Yogi lives 70 years without food or water

A Yogi in India claims to have spent the last 70 years surviving without food or water. The holy man, 83 year old Prahlad Jani is under 24 hour observation by 30 doctors and is undergoing a series of tests. He's been sealed in a hospital in Ahmedabad.

India's Defence Institute of Physiology and Allied Sciences spokesman said "The observation from this study may throw light on human survival without food and water". Jani says he meditates to get energy and since the experiment started on the 22nd April, he has not eaten or drunk anything and hasn't been to the toilet. Jani says the key to his survival is a mystical and unexplained process by which he receives drops of water through a hole in his pallet. Naturally, the doctors are keen to find out what energy supports his existence, and are hoping that body scans and a multitude of other tests will provide the answer. The experiment will take 15 to 20 days.

Interesting story but common sense tells me this cannot possibly be true and as much as I'd like to believe it, I think that someone is pulling our leg.

US group praying for the death of President Obama

There are over one million Facebook members in America praying for the death of their President. The group located in Marysville have uploaded pictures of the President against a communist flag, and cartoons associating him with Hitler. This is the prayer:

Dear Lord, this year you took my favorite actor Patrick Swayzie, you took my favorite actress Farah Fawcett, you took my favorite singer Michael Jackson. I just wanted to let you know my favorite President is Barack Obama. Amen.

Naturally there was an outcry and a Pro-Obama group was deeply offended and is asking for its removal. The question is - should Facebook remove offensive posts like this one or allow the people to fight it out amongst themselves? Facebook's 'terms of use' ban members from posting "content that is hateful, threatening, pornographic, nudity, or graphic or gratuitous violence."

I leave it up to you to draw your own conclusions.

It Pays to Advertise

They needed a job so three mates decided to stand by a busy road in the morning peak hour with signs asking for work. After only two days, they have had more job offers than 3 months through Centrelink. Stephen Graham, Liam Sharp and Adam Foxwell stood on the Central Coast Highway at West Gosford on Tuesday and Wednesday in suits and borrowed ties. The result? Their plight was picked up by the local radio station and they were overwhelmed with job offers.

Brainchild Adam Foxwell said "You can't get a job without experience, and you can't get experience without a job". The 19 year old wants a job to help put him through a commerce degree at Newcastle University.

"On the first day, we had six or seven legitimate job offers and today (Wednesday), we've had that and more.

Nice one fellas, well done.

Cancer tumours vanish in ten days

Scottish scientists from Strathclyde and Glasgow Universities have discovered a way to make tumours vanish in ten days, without any side effects. A leading medical journal has decribed the results so far as remarkable. Dr Christine Dufes, leader of the research said "The tumours were completely gone in ten days. It's fantastic. When you talk about ten days, that is the time frame for curing a cold. Imagine if within ten days, you could completely make a tumour disappear". Researchers have been trying for years to find something that would attack the tumour without destroying healthy tissue and now they've done it.

Remember hearing about those grants made by our governments and other institutions for medical research, well this outcome came about from a grant supplied by a Scottish charity - Tenovus Scotland - which helps young scientists get their ideas off the ground. This news is so exciting, I can't understand why the world isn't jumping up and down - it was released on the 21st April. Thanks to our Scottish cousins, a cure for this terrible disease is getting closer.

Shortage of Suicide Bombers

I actually read some good news today. Al-Qaeda in Iraq is struggling to recruit suicide bombers. The deaths of two important men - Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Ayub al-Masri - has put a dent in their leadership. Brigadier General Ralph Baker, a senior US officer in Baghdad said they are weaker now and it's getting harder for them to regenerate after the recent arrest of 404 Al-Qaeda members.

The General said "But it's just not the leadership that they will have trouble finding replacements for, we know they are having great difficulties recruiting scuide bombers because of better security on Iraq's border with Syria".

