End of moratorium on whaling threatens more blood in the seas

September 3rd, 2010   by lola

The moratorium on commercial whaling, one of the world's major environmental achievements, is in danger of being abandoned after 24 years at a meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) which begins this week in Morocco.

A proposed new deal, which stands a realistic chance of being passed at the conference in Agadir, would allow the three countries which have continued killing the great whales in defiance of the ban – Japan, Norway and Iceland – to recommence whaling legally in return for bringing down their catches.

However, many conservationists do not believe that catches will actually fall under the proposed new agreement, and one of the world's leading whaling scientists recently described it in testimony to the US Congress as "a scam ... likely to fool many people".
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Yet the chances of the deal going through are increased by a bizarre bureaucratic twist which may mean that European countries such as Britain, which are opposed, may not be able to vote against it in the final section of the meeting, which begins in three weeks' time.

"This is a great deal for the whaling countries," said Mark Simmonds, international head of science for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society. "In Norway they're already celebrating. But it's potentially a tragedy for the whales."

Should the moratorium be dismantled, it would represent one of the most damaging setbacks ever for wildlife conservation. The ban, which was agreed in 1982 and became operational in 1986, was introduced after a long and intense campaign by environmental pressure groups such as Greenpeace.

They were protesting against the intense cruelty of whaling, where the killing is done by firing explosive harpoons into the large, intelligent animals, and also against the fact that many of the stocks of the great whales had been drastically reduced by over-hunting, with blue whales driven to the brink of extinction.

Although large-scale whaling came to an end with the ban, and populations began to recover, three countries carried on killing: Japan, by labelling its hunting "scientific research", and the Norwegians and Icelanders by lodging formal objections. Since 1986 the three nations have between them killed more than 30,000 whales, the Japanese leading with more than 1,000 whales a year – mainly minke whales, but also Bryde's, fin, sei and sperm whales.

But the global total of kills has nevertheless fallen to a tiny fraction of what it was, and the moratorium has been an unqualified success from a whale conservation point of view.

The deal which may do away with it, which has been on the table for three years, was first thought to be merely a diplomatic compromise to end the perpetual confrontation at IWC meetings between the whaling nations and the anti-whaling countries. But recently it has become clear that it had a different purpose, and was cooked up in the US – by leading figures in the Bush administration, among them being Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, who, until his conviction for taking unreported gifts in 2008, was the longest-serving Republican senator in American history.

One of the most powerful figures in US politics, Senator Stevens sought a deal with Japan after the Japanese caused problems for the US by objecting (as a bargaining counter in IWC negotiations) to the whale-hunting quota for Alaskan Inuit peoples, who have a traditional hunt for about 50 bowhead whales.

drive from www.independent.co.uk

Why can't I have a baby on my own?

September 2nd, 2010   by lola

One evening last September I was sitting in my consultant's office after a checkup following the fifth surgery on my uterus, when he dropped the bombshell: due to the unlikelihood that my womb would be able to sustain a pregnancy, surrogacy might be a fertility option I would need to consider, if I wanted a child.

It was, strangely, a comical moment. "What?" I remember saying, my cheeks going as white as his collar. "This can't be happening," I protested, giggling. "Things like this happen to Sarah Jessica Parker, not me!" I didn't cry. I went home, chain-smoked a few fags, and went to bed feeling shocked and void of emotion. When I woke up the next day, this alien idea that had been presented to me hovered over me in the abstract ether. Over the following few weeks, as much as it sat on my shoulder pecking at my thoughts, I refused to let it in as something real – as something I would seriously, at some point, have to consider.

Eventually, curiosity got the better of me and I hit Google and contacted some surrogacy support agencies. Within a couple of hours any decision-making process on my part had been obliterated. There it was, in black and white: "I am afraid that, as a single person, surrogacy in the UK is not an option for you. This is because a parental order – the legal device by which you would become the legally named parent of a child born through surrogacy – is only open to couples in a long-term stable relationship." From an innocent investigation of an area I knew little about, the shock felt like a punch in the stomach.

