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| A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page | |
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San
José, Costa Rica, Friday, Nov. 8, 2013, Vol. 13, No. 222
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 This
is 'Sirena' by Mario Peraza.
Being submerged
is a metaphor
in this 18-photo exposition By the A.M. Costa Rica staff The Galería Nacional has debuted a photo show that is unique in that the works all were taken under water. The artist is Mario Peraza, who placed 18 photos in the show called “H20, Hipnótico y Onírico.” The gallery said that those who wish to submerge themselves in a world of fantasy, dreams and dreamlike hallucinations can visit the show through Nov. 29. Admission is free. Peraza, himself, is submerged in the depths of surrealism to depict new worlds of magic, fantasy, irrationality and abstraction, the gallery said, adding that the artist is accustomed to swim in these waters. The show is a retrospective of some three years of work. The gallery is in the Museo de los Niños off Avenida 9 in north San José. The photographer used special underwater housing on professional cameras. One of the works "Sirena," shows a woman underwater in a tight-fitting garment that looks very much like fish scales. The word translates into English as mermaid. Puntarenas clown organizes march for Puntarenas security By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Residents of Puntarenas Centro are promising to march Saturday to attract the attention of the government. An announcement said that drugs, violence, the lack of a hospital, unemployment and abandonment by the central government are reason for the march. The march is being organized by Luis Fernando Murillo, who is known in the community as the clown Albóndiga. He said the march will begin in the Parque de Barranca. The march will end at the Pollo Real chicken outlet whose owner, William Salazar, was gunned down by a robber last week. The principal suspect had just been released from prison by officials who were complying with a judge's order to reduce the jail population. Murillo said that Salazar was killed for a couple of pieces of chicken and 60,000 colons, which is about $130. "We cannot permit that they are killing us in this way. We do not have security. We do not have jobs. The drugs and the violence is growing in our beautiful Pearl of the Pacific, he said. The local hospital was damaged heavily in an earthquake Sept. 5, 2012, and repairs are slow. Globetrotters plan two shows in a quick visit to Costa Rica By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
America’s beloved basketball tricksters, the Harlem Globetrotters, will be entertaining expats and Ticos in Guápiles tonight at the Gimnasio Polideportivo Guapiles and Saturday at Ciudad Deportiva Hatillo. Tickets can be purchased at the Gimnasio prior to the presentation. The Globetrotters will not be playing against a local team. It is planned to be only a presentation of comedy and skill. This event is targeted towards all ages and focuses on family fun, said organizers. A representative from the gymnasium in Guápiles said that the team will arrive early the day of the event, starting at 2 p.m. to sign autographs and pose for pictures with fans. The Harlem Globetrotters originally formed 87 years ago in 1926 as a five-man black basketball team. In 1927 the team was named the Harlem New York Globetrotters. In 1941, comedy routines were added and the members have been playing exhibition games for good causes ever since. Wilt “The Stilt” Chamberlain and Magic Johnson spent time as Globetrotters. They even appeared as cartoon versions of themselves in a Scooby–Doo episode. Judicial agency confirms shooting of robber in Aserrí By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The Judicial Investigating Organization has confirmed the shooting death of a young man in Aserrí. But it has declined to identify the man who shot him as a judicial agent. In a release Thursday, the judicial agency confirmed that the 18 year old was one of two men on a motorcycle who tried to rob a pedestrian. The pedestrian was a homicide detective, and he responded with his own weapon. The agency did say that two pistols were at the scene, presumably one carried by the agent and one dropped by the dead man. Teacher arrested in alleged scam over providing employment By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A teacher has been detained on a fraud charge because investigators claim he was taking money for supposedly finding individuals state jobs as clerical assistants or teachers. The Judicial Investigating Organization said that in the four months that the investigation was going on the man collected 3.5 million colons, about $7,000. The 38-year-old man was detained at his home Thursday in the Plaza González Víquez section of San José. Evening storm in metro area generated lightning strikes By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
An evening storm Thursday generated 51 lightning strikes in the metro area and dumped up to two inches of rain in some places, said the Instituto Meteorológico Nacional. There also was rain along the pacific coast, the weather institute said. The same type of weather is predicted for the afternoons of today and the weekend, said a longer-range forecast. Pacific quake hits near Jacó By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
An offshore earthquake most strongly felt in Jacó took place Thursday at 9:17 p.m. The epicenter was estimated to be about 13 kilometers south southeast of Jacó. There was no report of damage. Japanese lawmaker criticized for giving emperor a note By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A Japanese lawmaker was reprimanded on Friday for breaking a taboo by trying to involve Emperor Akihito in politics when he handed him a letter expressing concerns about the health impact of the Fukushima nuclear crisis. A furor erupted after Taro Yamamoto gave Akihito the handwritten missive at a garden party last week, the first such bid in more than a century to draw the emperor's attention. The incident highlights Japanese sensitivities about the emperor that linger nearly 70 years after his father, in whose name the Japanese military waged World War II, renounced his divine status. The topic was also unwelcome for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, under pressure for his handling of the world's worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl. Abe faces demands from some in his party and from charismatic former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi to give up nuclear power altogether.
