Blade Man and the spirit of the sword

December 17, 2008

One aspect of Korea’s cultural heritage that tends to receive much less attention than ceramics, food, music and clothing is the sword.

Very rarely do historians, cultural experts and even tourism personnel devote much attention to this steely weapon and its bloody as well as its ceremonial legacy.

The head of Kyung-in Museum of Fine Art is an exception, though. Lee Seok-jae has accumulated a vast collection of swords, items of armor and assorted weaponry over the years. Here, he shares his insight with the JoongAng Sunday.

Q.There are said to be only 300 extant swords from the Joseon Dynasty. Why are there so few left?

A. There was a lot of looting by Japanese invaders in the past and many swords were probably sold to U.S. military personnel after the country gained its independence and the U.S. military maintained a presence here. Nevertheless, the fact that swords were expendable and distributed by the government played a big role. Unlike Japan, the government had a monopoly over the manufacture and management of swords, and the number of swords was not that big in the first place. When the country was lost to Japan during the colonial period [1910-1945], swords in the government’s armory became lost sheep.

How would you compare swords from Japan, China and Korea?

When talking about the overall level and finish it’s hard not to acknowledge the quality of Japanese swords. Swords manufactured by the Chinese government are also on par with Japan’s work. Our swords made by the government, especially those for formal ceremonies or for decoration purposes are very original, but I think the quality of the blade is less impressive.


During the Joseon Dynasty, the noble class liked literature and warriors favored the bow more than the sword, so the culture surrounding the sword was less developed. But modern Korea has companies like Posco Steel Works. Hypothetically, do we have the technology to make swords?

A kitchen knife company like Dorco could probably do a good job of making kitchen knives, but Posco isn’t making them because there isn’t any demand even for ceremonial or ornamental pieces. Nevertheless, when you talk about long swords used for battle, it’s a different story. We can’t even restore existing ones. It’s all based on assumptions or copying Japanese swords.


Your love for swords has resulted in the establishment of a research arm within the Kyung-In museum. When did your interest in swords begin?

My family was always interested in martial arts. We had real swords in our house as well. Sometimes my father would allow me to take a closer look at them. I still remember how I had tears in my eyes when I saw swords with dented blades, but when I was young I was more interested in the use of swords rather than the sword itself. When I went to Yonsei University, my interest in swords started to kick in.

	Lee Seok-jae

We heard that the Kyung-In Museum of Fine Art is in possession of 12,000 different weapons and items of armor. You must have spent a considerable amount of time and effort putting the collection together?

We have probably the biggest collection when it comes to weapons and armor. We tried to get an Eo Do [a sword used by the king] at a Sotheby’s auction, but we failed. Then we found out after several years that the sword was in the country. After two years of negotiations with the owner we were able to get it. But it’s not ours to take. It belongs to the whole country, really.



Combat swords are made for killing people. When you handle swords, do they give you the creeps?

Sometimes that’s the case. I believe there’s a spirit within a sword. When someone moves house, sometimes they ask to borrow a sword to repel the evil force that might be lingering there. Some of the swords that I have collected were from tombs. I get a chill and my hair stands on end when I take the sword out of its sheath. In most cases, such swords have residues of grease left. After killing a person, the grease was used to wipe off the blood and the grease just clotted up. And some blades are slightly bent.



By Noh Jae-hyun JoongAng Ilbo [africanu@joongang.co.kr]

Love machine: Computer geek too busy for romance builds himself the perfect girlfriend

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 11:06 AM on 12th December 2008

If blind dates, speed dating or websites haven't led you to the love of your life, you could always take a leaf out of inventor Le Trung's book - and build your perfect partner.

The 33-year-old has created Aiko - a 'twenty-something' robot who not only looks feminine and sexy but also does household chores and his accounts.

But despite her shiny hair and 32-23-33 figure, Aiko - whose name means love child - is no trophy partner.

Robot romance: Le Trung with his perfected partner Aiko

She is accomplished too with a talent for maths and a 13,000-sentence vocabulary - in English and Japanese. She can also recognise faces, read aloud from a newspaper and give directions.

Aiko, a fembot made from silicone and A.I. technology, is a genuine labour of love for Mr Trung.

He has taken out credit cards and loans, sold his car and spent his life savings on perfecting the machine - at a cost so far of £14,000.

The former software programmer, from Ontario, Canada, said he never had time to find a real wife but has not built Aiko as a sexual partner - although she is touch-sensitive and reacts if she is shown affection or is hurt.

Living doll: The petite, feminine robot speaks two languages and does all the household accounts and chores

Mr Trung said: 'I want to make her look, feel and act as human as possible so she can be the perfect companion.

'Like a real female she will react to being touched in certain ways. If you grab or squeeze too hard she will try to slap you. She has all senses except for smell.

'She doesn’t need holidays, food or rest and she will work almost 24-hours a day. She is the perfect woman.'

Mr Trung, who dresses Aiko in different outfits and takes her for drives in the countryside, was a child genius and made his first robot when he was eight years old.

'People have mixed reactions when they meet Aiko,' he said.

'They either love or hate her. Some people get angry and accuse me of playing God. Once someone threw a rock at Aiko. That really upset me. But many people are fascinated by her.

'Women are generally impressed and try to talk to her. But the men always want to touch her, and if they do it in the wrong way they get a slap.'

Mr Trung will spend the next few years perfecting Aiko's software and increasing her range of skills - but not just for his own amusement.

'I suffered a heart attack and I thought that one day I might need 24-hour care in the future,' he said.

'I may need to have Aiko look after me one day.'

Watch Aiko in action...

Download video!

