and A

gn

eep

ath

. A

dancer p

ar e

xcellence, th

e a

cto

r

adm

its

his

only

aim

in lif

e is

still about

“putt

ing in m

y b

est

to fi

nd o

ut

my

true p

ote

nti

al”

. “

I am

on a

mis

sion t

o m

ake t

his

the b

est

lif

e, com

e w

hat

may,

and e

very d

ay is

a s

tep f

orw

ard in fi

ndin

g o

ut

my t

rue p

ote

nti

al,”

he s

aid

.

Asha

Bho

sle

wal

ks th

e ra

mp

at L

FW

Vete

ran s

inger A

sha B

hosl

e, w

ho v

entu

red into

acti

ng w

ith M

ai, e

ven

did

the c

atw

alk

at

desi

gner M

anis

h M

alh

otr

a’s

specta

cula

r s

how

, cele

brati

ng 1

00 y

ears

of In

dia

n c

inem

a, at

the L

akm

e F

ash

ion W

eek

sum

mer-r

eso

rt

2013

in M

um

bai. T

he s

how

, held

on F

rid

ay n

ight,

turned o

ut

to b

e o

ne u

nfo

rgett

able

aff

air

. A

sha B

hosl

e, w

ho w

as

sitt

ing in t

he a

udie

nce

and a

dm

irin

g t

he c

reati

ons

alo

ng w

ith a

ctr

ess

Hem

a M

alini

and c

ost

um

e

desi

gner B

hanu A

thaiy

a, w

as

called u

p o

n t

he r

am

p, and s

he w

as

delighte

d.

“Whate

ver I

am

today,

it’s

on

ly b

ecause

of

cin

em

a.

I am

proud t

o b

e a

part

of

this

indust

ry. I

have d

one e

veryth

ing in m

y lif

e, and t

he o

nly

thin

g

left

was

to w

alk

the r

am

p,”

she s

aid

. H

er r

am

p w

alk

w

as

a v

isual

treat

for t

he

audie

nce. S

he fl

aunte

d o

ne

of

Manis

h M

alh

otr

a’s

sari,

an

d th

e en

tire audie

nce

stood u

p for t

he legend a

nd

gave h

er a

much-d

ese

rved

standin

g o

vati

on.

Post

the

walk

, A

sh

a said

: “T

oday

I am

w

earin

g

Man

ish

Malh

otr

a’s s

ari, a

nd t

hanks

for g

ivin

g m

e t

his

opportu

-n

ity.”

The s

how

was

star-

studded d

ue t

o c

ele

brit

ies

lik

e

Priy

an

ka

Ch

opra,

Varun

Dhaw

an

, S

idharth

M

alh

otr

a, K

aris

ma K

apoor,

K

ajo

l, K

aran J

ohar,

Dib

aker

Banerje

e, A

nurag K

ash

yap

an

d

Zoya

Ak

hta

r.

Th

e

on

goin

g edit

ion

of

LF

W

ends

on M

arch 2

6.

Britn

ey S

pear

s in

love

aga

in?

Pop s

tar B

rit

ney S

pears

split

from

her fi

ance J

aso

n T

raw

ick just

tw

o

month

s ago, but

she s

eem

s to

have f

ound n

ew

love a

lready,

and s

he

wants

the w

orl

d t

o k

now

about

it. T

he 3

1-year-o

ld s

inger w

as

spott

ed

hangin

g o

ut

wit

h D

ave L

ucado o

n F

riday,

report

s dailym

ail.c

o.u

k. S

he looked

love-s

truck a

s sh

e a

rriv

ed a

t a s

hoppin

g c

entr

e in T

housa

nd O

aks,

Califo

rnia

, hold

ing h

ands

wit

h h

er

27-

year-

old

beau. S

pears

wore

a s

tylish

bla

ck a

nd p

ink

dress

access

oris

ed w

ith a

pair

of T

-str

ap h

eels

, w

hile L

ucado w

as

dress

ed in

a f

orm

al w

hit

e s

hir

t, g

rey w

ais

tcoat,

and p

olish

ed b

row

n s

hoes

and h

e h

eld

a g

rey d

ress

jacket

over h

is a

rm

. T

hey’v

e o

nly

been d

ati

ng f

or t

he p

ast

few

w

eeks.

Lucado is

Spears

’ firs

t lo

ve inte

rest

sin

ce s

plitt

ing from

form

er a

gent

and fi

ance J

aso

n T

raw

ick i

n J

anuary a

fter a

three-y

ear r

ela

tionsh

ip. T

he

singer

is lookin

g h

appie

r th

an e

ver

as

she c

onti

nues

to s

pend m

ore

tim

e w

ith

her n

ew

boyfr

iend w

ho’s a

field

rese

archer a

t a law

firm

.

Adel

e, W

illia

ms

to d

uet?

Sin

gers

Adele

and R

obbie

William

s are r

eporte

dly

set

to c

ollaborate

to

geth

er f

or o

ne o

f th

e latt

er’s

alb

um

. T

his

will be t

he fi

rst

collabo-

rati

on f

or A

dele

, w

ho b

onded r

eally w

ell w

ith W

illiam

s and h

is w

ife

Ayda, w

hen s

he m

et

them

durin

g t

he A

cadem

y A

wards

in F

ebruary.

