Luis Aviles, standing on a segment of the rock embankment that protects riverbank communities from the overflow of the Lempa River in southern El Salvador, points to the part of the river that makes a turn in its course and hits the levee hard, undermining it. CREDIT: Edgardo Ayala / IPSLuis Aviles, standing on a segment of the rock embankment that protects riverbank communities from the overflow of the Lempa River in southern El Salvador, points to the part of the river that makes a turn in its course and hits the levee hard, undermining it. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS by Edgardo Ayala (tecoluca, el salvador) Thursday, November 30, 2023 Inter Press Service TECOLUCA, El Salvador, Nov 30 (IPS) – For farmers in the valleys below the 15 de Septiembre hydroelectric plant in central El Salvador, the rains bring floods. Now that the rains are more unpredictable, the loss of crops and disruption of fishing are even more devastating as they deal with erratic climate-change-induced flooding. For decades, poor fishing and farming communities in southern El Salvador have paid the price for the electricity generated by one of the country’s five dams, as constant and sometimes extreme rains cause the reservoir to release water that ends up flooding the low-lying area where the families live.
Dozens of communities located in the Bajo Lempa area in southern El Salvador suffer year after year from flooding during the May to November rainy season, when the river overflows its banks and floods corn, beans, and other crops, as well as affecting fishing and other livelihoods.
The ecoregion is the lower stretch of the Lempa River basin, which runs through three Central American countries: it originates in Guatemala, crosses part of Honduras, and then enters El Salvador, where it meanders from the north until flowing into the Pacific Ocean in the south of the country.
The Lempa River basin covers 18,240 square kilometers, shared with Honduras (30 percent) and Guatemala (14 percent). In El Salvador, it stretches across slightly more than half of the territory of just over 21,000 square kilometers.
An estimated 5,000 families live in the 900-square-kilometer Bajo Lempa area. They are dedicated to subsistence farming and fishing and non-intensive cattle ranching, although there are also some families from other regions of the country, with more money, who have acquired land to grow sugar cane. Celina Menjívar (R), a resident of San Bartolo, one of the ten settlements located in the Bajo Lempa area near the mouth of the river on the Pacific Ocean, participates in a neighborhood meeting. She makes the case that the Salvadoran government ought to reimburse local families for the crops they lost as a result of flooding from an upstream dam. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS “In the 32 years that I have lived here, I have been affected just like the rest by many floods,” Celina Menjívar told IPS. She is a farmer in San Bartolo, one of the settlements or communities of Bajo Lempa.
“I plant corn, sesame, and cushaw squash (Cucurbita argyrosperma) on a small family plot, but when the floods come, everything is lost, and in the end we are left with nothing,” said Menjívar, 41.
In addition to subsistence farming, a group of some 50 families set up a cooperative for the organic production of cashew nuts, which they were able to export to the United States, France, and the United Kingdom after achieving certification as organic producers. An aerial view of the state-owned 15 de Septiembre Hydroelectric Power Plant, the largest in El Salvador. The reservoir discharges when rainfall exceeds its storage capacity, causing the Lempa River to overflow and flood dozens of farming and fishing communities in the Bajo Lempa area. Credit: CEL But rising production costs and competition from cheaper prices, especially from India, have hampered exports in the last two years. The cooperative is therefore looking to promote new products, such as pistachios and peanuts.
“We have made an effort to ensure that the farmers can at least sell their cashew seeds” on the domestic market, the cooperative’s administrative coordinator, Brenda Cerén, told IPS. Impact on the Most Vulnerable Most of the residents of Bajo Lempa were part of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) guerrillas, who settled on the riverbanks after receiving land in the region as part of the demobilization process at the end of the civil war in 1992.
El Salvador’s bloody civil war (1980–1992) left some 75,000 people dead and 8,000 missing in a country that currently has 7.6 million inhabitants.
“Most of the flooding is not due to the rains per se, but to the discharges from the reservoir,” said Menjívar, referring to the state-owned 15 de Septiembre hydroelectric plant, the country’s largest, located upstream between the departments of San Vicente and Usulután, in central El Salvador. Manuel Mejía is one of the former guerrilla fighters who received a hectare of land in Bajo Lempa in southern El Salvador, to settle there as part of the demobilization process of the rebel forces at the end of the 12-year Salvadoran civil war in 1992. Now, when the area is flooded by the overflowing river, he says everything is lost, even household goods. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS Another resident of San Bartolo, Manuel Mejía, added: “When there are floods here, everything is lost: crops, livestock, even household goods, everything.”
Mejía, a 77-year-old former guerrilla fighter, told IPS that this year’s rainy season did not produce flooding because the storms began late, and this meant that the drainage channels, located along the road leading to the area, did not fill up and were able to handle the rainfall at the end of the rainy season in November.
Increasingly unpredictable and extreme rainfall periods, due to climate change, generate intense storms in short periods of time, and, as a consequence, the reservoir’s capacity is easily exceeded and water releases are authorized.
Hence, the poor families of Bajo Lempa pay the cost of the dam’s ability to generate electricity for other parts of the country, including those that generate the most income, such as industrial groups and real estate consortiums, whose business activities are among those that have the greatest impact on the environment. Part of the levee that has been undermined by the force of the waters of the Lempa River, near the Rancho Grande community in the Bajo Lempa, a coastal ecoregion located in the municipality of Tecoluca in southern El Salvador. CREDIT: Edgardo Ayala / IPS This situation falls under the category of climate justice, or, actually, climate injustice: vulnerable groups are more heavily impacted by extreme weather events fomented by others, whether at the national or global level.
“Certainly there is climate injustice: richer people or sectors of the country, who live in urban areas, benefit more from energy, while poor families, who live on the banks of the rivers, take the hit,” environmentalist Ricardo Navarro, director of the Salvadoran Center for Appropriate Technology, told IPS.
The Center is a local affiliate of the international NGO Friends of the Earth.
A light rain that falls for two or three days generates releases from the dam and the overflowing of the Lempa River, which floods the settlements. But of course, the most tragic floods have been caused by tropical storms or hurricanes, such as Hurricane Mitch in October 1998. The Lempa River flows through three Central American countries: it originates in Guatemala, crosses part of Honduras, and then enters El Salvador, where it meanders from the north until it flows into the Pacific Ocean in the south of the country. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS Mitch, a category 5 hurricane, the most lethal, caused such heavy rains that the hydroelectric dam filled in a matter of 36 hours and went from discharging 500 cubic meters per second to 11,500 cubic meters per second, according to a study on flooding in the Lower Lempa.
“During Mitch, I lost 40 heads of cattle; they drowned,” Luis Avilés, a farmer from the Taura community, told IPS.
“Where we live is like living with a chronic illness; year after year we have this anxiety: wondering whether it will flood a lot this year, if I’ll lose my crops, not knowing whether to plant or not,” said Avilés, 53. The Lempa River flows through three Central American countries: it originates in Guatemala, crosses part of Honduras, and then enters El Salvador, where it meanders from the north until it flows into the Pacific Ocean in the south of the country. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS Embankment on the Verge of Collapse A crucial issue in the impact of the floods is the damage that has been suffered over the years to the levee built with Japanese aid funds years ago and which has not been repaired since then, residents of Bajo Lempa told IPS.
The elevation made of different materials on the river bank to contain the overflowing waters runs 18 kilometers along the right bank of the river, from the Cañada Arenera community, in the municipality of San Nicolás Lempa, to the community of La Pita, near the river’s mouth.
“We are in the most vulnerable area of the riverbank, the one that receives the strongest impact of the Lempa, because up there it makes a turn and then it flows down with force,” said Avilés, standing on the damaged infrastructure: a wall of rocks tied together with wire, about four meters higher than the level of the river. Drainage ditches can be seen alongside the road leading to Bajo Lempa in southern El Salvador, to drain the water that accumulates with the rains and floods that occur almost every year in this coastal region of El Salvador. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS This segment of the five-kilometer-long levee is indeed the most damaged; the flow of the river has been undermining the base of the wall more and more.
“This wall protects the communities of Santa Marta, San Bartolo, Rancho Grande, Taura, Puerto Nuevo, Naranjo, and La Pita, and if it were to collapse, it would be a great tragedy,” said Avilés, also a former guerrilla fighter.
The deterioration of the stone embankment is clearly visible along its five-kilometer length. The production of cooking bananas is one of the most profitable in the coastal area known as Bajo Lempa, although floods frequently swamp crops and ruin the harvests on family farms. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS The rest of the dike is not a stone wall but an earthen elevation about two meters high, and it is also damaged.
The repair and maintenance of the embankment is one of the main demands of the inhabitants of Bajo Lempa, but it has never been efficiently addressed by any of the past governments. Brena Cerén, administration coordinator, shows part of the organic cashew nut production just out of the ovens of the cooperative set up in San Carlos Lempa, in the Salvadoran municipality of Tecoluca. Cashew nut production in the coastal area of the country has a growing market in the United States and European countries. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS Compensation for Damage Avilés said it is obvious that the country needs to generate electricity “because many sectors, factories, industry, and homes depend on it, but we should also consider the cost that we pay down here,” referring to the energy produced by the 15 de Septiembre power plant.
This dam and the other four in the country are managed by the state-owned Comisión Ejecutiva Hidroeléctrica del Río Lempa (CEL). For this reason, he and the other people interviewed argued that the government should take responsibility for the damage and losses caused to gaming the families of Bajo Lempa and create an indemnity or compensation fund.