Amish gene 'limits heart disease'

The Amish population is best known for avoiding modern technology A gene mutation which protects the heart against a high-fat diet has been found in the Amish population. Researchers found 5% of the US Amish population in Lancaster, Pennsylvania have a mutation in a protein which breaks down fatty particles. Those with the mutation had higher levels of "good" HDL-cholesterol and lower levels of "bad" LDL-cholesterol, the journal Science reported. It is hoped the finding will lead to new therapies to reduce cholesterol. The researchers used blood samples from 800 volunteers in the Old Order Amish community to look for DNA markers that might be associated with levels of fat particles called triglycerides in the blood stream. The discovery of this mutation may eventually help us to develop new therapies to lower triglycerides and prevent cardiovascular disease Dr Toni Pollin High blood levels of triglycerides, one of the most common types of fat in food, have been linked to heart disease. They found a mutation in the APOC3 gene, which encodes a protein - apoC-III - that inhibits the breakdown of triglycerides. As part of the study, participants drank a high-fat milkshake and were monitored for the next six hours. Individuals with the mutation produced half the normal amount of apoC-III and had the lowest blood triglyceride levels - seemingly because they could break down more fat. They also had relatively low levels of artery-hardening - a sign of cardiovascular disease. Protection Study leader Dr Toni Pollin, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, said: "Our findings suggest that having a lifelong deficiency of apoC-III helps to protect people from developing cardiovascular disease. "The discovery of this mutation may eventually help us to develop new therapies to lower triglycerides and prevent cardiovascular disease," she added. The researchers believe the mutation was first introduced into the Amish community in Lancaster County by a person who was born in the mid-1700s. It appears to be rare or absent in the general population. Cathy Ross, cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation said the benefits of high HDL cholesterol and low LDL cholesterol are already being achieved by drugs such as statins. "If new drugs can be developed that mimic the effect of this mutation, it may afford more ways in which individuals could be protected from developing cardiovascular disease. "There are also lots of other simple ways people can reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease such as eating a diet low in saturated fat, having five portions of fruit and vegetables a day and taking regular physical activity."

Toddlers' toilet seat crush peril

An increasing number of small boys seem to be affected An increasing number of small boys may be finding toilet training a more painful experience than they anticipated, say safety experts. Doctors at one English hospital reported four cases in which a toddler's penis had been injured by a falling toilet seat. The fashion for heavy wooden and ceramic seats is worsening the problem, they say. Figures suggest there may be up to 250 similar cases a year in the UK. Perhaps it's advisable that parents with toddlers think twice about having heavy toilet seats while their children are young Sheila Merrill RoSPA Dr Joe Philip, from Leighton Hospital in Crewe, said that parents might need to take more precautions to keep their young sons out of A&E. He called for more seats to be designed to fall slowly, and for heavier seats to be banned from households with young boys. He even suggested that the social norm of putting the seat down after use be suspended and the seat fixed in an upright position. He said: "As Christmas approaches many families will be visiting relatives and friends and their recently toilet-trained toddlers will be keen to show how grown up they are by going to the toilet on their own. "It is important that parents check out the toilet seats in advance, not to mention those in their own homes, and they should accompany their children if necessary." The four boys visiting the Crewe hospital, aged between two and four, all needed to stay in hospital overnight, although fortunately no lasting damage was done. They had all lifted the toilet seats themselves, which had then fallen back down onto their penises, the journal BJU International reported. Increasing risk Dr Philip said: "A recent market research report has suggested that there has been a worldwide increase in the number of wooden and ceramic toilet seats sold. "We would not be surprised to hear that other colleagues have noticed an increase in penis crush injuries as a result of this." He said that parents should consider training their youngsters to hold up the toilet seat with one hand. A spokeswoman for RoSPA confirmed that the cases at Crewe were not isolated examples. Sheila Merrill, home safety manager for England, said: "The most recent figures show there are an estimated 250 visits to A&E each year by boys under the age of five involved in similar accidents. "So perhaps it's advisable that parents with toddlers think twice about having heavy toilet seats while their children are young. "However, as with children of all ages, in all areas of the home, supervision is always the most crucial aspect in preventing accidents."

Tula & bicky

Lily in the window

Lily was busy!

Pet profiling: "Is it because I'm black?"

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Note: To be read with a Syl Johnson soundtrack (click above).

Black dog discrimination (a.k.a Black Dog Syndrome or BDS), a phenomenon that has historically made black dogs the most difficult of shelter animals to adopt out, is becoming a thing of the past, according to Jan McHugh-Smith, president of the San Francisco SPCA and PetPoint, a web-based animal management program.

In 2007, PetPoint collected data from more than 700 adoption agencies, totaling approximately 380,000 adoptions, and discovered that although black animals do take longer to be placed with adoptive families than other groups, the difference for black dogs amounts to little more than a day. And happily, all of the black dogs in the data pool eventually found homes.

PetFinder.com

Bensen boogies on a beige couch.

Betsy Saul, co-founder of PetFinder, agrees that there is no longer a significant difference, at least in the more progressive shelters, for the time it takes black dogs to be adopted. But this delay can still have hugely negative consequences for the animals. "A one-day difference may not seem like a lot, but if it happens to be the seventh day, in some shelters that black dog could be euthanized."

Generally speaking, Saul says BDS tends to have a greater impact on BIG black dogs (BBDS). "And it isn't so much about people being afraid of them," she says. "It's 'Can you see me?' With the little, white fluffy dogs, BAMO! They're right there. The black ones just blend in to the background."

This prejudice can also apply to cats, although McHugh-Smith notes that many potential cat parents come in with a specific color of cat in mind, be it orange or black or calico. "For us, dogs are pretty easy, regardless of their color" says McHugh-Smith. "We have three cats for every dog in our shelter, so we tend to focus on creative ways to help our cats find homes," she says. For example, in October, the SF SPCA launched a "black cats are lucky" campaign to help debunk the old "cross-your-path" wive's tale. (For all you cultural trivia geeks out there, seeing a black cat in Scotland and Japan is actually considered good luck.) The Marin Humane Society recently gave all of its black cats names like Crayola, Rainbow and Sienna as part of its "Black Cats Have Colorful Personalities" promotion.

SF SPCA

Giblet is just one of 22 adoptable black cats listed on the SF SPCA website.

A number of factors have contributed to BDS over the years, beginning with visibility (in photographs the faces and features of black animals can be difficult to distinguish, especially when contrasted against the reflection of a camera flash off metal bars) and the stigma attached to some canine breeds like Rottweillers.

In British folklore, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (best known for his creation of detective Sherlock Holmes) and Sir Walter Scott both depict the black dog as a creepy, spectral figure that haunts cemeteries and is an omen of death. More recently, Harry Potter is stalked by a big black dog called "the Grim" in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban." And Winston Churchill was known to battle serious bouts of depression that he referred to as "the black dog."

PetFinder.com

Buck disappears behind bars.

Knowledge of these biases has motivated many shelter workers and volunteers to put extra energy into getting their black dogs and cats noticed, including targeted adoption campaigns, tying bandanas or ribbons around their necks and placing brightly colored blankets and toys in their living areas. Saul largely attributes the dwindling discrimination against black dogs to these efforts. "We are at the mid-point of positive change, she says. "But we need to stay vigilant about this issue for the change to continue."

