Andrea Bocelli – The Lord’s Prayer

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The Best of Andrea Bocelli: Vivere
Image via Wikipedia

 Lovers of opera would have heard of Enrico Caruso, Beniamino Gigli of the era gone by and of the present great Three Tenors of whom Luciano Pavarotti is lately deceased. Andrea Bocelli can be counted in the same rank.

Andrea Bocelli, born 22 September 1958, is  an Italian tenor, multi-instrumentalist and classical crossover artist. Born with poor eyesight, he became blind at the age of twelve following a soccer accident.

However, he’s gifted with a golden voice. Though without the blessing of sight, “he sings beautifully in colours”. God is great! He takes away one thing but endows you with another even greater!

Remember too, this is the only prayer that comes directly from God!

“The Lord’s Prayer as sung by Andrea Bocelli and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
Sublime, magnificent, powerful, amazing, and breathtaking! Simply heavenly! What a marvelous piece of music and arrangement.
When one needs to calm thyself or to reflect on what is good in this world, this piece of beautiful, heavenly music is perfect.”

This short & simple prayer, well translated into hundreds of languages, was given by our Lord Jesus Christ according to the Gospel of Luke which records Jesus being approached by “one of his disciples” following the Sermon on the Mount with a request to teach them “to pray as John taught his disciples.”

With over 5 million units sold worldwide, Sacred Arias became the biggest-selling classical album by a solo artist of all time, and with just under 20 million units sold worldwide, his 1997 pop album, Romanza, became the best-selling album by an Italian artist ever, as well as the best-selling album by a foreign artist in Canada, and a number of other countries in Europe and Latin America. The album’s first single, “Time to Say Goodbye“, topped charts all over Europe, including Germany, where it stayed at the top of the charts for fourteen consecutive weeks, breaking the all-time sales record, with over 3 million copies sold in the country. He is widely regarded as the most popular Italian and classical singer in the world.

In 2006, Bocelli was made a Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, and on March 2, 2010, he was honoured with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, for his contribution to Live Theatre.(Source: Wikipedia).

A Prized Photo Worth $4.3m?

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By P Chong                                                                                       16 November 2011

When I first saw the painting of Mona Lisa in the Louvre Museum in Parisin 1959, it didn’t strike or fascinate me nor any of my friends. Yet this is undoubtedly one of the most famous paintings of Leonardo de Vinci. What then priced thevalue of art? Is it because of the known artist?

Beauty I guess is in the eyes of the beholder. 

Now, it’s reported in The West Australian AP on November 13, 2011

a prized photograph auctioned off for $4.3m. Have a look & see

if this photo is really worth that much?

Photo by Andreas Gursky

This is what was reported by The West Australian:

“A 1999 photograph of the Rhine River by German artist Andreas Gursky has sold for $4.3 million in New York City, setting a record for any photograph sold at auction.

Titled “Rhein II”, the chromogenic colour print, which is face-mounted to acrylic glass, had a pre-sale estimate of between $2.5 million and $3.5 million.

It sold on Tuesday at Christie’s, but the buyer was not disclosed.

The previous record for any photograph sold at auction was Cindy Sherman‘s “Untitled”, which fetched $3.8 million at Christie’s in May.

Gursky’s panoramic image of the Rhine is one of an edition of six photographs.

Four are in major museums, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Tate Modern in London.”

Weeping Buffalo Changing Lives

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By P Chong                                                                                                     14 November 2011

At the abattoir, quite often strange happenings of animals crying go unnoticed by human beings. I was talking to my wife about the story below “of a sorrowful buffalo suddenly standing still, refusing to move forward, kneeling on its two front knees, and with tears streaming from its eyes,” when she recalled of her young days living in Taiping, Malaysia. She too had observed in the nearby abattoir of cows awaiting to be slaughtered crying aloud, seemingly knowing their fateful demise.

But this water buffalo had real tears that touched the hearts of the butchers & changing their lives!

 

The Buffalo was standing still, sad and frightened to tears.

