The most extravagant weddings

The most extravagant weddings - Prince William's wedding is expected to rank among the most expensive of modern times. These are the A-list blowouts it will be judged against.

When it comes to getting married, the rich are really no different than you or me: They want to have weddings to remember. Their financial firepower just gives them more ways to pump up the drama than the average U.S. bride and groom with a $24,000 budget.

Rather than a simple spray of white roses, Donald Trump wed Melania Knauss amid 10,000 roses, peonies and hydrangeas. Where the more common man might have had Uncle Tony's son's garage band play at the reception, Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise had Andrea Bocelli.

When Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the heir to the throne in Dubai, married Princess Salama in 1981, his proud parents built a 20,000-seat stadium for the week-long celebration, the most expensive wedding on record at $100 million in today's dollars. The sheikh visited every town in the emirate by horseback during that week, and fed them all. During the ceremony, wedding gifts for his bride were delivered by 20 bejeweled camels.

When Indian steel barron Lakshmi Mittal married off his daughter Vanisha in 2005, the family sent out 20-page invitations contained in silver boxes. Mittal paid for 1,000 guests to stay for five days in five-star Paris hotels. The reception was held at the Palace of Versailles and concluded with a celebratory fireworks display at the Eiffel Tower. Total cost: $60 million, the third most expensive wedding of modern times by our estimation.

Across the channel, the British royal family has been no stranger to opulent nuptials. When Prince Charles married Lady Diana Spencer in 1981, the fairy-tale wedding, complete with horse, carriage and a worldwide TV audience of 750 million, had a price tag to match: an estimated $70 million in today's dollars, No. 2 on our list, with Diana's ivory silk gown alone believed to have cost more than $15,000.

Prince William and fiancee Kate Middleton will reportedly take a more low-key approach to their big day, opting to arrive in a car rather than the traditional horse-drawn carriage. Despite the nod to more austere times, the estimates are still staggering. Reports suggest the wedding could top $30 million.

Perhaps the propensity for all of us, rich and not-so-rich, to go over the top for our wedding is an attempt to make sure we're serious about our mate on the first go-round. An opulent service, with vows made in front of hundreds, can place an obligation on the bride and groom to work through rough patches rather than toss it all aside at the first hint of rough water.

But no amount of glitz and expensive pageantry offers any guarantee. Take Liza Minnelli and David Gest. Michael Jackson served as best man at their $3.5 million wedding in 2002. Natalie Cole sang "Unforgettable." The ultra-A-list guest list, which one wag labeled "night of 1,000 facelifts," included Elton John, Elizabeth Taylor, Kirk Douglas, Mickey Rooney, Barbara Walters and 1,500 others. Yet a mere 18 months later, the two split up amid accusations by Minnelli that he tried to poison her.

Here's hoping that Will and Kate do better.

THE MOST EXTRAVAGANT WEDDINGS

1. Princess Salama to Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum

$100 million, 1981 (today's dollars)

To hold a really large wedding it helps to have a large venue, such as the 20,000-seat stadium specially built for the now-ruler of Dubai for his 1981 wedding to Princess Salama.

2. Charles, Prince of Wales, to Diana Spencer

$70 million, 1981 (today's dollars)

There are special expenses when royalty weds, including mob control. Part of the millions spent on the fairy-tale wedding of the decade was allotted to ensure tight crowd surveillance. The joy of the occasion would later turn to ashes, proving that the amount spent on the wedding does not necessarily equate to the likelihood it will succeed.

3. Vanisha Mittal to Amit Bhatia

$60 million, 2005

Six days, 100 guests, the Palace of Versailles, free jet transportation to France for the ceremonies, five-star hotels, fireworks at the Eiffel Tower, can-can girls, all these expenses add up -- in this case, a total of $60 million.

4. Aleksandra Nikolic to Andrey Melnichenko

$30 million, 2005

Entertainment was an important part of the wedding between this Russian billionaire and model, with performances by Whitney Houston, Christina Aguilera, and Julio Iglesias, each of whom raked in an estimated $3.6 million for the gig.

5. Priya Sachdev to Vikram Chatwal

$20 million, 2006

Take 600 guests for a 10-day wedding celebration and jet them from city to city in India, and you have the foundation for an over-the-top opulent wedding. Chatwal (nicknamed the "turban cowboy"), owner of luxurious hotels such as Dream New York, managed to bring the event in at a tidy $20 million.