When we thought it was almost over, the innocent people of Iraq are still dying. While the Iraqi government and the US military were celebrating the death of Baghdadi and Masri, car bombs were being planted throughout Baghdad and on Friday last, 54 more people died and 201 were injured. The sooner Australia is out of this dirty war the better.

Stephen Hawking talks about aliens

Stephen Hawking warns not to make contact with visitors from out of space. The British scientist said "If aliens visit us, the outcome could be the same as when Columbus landed in America - which didn't turn out well for Native Americans". He's in a new television series which explores a fictitious world where aliens invade earth in huge spaceships looking for resources after depleting their own planet. It's called Into the Universe on the Discovery Channel which has just started in the US.

He suggests that these very advanced alien invaders could become nomads looking to conquer and colonise whatever planet they can reach. Does he really think there could be aliens out there? "To my mathematical brain, the numbers alone make thinking about aliens perfectly rational. The real challenge is to work out what aliens might actually look like" he said.

So far scientists haven't found any evidence that aliens exist but in 2008, NASA beamed the Beatles song "Across the Universe" into deep space to send a message of peace to any alien that happens to be in the region of Polaris - also known as the North Star - in 2439.

The Formula

And thus, dear students, we have arrived at the formula for understanding women.

Child Brides

Saudi Arabia is the largest Arab country in the Middle East and the Kingdom is home to two of the holiest places in Islam - Mecca and Medina. It's also a country that for centuries has been marrying child brides to old men. But now for the first time, a 12 year old girl has won a divorce from her 80 year old husband after the State-run Human Rights Commission appointed a lawyer to represent her.


Her plight was reported in news media around the world and she could be responsible for a push to raise the minimum age for marriage to 16. Medical experts, child psychologists, social workers and scholars in Islamic law will debate the issue before announcing their recommendations. Then the Ministry of Justice will impose a legal minimum age for marriage for the first time and child marriage may be banned completely.


The Prophet Muhammad married a 9 year old girl and has been used as justification for the practice. But Sheikh Abdullah al-Manie, a senior Saudi cleric, said the Prophet's marriage 14 centuries ago could not be used to justify child brides today. The 12 year old girl was married against her wishes to her father's cousin last year. A dowry was paid and the marriage consummated. Last week another child bride was in the news, she died in hospital of internal bleeding after consummation of a marriage to a man she was forced to marry.

UN officials have discussed child marriage to Saudi's ruler King Abdullah but progress has been slow regarding women's rights. However, when the king was challenged by orthodox clerics last year, he went against their advice and opened the country's first mixed university in Jedda and last Saturday he axed the head of the religious police and appointed Saudi Arabia's first ever woman deputy minister in the biggest shake-up since he took over the throne.

The wheel of change is slowly turning.

What should I do to prepare for death?

A young American man poses a question to a popular Internet site.

I have pancreatic cancer and I am probably going to die. What should I do to prepare for death?

I'll keep this brief, to the point, and anonymous. Two days ago my doctor told me that I have pancreatic cancer and that if I am lucky, I will live six months. I'm only 28 years old.

I'm not here for sympathy or a handout. I need advice. I want to get all of my things in order before I tell my parents. They are very wealthy and will help me get the best treatment possible. From what I've read, even with the best treatment, my chances are not good. So what do I need to do?

What should I do with my stuff? Can I just type out a will or do I need a lawyer to stamp it? There is a tiny chance that I can beat this, so I don't want to give it all away just yet. I am thinking that I will move into my parents guest house while I go through treatment. Without an apartment to pay for I can quit my job.

I don't have a lot in the way of decorations and knick knacks but I have a huge (over a thousand in total) collection of books, dvds and video games. I figure after I die my books can be donated to a library but I don't know what to tell people to do with the movies and video games. My clothes can go to a charity shop. My brother has always wanted my 56 Chevy Bel Air (typing that made me sad, I'll miss that car). The rest of my stuff such as furniture and my truck I wouldn't mind selling now. If I do get to mooch off my parents, should I just box up the stuff and put it into storage? Would it just be best to get rid of it all now? I don't want to give my family grief by having to go through my things when I die.