According to China’s People’s News, whether people believe it or not, this incident actually happened in Hong Kong. TheWeekly World News reported that a group of workers were bringing a water buffalo into a packaging factory, ready to slaughter it to make steak and beef stew.

When they approached the front door of the slaughterhouse, the sorrowful buffalo suddenly stood still, refusing to move forward, kneeling on its two front knees, and had tears streaming from its eyes.

How could the buffalo be aware that it was going to be slaughtered, before entering the slaughterhouse? This shows that it was even more alert than many a person. “When I saw what is believed to be a stupid animal actually crying, and when I noticed that its eyes were full of fear and sadness, I could not help but shiver.” Extremely shocked by this, butcher Shiu Tat-Nin recalled: “I quickly called the other people to come and see, and they were as surprised as I was! We pushed and pulled the water buffalo, but it would not move; it just sat there crying constantly.”

Billy Fong, the boss of the Hong Kong packaging plant said, “Mankind has always thought that animals are not like people who can cry, but this buffalo is really sobbing like a baby!”

At that time there were at least a dozen strong, burly men present, but their hearts were softened by the buffalo’s crying, and those who were responsible for killing water buffaloes were even more touched by this, tears welling out of their eyes.

Buffalo weeping non-stop – When workers from other slaughterhouses heard the news, they also ran to the crying and kneeling buffalo, and the site was soon crowded with people who were astonished at what they saw. Three of them were so shocked that they said that from now on, even when they slaughter other kinds of animals, they will never forget that buffalo’s tears. 

At the point when a buffalo is crying and people are crying as well, we can all be sure that none of them will kill the buffalo now. Then the question was how to take care of this matter. Finally, they decided to buy the water buffalo with cash, and then they sent it to a Buddhist temple, for the monastic to take good care of it, so that it could be assured of living out its life peacefully.

When this decision was made, an amazing thing happened again: “When there was an assurance that the buffalo would not be killed, it finally agreed to move, got up, and it’s here with us.” How could a water buffalo understand human words? Shiu said: “Whether you believe it or not, this is really true, although it sounds really incredible. 

Undoubtedly, this buffalo has changed the lives of these butchers.

Ten of the World’s Richest without College Degree

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By P Chong                                 9 November 2011

 It’s said that some are born rich, others achieve riches and

still others have riches thrust upon them.

It’s found however, that if you’re gifted with a special talent

then riches will be yours to have.

Ten of the world’s richest persons are without college degree. They range from sportsmen, actors, singers, technologists and others. The common denominator is talent or special skill.

Now the question is whether education is at all essential for the road to riches. Not necessary so. There are evidences of professors or highly educated persons ending in poverty. In short, education is supposed to equip you for the life ahead of you. Really education is an unending process, that is why from the womb to the tomb, you’re always learning. Knowledge is dynamic & expandable.

Here are some questions to consider:

    • Need you go to school from the cradle to the grave?

    • What benefits do you hope to get out of education?

    • Will you really be able to apply your acquired knowledge to your life’s practical activities?

    • Can skill, talent, attitude & other positives be acquired through education?

    • In a word, will education ensure riches?

The following Ten are some of the world’s richest persons:

Here’s to show you the ‘Irony of Life’ :

Most ‘First Class’ students get technical seats, some become Doctors and some Engineers.

* The ‘Second Class’ pass, and then get MBA, become Administrators and control the ‘First Class’.

* The ‘Third Class’ pass, enter politics and Become Ministers and control both.

* Last, but not the least, The ‘Failures’ join the underworld and control all the above.

And those who do not attend any school, become Swamis and Gurus and Everyone goes to them.  

 

Shenzhen – The Voice of Innovation In Mainland China

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BY P Chong       8 November 2011

Shenzhen in the early 1990s  

Present Shenzhen
Shenzhen as it Now

Shenzhen was voted by Forbes China in 2010 as the most innovative city in mainland China. It virtually started from scratch.

Shenzhen in the 1970s was but a small village. Its metropolitan cityscape is the result of the vibrant economic growth made possible by rapid foreign investment since the institution of the policy of “reform and opening” establishment of the SEZ in the late 1970s. Both Chinese and foreign nationals have invested billions in the Shenzhen SEZ. More than US$30 billion in foreign investment has gone into both foreign-owned and joint ventures, at first mainly in manufacturing but more recently in the service industries as well. Shenzhen is now reputedly one of the fastest-growing cities in the world.

