Posts for 'Activities' Category

THE children had fun, while the adults interacted and got to know their neighbours at the Valencia Family Fun Day held at the Valencia Village Square in Petaling Jaya last weekend.The community event featured activities like face-painting, bouncing castle, clown magic show and telematch for the children, and a flower arrangement session for the ladies.The cupcake decorating stall,

which was set up by a Valencia resident, was popular among children and adults alike as they exercised their creativity in decorating the cupcakes with icing and sprinkles.A buffet dinner was provided at the Valencia Club House.Valencia Residents Associa-tion (RA) chairman Datuk Jason Goh estimated that there were 500 families residing in the township, out of which 200 are RA’s members Today’s event is aimed at recruiting more RA members and creating community awareness about everything they can get in this gated township,” said Goh, whose committee members had organised the event for the first time.It’s also an opportunity for residents to mingle and get to know their neighbours,” he said.Valencia,

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Long before the next manned mission to the moon, Earth-bound scientists at NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View will send a spacecraft to the lunar surface to study its thick layer of dust and find out what kicks it up.

The $80 million craft is being built and managed by the Ames center and will fly to the moon three years from now, launched aboard a single rocket together with a second spacecraft from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory that will examine lunar gravity from orbit.

Still another craft, also managed by the Ames center, is scheduled to be launched to the moon in October and crash into a lunar crater near the moon's South Pole. Its instruments will hunt for signs of water that might be used by astronauts living inside a future outpost, NASA officials said Friday as they dedicated the center's new Lunar Science Institute.

The missions are all designed to pave the way for future landings by human crews and all bear elaborate names and acronyms for their goals: The dust-hunter on the moon's surface is called LADEE, for Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer; its orbiting companion's name is GRAIL, for Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory; and the one being readied for launch this fall is LCROSS, for Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite.

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Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was well and reports speculating about his sickness were false, his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri said in a recording on Wednesday.

"Sheikh Osama bin Laden is in good health," Zawahri, who is also a doctor, said in response to questions compiled by Islamist Web sites. "The ill-intentioned always try to circulate false reports about him being sick."

Zawahri, who, like Saudi-born bin Laden is believed to be hiding in Afghanistan or Pakistan, also denounced the United Nations and vowed to attack Jews both within and outside Israel.

"The United Nations is an enemy of Islam and Muslims," he said. "It has legalised the creation of the state of Israel and its seizure of Muslims' land ... it has legalised the crusader presence in Afghanistan ... and Iraq," he said in a 104-minute audio recording posted on the Internet.

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Five years ago, weighing just 5st 1lb, Hayley Wilde was told by doctors she had only days left to live. So sick her hair fell out, the skeletal teenager, who had suffered from anorexia since she was 11, was hospitalised and brought back from the brink. But it was not the end. Over the next three-and-a-half years, the teenager from Blackpool was hospitalised five times. At her lowest ebb, she was fed through an intravenous tube. In 2005, she spent just seven weeks out of hospital. But in March this year, Hayley - now 20 - defied the odds by giving birth to a healthy baby boy. Baby Michael was born in March, weighing a healthy 7lb 14oz. It was something neither Hayley, nor her mother Jane, ever believed would happen. The new mother said she hoped to help other anorexia sufferers Jane Wilde said her daughter's periods had only recently returned when she fell pregnant. She said: "It was a miracle. I was so very proud. She coped so well when she was pregnant, she ate very well and ate healthily. "It was frightening for her at first because she realised she was getting bigger, but she coped really well." Hayley became so proud of her bump she had professional photographs taken of her during her pregnancy. Her mother Jane said: "I was so proud of that picture - I never expected in my wildest dreams that it could happen." Mrs Wilde, who has set up a support group for families of anorexia sufferers, described how she first realised her daughter was suffering from an eating disorder when she saw her hiding food. The teenager would stuff food into her pockets or down her trousers, and throw it away when her parents went out. She drank water to make herself feel full. On one occasion, while on a shopping trip for summer clothes, Mrs Wilde saw her daughter undress in a changing room. She said: "I told her, 'I've got to go outside because I feel sick and I'm going to faint'. "I thought she had got cancer, all I could see was bones." Hayley, who is now studying to be a teacher, said she hoped her experience would help other people battling anorexia. She said: "I didn't really want a baby, I hadn't had it in mind because I didn't like the idea of becoming fat and big. "Already though, I thought I was big and fat. I didn't think I wanted a baby at all but he [Michael] has definitely changed my mind."

