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Wednesday, February 17, 2010

EARTHQUAKE UPDATE: Magnitude 6.7 Quake Hits North Korea’s North Border

February 18, 2010, 01:26 AM EST

By Bomi Lim and Stuart Biggs

Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) -- A 6.7-magnitude earthquake struck close to North Korea’s northeastern border with China and Russia today. The temblor’s depth indicated it was unlikely to have caused extensive damage or triggered by an explosion.

The quake, within Russian territory, occurred at 10:13 a.m. local time, 110 kilometers (70 miles) northeast of North Korea’s Chongjin at a depth of 562.5 kilometers, the U.S. Geological Survey said on its Web site. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.

“Our preliminary assessment is that it is highly unlikely the quake was caused by a nuclear test, given the depth of the epicenter,” Kim Young Sun, spokesman at South Korea’s Foreign Ministry, told reporters today in Seoul.

Kim didn’t give further details, saying the government is still looking into the matter.

North Korea’s two nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009 triggered tremors that were of less magnitude than that of today’s earthquake. The May 2009 explosion of an atomic device caused a 4.7-magnitude quake at 10 kilometers below the earth’s surface, the U.S. Geological Survey said then.

Chongjin, located in North Hamkyong province, is a key port city for North Korean trade with China. The province is also home to the country’s Rason economic zone.

Earthquake damage diminishes the deeper the temblor is from the earth’s surface, according to the Institute of Crustal Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara. The magnitude-7 quake on Jan. 12 in Haiti, which killed about 250,000 people, struck at a depth of 13 kilometers.

--Editors: Bill Austin, Aaron Sheldrick

View Article in BusinessWeek

CHINA: 15 places worth visiting in China: Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous prefecture

In Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous prefecture in Sichuan Province, there are many famous tourist destinations, including the Wolong National Natural Reserve for giant pandas, Jiuzhai Valley, Huanglong National Park and Siguniang Mountain.

In Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous prefecture in Sichuan Province, there are many famous tourist destinations, including the Wolong National Natural Reserve for giant pandas, Jiuzhai Valley, Huanglong 
National Park and Siguniang Mountain.

2009-12-01 17:02 BJT

Editor: Jin Lin | Source: China.org.cn

View Article on CCTV

EARTHQUAKE UPDATE: Geographic Location

Earthquake Date and Time: February 18, 2010 01:13:17 GMT

By QuakeTracker

Magnitude 6.7 earthquake, China-Russia-North Korea border region

The geographic location of this earthquake was at 42.5606 latitude, 130.8356 longitude.

View a larger image.
Magnitude 6.7 earthquake, China-Russia-North Korea border region

Magnitude 6.7 earthquake, China-Russia-North Korea border region

NEWS FLASH: USGS: 6..8 Earthquake Rocks China-Russia-N.Korea

Feb 17, 2010 5:40 pm US/Pacific

USGS: 6.8 Earthquake Rocks China-Russia-N.Korea

BEIJING (AP) ―

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 struck Thursday morning in the region where China, Russia and North Korea meet, the U.S. Geological Survey reported.


The temblor hit about 9:15 a.m., and office towers in Beijing swayed slightly for about a minute.


The USGS said the quake was centered on the Russian coast along the sea of Japan, 61 miles (98 kilometers) west-southwest of Vladivostok, Russia and about 70 miles (110 kilometers) east from Yanji city in northeast China's Jilin province.


A man at the Jilin province earthquake bureau said the agency was trying to get more information and did not have any immediate details.

KAMAKURA, JAPAN: The Big Buddha

HIROSHIMA, JAPAN: Hiroshima Port

 

Click here to listen to or download podcast about this port.

Source:  Hiroshima Convention & Visitors Bureau

OLYMPICS: Ice Hockey: Thirteen's lucky for US, China crash


Vancouver (AFP) - The United States followed up their 12-1 win over China with a 13-0 demolition of Russia in the Olympic Games women's ice hockey tournament on Tuesday.

USA opened the scoring when Monique Lamoureux found herself alone in the slot and with her twin sister Jocelyne causing problems for net-minder Anna Prugova, Monique hit the opener at 2:19.

Four more goals followed in the first period with Jenny Potter on her way to her second hat-trick in as many games, with a shorthanded goal and a power-play goal.