“A

dele

and R

obbie

have r

eally h

it it

off

. T

hey a

re g

reat

frie

nds

and t

alk

ed a

t le

ngth

about

doin

g s

om

eth

ing t

ogeth

er w

hen s

he w

as

in L

os

Angele

s w

ith h

im

ahead o

f th

e O

scars

last

month

,” t

hesu

n.c

o.u

k q

uote

d a

source a

s sa

yin

g.

“They t

hrew

som

e i

deas

around b

ut

haven’t

decid

ed e

xactl

y w

hat

song

they’d

lik

e t

o w

ork

on, th

ings

are in t

he e

arly

sta

ges,

” th

e s

ource a

dded.

Patt

inso

n, S

tew

art c

eleb

rate

with

Per

ry

Tw

ilig

ht

co-s

tars

and r

eal

life

lovers

Robert

Patt

inso

n a

nd K

ris

ten

Ste

wart

were s

pott

ed d

inin

g o

ut

wit

h K

aty

Perry t

o c

ele

brate

the

sin

ger’

s ass

ista

nt’s

bir

thday.

In a

short

vid

eo p

ost

ed o

n Y

ouT

ube,

Ste

wart,

who i

s good f

rie

nds

wit

h t

he b

irth

day g

irl

Tam

ra N

ati

sin, w

as

seen s

tandin

g n

ext

to P

att

inso

n, w

hile P

erry p

laced t

he c

ake a

nd s

tarte

d

singin

g “

Happy B

irth

day”,

reports

fem

ale

first

.co.u

k. Perry s

eem

ed t

o b

e

in a

good m

ood c

onsi

derin

g s

he h

as

just

split

wit

h b

oyfr

iend J

ohn M

ayer

aft

er a

seven m

onth

rom

ance. T

he T

wil

igh

t acto

rs,

who b

rie

fly s

plit

last

su

mm

er a

fter S

tew

art

was

caught

cheati

ng w

ith m

arrie

d fi

lm d

irecto

r

Rupert

Sanders,

have b

een m

akin

g t

he m

ost

of

their

tim

e t

ogeth

er b

y

hit

ting t

he t

ow

n f

or o

uti

ngs.

New

s of

the p

air

’s r

eunio

n b

ecam

e p

ublic

Tuesd

ay a

t a k

araoke b

ar i

n L

os

Angele

s, a

nd a

lucky f

an e

ven m

anaged

to g

et

a p

hoto

wit

h t

he d

uo.

Ston

e en

joys

‘The

Am

azin

g Sp

ider

-Man

2’ s

hoot

Holl

yw

ood

actress

Em

ma

Sto

ne

has

been

h

avin

g a w

ild

tim

e s

hooti

ng T

he A

ma

zin

g

Sp

ider-

Ma

n 2

wit

h A

ndrew

G

arfi

eld

. T

he

24-year-old

actr

ess

has

repris

ed

her

role

as

Gw

en

Sta

cy f

or t

he

film

, and is

enjo

yin

g s

hooti

ng

for i

t. S

he i

s st

arrin

g o

ppo-

site

Garfield

, w

ho p

lays

the

titu

lar c

haracte

r. “

It’s

wild

to b

e b

ack i

n c

haracte

r a

s G

wen S

tacy.

I lo

ve h

er a

nd

the scrip

t is

ju

st

won

der-

ful,”

fem

ale

first

.co.u

k q

uote

d

Sto

ne a

s sa

yin

g. T

he a

ctr

ess

sh

ares a great

ch

em

istr

y

wit

h G

arfield

, w

ho s

he h

as

been

dati

ng f

or m

ore t

han

a

year.

S

he

adm

its

their

rom

an

ce

cli

cked

str

aig

ht

aw

ay.

“There’s

no r

hym

e o

r

reaso

n t

o it.

I t

hin

k y

ou just

have t

o c

lick. I

don’t

thin

k y

ou s

hould

try t

o e

xpla

in t

he c

hem

istr

y b

etw

een

two p

eople

, it

’s e

ither t

here o

r it

isn’t

,” s

he a

dded.

PLU

S |

SU

ND

AY

24

MA

RC

H 2

013

The

Cro

od

bro

od

inha

bits

a

bea

utifu

l but

sca

ry p

rehi

sto

ric

wo

rld

of

dan

ger

ous

cri

tter

s an

d s

hift

ing

co

ntin

ents

. The

C

rood

s is

lig

ht, f

un f

are,

with

a

seri

ous

the

me

that

yo

ung

er

view

ers

mig

ht m

iss.

The

Cro

ods:

The

Cro

ods:

Mam

mot

h fu

n, w

ith a

mes

sage

SCIENCEPLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 201310

By Kate Kelland

WHEN Ireland’s Katie Taylor was taking hits and striking blows for box-ing’s Olympic

debut in an east London ring last year, John Hardy did not want to look. To this leading neuroscientist and molecu-lar biologist, a boxing bout is little more than a session of mutual brain injury. He was horrified to see women boxing at Olympic level for the first time at the London 2012 Games.

“We shouldn’t get our fun out of watching people inflict brain damage on each other,” said Hardy, who is chair of Molecular Biology of Neurological Disease at University College London’s Institute of Neurology. “To me as a neuroscientist it’s almost surreal.”