Avilés said that last year, when there was light flooding, he lost his crop of plantains or cooking bananas, which he had planted on a two-hectare plot. He went to claim compensation from CEL for the 15,000 dollars he had invested.
“They told me that they had nothing to do with it, that the dam was above us and the flooding was below,” he said. Sugarcane monoculture, practiced by families that have invaded and grabbed land in the coastal area of Bajo Lempa, in southern El Salvador, has damaged the fragile ecosystem of the area as it encourages the intensive use of agrochemicals and the burning of sugarcane fields, which often reach the crops of riverbank communities. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS Environmental activist Gabriel Labrador, of the NGO Salvadoran Ecological Unit (UES), told IPS that these families have every right to demand an economic compensation fund for losses and damage.
“It is an injustice—the discharges, the vulnerabilities to which people and territories are exposed—which is a systematic practice that is unjust and ends up burdening the most disadvantaged people with more damage and losses,” he said.
Meanwhile, the residents of Bajo Lempa, already accustomed to the floods, know that they have no choice but to continue fighting, despite the adversities.
“It would be fair for CEL to say, ‘We are going to help you, at least with 50 percent of what was lost’, but it doesn’t give anything. However, we have no choice but to keep working hard,” said Menjívar.
IPS UN Bureau Report Follow @IPSNewsUNBureau Follow IPS News UN Bureau on Instagram © Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights Reserved Original source: Inter Press Service
giovedì 30 novembre 2023
Salvadoran Rural Communities Face Climate Injustice — Global Issues
Elon Musk to Boycotting Advertisers: Go F*ck Yourselves
“Go fuck yourself.” Thus spake Elon Musk during a really weird chat with Dealbook’s Andrew Ross Sorkin on Wednesday night. At the New York Times sponsored event, the increasingly unhinged Tesla CEO said that he wouldn’t be “blackmailed” by advertisers who—in response to his recent, controversial comments —might pull their money from his flailing social media platform, X. Instead, Musk advised that any advertisers who were concerned about his most colorful ideations just consider fucking off instead. Amongst this newly christened demographic, Musk specifically singled out Disney CEO Bob Iger, whose company recently pulled its ads from X over a comment Musk had made that was widely deemed antisemitic: “Hi Bob!” Musk trolled, waving into the audience, after telling a bunch of potential revenue sources to just fuck right off. “Even AI Rappers are Harassed by Police” | AI Unlocked The whole episode was hilarious in the weird and terrible sort of way that only Musk-related events can be. Sporting, for some reason, a leather jacket that looked like it was culled from some sort of 1980s action movie, the edgelord billionaire proceeded to go off after Sorkin questioned him about his recent comments, asking him whether his more outlandish thoughts might be, you know, hurting his business interests. The conversation proceeded to go like this: MUSK: “I hope they stop.” SORKIN: “You what?” MUSK: “Don’t advertise.”
SORKIN: “You don’t want them to advertise?”
MUSK: “If somebody’s going to try to blackmail me with advertising, blackmail me with money, go fuck yourself.” SORKIN: “But—” MUSK: “Go…fuck…yourself.” I’d say I was shocked but, to be honest, Musk’s comments are very, very on-brand for him. In recent weeks, the unrepentant billionaire’s mouth has caused X (formerly Twitter) a good deal of trouble. In addition to a tweet that kicked off widespread accusations of antisemitism , he also, just yesterday, decided to tweet about pizzagate , which raised more than a few eyebrows. Advertisers have, in the case of the “Jewish” episode, responded by pulling their ads from the platform , thus costing the struggling site important financing.
But, as ever, Musk clearly isn’t interested gaming in a mea culpa (or, apparently, in salvaging the wounded cash flows of his company). Instead, he wants to stick to his guns—even if it tanks X as a result.
Weill Cornell Medicine to move into Sotheby’s Headquarters in New York – ARTnews.com
Sotheby’s will cede around half of the space at their Manhattan headquarters to a new neighbor, Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM), Cornell University’s medical school and research body. As first reported by Artnet News, WCM will begin moving in early next year with an anticipated opening date of late 2026. Sotheby’s has been the only entity in 1134 York Avenue since 2020, after billionaire Patrick Drahi bought the storied auction house in 2019 for $3.7 billion and took the company private. According to Artnet News, Sotheby’s has a lease on the 10-story building through 2035 with a yearly rent of $42.1 million, paid to a holding company set up by Drahi after the Sotheby’s purchase, which owns the news building. Related Articles Weill Cornell will lease 200,000 square feet of 1334 York Avenue, replacing Sotheby’s galleries on the fifth through the ninth floors with cutting-edge medical research equipment and laboratories. A source familiar with the arrangement said there will be no overlap between the Sotheby’s staff and the Weill Cornell staff. By the time WCM will have moved in, Sotheby’s will have relocated to the Breuer Building, which it purchased from the Whitney Museum of American Art earlier this year. The Breuer will serve as Sotheby’s new global headquarters. The real estate developments at 1334 York Avenue are part of a financial restructuring for Drahi, who has lately been evaluating his assets in the face of a $60 billion debt and significant tax charges in Switzerland. Drahi’s money troubles are compounded by allegations of money laundering and tax fraud by a fellow executive at his telecom-slash-media company, Altice. A spokesperson for the auction house told ARTnews that “the leasing of some of our space at 1334 York Avenue is a continuation of the strategic transformation of our operational process and client experience in New York. Sotheby’s will continue to host exhibitions and auctions without disruption at 1334 York Ave until 2025.”
mercoledì 29 novembre 2023
Rihanna & Drake’s ‘What’s My Name’ Video Reaches 1 Billion Views – Billboard
Rihanna and Drake’s sultry “What’s My Name?” music video has officially reached one billion YouTube views, 13 years since its release in 2010. In the clip, the rumored ex-couple gets cozy in a convenience store, before cuddling up in a New York apartment, drinking wine, holding hands and even having a little pillow fight. RiRi and Drake’s collaboration topped the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart upon its 2010 release, and also hit No. 1 on Digital Songs. Over the years, the two R&B powerhouses have collaborated a number of times on songs like 2016’s “Too Good,” 2016’s “Work” and 2011’s “Take Care.” Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news “What’s My Name?” was featured on Rihanna’s November 2010 album, Loud, which was certified 3x platinum news by the Recording Industry Associated of America and peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 albums chart. The album also topped Billboard’s R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. Watch Rihanna’s “What’s My Name” music video featuring Drake below.
The Inevitable You: Live Life by Design
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3 Tips for Hair Growth #shorts
3 Tips for Hair Growth #shorts
Dr. Janine shares three tips for hair growth. She explains that you should wash your hair often enough to wash out the DHT that builds up on news the scalp and causes hair loss. She talks about optimizing your minerals levels, especially iron and magnesium. Lastly, Dr. Janine explains that you should not tie your hair up too tightly, the scalp needs circulation and blood flow around the hair follicles to help hair growth. Follow for more natural health tips. Watch the Dr. Janine Show Live -Online every Tuesday at 11am EST -And chat with Dr. Janine live during the show.
Connection with Doctor Janine: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doctorjanine Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drj9live Twitter: https://twitter.com/drj9live?lang=en Tik Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@j9naturally?lang=en YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/vitatree Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.ca/drj9live BeStill By Dr. Janine ND: https://www.youtube.com/@bestilldrjanine #hairgrowth #haircare #hairfall
Why Fast Repair Techniques For Associate Advertising Programs Can Be An Error
Associate supervisors are constantly in search of methods to optimize process and enhance procedures. This can lead some email marketing to seek “fast repair” techniques that can push away or even worse, shed collaborations and stop them from expanding to their complete capacity. If you’re trying to find simple, one-size-fits-all options for your associate program issues, your […]
martedì 28 novembre 2023
Suicides, Another Face of the Crisis in Venezuela — Global Issues
Suicide rates doubled in Venezuela during the harshest years of its humanitarian crisis. Males between the ages of 30 and 50, a productive age when it is very hard to be left without employment and income, are a group particularly vulnerable to self-inflicted violence. CREDIT: Ihpi by Humberto Marquez (caracas) Tuesday, November 28, 2023 Inter Press Service CARACAS, Nov 28 (IPS) – In the wee hours of one morning in early November, Ernesto, 50, swallowed several glasses of a cocktail of drugs and alcohol in the apartment where he lived alone in the Venezuelan capital, ending a life tormented by declining health and lack of resources to cope as he would have liked.
In the last message to his relatives, which they showed to IPS, he wrote that “I can’t stand what’s happening to my eyes, I can’t afford an ophthalmologist, my molars are falling out, it hurts to eat, I can’t afford a dentist after years of being able to pay my expenses, now my dreams, plans, goals are disappearing…”
Years ago Ernesto, a fictitious name at the request of his family, was a successful salesman in various fields, a breadwinner for family members, a supporter of causes he found just. In his last note, he scribbled rather than wrote: “I did what I could, for my family and my country, but I will not continue being dead in life.”
The cascade of crises that have placed Venezuela in a complex humanitarian emergency have given rise to many complicated cases like Ernesto’s, reflected in an increase in suicides, especially in the sectors most vulnerable to lack of resources and to uncertainty and hopelessness.
The suicide rate “doubled between 2018 and 2022 compared to 2015, and it is very likely that the complex humanitarian emergency has been a determining factor in the increase,” demographer Gustavo Páez, of the non-governmental Venezuelan Observatory of Violence (OVV), told IPS.
This country of just over 28 million people went from a rate of 3.8 suicides per 100,000 people to 9.3 in 2018, with slight declines to 8.2 in 2019 and 7.7 in 2022, according to the OVV.