Both McHugh-Smith and Saul recommend photographing adoptable black dogs and cats in well-lit places outside of the shelter whenever possible. Posting videos (a feature PetFinder offers; check out black boxer-pit mix Hayden's video here) is also a sure way to help communicate a large black dog's gentle demeanor and playful personality to a potential adopter.

Saul adds that some shelters strategically place PVC pipes at the front of their dog kennels to allow visitors to offer sanctioned treats to the animals. The dogs quickly learn to associate new visitors with F-O-O-D and automatically come to the front of their kennels whenever a new person walks by. "What a great way to market themselves with a good sit right where everyone can see them," says Saul.

Do you have a black dog or cat? What influenced your decision to take him or her home? Or maybe you recently passed up a black animal in a shelter for a whiter, fluffier version? Share your stories.

Posted By: Amelia Glynn (Email) | December 08 2008 at 08:12 AM

With Treats, Dogs Seem to Know What's Fair

Chris Gash

By HENRY FOUNTAIN

Published: December 8, 2008

To the list of the qualities of dogs — enthusiastic and steadfast come to mind — can be added another. That pooch of yours, researchers say, may be envious.

Scientists in Austria report in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that a dog may stop obeying a command if it sees that another dog is getting a better deal.

In this way dogs may be showing a sensitivity that is similar to, although perhaps more primitive than, that shown by chimpanzees and some monkeys. Until now those primates were the only nonhumans to show what is called “inequity aversion” in the absence of a reward.

The finding may come as no surprise to some dog owners, and it didn’t completely surprise Friederike Range, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Vienna who led the study.

“We have a dog at home,” she said, “and I know how jealous she is of different people and situations.”

The study tried to quantify the behavior by using well-trained dogs that readily offer a paw on command. The researchers used two dogs side by side but treated them differently, giving one a better reward (sausage) and the other a lesser one (bread) when the paw was given, or giving one dog no reward at all.

They found that the quality of the reward made little difference. But in the case in which one dog got no treat at all, that dog became less and less inclined to obey the command.

"Prop 8 - The Musical" starring Jack Black, John C. Reilly, and many more...

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Sydney art fuses surf with Islam

By Nick Bryant
BBC News, Sydney

Phillip George wants to bring Islamic art to a wider audience

An Australian artist has produced a range of Islamic surfboards in an attempt to create a greater understanding between East and West.

Phillip George was inspired by his trips to the Middle East and by riots in 2005 when Lebanese Australians were targeted on a beach in Sydney.

He has called the range the Inshallah - or God Willing - surfboards and has put them on exhibition in Sydney.

There are 30 surfboards in all, each adorned with intricate Islamic motifs.

Mr George hopes that the Inshallah surfboards can help bridge cultural and religious misunderstandings within Australia.

His inspiration has come from his travels and also from the Cronulla riots, when a crowd of mainly white Australians gathered at a beachside suburb of Sydney and targeted people of Middle Eastern appearance.

This is an attempt to fuse the Australian beach culture with the Islamic culture, he says.

The boards are adorned with intricate patterns from Islamic culture

"What I've done to bring the joy and the interest of our Islamic art to an Australian audience," said Mr George.

"I have actually transposed a lot of my photographic images - the work of the tiles and shots of the mosque - on to a surfboard so that they become a lot more acceptable or easy to digest for an Australian audience."

The exhibition, Borderlands, is at the Casula Powerhouse arts centre near Sydney.

All the surfboards face Mecca, and visitors have included schoolchildren from Cronulla, a mainly white suburb, and pupils from Sydney's Islamic schools.

This is not the first time that symbols of the Australian beach culture have been used in this way.

A local designer has already brought out what she calls a burqini - a full-length swim suit to make Muslim women feel more comfortable at the beach.

Actor Zo In-sung On the Challenges of Playing Gay

Actor Zo In-sung The production team for a film called "A Frozen Flower" held a press conference in the Sofitel Ambassador Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul, on Nov. 25. "I was afraid that the set for this movie might prove unfamiliar because I have mostly been doing modern movies," said actor Zo In-sung. "I had to wear the old-fashioned clothes and makeup of a person from the past dynasty and speak differently, as well. I wondered if such a character would suit me. I am heavily indebted to the director because I relied on him every time I felt insecure and he gave me support and strength along the way," admitted Zo In-sung. "The director advised me to always 'think out of box.' I think this opportunity has helped me become a more versatile actor." Zo plays the role of Hong-rim, a captain of a 36-man squadron of royal guards who is so loyal that he is prepared to follow the king's orders -- to sleep with the queen. Actor Joo Jin-mo, who plays a king in the Koryo Dynasty, will appear as Zo's homosexual partner. The film will be released on Dec. 30. (englishnews@chosun.com )

How 'Britain' got its name from 'Great Land of the Tattooed': The astonishing map that reveals the origins of place names

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 12:54 PM on 06th December 2008

They may sound like places more likely to be found in Middle Earth, but these amusing-sounding locations actually reveal the origins of modern place names.

An unusual take on the world, The Atlas of True Names shows how global places came to be named.

The etymological take on the world traces Great Britain to Great Land of the Tattooed. The combination of the Greek word 'prettanoi', meaning tattoed people, and the Celtic word, 'brit', meaning light coloured or speckled, is behind the modern name.

Enlarge

The atlas reveals the origins of each place names. Gdansk, in Poland, for example, is Goth Entrenchment

London is re-named as Hillfort, as one theory behind the name of the city's origin is that the celtic words 'lon' and 'dun' mean fort on a hill, while Birmingham is Bear Guard Home, and York is Wild Boar Village.

The Orkneys has one of the most fascinating origins. Labelled Isles of the Sea Monsters in the atlas, the word 'orc' means whale, or sea monster in Celtic.

Places outside of the UK have equally intriguing origins. Cameroon, for example, is Land of the Shrimps, coming from the Portugese word 'camaroes', meaning shrimps.

Chicago and Moscow have been given the less romantic monikers of Stink Onion and Bog respectively - Chicago comes from the Native American word 'checagou', while Moscow is derived from 'mosk', the Slavic word for bog.

The creators of the atlas do not intend it to be a serious etymological work however. 'It's more of a stimulus, and a very amusing one at that, to make us think about why places are called as they are,' says Sean Quigley of Outstanding Map Distributors.

'It is already causing a degree of heated discussion, and I am sure that is just the beginning.'

