May 06 2010

I Couldn’t Spell Kalmykia Either

Category: Aware Or Conspiracy Nut...,In The Media — ChrisM @ 1:26 am

Just caught an interesting BBC article regarding claims from Kirsan Ilyumzhinov (the president of Kalmykia (or Kalymkia as the BBC have it currently spelt in the article?!)) that he was abducted by aliens, and spoke with them!

Kirsan Ilyumzhinov

If, like me, you hadn’t heard about this region of Russia before, check out the Wiki page on it here, or a similar BBC page on it here.

Now the question is whether this is connected to recent UFO sightings in Kazakhstan? Tongue in cheek level is around 99.7% here, on my part, but a really small part of my brain wants to hope this is some sort of alien contact involving two way communication. If I have a couple of beers, that stat might alter to 98% 🙂

Hoping KZBlog doesn’t totally hate this post 😉

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May 03 2010

Chocolate – Apparently The Choice Food Of Evil Doers?

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 10:17 pm

According to a BBC article, Israel could have a(n even more) difficult job justifying their blockade on Gaza.
Whilst keeping ammunition, rocket fuel or night-sight equipment out of the area could easily be defended by most politicians that were keen on minimizing military supplies (or dual purpose items) flowing to Hamas, the list that was presented following legal action (similar to a UK-style FoI request I believe) displayed how normal everyday items were also being stopped from crossing the border. A few examples? Canned fruit, fruit juice, jam, chocolate are/were all banned at some point, although canned meat and tuna, mineral water, sesame paste, tea and coffee are all fine apparently.
The blockade is aimed at weakening Hamas’ grip/influence in the Gaza strip, however this sort of action merely reinforces the image for many people of a government/system in Israel that is happy to make the lives of ordinary, non-violent Palestinians worse, day by day, which some would argue merely serves Hamas’ propaganda needs, rather than really achieving it’s stated aim.

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Feb 03 2010

PS3 Hacked

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 6:10 pm

Finally someone has hacked the PlayStation 3, though I’m not certain whether it is the original model, or one of the newer, redesigned versions that George Hotz had his success with. The newer (slimmer) versions have some of the hardware missing I believe, that stops Linux being installed (useful for people looking at obtaining cheap parallel processing units) or it could be the firmware has modifications. Anyway, with the hack in place, home brewed software (and of course backed up/pirated games) can be run. Whether the hack will need to be modified the next time Sony pushes out updates remains to be seen, but as this is a Xbox household, I’ll not be losing any sleep over it.

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Oct 24 2009

SEC SaryArka

Category: In The Media,Kazakhstan,Personal,Videos — ChrisM @ 1:25 am

Someone has apparently uploaded the video (unreleased, as they later changed the script when I was no longer around to re-record) I did a voice over for last year. I’m still trying to find the other film (on transport policies) that they did publish, but for now, have a listen to my dulcet tones explaining all about Social Entrepreneurship in Kazakhstan. Don’t laugh too hard, and don’t blame me for the occasional lack of sync between my words and the images on screen – I had never seen the film to which I’m applying my voice at the time of recording!

I’m also hoping to find an online copy of the voiceover work I did with DanD a month back, on Religious Tolerance in Kazakhstan.

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Oct 13 2009

Thugs Not Doing Well Recently

Category: In The Media,Videos — ChrisM @ 11:18 pm

Picked on the wrong guy…

Picked on the wrong guy in a dress…

See this article for a bit more background.

Thug found via his Facebook profile – see here

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Oct 13 2009

Yes Sir/Mate?

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 5:54 pm

Just finished reading a pretty interesting article from the BBC on a headmaster from India. Check out the picture below…

Babar Ali

That isn’t one of his pupils, that IS the headmaster! Babar Ali decided that the amount of children in his neighbourhood who simply can’t afford to attend lessons (even if there is space in a free school, many of them have to work to earn money for their family) wasn’t acceptable, nor a good situation for the prospects of his village. So, each evening after attending school as a pupil, he goes home and relays what he has learned to those kids who are able to take a few hours off work. It is truly humbling to think of someone that age having the emotional capacity to consider others less lucky than himself, and managing to continue his own studies whilst teaching others. Hats off to young man.
(Cynical posting about nothing too important will resume shortly).

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Oct 13 2009

Pinked Chavs?

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 3:06 pm

I’ve got a few videos I’ll be posting later that display some of Britain’s finest, most up standing citizens (/sarcasm) chavs choosing the wrong people to start some aggravation with. However, for now, please make do with this short piece from BBC news, that details one approach to stop troublesome tearaway teenagers from congregating in some areas. Now, yes, they could just buy some creams and then continue to hang around in alleyways. However I suspect they’ll just move along to the next dimly lit corner that doesn’t have pink lighting installed!

This reporter needs to have a quiet word with whoever edited the video – the first frame you see whilst waiting for the buffering to complete does not show him at his best, especially with his eyes like that!
[edit]
Ooops, looks like when I borrowed the embed code from the BBC website that I missed some sort of don’t autoplay function. Click the link below to see the post on its own, and watch the video.
Continue reading “Pinked Chavs?”

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Sep 18 2009

Ridiculous Bill

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 8:49 pm

OK, so this one is a little late in being published. With catching up with the backlog of Anna’s unpublished photos, I didn’t get around to posting links from news stories that I found interesting. So, just in case you missed it, checkout the BBC’s article that gives more information on the case of a man who bought a packet of cigarettes on his credit card. He got home and later checked his balance. He apparently owed 23 QUADrillion dollars (US)! That is 23 followed by another 15 digits. Somewhat obviously this was an error, as that sort of figure dwarfs even the current American national debt total.

Expensive Fags

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Sep 17 2009

On The Other Hand…

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 7:33 pm

I’ve written a few times about Special Constables (back in Britain) on this blog, and not been entirely complimentary to the profession as a whole. Overall, they do not get a lot of respect in the UK, and sometimes this is understandable. However, I wanted to post a quick link to a forum post that I found to be an interesting read – What I Did On Duty over at the PoliceSpecials.com forum. Whilst I still believe that there are some specials who do their service no honour, it was interesting to find out what the average (or at least average internet dwelling) special’s shift was like.

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Aug 24 2009

John Doe become Eddie

Category: In The Media — ChrisM @ 4:23 am

Jon Doe (the article‘s URL spells John, the text itself states Jon. Thought I’d play it safe, not that it matters to much, as this is just a name used for people of unknown origin) has a name at last! Edward F. Lighthart is the man who turned up in a Seattle park almost a month ago. The name of the park he wandered out of made me smile at least – Discovery Park!

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