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A. 2013 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
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A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
A.M.
Costa Rica advertising reaches from 12,000 to 14,000 unique visitors every weekday in up to 90 countries. |
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Nov. 8, 2013, Vol. 13, No. 222 | |
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| Archives will accept and display current
photos of daily life |
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By
the A.M. Cost Rica staff
Anyone can take an historic photo. At least as far as the Archivo Nacional is concerned. This is the repository of the country's history, but archivists there are opening the door to photos that have been taken in the last five years. The good ones will end up in an exposition marking the 200th anniversary of San Jose's charter by the Spanish Cortes de Cádiz. The exhibition is called "San José en blanco y negro," and it opens Nov. 21. The archive has plenty of older historical photos. There are 300,000 on file. The images submitted by the public will be computerized and available for viewing. The archive says it is seeking a collective portrait of the city that will be of value in the medium and long term. There are no rules about content. The archive subdirector, Carmen Campos Ramírez, mentioned photos of daily life, landscapes, architecture, and activities natural to this time. Also suggested were parades fiestas, buildings and concerts. among others. The photos should be at least 1200 by 1800 pixels and in TIF of JPEG format. The photo can be sent via email to difusion@dgan.go.cr along with a detailed description of the content, including where the photo was taken and who might appear in the photo. Also sought is the exact date and the name of the person donating the photo. The archive said that it would accept photos that are older than five years, although these will not be included in the show. These can be prints because the archive staff can make digital images. |
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| Making the people count requires being a good listener |
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| Every
now and then I have an epiphany, not a great big aha! epiphany, just a
simple realization of a truism. Like this Wednesday, I realized
how important other people are to expanding our worlds, to our well
being, and to learning who we are . . .and how interesting and
sometimes even how special they are. Learning this requires
listening, and sometimes I am not a very good listener, having my own
anecdotes to tell. This week I was again lucky enough to be invited to enjoy Ileana’s stone fireplace pizza and meet some new people. I have mentioned Ileana before. She seems to glide through the busiest life with less effort than anyone I know. It helps to have a supportive and similar partner that is her husband. Besides my longtime friend, Jerry, there were two new people; two women whom I had never met. Julia is an artist, and Angela has a bakery and small restaurant in Pavas, the Backland Café, opposite the Virgen de Loreto's Church, 75 meters West of the American Embassy. She started it after many people complimented her on her homemade sourdough bread and said, “You should open a bakery.” She came to Costa Rica years ago with her husband and children and lived in the southern, rural part of the country. I learned this when I was telling a story about a scorpion with my usual voiced fear of the creatures, and she said she was quite used to scorpions and snakes on her property. She is a better woman than I am. Julie is Costa Rican and an artist, who experiments with many materials and believes that it is the imperfections that make a work of art interesting. She has two dimples in her cheeks that keep appearing when she talks and she seems about to smile or say something mischievous all the time. Both Angela and Julie are widows who have made very successful independent lives for themselves. I think they represent many women I have never met in Costa Rica and elsewhere. |
My friend Sandy was telling me of the travel plans she and her husband had been discussing. They are thinking of, for instance, flying to Seattle, Washington, renting a car and driving down to practically the Mexican border, using as their destinations their member of their family and their friends, of which they have many. So instead of place destinations, it will be people who determine their stops. And my son, who is visiting, just came back from a couple of days on the west coast. He took pictures of some of the places and the beaches, but he mainly talked about the people he met, like the frequent visitor who told him about the less expensive hotel next door to where he was staying, but using the same amenities, or the ebullient restaurant owner who greeted him as he read the menu outside, and, of course, about some of the most beautiful women he has ever seen. “It’s the people who make a place,” he said. It doesn’t take much of an epiphany to recognize such a simple truth, just now and then thinking about what has changed your life, and more often it will not be some place or something, but someone who has made a difference in your life. Of course, you must put yourself in a place where you will meet or interact with people to appreciate their worth. Perhaps that is why someone like myself who enjoys her privacy and solitude so much finds it a revelation to discover what everyone else knows and takes for granted. I think Barbra Streisand had s song about it. Of course, she would. |