Being the southern mainland China’s major financial centre, Shenzhen is home to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange as well as the headquarters of numerous high-tech companies. Shenzhen is also the third-busiest container port in China, after Shanghai and Hong Kong.

Shenzhen/Suzhou/Shanghai

Shenzhen continued to top the list of the most innovative cities on the Chinese mainland this year, followed by Suzhou and Shanghai.

Shenzhen continued to top the list of the most innovative cities on the Chinese mainland this year, followed by Suzhou and Shanghai, according to the latest list of the 25 Chinese mainland cities with the strongest innovation capabilities released Monday by Forbes China.

Forbes China’s survey covered 129 mainland cities:

  • with the municipal GDP of above RMB 43.6 billion yuan (US$6.84 billion) in 2010

  • also the number of patents newly applied for (per capita and total number)

  • the proportion of sci-tech expenses to local fiscal expenditures (including expenses on trial development of new products, intermediate experiment allocations and subsidies for important scientific research projects).

 In 2010, the value-added of Shenzhen’s high-tech industry rose 17.1 percent to RMB 305.9 billion yuan, while the total output value of high-tech products made in Shenzhen hit about RMB 1.02 trillion yuan, with 60.1 percent contributed by products with independent intellectual property rights.

The Yangtze River Delta region retained its predominant status this year, with 15 cities edging into the list. Jiangsu province alone has 11 cities included. Five cities from the Pearl River Delta moved up into the list, while no cities from Western China appeared there.

Statistics show that China’s smaller cities are amazingly eye-catching for their innovation capabilities with more than half cities on the list being county-level and prefecture-level cities. Of the top ten, there are 4 county-level cities: Wujiang, Kunshan, Changshu and Zhangjiagang.

Source: China.org.cn

Beijing Then and Now (Beijing-Chengde-Tianjin Tour)

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(Beijing–Chengde-Tianjin Tour)

20 – 27 October 2011

By P Chong     1 November 2011

"Bird's Nest" Beijing National Olympic Stadium

I first visited Beijing in May/June 1989 when I led a tour party of 10 there. The most memorable thing about that trip was the infamous Tiananmen Square demonstration which disrupted our sightseeing of the place. Tiananmen which means “Peaceful Heaven Gate” & which demonstration if not cracked down by the then Paramount Ruler, Deng Xiaoping would have spelt a different China we see today. It would be reminiscent of the last days of the weak Qing Dynasty which saw some eight foreign countries or more carving out Chinese motherland for themselves & looting away China’s precious treasures & heritage.

Beijing CBD

Now what a difference 22 years made? I saw then a city of millions of bicycles transformed to a city of millions of vehicles. Everywhere high rise buildings tower the sky, multiple lane thoroughfares, highways, express ways, traffic jams and as one of my Aussie friends said, “I have never seen so many Chinese.” Then in 1989, any significant modern structure was that of modern 5-star hotel, such as Kunlun Hotel where we stayed.

With increasing affluence & growth of capitalism, tourism is a great revenue source from foreign tourists as well as the locals. Wherever we went in our recent October 2011 tour, be it the Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, the Great Wall, Shopping Malls or Centrers, Summer Palace . . . there were jostling crowds & seas of heads. In a way, I was kind of disappointed as I was really looking to a more leisurely holiday.

The tour covering Beijing, Chengde & Tianjin, sponsored by the Chinese government, is designed to encourage the overseas Chinese to return to motherland China to see for themselves the phenomenal leap of progress that China has made in the last 3 decades. China may be Communist in name, but capitalism with Chinese characteristics is evident everywhere. The popularity of the tour is evident by some 34 luxurious coaches averaging 45 – 50 passengers.

When Deng Xiaoping coined the words “Xiang Qian Zou” (basically meaning Forward March), he changed the same sounding word “Qian” to mean money. The “Road to Riches” has since taken on with frenzy pace. Never has the world seen such rapid changes & progress anywhere in the last 30 years or so!