Hardy, whose research work focuses on Alzheimer’s and other types of dementia, said having women in an Olympic boxing ring was “a terrible thing” - not because he thinks women should not compete alongside men in sport, but because women boxing sim-ply meant more people inflicting more damage on more brains.

That, in turn, was highly likely to mean more people suffering the dev-astating, incurable symptoms of brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s.

Advances in modern neuroscience mean scientists know more than ever about chronic brain damage and the long-term trauma that can result from frequent knocks to the head.

“You get tiny lesions along the blood vessels where they have torn the nerve cells around them. This damages those nerve cells, and those cells start to develop the tangles that you see in Alzheimer’s disease,” Hardy said. “And what we now understand is that this process spreads.” Partly due to this new understanding, now is a time of intense sensitivity about and scrutiny of brain damage in sport - particu-larly among North America’s National Football League (NFL) players.

Former San Diego Chargers player Junior Seau committed suicide last year after what some believe were years of depression stemming from multiple concussions he suffered as a player. Last week, the NFL and General Electric Co announced a $60m effort with leading neurologists to speed up research on brain injury to improve diagnosis and treatment amid growing concern about sports-related concussion.

RULE CHANGES

A study published last year found that even minor repeated head blows during sports such as hockey and American football may damage the learning ability of sports men and women after just one season.

The brain debate has even reached the White House, where President Barack Obama suggested in January that changes be made to NFL rules to reduce the level of violent impact.

In soccer too, concerns are growing

about the damage players might be doing to their brains when they head the ball. A small study of female soc-cer players published last month found evidence of mental impairment caused by repeatedly bouncing a football off the head. The US researchers who con-ducted that study said the effects sug-gested headers caused “mild traumatic brain injury of the frontal lobes”.

When it comes to boxing, health experts and scientists — and even some competitors themselves — have been worried about brains for decades.

The Irish former featherweight world champion Barry McGuigan, perhaps fearful of what damage might already have been done, said in 1988: “Boxing damages your brain; don’t let anyone tell you any different”.

Around the same time, fellow light-weight fighter Terry Marsh, who was later diagnosed with epilepsy, said: “I don’t need the British Medical Association to tell me getting hit on the head can’t do me any good.”

As far back as 1928, the American pathologist Harrison Stanford Martland wrote a paper entitled Punch

drunk in which he showed that prize fighters were suffering from brain injury caused by the rupture of blood vessels.

The “punch drunk” condition, known more formally as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) or as its vari-ants, dementia pugilistica or boxer’s dementia, is a neurodegenerative dis-ease that can affect boxers and others who suffer knocks to the head.

It can cause depression, aggression, impulsivity and memory loss and has been linked to suicide. “A lot of boxers,

and indeed American footballers too, have a period in their 30s and 40s where they are depressed, they drink, they show explosive tempers, and have basically pretty messed up lives,” said Hardy.

BAD JUDGEMENT

It is not hard to find examples of boxers whose brains have begun to fail them. American heavyweight cham-pion and boxing idol Muhammad Ali began struggling with a stutter and trembling hands even before he came to the end of his fighting career. His subsequent decline with the neurode-generative disorder Parkinson’s syn-drome has been painful for fans to witness.

Mike Tyson, a former undisputed heavyweight champion of the world, was convicted and imprisoned for rape, had multiple marriages and break ups, was declared bankrupt and was even-tually diagnosed with the brain condi-tion bipolar disorder.

British former heavyweight world champion Frank Bruno was diagnosed with the same condition while his com-patriot Michael Watson needed six brain operations and suffered lasting damage after being knocked down in a 1991 bout. Hardy argues that there is a tendency to think of these problematic lives as par for the course for boxers — who were more likely than non-box-ers to come from disadvantaged back-grounds and mix in unstable circles.

“But the truth is they have bad judgement because of the injuries to their brain,” he said. In the language of brain science this was called “loss

of executive control”, he explained, “and this in itself is part of the disease process”. “It’s not inherent in their personalities as boxers, it’s damage to the frontal cortex. They are already experiencing brain injury.”

In an article posted on the World Boxing Association’s (WBA) website, Calvin Inalsingh, head of the association’s medical advisory committee, admits that “boxing is the only sport in which the objective is to render blows to the head and body of the opponent so as the cause the opponent to be incapacitated”.

It is this, according to Hardy, that means when it comes to arguing for a ban on sports that cause brain injury, boxing is in a class of its own.

In other sports, such as American football, soccer or rugby, where the objective is to score touchdowns or goals or tries, and where head injury may be a by-product of that aim, authorities can and do change the rules or adjust the advice on protective clothing to make the game safer.

“But the whole point of boxing is to inflict brain damage,” said Hardy. “That’s why I think it’s really a hopeless case in terms of a sport.” He has little doubt that in time, as medical knowledge expands, boxing will be banned, although he accepts there may be many more years of argument between brain scientists and sports authorities first.

“In science we have become very good at identifying causes and mechanisms of disease but unfortunately we understand things for a long time before we get better at solving them.”

Reuters

Two 11-year-old boys face each other in the ring during a boxing training session in Havana. When it comes to boxing, health experts and scientists — and even some competitors themselves — have been worried about brains for decades.

Should science Should science on brain injury on brain injury inspire a ban?inspire a ban?

11WHEELS PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

Mannai Trading Company, the exclusive dealer in GMC vehicles in Qatar, together with representa-

tives from General Motors’ Regional Office, launched the New 2013 GMC Acadia in Qatar at a ceremony held at the Mannai GMC Showroom recently.

