In the two years since he came to Washington, D.C., Carlos Carmonamedina has created almost 100 postcards of everyday scenes in the nation’s capital. Many have DC landmarks in the background, like the White House, the Capitol and the Washington Monument, but all give a taste of what life in D.C. is like. Niki Papadogiannakis spoke to Carlos about why he documents D.C.
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Los Angeles artist Robert Vargas says he’s fulfilling his destiny by painting a huge mural in his hometown. A tall building in downtown LA serves as his canvas. VOA correspondent Arturo Martínez reports.
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The United States is publicly blaming North Korea for unleashing a cyber attack that crippled hospitals, banks and other companies across the globe earlier this year.
In an op-ed piece posted on the Wall Street Journal website Monday night, Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert said that North Korea was “directly responsible” for the WannaCry ransomware attack, and that Pyongyang will be held accountable for it.
“The attack was widespread and cost billions, and North Korea is directly responsible,” Bossert writes. “North Korea has acted especially badly, largely unchecked, for more than a decade, and its malicious behavior is growing more egregious.”
Bossert says President Donald Trump’s administration will continue to use its “maximum pressure strategy to curb Pyongyang’s ability to mount attacks, cyber or otherwise.”
Pyongyang has previously denied being responsible for the attack.
But, the U.S. government has assessed with a “very high level of confidence” that a hacking entity known as Lazarus Group, which works on behalf of the North Korean government, carried out the WannaCry attack, senior officials told Reuters.
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Utah officials studying the possibility of Salt Lake City making a bid to host another Winter Olympics said Monday they would rather host the games in 2030, but could be ready if they’re needed for 2026.
Hosting the games after the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles would provide a better opportunity to raise sponsorship dollars, said Fraser Bullock, co-chairman of the committee and a key player in the city’s 2002 Olympics. Los Angeles has exclusive rights to negotiate first with potential sponsors to help fund their games, meaning hosting the games before them would be more complicated than after, Bullock said.
“But if nobody else bids for 2026, we would certainly be available,” Bullock said.
Denver and Reno, Nevada have also expressed interest in the U.S. Internationally, cities considering making a bid include Sion, Switzerland; Calgary, Canada; and Sapporo, Japan.
The Salt Lake City committee held its second meeting Monday, discussing in broad strokes budget, venues, staffing, transportation and environmental issues.
The group is leaning toward recommending that the city make another bid but will issue its full report to state leaders on Feb. 1. It will include a budget estimate and other detailed plans.
Salt Lake City’s pitch would be centered on being able to host the Olympics for less money than other cities by using existing venues. Some venues need improvements and refurbishing, but officials say they wouldn’t have to build anything from scratch.
It’s likely to still cost $1.2-$1.6 billion, officials have said.
“Our budget will be a fraction of every other bid city that is out there,” Bullock said.
Even though the 2030 Olympics would normally be awarded in 2023, Bullock said Utah must have its bid ready much earlier. Bullock says there’s a chance the International Olympic Committee awards the 2026 and 2030 games at the same time in 2019.
That’s what the IOC did in September for the first time ever, awarding the 2024 Summer Olympics to Paris and the 2028 Summer Olympics to Los Angeles.
Salt Lake City would first have to persuade the United States Olympic Committee it’s a better candidate than Denver and Reno because the country can only put one city in the bidding per cycle.
The USOC has until next March to pick a city for 2026, though chief executive Scott Blackmun said earlier this month that officials believe the 2030 Winter Olympics are more realistic. He said though they are still keeping open the possibility of making a bid for 2026.
Denver, which famously rejected an offer to host the 1976 Winter Olympics, has assembled a committee to take a tough-minded look at whether the city should pursue a bid for another Olympics. Denver Mayor Michael Hancock has asked the group, which includes former Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning as well as Gov. John Hickenlooper and the heads of companies such as Vail Resorts and Liberty Global, to look at whether the Olympics could be privately financed, gauge community support and study the possible environmental impact.
