Facing down a culture where they talk like crazies: In a more culturally confident age, the British in India were faced with the practice of "suttee" -- the tradition of burning widows on the funeral pyres of their husbands. General Sir Charles Napier was impeccably multicultural: ''You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: When men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows.You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
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Walking the Talk Talk: A Family-Friendly Guide: We finished our coffee and set out again. This time my brother knew what to do. He acted like an old hand at this, like he’d been doing it for years. A lady crossed in front of him – he kept walking, plowed her over…and then kept walking! I could not have been a prouder brother that day.
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Thousands Honor Chinese Goddess in Taiwan: The festival, which began on the night of March 25, is under the patronage of Chen Lan Temple president Yen Ching-piao, who is also an independent lawmaker and a political powerbroker with a shady past. Given to wearing dark designer suits, Yen is short, squat man with owlish eyes and the piercing look of a mafia godfather. A mammoth wooden plaque in his office reads, "He of high morals is greatly esteemed." Yen has been convicted of corruption, attempted murder, illegal possession of firearms and attempting to pervert the course of justice, but is free pending an appeal.
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Killing Bin Laden will inspire 10 more: Dalai Lama - "This new terrorism has been brewing for many years. Much of it is caused by jealousy and frustration at the West because it looks so highly developed and successful on television. Leaders in the East use religion to counter that, to bind these countries together."...Although he appeared not to approve of the war, he was admiring of Bush. "He is very straightforward," said the monk. "On our first visit, I was faced with a large plate of biscuits. President Bush immediately offered me his favourites, and after that, we got on fine. On my next visit, he didn't mind when I was blunt about the war. "By my third visit, I was ushering him into the Oval Office. I was astonished by his grasp of Buddhism." Biff- plates of biscuits..? astonishing grasp of Buddhism..?
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3 Pinoys confirmed killed in Bahrain boat mishap: Abdullah al-Qubaisi of vessel owner al-Dana blamed the disaster on overloading, telling Bahrain television the boat was allowed to carry only 100 passengers. “They loaded the boat with more than its capacity. The captain refused to sail but they forced him to leave,” he noted. Al-Qubaisi said the captain and two assistants who survived reported that the two-level 100-meter long boat capsized when too many passengers gathered at one end. Biff- Flip fisherman, like their eastern Canadian brethren are famous for being unable to swim. A couple of years back, when questioned about this by nosy Western reporters and asked what was being done about it, a Philippines minister cried racism, implied that locals making claims about the inability to swim was unpatriotic, and said there was no need for a program to teach fishermen to swim.
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