Mohamed Helmy, Group General Manager, Mannai Automotive, said: “We are pleased to announce that the new Acadia is now available in Mannai showrooms for customers in Qatar to purchase. For 2013, Acadia and Acadia Denali introduce new exterior styling, greater interior versatility and more safety features, including the indus-try’s first front centre air bag, as well as a new infotainment system with touch screen controls. We are confi-dent that our customers will be very much attracted to this new model. As always, we will support them fully with our first-class expert service and cus-tomer care.”

Bader El Houssami, Regional Manager, General Motors, said: “We’re now extremely pleased to be able to offer people the opportunity to be enticed by the all-new 2013 Acadia. It is just as functional and accommodat-ing for space as the 2012 models were, but the 2013 models have enhanced style, luxury, comfort, safety and tech-nology. Ensuring absolute safety for the seven or eight-passenger 2013 GMC Acadia, it is made to be one of the most comfortable SUV’s on the market.”

The Acadia line-up includes SLE, SLT (SLT1 and SLT2 trims) and Denali models, with seven- or eight-passenger configurations. All models

Mannai launches 2013 GMC Acadia

are powered by a 3.6L V-6 VVT engine that uses petrol direct injection tech-nology to optimise performance and fuel economy.

Acadia for 2013 retains the interior functionality popular with families, including the smart slide seating sys-tem, which allows easy access to the third row for both seven- and eight-passenger seating configurations. Likewise, both the second and third row still fold flat for class-leading max-imum cargo space.

The 2013 Acadia has a new chiselled, three-bar grille that sits prominently in a more upright design, while diffused LED running lamps lend a premium look. They are standard on all models, including the standard projector-beam headlamps and fog lamps. A new LED tail lamp design reflects the advance-ments up front. Additional exterior updates include wrap-around rear glass and a new rear spoiler.

Along with GMC’s name for qual-ity and design comes the reputation

of Mannai Automotive, known for their experience in the local market, great service, satisfied customers, and unsurpassed attention to detail by their knowledgeable and friendly sales staff, who can put almost any individ-ual looking for a new vehicle at ease.

Those interested can visit Mannai Automotive showrooms to learn more about the 2013 Acadia or any of the other models the dealership offers, as well as to book a test drive.

The Peninsula

Officials at the 2013 Acadia launch ceremony.

DOHA: Porsche Centre Doha, Al Boraq Automobiles Co WLL, continuously invests in train-ing courses for its employees to enhance the Porsche ownership experience even further. In their latest bid to enhance technical skills and stay up-to-date with the newest inventions, 32 members of the Porsche Service Centre have successfully completed the ‘Bronze Fast Track Technician Certification Programme’ offered by Dr Ing. H c F Porsche AG, Stuttgart, qualifying them as experts in Porsche technology.

Awarded as “Certified Bronze Porsche Technician’, the 32 after sales employees have successfully completed a range of training ses-sions on Porsche diagnostic units, vehicle electrics, fuel and ignition systems as well as complex chas-sis details. The long-term training project started in July 2011 and fin-ished with the official handover of

personal certificates last Thursday.The programme is divided into

three phases: Pre-assessment, qualifi-cation, and certification. It comprises both theoretical and practical exer-cises, ensuring technicians and service advisors have the relevant skills to consult on complex engineering and electronics matters, with the overall aim to enhance the service for Porsche customers even further.

“Porsche Service is a centre of excellence; it is not just the per-sonal consultation that makes the difference but the expertise of our technicians,” said Salman Jassem Al Darwish, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Porsche Centre Doha, Al Boraq Automobile Co WLL.

“We invest heavily in our team’s knowledge, ensuring that they are equipped with the latest set of skills

for the entire Porsche model range. We are passionate in what we are doing and continuously strive for cus-tomer service excellence.”

The next group of technicians is being prepared for the first stage of the certification process. The 32 already qualified technicians will advance on to the second training phase, which will start later this year.

The Peninsula

32 Porsche technicians complete certification programme

The technicians posing for a group picture.

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013 TECHNOLOGY12

UP fitness wristbands get in stride with gadgetsSAN FRANCISCO: UP fitness wristbands got in stride with Android, keeping in step with the popularity of smartphones pow-ered by the free Google software.

The move to take UP beyond Apple mobile devices came as the San Francisco-based com-pany announced the release of the wristbands in Europe and plans to expand to Asia, Australia and the Middle East next month.

Wireless earpiece maker Jawbone in November released redesigned UP wristbands that combine fashion with smartphone lifestyles to help people along paths to improved fitness.

New UP wristbands debuted in the United States with a $129 price tag nearly a year after original mod-els were pulled from the market due to problems caused by moisture fouling up electronics in the “wear-able computers.”

UP launched with applications for iPhones and iPod touch devices were redesigned to let people more easily get pictures of activity, sleep, eating, and even their moods on any given day or over time.

UP wristbands track users’ level of activity, whether they are exer-cising, pacing in an office, or snooz-ing in bed.

“Everyone wants to improve upon themselves; we’ve found this to be a fundamental human desire, no mat-ter where a person is starting from or what they want to achieve,” said Jawbone vice president of strategy Travis Bogard. “It marks a big step toward our commitment to help people establish a basis for behav-ior change.”