This wasn't supposed to be how my life was going to turn out. Since my early twenties I'd had it all mapped out. Throw myself passionately into my career and have as much fun as possible – the things I was good at – and the family stuff could be put off until later. Pah! what's the rush? But a decade later the trouble started: fibroids (non-cancerous tumours in the uterus); a ruptured ovarian cyst; more fibroids (lots more). By January 2008, aged 37, I'd had three surgeries which had left me with some knock-out scars, emotionally and physically. Recovery from an operation to remove multiple fibroids that January was tough. Blood transfusions resulted in severe anaemia, as well as a bout of E. coli, which the hospital kindly packed me off home with. The C-section-style wound opened and took months to heal.

drive from www.independent.co.uk

Lindsay Lohan admits flaws but says career is not over

September 1st, 2010   by lola

Troubled actress Lindsay Lohan has admitted she was irresponsible in a new interview released on Tuesday, but downplayed alcohol or drug troubles and declared her acting ability was still in top shape.

Lohan, 24, recently released early from jail and a rehabilitation program and now ordered to attend behavioral therapy classes twice a week, told Vanity Fair magazine in an interview conducted one week before her jail term began that she "was fine."

"I don't care what anyone says. I know that I'm a damn good actress," she told the magazine. "And I know that in my past I was young and irresponsible, but that's what growing up is. You learn from your mistakes."

Reports of alcohol abuse were overplayed, she said, while dealing with her father was far harder.

"I think everyone has their own addictions and hopefully learns how to get past them," she said. "I think my biggest focus for myself is learning how to continue to get through the trauma that my father has caused in my life."

Lohan admitted in 2007 that she was addicted to alcohol and drugs, and went to rehab three times. She was ordered to wear an alcohol monitoring anklet in May this year and was jailed for missing multiple alcohol education classes imposed as part of her probation three years ago.

In the Vanity Fair interview she denied rumors of abusing prescription pills.

"I've never abused prescription drugs. I have never in my life. I have no desire to. That's not who I am," she told the magazine.

In part she blamed some of her behavior on hanging with the wrong crowd.

"So many people around me would say they cared for the wrong reasons. A lot of people were pulling from me, taking from me and not giving. I had a lot of people that were there for me for, you know, the party."

The career of the once promising actress, who starred in "Mean Girls" and "The Parent Trap," has foundered in the past three years, with Lohan hitting the headlines repeatedly for nights on the town and bizarre behavior.

drive from www.independent.co.uk

Japan opens up its secret death chamber to the world

August 31st, 2010   by lola

One of the world's most secret execution rooms was opened up to reporters for the first time yesterday, the likely first step in a long-delayed debate on Japan' s controversial death penalty.

The Justice Minister, Keiko Chiba, who opposes the death penalty, ordered the ministry's conservative bureaucrats to allow the press to visit Tokyo Detention Centre to stimulate public debate on hanging.

A select group of reporters was allowed to take pictures of the execution chambers, including the room where prisoners are hanged.

Visitors have only been allowed to see the gallows on three occasions. In each case they were members of parliament who were forced to surrender recording and photographic equipment before their visit. What little is known about the centre comes mainly from former prison guards.

Last month, Ms Chiba became the first justice minister to witness an execution when she sat grey-faced through the hangings of Kazuo Shinozawa, 59, and Hidenori Ogata, 33. The decision caught many people by surprise – Ms Chiba was widely expected to begin a moratorium on the death penalty.

Yesterday she said she hoped her actions would help the public decide on the system's merits. "It was the most open we could be, after considering the feelings of death row inmates, those who are close to them and prison guards as well as security problems."

Footage of the facility released by the state broadcaster NHK showed an anteroom with chairs, a large Buddhist altar and low table, where the execution order is read to the condemned. In a second room, a blue curtain conceals an observation chamber and a platform with a trapdoor marked in red. Some reporters said the entire facility was chilled by air-conditioners and smelled of incense.

drive from www.independent.co.uk

Gridlock is a way of life for Chinese

August 30th, 2010   by lola

A cleaner picks up waste beside the Beijing-Zhangjiakou highway in north China's Hebei province. Roadworks are blamed for causing the 60-mile jam that has lasted 10 days. Photograph: Alexander F. Yuan/AP

The trucks were parked up, bumper-to-bumper and mile upon mile of them. No one is going anywhere fast in what has been dubbed the world longest-lasting traffic jam, in China's Hebei province.