Intelligent 'have better sperm'

The same genes may govern intelligence and sperm quality Men of higher intelligence tend to produce better quality sperm, UK research suggests. A team from the Institute of Psychiatry analysed data from former US soldiers who served during the Vietnam war era. They found that those who performed better on intelligence tests tended to have more - and more mobile - sperm. The study, which appears in the journal Intelligence, appears to support the idea that genes underlying intelligence may have other biological effects too. This does not mean that men who prefer Play-Doh to Plato always have poor sperm Dr Rosalind Arden Institute of Psychiatry Therefore, if tiny mutations impair intelligence, they might also harm other characteristics, such as sperm quality. Conversely, people with robust genes might be blessed with a biological "fitness factor" making them fit, healthy and smart. Previously, scientists tended to assume that lifestyle factors were more likely to underlie any relationship between intelligence and health. For instance, brighter people may be less likely to smoke, and more likely to take exercise, both of which are known to impact on mental performance. Different characteristics The latest study tested the gene theory by taking two characteristics that seemed unlikely to be associated with each other - intelligence and sperm quality. They found a small, but statistically significant link, and were able to show that this could not be explained by unhealthy habits, such as smoking or drinking alcohol. The study was based on 425 men who undertook several intelligence tests and provided semen samples. The researchers found that independently of age and lifestyle, intelligence was correlated with all three measures of sperm quality - numbers, concentration, and ability to move. Lead researcher Dr Rosalind Arden said: "This does not mean that men who prefer Play-Doh to Plato always have poor sperm: the relationship we found was marginal. "But our results do support the theoretically important 'fitness factor' idea. "We look forward to seeing if the results can be replicated in other data sets, with other measures of intelligence and other measures of physical health that are also strongly related to evolutionary fitness." Dr Allan Pacey is an expert in fertility at the University of Sheffield. He said: "The fact that it's possible to detect a statistical relationship between intelligence and semen quality in adult men probably says more about the co-development of brain and testicles when the man was in his mother's womb, and therefore how well they both function in adult life, rather than suggesting that playing Sudoku can somehow stimulate more sperm to be produced. "The improvement in semen quality with intelligence observed in this paper is small and therefore it is unlikely to have a big impact on the ability of men of different intelligences to conceive." The semen samples were collected in 1985 by the US Centers for Disease Control as part of a large-scale study into the health of US soldiers who served during the Vietnam Era. Some of the men in the sample had served in Vietnam, some had served in Germany, Korea and the USA.

Body ink.. record-holding tattooed British pensioner takes Berlin show by storm

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 2:19 AM on 06th December 2008

Isobel Varley isn't shy of showing her tattoos, as these pictures of her at the Tattoo Convention show in Berlin demonstrate.

She has spent the last 20 years having her body decorated and according to her website, she is in the Guinness Book of Records as the most 'World's most senior tattooed woman'.

Mrs Varley, originally from Yorkshire but now living in Hertfordshire, had her first tattoo in 1986 when she visited a tattoo convention at the Hammersmith Palais in 1986.

Isobel Varley: Showing off her tattoos at a Berlin exhibition

'This was the first tattoo convention that we had attended and I was really amazed and aroused by the sheer beauty of some of the tattoos and I was surprised to see people with tattoos.

'I got my first ever tattoo in 1986 at 49 years old. Originally, I was only ever going to have one - a small bird - but I fell in love with it, and developed an addiction.'

Since then she has had dozens of tattoos and by 1997 almost every square cm of her body, including the 'inside of my nether regions and the ends of my toes' were covered.

An earlier photo of Isobel seen here showing her wider webs under her arms

She entered her first competition in 1989 'for a tattoo on my back'.

'That's when I first heard of the "full bodysuit" category. Now I've spent 500 hours under the needle,' she said.

But Isobal draws the line at having her face tattooed, 'I want people to be able to see what I look like,' she says.

However, Mrs Varley has no plans to stop showing her tattoos just yet.

Isobel aged 66 in 2003 at the 7th Annual International Tattoo Convention in Lausanne, Switzerland

Evolutionists Flock To Darwin-Shaped Wall Stain

September 5, 2008 | Issue 44•36

Darwinic pilgrims claim the image fills them with an overwhelming feeling of logic.

DAYTON, TN—A steady stream of devoted evolutionists continued to gather in this small Tennessee town today to witness what many believe is an image of Charles Darwin—author of The Origin Of Species and founder of the modern evolutionary movement—made manifest on a concrete wall in downtown Dayton.

"I brought my baby to touch the wall, so that the power of Darwin can purify her genetic makeup of undesirable inherited traits," said Darlene Freiberg, one among a growing crowd assembled here to see the mysterious stain, which appeared last Monday on one side of the Rhea County Courthouse. The building was also the location of the famed "Scopes Monkey Trial" and is widely considered one of Darwinism's holiest sites. "Forgive me, O Charles, for ever doubting your Divine Evolution. After seeing this miracle of limestone pigmentation with my own eyes, my faith in empirical reasoning will never again be tested."

Added Freiberg, "Behold the power and glory of the scientific method!"

Since witnesses first reported the unexplained marking—which appears to resemble a 19th-century male figure with a high forehead and large beard—this normally quiet town has become a hotbed of biological zealotry. Thousands of pilgrims from as far away as Berkeley's paleoanthropology department have flocked to the site to lay wreaths of flowers, light devotional candles, read aloud from Darwin's works, and otherwise pay homage to the mysterious blue-green stain.

Capitalizing on the influx of empirical believers, street vendors have sprung up across Dayton, selling evolutionary relics and artwork to the thousands of pilgrims waiting to catch a glimpse of the image. Available for sale are everything from small wooden shards alleged to be fragments of the "One True Beagle"—the research vessel on which Darwin made his legendary voyage to the Galapagos Islands—to lecture notes purportedly touched by English evolutionist Alfred Russel Wallace.

"I have never felt closer to Darwin's ideas," said zoologist Fred Granger, who waited in line for 16 hours to view the stain. "May his name be praised and his theories on natural selection echo in all the halls of naturalistic observation forever."

Despite the enthusiasm the so-called "Darwin Smudge" has generated among the evolutionary faithful, disagreement remains as to its origin. Some believe the image is actually closer to the visage of Stephen Jay Gould, longtime columnist for Natural History magazine and originator of the theory of punctuated equilibrium, and is therefore proof of rapid cladogenesis. A smaller minority contend it is the face of Carl Sagan, and should be viewed as a warning to those nonbelievers who have not yet seen his hit PBS series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage.