( yahoo.com )

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American Sex Portrait

American Sex Portrait - Alfred Kinsey spent 25 years conducting his famous sex surveys. From 1938 to 1963, he and his staff interviewed more than 18,000 men and women, asking about the relative frequency of practices like masturbation and premarital, extramarital, and homosexual sex. And almost half a century later, many of his results are still embedded in the public imagination. The great man's research methods have been called into question—in the 2004 biopic Kinsey, for example—and yet, who hasn't heard that 10 percent of men are gay, or that half of married men have had adulterous affairs?

Sex researcher Alfred Kinsey

Kinsey's pioneering work is still one-of-a-kind because in all the time since, only a handful of sex researchers have even tried to match his breadth, depth, and scale. For all our obsession with sex, we're skittish about studying it. There's one major exception: a large survey, conducted in the 1990s, that far outdid Kinsey in terms of statistical reliability. It's the most authoritative sexual self-portrait the country has. But you've probably never heard of its author, because unlike Kinsey, he has worked hard to keep it that way.

As a pioneer in the field, Kinsey had methodological strengths. To begin with, he was a counter, to the core. He gathered his data by conducting detailed, face-to-face interviews, occasionally lasting six hours or longer, and then tabulating how many people said they did what. He was an innovator in this regard, zeroing in on behaviors (whether a person had a homosexual experience or response, for instance) rather than identities (whether a person described himself as gay). That more concrete, less subjective approach has largely endured.

But Kinsey is a famously flawed icon. His subjects were not representative of the population at large, and his data probably erred in the direction of the sexually active and adventurous. He and his staff met some of the people they interviewed in bars or at parties, and got them to recruit their friends. Those most eager to talk about their sex lives—perhaps because they had sex lives—were probably overrepresented.

The same problem plagued the next wave of sex surveys. Researcher Shere Hite is a cultural critic whose 1976 treatise on female sexuality, The Hite Report, became a rallying cry for feminists and an international best seller. Hite found that 82 percent of women said they masturbated, and of these, "95 percent could orgasm easily and regularly, whenever they wanted." This was in contrast to the stereotype that "women are slow to become aroused and are able to orgasm only irregularly." In an interview last year looking back on her heyday, Hite said that she trusted her survey respondents because they often told her they took her survey "after they put their whole family to bed and they were answering on the kitchen table." But her results were, if anything, less scientific than Kinsey's. Though Hite tried to include women of many different backgrounds—drawing on the mailing lists of feminist organization, women's magazines, and some religious groups—her overall response rate was low, making it hard to generalize from her numbers. Highly publicized surveys in the 1970s from Redbook, Playboy, and others had similar problems.

It wasn't until the early 1990s that sex surveys caught up with statistics, in the work of Edward Laumann of the University of Chicago. Laumann is a former provost of the university, a venerable sociologist, and an expert on social networks. He's wary of negative press, likes to downplay controversy, and giggles disarmingly over the boring headlines he's generated over the years. In the mid-1980s, with the threat of HIV looming, Laumann's interest turned to sexual networks and the need for better data on sexual behavior. By this time, conservatives were heading off sex studies, afraid that the results would show high rates of homosexual and premarital sex and so make them seem normal. If, God forbid, a government-sponsored study had echoed Kinsey's findings, the results would have been hard to dismiss. Thus, Congress withdrew funding for a large-scale survey that Laumann had begun preliminary work on. But a smaller, privately funded version proceeded, in part because of the HIV imperative.

In the end, conservatives had less to fear from Laumann than from his predecessors. Among his most famous results, published in 1994: Less than 5 percent of men said that they had had a same-sex sexual experience since the age of 18, half of Kinsey's 10 percent figure. As writer Katha Pollit quipped in The Nation, "It isn't 10 percent of Americans who are gay, it's 10 percent of New Yorkers." Laumann's adultery number for men was also half the Kinsey figure: Only 25 percent of married men (and roughly 15 percent of married women) reported having had extramarital sex.

Laumann's work countered the fond image of a national sex party. More than 80 percent of his interviewees said they'd had either one or no sexual partners in the prior year. If Kinsey made people think about the elephant in the master bedroom that at the time no one talked about in public, Laumann reeled us back in from the Madonna sex-is-everywhere idea. Kinsey may have reassured people that their taboo practices were not so taboo; Laumann helped the more conventional among us take comfort that the neighbors weren't having all that much fun, either.