The motorway, part of the Beijing to Tibet expressway, resembles a giant car park – and has done so for the past 10 days. Normally one of the busiest – and noisiest – trunk roads in China, now the only sound that can be heard is the chirrup of the crickets in the nearby wheatfields.

The Chinese authorities are struggling to clear the congestion, now entering its eleventh day and which, at its peak, stretched for more than 60 miles (100km). But the drivers still joining it are not optimistic about reaching their destinations swiftly.

"I have not moved for five hours," said Zhang Xingping, 27, standing outside his cab near a road traffic sign mockingly warning him to obey the 100km per hour speed limit.

A combination of road works and the huge volume of coal trucks that daily rumble along this main route is said to have caused the problem.

Stalled traffic has stretched for days between Jining in Inner Mongolia, and Huai'an in Hebei province, north west of Beijing.

The roadworks are necessary to repair damage caused by an increase in cargo lorries using the highway after large coalfields were discovered in Inner Mongolia.

This highway is often congested, as local drivers can attest, shrugging their shoulders at the monotony of hour after hour spent with their gearbox in neutral. Many of them think this is well on its way to being the world's busiest road.

This particular and spectacular jam began on 14 August. At one point vehicles were moving half-a-mile a day with some drivers taking five days to clear it. Now it is slowly easing, said Zhang. He should know. He has been through it once already in the past 10 days. "It took me three days last time," he said. "I am prepared. I have plenty of water."

Local villagers come on motorbikes to take advantage. They are selling simple boxed meals of rice, vegetables and pork for 10 yuan (£1) each. "It's not cheap. It's not filling. But we have no choice," said Zhang, of the food on offer.

The stranded drivers, who spend their time sleeping, walking around, or playing cards and chess, are a captive market, and the local entrepreneurs are keen to take advantage. A bottle of water, normally 1 yuan, sells for 10 yuan, while the price of a 3 yuan cup of instant noodles had tripled. "It's more expensive than eating in a restaurant," complained one driver who gave his surname as Lu.

Zhang had set off this morning from the coal mining area in Inner Mongolia. As the moon rose and time ticked into the early hours, he still had no idea when he would make Tangshan, in Shandong province, the coastal industrial town to which he and his cargo were headed. Others were following the same route. Instead of celebrating Zhong Yuan festival, China's equivalent of Halloween, with their families, they were on the highway, smoking cigarettes. Another driver, who gave his name as Li, blamed the high toll fees on the roads in neighbouring Shanxi province – as well as the volume of traffic that has become a big problem in China.

drive from www.guardian.co.uk

From hoof to plate

August 28th, 2010   by lola

Afterwards, which is when I really began thinking about it, what was most striking was not that I had witnessed the death of a large animal, but that I had never seen such a thing before. I eat an awful lot of meat. I could not even begin to calculate the number of chickens, ducks, pigs, cows and the rest who have died simply to feed my appetites. But, jokes about my capacious appetite aside, we can agree that it falls under the heading 'lots'. And yet, not once had I actually been there for the moment of slaughter.

Well now I've done it and recorded the results in this piece about following an animal all the way from being 'on the hoof' to the butcher's slab (or almost; the animal I chose for slaughter had to hang for four weeks so the one I actually butchered was an equivalent). Nothing that happened is at all unusual. Millions of animals are killed to feed us every year and, as I say, the Limousin cow I picked out was going to be slaughtered whatever I did. It just might not have been so soon. The only thing that made the whole event remarkable is that I was there, which is solipsism run riot of course. If a cow dies in an abattoir and no journalist is there to see it killed, how do we know it happened? Bloody easy, mate: by the shrink wrapped steaks in the supermarket.