Still others have attempted to discredit the miracle entirely, claiming that there are several alternate explanations for the appearance of the unexplained discoloration.

"It's a stain on a wall, and nothing more," said the Rev. Clement McCoy, a professor at Oral Roberts University and prominent opponent of evolutionary theory. "Anything else is the delusional fantasy of a fanatical evolutionist mindset that sees only what it wishes to see in the hopes of validating a baseless, illogical belief system. I only hope these heretics see the error of their ways before our Most Powerful God smites them all in His vengeance."

But those who have made the long journey to Dayton remain steadfast in their belief that natural selection—a process by which certain genes are favored over others less conducive to survival—is the one and only creator of life as we know it. This stain, they claim, is the proof they have been waiting for.

"To those who would deny that genetic drift is responsible for a branching evolutionary tree of increasing biodiversity amid changing ecosystems, we say, 'Look upon the face of Darwin!'" said Jeanette Cosgrove, who, along with members of her microbiology class, has maintained a candlelight vigil at the site for the past 72 hours.

"Over millions of successive generations, a specific subvariant of one species of slime mold adapted to this particular concrete wall, in order to one day form this stain, and thus make manifest this vision of Darwin's glorious countenance," Cosgrove said, overcome with emotion.

"It's a miracle," she added.

Better orgasm for women

If you have a problem email problems@deardeidre.org Everyone receives a personal reply free of charge

Published: 01 Dec 2008

WE hear a lot these days about how people can and should make love, but there are virtually no rules for good sex.

It isn't compulsory to have an orgasm. As long as a woman is left feeling satisfied, neither she nor her partner should feel that they have in any way failed because she hasn't had an orgasm. Sex is for your pleasure, not to pass some test or keep up with the Jones's.

Many women, however, while they enjoy intercourse with their partner, never or rarely reach orgasm, and are left feeling dissatisfied as a result.

Women's problems over orgasm vary. Some women have never experienced an orgasm at all. This is often because they were brought up to think of sex as something not quite nice.

Parents worried about daughters getting pregnant may keep impressing on them that they mustn't get carried away. It is small wonder that, when they have a partner, they can't suddenly undo all those lessons to their sub-conscious.

Before a woman who has never experienced an orgasm can help her partner to help her to climax, she has to learn for herself what pleases her. Sex is a positive pleasure, and there is nothing wrong with enjoying it, even when you are alone.

Having given yourself permission to enjoy your sexuality, you have to find out what turns you on, explore the effect of different caresses of the genital area. There is nothing wrong with self-stimulation - in fact it is a basic part of the treatment prescribed by sex therapists.

It's not stimulation of the vagina, by the way, but of the clitoris that leads to orgasm for most women - the clitoris is the little peak you can feel in the front of the vagina.

When you have an orgasm it feels like an internal throbbing. The intensity varies widely. It can be fierce and wild, it may be quiet and sensuous. The common denominator is it certainly should feel pleasurable.

Some women learn how to masturbate, perhaps as teenagers, but find they are unable to reach a climax with their partner, even if he stimulates them in a similar way. The most likely cause of this is a variation on the inhibited feelings mentioned before. Their sub-conscious will not let them admit to anyone else that they are enjoying sex.

Sharing regular sessions of all-over massage can help a couple start communicating physically and sexually. Use a little cream or oil, massage and stroke one another all over. Say what feels good and what not-so-good.

When the time feels right, you can begin showing one another how to give the most pleasure by stroking and massaging the sexual areas, too. The only rule is that you should both enjoy it.

Modern-style vibrators designed especially to suit women’s sexual responses can make a terrific difference.

Check out www.emotionalbliss.co.uk, www.durex.co.uk and www.passion8.co.uk.

Tingletip is a tiny but powerful vibrator for clitoral stimulation only, designed to fit on the head of an electric toothbrush – so great for travelling (www.tingletip.com).

The Vielle range - a non-electrical clitoral stimulator, lubricant and stimulating gel is widely available in pharmacies and Boots.

Some women can climax when masturbating or when stimulated in some similar way by their partner, but cannot reach orgasm during intercourse. In fact, this is normal, as only a minority of women do climax during intercourse. Most reach orgasm through other stimulation.

Many couples have perfectly happy ways of making love which involve the man stimulating the woman until she climaxes, either before or after intercourse.

It really doesn't matter how or when a woman reaches her climax, as long as she enjoys it, but if a couple feel that they very much would like the woman to climax during intercourse, they may find a change in position will help or he can caress her at the same time.

The vagina has comparatively few nerve endings and the clitoris has many. Basically, few women can possibly climax unless they are receiving some form of clitoral stimulation. Of course, it is important for the man to be sure that the woman is really aroused before he attempts intercourse, so they must share lots of loving foreplay first.

Also the man has to be able to sustain intercourse for a reasonable length of time, since it is important to keep stimulating a woman right up to and during orgasm. If premature ejaculation is a problem, however, let me know because I can send you a free leaflet on how to solve the problem.

Reaching a climax needs some muscle tension and you can give this a nudge in the right direction.

You need to have at least half an hour of foreplay to be sure the woman is fully aroused. Then she shouldn’t try to relax but tense the pelvic-floor muscle (if you’re unsure how to do this, my free leaflet on increasing sexual sensation explains).

If she then arches her back and puts her head back, this gets her body in the right position to reach climax, as long as her partner carries on pleasuring her.

Assuming a couple feel free to experiment with what feels good to them, then they have a good chance of discovering what will lead to the woman achieving full sexual satisfaction pretty frequently, if not every time.

However, some couples experiment with different positions and techniques and still draw a blank. Too much alcohol can dry up the vaginal secretions and reduce the blood flow to the sex organs. This in turn can make sex more painful and will affect a woman’s ability to have an orgasm.

Loss of orgasm can also be linked with major changes in a woman's life such as childbirth or the menopause. Depression can severely damp down sexual feelings.

It could be that she’s had a bad sexual experience in the past or that there’s some problem in her relationship with her partner, and unaided you can’t stop it getting in the way.

For more details about the help available, or if you want a step-by-step explanation of the self-help therapy suggested earlier, do write for my more detailed free leaflet on solving orgasm problems which explains all this and gives contacts for finding expert sex therapy.

Write to problems@deardeidre.org.

Perhaps the best testimonial I ever had was from one woman who said that she had managed to achieve her first ever orgasm in 16 years of marriage through following the suggestions in that leaflet!