Among the international cities with interest, Bullock said he thinks Sion, Switzerland, is the best candidate. But, he said the European country needs to generate support first from its residents and lawmakers. Utah officials say they have polling that shows nearly nine in 10 state residents approve the idea of hosting the Olympics again.
Utah Gov. Gary Herbert thinks Salt Lake City should make the bid, saying that the state still reaps benefits from hosting the 2002 Winter Olympics, which not only brought billions in spending but invaluable exposure.
“Foreign direct investment in Utah comes with this exposure,” Herbert said. “It was a great door opener for us on international business.”
If Utah officials decide to bid, they may have to answer questions about a bidding scandal that marred the 2002 Games and resulted in several International Olympic Committee members losing their positions for taking bribes.
Bullock said he’s not worried because the 2002 Olympics were a success and the current IOC members remember that and not the scandal.
“We have a new group of IOC members who think of Salt Lake City very fondly,” Bullock said.
When director Ridley Scott decided to remove Kevin Spacey from his film All the Money in the World and reshoot it with Christopher Plummer, he did not just pull off an extraordinary feat.
Plummer’s performance as U.S. oil billionaire J. Paul Getty also subtly changed the tone of the movie about the sensational 1973 kidnapping of Getty’s 16-year-old grandson.
“There is a coolness to Kevin. That’s his style, even when he’s being emotional,” Scott said in an interview.
“This man [Plummer] has enormous charm, and when you apply that charm to such, sometimes really hard, words, it makes it much more interesting,” he said.
Part biography and part thriller, All the Money in the World dramatizes the kidnapping in Italy of John Paul Getty III and his grandfather’s refusal to pay a $17 million ransom despite being the richest man in the world.
In a rare move, Scott announced in November that he would reshoot the finished film with Plummer after allegations of sexual misconduct against Spacey, saying he feared negative publicity would damage the film’s prospects.
Spacey issued an apology for the first reported incident, involving actor Anthony Rapp. He has since been accused of misconduct by more than 30 men and dropped from the next season of Netflix TV series House of Cards.
Reuters has been unable to verify the allegations against Spacey. The Oscar-winning actor is seeking unspecified treatment, and a representative on Monday did not respond to a request for comment.
The Sony Pictures movie, now starring Plummer along with original cast members Michelle Williams and Mark Wahlberg, will be released in Europe later this week and in the United States on Dec. 25.
Plummer, 88, sought to bring humanity to Getty, although he said he “made no pretense at research” for the role ahead of a nine-day reshoot in London and Rome in mid-November. He did not see Spacey’s original scenes.
“I had to follow the writing, all in a very short space of time,” Plummer said. “I saw him more vulnerable than the script suggested … so he would have some dimension and some humanity.”
Plummer, Scott and Williams were nominated last week for Golden Globe awards.
Scott said he was initially drawn to the project not so much because of the kidnapping by the ‘Ndrangheta, the Calabrian mafia, who cut off their victim’s ear, but because of the elder Getty.
“He’s an enigmatic character who isolated himself through wealth. When somebody becomes that wealthy, all the friends start evaporating, so he was an isolated individual,” the British director said. Getty died in 1976.
Scott said the $40 million reported budget for the film plus $10 million for reshoots was “a little high.” The costs were borne by production company Imperative Entertainment.
He said he hoped the publicity around the decision to reshoot six weeks before its scheduled release would help rather than overshadow the film.
“I think it may have people attracted to it out of curiosity who normally wouldn’t come and see this film.”
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Facebook announced Monday that it removed nearly 3 million posts, including videos, ads and other forms of content, from its services during the first half of 2017 following complaints of counterfeiting and copyright and trademark infringement.
The worldwide data on intellectual property-related takedowns is a new disclosure for Facebook as part of its biannual “Transparency Report,” Chris Sonderby, a deputy general counsel at the firm, said in a blog post.
“We believe that sharing information about (intellectual property) reports we receive from rights holders is an important step toward being more open and clear about how we protect the people and businesses that use our services,” Sonderby wrote.
Transparency report
The ninth Facebook transparency report also showed that government requests for information about users increased 21 percent worldwide compared with the second half of 2016, from 64,279 to 78,890.