Along with releasing an UP appli-cation for Android gadgets at the Google Play online shop, Jawbone added 11 languages to the inter-face for the ‘app’ for Apple devices, according to Bogard.

An overview of billions of steps and millions of hours of sleep logged by UP wearers so far showed that they tended to slumber longest on week-ends and walk most on Fridays. UP was built on the premise that most people want to improve their fitness and could benefit from encourage-ment along with detailed feedback about their habits.

“Despite wanting to be better there is this big gap between intention and action,” Bogard said. “This is really about that personal journey; helping people understand themselves and the decisions they make.”

AFP

BY ROBERT F SERVICE

IF YOU’VE pondered whether to sink a cool couple of grand into a fancy new three-dimensional TV but didn’t want to mess around with those dorky glasses, you

may want to sit tight for a few more years. Researchers at Hewlett Packard (HP) Laboratories in Palo Alto, California, report that they’ve come up with a new 3D technology that not only doesn’t require viewers to wear special glasses, but it also can be viewed from a wide variety of angles. The advance could propel the development of mobile 3D devices as well as TVs.

Our eyes and brains visualise our world in its full 3D glory with seeming ease, thanks to what’s known as para-llax. Our eyes are several centime-ters apart and thus perceive slightly different-yet overlapping-images when looking at an object. Our brains stitch the two views together into a single coherent image. But because TVs pre-sent images on 2D screens, this task is much harder to pull off. To allow us to see in three dimensions, imaging tech-nologies must present slightly different images to each of our eyes.

Numerous technologies have been invented over the years to carry this out. Perhaps the most familiar is the one that requires moviegoers to wear red and green glasses. In this case, the visual information for full 3D images is sent out in all directions, and the

glasses filter out unwanted portions for each eye. To display 3D images without special glasses, engineers must control how light is directed from each pixel of the display so that different light patterns reach the viewer’s eyes. (The strategy for more modern 3D glasses is largely the same.)

Today, the gold standard in providing that control is holography, which can project specified colours in any direc-tion. But holography is expensive and practical only for displaying still ima-ges rather than full-motion video. In recent years, researchers have come up with several alternatives. One family of techniques, known as autostereos-copic multiview 3D displays, projects multiple different images on a single screen. But such approaches have ten-ded to reduce resolution or permit the ideal 3D images to be seen in only a few spots where viewers are the right distance from the screen and oriented at the correct angle, muting interest among consumers.

To get around these limitations, the HP Labs team, led by physicist David Fattal, used standard computer chip manufacturing techniques to create an array of optical elements called diffrac-tion gratings that precisely control the direction in which light emerges from each pixel in the display. The resear-chers then used other standard opti-cal devices called waveguides to steer light toward the diffraction grating in each pixel, as well as liquid crystals to

modulate which colours of light are sent out from each spot. The result was a high-resolution video display that allowed viewers to see full 3D images from 14 different viewing zones, the researchers reported online in Nature.

The HP team believes that it should be able to increase the number of viewing zones to 64, enough to convince our eyes that they are seeing a seamless 3D image even if we walk around the room. In addition, because the techno-logy uses conventional chip-patterning techniques, the new diffraction gratings should be cheap to make and already offer a resolution that is potentially hig-her than current displays.

Still, the novel displays aren’t a shoo-in for commercial success, notes Neil Dodgson, a computer scientist at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. In a commentary in Nature, Dodgson writes that the novel displays must still leap a series of manufacturing hurdles, and that engineers must come up with cameras that can capture 14 to 64 different images that would then be projected through the 3D TV. “If the authors can solve the practical problems, then they have a compelling alterna-tive to existing 3D display technology,” Dodgson says. That might also give them a raft of customers ready to put down those 3D glasses.

This is adapted from ScienceNOW, the

online daily news service of the journal

Science. http://news.sciencemag.org

WP-BLOOMBERG

3D TV, without the glasses

A 3D HP logo created with the new technology.

COMICS & MORE 13

Hoy en la HistoriaMarch 24, 1958

1999: Fire broke out in the Mont Blanc tunnel in the Alps; it would claim 39 lives and take two days to extinguish 1882: German scientist Robert Koch announced he had discovered the bacillus responsible for tuberculosis 1942: The U.S. government began detaining Japanese-Americans following the attack on Pearl Harbour2009: The U.S. government announced increased border security because of Mexico’s drug war

Rock and roll star Elvis Presley was drafted into the U.S. army for two years, earning respect by serving as a regular soldier rather than entertaining the troops

Picture: Getty Images © GRAPHIC NEWS

ALL IN THE MIND Can you find the hidden words? They may be horizontal,vertical, diagonal, forwards or backwards.

ASTEROID, ASTRONAUT, ASTRONOMY, BETELGEUSE, BIG BANG,BLACK HOLE, CALLISTO, COMET, CONSTELLATION, CORONA,COSMOS, CRATER, EARTH, EUROPA, GALAXY, GANYMEDE,GRAVITY, JUPITER, LEONIDS, LIGHT YEAR, MARS, MERCURY,METEOR, MILKY WAY, MOON, NEBULA, NEPTUNE, NORTH STAR,OBERON, ORBIT, PHOBOS, PLANET, PLUTO, PULSAR, QUASAR,RED DWARF, SATURN, SIRIUS, SPACE, STAR, SUN, SUNSPOT,SUPERNOVA, TITAN, URANUS, VENUS.