Iggy Pop: A lust for life

By Mark Tutton
For CNN

(CNN) -- Iggy Pop invented punk rock. That's how cool he is. His songs have been covered by the likes of Guns N' Roses, REM, The Red Hot Chili Peppers and The Sex Pistols.

Iggy Pop: The wildest man in rock music.

more photos »

He is the wildest wild man of rock and his four-decade career has been marked by drug addiction, self mutilation and onstage nudity -- and at 61 years old he is showing no signs of growing old gracefully.

Born on April 21, 1947, in Muskegon, Michigan, James Newell Osterberg grew up in a trailer park.

When he began learning the drums as a teenager his parents gave up their bedroom to house his drum kit. It wasn't long before he took his talent out of the bedroom, playing with high-school band The Iguanas, from which he later took his stage name.

After graduating from high school in 1965, Iggy formed a blues band called the Prime Movers. Following a brief stint at the University of Michigan he moved to Chicago, playing drums with local bluesmen, before returning to Michigan with his sights set on fronting a rock band.

In 1967, he recruited guitarist Ron Asheton, his drummer brother Scott Asheton and bassist Dave Alexander and formed The Psychedelic Stooges.

See photos of Iggy in action. »

It was after seeing the Doors in concert, and inspired by Jim Morrison's confrontational stage persona, that James Osterberg reinvented himself as Iggy Pop, a drug-fueled, crazed whirling dervish of a front man, who would strut semi-naked around the stage, roll around in broken glass and dive headlong into the audience.

The band shortened its name to The Stooges and released its eponymous debut in 1969. Right from the start there was clearly something different about Iggy Pop. At the height of flower power, when The Stooges' contemporaries were singing about peace and love, Iggy was singing "No Fun" and "I Wanna Be Your Dog."

The album was a brilliant mess of raw, blues-influenced garage rock, but it sold poorly, as did the 1970 follow up "Fun House," later described by Jack White of the White Stripes as "the definitive rock album of America."

By this time, Iggy had begun the Heroin use that would plague his career and in 1971, The Stooges split up after being dropped by their record label. That same year, Iggy met David Bowie, who took him to England, re-united The Stooges and produced 1973's "Raw Power."

With "Raw Power," Iggy and the Stooges created the blueprint for punk rock and made an album that would one day be regarded as a landmark in rock music, an album that Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain listed as his favorite of all time. Nonetheless, it was another commercial failure and in 1974, The Stooges split again.

By this time, Heroin had taken over Iggy's life and in 1975 he checked himself into a Los Angeles mental institution in an effort to kick the habit. Bowie visited him there and took Iggy along on his 1976 tour, before the pair moved to West Berlin in an effort to get away from the temptation of drugs.

It was there that Bowie produced and co-wrote Iggy's 1977 solo albums, "The Idiot" and "Lust for Life." The latter included the songs "The Passenger" and "Lust for Life," which have since become staples of TV ads and movie soundtracks, spawning countless cover versions.

More commercial than The Stooges' records, Iggy's solo albums were met with critical acclaim and better sales, but never breakthrough into the mainstream. Songs that Bowie wrote with Iggy during this period were later included on Bowie albums, with "China Girl" becoming a hit single for Bowie.

Don't Miss

• Iggy Pop interview

Iggy carried on touring and releasing albums throughout the 80s, without much commercial success, although the single "Real Wild Child" was a hit in the U.S. and UK. But by the end of the decade, Iggy was beginning to be recognized as "the Godfather of Punk," with a new generation of bands citing him as an influence.

Members of Guns N' Roses and the B52s appeared on his 1990 album "Brick by Brick," which sold more than 500,000 copies, and his 2003 album "Skull Ring" featured the likes of Green Day, Sum 41 and Peaches. But what really made "Skull Ring" special was that it re-united Iggy with Ron and Scott Asheton of The Stooges.

After years on the periphery, Iggy was suddenly fashionable, with the reformed Stooges appearing at festivals all over the world. The band recorded the album "The Weirdness" in 2007, but it was their astonishingly powerful live performances that showed why they were still such a big deal 40 years after they started out.

Any hopes Iggy may have had for a peaceful retirement in Miami have been dashed. At 61 years old he is still performing with the same energy and abandon as when The Stooges first formed, with only marginally less stage diving and nudity. It seems that the world has finally caught up with Iggy Pop, the most exciting, unpredictable and entertaining man in rock.

Ancient lost city discovered deep in the Amazonian rainforest linked to the legendary Cloud People of Peru

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 12:30 PM on 03rd December 2008

An ancient lost city has been discovered in the remote Amazonian rainforest of north-east Peru, archaeologists have announced.

The fortified citadel appears to be from the pre-Inca era and may be linked to the country's legendary 'Cloud People'.

The main encampment comprises circular stone houses overgrown by lush jungle over an area of 12 acres, said archaeologist Benedict Goicochea Perez.

The citadel sits atop a chasm that the former inhabitants may have used as a lookout to spy on approaching enemies, she added.

An ancient Chachapoyas village located close to the area where the lost city was found

Rock paintings cover some of the fortifications, and next to the dwellings are large platforms believed to have been used to grind seeds and wild plants for food and medicine, he continued.

It is tucked away in the remote Jamalca district of Utcubamba province, part of the northern Amazonas department, said Jamalca Mayor Ricardo Cabrera Bravo, who had joined the expedition.

The area, about 497 miles northeast of Lima, is famed for its vast, isolated natural beauty, surrounded by verdant foliage and soaring waterfalls, said Cabrera Bravo.

The citadel likely belonged to the Chachapoyas civilization - an ancient people whose glory days over a thousand years ago pre-date the hegemony of the powerful Incas.

The area where the lost city was discovered by a team of archaeologists

The Chachapoyas, also called the Warriors of the Clouds, were an Andean people living in the cloud forests of the Amazonian region of present-day Peru

The Chachapoyas culture (known as the Cloud Forest people) also built the imposing Kuelap fortress atop a mountain in Utcubamba, which can only be compared in scale to the Inca's Machu Picchu retreat, built hundreds of years later.

The Chachapoyas, also called the Warriors of the Clouds, were an Andean people living in the cloud forests of the Amazonian region of present-day Peru.

The Incas conquered their civilization shortly before the arrival of the Spanish in Peru.

When the Spanish arrived in the 16th century, the Chachapoyas were one of the many nations ruled by the Inca Empire.

Their incorporation was not easy, due to their constant resistance to the Inca troops.