For intellectual property disputes, Facebook offers monitoring tools that alert rights holders to suspected copies of their videos and songs on Facebook and use of their brand.
Rights holders can send takedown requests for unauthorized uses to a team of Facebook content analysts.
Entertainment and media industry groups have long expressed frustration with the process, contending that they bear too much of the internet policing burden and that online services should be more proactive about stemming infringement.
377,400 complaints
Facebook did not supply data about earlier periods or release individual requests, a level of detail that advertising rival Alphabet Inc provides for requests to remove Google search results.
Aggregate data shows Facebook received about 377,400 complaints from January through June, with many referencing multiple posts. About 60 percent of the reports related to suspected copyright violations on Facebook.
A “small fraction” of requests were excluded because they were not sent through an official form, Facebook said.
The company removed user uploads in response to 81 percent of filings for counterfeiting, 68 percent for copyrights and 47 percent for trademarks, according to its report. The percentages were roughly similar for Instagram.
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The Federal Aviation Administration said Monday it will bar drone flights over seven major U.S. nuclear sites, including Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.
The move is the latest in a series of growing restrictions on unmanned aerial vehicles over U.S. sites that have national security implications.
The new restrictions begin Dec. 29 and include the Hanford Site in Washington State, Idaho National Laboratory, Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina, Pantex Site in Texas, and the Y-12 National Security Site and Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
The FAA said it is considering additional requests from other federal security agencies to bar drones.
Earlier this year, the FAA banned drone flights over 133 U.S. military facilities. The Pentagon said in August that U.S. military bases could shoot down drones that endanger aviation safety or pose other threats.
The FAA also banned drone flights over 10 U.S. landmarks in September, including the Statue of Liberty in New York and Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota, at the request of national security and law enforcement agencies.
It separately barred drone flights over the USS Constitution in Boston, the Gateway Arch in St. Louis and Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia. The list also includes Glen Canyon Dam in Arizona, Hoover Dam in Nevada and Grand Coulee Dam in Washington state.
Last week, the National Transportation Safety Board said a September collision between a small civilian drone and a U.S. Army helicopter was caused by the drone operator’s failure to see the helicopter because he was intentionally flying the drone out of visual range.
The incident between a U.S. Army UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter and a DJI Phantom 4 drone near Staten Island, New York, occurred as concerns mount over the rising number of unmanned aircraft in U.S. airspace.
The helicopter landed safely, but a 1 1/2-inch (3.8-cm) dent was found on the leading edge of one of its four main rotor blades and parts of the drone were found lodged in its engine oil cooler fan. The Army said previously the helicopter was not targeted and that it was struck by a drone being operated by a hobbyist.
Government and private-sector officials are concerned that dangerous or even hostile drones could get too close to places like military bases, airports and sports stadiums.
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South Sudanese refugees at the Bidibidi settlement in Uganda live a hard life, residing in tents and mud huts and surviving on international aid. But on Saturday, the refugees put aside their hardships and held a talent show, with songs and plays that touched on the war back home but that also expressed hope for peace.
Bidibidi is the world’s largest refugee settlement, according to the United Nations refugee agency. It houses more than 300,000 South Sudanese who fled their country’s civil war, now entering its fifth year.
On Saturday, memories of the war came flowing out, but this time, in acts presented at the talent show, ranging from dance, rap, music and drama acts.
The beats came hard and strong in the songs, instrumentals and dances performed on a makeshift stage that had no cover, exposing performers and the audience alike to the hot sun.
The Kejebere music and dance group won the show with a range of dances from Uganda and South Sudan.
Fifteen-year-old sisters Maneno Nunas and Vicky Nyoka, dancers in the group, were brought to the Bidibidi settlement from Yei by their stepmother, who built a small hut for them and left the girls to fend for themselves.
To survive, they sometimes sell food rations to buy other necessities. Maneno explained why they joined the talent show.
“The reason that, we should avoid thinking of those bad things. About our parents and the bad things that they [soldiers] were doing for us,” said Maneno. “We need to forget home problem, yeah, that makes us to join dancing.”