Baby Blues Jerry Scott and Rick Kirkman

Zits by Dennis Young and Denis Lebrun

Hagar The Horrible Chris Browne

LEARNARABIC

Body parts:

Ar’ra’ss A head

Al An’f A nose

Al Fem A mouth

Al As’nan Teeths

Al Ain An eye

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

HYPER SUDOKU

CROSSWORD

CROSSWORDS

YESTERDAY’S ANSWER

How to play Hyper Sudoku:A Hyper Sudoku

Puzzle is solved

by filling the

numbers from 1

to 9 into the blank

cells. A Hyper

Sudoku has

unlike Sudoku

13 regions

(four regions

overlap with the

nine standard

regions). In all

regions the numbers from 1 to 9 can appear

only once. Otherwise, a Hyper Sudoku is

solved like a normal Sudoku.

ACROSS 1 2007 Ellen Page film 5 Some coolant fluids,

for short 9 Runaway success14 Work on ___ (sunbathe)15 Da capo ___16 One leaving a

personnel director’s office, maybe

17 Study of trees?19 Dana of “MacGyver”20 Better halves21 Henry who founded

Cadillac22 Tenacity25 Doctrine28 French comment that

may elicit the reply “de rien”

29 Passport for foreign travel, e.g.

30 Article with an ushiromigoro

33 Dinar spender35 Suits 36 Mic holders37 Move at all

41 They’re on haciendas43 Persistent Seuss character44 “Forever, ___” (1996

humor book)47 Rise49 Where Spike Lee

earned his M.F.A.50 Survey staple54 Depletes55 Orthodontic add-ons59 Moving about60 Like the six longest

answers in this puzzle62 Spanish citrus fruit63 Role in “Hook”64 Scottish Gaelic name

for Scotland65 Composer Camille

Saint-___66 Red letters?67 Furniture wood

DOWN 1 Pricey cars, informally 2 Sch. with the mascot

Paydirt Pete 3 Prefix with technology

4 Extra life, in a video game

5 City gained by Rome during the First Punic War

6 La ___, Wis. 7 Highly successful 8 Perhaps 9 Unqualified10 Long time11 Esoteric12 Event for a rapper?13 Drove together18 Sugar suffix21 Speaker of the line “Help

me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You’re my only hope”

23 Explorer born around A.D. 970

24 TV accessories25 Five-star W.W. II hero,

informally26 Large roll27 Fr. title31 Event32 Org. associated with

U.S. Cyber Command

34 Shooters’ grp.?36 Word before and after “a”38 Bedlam let loose39 John who wrote “The

Beggar’s Opera”40 Prey for a dingo42 LP problem43 Prop in “Cinderella”44 Is, in math45 More than one-ninth of

the earth’s land46 “Let’s get together”48 Highland girls

51 Goes bad52 Charlotte of “The

Facts of Life”53 Fanfare56 International magazine

founded in France in 1945

57 Single-mom sitcom of the 2000s

58 Its state sport is rodeo: Abbr.

60 The Spartans, briefly61 Pre-texting texts, for

short

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

14 15 16

17 18 19

20 21

22 23 24

25 26 27 28 29

30 31 32 33 34

35 36 37 38 39 40

41 42 43

44 45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52 53

54 55 56 57 58

59 60 61

62 63 64

65 66 67

B I A S C I V I C H A A S T W A SO R G Y O N E A L I L S A C H I L LH A U L K A N G A G O T O H A N O IR E A L M E N D O N T H E A T Q U I C H E

A I D E G A L S O U R E A RL E T B E E C O L I M A C HI T H I N K T H E R E F O R E I H A MN A E N A S A E O E D Y N A S TG L E A S O N S A S O W L D R E A

R E B D E L T A H A I R L I N E SA D O R A B L E P A C S P O U T E R SS E V E N Y E A R H I T C H P V TA M E S O R E D E N R E S O R T SP O R T A L M D S O N E I I O U

S E T O N E S T E E T H O N H E D G ER E G O P A N E L U V E A S

S T U L O U S E C T E T N AH E R R I N G O N T H E R I G H T S I D EA R G U E A L E E B O N G O I M A XF R E E R T E A R B A T E S O H M ET E S S S O D S E R O D E N O E S

How to play Kakuro:The kakuro grid, unlike in sudoku, can be of any size. It has rows and columns, and dark cells like in a crossword. And, just like in a crossword, some of the dark cells will contain numbers. Some cells will contain two numbers.However, in a crossword the numbers reference clues. In a kakuro, the numbers are all you get! They denote the total of the digits in the row or column referenced by the number.Within each collection of cells - called a run

- any of the numbers 1 to 9 may be used but, like sudoku, each number may only be used once.

YESTERDAY’S ANSWER

14

EASY SUDOKUEasy Sudoku PuzzlesPlace a digit from 1 to 9 in each empty cell so everyrow, every column and every 3x3 box contains allthe digits 1 to 9.