Most importantly, in terms of the development of the field, Laumann used up-to-date, rigorous methods to collect his data. He and his team selected a representative sample of American households, and then tried to interview one adult between the ages of 18 and 59 in each of them. The researchers scored an impressive 78.6 percent response rate, interviewing a total of 3,342 people. If the number of respondents was one-fifth Kinsey's total, it was still a better snapshot of the nation.

Laumann wasn't perfect: His team conducted a small number of interviews with the subject's partner in the room, reducing the likelihood of truthful answers to certain questions—involving affairs, say, or homosexuality. After the interview, the team also asked for written responses to selected questions—about masturbation, for instance—that were to be entombed in a sealed envelope, a setup that might have telegraphed extra sensitivity and led to underreporting. There was also the nagging question, and one that haunts any sex survey (or a survey of any sensitive issue, for that matter), of whether people were really telling the truth. Still, Laumann points out that data collected in 2002 by the National Center for Health Statistics corroborated some of his basic findings about the prevalence of homosexuality and the number of partners people tend to have.

So, where's the Laumann biopic? Kinsey came first, and being first at anything always helps in the fame department. And he was promptly martyred by conservatives—his legacy is still dogged by unfair accusations of pedophilia—paving the way for progressives to lionize him later. Laumann, by contrast, showed up at a relatively blasé moment, and his findings had less shock value. His work was also more formally academic, employing a team of more than 150 interviewers. (Kinsey had just a handful, and did a large number of interviews himself).

But Laumann says he and his colleagues also shrank from pop stardom and tried to "downplay who we were as individuals." Working intensively with media handlers, Laumann's team didn't advertise results that would rile conservatives (for instance, that 17 percent of women said they'd been sexually touched by an older person during childhood). Instead, they emphasized the least threatening findings (that married people reported the highest levels of sexual satisfaction).

Having mastered the art of the huge sex survey, and calmed conservatives, Laumann now argues that the questions most worth exploring are the fine-grained ones: how sexual expression plays out locally, for instance, or among different ethnic groups. Or what circumcised men do differently from uncircumcised ones (Laumann found that they tend to masturbate more), or how women's and men's arousal differs. He's also interested in international comparisons of sexual satisfaction and has worked on that issue with money from Pfizer, makers of Viagra. Laumann also had a hand in the research on sex among older adults recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Laumann's recommendations make sense; still, the allure of a bigger, better American sex survey endures. Laumann's 1994 findings are recent compared with Kinsey's, but no longer new. For lofty abstract reasons—self-understanding—and more practical ones—better sex ed and STD prevention—we could do with an updated snapshot. Where better to look for it than the Kinsey Institute of Indiana University, which Alfred Kinsey founded in 1947? Researchers there are exploring the possibility of a big survey, and testing an approach that would make greater use of computer responses (while trying to ensure that precocious 13-year-olds won't sneak on to pose as hypersexed adults). Let's hope they scrape up the roughly $2.7 million they need for the project.

Meanwhile, other researchers continue to mine the Kinsey data to test their own hypotheses—for instance, whether men who have more older brothers are more likely to be gay, or a new project on how prison time affects men's and women's sexuality. Kinsey's data aren't the last word on matters sexual, but they're sometimes still the first. ( slate.com )

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More than 2m child pornography images were circulated by just 100 paedophiles convicted in past 20 months

More than 2m child pornography images were circulated by just 100 paedophiles convicted in past 20 months

More than two million indecent internet images of children were circulated by 100 child sex offenders convicted in the past 20 months, an NSPCC investigation found.

The children's charity said the 'alarming' haul was enough to cover the football pitch at Wembley Stadium twice over.

One in four of the offenders held a 'position of trust' allowing them direct contact with children, the study revealed.

These included teachers, school workers, clergymen, medical professionals, police officers and a social worker.

Nearly 50,000 photographs and videos confiscated were in the most serious categories of abuse, with some showing children and babies being raped by adults.

Diana Sutton, NSPCC head of public affairs and campaigns, said: 'The scale of graphic child sex abuse pictures and videos over the internet is very alarming.

More than two million indecent internet images of children were circulated by 100 child sex offenders convicted in the past 20 months

'The number of images seized in these cases is enough to cover the pitch at Wembley Stadium twice over - and this is just a sample.

'Many more people were convicted for possessing, making and distributing indecent images of children online during the same period.