Presumably, the Chinese government has the ancillary support of some of the major corporations & manufacturers like the Chinese Tea industry, silk manufacturers, jade & pearl industry . . . in offering such cheap & good valued tours initially at AUD99 per head and then increasing to AUD198 excluding the AUD10 tip per day for the tour guide. The tour period is 7/8 days.

The tour would have been par excellent if more time was accorded to sight-seeing rather than taken to all those named factories where we spent unlimited time listening to sales presentations & demonstrations. As a matter of fact, in a previous similar tour of Shanghai, I found the tour guides were real professionals & skillful in their sales pitch. By the time you got to the jade or silk factory you were already succumbed to buying!

The food provided was good & the 5-star hotel accommodation at Radisson (Blue) Hotel excellent. One night accommodation plus the breakfast is worth every cent paid for. The day began at 6.00AM and so packed with activities that we didn’t get to bed till 10 or 11PM.

Parting is such sweet sorrow. All too soon, the tour came to an end, as with the mountain resort in Chengde & the ultra modern Tianjin with its impressive high rise. Friendships were made & though we parted, memories would linger on from the hundreds of digital snap shots we took.

Asian Rich Outnumber Europeans

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According to a report by Xinhuanet (October 17, 2011), Merrill Lynch Global Wealth Management and Capgemini found that the number of wealthy people in the Asia-Pacific region grew 9.7 percent to 3.3 million in 2010, becoming the second-largest region behind North America in terms of wealth. This is leapfrogging Europe for the first time.

The report, which defined the wealthy as people with at least $US1 million in net assets (excluding their homes, collections, consumer and durable goods), said the wealth of Asia-Pacific rich surpassed Europe as early as in 2009 and increased 12.1 percent to US$10.8 trillion last year, compared with Europe’s US$10.2 trillion.

In the Asia-Pacific region, real estate and equities investment still made up the primary choices for the rich last year, with 27 percent choosing housing market, far higher than the global average of 19 percent.

The report also predicted that the Asia-Pacific wealthy will beef up stock and fixed-return investment while reducing holdings of cash and deposit from 2011 through 2012.

While economy stumbles globally

The rich & famous have cash to splash around still.

(Source: China.org.cn)

The Super Yacht That’s Dubbed “Tropical Island Paradise”

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In the trend of modern day travelling, cruising has set its mark with cruise ships ranging in size. Presently, the largest afloat is “Oasis of the Seas” (Read all about it in this blog).

But you haven’t seen anything yet!

Now, to challenge the field of cruising, private ownership of yachts has taken on a different style from the usual. Such is the case with this Super Yacht (appropriately dubbed “Tropical Island Paradise”). No price tag has been attached to it, but you bet all the rich & famous will be vying for it.

The next super-yacht that’s set to hit the world’s oceans comes complete with its own functioning volcano and floating tropical islands.

The vessel – dubbed the ‘Tropical island Paradise’ – has been designed by British boat builders Yacht Island Design, from Derby, Derbys – some 90 miles from the sea.

The extraordinary & extravagant 295 ft. yacht has many unusual features:

  • it boasts of a towering volcano with a cascading waterfall which feeds the swimming pool

  • its very own floating tropical islands

  • helicopter landing pad & huge bar set behind a series of beach cabanas. Playboys will love this. This sis spectacular for those quick shore trips.

  • It comes with its own private beach cove and a waterfall cascading down from a volcano.

Studio director Rob McPherson at the Derbyshire firm, who have also created the Streets of Monaco super-yacht, said: ‘The exterior was designed to give the impression of waves breaking around a volcanic island, whilst maintaining the look of a contemporary yacht design.

‘This design centres around a secluded island paradise, with elements inspired by the islands of the Caribbean, Indian Ocean and Polynesia. It is set to be a big hit when it comes onto the market.’

The lavish yacht can accommodate up to 10 guests – and can travel along at a top speed of 15 knots.

The main deck is a secluded beach ‘cove’ of cabanas surrounding a massive ocean view swimming pool.