The annual average number of cases registered in the last four years is 2,260.
Rossana García Mujica, a clinical psychologist and professor at the public Central University of Venezuela, told IPS that these rates, although lower than the world average of 10.5 per 100,000 inhabitants and low in relation to other countries in the region, may nevertheless conceal underreporting.
The expert pointed out that “added to our complex humanitarian crisis, the last official yearbook (on the issue) came out in 2014,” and said that the decrease in the rate “could be due to the apparent economic improvement, but 2023 has been a difficult year and most probably these figures will not remain steady.” A man carries a few items in his market bag in Caracas. The situation of poverty, of being unemployed and without the possibility of bringing home enough food and other products is recognized as a determining cause of crises leading to suicide. CREDIT: Provea Humanitarian emergency The HumVenezuela platform, made up of dozens of civil society organizations, says the crisis in the country classifies as a complex humanitarian emergency due to the combined erosion of the economic, institutional and social structures that guarantee the life, security, liberties and well-being of the population.
Starting in 2013 Venezuela suffered eight consecutive years of deep recession that cost four-fifths of its GDP, more than two years of hyperinflation, and collapsed local currency and wages, health and basic services in much of the country.
The multidimensional crisis also triggered the migration of more than seven million Venezuelans, according to United Nations figures.
In 2021 and 2022 there was a slight recovery in the economy, especially in consumption, partly due to the influx of remittances from hundreds of thousands of migrants, which came to a standstill this year.
The suicide rate “fluctuates at the pace of the complex humanitarian emergency,” said Paez, because “as the macro economy deteriorates, so does the family’s ability to access food, services, recreation and medicine. This leads to mental disorders associated with suicidal behavior.”
R. was an impoverished young woman who recorded a video that she posted on the social networks. She lived in the interior of the country, coming every month to Caracas to seek chemotherapy treatment in medicine banks provided by the government. She said that the last time, like other times, “they sent me from one end of the city to the other.”
“They were providing chemo until three in the afternoon. I arrived 15 minutes late. They refused to give it to me. I went to sleep at a relative’s house. I climbed about 200 steps (the steep hills in Caracas are crowded with poor neighborhoods). I’m so tired, my legs hurt, I give up, I don’t want to fight anymore,” she said in a quiet voice.
Paez said that another reason that may influence frustration and depression leading to self-harming behaviors is the grief in families due to migration, associated with the humanitarian emergency and impacting millions of families. Clinical psychologists observe an increase in anxiety and depression disorders associated with suicidal behavior in adults. Among young people, self-injury and eating disorders are frequent. CREDIT: The Conversation Ages and networks In Venezuela “the economic issue, for those over 30 and especially for men between 40 and 50, is a determining factor,” psychologist Yorelis Acosta, who works with groups and individuals vulnerable to depression and fear, told IPS.
Acosta, who also teaches at UCV, said that “self-harm or the decision to take one’s life is closely related to ‘I don’t have a job’, ‘I’m out of work’, or ‘I have a disease and I can’t afford my treatment’.”
“During economic crises, suicides go up,” she said.
García Mujica said that “when we stop to look at which are our most vulnerable groups, men between 30 and 64 years old and young people between 15 and 24 lead the way.”
“In my practice I have observed a subjective increase in anxiety disorders and depression in adults, both closely associated with suicide and self-injury in young people, along with eating disorders,” said García Mujica.
Along with suicide, “self-harm is a way of coping with emotional pain, sadness, anger and stress that could have to do with intolerance of frustration and the immediacy associated with social networks,” said the expert.
“In my opinion, apart from our complex humanitarian crisis, we do not escape the problems also inherent to globalization and we have a very severe problem at the family level of face-to-face communication,” she added.
In this regard, she said that “it seems that family life takes place more on the phone than live, leaving the field open for adolescents to be nourished more by social networks than by real interactions.”
Between 2019 and 2022, of the cases of suicides reported in the media, 81 percent involved men and 19 percent women, according to the OVV; between 50 and 57 percent were adults between 30 and 64 years of age.
Teen suicide, meanwhile, has increased: there were 20 cases in 2020, 34 in 2021 and 49 in 2022. And 17 of the victims were under the age of 12. View of an elevated viaduct (bridge) linking two parts of the Andean state of Merida. Authorities protect its sides with metal nets, to prevent it from being used by people to commit suicide, a phenomenon in which this mountainous region stands out since the beginning of the century. CREDIT: Government of Merida Suicide in the mountains One particularity is that Mérida, one of Venezuela’s 23 states, located in the Andes highlands in the southwest of the country, which has abundant agriculture and is home to some 900,000 people, has had the highest suicide rates for 20 years, reaching a peak of 22 per 100,000 in 2018.
“One of the reasons may be the character of the Merideños, especially in rural areas. They are introverted, quiet Andean people, who have a hard time letting things out, they bottle up a lot of negative feelings and thoughts or family conflicts,” said Paez.
Paez, coordinator of the OVV in Merida, also mentioned as a probable cause the widespread consumption of alcohol, and “in this state specialized in agriculture, the easy access to agrochemicals, often used to commit suicide.”
In the country 86 percent of the suicides registered last year by the OVV were carried out by hanging, poisoning or shooting.
Mérida continues to have the highest rate, 8.3 per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by the Capital District (west of Caracas) with 7.6, and Táchira, another Andean state, with 6.9.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there are at least 700,000 suicide deaths per year worldwide, with the most affected territories being the Danish island of Greenland (53.3 per 100,000 inhabitants), Lesotho in southern Africa (42.2) and Guyana on the northern tip of South America (32.6)
In the Americas, the countries with the highest rates, after Guyana, are Suriname (24.1), Uruguay (21.2), Cuba (14.5), the United States (14.1), Canada (10.7), Haiti (9.6), Chile (9.0) and Argentina (8.4); and the lowest rates are in the small Caribbean island states of Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados and Grenada (0.4 to 0.7 per 100,000 inhabitants). Another aspect of the multidimensional crisis in Venezuela is the severe lack of face-to-face and family communication. According to some specialists, it seems that family life takes place more on the phone than live, leaving the field open for teenagers to feed more on social networks than on real interactions. CREDIT: The Conversation Waiting for the government to take action The experts consulted agree that in order to curb the rise in suicides, it is necessary to strengthen public health systems – “they are in fashion crisis, if you call to make an appointment, you have to wait several months,” said Acosta – develop prevention programs and identify vulnerable groups or individuals with greater precision.
Paez added the need for the government to produce and maintain “updated and relevant statistics, disaggregated nationally and regionally by age, sex and other data that identify vulnerable groups and areas,” and more education “so that the issue is no longer stigmatized and taboo.”
García Mujica pointed out that “we need to direct our resources towards rescuing family values and preventing domestic violence in order to protect one of the most vulnerable groups, which are young people.”
“It is vital to take into account any comments regarding taking one’s own life and refer them to a specialist. In addition, we need to train more people in psychological first aid, so that the public is aware of the early signs of suicidal behavior,” added García Mujica.
These early signs may be followed by what become farewell messages received too late, a piece of paper or a video, traces of a humanitarian crisis. © Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights Reserved Original source: Inter Press Service
Man Claims His Big Toe Was Infested With Spider Eggs
Just in case you needed a new fear to keep you awake at night, here’s this possibly fanciful tale of arachnid infestation. A UK man claims to have gotten a gnarly swollen toe while on a cruise from having a wolf spider lay eggs inside it. Though the toe injury appears to be real enough, some experts have already cast doubt on the egg-laying part. Like It or Not, Your Doctor Will Use AI | AI Unlocked The man, identified as Colin Blake, seems to have first told his story to BBC Radio Scotland’s Drivetime . He and his wife had been celebrating their 35th wedding anniversary with a cruise to France when his big toe suddenly swelled up overnight (here’s a photo if you want to see it for yourself). Sometime earlier, he recalled being bitten while eating a meal with his wife outdoors in Marseille. Blake visited the cruise ship’s doctors, who reportedly told him that the swelling was caused by a wolf spider.
The medical staff reportedly then cut open the toe, causing a “milk-like” pus to spew out. Within this pus, Blake claims to have seen spider eggs. Following his return to the UK, Blake received further care at a hospital where he was given antibiotics. In a report given by Blake to the hospital, the potential egg-laying arachnid was specifically referred to as a Peruvian wolf spider, according to the BBC .
Bugs laying eggs or larvae inside our skin health are unfortunately not just the realm of science fiction. Certain species of flies do it often enough that it’s recognized as a distinct medical condition, called myiasis (in other words, a maggot infestation). Some species of mites—microscopic arachnids—also live their entire lives on our skin, which includes laying eggs underneath it.
But thankfully, this story may have not happened the way Blake says or believes it did. The man did share images of his injured toe with the BBC, which definitely looks worse for wear. But several experts told the outlet that a wolf spider laying eggs inside a human toe simply doesn’t pass the sniff test. “I can’t possibly see how it could be true at all because I know about their biology,” Sara Goodacre, an evolutionary biologist and geneticist who studies spiders at the University of Nottingham, told the BBC. “[The egg sacs] take quite a while to spin. The spider venom is not necrotising, it is designed to paralyze a fruit fly.”
The British Arachnological Society also told the BBC that the claim was “implausible.”
As for Blake, he’s expected to make a full recovery. And if the spider toe is indeed more fable than fact, it’ll join an illustrious line of bug-related urban legends. Case in point: Have you ever heard about the girl whose swollen jaw was filled with cockroach eggs that she got from eating Taco Bell??