Yonna Tukundane, the public information associate for UNHCR Uganda, says the talent show will be a recurring activity.
“Our main objective is to create social cohesion between the different ethnic groups and the host community,” said Tukundane.
The winning team from the Bidibidi talent show will be mentored by local artists. Afrobeat musician Solomon Sentongo explains the reason he chose to work with refugee youth.
“These people are always feeling left alone. So, as an artist, actually young artist, I am here to give them hope, so they will not actually be despaired,” said Sentongo. “They will feel important; that’s why we are here.”
Reggae musician Inizu Ronald Peace had a strong message to the warring factions in South Sudan.
“Hey Mr. soldier man, what you fighting for? Hey, Mr. President, what have you done for my residents? Why this much greed? I see your eyes full of evil. Can’t you see, these guns are gonna kill us here today. Can’t you see, this love is gonna heal us. South Sudan. Cause we are one.”
Above all, the show demonstrated that Bidibidi’s got talent.
Twitter suspended the accounts of well-known white nationalists Monday, moving swiftly after putting into place new rules on what it sees as abusive content.
The account of far-right group Britain First, a small group that regularly posts inflammatory videos purporting to show Muslims engaged in acts of violence, was among the first to go dark. The individual accounts of two of its leaders, Jayda Fransen and Paul Golding, were also suspended.
President Donald Trump caused a stir last month when he retweeted a post by Fransen, drawing criticism from British Prime Minister Theresa May. Fransen and Golding were arrested in Belfast last week for allegedly stirring up hatred.
The guidelines, announced a month ago and put into force this week, address hateful images or symbols, including those attached to user profiles.
Monitors at the company will weigh hateful imagery in the same way they do graphic violence and adult content.
If a user wants to post symbols or images that might be considered hateful, the post must be marked “sensitive media.” Other users would then see a warning that would allow them to decide whether to view the post.
Twitter is also prohibiting users from abusing or threatening others through their profiles or usernames.
The account for American Renaissance, a white nationalist online magazine run by Jared Taylor, was among those suspended. The magazine responded to the Twitter ban with the terse message, “this isn’t goodbye” and referred readers to a chat site frequented by white nationalists. Brad Griffin, who blogs under the name Hunter Wallace on the website Occidental Dissent, said in blog post that he was also suspended, along with Michael Hill of the Traditionalist Workers Party and others.
The white nationalist Richard Spencer, whose account was not suspended, tweeted that he had lost more than a hundred followers in the past 24 hours and noted that he didn’t “see any systematic method to the (hash)TwitterPurge.”
There appeared to be some inconsistencies in the enforcement. Still on Twitter was David Duke, with some of his posts hidden behind the “sensitive material” warning. However, Twitter allowed him to keep the message “It’s Ok To Be White” as his header, even though the same phrase was hidden by the warning on his pinned tweet.
Twitter said it would not comment on individual accounts.
While the new guidelines are now in play, the social media company continues to work out internal monitoring tools and it is revamping the appeals process for banned or suspended accounts. But Twitter will begin accepting reports from users.
Users can report profiles, or users, that they consider to be in violation of Twitter policy. Previously, users could only report individual posts they deemed offensive.
Now being targeted are “logos, symbols, or images whose purpose is to promote hostility and malice against others based on their race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national origin.”
There is no specific list, however, of banned symbols or images. Rather, the company will review complaints individually to consider the context of the post or profile, including cultural and political considerations.
It is also broadening existing policies intended to reduce threatening content, to include imagery that glorifies or celebrates violent acts. That content will be removed and repeat offenders will be banned. Beginning Monday, the company will ban accounts affiliated with “organizations that use or promote violence against civilians to further their causes.”
While more content is banned, the company has provided more leeway for itself after it was criticized for strict rules that resulted in account suspensions.
There was a backlash against Twitter after it suspending the account of actress Rose McGowan who opened a public campaign over sexual harassment and abuse, specifically naming Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. Twitter eventually reinstated McGowan’s account and said that it had been suspended because of a tweet that violated its rules on privacy.