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's Fourth News page | |||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Nov. 8, 2013, Vol. 13, No. 222 | |||||
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| Wildlife experts accidentally discover ancient rock art in
Brazilian caves |
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By
the Wildlife Conservation Society news service
While tracking white-lipped peccaries and gathering environmental data in forests that link Brazil's Pantanal and Cerrado regions, a team of researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society and from a local partner, Instituto Quinta do Sol, discovered ancient cave drawings made by hunter-gatherer societies thousands of years ago. The drawings are the subject of a recently published study by archeologists Rodrigo Luis Simas de Aguiar and Keny Marques Lima in the journal Revista Clio Arqueológica. The diversity of the renderings, according to the authors, adds significantly to knowledge of rock art from the Cerrado plateau region that borders the Pantanal. "Our work with the Wildlife Conservation Society focuses on promoting sustainable land-use practices that help protect important wildlife species and the wild places where they live," said Alexine Keuroghlian, researcher with the society's Brazil program. "Since we often work in remote locations, we sometimes make surprising discoveries, in this case, one that appears to be important for our understanding of human cultural history in the region." The discovery was made on Brazil's Cerrado plateau in 2009, when Ms. Keuroghlian and her team were conducting surveys of white-lipped peccaries, herd-forming pig-like animals that travel long distances and are environmental indicators of healthy forests. The peccaries are vulnerable to human activities, such as deforestation and hunting, and are disappearing from large swaths of their former range from southern México to northern Argentina. While following signals from radio-collared white-lipped peccaries and the foraging trails of peccary herds, the team encountered a series of prominent sandstone formations with caves containing drawings of animals and geometric figures. Ms. Keuroghlian contacted Aguiar, a regional specialist in cave drawings who determined that the drawings were made between 4,000 to 10,000 years ago by hunter-gatherer societies that either occupied the caves, or used them specifically for their artistic activities. The style of some drawings, Aguiar noted, was consistent with what archeologists call the Planalto (central Brazilian plateau) tradition, while others, surprisingly, were more similar to Nordeste (northeastern Brazil) or Agreste (forest to arid-land transition in northeast Brazil) style drawings. The drawings depict |
 Wildlife Conservation Society/Liana Joseph
This is a drawing of a large cat
and prey found in the cave complex.an assemblage of animals including armadillos, deer, large cats, birds, and reptiles, as well as human-like figures and geometric symbols. Oddly, the subject of the surveys in the area, peccaries, are absent from the illustrations. Aguiar hopes to conduct cave floor excavations and geological dating at the sites in order to fully interpret the drawings. "These discoveries of cave drawings emphasize the importance of protecting the Cerrado and Pantanal ecosystems, both for their cultural and natural heritage," said Julie Kunen, director of the society's Latin America and the Caribbean Program and an expert on Mayan archeology. "We hope to partner with local landowners to protect these cave sites, as well as the forests that surround them, so that the cultural heritage and wildlife depicted in the drawings are preserved for future generations." |
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A. 2013 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Nov. 8, 2013, Vol. 13, No. 222 | |||||
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| Obama issues a new apology over health policy cancelations By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
U.S. President Barack Obama said that he regrets his administration wasn't as clear as it needed to be about details of his health care reform program, and that he has directed his administration to close some of the gaps in the new law. Obama spoke on national television Thursday, when he directed his apology to what he said are the 5 percent of Americans who bought insurance on their own and have since had their policies cancelled. Those cancelled policy holders are being forced to enroll in new plans with their current insurer or through government exchanges, sometimes at a higher rate. The president said "obviously we didn't do a good enough job, and I regret that." He also said he regrets that people are "finding themselves in this situation based on assurances" he made to them. The televised apology marks the second time in 10 days that Obama has been forced to concede