How do I arrange for my body? I want to be cremated. With having cancer I don't know how many of my organs and tissues I can donate but I'd like to donate as much as possible. Again, I just want to get this stuff out of the way so that my family doesn't have a lot to do.

How do I break the news to people? Right now my only idea is to get my sort-of girlfriend, parents, ex-wife (she's still a friend) brother and best friend in a room and say "Okay, all of you stand up, stand up, okay good. Now everyone who doesn't have cancer and isn't going to die please sit down. Not so fast me" But I don't they will find that as funny as I do.

What else should I do? What else do I need to know? I meant to keep this real brief but I ended up typing way more than I thought I would. I know I have a lot of google searches to do. I am hoping you people can give me some advice and just tell me some things that I might not think of on my own.

It's kind of funny, if you told me a year ago that I was going to die I would of told you "I'm going to Vegas, I'm hiring a dozen hookers and I'm going to eat myself fat". Now that I'm probably going to die, I don't want to go anywhere, I don't want to have sex, and I definitely don't want to eat. What I want is to not cause problems for the people who I love.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give me.

Disposable Soldiers

Chuck Luther

Joshua Kors writes about veterans affairs for the Huffington Post and is responsible for this incredible story.

Sergeant Chuck Luther went to an aid station for medical treatment but he didn't get any. Instead, they wanted him to say that he had a 'personality disorder' (PD) before going to Iraq and was therefore not eligible for disability or medical benefits. When he refused, they put him in an isolation room about the size of a walk-in wardrobe with a bed pan for a toilet. They stopped him from sleeping by turning bright lights on and blasting him with heavy metal music all through the night. When he rebelled, he was pinned down and injected with sleeping medication. After one month of this treatment he finally did sign, by then he would have signed anything. Once he signed the paper, he was immediately whisked back to Fort Hood and told what the consequences were - he was now a PD which meant no disability pay, no long-term medical care and because he didn't serve out his contract, he had to pay back a portion of his signing bonus which meant he now owed the Army $1,500. Sergeant Luther is just one of thousands of severely wounded soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan who face a lifetime without medical care.

It's hard to believe that American military doctors were prepared to lie by misdiagnosing their own men on purpose - wounded soldiers, returning from combat - by saying they had a pre-existing mental illness. As in the civilian world, if you have one, you are locked out of medical insurance.

When Joshua Kors broke the story of Jon Towns, a soldier awarded a Purple Heart when wounded in Iraq, some of the right people started to listen. Towns was also denied disability and medical benefits. His doctor said that his headaches and hearing loss were not caused by the 107-millimeter rocket that knocked him unconscious - it was really a pre-existing personality disorder. Only then did a few military doctors come forward to tell the truth. One doctor admitted he was distraught when he had to issue a PD for a soldier who had a massive chunk missing from his right leg.

Since 2001, more than 22,600 soldiers have been discharged with personality disorder, saving the military billions in disability and medical benefits. This week, Sergeant Luther's struggle is featured on the cover of The Nation. It's hard to believe that this is actually happening in the richest country on earth.

Dawn Service at Gallipoli

With the ash cloud from the Icelandic volcano spreading further across Europe, Australians planning to attend the dawn service at Gallipoli may be disappointed. Qantas said about 62,000 flights have been cancelled for people travelling between Australia and Europe and 17,000 are stuck in countries not their own.

"We are very much hoping that Istanbul will remain open" Singapore Airlines spokeswoman Susan Bredow said last night, "It's touch and go at the moment, the ash cloud is moving down that way. It's not good". A spokesman from The Australian War Memorial said there was concern that backpackers may not reach turkey from London.