'Children and babies are being seriously sexually assaulted to feed the demand for these photos and videos.

'And each time they are viewed, more degradation is heaped on the young victims.'

The collection of images seized by police was revealed in a selection of news reports on court cases from across the UK studied by the charity.

Although a snapshot, the charity said it was the first time the number of online child abuse images being distributed had been counted in this way.

Each case included in the study resulted in criminal convictions.

The study showed 10 per cent of those convicted had been hoarding child abuse images for five years or more before they were caught.

A third of offenders involved in the court hearings had shared files or distributed pictures of child sex abuse online.

One in six had a conviction for sexually assaulting or grooming a child for sex.

Ms Sutton said the investigation showed the battle against internet paedophiles was 'far from won'.

'Recent years have seen some welcome measures in the UK to drive child abuse images from the internet,' she said.

'But the battle is far from won. Offenders are now trying to keep under the radar by using peer-to-peer file-sharing software instead.

'The NSPCC is calling on the next government to work with industry and law enforcement agencies on an action plan to combat peer-to-peer file sharing.

'Making the internet safer for children should be a priority for all Parliamentary candidates during the General Election campaign.

'In particular, we are calling on party leaders to show their commitment now to putting this disgusting industry out of business.'

In December, Vanessa George, then 39, who worked at Little Ted's Nursery in Plymouth, Devon, was jailed indefinitely after a court heard how she 'plumbed new depths of depravity' by abusing babies and toddlers in her care. ( dailymail.co.uk )

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Smoking Keeps Its Grip on Urban Poor

Smoking Keeps Its Grip on Urban Poor. Misconceptions, marketing are boosting rates to double the national average, researchers say . A full 42 percent of people in Milwaukee's poorest neighborhoods smoke -- more than twice the national U.S. average -- sacrificing $9 on a pack of cigarettes even while most of the households reported earning less than $15,000 a year.

Even more troubling is the fact that a large number of these low-income smokers hold beliefs that make them less likely to quit, according to ongoing research from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Over the past 40 years or so, the overall smoking rate in the United States has decreased to about 20 percent, but those gains have taken place largely among people with resources, namely money and education, said Bruce Christiansen, an associate scientist with the University of Wisconsin Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention in Madison, who is one of the researchers on what's known as the "ZIP Code" project.

"With public health, we got 80 percent of the people who were going to quit smoking to quit smoking. That's great, but the next 20 percent is going to be tough," added Dr. Jay Brooks, chairman of hematology/oncology at Ochsner Health System in New Orleans. "Smoking tends to be a disease of poverty and lack of education. Thirty years ago, 50 percent of the population smoked and now we're down to roughly 25 percent. What we have left is a very select group of people."

That select group includes people with mental health issues, which, according to the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration (SAMHSA), smoke 44 percent of all cigarettes.

Not only are these groups often specifically targeted by Big Tobacco, they also tend to reside in areas without extensive health care systems and don't have insurance, Christiansen said.

This study, a partnership between the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and the Salvation Army, sent five interviewers door-to-door in two of Milwaukee's poorest ZIP codes.

Interviews were conducted primarily between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. on weekdays, catching the "poorest of the poor," those who don't work. Many in the group would be hard to capture in a regular survey as they often don't have phones, Christiansen said.

Responses from 654 smokers living in low-income neighborhoods revealed the following:

* People who smoked thought most other people smoked as well and, when asked, said that 73 percent of adults smoked, way higher than the 20 percent who actually do.
* Almost two-thirds thought it was okay to smoke as long as it didn't impinge on others.
* Almost half thought that medications intended to help people quit smoking were actually more dangerous and addictive than cigarettes.
* More than half (56 percent) had never heard of the free Wisconsin Tobacco Quit Line despite efforts to promote the service. In fact, Christiansen noted, some respondents said that going to jail was the best way to quit (at least temporarily).
* Thirty-eight percent had never actually tried to dispense of the habit. "It was amazing how many people said they hadn't tried to quit," Christiansen said. "They thought that everyone is doing it so it's okay."

Christiansen and his colleagues haven't finished analyzing the results yet but want to take the research a step further. "Can we change beliefs and, if we can change them, does that increase uptake of [quit-smoking] treatment?" he wondered. "Then we'll look at what it takes to change beliefs."

