Links - 16th November 2011

"Say what you will about the Ten Commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them." - H. L. Mencken

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The only living master of a dying martial art - "A former factory worker from the British Midlands may be the last living master of the centuries-old Sikh battlefield art of shastar vidya... By working to revive a culture and practice that left the mainstream more than 200 years ago, Mr Singh has come up against a lot of resistance from within the Sikh community. He says he received 84 death threats in his first two years as a teacher... "Sikhism has gone through several stages of evolution," says Christopher Shackle, a former professor of South Asian studies"
"Hair was worn long and wrapped around the head to protect the skull"

Twentysomething: Why I regret getting straight A's in college - "1. No one has ever asked about my GPA.
2. I didn't sleep.
3. I've forgotten 95% of it.
4. I didn't have time for people.
5. Work experience is more valuable...
If you're getting your masters, going to law school, or becoming a doctor, then you'll need all 37 of those A's to get into the best school possible, and you can safely disregard this entire post. Just be sure that you follow through. I thought I would go to law school, and then I found out what a miserable career it is and how little it actually pay"

Top US foreclosure law firm threw Halloween party where staff dressed as foreclosed-upon Americans

A little fright music: A few notes on why we find film and TV scores scary

Путин лапает избирательниц! / Epic! Putin paws women voters! - YouTube - "We are sure that Russian girls are the most beautiful, open and wonderful, there are no such beauties in any other country!"
I was quite disappointed with this, since it used juvenile logic reminscent of the Penis Pimps. Luckily I didn't sit through all 1,000 pawings (I stopped at 270, after being bored). I wonder just what they told the girls to get them to consent to being fondled.

9GAG - Girl in Toyota Supra

Never mind dark circles - this concealer even hides tattoos

Leaping antelope brings down cyclist in South Africa

Skydiving Sex Stunt (un-censored version!)

Sir Ian McKellen Reads Manual for Changing Tires in Dramatic Voice

A Sumo wrestlers diet - "This is acheived through very rigorous eating and sleeping strategies rather than a mass endulgence in foods with high fat content"

Everything is a Remix Part 2 on Vimeo - "An exploration of the remix techniques involved in producing films. Part Two of a four-part series."
Part 3 talks about how the Mac copied 2 other systems

Women's 'sex strike' ends fighting in Mindanao villages
Lysistrata!

Jazz for Cows - YouTube - "The New Hot 5, American-based jazz band plays for a herd of cows in Autrans, France"

Skepticblog » Folk-Wisdom Medicine versus Science-Based Medicine - "I gained a deeper understanding of why people turn to alternative medicine. Don’t get me wrong—my mother’s doctors were brilliant, her care the very best available, and we have no regrets about what might have been. And that’s the point. Even under such ideal conditions I found the whole experience frustrating and unfulfilling: it was nearly impossible to get honest and accurate information about my mom’s condition; neither my father nor I could get doctors to return our calls; misinformation and (usually) no information was the norm; and despite my best efforts, the relationship with her physicians (with one exception—her oncologist whom I befriended), could not have been more detached."

'You just don't understand my religion' is not good enough - "Too often I find that faith is mysterious only selectively. Believers constantly attribute all sorts of qualities to their gods and have a list of doctrines as long as your arm. It is only when the questions get tough that, suddenly, their God disappears in a puff of mystery. Ineffability becomes a kind of invisibility cloak, only worn when there is a need to get out of a bit of philosophical bother."

Nature Wants to Eat You - "A celebration of the animal kingdom's terrifying mouths, jaws, teeth, and tongues... You know how it goes: one day you’re swimming happily along, and then a parasitic louse swims through your gills, drinks all the blood from your tongue until it wastes away and then insinuates its own body in the now empty space"

Calling All Koopas: Mario Propaganda Posters

Nurturing more women entrepreneurs in the Philippines - "The Philippines is trying to encourage and nurture more women entrepreneurs to drive the country's economy... Six out of 10 business start-ups are owned and managed by women"
If the majority of business start-ups are directed by women, why do you need to encourage them still?