So why do our kids have to travel all the way to Turkey? Winston Churchill's plan to capture the Gallipoli Peninsula backfired. Australian and New Zealand soldiers were among an allied expedition sent to take control of Istambul - a friend of Germany but it didn't happen. The ANZAC's landed at Gallipoli on the 25th April 1915 and were overwhelmed with fierce resistance from the Turkish army. Churchill's overall objective was to take Turkey out of the war but the campaign dragged on for eight months before the allies were evacuated, both sides suffering heavy casualties and enduring shocking hardships. 8,000 Australians and 2,700 New Zealand soldiers died in the campaign and it was decided that the 25th April - the date of the landing - would become our national day of rememberance.

The Anzac legend has become such an important part of our national identity, more and more young people are making a pilgrimage to Gallipoli every year to attend the dawn service. But because mother nature decided to teach us all a lesson and stopped the world, numbers may be down this year.

Mother Nature Closes Down Europe

Britain hasn't had a volcanic eruption for millions of years but mother nature gave everyone a reality check yesterday when Iceland's volcano erupted and shut down UK air space - no planes were allowed in or out of the country and thousands of flights were cancelled across northern Europe.



A huge eruption in Iceland in 1695 sent sulphurus fog across the Scottish Highlands and could have contributed to the terrible famine that came shortly after. In 1783 Iceland's Laki volcano spewed sulphurous cloud that hung over Europe for months and shortly thereafter, very hot temperatures and poor air quality killed thousands of the elderly and very young.

This time, it's ash rather than gas so health problems are unlikely. But there is a chilling side-effect - volcanic ash and machinery don't mix - it penetrates sensitive electronics, clogs filters, contaminates water, damages crops and makes livestock ill. It is also an airline pilot's worst nightmare. If a plane strikes an ash cloud, the particles can damage the windscreen and clog the engines. Over the past 30 years there have been more than 80 incidents of aircraft hitting volcanic ash clouds. In 1982 a British Airways 747 hit one over Indonesia and all four engines failed and the plane dropped 7,000 metres before they could be restarted.

When Tambora in Indonesia erupted in 1815, it wrapped a veil of sulphur around the entire planet, blocking the sun's rays that led to the so-called year without summer. Bitter cold and frosts devastated harvests in North America while in Europe they had bread riots which led to the worst food shortage crisis in the western world. About 74,000 years ago, scientists believe that when the Indonesian volcano Toba erupted, it almost wiped out the human race.

By comparison, this most inconvenient disruption to business and holiday travel reminds us that not-withstanding all our wonderful technology and know-how, Mother Nature is still very much the boss.

Al-Quaeda Recruiter speaks to Sydney Youth

Al-Quaeda recruiter Anwar al-Awlaki got to speak to hundreds of Muslim youth by phone link from Yemen last year. It had to be by telephone link because he's the first US citizen to be put on the CIA 'kill list'. He was the spiritual guide to three of the hijackers on September 11 2001 and has transformed himself from radical cleric to trainer for Al-Quaeda. Last year, the Christmas Day bomber on a plane to Detroit said Mr Awlaki was his recruiter so one can only guess what he spoke to the young men about.

The Sydney Morning Herald attended the sermon at the Lakemba mosque in February last year but was ejected by organisers. Yesterday, no one involved with the mosque would take responsibility for asking him to speak.

Kaiser Trad, spokesperson for the Muslim community was interviewed on television this morning and denied any knowledge of the incident and didn't know who organised the sermon. To say that his explanation was hopelessly inadequate, is a monumental under-statement.

The Archibald Art Prize 2010

Sam Leach has been compared to Brett Whiteley and William Dobell. He not only won the Archibald Prize for his portrait of Tim Minchin, he also won first prize for "The best landscape painting of Australian scenery". But Adam Pynacker painted a picture of boatmen on the shore of an Italian lake in 1660 and as you can see, it's a straight copy.

Yesterday the artist said "For quite a while now, I've been obsessed with 17th-century Dutch painting, I haven't made any secret of where the painting came from".