the rollout of his landmark health plan has not gone smoothly. In Boston last week, he said the government Web site was too slow and failing to serve many people seeking to buy insurance online. He said he was not happy about the situation, and called the technical glitches a debacle. Under the Affordable Care Act, widely known as Obamacare, Americans have until March 31, 2014, to buy a federally subsidized health care plan or face a financial penalty. More than three million Americans are now losing insurance plans that do not comply with the new health care law, seemingly contradicting a promise made by President Obama during his reelection campaign that "if you like your health care, you can keep it.” Kavita Patel, a health care reform expert at the Brookings Institution, says in many cases new policies are required under Obamacare to ensure equal coverage for men and women, with children or without, to equally share costs. “You shouldn’t have to pay more just because you are a woman, which is what had been happening before. So, as a result, we have a much more nationwide policy that does not necessarily penalize you for being a woman, and as a result of that we’ve got benefits that apply to both men and women," said Ms. Patel. But she says these changes should not significantly increase the cost of plans and that most young people will qualify for a government subsidy when they enroll. Critics of Obamacare, like Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Repubican, say the law is too complex and gives government too much control over the system. “It's a law transforming our health care delivery system in the wrong direction, we believe, by increasing premiums, canceling insurance plans, destroying relationships with doctors, raising taxes," said Alexander. Andrew Leonard says if he can’t find an affordable alternative, he may drop his insurance completely and pay a fine for not having coverage. “I haven’t researched it enough, but if it ends up being that it is cheaper to go without health insurance, I just won’t go to the doctor most of the year. And if something happens, you know, I’ll hold off as much treatment until open enrollment comes along," he said. Ms. Patel says these technical glitches and policy cancelations could threaten the entire system if they discourage young and healthy Americans from enrolling. “I think all of this is causing, causes me great concern that people are now feeling that the promise about having affordable health care is not attainable," she said. She says over time Obamacare will stabilize costs if these problems are addressed and more people enter the marketplace. FDA seeks to eliminate use of trans fat in U.S. foods By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
U.S. government food regulators have launched an effort to eliminate partially hydrogenated oils, the primary source of so-called trans fats found in some processed foods. Health officials say consumption of trans fats is potentially harmful and can lead to health conditions that are deadly. It is a case in which what tastes good is not necessarily good for you. Many of the foods that can contain trans fats are often regarded by Americans as comfort food. Lisa Martin, a George Washington University cardiologist, says a lot of people eat a fair amount of these foods. "Cookies, cakes, pies and pastries, a lot of those pre-made foods have the trans fat to increase the shelf life," said Ms. Martin. Ms. Martin says health articles have shown that artery-clogging trans fats can lead to significant health problems. "There are some of the articles that have shown that small amounts of trans fats reach 2 percent increases of trans fat in the diet. You can increase your chance of having a heart attack by as much as 30 percent in some of those articles. So, it is a significant risk factor for developing heart disease," she said. The Food and Drug Administration says some manufacturers and retailers have voluntarily cut trans fat levels in their products. It says a further reduction could prevent an additional 20,000 heart attacks and 7,000 deaths from heart disease each year. FDA food safety director Dennis Keefe says studies on the potential benefits show why trans fats should be phased out. "Information provided by recognized scientific bodies such as the Institute of Medicine which have indicated that and recommended that consumption of trans fats should be reduced to as close to zero as possible," said Keefe. Artificial trans fats have been used in restaurants and in processed foods to improve the texture, flavor and shelf life of foods. But Keefe says a growing number of food producers are finding alternatives. "There are products that indeed can be formulated without the use of partially hydrogenated oils," he said. The FDA proposal for eliminating partially hydrogenated oils will go through a 60-day comment period before being finalized. Russian meteor reduces odds that big rock with hit earth By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The idea that the orbiting chunks of interplanetary rocks called asteroids could hit the Earth and wipe out cities, or even life itself, is a familiar theme in space-based adventure films. But according to three just-released scientific studies in the journals Nature and Science, the