Mike Tyson In Bollywood

Boxing champion Mike Tyson is packing in punches for his Bollywood debut.

Tyson is now an item boy in the promotional video of Ahmed Khan's film Fool N Final.

Though Tyson was to shoot in India it was later shot it Las Vegas due to security reasons and date problems. So why Mike Tyson?

When asked why Ahmed chose Mike Tyson, the director said, “Somebody will get Shakira, somebody Tata Young. I said lets get somebody who is not a usual thing. We thought of Mike Tyson, and got him.”

Ahmed also said he was a little skeptical about shooting with Tyson, having heard stories about his mood swings. But it turned out to be a completely different experience.

“When I shot with him, he was more humble than I could be. So his level of thinking was changed in that last 10 years. He is no more that iron Mike Tyson. He is soft mike Tyson now,” said Ahmed.

When asked if casting him cost a bomb in the producer's pocket, Ahmed said, “Bomb. It cost a missile not a bomb.”

We hope the missile does doesn’t miss out the box office target.

Losing Weight?

While most diets focus on foods you shouldn't eat, those that emphasize adding low-calorie foods, like fruits and vegetables, can promote healthy weight loss, new research shows.

Some weight-loss plans shun carbohydrates while others ban fat, but in the new study, researchers found that overweight adults who were instructed to focus on lower-calorie foods lost more weight than their peers who were simply told to cut their overall calories. The key, according to the study authors, is that foods such as fruits and vegetables have low "energy density." Because they have a high water content, they are heavy by weight but low in calories; while such foods do not add many calories to the diet, they are still filling.

The study included generally healthy men and women with borderline-high blood pressure who were randomly assigned to one of three groups, to look at the effect on blood pressure. Of these 658 men and women, those who made the greatest reductions in the energy or calorie density of their diets lost an average of 13 pounds over 6 months. Those who made the smallest reduction in energy lost a meagre 5 pounds over the same period.

The findings of the study, carried out by Jenny H Ledikwe and her colleagues, of Pennsylvania State University, was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

The difference was that one group was told to follow the "DASH" diet, which emphasized getting 9 to 12 daily servings of fruits and vegetables, and 2 to 3 servings of low-fat dairy products. The other groups were told to reduce their calorie intake, but were not given goals for fruit, vegetable and dairy intake. Overall, Ledikwe's team found, the DASH group cut down the most on calorie density,despite started eating more food by weight -- a consequence of getting more fruits and vegetables. The group was also able to increase intake of fiber, vitamins and minerals.

Diets that emphasize low-calorie foods may be easier to stick to than diets that focus on foods to avoid, the investigators point out, as well as more healthful.

"Whereas a decrease in body weight is a primary goal of a weight-loss diet," Ledikwe and her colleagues write, "consideration of nutritional quality is equally important."

Comics R Not Only 4 Kids

Comics are not merely for kids any more. Some NGOs have joined hands to use this medium to tell young Indian men it is wrong to presume that "girlfriends must be meek and submissive and that a sexually aggressive woman is bad".

The Population Council and four other NGOS have brought out this set of comics, interwoven with messages on HIV/AIDS, in four languages - Bengali, English, Hindi and Telugu.

"The aim is to change social attitude and dispel the popular notion of masculinity that makes young men in urban slums indulge in violence against women and use condoms only when having a relationship with sex workers," Vijaya Nidadavolu, Population Council's communication head, told IANS.

The comics have been titled - "Josh Mein Hosh" (Passion with Sense), "Khoon Ka Katra" (Just a drop of blood), "Savdhan Senior" (On your guard, senior) and "Pyar Ka Packet" (A packet of love).

About 250,000 copies of these pocket-sized comics have been sent for distribution in urban slums of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Hyderabad. These comics were produced in partnership with Prerana-Delhi, Apnalaya-Mumbai, CINI Asha-Kolkata and Divya Disha-Hyderabad.

"There was an urgency to bring out these educational comic books because in 2006, about 30 percent of HIV infections were reported in the 15 to 20 age group," Nidadavolu said.

"Existing literature showed that young Indian men subscribe to norms of masculinity that lead to risky behaviour and to change this discussions were held with young men in four cities to understand their media habits, message retention from HIV campaigns, myths and misconceptions," she added.

Participants were encouraged to relate real life incidents so that these comics echoed true stories. The draft stories were pre-tested in discussions with young men in urban slums and their feedback was incorporated in the final version, Nidadavolu said.

Twenty-year-old Ramu, who was born and brought up on the Sealdah platform in Kolkata and is a school dropout, was involved in the creation of these comic books.

"We thought the stories were really nice. We suggested some changes because we find it difficult to read comics. We are not used to sequencing. We also wanted the comics to be small enough to carry in our pockets," Ramu told IANS.

"I am looking forward to seeing these books made with our stories. I learnt a lot about sketching, comic book-writing and want to make sure that these books go into the hands of young men like me."

Others like Ramu suggested that comic books should have an adult look but the covers should not be too bold. The books also had to be packaged in a manner so that they could not be identified as HIV-related and the information on HIV had to be woven into the story. Such information was considered important as India has over 5.1 million HIV/AIDS patients.