But Brisbane gallery owner Philip Bacon said the use of artworks without acknowledgement of the source was a "dangerous road" for an artist. "It seems to me unwise not to attribute something that is a direct take" he said. Others scoffed at the notion, saying the age of appropriatiion was upon us and artists were referencing each other without any criticism at all.

Last night Sam Leach denied his actions constituted plagiarism in this context.

KFC Halal Restaurants

KFC is running a trial of 86 restaurants in the UK that will sell nothing but halal meat. At Burton-on-Trent in Staffordshire, a customer, Alan Phillips, was furious when told he couldn't have his favourite burger - a Big Daddy - a chicken burger topped with bacon, cheese and salad, because it was now off the menu. He said it was very unfair to non-Muslim customers when told he would have to drive five miles to the next restaurant to get one. KFC said it was responding to increased demand for a halal menu in the areas of growing Muslim populations.

Traditionally, halal meat must be slaughtered by hand - a swift, deep incision with a sharp knife to the neck, cutting the jugular veins and carotid arteries in both sides but leaving the spinal cord in tact. The meat must also be blessed in the name of Allah and cannot be kept on the same premises as banned substances, including pork and alcohol.

KFC isn't the only large fast food chain thinking of going totally halal. McDonalds in Australia has 6 halal restaurants, 4 in Sydney and 2 in Melbourne and are thinking of opening more.

Phil Mickelson Wins at Augusta

It was quite emotional watching Phil Mickelson win the Masters today, knowing that his wife Amy has been so ill. I could almost hear him saying 'This is for you Amy" as he walked up to the 18th hole amid thousands of noisy fans cheering him on. Last year his beautiful wife Amy was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Amy couldn't walk the course with him today but watched her husband on tv in a house near Augusta National. But she came to the 18th hole with her children to meet him at the end and it was heart warming to see their long embrace with words meant only for each other. They are saying that it was one of the most touching moments in Augusta's long history.

He will suspend his PGA Tour schedule indefinitely as his wife has to have more tests and begin treatment with major surgery, as early as the next two weeks. So his toughest battle is about to begin.

Woman sends adopted son back to Russia

Little boy in an orphanage in Ukraine

An American woman from Tennessee put her 7 year old adopted son on a plane and sent him back to Russia with a note that read: "I no longer want to parent this child, he is violent and has severe psychopathic issues/behaviours." Torry Ann Hansen adopted the boy from an orphanage in Siberia last year. This is the second time the child has been abandoned. He lived with his alcoholic mother until he was six years old and when it was discovered that she couldn't take proper care of him anymore, he was sent to an orphanage. After arriving in Moscow yesterday, he was taken to hospital for a check-up and will then be sent to another one.

Another part of the note read: To whom it may concern, after giving my best to this child, I am sorry to say that for the sake of my family, friends and myself, I no longer wish to parent this child. He is a Russian national and I am returning him to your guardianship and would like the adoption disannulled".

Russia wants to draw up a new agreement between the two countries before any more adoptions are organised. John Beyrle, the US Ambassor to Russia said he was "deeply shocked and very angry that any family would act so callously towards a child they had legally adopted".

The Russians are furious and said this is the last straw after a series of Russian orphans had been mistreated by their adoptive American parents. Peggy Sue Hilt of Manassas was sentenced to 25 years in prison in 2006 after beating a 2 year old girl to death after adopting her from Siberia. In 2008, Kimberly Emelyantsev of Tooele, Utah was sentenced to 15 years after pleading guilty to killing a Russian infant in her care.

But a Russian Social Service official didn't agree with Hanson and said the boy was only a "little stubborn" and the only disability he had was flat feet. They also said that his new mother was bad and didn't love him and used to pull his hair.

But there's always another side to the story. Hanson, a 34 year old nurse said that Russian officials knew he was mentally unstable and deliberately didn't tell her in order to get him out of the orphanage. American authorities now say there should be more information available to potential adoptive parents. Joyce Sterkel is the Director of the Ranch for Kids, a Montana facility that caters to troubled Russian adoptees. She's taken in hundreds of Russian adopted children with severe fetal alcohol syndrome and attachment disorders. "Let's stop demonizing this mother, these kids are really sick and there's no magic number you can call for cases like this" she said.