Since the Incas and the Spanish conquistadors were the principal sources of information on the Chachapoyas, unbiased first-hand knowledge of the people remains scarce.

The city was found in Amazonian rainforest in northern Peru

A mummy of a baby from the Chachapoyas culture

Writings by the major chroniclers of the time, were based on fragmentary second-hand accounts.

Much of what is known about the Chachapoyas culture is based on archaeological evidence from ruins, pottery, tombs and other artifacts.

The chronicler Pedro Cieza de León offers some picturesque notes about the Chachapoyas.

He writes: 'They are the whitest and most handsome of all the people that I have seen in Indies, and their wives were so beautiful that because of their gentleness, many of them deserved to be the Incas' wives and to also be taken to the Sun Temple.

'The women and their husbands always dressed in woolen clothes and in their heads they wear their llautos, which are a sign they wear to be known everywhere.'

The name Chachapoya is the name that was given to this culture by the Inca; the name that these people may have actually used to refer to themselves is not known.

The Chachapoyas' territory was located in the northern regions of the Andes in present-day Peru.

It encompassed the triangular region formed by the confluence of the rivers Marañón and Utcubamba in the zone of Bagua, up to the basin of the Abiseo river, where the ruins of Pajáten are located.

This territory also included land to the south up to the Chontayacu river, exceeding the limits of the current department of Amazonas towards the south. But the centre of the Chachapoyas culture was the basin of the Utcubamba river.

Due to the great size of the Marañón river and the surrounding mountainous terrain, the region was relatively isolated from the coast and other areas of Peru, although there is archaeological evidence of some interaction between the Chachapoyas and other cultures.

The contemporary Peruvian city of Chachapoyas derives its name from the word for this ancient culture as does the defined architectural style.

Firm denies workers' comp in racial killing

Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

(12-02) 21:02 PST -- Taneka Talley was stabbed to death in March 2006 while she was working as a clerk at a Dollar Tree store in Fairfield. Her killer's only motive, prosecutors say, is that she was African American.

That's also the reason the store's workers' compensation insurer is denying $250,000 in death benefits to Talley's 11-year-old son.

The boy's grandmother, the child's legal guardian, said Specialty Risk Services is taking the position that a racially motivated killing is personal, not work-related - even though the man charged with killing Talley had never met her before. The insurance company, Dollar Tree and their lawyers aren't talking publicly about the case but are defending their position before a state appeals board that hears workers' compensation disputes.

"I think it's unfair. It's discrimination," said Carol Frazier of Vallejo, who gained custody of her grandson, Larry Olden, after her daughter's death and is challenging the insurer's refusal to pay in a case that eventually could go to court.

"They're saying (the killing) didn't arise out of her employment, except that in this case she wouldn't have been killed if she hadn't been at work," said Frazier's attorney, Moira Stagliano. "This person didn't know her, just walked into the store and picked her out."

The opposition by Dollar Tree and its insurers to paying benefits to Talley's son represents an attempt to set new limits on California's workers' compensation system, under which a company provides benefits to employees or their survivors for work-related deaths or injuries regardless of whether the firm was at fault.

Businesses have long assailed the system as overly generous to employees and as expensive, complaints that led to passage of state laws in 2003 and 2004 tightening limits on what medical treatment is covered by compensation payments.

The man accused of stabbing Talley, Tommy Joe Thompson, 45, of West Sacramento, is tentatively scheduled to go to trial Dec. 10 in Solano County Superior Court on a charge of murder. If convicted, he could be sentenced to life in prison.

Talley, of Fairfield, was 26 and working full time at the Dollar Tree on North Texas Street to support herself and her young son. She was stocking shelves just after 9 a.m. on March 29, 2006, when a man walked in and stabbed her, authorities said. The killer fled.

Thompson was arrested that evening. He had previously served a prison sentence for beating his young son in 1994, records show.

At a hearing in March in which Thompson was found mentally competent to stand trial, a defense psychiatrist, Herb McGrew, testified that Thompson had told him he stabbed Talley because she was black. Thompson is white.

"You know that he got up that morning, and he said, 'I'm going to kill a black person,' " said Deputy District Attorney Dane Neilson, according to a transcript of the hearing. "She was, unfortunately, the first person he saw, correct?"

"Correct," McGrew replied.

An insurance company lawyer later cited that exchange in a letter to Stagliano defending the denial of benefits to Talley's son.

"The doctors testify that Mr. Thompson's motivation in stabbing Taneka Talley was purely race motivated," attorney Kelly Hamilton wrote. "As such, it is our belief that our denial in this matter is proper."

The compensation law doesn't consider an on-the-job injury to be work-related if the motives were entirely personal - for example, if an estranged lover or spouse comes to the workplace and attacks an employee because of a private grudge.

The line can be hard to draw when one worker assaults another for personal reasons or when the injured employee was on a personal errand or instigated the assault. But Stagliano said Talley's death was definitely job-related.

"Taneka Talley was at work, doing her job, when she was killed," the lawyer said. "If she had not been in that store, she would not have been available to (the killer), and she would still be alive.

"It's shocking that Dollar Tree and its insurance carrier are using the alleged racist motivation of a killer as an excuse to get out of paying benefits," Stagliano said.

Frazier, who works for the Richmond Parks and Recreation Department, said her daughter had a $15,000 life insurance policy. It covered burial expenses, she said, but is nowhere near enough to care for a growing boy who needs new clothes every six months.

"His mother worked hard on her job for him to get a good education, to go to college," Frazier said.

Larry, now in sixth grade, is "a very good student, he loves sports, really good in basketball - a normal little boy," she said. "He misses his mom."

E-mail Bob Egelko at begelko@sfchronicle.com.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/03/MN1514DSB4.DTL

This article appeared on page A - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Modesto pastor: Consider confession if you voted for Obama

By Sue Nowicki
snowicki@modbee.com

last updated: November 29, 2008 02:20:20 AM

St. Joseph's Catholic Church Father Joseph Illo at his church in Modesto Thursday Oct. 05, 2006. Marty Bicek/The Modesto Bee - Modesto Bee - Marty Bicek

Parishioners of St. Joseph's Catholic Church in Modesto have been told they should consider going to confession if they voted for Barack Obama, because of the president-elect's position condoning abortion.

"If you are one of the 54 percent of Catholics who voted for a pro-abortion candidate, you were clear on his position and you knew the grav- ity of the question, I urge you to go to confession before receiving communion. Don't risk losing your state of grace by receiving sacrilegiously," the Rev. Joseph Illo, pastor of St. Joseph's, wrote in a letter dated Nov. 21.