likelihood that dangerous asteroids will enter Earth’s atmosphere may be greater than previously believed. Feb. 15 of this year, the world was inundated with dramatic video images of a 19-meter-wide meteor streaking across the sky above Chelyabinsk, Russia, at nearly 67,000 kilometers per hour. Well over 1,000 people were injured by the event, mostly from the blinding flash and from broken window glass. Still, according to physicist Paul Wiegert of the University of Western Ontario and an author of a study of the Chelyabinsk meteor just published in the journal Nature: “… Chelyabinsk didn’t really create as much damage as we might have expected, and that’s a good thing. The flip side is that we are now starting to discover that events like the Chelyabinsk event are occurring more frequently than we had originally anticipated. But we’ll have to wait a little while longer and collect a little more information before we can know for sure," said Wiegert. Wiegert adds that collecting that information about orbiting asteroids the size of the one that exploded over Chelyabinsk, then determining their path relative to Earth, is a difficult job using conventional earth-based telescopes. “Larger asteroids are relatively easily seen with telescopes because they are fairly big. Much, much smaller objects are much more common and frequently hit the earth as meteorites, shooting stars, falling stars and things like that. So we see the bigger objects and we see the smaller objects relatively well. But the Chelyabinsk event kind of falls into the gap between the two," he said. At a recent panel of the Association of Space Explorers in New York, physicist and former astronaut Ed Lu warned there is little time to lose. He said there are about 10,000 known asteroids orbiting this region of the solar system. That’s just one-thousandth of the number scientists believe could actually be there. Lu's B612 Foundation is planning to help launch a space-based infrared telescope in 2018 that can detect the heat emitted by asteroids, map their position and orbit, then provide a warning in time to mount an international effort to deflect the more dangerous ones. “You cannot deflect an asteroid that you haven’t found. And the technology exists, the know-how exists and we realized that the cost of finding and tracking these things, the telescope to do that, is about what it costs to build a large freeway overpass," said Lu. Wiegert says he’s fascinated by the Chelyabinsk event and would welcome the launch of an infrared space telescope to locate similar asteroids. “But I don’t think the Chelyabinsk event has really increased our perception of the danger. You won’t have any difficulty finding someone who thinks we should be spending more money looking for more asteroids. But I don’t think anybody in the asteroid community is sleeping any less soundly because of that event," he said. Nevertheless, officials at NASA’s Near Earth Object program, which scans the heavens for dangerous objects, say the space agency is reassessing what size rocks to look for and how often they are likely to hit. Asteroid with multiple tails found between Mars and Jupiter By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Astronomers studying images from the Hubble Space Telescope have seen what they call a weird and freakish object in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Unlike other space rocks, which appear as tiny points of light, this asteroid has six comet-like tails of dust. The tails radiate from it like the spokes of a wheel, and dramatically change their structure every two weeks. Lead investigator David Jewitt, from the University of California, Los Angeles, says he and his colleagues were dumbfounded when they first saw it. "It is hard to believe we're looking at an asteroid," he said. When the asteroid, designated P/2013 P5, was discovered in August, through a land-based telescope array in Hawaii, it looked unusually fuzzy. The more detailed image taken by Hubble in September revealed the tails. Jewitt's team suggests the asteroid is rotating so rapidly that its surface is flying apart, spewing dust in periodic eruptions. Radiation pressure from the Sun forces the dust out into streamers. Jewitt says it may be the main way in which small asteroids die. He expects to find many more asteroids with tails. News of the unusual asteroid appeared in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Muslim girl is new super hero for marvel comic book series By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A popular U.S. comics brand is introducing a female Muslim superhero to its stable of characters. Ms. Marvel will be a 16-year-old Pakistani immigrant living in New Jersey. The company, whose most popular characters include Spider-Man and the X-Men, says Ms. Marvel, aka Kamala Khan, will be the first in a series of characters who are both female and Muslim. “The Ms. Marvel mantle has passed to Kamala Khan, a high school student from Jersey City who struggles to reconcile being an American teenager with the conservative customs of her Pakistani Muslim family,” said writer G. Willow Wilson in an interview on the Marvel Web site. “So in a sense, she has a dual identity before she even puts on a super hero costume.” Ms. Marvel’s superpower will be “extraordinary body-morphing