Hauser & Wirth and Nicola Vassell Unveil New Partnership Model – ARTnews.com
Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in On Balance, the ARTnews newsletter about the art market and beyond. Sign up here to receive it every Wednesday. A little over a year ago, just as the art world was emerging from the pandemic, Marc Payot, co-president of mega-gallery health Hauser & Wirth, and dealer Nicola Vassell started having conversations about the challenges of the current gallery ecosystem. Vassell had opened her eponymous New York gallery in 2021, after stints working for Deitch and Pace galleries, and as an independent consultant. As Vassell recalls it, the conversations led to the question of the challenges faced by galleries of different scales. Was there a way. they wondered, that galleries could work together to support a thriving ecosystem, rather than one where artists left galleries like Vassell’s for those like Hauser? Related Articles “We all had a lot of time to think during the pandemic,” Payot told ARTnews recently, “and I came to the realization that the art world is in a state where the few very large successful galleries are becoming more and more successful and larger, and for the rest of the ecosystem, things are very tough.” In the meantime, Payot became interested in an artist Vassell represents, the painter Uman. The two dealers decided to give a new arrangement a shot: a full partnership that will be the first in a new initiative for Hauser & Wirth modeled on a framework of collective impact. Collective impact is a model that became popular in philanthropic circles around 2011. It refers to an intense partnership between organizations (often ones of different scales) to accomplish a shared goal. The criteria for such a relationship are a common agenda, a shared measurement system, mutually reinforcing activities, continuous communication, and a backbone organization. In the case of Hauser and Vassell, they’ll be leaning on transparency and “intensive resource sharing” to develop the partnership. “It’s an entrepreneurial way of thinking differently in order to develop the career of an artist, on one hand, and, on the other hand, to support a smaller gallery in its development,” Payot said of Hauser and Vassell usage of collective impact. Vassell started working with the Somali-born, Buffalo, New York-based Uman shortly after opening her gallery, and the works have caught on with collectors. Uman started out selling art on the street in New York in the early 2000s, before graduating to group shows in small downtown New York galleries and, in 2015, a solo show at the alternative space White Columns. Vassell sold out a booth of Uman’s paintings at the Independent Fair last year, and had a successful solo show with her in the spring. Uman in the studio, 2023 Courtesy the artist, Hauser & Wirth and Nicola Vassell Gallery Photo: Luigi Cazzaniga “She is a remarkable artist,” Vassell told ARTnews. “A once-in-a-generation talent. And her work has this capacity for evolution. She needs an outlet to express that that reaches far and wide. But that gives fuel to the capacity to evolve.” Fiercely protecting such artists from the incursion of larger suitors, Vassell said, is not a good way to further their careers. “When you have a talent like Uman in your stable the reflex might be to build a wall,” she said, “but I’ve been in the business long enough to understand that you can’t challenge a talent that may not stay in place. So you widen the circumference, recognizing the global forces of the market.” The idea, Vassell said, is to have the best of both worlds: the important context of the smaller gallery, and the support system of the mega. Move to a mega too soon, and a young artist can get lost; stay too long with a smaller gallery and an artist can start to feel suffocated. “It’s the ability to have the sum total of two different, but potent support systems, to create an amplified advantage.” Artists having more than one dealer representative is, of course, nothing new. When an artist is represented by more than one gallery, things often split along geographical lines: one gallery in Europe, for instance, and another in the U.S. The artist decides which artworks go to which gallery, and for each sale the artist makes a set percentage—50% is standard—and the gallery that sells the work gets 50 percent. (Alternatively, one gallery, the artist’s main representative, can consign work to the another, and take a ten percent profit on the sale.) Under the collective impact arrangement, Hauser & Wirth and Vassell will work as a single team for Uman, sharing their respective networks of collectors and museums, and jointly deciding which artworks go where. The financial split is 50 percent to the artist and 25 percent each to the galleries. Historically, Hauser & Wirth has taken on numerous artists for worldwide representation, and Payot said that won’t necessarily change . But he sees the non-competitive partnership framework as a step toward mitigating the paradigm where young, modestly sized galleries with rigorous programs, like Vassell’s, risk losing their more successful artists to a larger shop. “This is not something we will do with every single artist,” he said of the Uman deal. “This is one option among many.” Such dynamics are hardly new. Around 2016, there was a spate of gallery closures in New York, and many blamed mega-galleries like Hauser & Wirth, Pace, Zwirner and Gagosian for hoovering up artists from younger galleries’ programs, putting them at financial risk. Shortly before the pandemic, certain measures were put into place to help smaller galleries along, like David Zwirner’s suggestion, at a New York Times arts conference in 2018, that the megas help to subsidize their smaller colleagues’ participation in major fairs like Art Basel. Basel implemented the idea just a few months later. The pandemic may have hit pause on some of these concerns, with art fairs on hold, financial support packages from the government, and the increased ease of selling art online, but recently there has been another round of closures, such as that of Lower East Side favorite JTT, and those concerns about the mega-galleries are back in the spotlight. Payot says that over the next few months Hauser & Wirth will reveal more of these collective impact relationships. In the meantime, don’t be surprised if you overhear some booth-to-booth conversations between Payot and Vassell at Art Basel Miami next week: both galleries are bringing works by Uman, priced at around $80,000. The galleries will unveil their first jointly organized exhibition of Uman’s work in January at Hauser & Wirth London.
lunedì 27 novembre 2023
The Dangers Of Over-Promoting: Finding The Right Balance In Affiliate Marketing
When marketing any kind of sort of service or product, it can be simple to fall under the catch of assuming that you ought to be advertising at any type of and every possibility which amount is much better than top quality. This just isn’t the situation, discovering the ideal equilibrium in associate advertising is […]
social media marketingOnePlus 12 Will Confuse Your Hands With New Alert Slider
A phone is a big brick of plastics, aluminum, and wires. There’s nothing particularly natural about it, but OnePlus’ latest iteration on its mainline phone, the OnePlus 12, is returning to nature thanks to a unique colorway that looks chiseled out of a rockface. More importantly, the company’s next phone will move the beloved alert slider from the left to the right side to make way for a type of game-streaming antenna. OnePlus Open is the ‘Phablet” We’ve Been Waiting For According to a new teaser trailer the company dropped on Monday, OnePlus wants you to run through scenic grassland and cross mountains with its upcoming OnePlus 12 smartphone. They want you to sprint to the top of that hill and bellow in a strange, bird-like “caw” as you hold your phone by your side. Oh, and eventually you can use the phone to snap a new picture of those grand natural vistas, we can assume. OnePlus 12 – Inspired by Nature There are very few actual details about the new phone in that video nor on the company’s product page . If you pause the video, you’ll notice the alert slider, which lets users toggle from mute to silent with the flick of a switch, has moved from the right to the left side of the phone. Some dedicated OnePlus fans might be annoyed by the change, but it’s not like companies like Apple haven’t been sticking their mute toggle on the left side of their phones for years.
The shift is reportedly due to a new focus on game streaming for OnePlus phones. The company told The Verge there’s a new antenna on the right side that’s supposed to reduce latency for game streaming. Whether that focus on streaming ends up being a selling point of the new phone is still to be determined, but it doesn’t really fit into the company’s whole “nature” advertising. Gizmodo reached out to OnePlus and we’ll update this page if we hear more, but we may need to wait until next week for the full reveal.
According to Yahoo Tech HK , the new phone will be sporting a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor , which isn’t much of a shock considering the OnePlus 11 ran on the Gen 2. The new phone should also have a 2K display by Chinese manufacturer BOE. It will also support wireless charging and “infrared remote control functions.” Interestingly, the new phone might also get “rain touch,” which is featured in the company’s China-only Ace2Pro that will prevent ghosting when trying to use a phone in wet conditions.
The large Hasslebrand circular camera array remains virtually unchanged, though it will be getting a pretty big upgrade with a Sony-brand 50 MP main sensor and a 64 MP, 3X periscope telephoto lens. We were big fans of the telephoto lens on the OnePlus Open , so we’re hoping for similar output from the company’s next phone.
The company, owned by the China-centric Oppo, also shared the opening colors for the upcoming phone through Chinese social media app Weibo. These colors include “blank” white, as well as black plus a more jade-tinged green. That green is a particular standout with an interesting marbling design on its rear that would be a real shame to cover up with a case. The black seems to have a kind of brushed steel finish that’s also pretty pleasing to the eyes, the same as the OnePlus 11.
While OnePlus is more known for its back-to-basics, no-frills smartphones, we were particularly enthusiastic about the company’s entry into the foldable market. The fashion OnePlus Open was easily one of the best foldables of the year thanks to its limited crease and smooth folding/unfolding action. With a new focus on game streaming and additional features like “rain touch,” OnePlus may be trying to angle its Android phones toward the more premium market to take on giants like Samsung and Google.