“In our efforts to be more aggressive here, we may make some mistakes and are working on a robust appeals process,” Twitter said in its blog post.
Twitter relies in large part on user reports to identify problematic accounts and content, but the company said it is developing “internal tools” to bolster its ability to police content.
Twitter also seeks to improve communications with users about the decisions it makes. That includes telling those who have been suspended which rules they had violated.
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Harvey Weinstein on Friday denied barring actresses Ashley Judd and Mira Sorvino from working on the movie adaptation of “The Lord of the Rings” or blacklisting them from further projects.
Weinstein, who has been accused of sexual harassment by more than 50 women, including Judd and Sorvino, was responding to remarks by “Lord of the Rings” director Peter Jackson.
Reuters is unable to independently confirm the misconduct allegations and Weinstein has denied having non-consensual sex with anyone.
In an interview with New Zealand website Stuff on Thursday, Jackson said he expressed interest in casting Judd and Sorvino in the movie while pitching the project to Weinstein’s production company Miramax.
“I recall Miramax telling us they were a nightmare to work with and we should avoid them at all costs. This was probably in 1998,” Jackson said.
“At the time, we had no reason to question what these guys were telling us … I now suspect we were fed false information about both of these talented women — and as a direct result their names were removed from our casting list,” he added.
The “Lord of the Rings” movie trilogy later went to New Line Cinema and released in 2001.
Weinstein’s spokeswoman Holly Baird said in a statement that Harvey and his bother Bob “had no input into the casting whatsoever” on “Lord of the Rings.”
The statement said that Judd was subsequently cast by Weinstein in two other movies — “Frida” and “Crossing Over.” It added that Sorvino called Weinstein earlier this year to ask if her husband, actor Christopher Backus, could be cast in the TV series “Six” that he was producing “and Mr. Weinstein cast him.”
Judd, responding on Twitter on Friday, recalled having detailed talks with Jackson about “Lord of the Rings” but “then I abruptly never heard from him again.”
Sorvino said on Twitter that she “burst out crying” when she read Jackson’s remarks, calling them “confirmation that Harvey Weinstein derailed my career, something I suspected but was unsure.”
Representatives for the two actresses did not respond on Friday to a request for further comment.
Reporting by Jill Serjeant; editing by Clive McKeef.
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Google and Facebook will have to accept China’s censorship and tough online laws if they want access to its 751 million internet users, Chinese regulators told a conference in Geneva on Monday.
Google and Facebook are blocked in China, along with Twitter Inc and most major Western news outlets.
“That’s a question maybe in many people’s minds, why Google, why Facebook are not yet working and operating in China,” said Qi Xiaoxia, director general of the Bureau of International Cooperation at the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC). In Google’s case, it left China of its own accord in 2010.
“If they want to come back, we welcome,” Qi told the Internet Governance Forum at the U.N.’s European headquarters.
“The condition is that they have to abide by Chinese law and regulations. That is the bottom line. And also that they would not do any harm to Chinese national security and national consumers’ interests.”
China’s Communist Party has tightened cyber regulation in the past year, formalizing new rules that require firms to store data locally and censor tools that allow users to subvert the Great Firewall that blocks sites including Facebook and Google.
Their rival Apple operates subject to strict censorship, having removed dozens of popular messaging and virtual private network (VPN) apps from its China App Store this year to comply with government requests.
In June, China introduced a new national cybersecurity law that requires foreign firms to store data locally and submit to data surveillance measures.
“We are of the idea that cyberspace is not a space that is ungoverned. We need to administer, or supervise, or manage, the internet according to law,” Qi said.
“Can you guess the number of websites in China? We have five million websites. That means that the Chinese people’s rights of speech and rights of expression are fully ensured.”
It was not clear what her figure of five million was based on. According to the website internetlivestats.com, there are 1.3 billion websites on the World Wide Web, defining a website as a unique hostname which can be resolved, using a name server, into an IP address.
Reporting by Tom Miles, additional reporting by Cate Cadell in Beijing, Editing by William Maclean.