powers,” according to the Marvel Web site. According to Wilson, Marvel Khan’s relationship with Islam is an important part of her character. ‘Islam is both an essential part of her identity and something she struggles mightily with,” he said. “She's not a poster girl for the religion, or some kind of token minority.” Ms. Khan does not cover her hair, he added, but “she's going through a rebellious phase. She wants to go to parties and stay out past 9 p.m. and feel normal. Yet at the same time, she feels the need to defend her family and their beliefs,” he said Ms. Khan is not the first Muslim comic book character. A Marvel character called Dust is a young Afghan woman who can manipulate sand and dust. Last year, DC Comics relaunched its 'Green Lantern series with Simon Baz, an Arab-American and Muslim of Lebanese descent, as its central character. DC Comics also has Nightrunner, a Muslim of Algerian ancestry. Data base of brain images seen as major research tool for pain By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Many people around the world suffer from chronic pain - from pain in the joints to migraines to abdominal pain. Many scientists now believe that kind of pain - in whatever part of the body - has a common connection to the brain. The University of California Los Angeles is now developing an international database of brain images of hundreds of chronic pain patients. So far, they include people from North America and Europe. The goal: to accelerate research and develop better ways to treat chronic pain. Carolyn Crow is no stranger to pain. “Sometimes I’ll just have a background dull ache, you know, all the time. Sometimes there’s cramping that’s so bad that it’ll just kind of almost double you over in pain.” It is a chronic pain caused by irritable bowel syndrome, an illness that currently has no cure. UCLA Gastroenterologist Emeran Mayer said this disease is not the only cause of chronic pain in the body. And often patients often can only suffer. “One of the big things in pain research has been the failure to really come up with major breakthroughs in treatments.” In hopes of finding new treatment options, Mayer is working on a new field of study that links chronic pain to biological changes in the brain. The Oppenheimer Center for Neurobiology of Stress at UCLA serves as the main hub for the first standardized database for brain imaging connected to chronic pain. “So I think a lot of people now agree with the concept that chronic pain is a brain disease. It may start anywhere in the body when you have acute pain, but once it becomes a chronic pain syndrome it does become a brain disease,” said Mayer. Kirsten Tillisch, a professor in UCLA’s Division of Digestive Diseases, said the database allows doctors to take a more holistic approach in chronic pain research. “One of the failures of Western medicine and I think our research approaches is how we diced up the human body and how we’ve diced up research into these little silos that work very independently.” Mayer said Western scientists are starting to look more closely at how mind, body and environment effect each other, and his database is one example. “Big data, medicine, and analysis is essentially doing the same thing the ancient Chinese did by observation. We do it by observing and analyzing very large data sets and trying to see are there patterns in there that hang together by biologically,” said Mayer. And Ms. Tillisch said new technology makes this possible. “You know when I started this type of work 10 years ago there, we didn’t have computing power to do this type of analysis. In the brain alone in the last decade it’s really exploded what we could look at.” The database currently holds the brain scans of more than 500 patients from North America and Europe, and UCLA is in the process of acquiring more. Mayer hopes to eventually include brain images of people from Asian countries, plus other biological markers that can help researchers understand pain and find treatments that can help improve the quality of life for patients such as Carolyn Crow. “As a patient receiving care it makes you feel much better also to realize the doctor is treating you as a person and a whole being with many complicated parts,” said Ms. Crow. Images of Ms. Crow’s brain also will be in the database. She hopes doctors might find a cure one day for her chronic pain. Bolivia erects Chavez statue in rural town that he helped By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Bolivia has unveiled a statue honoring the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in an Amazonian city that benefited from his generosity. President Evo Morales inaugurated the statue in Riberalta Wednesday. During his 14 years in power, Chávez used his country's rising oil wealth to help Morales honor promises of social improvement, including the building of new roads. Venezuela is also credited with providing tractors for poor farmers in Bolivia. Chávez died in March after a lengthy battle with cancer. Colombian negotiation reported to have made a breakthrough By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The Colombian government and rebel negotiators have reached a fundamental agreement to allow the rebels to take part in national politics once they end their insurgency. The deal was announced