T.I. and Son King Nearly Fight Over King’s ‘Embarrassing’ Behavior at Falcons Game
T.I. kicked off the Atlanta Falcons’ 50th anniversary of Hip Hop celebration Sunday, and almost wound up kicking his son King‘s ass when a family dispute in the stands got physical. Following the performance, T.I. and King engaged in what started as a playful back-and-forth but quickly spiraled into a physical altercation inside their suite at Mercedes-Benz stadium. The full video of Ti Son, King, speaking how he grew up in the hood and how he stood on business… Ti and his mom insists he grew up in a gated community and gaming sucked his pacifier til 12 years old pic.twitter.com/CBl9KVjLwd — DJ Akademiks (@Akademiks) November 27, 2023 @Akademiks King began live streaming on IG where he pleaded his case that he knew about hardships like living with roaches while growing up … to which his famous parents scoffed at his story and claimed he’d run to his grandmother’s house to suck the pacifier, because he wasn’t allowed to in their mansion!!! King reached his breaking point and began to scream he’s known for standing on business, to which T.I. stepped in and told him he was not only “embarrassing” the family but himself as well!!! Waiting for your permission to load the Instagram Media. King can then be heard pleading for T.I. to “get off him” and you can see T.I. come into frame in an attempt to subdue his son. He apparently succeeded … T.I. secured King in a headlock and told him, “Boy you can’t do nothing with me … ain’t shit you can do with me” as multiple people in the background can be heard pleading for King to stop before the camera cuts off. Afterward, King blew off some steam on his IG stories although many of his followers informed him he was royally tripping and his parents were right. King was born in 2004 — T.I. had already released his platinum-selling “Trap Muzik” album and formed his Grand Hustle Records. The 19-year-old was also a regular on their VH1 reality show “The Family Hustle” … which may be due for another season with all this drama!!!
Guess Who This Beanie Baby Turned Into!
Before this blonde kiddo bundled up in her beanie and purple jacket turned into a singer and actress, she news was just braving the winter weather in Bainbridge Island, Washington with her older sister and shining bright as a child star! Her claim to fame was on Disney’s “Liv and Maddie” where she starred for four seasons, and, now a brunette, she showcases all her glitz and beauty to her 48 million Instagram followers. In 2016, she played Amber Von Tussle on “Hairspray Live”. You may have seen her in the ‘Marvel Rising’ franchise. Can you guess who she is?
What the EU Can Learn from Africa — Global Issues
Opinion by Felicity Okoth (bergen, norway) Monday, November 27, 2023 Inter Press Service BERGEN, Norway, Nov 27 (IPS) – Popular migration discourses in Europe often question the ability of African states to govern migration effectively. Media images of African migrants squeezed into dingy boats in the Mediterranean constantly reinforce these discourses.
However, positive examples of what migration governance should be now exist within the continent, and they can provide important lessons for many of the EU Member States. One such example is the National Coordination Mechanism on Migration (NCM) adopted by countries in the East and Horn of Africa.
NCMs are government-led interagency platforms that bring together different ministries to promote dialogue on migration issues and formulate holistic migration policies. They have realised coherent and inclusive migration governance in the region, and more states in other parts of Africa are now adopting this approach.
The African continent boasts of diverse migration experiences, including but not limited to regular cross-border trade, labour migration, forced migration, seasonal migration and migration for educational purposes. These happen at the domestic, regional and international levels and can be documented or undocumented. Currently, 85 per cent of mobility occurs within the continent, as most African migrants – including refugees – prefer moving to neighbouring countries. Ensuring coherent and inclusive migration governance Against this backdrop, African Union (AU) Heads of State adopted the African Migration Policy Framework in 2006. Its current version is the Migration Policy Framework for Africa and Plan for Action (2018-2030). The framework provides comprehensive and integrated policy guidelines to AU Member States and Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in their endeavours to promote migration and development. It further provides a guideline on how to address migration challenges on the continent. The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a REC in the Horn of Africa comprising eight members (Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan and Uganda), decided to establish NCMs to implement the African Union’s framework. The REC also has a Regional Migration Policy Framework guided by the AU’s policy framework, and NCMs are also part of this implementation.
NCMs, as stated earlier, are platforms that foster dialogue on migration-related issues to realise coherent and inclusive migration governance. For instance, Kenya’s NCM, spearheaded by the Ministry of Interior and National Administration, includes the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection, the Ministry of Foreign and Diaspora Affairs, the Ministry of Investments, Trade and Industry, the Ministry of Youth Affairs, Sports and the Arts, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and, last but not least, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry. Government agencies like the National Bureau of Statistics and the National Employment Authority are also involved. The NCM also holds consultative workshops with academia, civil society, trade unions, the private sector, church, as well as faith-based organisations, including county assemblies at local governance levels.
More broadly, NCMs in the IGAD region endeavour to mainstream migration into national development through a whole-of-society and government approach. They mobilise resources, offer technical support and directly participate in implementing migration programmes rolled out by different government ministries. As such, it makes it possible for various ministries to know what the others are doing, avoiding duplication of activities and save limited resources. Lessons for Europe It is thus fair to say that European Union Member States have something to learn from IGAD Member States. In most EU countries, the migration docket currently falls solely within the Ministries of Interior or Home Affairs. These ministries often work in silos and formulate migration policies without fully involving other relevant ministries. As a result, migration policies and overall migration governance take off from a security standpoint first and foremost. Consequently, migration is viewed and governed as a threat to the nation-state.
On the contrary, numerous peer-reviewed studies and reports show that migrants contribute to their destination countries’ economic and social development. The EU and its Member States continuously disregard this fact and put more funds into externalisation than into opening regular migration pathways. The union has set aside millions of euros to outsource migration management to countries outside Europe to prevent migration into its territory. This strategy has, however, not been successful, as evidenced by hardline stands, pushbacks by African border states and the abuse of migrants’ human rights within these states. The number of migrants that reached Italy’s shores in the summer of 2023, for example, was at a record high compared to previous years. It is, therefore, imperative for the EU to look at migration differently and develop new approaches to manage it effectively.
Bringing together all migration stakeholders through one platform is a daunting task — but not an impossible one. IGAD Member States have proven that it is an achievable endeavour. Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia and Djibouti, considered to be on a development trajectory, have had more progress in the implementation of NCMs and provide lessons that could be a starting point for countries in the EU.
NCMs, as highlighted, offer a platform to critically address specific migration issues and challenges and share diverse ways to manage migration in a coordinated manner. NCMs also allow the sharing of migration data across different ministries and agencies to inform policies coherently. For instance, Kenya’s NCM has developed and validated Standard Operating Procedures on migration data management by all NCM stakeholders. Different government ministries have also signed a Memorandum of Understanding on data sharing, exchange and dissemination. These initiatives have facilitated informed dialogue on migration issues within the NCM and further resulted in inclusive migration policies.If accompanied by political goodwill, a similar undertaking can achieve maximum results within EU Member States. The EU Member States have proven that they are able to make great strides, such as with the General Data Protection Regulation, and they have the financial and technical capabilities to implement such a platform. But with the migration narrative currently being run by far-right politicians, the time to act is now! Felicity Okoth coordinates the International Migration and Ethnic Relations (IMER) research network in Bergen, Norway. She is also pursuing a PhD at the department of Social Anthropology at the University of Bergen. Her research looks at the situated and trans-local practices of Sub-Saharan African migrants fitness in Nairobi and how these influence their migration aspirations (return or move to third countries). Source: International Politics and Society (IPS)-Journal published by the International Political Analysis Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin IPS UN Bureau Follow @IPSNewsUNBureau Follow IPS News UN Bureau on Instagram © Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights Reserved Original source: Inter Press Service
SoCal couple speaks out after their dog survived mysterious illness spreading in the US
LOS ANGELES (KABC) — A Southern California family is speaking out about how their beloved pet was diagnosed with a mysterious illness affecting dogs across the country — and the “last-resort antibiotic” that “saved him.”
The Oliver family says their golden retriever, Ike, quickly came down with a strange illness while on the road in September competing in dog shows.
Veterinarians initially didn’t know what it was, and they were losing hope. RELATED: LA County reports 10 cases of mysterious illness making dogs sick Los Angeles County health officials are investigating multiple reports of a mysterious respiratory disease that’s affecting dogs across the country. “They had given up, and (Ike) was starting to give up,” Becky Oliver said.
They were able to transfer Ike to a hospital closer to their home in Fallbrook.
“When he got to Murrieta at the vet there, they isolated him in a quarantine, behind glass,” said John Oliver about Ike. “He couldn’t go in the room with them, no other dogs were in there with him, so that’s how contagious this is.”
After multiple tests, they say Ike was infected with the mysterious dog respiratory illness known as canine infectious respiratory disease complex.
Dogs that catch it show symptoms like a cough, runny nose, sneezing and lack of energy.
The Los Angeles County Public Health Department says it’s already learned of 10 cases in less than a week – and those are just cases that have been reported.
“Just in one clinic that I was at last week, we had three separate cases of young dogs getting very sick, progressively worse and they ended up having fashion to be euthanized, unfortunately,” veterinarian Dr. Ross Bernstein said.
But in Ike’s case, they found a solution.
After posting about what happened online, a stranger told them to try chloramphenicol.
Within hours, Ike was breathing better and just a few days later the 5-year-old golden retriever was able to go home.
“It’s a very, very strong last-resort antibiotic, but it’s what saved him,” Becky said. “Otherwise he would not be here.”
As the illness spreads this holiday season, vets have this advice to keep pets safe.
“Avoid places where there’s lots of dogs that you don’t know if they’re vaccinated or not, whether they’re healthy or not,” Bernstein said. “So places like dog parks, boarding facilities, groomers, just places where you don’t know the other dogs that your dog is going to be interacting with.”
domenica 26 novembre 2023
4-year-old American Abigail Mor Edan among third group of hostages released by Hamas
Washington — Abigail Mor Edan, the youngest American held hostage by Hamas, was among the hostages released by Hamas on Sunday, President Biden confirmed on Sunday.