Cartoon Arts International / The New York Times Syndicate

CINEMA / TV LISTINGS 15

13:30 Football Asia

14:00 Omni Sport

14:30 Basketball Nba

Brooklyn @ La

Clippers

16:30 Uefa

Champions

League

Magazine

17:00 Rugby Aviva

Premiership

Saracens V

Harlequins

19:00 Npower League

Tranmwere V

Stevenage

21:00 Boxing

Abraham V

Steiglitz

22:00 Basketball

Nba Atlanta @

Milwaukee

08:00 News

09:00 The Family

10:30 Inside Syria

11:00 News

11:30 Talk To Al

Jazeera

12:00 News

12:30 Football

Rebels

13:00 NEWSHOUR

14:30 Inside Syria

15:00 Al Jazeera

World

16:00 NEWSHOUR

17:00 News

17:30 Listening Post

18:00 NEWSHOUR

19:00 News

19:30 101 East

20:00 News

20:30 Inside Story

21:00 NEWSHOUR

22:00 News

22:30 Talk To Al

Jazeera

23:00 Witness

13:15 How It’s Made

14:35 Auction

Hunters

15:05 Auction

Hunters

16:55 Border Security

19:10 Mythbusters

20:05 Superhuman

Showdown

21:00 James May’s

Man Lab

21:55 Curiosity

22:50 Inside The

Gangsters’

Code

13:00 Mysteries Of

The Moose

14:00 Dinofish

16:00 Hunter Hunted

18:00 World’s

Weirdest

19:00 Hooked

20:00 Mysteries Of

The Moose

21:00 Dinofish

22:00 Dive To Tiger

Central

23:00 Hunter Hunted

13:20 Jessie

14:35 Shake It Up

15:00 Gravity Falls

16:40 A.N.T. Farm

17:00 Twitches Too

18:20 Wizards Of

Waverly Place

19:10 Shake It Up

20:00 Austin And Ally

20:25 A.N.T. Farm

21:15 Jessie

22:05 Good Luck

12:00 Just Crazy

Enough

14:00 Police Academy

7: Mission To

Moscow

18:00 Decoy Bride

20:00 A Little Help

22:00 The Janky

Promoters

13:45 The Animals’

Guide To

Survival

14:40 Shamwari: A

Wild Life

15:35 World Wild Vet

16:30 Ray Mears’

Wild Britain

18:45 Animal

Crackers

21:05 Wildest Arctic

22:00 Wildest Islands

22:55 Wild Things

With Dominic

Monaghan

12:50 Vigilante Force

14:20 Eddie & The

Cruisers II

16:15 What Did You

Do In The War

Daddy?

18:10 Where Angels

Fear To Tread

20:00 Witness To The

Mob

22:00 Joseph

Andrews

23:40 Coming Home

13:40 The Roaring

Twenties

15:40 Somebody Up

There Likes Me

18:00 3 Godfathers

19:45 The

Scapegoat-PG

21:25 Rich, Young

And Pretty

23:00 Our Mother’s

House

13:00 Tom Tom &

Nana

14:30 Battle For Terra

16:00 Quest For A

Heart

18:00 Spooky Buddies

20:00 The Smurfs

22:00 Tom Tom &

Nana

TEL: 444933989 444517001

MALL CINEMA

1

Rise Of The Guardians

(Animation) – 2.30 & 4.15pmJack Reacher (Action)

– 6.00 & 8.15pmThe Hobbit: An expected

Journey (Fantasy) – 10.45pm

2

Aatma (2D/Hindi) – 2.30 & 4.30pm

Olympus Has Fallen

(2D/Thriller) – 6.30 & 9.00pmCelluloid (2D/Malayalam)

– 11.15pm

3

Croods (3D/Comedy)

– 3.00 & 5.00pmSide Effects

(2D/Drama) – 7.00 & 9.15pmLove And Horror (2D/Romantic)

– 11.30pm

LANDMARK

1

Love And Honor

(2D/Drama) – 2.30 & 4.30pmOz: The Great & Powerful

(3D/Action) – 6.30pmJack, The Giant Slayer

(3D/Drama) – 9.00pmSide Effects

(2D/Drama) – 11.30pm

2

Croods (3D/Comedy)

– 3.00 & 5.00pmOlympus Has Fallen

(2D/Thriller) – 7.00, 9.15 & 11.15pm

3

Al Hafla (Arabic/2D) – 2.30pm

Side Effects (2D/Drama)

– 4.30pmLucky Star (2D/Malayalam)

– 6.30 & 9.00pmA Good Day To Die Hard (2D)

– 11.30pm

ROYAL PLAZA

1

Croods (3D/Comedy)

– 3.00 & 5.00pmSide Effects (2D/Drama)

– 7.00pmOlympus Has Fallen

(2D/Thriller) – 9.00pmLove And Horror (2D/Romantic)

– 11.15pm

2Rangrezz (Hindi)

– 2.30, 5.00, 8.00 & 11.00pm

3

Contraband (Action)

– 2.30 & 9.00pm

ATM (Horror) – 4.30 & 11.30pm

Gringo:How I Spent My Summer

Vacation (Drama) – 6.30pm

QF RADIO 91.7 FM ENGLISH PROGRAMME BRIEF LIVE SHOWS Airing

TimeProgramme Briefs On the Programme…

TodayRISE 7:00 –

9:00 AMRise, a LIVE 2-hour morning show hosted and produced by Scott Boyes. It discusses a wide array of topics from Weather, News, Health tips, Sports News and interactive bits with the callers.

On the program today, Scott speaks with Shabina Khatri, co-founder of Doha News. Shabina will fill us in on all the latest news about everything that’s happening locally here in Qatar.