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It’s all fun and games until a family gets behind the wheel. That’s the whole idea behind Volvo’s Drive Me project. Automated vehicles are now being test driven by families as part of a multi-stage experiment that’s taking place in Norway. VOA’s Steve Redisch reports.
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A boom in production of Apple iPhones is helping lift the economy of Taiwan, an industrial center that still relies on high-tech manufacturing contracts despite increasing competition from offshore.
Apple’s phone sales in the third quarter this year grew 5.7 percent over the same period of 2016, ahead of a cross-brand increase of 3 percent to 383 million units, market research firm Gartner says.
Orders for older iPhones as well as the iPhone X, which is seen taking off next year, have solidified orders for parts supplied by tech firms in Taiwan, analysts say.
Tech specialists say the Silicon Valley icon is looking this year to Taiwanese firms for chip production, camera modules, displays and final assembly.
Taiwanese-owned Foxconn Technology often assembles Apple gear at sprawling factories in China, for example. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the world’s biggest chipmaker, is building the A11 processor for the iPhone 8, local media reports say.
“It’s a good shot in the arm,” said John Brebeck, Taipei-based managing director of the Hong Kong investment consultancy Peace Field. “If you’ve got Apple making a new chip, if you’ve got the OLED (display) guys and if you’ve got Foxconn with the assembly, the camera module guys, that’s a pretty big chunk of Taiwan GDP.”
A reprieve as offshore competition intensifies
Officials in Taipei worry that China will take a growing share of the world’s hardware manufacturing business, a trend spotted in 2013 when Taiwan’s tablet PC assembly began moving across the strait. China’s costs are generally lower and production scales higher.
Taiwanese high-tech, an aging industry worth about one-fifth of the island’s $528 billion GDP, has long depended on Apple among other developers for orders.
Tech hardware contracts often follow from years of trusted relationships based on quality supplies or assembly, Gartner’s Taipei-based research vice president Tracy Tsai said, citing orders for Macs as an example.
Mac shipments should grow 4 percent this year and 3 percent in 2018 as users replace older devices, she said.
“Notebooks are a something that’s very focused on previous quality and the numerous standards maintained by suppliers, what they measure up to,” Tsai said. “It’s not so easy to change it all, so (it’s) still mainly about Taiwan.”
Apple declined to comment for this report, and its Taiwanese contractors seldom discuss the sources of their business.
Cycles in global demand for consumer electronics highlight Taiwan’s dependence on high-tech. When demand sagged in 2015 and early 2016, Taiwan’s income from exports shrank for 17 straight months. It has stabilized since then.
A tale of cameras and displays
Taiwan-based Largan Precision has made iPhone modules over at least the past six years, analysts believe. But the iPhone X comes with three-dimensional cameras equipped for face recognition, and given the depth of that new technology Largan may share orders.
Apple is expected to tap several suppliers for the related parts, said Bryan Ma, devices analysis vice president with market research firm IDC in Singapore.
Production of smartphone displays also shows pressure from China. Taiwanese display makers AU Optronics and Innolux ranked among IDC’s top five firms for market share in the third quarter.
But BOE Technology of Beijing reached the top spot with a 23.5 percent market share.
BOE gets subsidies from local government in China. It has held prices down and splits its business between higher-end OLED smartphone screens and the basic LCD type used by a range of consumer electronics, said Hattie He, an analyst for mobility service at Canalys in Shanghai. The Apple X uses OLED displays.
“To many Chinese vendors, BOE provides an affordable alternative to the international suppliers, gaining an edge in the OLED transition phase,” He said. “As display is part of the solution, being a leading provider will help BOE continue its growth.”
Chinese PC maker Lenovo and telecom equipment manufacturers Huawei Technologies and ZTE are reaching “sufficient scale to take their businesses worldwide,” Strategy&, a consulting group under PwC, said in a report. “They will be joined, in turn, by hundreds and then thousands more.”
Gains in 2018 from the iPhone X
Apple’s iPhone shipments next year will rise 8 percent to 240 million largely because of the X model, Ma with IDC says.