Christiansen's group has started an initiative called "Tobacco-Free Advocates," which trains individuals in the community to bring short (10-minute) messages to local groups.

"They talk about willpower, that it's a muscle you can build, dealing with urges, that medications can give willpower a chance to work," he said. "They're very brief messages. Then we made the advocates available to them."

And when the researchers come across households without any smokers, they offer them a bright green sign to place in the window that says: "Another smoke-free home in this community." [ healthday.com ]

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Mistakes Newlyweds

Mistakes Newlyweds. Four words no one wants to hear soon after his or her wedding day: "We made a mistake." I'm talking about financial choices, not your choice of spouse. Unfortunately, many newlyweds set themselves up for failure soon after they say "I do." If you bring bad money habits to your marriage or fail to come up with a plan to merge your financial lives, you could potentially doom your relationship to money trouble and endless arguments. That's not exactly "happily ever after."

On the other hand, nothing says "I love you" like the desire to start your marriage on the right financial foot (roses, schmoses). Here are six common pitfalls that trip up new couples. Steer clear of these, and you'll decrease the money tension and increase the harmony in your new life together.

1. Keeping money secrets

Money is one of the most common sources of arguments in a marriage, so it's best to simply avoid the subject altogether, right?

Wrong! Some of the most heated arguments stem from failing to discuss financial backgrounds, expectations and attitudes from the start. Communication is key to the survival of any relationship, and baring your financial soul to your partner is no exception.

Ideally, you want to have this conversation before walking down the aisle. After all, there are good marital surprises ("I didn't tell you I'm a gourmet chef?") and bad surprises ("I didn't tell you I have $20,000 in credit card debt?"). Full disclosure is in order here, and that includes your shoe fetish or gambling habit.

2. Not having a budget

Now that you're settling into your new life together, it's time to discuss the B-word. No, not "baby" -- I mean "budgeting." You're merging two spending habits and two saving habits into one household. So even if you had a budget when you were single (pat on the back), you've got to make a new one with your husband or wife to include his or her income, debts and monthly expenses. That will help to ensure you have enough money left over for that other B-word: "Bahamas."

Your first step is to write down your fixed expenses, such as rent, car payments, insurance premiums and student-loan payments. You should also make a habit of contributing to your savings or investments as if you were paying a fixed bill each month. Then write down your flexible expenses, such as utility and phone bills, transportation costs, groceries, trips to the ATM and miscellaneous purchases. Track your spending for a couple of months to see where your money really goes, then find the spending leaks and plug them. Building a budget is a great way to set common spending and saving goals, identify problems and work together to fix them.

3. Giving one person the financial reins

The honeymoon's over, and it's time to get down to the nitty-gritty of the daily finances. Who will physically pay the bills, monitor the investments and crunch the tax numbers? One person may be more inclined toward these tasks, or you may decide to split the responsibility or trade off each month.

There's nothing wrong with letting one person take over the family finances, as long as both partners are OK with that decision. But that doesn't mean the other partner should be excluded. It's important for each person not only to feel involved in the big financial decisions but also to have an understanding of the day-to-day finances. Each of you needs to know both partners' account information, passwords and bill due dates in case anything were to happen to the other person.

And no matter how you divide the responsibility, it's a good idea to have a regular "money date" each month or so to make sure you're both in the loop. You should go over your budget, review your savings progress and discuss upcoming expenses. How's that for keeping the romance alive?

Also, if you choose to combine your finances after you wed, make sure that major purchases and savings accounts are held in both of your names so that each of you has equal access and can maintain a credit rating. You don't want to find out in the event of a divorce that your name wasn't actually on the car title or savings accounts. Considering keeping separate accounts? Read "New his-and-her banking."

4. Dragging debt down the aisle

What's his is hers, and what's hers is his. Whether you decide to combine your finances or maintain separate accounts, if one of you brought debt into the marriage, it becomes a problem for both of you. You'll need to work together on a plan to pay it off. However, you should never officially commingle your debt. Doing so could hurt the credit scores of the other partner and make it difficult for one or both of you to get credit later. Keep existing credit card and loan accounts in the original holder's name.

If you can help it, it's best to avoid beginning your marriage in the red. Many newlyweds make the mistake of going too far into debt to pull off the wedding of their dreams, go on an exotic honeymoon or buy new furniture and appliances. Before you dig too deep a hole, you should sit down together to determine which expenses are necessary and which are worth a splurge -- and come up with a plan to pay for it all before you spend it.