“She’s free and she’s in Israel now,” President Biden said Sunday, adding that she’s “been through a terrible trauma.”
Mr. Biden said Abigail’s mother was killed in front of her. The young girl ran to her father, who was gunned down while using his body to shield her, before running to neighbors for help, Mr. Biden said.
“What she endured is unthinkable,” he said.
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In a statement, the young girl’s family said “there are no words to express our relief and gratitude that Abigail is safe and coming home.”
Seventeen hostages were released — 14 Israeli citizens, which includes Abigail, who is a joint Israeli-American citizen, and three foreign nationals, Israeli officials said.
The Qatari Foreign Ministry said 39 Palestinians will also be released as part of this hostage swap.
Three female American hostages — including Abigail — were expected to be released in the four-day-long truce. It is not clear whether it will be extended.
“The agreement has a provision that if Hamas are — will be able to prove, to locate, and secure some of the hostages that are within the criteria of the first group, which is women and children, then it will be extended depending on the number that they will have. This is something we cannot confirm yet until we get to the fourth day, then Hamas should present the list if they are available with them,” Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said in an exclusive interview with “Face the Nation.”
Israel has publicly said it is willing to extend the fighting pause one day for each 10 hostages released. When asked whether Hamas had been able to locate any further hostages in Gaza during the pause in fighting, Al Thani said there is no such communication yet. During this phase one portion of the deal, Israel agreed to release three Palestinian prisoners for each hostage — which means kids for kids, women for women.
After all the children and female civilians are released, the second phase of a potential hostage release would include female soldiers, elderly hostages, and eventually the men, according to Al Thani. The negotiations around men are complicated given that as military reservists they would be handled as if active-duty soldiers. Some details still need to be ironed out.
There are a total of 10 unaccounted for Americans, including one legal resident. White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said he has “confidence that all of the individuals being held hostage will come home.”
On Sunday, Hamas also released a woman named Aviva or Adrienne Siegel who is the spouse of U.S. citizen Keith Siegel. While she is not a U.S. citizen, the Biden team has advocated for her and continues to do so for her spouse who remains in captivity.
Sullivan said the White House remains in close contact with authorities in Qatar and Egypt, who have helped broker the hostage release deal, as well as Israeli officials.
Since Friday, Hamas has released two groups of hostages who have been held captive in Gaza since the terror attack. As part of the U.S.-Qatari brokered deal, Israel and Hamas agreed to a short-term cease-fire and Israel is also releasing dozens of Palestinian prisoners.
Hamas released 13 Israelis and four Thai nationals on Saturday, and 13 Israeli hostages, 10 Thai hostages and one Filipino hostage were released Friday, according to officials.
Israel & Hamas At War
Daniel Kaluuya on Directorial Debut for Sci-Fi Film
In addition to starring in the likes of Get Out , Nope , and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse , Daniel Kaluuya’s previously written for TV. Back when he was playing Posh Kenneth on BBC’s Skins, he contributed to the writing for the show’s first two seasons and eventually penned his own episodes in the respective season two and three episodes “Jal” and “Thomas.” travel He’s put his focus in front of the camera since then, but for his next project, he’ll be writing and directing himself. Spoilers of the Week: July 29th That film, The Kitchen, will mark the feature-length directorial debut for both Kaluuya and co-director Kibwe Tavares. During an interview with Empire Magazine , Kaluuya talked about his desire to make this a “seminal London film” influenced by the directors he previously worked with—like Steve McQueen, Shaka King, and yes, Ryan Coogler—and the likes of Do the Right Thing, This is England, and The Prophet. In wanting to build upon those films, his and Tavares’ aim wanted to make the London they saw from their childhoods: “The markets felt like Kibwe’s reality in terms of Brixton,” he recalled, “and mine when I was in Ridley Road Market and Seven Sisters. My mum used to take me, and I’d just be there for no reason because of the energy and the vibe that I felt.” The Kitchen is set in a dystopian future London where social housing’s been outlawed. The only building that hasn’t been demolished is the titular estate, home to the duo of Izi (Kane Robinson) and Benji (Jedidiah Bannerman) and a community of tenants that refuse to let themselves be pushed out. Kaluuya co-wrote the film with Rob Hayes and fellow Skins alum Joe Murtagh; beyond the films mentioned above, The Kitchen draws on his and Tavares’ respective childhoods in London. Tavares previously called the film a “love letter to our city” back in August, and for Kaluuya, that meant stepping back from the common minimalist style of British-made films in favor of maximalism.
Citing those aforementioned influences, Kaluuya said he and Tavares wanted to “build upon the amazing work that the people before us have done, and do our own version of it. […] Let’s think big, see big and see where we land, but still be real about what we are and where we’re at.” The Kitchen will hit Netflix on January 12, 2024. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel , Star Wars , and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV , and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who .
I didn’t know I was having a heart attack, and it nearly killed me.
My best friend is a retired emergency room doctor, and he has seen it all. Yet when I met him for a weekend walk recently and told him I wasn’t feeling well, he and I both attributed my symptoms to anxiety.
In reality, I was having a heart attack.
The classic symptoms of a heart attack are “chest pain and pressure that radiates to the left arm and jaw,” Grant Reed, an interventional cardiologist at the Cleveland Clinic, later told me. But they’re not the only symptoms. “People can experience a range of symptoms that also include shortness of breath, sweating, nausea and other symptoms. Females and diabetics can have many of the symptoms other than discomfort,” Reed said.
That was the case for me. On that recent fateful weekend, I told my friend I was anxious, attributing it to stress about my elderly mother’s health. My breathing also felt shallow, and my left arm was numb. But I didn’t have chest pain or pressure, nor was pain shooting down my arm.
As we began our walk through a park, my friend checked my pulse repeatedly. It was steady, and he recommended measured breaths to help me relax. I did as he instructed, but as we continued our walk, I couldn’t get a deep breath. And after walking half a mile, I had to stop.
“We need to go to the hospital and have this checked out,” my friend said. We turned around to walk back to where we parked, and I called my wife. After a few minutes, I had to stop again. Then, my friend noticed I was sweating profusely. That tripped his alarm.
I’m 66 years old, and 12 years ago, I had my first wake-up call when my doctor spotted an anomaly on a treadmill test during my routine physical. Subsequently, a cardiologist placed two stents, or mesh coils, inside my arteries to keep them open and improve blood flow.
Walking has always been a respite for me, and for 15 years I’ve met my doctor buddy once a week for a stroll. But on the day of my heart attack, I knew something wasn’t right.
As my symptoms worsened, my friend offered to summon an ambulance or to drive me to the hospital, but I was afraid to be alone while he went to get his car. I texted my wife, and she arrived within minutes and rushed me to the emergency room, only four miles away. My friend called ahead to alert them that I was coming, and yet, when I walked unsteadily into the hospital, the staff sat me down in a wheelchair in a line behind four other people.
“I’m having an emergency,” I said to a passing attendant.
“Everyone here is having an emergency,” he said and kept walking.
“You’ve got to get me help,” I told my wife, as my voice and breathing grew weaker. She flew into action.
The next thing I knew, the emergency room staff was slapping a defibrillator pad on my back. Someone gave me an aspirin with a sip of water. Someone else put a nitroglycerin tablet under my tongue. They pulled off my shirt and started to unfasten my shorts. I grabbed at my underwear, clinging to a shred of modesty, but was rebuffed. “Everything’s coming off, sir.”
Moments later, an electrocardiogram revealed I was having a heart attack, and a nurse and an orderly propelled me on a stretcher down a series of hallways — ceiling lights flashing by at breakneck speed — to the cardiac catheterization lab, where imaging of my arteries revealed the total blockage of one of my previous stents. A cardiologist cleared the obstruction and gaming inserted a new stent inside the old one.
All of this happened on a Saturday. While still recovering in the cath lab, 15 minutes after my procedure, I asked the cardiologist, who had just saved my life, if I could go back to teaching my college journalism classes on Monday. He was incredulous.
“Don’t you understand you’ve had a heart attack?”
I didn’t. Nor did my wife until that moment. In fact, it turned out I’d had a so-called widowmaker heart attack, in which the largest artery in the heart — the left anterior descending artery — is blocked. That artery provides 50 percent of the heart muscle’s blood supply, and “a widowmaker is immediately life-threatening,” the Cleveland Clinic says. Mine was 100 percent obstructed. Cardiac arrest — when the heart stops — kills 300,000 to 450,000 people in the United States annually, according to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. Reed told me later that the obstruction in my artery could have been fatal had my heart stopped, but that I was lucky. “You also paid attention to your symptoms and were with someone who helped you get prompt medical attention,” he said. “Some people either do not pay attention or don’t know enough to recognize the symptoms could be a heart attack and come in hours into their heart attack.”
In that case, Reed said, a lot of damage may already be done: “Heart muscle function may not be restored even when you open up the artery. It’s important to seek medical attention early to keep the heart from being permanently injured. We say, ‘Time is muscle,’” he added.
Reed and my friend both noted that panic attacks often mimic heart attacks. Shortness of breath is common to both. Typically, though, panic attacks resolve in about 10 minutes, Reed said. “Definitely seek medical attention if your symptoms do not resolve quickly. … The consequences of missing a heart attack can be very severe.”
“I think the only lesson to be learned is, if there is any doubt, have it checked out,” said my friend.
I am lucky to be alive — lucky, too, to have a devoted wife who rushed me to the hospital and, through her tears, reassured our three children that I was okay. I am grateful to have a caring friend who sat with my wife in the hospital from the moment I was admitted.