"The state and district AIDS control societies in Andhra Pradesh and Delhi have integrated elements of their campaign into the comic book series and have endorsed the products," Nidadavolu said.

"Several NGOs have also been approached to integrate this package within existing outreach activities and to distribute the comics," she added.

Sex Determination Test

"It is very difficult to see the purpose of a blood test kit which reveals the sex of the unborn child at six weeks, particularly at £189 a go. The marketing ploy of 'Consumer Genetics Inc', claiming that many parents want to know in advance whether they will have a boy or a girl so that they can decorate the nursery in the right colour, seems particularly frivolous when one thinks of the more sinister potential of this test.
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The problem is not the test itself, of course, so much as the potential for the knowledge obtained to be misused. With our casual attitudes to early abortion in the United Kingdom, we feel it is inevitable that abortion numbers will rise.

The test is very likely to be abused by those who have a preference for one sex or the other, and do not want to have a baby of the 'wrong' sex, and who will chose to abort the pregnancy if it is not the boy or girl they desire.

Social abortion on the grounds of wrong gender does not fall within the terms of the UK abortion law, and selection of embryos on the basis of sex for social reasons is not allowed in the UK either, but as we know abortion is virtually on demand in the first trimester so it will be very easy to do this early test, get rid of one baby and try again for the right sex. Social sex selection has wreaked demographic chaos in countries such as India and China, where boys are preferred almost exclusively over girls. We need an international agreement that social sex selection should never be permitted anywhere, and nationally we need to implement stringent controls over the provision of abortion."

What A Law

An attorney representing six gay and lesbian couples argued Friday that Iowa’s law preserving marriage for only a man and a woman is unconstitutional.

Des Moines attorney Dennis Johnson told District Court Judge Robert Hanson that Iowa has a long history of aggressively protecting civil rights in cases of race and gender. He said the Defense of Marriage Act, which the Legislature passed in 1998, contradicts previous court rulings regarding civil rights and should be struck down.

‘‘It’s just amazing if you look at the history what our Supreme Court has done and we have very good law in Iowa for equal rights, so I do think that Iowa is actually a stronger state than many in that respect,’’ Johnson said.

He said some of the case history in Iowa suggests that marriage is a fundamental right and as such, the state can’t choose who people can or cannot marry.

Johnson said the Defense of Marriage law is ‘‘mean spirited’’ and was designed only to prohibit gays from marrying. He said it violates the state constitution’s equal protection and due-process clauses.

Lambda Legal, the New York-based gay rights organization that spearheaded a same-sex marriage drive across the country, filed the lawsuit on behalf of the gay and lesbian couples in Polk County District Court on Dec. 13, 2005.

The lawsuit contends that the gay couples were treated unfairly when Polk County Recorder Tim Brien improperly denied them marriage licenses. It argues that Iowa’s marriage law is unconstitutional because it draws ‘‘impermissible distinctions based on sex and sexual orientation.’’

What An Indian

THERE IS THIS GOOD OLD BARBER IN LONDON

ONE DAY A FLORIST GOES TO HIM FOR A HAIRCUT. AFTER THE CUT, HE GOES
TO PAY THE BARBER AND THE BARBER REPLIES:

"I AM SORRY. I CANNOT ACCEPT MONEY FROM YOU. I AM DOING THE
COMMUNITY SERVICE."

THE FLORIST IS HAPPY AND LEAVES THE SHOP.

NEXT MORNING WHEN THE BARBER GOES TO OPEN HIS SHOP,
THERE IS A "THANK YOU" CARD AND A DOZEN ROSES WAITING AT HIS
DOOR.


POLICEMAN GOES FOR A HAIRCUT AND HE ALSO GOES TO PAY THE BARBER
AFTER THE CUT.

BUT THE BARBER REPLIES: "I AM SORRY. I CANNOT ACCEPT MONEY FROM
YOU. I AM DOING THE COMMUNITY SERVICE.

THE COP IS HAPPY AND LEAVES THE SHOP.

THE NEXT MORNING THE BARBER GOES TO OPEN HIS SHOP, THERE IS A
THANK YOU CARD AND A DOZEN DONUTS ARE WAITING AT HIS DOOR.

AN INDIAN SOFTWARE ENGINEER GOES FOR A HAIRCUT AND HE ALSO GOES
TO PAY THE BARBER AFTER THE CUT.

BUT THE BARBER REPLIES: "I AM SORRY. I CANNOT ACCEPT MONEY FROM
YOU. I AM DOING THE COMMUNITY SERVICE. "

THE INDIAN SOFTWARE ENGINEER IS HAPPY AND LEAVES.

THE NEXT MORNING WHEN THE BARBER GOES TO OPEN HIS SHOP,

GUESS WHAT HE FINDS THERE...

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TRY TO GUESS
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COME ON, THINK LIKE AN INDIAN.................

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A DOZEN INDIANS WAITING FOR A HAIRCUT... --