Apple had already returned to growth in China in the third quarter while posting “strong sales” in emerging markets such as India, Gartner says. The iPhone X got off to a late start, extending benefits to suppliers into next year.
“The expectation always has been that this 10th anniversary edition is going to hit big and clearly as the product came out it was obvious that they had done a lot in the product to make it dramatically different from generations of the past,” Ma said.
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Jazz superstar Keely Smith, best known for her immortal duets with her late husband Louis Prima, has died of heart failure at 89.
Smith began her professional career her hometown of Norfolk, Virginia when Prima hired her to sing with his band while she still a teenager.
Smith was known for her cool demeanor, her deep smoky voice, and distinct black pageboy haircut, a counter-balance to the high-energy trumpet-playing Prima.
They won the very first Grammy award for best pop vocal performance by a duo for their 1959 hit “That Old Black Magic.”
Smth’s solo career thrived after divorcing Prima in 1961, making albums and becoming a top attraction in nightclubs in Las Vegas and New York.
Egypt reopened on Saturday an ancient library that holds thousands of centuries-old religious and historical manuscripts at the famed St. Catherine Monastery, a UNESCO World Heritage site, in South Sinai.
The inauguration ceremony, attended by Egyptian and Western officials, comes after three years of restoration work on the eastern side of the library that houses the world’s second largest collection of early codices and manuscripts, outnumbered only by the Vatican Library, according to Monk Damyanos, the monastery’s archbishop.
“The library is now open to the public and scholars,” said Tony Kazamias, an adviser to the archbishop, adding that restoration work is still underway without specifying a completion date.
Thousands of manuscripts, scrolls, books
The ancient library holds around 3,300 manuscripts of mainly Christian texts in Greek, Arabic, Syriac, Georgian and Slavonic, among other languages. It also contains thousands of books and scrolls dating to the 4th century.
At least 160 of the manuscripts include faint scratches and ink tints beneath more recent writing, according to Kazamias, who believes the palimpsests were likely scraped out by the monastery’s monks and reused sometime between the 8th and 12th centuries.
During the library’s renovation, archaeologists apparently found some of Hippocrates’ centuries-old medical recipes. The ancient Greek physician is widely regarded as the “father of western medicine.”
“The most valuable manuscript in the library is the Codex Sinaiticus, (which) dates back to the fourth century,” said the Rev. Justin, an American monk working as the monastery’s librarian. “This is the most precious manuscript in the world,” referring to the ancient, handwritten copy of the New Testament.
The library also held some ancient paintings that are on display in the monastery’s museum.
“There are beautiful paintings in the manuscripts. When you turn the (pages) there is a flash of gold and colors. It is a living work of art,” Justin said.
Mosaic of the Transfiguration
The officials also inaugurated the Mosaic of the Transfiguration situated in the eastern apse of the monastery’s great basilica. It mosaic covers 46 square meters and features a rich chromatic range of glass paste, glass, stone, gold and silver tesserae. Jesus Christ is depicted in its center between the prophets Elias and Moses. The sixth century mosaic was created at the behest of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian, who also requested building the monastery.
St. Catherine’s, where the monastery is located, is an area revered by followers of the Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Like the Old City of Jerusalem, it has become a popular destination and an attraction not only for pilgrims but also tourists from the world over.
The sixth century monastery, one of the oldest Christian Orthodox ones, is home to a small number of monks who observe prayers and daily rituals unchanged for centuries. Its well-preserved walls and buildings are of great significance to the studies Byzantine architecture. It’s situated at the foot of Mount Sinai, also known as Jebel Musa or Mount Horeb, where Moses is said to have received the Ten Commandments.
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Top entertainment and business executives have agreed to found and fund a Commission on Sexual Harassment and Advancing Equality in the Workplace.
The new group was established at a meeting in Los Angeles convened by Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy, Nike Foundation founder and co-chair Maria Eite, talent attorney Nina Shaw and venture capitalist Freada Kapor Klein. It was attended by the heads of nearly every major Hollywood studio.