In writing about the experience I concluded the best approach was simply to describe what happened. Death is a drama all its own and need not be attended by histrionics. Still I suspect I'm going to get some in the comments section below this piece. Perhaps the fact that I was not horrified by what I saw means I am lacking empathetic skills; that I am, emotionally speaking, a plank of wood. Unsurprisingly I don't think so. Cruel or inhumane treatment is obviously unacceptable. Any animal deserves as pain- and stress-free a death as possible. But when, as here, it's done as professionally and quickly as this was, I can't claim to be overwhelmed by a sense of grief and self-disgust when I feel none. I did not hesitate about eating an equivalent steak a few hours later.

But it does raise a few interesting questions which deserve to be answered here. I asked Christine Thompson, who with her husband David had raised this herd, whether everybody should be forced to make the connection between animal and carcass. No, she said, because it might put people off eating meat and that was not in their commercial interests. Fair enough.

So then, do you think if you had to witness the death of an animal it would put you off meat eating? More to the point, do you think anybody who chooses to eat animals should be forced, as I have done, to witness what goes on in a slaughterhouse? And if you could avoid getting too shouty on the issues we'd appreciate it. Sensible measured debate please. A lot of blood has already been spilt in the researching of this piece. We probably don't need any more.

drive from www.guardian.co.uk

54 hot dogs in 10 minutes help 'Jaws' chew up competitors

August 26th, 2010   by lola

He came, he saw, he very nearly chundered. Joey "Jaws" Chestnut, a 26-year-old Californian with a famously-ferocious appetite, confirmed his standing as the world's greatest professional eater when he won America's most prestigious hot dog eating contest for the fourth consecutive time.

The former engineering student – who weighs a mere 16 stone – consumed 54 hot dogs in 10 minutes to win the 95th annual event, held at Coney Island every Fourth of July. His victory was relatively easy: his nearest rival for the $20,000 (£13,000) in prize money and mustard-yellow victor's belt was Tim "Eater X" Janus, who managed just 45 sausages.

The champion was nonetheless mildly disappointed at the result, having hoped to break his previous personal best of 68 and claim a new world record. "To be honest, the heat affected me," he said. "I stopped drinking water to relax my stomach several hours before the event, so I was a little bit dehydrated."

The Coney Island event, which began in 1916 and is still sponsored by its original sausage company Nathan's, has become a staple part of the star-spangled excess with which America celebrates its independence from Great Britain. The contest draws crowds of 30,000, is broadcast live on ESPN, and syndicated to over a dozen countries.

Americans enjoy 150 million hot dogs each 4 July, which according to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council is enough to stretch from Washington DC to Los Angelese more than five times. Few probably eat them as Mr Chestnut does, however. He has perfected the "garbage bag" style of hot dog eating, in which he crams two sausages into his mouth, before dipping the buns in water and swallowing them separately.

The Californian is one of dozens of men and women who now make a living on the competitive eating circuit. He holds several records, including the largest amounts of pork (4.4kg) and deep-fried asparagus (3.9kg) in 12 minutes.

Creeping professionalism comes at a price, though. The run up to this year's contest was marred by the withdrawal of Takeru "The Tsunami" Kobayashi – a Japanese pro-eater who has won taken the title a record six times.

drive from www.independent.co.uk

Hi-tech coffee: What's the buzz?

August 25th, 2010   by lola

To the untrained eye, the PC base unit belonging to Tim Quax, a computer programmer based in the Netherlands, looks like any other electric-green metal shell with huge black flames licking its sides. But inside the garish carapace of Quax's Compaq Deskpro lies neither motherboard nor disk drive. Instead, it contains a chamber for boiling water, a filter, a plastic nozzle and a place to store finely-ground Arabica beans. According to the machine's maker – who has melded the external parts of a computer with the functioning innards of a coffee machine – this is neither PC nor beverage generator. "It is a coffee-maker integration project," he says.