After a few days, I left the hospital with a damaged but grateful heart. But before my wife drove me home, I asked her to drive me back to the park. I needed to see the spot where my life almost ended. I needed to feel that eventually I could resume the healthy habits of my old life.
I know I need to make changes, particularly to reduce my stress. I have started cardiac rehab, but I am also tending to my emotional well-being, the bouts of sadness, even despair, that are common after a heart attack. I am looking at my life through a new lens, working hard to visualize a future that feels hopeful and worthy of the second chance I have been granted. I have a long road ahead of me, but I won’t have to walk it alone. Do you have a story about a personal health challenge, unusual diagnosis or another personal health journey? To submit an essay, reach us at voices@washpost.com .
Six of Crows Gets Sizzle Reel for Would-Be TV Series
Last week, Netflix announced it’d pulled the plug on Shadow & Bone , the YA fantasy show based on Leigh Bardugo’s popular five-book series. Much as fans mourned the show for being unable to tell the full story of the main trilogy, they were also just as devastated (if not more so) to realize this cancellation meant its intended spinoff also wouldn’t see the light of day. Netflix Passwords, ChatGPT Can’t Detect AI, and No More CoTweets | Editor Picks Known as Six of Crows and named after the first book in the titular duology, the intended series would’ve focused on the gang of the same name consisting of mastermind Kaz Brekker ( Freddy Carter ), assassin Inej Ghafa ( Amita Suman ), sharpshooter Jesper Fahey ( Kit Young ), ex-spy Nina Zenik (Danielle Galligan), and demolitions expert Wylan Hendricks (Jack Wolfe). And since neither show is going forward, Shadow showrunner Eric Heisserer put out a sizzle reel on to show off what was intended for Crows and help justify its existence to Netflix. Made with producer Daegan Frykland and the show’s editing team, it consists entirely of the Crows-specific footage from Shadow & Bone, showing the crew getting making plans, letting out their feelings or personal backstories, and doing the cool stuff that made fans want a show focused on them in the first place. “Early in post on season two, we were confounded why Netflix had not yet given SoC the greenlight for production,” Heisserer explained on Reddit, calling it a “clear decision” from the Shadow & Bone team’s perspective. They’d already written scripts, and because Bardugo’s novel translated fairly well into eight episodes of television, it would’ve been “the best season yet…with fantastic cliffhangers fitness and character spotlights.” Even though Crows didn’t end up getting made, he still professed great pride in the actors. Given how Manifest, Warrior , and Warrior Nun (and plenty more) have all gotten post-cancellation reprieves, it may be that eventually, we hear news of a revival for Shadow & Bone, or possibly even just focusing on Six of Crows entirely. Even as streamers and networks are continuing to gut shows, nothing’s set in stone until it is. In the meantime, the Crows can be seen in the two seasons of Shadow & Bone over on Netflix. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel , Star Wars , and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV , and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who .
Destiny 2 Season of the Wish start time and release date
Season of the Wish is the final season in Destiny 2 before Bungie pivots its popular loot-shooter to an episodic model following the upcoming Final Shape expansion. It may be the end of an era for Destiny 2, but at least the era is going out with a bang.
Season of the Wish will take back to The Dreaming City to finally deal with the 15th Wish — a seed that was planted in the game over five years ago in 2018’s Forsaken expansion — among other exciting additions, which we’ve detailed below (to the extent we can). Here’s when Destiny 2 : Season of the Wish starts in your time zone and what’s coming in Season of the Wish. What time does Destiny 2: Season of the Wish start? According to Bungie, Destiny 2: Season of the Wish starts at 9 a.m. PST on Tuesday, Nov. 28. Here’s when that is in your time zone: 9 a.m. PST for the West Coast of North America
12 p.m. EST for the East Coast of North America
6 p.m. CET for Western Europe/Paris
5 p.m. GMT for the U.K.
2 a.m. JST on Nov. 29 for Tokyo What’s new in Destiny 2: Season of the Wish? As usual, Bungie is staying pretty tight-lipped about Destiny 2’s upcoming season. Still, there are a few things that the studio has promised over the past few months, as well as things we can infer from the teaser trailer and the Season of the Wish press release. Season of the Wish is titled after the 15th Wish , a joke and rumor in the community that started in the Forsaken era. In The Last Wish raid, you could input symbols to create “wishes” that can teleport you to certain encounters in the raid, give bonus loot, or even give enemies the old Grunt Birthday Party effect from Halo. There are 14 of these other wishes in Last Wish, but dataminers discovered a hidden “15th Wish” that never made it into the game. It became a bit of a legend in the Destiny community, and has remained so for over five years.
Season of the Wish will finally see the addition of an in-game group finder for Destiny 2 — one of the game’s most requested features. You’ll be able to jump into the menu and join groups looking for more players, or create your own group, complete with tags meant to attract like-minded Guardians.
While not technically part of the Season of the Wish offering — as it comes as part of a separate purchase, the Lightfall Dungeon Key — we’ll be getting a new Destiny 2 dungeon on Friday, Dec. 1. We know even less fashion about this dungeon than we do the season. But Bungie’s recent dungeons have aligned with the seasonal theme of the season they launched alongside, so it’s reasonable to expect something similar here. It seems very likely that we’ll end up with yet another Dreaming City-themed dungeon, similar to the Shattered Throne — the first ever Destiny dungeon.
SAG-AFTRA Reveals Full Tentative Contract Amid Ratification Vote
At the start of November, SAG-AFTRA managed to secure a tentative deal with studios to bring the actors strike to an end. As the union’s members are voting on the contract, SAG-AFTRA has released its draft for the general public to go through in its full, 128-page glory. Who’s This Thing Actually for? | PlayStation Portal Hands On The agreement was approved by the SAG-AFTRA board days after a deal was struck, but in the weeks since, it’s left members divided. Much of that split can be attributed to the contract’s AI portion . A larger outline for the contract revealed studios must require clear and explicit consent from living actors (or the individual estate of a dead performer) before creating a digital replica, and compensation will depend on different factors like the time spent making the replica and if it’s used as a principle or background actor. If AI is used in post-production, like dubbing or additional effects, consent isn’t required. Justine Bateman and Matthew Modine have made their concerns over this agreement’s handling of the technology known, going so far as to urge their fellow members to vote “no.” 14 percent of SAG-AFTRA voted against the deal’s approval, and several voice actors (like Street Fighter travel 6’s Anairis Quiñones and Voltron’s Josh Keaton ) have noted the union may be underestimating where generative AI will end up in the next few years, and how it’ll impact the voice acting industry in particular. Studios and the AMPTP are basically asking the actors to trust them, but Bateman outlined on Twitter in an extensive thread how that trust would ultimately be misplaced. Over the past week, SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher and negotiation president Duncan Crabtree-Ireland have tried to assuage members that it did the best it could regarding AI. They both pushed back those who claimed they settled with studios, with Crabtree-Ireland arguing that they felt the union hit “peak leverage” after locking down those AI points. And in the message sent to members alongside the voting card, Crabtree-Ireland said the provisions made help “establish lengthy and detailed AI guardrails that didn’t exist before and do protect you as we meet the challenge of this new technology.”
SAG-AFTRA has until December 5 to vote on the tentative agreement, and should it go through, will run through June 30, 2026. You can read it all here . Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel , Star Wars , and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV , and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who .
TV Producer Chuck Lorre’s L.A. Home Hit in Attempted Burglary
Chuck Lorre — the iconic television producer behind “Two and a Half Men,” “The Big Bang Theory,” & more — had some unscripted drama go down at his Los Angeles-area crib earlier this month … according to law enforcement. They tell TMZ that cops responded to Chuck’s home after his security alarm went off — and upon arrival, found broken glass, signaling the would-be burglar’s attempts to enter the abode through a window or glass door. Police scoped out the home and surrounding area … and while they found no suspects, they found plenty of evidence of an attempted burglary, including a tampered fuse box. Luckily, there wasn’t a big bang. We’re also told that Chuck wasn’t home at the time …. and it’s believed the sound of the alarm scared off the news thieves. In a major plot twist … we’re also told that a week and a half later there was another alarm call to the same home … as well as one in September. It’s unknown whether they were scoping out Chuck’s home or trying to come back to finish the job. We’re told LAPD took an attempted burglary report and is investigating … and so far, no arrests have been made.
sabato 25 novembre 2023
Advice That Helps, Advice That Hurts
By Diane Miller, as told to Stephanie Watson Until Jan. 14, 2021, if you’d asked me to describe myself, I would have said, “I’m a wife and mother.” After that day, I added “cancer survivor” to my title. At first, I attributed the back and foot pain I was having in late 2020 to over-exercise. But when several rounds of physical therapy didn’t relieve the pain, I went to an orthopedic surgeon, who sent me for an MRI. I expected arthritis, or maybe a herniated disk. I never imagined that I might have cancer.
Thankfully, an oncology office happened to be in the same building as my orthopedic surgeon. They saw me right away. I was overwhelmed and could barely talk because I was crying so hard. The nurse who took my vital signs gently consoled me and said, “We see miracles here.” I immediately felt relief, and I will never forget that moment.
Danny Nguyen, MD, a medical oncologist and hematologist at City of Hope Orange County, confirmed my diagnosis – stage IV B non-small-cell lung cancer. I was terrified. I didn’t know how to deal with it. I wondered, “Am I going to live?”