The Son of Charles Manson

For much of his life, Matthew Roberts has suffered from night terrors from a young age, sometimes he wakes up covered in spiders and some dreams are so horrific he won't even describe them. He's an aspiring singer/songwriter and at the moment he works as a DJ. People often think they've met Matthew before, there's something familiar about the face, especially around the eyes.

He was adopted by a conservative couple a few days after his birth in Chicago in March 1968. He grew up in Rockford, Illonois and had a normal chilhood. He was involved in football, played drums in a band and went to church every Sunday. After graduating from high school, he moved to Los Angeles and enrolled in the Musicians Institute in Hollywood, fell in love and started thinking about finding his biological parents.

In 1999 he contacted an adoption search agency who found his mother. She was living in a cabin in Wisconsin with no phone, no car and no prospects. The adoption people warned him before the meeting, saying "Your mother is a bit off". At first he thought she was just an eccentric old hippie who had a strange way of talking. Then she told him that her own mother suffered from Munchausen syndrome, where a parent slowly poisons their own child while pretending it's a legitimate illness. After telling him this, she sent him a mystery juice in the mail that had 'things floating in it' - needless to say he didn't drink it.

She told him he was conceived during a hippie orgy in San Francisco in 1967 and while under the influence of LSD she had sex with four men. While pregnant, she continued to use LSD which could explain where those night terrors came from. In 1999 Matthew finally sent her a photo of himself when he was about 30 years old and she recognised the similarity immediately - he was the son of Charles Manson. Since he found out, he's become very ambitious and plans to make money on the name by starting a 'son of Manson' reality show. "Superstardom would be kind of cool" he says.

He's been spending a lot of time supporting his adoptive parents in Chicago as they struggle with old age ill health. They ignore the Manson tale altogether and won't speak about it. He is no longer in touch with his biological mother, her letters became demented and hostile.

In 2002 Matthew wrote to Manson in prison and he responded immediately. In one of his letters he talks about the song he wrote for his son before he was born and as Matthew reads the words, he is obviously moved by them and says "This is a beautiful song, it's really nice poetry and this to me shows some real, you know, love".

But despite the striking resemblance, without a DNA test, it's just another story.

Update 28/4/2012.  DNA testing has just come back - he is not the son of Charles Manson.

US Apologises for 5 civilian deaths

After a cover-up that didn't work, a top US Commander has finally admitted his men killed five innocent civilians in a botched raid in Afghanistan. Vice-Admiral William H McRaven went to the home of Haji Sharabuddin and apologised to him and his family for the death of his two sons, two pregnant women and a teenage girl who were killed in a raid by his men on the 12th February.

He said "I am the Commander of the soldiers who accidentally killed your loved ones. I come here to send my condolences. I also ask for your forgiveness for these terrible tragedies". They then presented two sheep to the family. A ritual sacrifice of a sheep at an adversary's door is a way of asking for forgiveness but for some reason, the head of the house decided to spare the animal and the two sheep were led into the courtyard alive - then he welcomed the visitors into his guest room. The Admiral sat stoney-faced in the crowded room before he started to speak.

"Sir, you and I are very different, you are a family man with many children and many friends. I am a soldier. I have spent most of my career overseas, away from my family but I have children as well and my heart grieves for you. But we have one thing in common, we have the same God. He is a God who shows great love and compassion. I pray for you today that in your grief he will show you love and compassion and ease your pain. I also pray that he will show mercy on me and my men for this awful tragedy". Then the Afghan Generals gave the family a wad of cash, around $30,000 wrapped in a handerchief.