Among the countless millions of who enjoy a hot cup of coffee in the morning there is a breed apart. These are the caffeine freaks who want to harness technology to make their brew even better, whether it is home-grown aficionados like Quax – who've now taken to modifying their hardware, and posting the results on specialist "modding" websites like ByteMods.com – those posting on coffee blogs like the US-based Coffeegeek.com, or head honchos at international coffee companies and thirsty thinkers seeking the ideal cup of joe.

The latest piece of hi-tech kit providing a buzz Among these obsessives is the Slayer. Since it was launched last summer in the US the £12,000-a-piece machine has been sold to 20 coffee shops scattered close to the Seattle-based company that makes it; there are now plans to launch the machine in Britain. Its appearance has given coffee-lovers the jitters. With its rustic design and cutting-edge technology, it gives baristas a never-before-seen amount of control over how they pull an espresso shot. "The design alone is mesmerising," writes Erin Hulbert, a blogger on US food website Seriouseats.com. "The ergonomics provide smooth movements much easier for your body to withstand. The short height of the machine allows ample visibility for the barista and client to connect, creating better relationships."

According to bloggers such as Hulbert, the Slayer is part of the latest evolutionary waypoint in coffee consumption, something known colloquially as "third-wave coffee". Third wave, goes the theory, involves the rise of independent coffee shops – in London, there is the boutique coffee house London's Taylor Street Baristas, for example – which source a relatively small number of beans from small-scale farms. Starbucks – by dint of its size – is often unable to deliver this.

"What we're doing is a complete departure from the kind of coffee conventionally sold in bigger chains," says Eric Perkunder, one of the Slayer's designers. "Coffee has always been looked at as this monolithic property, bought in bulk. Nowadays the sourcing of beans is viewed much more in the way wine is. People source them from specific farms; often you can get a certain taste from a specific place. In order to make use of that specificity a new breed of machines has had to emerge."

drive from www.independent.co.uk

The hottest ticket of the summer (if you're two)

August 24th, 2010   by lola

It is possible for an adult to sit through hundreds of hours of In the Night Garden and still not have a clue what is going on. Children, however, see the multi-Bafta-winning show entirely differently. They know exactly what is happening – the only problem is extracting them from in front of the television set when it is on.

Not that most parents want to, because for a generation of pre-school-age youngsters, the CBeebies series from the creators of the Teletubbies, with its hypnotic hurdy-gurdy theme tune and baffling array of characters, has become a bedtime institution. Now showing across 36 territories worldwide, and having sold one million spin-off DVDs, 2.5m books and 4.4m plush toys, Igglepiggle and company are a merchandisers' dream.

This weekend the marketing boundaries will be pushed even further when Liverpool's Sefton Park plays host to the world premiere of a £1m live version of the show. Already being hailed as the biggest family event this summer holiday, In the Night Garden Live will play to 500 people at a time, five times a day, six days a week from July to October at city parks in Merseyside, London, Glasgow and Birmingham. More than 100,000 adults and their toddlers are expected to see the one-hour performances which promise to faithfully recreate the kaleidoscopic colours and surreal enchantment of the sun-dappled forest setting that has proved so popular with viewers since the series first aired in 2007. Tickets cost from £5 to £20.

Everything from Top Gear to The Tweenies has been rolled out at theatres and exhibition centres up and down the land to "broaden the experience" and the brand beyond the traditional screen. But nothing quite like In the Night Garden Live.

Two vast inflatable igloo domes with the appearance of giant bouncy castles appeared over the weekend among the trees in south Liverpool's sprawling Victorian park. Built by engineers at car-makers Ferrari to be capable of withstanding Force 11 gales, one of the structures will play host to a 13-tiered amphitheatre from which will fly a copy of the show's famous multi-coloured airship the Pinky Ponk, tethered to a height of 50 metres. Beneath this an eight-strong cast clad in the big woolly suits of the main characters – Igglepiggle, Upsy Daisy and Makka Pakka – will re-enact newly created stories based on some of the original television episodes. They will be accompanied by the distinguished cadences of the show's narrator, the Shakespearian actor Sir Derek Jacobi.

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