5. Sweating the small stuff

Marriage is about compromises and simply letting some things slide. So she squeezes the toothpaste tube from the middle, and he doesn't put his socks in the hamper. Big deal. You'll both soon learn to pick your battles and save your energy for issues that really matter.

That goes for picking your money battles, too. I remember my first financial argument with my husband. We had been married two weeks, and we were doing our grocery shopping together. He wanted to buy the brand-name chocolate chips, and I felt strongly that we should save 75 cents and go with the off-brand chips. After a lengthy and heated exchange, we divided up the rest of the shopping list so we wouldn't have to look at each other for the rest of our outing. Then we drove home in a huff. Lesson learned: Never go grocery shopping when you're hungry, tired and irritable. Oh, wait. Financial lesson learned: Don't sweat the small stuff. Was the argument really worth 75 cents? No way.

Of course, if all the little stuff is adding up to a big drain on your finances and causing you to live beyond your means, bring it up at your next money date and work together to find ways you can both cut back. (Ah, there's that compromise idea again.)

But take note: It's important that you build a little "mad money" into your budget for each person to spend at his or her own discretion. (Can you imagine asking your spouse for permission every time you wanted to buy a cappuccino and a muffin or grab a drink with some friends after work?) But as far as the big stuff goes, make it a rule to consult each other on major purchases. You don't want to come home and unexpectedly find a new Mercedes in the driveway -- and the bill that goes with it.

By the way, I now go grocery shopping alone. We decided as a couple it's what's best for our marriage.

6. Failing to plan for an emergency

No one likes to think about bad things happening, but in all the excitement of your engagement, planning your wedding and moving in together, it's easy to overlook this important aspect of financial planning. One of the best gifts you and your spouse can give each other is financial security and protection from life's storms.

First, assess your emergency stash of cash. Every couple should have enough money available to cover from three to six months' worth of living expenses. You never know when the car will break down, one of you will lose a job or you'll have an unexpected medical bill. Need ideas? See MP Dunleavey's column "Why I'm saving up $15,000 this year." If that figure seems out of reach, start here: "Why you need $500 in the bank."

Then you need to make sure you have adequate insurance coverage, including health, auto, renters or homeowners insurance and possibly life insurance. Learn more about the types of insurance everyone should have and how to get the appropriate coverage.
Did you get married without a prenuptial agreement? It's not too late to protect the financial interests each partner brought to the marriage. Consider drafting a post-nup with your lawyers. Plus, make sure you each have written a will to divide your assets in the event of your death or your spouse's. [ msn.com ]

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Noordin Dead Was Not By Suicide Bomb

Noordin Dead Was Not By Suicide Bomb. 9 Years became police fugitive, Noordin M Top, the terrorist leader from Malaysia finally can be shot dead after hiding in the bathroom of a house in Solo, Central Java, which was raided by Densus 88.

"The house was burned because there was a motor that was hit and caught fire. To avoid fire, 5 people there were running to the bathroom to take cover," said National Police Chief Gen Bambang Hendarso Danuri (BHD).

BHD stated that in a press conference in his office, Jalan Trunojoyo, Jakarta, Thursday (17/9/2009).

In this bathroom, Noordin lives finally flew. The man who is said to have many wives was killed after hit by an explosion. However BHD ensure that Noordin dead was not by suicide bomb.

"He’s affected by our weapon, not suicide bombing," said BHD.

Noordin’s death was almost similar to his fellow alumnus of Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), Dr Azahari. Azahari who was the bomb assembling expert was killed in a raid in Malang, East Java, on November 9, 2005.

Together with Azahari, terrorist who valued USD 1 billion was allegedly masterminded series of bombings in Indonesia that killed hundreds of victims. Both masterminding the Bali Bombing I (2002), JW Marriott Hotel bombing, Jakarta (2003), Australian Embassy bombing (2004), and the Bali Bombing II (2005).

Noordin (40) is a Malaysian citizen who was born in Kluang Johor, on August 11, 1968. Noordin was recorded to be joined Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) and holding the funding part.

However, according to Director of the International Crisis Group (ICG), Sidney Jones, JI experienced internal divisions in 2003. Since then, Noordin led splinter group that is not subject to the JI and pretend to be a representative of Al Qaeda in Indonesia and Southeast Asia.