Wednesday in Havana and is part of the year-long peace talks between the government and the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or FARC. Both sides call the agreement a democratic opening that will lead the way to a lasting peace. The peace talks, sponsored by Cuba and Norway, cover a number of major issues, including convincing the rebels to disarm. FARC has been fighting a 50-year-long guerilla war against the Colombian government. It partially finances its war through drug trafficking and frequently kidnaps foreigners and Colombian officials. Toronto mayor in new video showing him extremely drunk By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A new video has surfaced showing the mayor of Canada's largest city in what he later admitted was an alcohol-driven rage. The widely circulated video, first released Thursday by the Toronto Star newspaper, has triggered new calls from local government officials for 44-year-old Rob Ford to take a leave of absence or to leave office altogether. The mayor told reporters he was extremely, extremely inebriated when the video was shot, and said he is embarrassed by it. He did not disclose the context in which it was recorded, and the object of his wrath is not clear. Earlier this week, the embattled Ford apologized to Canadians after admitting he smoked crack cocaine. That admission came after a separate video showed the transgression. That video, in the custody of Toronto police, has not been aired publicly. City Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti, one of the mayor's strongest supporters, joined others Thursday in urging Ford to seek medical treatment. He said the mayor's family needs to intervene and attempt to get him help. The mayor is married with two school-age children. |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Nov. 8, 2013, Vol. 13, No. 222 | |||||||||
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 Ministerio de Gobernación,
Policía y Seguridad Pública photo
Collection of marijuana sacks
are weighed by an agent.Container on
dock at Moín
held 693.5 kilos of marijuana By the A.M.
Costa Rica staff
Anti-drug agents intercepted a cargo of marijuana on a dock at Moín, Limón. The Policía de Control de Drogas said that the 14 large sacks weighed in at 692.5 kilos or about 1,523.5 pounds. The marijuana was found in a shipping container there. In Puntarenas near a school in Fray Casiano de Chacarita other agents detained a 50-year-old man who was carrying marijuana, crack and cocaine, they said. Two students at a school in Naranjo, Alajuela, also were arrested this week after residents complained about them. The pair are accused of selling drugs in the Parque Central of Naranjo. Agents confiscated crack, marijuana and cash. The pair are students in the night high school there, and agents said they thought that many of the drug customers were also. |
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| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A. 2013 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| From Page 7: Twitter shares soar on first trading day By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The most hotly anticipated stock offering of the year did not disappoint. Shares of Twitter jumped nearly 75 percent above the opening price of $26 at the opening bell of the New York Stock Exchange. The 7-year-old online micro-blogging service is now valued at more than $30 billion. But despite a stellar opening, many still have doubts about how profitable the company will be. The little white bird soared at the start of the opening bell raising nearly $2 billion on its first day as a publicly traded company. Market analyst Max Wolff called it impressive. “Well, we saw a very nicely staged, managed IPO of a very exciting company with obviously huge demand. We had already heard that it was 30 times over-subscribed. We saw some evidence of it. And we basically saw this company triple off the low end of its range from just one week ago," said Wolff. But analysts say don’t buy into the hype. Investment manager Hilary Kramer says Twitter is a valuable brand, but it has yet to prove it can be profitable. “Twitter unto itself is a name and is a brand that has billions of dollars of value, but is it worth $30 billion? No. I want to see some real profitability on the bottom line. Twitter has to figure out how to make money," said Kramer. Valuation experts say the immediate challenge is how to turn Twitter’s 230 million online users into willing consumers. Economist Aswath Damodaran says boosting advertising revenue will be key. “So they need people clicking on those ads and going and buying products because if that doesn’t come through, I don’t care how many users you have. If you can’t make money off those users, nobody really cares," said Damodaran. Twitter posted a $69-million loss this year, but Hilary Kramer says the smart investor needs to look beyond this. She says what’s exciting is the company’s potential. “A lot of the money that Twitter has raised in this initial public offering is going towards buying other companies that can help them get to that next step," he said. Twitter shares closed at $44.90 on its first day. That's nearly 73 percent above its initial opening price, making it the second largest technology IPO on record. |