'Man rapes donkey' - "He told the court that he hired a prostitute - and she turned into a donkey during the night"
It's a Miracle!

mental_floss Blog » It’s Complicated: 5 Puzzling International Borders - "The Cooch-Behar District, nestled between Bangladesh and India, is one of the most confusing border zones in the world, with 102 mini-exclaves belonging to India splattered on the Bangladeshi side of the border, and 71 exclaves belonging to Bangladesh peppering the Indian side. To further confuse things, inside many of those exclaves, there are other, even smaller exclaves belonging to the other country"

mental_floss Blog » New Math: The Time Indiana Tried to Change Pi to 3.2

Daily NK - Eyelid Surgery a Restaurant Must - "Since the start of the 2000s, young women working in North Korean restaurants both in Pyongyang and abroad have been required to have double eyelid surgery... “It seems that Kim Jong Il places great importance on the appearance of workers in restaurants earning foreign currency”"

Skin Deep - It’s Botox for You, Dear Bridesmaids - NYTimes.com - "“If I were 25 or 26 and getting married, a bracelet, necklace or matching earrings would be fine,” she said. But at 35?... Becky Lee, 39, a Manhattan photographer, declined when a friend asked her — and five other attendants — to have their breasts enhanced. “We’re all Asian and didn’t have a whole lot of cleavage, and she found a doctor in L.A. who was willing to do four for the price of two,” said Ms. Lee, who wore a push-up bra instead... two women were claustrophobic and couldn’t bear standing in a tanning capsule. “They asked the bride if they could use regular tanning cream from a salon,” Ms. Goldberg said. The bride refused; she wanted everyone to be the same shade. The women ultimately declined to be bridesmaids. “Friendships of 20-plus years gone over a spray tan?” Ms. Goldberg said. “Sad!”

PETA lawsuit alleges SeaWorld enslaves killer whales - "A PETA statement said the lawsuit is the first of its kind in contending that constitutional protections against slavery are not limited to humans... The 13th Amendment outlaws slavery and "involuntary servitude" in the United States without any specific mention that it applies only to people... The "next friends" joining PETA in representing the killer whales are three marine mammal experts, including Ric O'Barry, who was featured in the Academy Award-winning documentary "The Cove" about dolphin-hunting in Japan, and two former Sea World trainers. Their lawsuit contends killer whales -- Orcinus orca, the largest species of the dolphin family -- "possess sophisticated learning, problem solving, and communicative abilities," as well as "distinctive cultural traits"... "PETA has once again showed that it prefers publicity stunts to the hard work of caring for, rescuing and helping animals," the SeaWorld statement said"
Anything concerning PETA could be mistaken for an article from The Onion
RWS should bring in Killer Whales to join their dolphins
NWA: "But if human laws apply to whales, shouldn't Tilikum be in jail for killing a trainer?"

BBC News - Catch-22: Is the novel still relevant to modern soldiers? - "Lt Col Bates also sees similarities in frustrations surrounding the military's hierarchical organisation, which gives rise to comic, inept characters in command positions such as Cathcart, Dreedle and Peckem... "By virtue of their appointment alone and their position in the chain of command, they are allowed to get away with enforcing outrageous self-serving orders that those below are powerless to resist for fear of extreme military punishment," says Col Bates... In Catch-22, for those lower down the food chain, there is nowhere to go to question methods. The same can be true today mainly because the army employs the same top-down reporting system that was in place 70 years ago, says Lt Col Bates"

Mystery solved: Why Steve Jobs’ car never had a license plate - Apple

The American POW who chose China - "When it came time for his release, Mr Hawkins says, he had been so impressed by the Chinese he opted to return with them to Beijing... "I never had regrets," he says. "The one big thing I learnt about going to China was how lucky we are here in the US. Our government's not perfect but I think it's one of the best in the world""

JURN : search over 4,000 free scholarly ejournals in the arts & humanities

Bali: why bother? - "I once vowed never to go to Bali. The drunk Aussie tourists! The traffic! The noise! The tacky souvenirs! I mean, why would you go?... This tout smiled and asked if I wanted "transport". I smiled and explained very politely that, in Australia, if a woman gets on a motorbike with a stranger, that is called prostitution... I often wondered what these touts would think if their sister or mother got on a motorbike with a strange man... Tourists are similarly harassed in Ubud if they go shopping in the kilometre-long retail love-in that is Monkey Forest Road. Picture walking down Chapel Street and being constantly screamed at from each doorway to buy things. Should I have enjoyed this?... who makes these souvenirs? Are there entire villages near Ubud that make wooden penises?"
More travel writing should be like this instead of pretending everywhere is paradise

Driving Tests Do Not Increase Road Safety: Evidence from Mexico - "One possible explanation for our result is the Reverse Peltzman Effect: drivers become more careful and exert more effort on the roads if they know that the driving environment becomes less safe, due to the presence of incompetent drivers"