 For the first time in history, we are no longer at the top: Muslims have overtaken us," Monsignor Vittorio Formenti said in an interview with the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano. Formenti compiles the Vatican's yearbook.

He said that Catholics accounted for 17.4 percent of the world population - a stable percentage - while Muslims were at 19.2 percent.

"It is true that while Muslim families, as is well known, continue to make a lot of children, Christian ones on the contrary tend to have fewer and fewer," the monsignor said.

Formenti said that the data refer to 2006. The figures on Muslims were put together by Muslim countries and then provided to the United Nations, he said, adding that the Vatican could only vouch for its own data.

When considering all Christians and not just Catholics, Christians make up 33 percent of the world population, Formenti said.

Spokesmen for the Vatican and the United Nations did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment Sunday.

The day after splashing pictures of her naked, Britain's tabloids hailed Carla Bruni as a fashion queen who could be the new Princess Diana.

"What a difference a day makes ... and this time she remembered to put some clothes on," trumpeted The Daily Mail, which devoted a six-page spread to France's First Lady.

"Britain is enchanted by Madame Sarkozy," said the Daily Express opposite a picture of the former catwalk star turned singer arriving for a state banquet at Windsor Castle.

Tabloids had welcomed Carla at the start of a state visit with her husband, President Nicolas Sarkozy, on Wednesday by reproducing a nude fashion shot of her taken in the 90s. Bookmakers William Hill quoted odds of 10-1 that Sarkozy would buy the print when it was auctioned next month in New York.

Any moralistic tut-tutting by the popular press was replaced on Thursday by praise for a woman hailed as a demure model of elegance.

"A Good Night for France. The Gaul Scorers," declared The Sun in a front-page spread linking Carla's triumph with France's soccer defeat of England in Paris.

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A challenge to a court ruling that puts Britney Spears' father in control of her assets until July has been dismissed by a US appeal court.
Lawyer John Eardley, who claims to represent the singer, argued she had not been given sufficient notice when the order was granted in February.

A judge in California said it was not within his powers to grant an appeal.

Meanwhile, the singer's guest appearance on TV comedy How I Met Your Mother was screened on Monday night.

In the programme, shown on the CBS network, the 26-year-old played the character of Abby, a doctor's receptionist with a crush on main character, Ted.

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Halle Berry doesn't just play a mom in movies anymore.

The 41-year-old actress had a baby girl Sunday, and "is doing great," her publicist Meredith O'Sullivan told People.com, the Web site of People magazine. It is her first child.

The father is 32-year-old model Gabriel Aubry. The two met while shooting a Versace ad in Los Angeles two years ago.

Berry told Oprah Winfrey on her show last year that playing a mother in her latest movie, "Things We Lost in the Fire," helped convince her that motherhood was for her.

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If this was the best top 24 ever, then it stands to reason that this is the best top 12 ever. I may be drinking the kool-aid because, to my eyes, this top 12 looks as strong, top to bottom, as I’ve seen. David, is this the best top 12 ever?

It definitely has some strong competitors, but I never like to talk about the strongest group ever – or really anything as an overall group. There are some contestants who are super-strong, and others who aren’t. I think the winner may already be obvious, but we know that what appears obvious now won’t be as apparent in a couple months. So we’ll just take it a week at a time. (As always, when David is speaking, it’s in boldface.)

Last week, we said goodbye to Luke Menard and Kady Malloy. A surprise to no one – not even them, based on the looks on their faces.

Indeed, we both picked Luke to go before their performances, and I picked Kady as well.

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Pop star Madonna, folk singer Leonard Cohen, rocker John Mellencamp, British pop band The Dave Clark Five and instrumental group The Ventures will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on Monday.
The five artists have been chosen by 600 music industry professionals, and beat out disco queen Donna Summer, New York-based funk group Chic, rap pioneer Afrika Bambaataa and hip-hop group The Beastie Boys for the 23rd annual induction.

Artists become eligible for the Hall of Fame 25 years after the release of their first single or album and are represented in an exhibition at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame museum in Cleveland, Ohio.

"The 2008 inductees are trailblazers -- all unique and influential in their genres," said Joel Peresman, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation president. "From poetry to pop, these five acts demonstrate the rich diversity of rock and roll."

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