"It’s important to distinguish between Noordin and JI. He was a member of JI, but over the past 5 years has been a splinter group leader, where there are several members of JI, but they are not subject to the JI as an organization," Sidney said some time ago.

After the death of Azahari, Noordin continue recruiting cadres who are willing to be invited to complete a ‘jihad’ with a set bombings targeting foreigners. Noordin is known to be expert in influencing and persuade his followers.

Noordin mastery not only in terms of recruiting ‘bride’ (the man which was ready to commit suicide bombing). Noordin is also slippery like an eel, very smart to avoid the police chase. Noordin is known to be always on the move. He had lived in Riau, but then later preferred to wander in Central Java.

According to a former investigator of the Bali bombings I, Hermawan Sulistyo, Noordin as fast as ‘flash’ to disappear when police track him down. It was 9 years Noordin in the run since then.

"When in Semarang, Noordin had passed with the cop. When pursued, in 2 minutes, he was gone in public crowded," said Kiki, Hermawan close calls.

But now Noordin fugitive has been stopped. The terrorist leader was killed along with 3 colleagues, Bagus Budi Santoso alias Urwah, Aryo Sudarso aka Aji, and Hadi Susilo Adib aka.

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History of Drama

History of Drama. The magic of drama is more than the representation of fiction via performance. The term literally means 'action' in Greek. The thought sprung from the need for entertainment and recreation...

History of Drama

A drama is ideally enacted in a theater, open or closed, and the performances are by actors, live, before an audience that either sits around or before the stage. A single drama is a collaborative effort. The cumulative efforts are pooled for the various modes of production, flow of the text and research in the form of literature adopted.

This form of entertainment has not lost its patronage or vigor and continues to remain popular, despite all the technology involved in a film-making. The history of drama goes back ages and to various cultures. The earliest tragedies, comedies and romance were real masterpieces. They were represented as genres of poetry and the dramatic mode was interspersed with epic lyrics. The first ever work on theory in drama and dramatics was Aristotle's Poetics, published in c. 335 BCE.

There are different aspects of the art that make it popular with distinct audiences. Classical music and dance are integral parts of drama, while the opera involves only singing. There are musicals that have dialogue and songs within regular intervals. Melodramas offer the audience regular accompaniment by musical instruments.

Athenian Drama:

Athenian drama or Western drama was originated in Greece. The city-state of Athens is credited with the production of tragedy, comedy, and satyr. Drama in Athens was institutionalized through competitions. The Greeks came up with the idea of an actor who speaks and impersonates. The main lead was expected to deliver dialogue while interacting with the chorus. This form of drama involved non-dramatic poetry and complete texts. The Persians, by Aeschylus, is a historical tragedy that is also the oldest surviving drama.

Roman Drama:

Early Roman theater was not only more varied than Greek drama, but also more extensive. Initially, they were sophisticated works of Roman literature, tragedies and comedies. In the 2nd century BCE, drama was part and parcel of the Roman culture. There was a writers' guild who delivered dialogue and text for even plays that were set on street corners and crossings. They contributed to a variety of poetic forms and complex plots. The bifurcation of the production work thus led to the enaction of double-plots, involving the complexity of human behavior.

Medieval Drama:

Medieval drama basically involved religious enactment. These plays were enacted within the premises of the cathedrals. They were usually miracle and mystery plays. They focused on propagating morality with the help of specially interspersed interludes. Many of the plays were then written in verse. Ben Jonson and Christopher Marlowe were prominent playwrights of this era. The plays highlighted past kings and Tudor monarchy.

Modern Drama:

Modern drama is the result of innovative contributions, like the roles of imitators. Modernist drama is realist and has scope for experimentation and social critique.Important playwrights of Modern drama include Anton Chekhov, Maurice Maeterlinck, George Bernard Shaw and Arthur Miller, among many.

Other Shades of Dramatics:

While Indian drama initially involved dramatic episodes, it evolved to include human concerns. The earliest form of theory on drama is the Natya Shastra by Bharata. Chinese theater has stuck by the popular opera from Beijing. Japanese drama developed only in the 15th century. The musical instruments and techniques were handed down generations by word of mouth.

Drama is one of the types of literature that has gained popularity during the years. Among the various forms of drama, Western opera grew and thrived during the Renaissance in Italy. Music and theater were combined. Pantomimes told of fables. In a pantomime, there is always a lesson to be learned, as the hero emerges victorious. [ By Gaynor Borade ]

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