Haji Sharabuddin showed the Admiral a 6in scar on his grandson's stomach where doctors had to operate to save his life when he was wounded in a ricochet. He said later that he was happy the Americans had come but he didn't care about the money. He believes the troops attacked after false intelligence was given to them by one of his enemies. He believes the Americans should face international justice and the man responsible for the false intelligence handed over to Afghan authorities. "Maybe then I will forgive them" he said.

The owl who won't fly

This is Troy, the one year old tawny owl who fell out of his nest as a baby and has a fear of heights. Because he's been raised in captivity, he doesn't realise he's a bird and now his handler, Gareth Tonen has the job of getting him to feel secure enough to take to the skies. At the moment, he's happy to fly alongside Gareth who is 5ft 10in, but refuses to fly any higher.

Gareth works at the Hawk Conservancy trust in Hampshire and is trying to temp Troy to leave his comfort zone. He's never been any higher than his handler can lift him and doesn't know how to sit in trees or hunt. So every day, Gareth goes up into trees and when he calls, Troy will fly up to him but no higher. Then he flies down to the ground again.

At the end of the day Troy is given a meal of mouse, rabbit or his favourite chicken, so there is no incentive for him to learn to hunt. But they haven't given up hope. Gareth says "We'll get there. He's gaining more confidence and if I have to carry on climbing trees with him, then we'll do what it takes for him to be a high flyer".

British Nurse Shirley Chaplin

A British nurse has just lost a discrimination case over wearing a cross necklace at work. Shirley Chaplin 54 was told to remove the necklace by the Royal Devon and Exeter NHS trust Hospital. When she refused, she was removed from duties with patients and given a desk job.

She has worn the cross for 30 years and said it would go against her religious faith to remove it. But the employment tribunal didn't agree, and dismissed her claim stating that wearing a crucifix 'was not a requirement of the Christian faith' - unlike Muslim headscarves. They also added that the hospital had acted in a 'reasonable' manner.

The hospital said it was all about health and safety concerns - patients grabbing at necklaces was dangerous. But when she asked if she could pin it outside her uniform, they still said no and confirmed that they wanted to remove the visibility of the cross completely.

Her case against the NHS was backed by seven senior Anglican bishops and even the Archbishop of Canterbury got involved. In his Easter sermon he referred to 'wooden-headed bureaucratic silliness' and this case is surely one of those. He said there was a 'strange mixture of contempt and fear' towards Christianity.

Shirley Chaplin was angry that Muslim nurses' head coverings at the hospital went unchallenged and felt she was badly done by. It's hard not to agree.

Tiger Woods Returns

Tiger Woods will be wearing his new Buddhist bracelet when he tees off at the Masters this year. He's begun wearing the bracelet for "protection and strength". The Augusta National Golf Club is a veritable fortress which makes it the ideal place for his return to golf. The club accepts only men as members and in 1990 the first Afro-American was granted entry. In his stilted public apology on 19th February, he said that his infidelities were a private matter between himself and his wife. But his mistresses are angry, some believing they were the only other woman in his life. So angry in fact that 90 bodyguards, including ex FBI agents will be armed with photos of past lovers, including pron star Joslyn James who has threatened to picket the tournament with friends using megaphones. Heaven forbid!

Now on top of everything else, his kindergarten teacher has called him a liar. He has related the sad story of his first day at school to different interviewers, including Barbara Walters over the years. He tells how he was traumatized when bullies tied him to a tree and used spray to paint the word 'nigger' over his body. But his former kindergarten teacher, Maureen Decker, now 69, says it never happened and that he made the whole thing up. He also mentioned the same incident in a book by his basketball buddy Charles Barkley.

I became aware of my racial identity on my first day of school" he says in the book. "A group of sixth-graders tied me to a tree, spray-painted the 'n' word on me and threw rocks at me. And the teacher really didn't do much of anything. I used to live across the street from the school. The teacher said 'OK just go home'. So I had to outrun all these kids going home. It was certainly an eye-opening experience".