And should the millionaire future owners get tired of taking a dip in the pool, they can sail out into the sea on their very own floating island complete with deck chairs and palm trees.

McPherson added: ‘We had two reasons for designing such a boat. The first being that it’s good fun, and secondly the current market is pretty saturated with designs that look fairly similar.

‘Our mission is to work on incredibly fun designs and carve a niche for ourselves within the market, a place where other designers fear to tread.’

Inside the huge, towering volcano is a cinema, library, games room, gym, spa and VIP suites – including an owners pad spread over two decks.

The boat – which has yet to hit the market and hasn’t had a price set – is causing waves in the boat building world with its unique design.

Would you be vying for it when it hits the market?

According to a survey, the rich still splashes around while the economy stumbles!

Story Source: Daily Mail – 23 July 2011

The Secret Illuminati

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This is the original insignia of the Bavarian ...
Image via Wikipedia - Original Insignia

Believe it or not . . .

The Illuminati is Real

Source: Pravda-ru

• Illuminati – a Bavarian secret society founded in 1776, organized like the Freemasons . . . people claiming to possess special enlightenment or knowledge of something : some mysterious standard known only to the illuminati of the organization.

The Conspiracy for world takeover is as old as man himself. The Illuminati, in recent history, has twice tried to control the world — in Napoleon’s day and during World War I.

Only about 5,000 people in the entire world know the true purpose of the Illuminati and its conspiracy to rule the earth. Their plan was written down in code, as a fictional novel, in 1957.

In the mid-1950’s Philippe Rothschild ordered one of his mistresses, Ayn Rand, an established authoress and philosopher, to undertake the writing of this code to the witches of the world. This novel, “Atlas Shrugged”, was never intended to be a best seller, although it turned out to be one.

The main characters of “Atlas Shrugged” are code names for individuals or companies. The code is as follows:

Dagny Taggart — Ayn Rand

Dagny’s brother — The combined Railroad System

Ellis Wyatt — David Rockefeller

Hank Rearden — U.S. Steel, Bethlehem Steel

Francisco D’Anconia — Combined Copper Mines

Galt, D’Anconia, and the Pirate –Rothschild Tribunal

The Tribunal in the book went around convincing certain major corporation presidents of their philosophy and plan, getting them to bankrupt their own businesses. The owners of these companies would then vanish and leave with either Galt or D’Anconia to a retreat area in the Colorado mountain regions. “Colorado” is the code name for the “Bermuda Triangle“, the place where the key figures of the Illuminati will be when the world crashes.

Looking at the present world situations, the Illuminati maybe just

around the corner waiting to pounce yet again.

Nobel Prize Awards for Discovery of Graphene

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photo of Prof Geim
Prof. Geim - Image via Wikipedia

(Source: Pravda-ru)

 

Graphene

Graphene is both the thinnest and the strongest material yet discovered, opening up new frontiers in quantum physics. Two Russian scientists have been awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for their work developing graphene.

 Andrei Geim and Konstantin Novoselov demonstrated that carbon in its extremely thin form – just one atom thick – had exceptional properties originating in the world of quantum physics.

Konstantin Novoselov is a Royal Society Research Fellow at the University of Manchester in their Mesoscopic Research Group researching mesoscopic systems and nanostructures. He was awarded the 2008 Europhysics Prize for the same discovery.

Andre Geim is a physicist who, as well as the discovery of graphene, is known for the development of gecko tape and demonstrations of diamagnetic levitation. He’s also based at the University of Manchester.

Graphene is both the thinnest and the strongest material yet discovered. Geim and Novoselov extracted it from ordinary graphite, and used ordinary adhesive tape to obtain a flake of carbon with a thickness of just one atom.

“Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov have shown that carbon in such a flat form has exceptional properties that originate from the remarkable world of quantum physics,” says the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

“A vast variety of practical applications now appear possible including the creation of new materials and the manufacture of innovative electronics. Graphene transistors are predicted to be substantially faster than today’s silicon transistors and result in more efficient computers.”


It is said that investments in Graphene will reap huge dividends.

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