The establishment of the new group follows the recent avalanche of allegations about sexual misconduct and inequality in the entertainment industry.
“The Commission will not seek just one solution, but a comprehensive strategy to address the complex and inter-related causes of the problems of parity and power,” Kennedy said in a statement.
Anita Hill has been tapped to chair the newly formed group. She was one of the first people to introduce the public to the concept of sexual harassment when she testified in 1991 against Clarence Thomas at his Senate confirmation hearing for the Supreme Court.
“It is time to end the culture of silence,” Hill said in a statement. “I’ve been at this work for 26 years. This moment presents us with an unprecedented opportunity to make real change.”
Hill, a Brandeis law professor who has chaired the Human Rights Committee of the International Bar Association, said the commission will focus on issues ranging from “power disparity, equity and fairness, safety, sexual harassment guidelines, education and training, reporting and enforcement, ongoing research and data collection.”
Accounts in the New York Times and the New Yorker covering the allegations from women about predatory sexual behavior on the part of film producer Harvey Weinstein seemed to have opened the door for others to follow suit with allegations of sexual misconduct leveled against a host of other media and entertainment figures that have included Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer, Louis C.K., Russell Simmons, Kevin Spacey, Garrison Keilor and Brett Ratner. Not spared were political figures, including U.S. Senator Al Franken.
The commission said in a statement it will reconvene early next year to define its mission, scope and priorities.
With people coming from around the world to work in Silicon Valley, some struggle with the best ways to care for their aging parents.
Increasingly, the solution is an “affinity” retirement community, where older people from places like India and China can live near — but not with — their adult children. These communities break from traditional custom that parents and children live together.
“The children are so busy these days, they are all the time working, taking care of their kids, so we do not want to interfere in their lives,” said Asha RaoRane, an Indian national who wanted to move to the U.S. to be near her three daughters who had immigrated to San Francisco.
Her daughters started exploring the idea of a traditional senior retirement community, but were having trouble finding an American community they thought their mother would fit into.
In July, RaoRane, 70, moved into Priya Living, an affinity-living community, meaning it caters to people with similar interests, such as yoga and meditation.
Arun Paul founded Priya Living as a place for his parents to live. The couple moved from Los Angeles four years ago and are still in a ground floor apartment.
“In living here in America, as the son of immigrants, I’ve realized that there’s very unique needs that immigrants have,” said Paul, a real-estate developer.
“That old system was based on a different time when women were in the house, really taking care, in many cultures, of their husband’s parents,” Paul said. “Obviously the role of women in society has changed globally.”
New friends
For Bhagyashree RaoRane, 38, finding Priya Living for her mother has been a dream come true.
“We walked in and instantly it was like walking into an Indian community in India,” said RaoRane, a filmmaker. “Even the building is painted the same color as so many of the buildings in India are painted.”
This type of independent senior community came as a shock to Nagendra Prasad, 62, and Manjula Neelakantaiah, 53, who came to Priya on a two-month visit from Bangalore, India, to see their daughter, an intern at Google.
“Really, in the beginning we were surprised,” Neelakantaiah said. “In India the younger people, they definitely take care of the aged people.”
Not always a good fit
For a few residents, Priya is not the perfect fit. Dr. Byravan Viswanathan and his wife, Lakshmi, were born and raised in India but spent much of their adult lives in a small town in Pennsylvania.
“We had oodles and oodles of good friends and they were not Indians — regular Americans,” he said. “We had become so Westernized, we have to adapt to Indian living again. Look around. There are six different Indian languages spoken right now at this table, languages I have never spoken or haven’t spoken in decades.” Viswanathan’s daughter is looking into finding a more American community for them.
All are welcome
While the vast majority of residents are from India, Paul stressed that Priya Living welcomes people of all backgrounds. There are a few non-Indians who call Priya home.
Carlos McCann, an 89-year-old WW II veteran, has been living in the complex for almost 20 years, long before it was purchased and remodeled to become the primarily Indian community.
“Everything has sort of come together at this location it’s like it’s the center of the world,” he said.
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