But Ms Decker, a teacher for more than 30 years, vehemently denies it ever happened and said the Cerritos Elementary School in Cypress, California was racially diverse, with Asian, Hispanic and black students. "Some of those students were as dark as Tiger. No one mentioned his race or colour", she said.

Ms Decker took extreme offence to Woods' claim which she says has had an adverse affect on her health and she's been trying to get in contact with Tiger or his managers for years but they never return her calls. She says she doesn't want money, just an apology. Her lawyer, Gloria Allred said they have no plans to sue. "We're asking him to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth" she said.

The media circus is about to begin.

The Catholic Church

The Pope celebrates mass at the Vatican yesterday

The Catholic church is in crisis. Counsellors were on stand-by yesterday as a hot-line was set up by the church in Germany for people who had been abused by priests. But they were overwhelmed with the response and couldn't cope with the 4,459 people who rang. In the end, only 162 callers were given advice before the system shut down. Andreas Zimmer, head of the project, admitted that he wasn't prepared for "that kind of an onslaught".

In a scramble to win back some scredibility, Bishop Stephan Ackermann, who was appointed last year, said that three priests had been passed on to public prosecutors and promised that two more would soon follow. But it's all too little, too late for the church, as people all around the world find the courage to speak out for the first time.


Evidence is building against the German-born Pontiff Benedict XVI which includes protecting priests who were known child sex abusers. The Pope was allegedly aware of a case in the US where priest Lawrence Murphy spent years sexually abusing deaf children at a school in Wisconsin. When the matter was brought before Cardinal Ratzinger, later to become the Pope, he chose to take no action. This horrendous mistake on his part, has cost the church dearly. To make matters worse, he has chosen not to mention it in any of His Easter addresses so far and seems to be ignoring the scandal altogether.

But it's not going away and the world waits for his answer.

Brave Islamic Woman

It would take a lot of courage for a woman to say anything that might be regarded as mens' business in the world of Islam but a Saudi mother of four has done just that - delivered a blistering attack against Muslim extremists live on a TV show called 'The Million's Poet". Hissa Hilal said that 'Muslim preachers 'who sit in the position of power' are frightening people with their fatwas and 'preying like a wolf'' on those only looking for peace. The poem she wrote got loud cheers from the audience and she's now in the final on April 7. The show is broadcast live every week on satellite tv across the Arab world from Abu Dhabi. And surprise, surprise, she's received death threats posted on militant Islamic websites.


Over the past weeks, poets have aired their poems about various subjects. One poem was an ode to the beauty of Bedouin life, another about the widening gap between rich and poor. But Hilal is the first person to ever to take on extremism which she says is creeping into their society through fatwas. She described hard-line clerics as 'vicious in voice, barbaric, angry and blind, wearing death as a robe cinched with a belt', a reference to suicide bombers explosive belts. A very brave move by a Saudi woman. And the people responded overwhelmingly, the judges gave her top marks, as did the large TV audience, plus hundreds of text messages, giving her enough votes for a place in the final.


Sheik Abdul-Rahman al-Barrak, a prominent cleric in Saudi Arabia recently issued a fatwa saying those who call for the mingling of men and women should be considered infidels, punishable by death. And there are many hard-line clerics who have a huge influence through tv programs, university positiions and websites. 'Killing a human being is so easy for them, it is always an option' she said.

Clerics pronouce fatwas on every aspect of people's lives - from how they should deal with people from another religions to what to watch on TV. But their word is not law and it's up to the people to decide if they follow their rules or not. When asked about death threats she said she was concerned but not enough to go into hiding but she is worried about the fame, and how it could change her quiet family life at home in the Saudi capital Riyadh.

In the final Hilal will be up against five other poets and the winner of the $1.3 million grand prize will be announed a week later. One of her rivals will address terrorism and another woman will speak about the role of women.


'My message to those who hear me is love, compassion and peace' Hilal said "We all have to share a small planet and we need to learn how to live together'.


At last, a lone woman finds the courage to speak the truth.