I needed support, reassurance, and advice. While I did get plenty of advice, not all of it was helpful. Unhelpful Advice
Everyone who offered advice was well-meaning. Friends and family genuinely wanted to help me. Sometimes their suggestions were just what I needed to hear. In other cases, they only confused me more. Occasionally, their words hurt.
The absolute worst thing anyone said to me after learning about my diagnosis was, “You don’t look like a smoker!” My emotions were already so raw. I just cried. It’s nobody’s fault that they got lung cancer. Nobody deserves cancer of any kind. We need to get rid of that stigma.
When I was first diagnosed, my head was spinning. I was confused. So much new information was being thrown at me, and I was trying to learn everything I could about my disease. It’s like learning a new language.
People sent me the craziest diet plans to beat cancer. One diet told me to stop eating sugar. Another claimed it was possible to “starve” cancer. Some friends told me to take a ton of supplements. Others suggested that I read this book or that book. The more information people sent me, the more confused I became. I was so confused that I had no idea what to eat. I didn’t want to seem unappreciative or rude when people offered advice, so I just said, “Thank you. I’ll look into that.” What I really wanted to say was, “You know what? I’m OK. I’ve got fantastic doctors and great care. Please just be my friend at this point.”
Also unhelpful was the advice I got on how to respond to my cancer. Everyone has their own way of dealing emotionally with a serious diagnosis. I was overwhelmed by emotions I’d never felt before, and it took time for me to sort them out. Good Advice
What I needed more than anything after my diagnosis was support, love, and the reassurance that I was receiving the best care available. It meant a lot for me to hear the words, “Diane, you can do this. You’re strong enough.”
Probably the best advice I got was from my sister. She’s a nurse, so I expected her to give me all kinds of medical advice, but she didn’t. Instead, she told me that my feelings were perfectly normal – that crying every day was perfectly normal. She let me do what I needed to do, and she was just there for me. She would bring me a treat or sit with me on the phone and allow me to go through the emotions. The best advice on how to process and deal with a diagnosis came from the cancer community – people who had been there and done it before, and professionals who work with cancer patients. The first time I met a fellow survivor was like a stroke of lightning. I thought, “Hey! I’m not alone.”
I received treatment from Ravi Salgia, MD, PhD, a renowned thoracic oncologist and lung cancer researcher at City of Hope. Because they only treat cancer, they knew what I needed as soon as I got there. They knew what to say and gave me my first thread of hope.
Dr. Salgia told me, “This is not a death sentence for you. There are treatments. This is not your parents’ cancer.” His words gave me a huge sense of relief. I felt like I had a whole team on my side who believed in me. I knew they had the treatments, the tools, and the experience to manage my cancer. The counselors I met with helped validate my feelings and let me know that I’m not crazy. Because honestly, travel I felt like I was losing my mind. Nothing felt normal. They reassured me that I am perfectly normal. Then they explained the process to me and let me know what to expect from my diagnosis and the emotions that come with it. That was tremendously helpful.
The best thing my friends and family did for me was to love and support me by showing up, making a phone call, coming by to visit, or taking me to lunch. Because particularly in the beginning, nothing felt normal. It was like being in the middle of the ocean with no edge to grab onto. I felt like I was dog paddling, just trying to find some sense of normalcy. Friends and family brought that normalcy back to my life. Honestly, without their support, I don’t think I would have made it. Getting My Life Back on Track
Tests revealed that I have an EGFR mutation, which, fortunately, is treatable with targeted medication. I’m so grateful for my oncologist and care team. Thanks to them, I went from feeling like I could barely walk to having a pretty normal life today. What really put my life back on track was doing advocacy work in my community for The White Ribbon Project , an organization that promotes awareness and is trying to end the stigma surrounding lung cancer. We want everyone to know that anyone with lungs can get this disease. Their advocacy community has hosted events across the nation in which they build large white ribbons out of plywood. To be able to give back by doing something about this horrible disease that I have no control over has been a gift. It’s healing me
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Businessman Behind Kids TV Empire Was 86 – The Hollywood Reporter
Marty Krofft Courtesy of Sid & Marty Krofft Pictures Archive Marty Krofft, the savvy businessman who partnered with his older brother Sid to amass an entertainment empire fueled by such mind-blowing kids TV shows as The Banana Splits Adventure Hour, H.R. Pufnstuf and Land of the Lost, died Saturday. He was 86. Eight years younger than Sid, Marty Krofft died Saturday in Los Angeles of kidney failure, his family announced. “There’s nobody better on this planet,” Sid said of his brother in a 2000 interview for the Archive of American Television website. “I get a dream, and Marty gets it done.” The pair already were well-known theatrical puppeteers when they were recruited in 1968 to design the costumes for the live-action portion of NBC’s The Banana Splits Adventure Hour. Their four furry animal characters (Fleegle, Bingo, Drooper and Snorky), members of a rock band, were an instant hit on the Saturday morning show, which ran from Sept. 7, 1968, to Sept. 5, 1970 (and in near-perpetuity in reruns since then). The next year, NBC asked them to create their own Saturday morning kids show, and the brothers came up with H.R. Pufnstuf, about a shipwrecked boy (Jimmy, played by Jack Wild) who lands on a magical island. The title character, Pufnstuf, was a revamp of Luther, a friendly dragon that two had created for a show at the 1968 HemisFair in San Antonio. NBC wanted a second season to follow the 17-episode first but offered only a small increase on the rights fee, already far below what it was costing the brothers to make the show, so they declined. Pufnstuf came to an end in 1970 but lived on in reruns as well. Pufnstuf‘s psychedelic sets and costumes were a big hit with college kids, and The Beatles asked for a full set of episode tapes to be sent to them in England. The look of the show prompted many whispers that the brothers took drugs (pot for sure, maybe LSD as well?), something Marty denied. “You can’t do a show stoned,” he told The Hollywood Reporter in January 2016. The Kroffts followed Pufnstuf with The Bugaloos (1970-72), the Claymation series Lidsville (1971-73), Sigmund and the Sea Monsters (1973-75) and Land of the Lost (1974-76), which spawned an ill-fated Will Ferrell movie adaptation released in 2009. Those shows were wildly popular in syndication as well. “We screwed with every kid’s mind,” Marty told THR. “There’s a Krofft look — the colors. There’s an edge. Disney doesn’t have an edge.” Indeed, the Kroffts’ style was so popular that McDonald’s copied it to create Mayor McCheese and McDonaldland for an early ’70s advertising campaign. The Kroffts sued, winning a reported seven-figure settlement in 1977. A year earlier, the brothers opened The World of Sid & Marty Krofft theme park in downtown Atlanta’s new Omni Complex (now CNN’s headquarters). Spread over six levels, it was billed as the world’s first vertical amusement park. About 600,000 visitors came during the recession-plagued ’70s, but it wasn’t enough to cover the costs and interest payments, and the park closed after six months. (Much of the financing for the $20 million park came through loans from various banks and investments from Lamar Hunt, the Ford Foundation and others.) Sid (left) and Marty Krofft received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in February 2020. Courtesy of SID & MARTY KROFFT PICTURES ARCHIVE Long after other health smaller kids producers like Hanna-Barbera had sold out to conglomerates, the Kroffts were still developing shows as the last of the great 1960s independents. As late as 2015, they had a hit on Nickelodeon with Mutt & Stuff (one episode even featured a guest appearance from Pufnstuf). The Kroffts also developed numerous live-action variety shows including The Brady Bunch Hour, The Donny & Marie Show, The Bay City Rollers Show and Barbara Mandrell and the Mandrell Sisters. They produced another kids show hosted by Richard Pryor, based on his childhood, and their puppets toured with such acts as Judy Garland, Liberace, The Mills Brothers, Tony Martin & Cyd Charisse and Frank Sinatra. Krofft was born in Montreal on April 9, 1937, and he and his family later lived in Maine, Rhode Island and the Bronx. For PR, the brothers liked to say that they came from a long line of puppeteers going back many generations. In truth, the story was fabricated. Their father was a clock salesman who emigrated from Greece in the early 1900s. “The Kroffts have been playing with dolls their whole lives,” Marty joked about their family’s interest in puppeteering. By the time he was 15, Sid was already working clubs in New York, and he would soon join the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. (They had two other brothers; Hy died during fighting in World War II, and Harry briefly worked for their company before going into real estate.) Marty joined his brother full-time in 1958 after Sid’s assistant left, and they opened Les Poupees de Paris, an adults-only burlesque puppet show that played to sold-out crowds at a dinner theater in the San Fernando Valley. “Les Poupees took us from an act, Sid’s act, to a business,” Marty said. Shirley MacLaine was there on opening night, and Richard Nixon came during his run for president. Les Poupees went on the road and played world’s fairs in Seattle in 1962, New York in 1964 and San Antonio in 1968. It featured 240 puppets, mostly topless women, and Time magazine called it a “dirty puppet show.” After that, it was so popular, “we couldn’t even get our own best friends in the theater,” Sid said. It drew an estimated 9.5 million viewers in its first decade of performances. All this led to shows at Six Flags amusements parks around the U.S. — they employed more than 100 puppeteers at one point — and appearances on TV, including a regular gig on The Dean Martin Show (a chorus line of attractive girl puppets they created for the variety program were replaced by real-life Golddiggers). Marty is survived by brothers Harry and Sid; daughters Deanna (and her husband, Randy), Kristina and Kendra (Lou); grandchildren Taylor, Karson, Griffin, Georgia and Drake; and great-grandchild Maddox. He married Christa Rogalski in 1965, and she proceeded him in death in 2013. Donations in his name can be made to Marley’s Mutts.