The letter was sent to more than 15,000 members of the St. Joseph's parish. It is one of 34 parishes in the Stockton Diocese, which has more than 200,000 members in Stanislaus, San Joaquin and four other counties.

Illo also delivered this message in a homily.

Though Obama's support of abortion rights angered many Catholics nationally during the campaign, Illo's letter is believed to be the first in Central California from a priest to his parishioners on the topic.

The Most Rev. Stephen Blaire, bishop of the Stockton Diocese, disagrees with Illo. He said Catholics should not feel compelled to disclose how they voted to their priest.

Blaire said Catholics who carefully weighed many issues and settled on a candidate, such as Obama, who was supportive of abortion rights, were not in need of confession. He said confession would be necessary "only if someone voted for a pro-abortion or pro-choice candidate -- if that's the reason you voted for them."

"Our position on pro-life is very important, but there are other issues," Blaire said. "No one candidate reflects everything that we stand for. I'm sure that most Catholics who voted were voting on economic issues.

"There were probably many priests, and I suspect many bishops, who voted for Obama."

Illo's letter states, "Many Catholics voted for such pro-abortion candidates thinking that their good positions on other issues, such as the war or health care, outweighed their deplorable stand on abortion."

Illo also wrote that Obama "promised Planned Parenthood that the first thing he would do upon taking office is to sign the so-called 'Freedom of Choice Act,' which would grant unlimited access to abortion in all 50 states up until the moment of live birth."

Illo, in an interview Wednesday, explained his reasoning.

"In Catholic teaching, you have to go to confession when you have committed a mortal sin," he said. "Now, what is a mortal sin? It's somewhat complex. No one can say, 'You committed a mortal sin.' I can only say, 'It's a grave matter.' It's my job to look after my parishioners.

"I've gotten a lot of e-mails and phone calls. It's about 12-to-1 in favor of what I said. One person has left the parish. But I got all of these other positive things."

Across the country, Obama's nomination and campaign was divisive for many Catholics. Many priests and church officials sermonized against him because of his stance on abortion, as they did four years ago when Democratic John Kerry challenged President Bush. There were Catholic-inspired anti-Obama videos on YouTube regarding the issue.

In a story published in October in the Chicago Tribune, Joe Scheidler, president of the Pro-Life Action League, said it was hypocritical for any Catholic to vote for Obama -- even if they agreed with his positions on other health care topics.

"There are a lot of ways you can solve poverty and all these other issues," Scheidler said. "But abortion is the taking of a human life, and the church is very strict on that. Any involvement in abortion is not just a sin, it's an excommunicable sin. This is serious business."

But some loyal to the church disagreed. Patrick Whelan is one of the founders of Catholic Democrats, which supported Obama and other Democratic candidates in the election.

"I feel that every Catholic can vote for Obama in good conscience," Whelan told the Tribune. "I think Barack Obama is the first Democratic presidential candidate who has come out and said he plans constructive measures to reduce the number of abortions in the United States."

National exit polling after the Nov. 4 election shows most Catholic voters rejected the hard-line position as 54 percent of them voted for Obama and 45 percent for John McCain, the Republican nominee.

A week after the election, a number of high-profile Catholic bishops meeting in Baltimore signaled they intend to work with the president-elect on issues such as immigration and health, but remain strongly opposed to his position on abortion.

During the meeting, The Boston Globe reported, the bishops for the first time approved a new "blessing of a child in the womb," which could be said by priests for pregnant women.

Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville called the blessing "a very tangible way of us to witness, pastorally and sacramentally, the life of the unborn child."

Bishop Arthur Serratelli, of Paterson, N.J., said, "It is important to reaffirm and focus our attention on the life of the unborn."

American Cardinal Frank Stafford, formerly archbishop of Denver and now assigned to the Vatican, called Obama's election "apocalyptic" during a speech Nov. 14 at Catholic University in Washington, D.C. "On Nov. 4, 2008," he added, "America suffered a cultural earthquake."

Bee staff writer Sue Nowicki can be reached at snowicki@modbee.com or 578-2012.

Sought: Wal-Mart shoppers who trampled NY worker

By COLLEEN LONG, Associated Press Writer

Saturday, November 29, 2008

(11-29) 17:04 PST New York (AP) --

Police are reviewing surveillance videos of a post-Thanksgiving shopper stampede that trampled a suburban Wal-Mart worker to death, but they acknowledge it may be difficult to bring criminal charges.

Nassau County police and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said no new information was available Saturday on the employee's brutal death, which rattled shoppers even as they flocked to the Valley Stream store a day later.

"It felt a little freakish," customer Ellie Berhun, 48, told the Daily News. "Some man lost his life because a VCR was on sale? Please. It's just too sad for words."

Police said the temporary worker, Jdimytai Damour, was mowed down as about 2,000 bargain-hunters surged into the store at Friday's 5 a.m. opening, leaving a metal portion of the door frame crumpled like an accordion.

Other workers were knocked to the ground as they tried to rescue Damour, and customers simply stepped over him and kept shopping even as the store announced it was closing because of the death, police and witnesses said.

At least four other people, including a woman eight months pregnant, were taken to hospitals for observation or treatment for minor injuries. The store, about 20 miles east of Manhattan, closed for several hours but reopened Friday afternoon.

The day after Thanksgiving is known as Black Friday because it has traditionally marked the point when a throng of shoppers pushes stores into profitability for the year.

Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart said it added staffers and outside security workers and put up barricades to try to prepare for the crush. But police spokesman Detective Lt. Michael Fleming said Friday that security was inadequate for a scene he called "utter chaos."

Criminal charges are possible, but identifying anyone in the store's videos may prove difficult, Fleming said.

Damour, 34, came from a temporary agency and was doing maintenance work at the store, Wal-Mart said.

A woman reported being trampled by overeager customers at a Wal-Mart opening Friday in Farmingdale, about 15 miles east of Valley Stream, Suffolk County police said. She suffered minor injuries but finished shopping before filling the report, police said.

Items on sale at the Valley Stream Wal-Mart included a Samsung 50-inch Plasma HDTV for $798, a Bissel Compact Upright Vacuum for $28, a Samsung 10.2 megapixel digital camera for $69 and DVDs such as "The Incredible Hulk" for $9.

___

AP retail writers Anne D'Innocenzio and Mae Anderson contributed to this report.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/11/28/national/a080140S70.DTL