INTERNATIO-NAL NEWS

1:00 PM The latest news and events from around the world.

STRAIGHT TALK

7:00 – 8:00 PM

A LIVE weekly 1-hour Political show produced and hosted by Nabil Al Nashar. The show will host discussions and debates about the latest world political news/ issues and events.

REPEAT SHOWSLEGENDARY ARTISTS

8:00 – 9:00 PM

The show tells the story of a celebrity artist that has reached unprecedented fame. Throughout the episode the artists’ memorable performances/songs will be played to put listeners in the mood.

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013

PLUS | SUNDAY 24 MARCH 2013 POTPOURRI16

Editor-In-Chief Khalid Al Sayed Acting Managing Editor Hussain Ahmad Editorial Office The Peninsula Tel: 4455 7741, E-mail: plus@pen.com.qa / editor@pen.com.qa

If you want your events featured here mail details to plus@pen.com.qa

Hey’Ya: Arab Women in Sport When: March 7-Jun 16 Monday–Thursday, Saturday: 9am-8pmFriday; 3pm-9pm (Sunday closed)Where: QMA Gallery, Bldg 10 What: The Qatar Museums Authority will exhibit ‘Hey’Ya: Arab Women in Sport’ at QMA Gallery in Katara Cultural Village. The exhibition was first held in London during the 2012 Olympic Games. The exhibit originated in Qatar, beginning at the Arab Games’ Athletes Village in December 2011, where photographer Brigitte and documentary filmmaker Marian Lacombe set up an outdoor studio, working with female athletes. They then travelled to 20 Arab countries from the Gulf to North Africa, documenting images and videos of 70 Arab sportswomen. Free entry

Forever NowWhen: Until March 31; 11am-6pmWhere: Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art

What: Forever Now proposes new readings based on works of five artists from Mathaf’s permanent collection. This exhibition unpacks new narratives that posit a unique understanding of five diverse artists: Fahrelnissa Zeid, Jewad Selim, Saliba Douaihy, Salim Al Dabbagh and Ahmed Cherkaoui. Free entry

Tea with NefertitiWhen: Until March 31; 11am-6pmWhere: Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art What: Offer a critical perspective on how to perceive an artwork, particularly in and from the Arab world. Free entry

Designed To WinWhen: Until June 23; 10am-10pm Where: Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art What: Katara Exhibition in Collaboration with the Design Museum in London.Designed to Win celebrates ways in which design and sport are combined, pushing the limits of human endeavour to achieve records and victories of increasing significance and wonder. There will be an extensive educational programme and visiting artists’ talks complementing the expo.

A Bridge to the MoonWhen: Until April 27; 10am-10pmWhere: Katara Gallery 2 - Bldg 18 What: Amal Al Aathem is one of the most prominent and proactive Qatari artists today, her reputation as a Qatari artist with a real voice and message has won her respect internationally. Her work has been widely exhibited in the region and in different parts of the world. Al Aathem believes that old philosophies have linked the moon, nature and the woman in a symbolic way, believing that the moon is the centre of the universe and the woman is thecentre of society.

Events in Qatar MEDIA SCAN

• Discussion on social media sites about Fifa President Sepp Blatter’s statement on the possibility of scrapping Qatar’s right to host the World Cup in 2022.

• Talk about launch of tourist buses and tourist guide services by Doha Bus Company.

• Demand to ask contractors to complete roadworks before laying footpaths, as some of them are working on footpaths without completing roadworks, with the road excavations hindering traffic flow.

• Complaints from some parents about their children having poor knowledge of Arabic language due to schools focusing more on English.

• Demand from some parents for a vaccination campaign against influenza in schools to protect the students.

• Talk about an initiative by Qatar Charity to support Qatari youth in bearing the huge cost of marriage.

• Demand for strict monitoring of scrap dealers, automobile workshops and businesses that recycle batteries and car engines, to ensure that they have the required licence and are following environmental safeguards.

• Complaints about huge parking fees, of up to QR50, imposed by some commercial centres that have handed over management of their parking lots to private companies.

• Warning over irrigation water overflowing from public parks and green patches along roads, causing damage to roads.

• Some shopkeepers at Souq Haraj are complaining about the management of the souq hiking rents.

A summary ofissues of the daydiscussed by the Qatari communityin the media.

IN FOCUS

Camels in the desert. A photo taken by a Peninsula Plus reader.

by Hafiz Shaikh

Send your photos to plus@pen.com.qa

Salt causes 2.3 million deathsa year: StudyWASHINGTON: Over-abun-dant salt intake was a factor in nearly 2.3 million deaths from heart attacks, strokes and other heart-related causes that occurred worldwide in 2010, according to a new study. That number represents 15 percent of all heart-related deaths that year, the researchers said.

Nearly 1 million deaths (40 per-cent) caused by eating too much salt were considered premature, occurring in people aged 69 and younger, the study found. 60 per-cent of the deaths were in men.

The United States ranked 19th out of the 30 largest countries, with 429 deaths per million adults caused by eating too much salt. That works out to one in 10 of all heart-related deaths in the United States, the study authors noted.

Heart attacks caused 42 percent of the deaths worldwide, while strokes caused 41 percent. The rest of the deaths were caused by other types of cardiovascular disease. 84 percent of the deaths were in low- and middle-income countries.

QNA