Caitlin Cahow then added another power-play goal at 12:57. Karen Thatcher rounded out the opening period scoring with her first Olympic goal at 9:54.

Russia were short-handed for much of the second period, accumulating six penalties and allowing the US to score four more during that time.

Angela Ruggiero, Kelli Stack, Natalie Darwitz and Molly Engstrom all found the net within seconds of a Russian player going to the penalty box.

Jocelyne Lamoureux scored at 6:01 before Russia changed net-minders after Darwitz's second short-handed goal at 31:00.

Potter greeted replacement Mariya Onolbaeva with her third goal of the day at 31:46.

Lisa Chesson scored the USA's 13th goal on another powerplay at 1:05 of the third.

Prugova and Onolbaeva faced a total of 34 shots on goal, making only 21 saves while, at the other end, Jessie Vetter stopped all seven shots she faced.

US coach Mark Johnson said that despite the scoreline, teams like Russia can only get better by facing his side as well as Canada who started their campaign with an Olympic record 18-0 defeat of Slovakia.

"The Russian programme is just now starting to build. I think a lot of things concern me, and I don't think that's at the top of the list," he said.

"We respected our opponents, didn't try to do things that would embarrass them or ourselves. You have to respect the game. As a coach you'll be on both sides of the aisle. Their players are doing the same things we are, playing in the Olympics.

"My message in between periods was to be respectful. Their players are doing the same thing as our players and living the Olympic dream."

Finland came from behind to secure a spot in the semi-finals with a 2-1 victory over China.

Wang Linuo put China ahead but Finland struck back in the second period with 14 seconds left on a slashing penalty to Liu Zhixin.

Karoliina Rantamaki brought the puck from behind China's net and her shot was deflected off Jin Fengling past her goalkeeper Shi Yao.

Finland grabbed the winner when Venla Hovi slipped a backhand shot through Shi's legs.

"I think the referee was very unfair to us. I've played for so many years and no one (referee) has ever made my team win or lose," said a tearful Jin.

"Some penalties shouldn't have been called. What the ref did had a great effect on us. I don't think we deserved to lose."

The game grew increasingly rough with the two teams racking up 30 minutes in penalties between them during the game, with China accounting for 20 of them.

View article...

DALIAN, CHINA: Dalian Wax Museum - everybody from Hitler to Jackie Chan stands at attention

Posted: 05th July 2009

By: eMarketingEye


Dalian is a much sought after tourist spot among leisure travelers for its contemporary city feel, warm weather and coastline. The number of museums found in Dalian is nowhere near the sum of museums and art galleries put up in Shanghai or Beijing. However, Dalian puts forward a respectable account of itself through quite a lot of institutions. These institutions display the area's one of a kind legacy. The amusing and interesting wax museum along with the traditional works of art of Lushun Hall is some of the attractions in Dalian.


The Dalian Wax Museum is the biggest in China and features one hundred celebrity figures. The European style structure has prominent global celebrities like multi billionaire Bill Gates, acclaimed actress Julia Roberts, basketball legend Michael Jordan, China’s own Jackie Chan, and the former United States President Bill Clinton. In addition, there are local stars from Asia also featured in the museum. Moreover, the Dalian Waxwork Museum remakes a lot of well known scenes from entertainment classics, comprising the Titanic and Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
The Dalian Wax Museum will definitely be a delight for the children as it is a true to form, and an out of the ordinary wax museum with a wide range of politicians, famous figures and other remarkable persons. Also, the entry price is sufficiently small to make the Dalian Wax Museum worth a visit.


There are also customary Chinese social scenes that have been produced in wax, together with imaginative interpretations from Western icons such as Romeo and Juliet and Jane Eyre.

Pushpitha Wijesinghe is an experienced independent freelance writer. He specializes in providing a wide variety of content and articles related to the travel hospitality industry

OLYMPICS: Quotes: Who said what at Vancouver Olympic Winter Games

Vancouver (AFP) - Who said what at the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games on Tuesday:

FIGURE SKATING


"It's another disappointment at the Olympic Games. These Games have beaten me."
- France's Brian Joubert after his short programme in which he fell.

"Before, it was very hard for me. I didn't want to be a famous person. I wanted to be a normal girl. The paparrazzi would be waiting for me in front of my home all the time. I was just 18 years old then. But now I am a bit older and I'm used to it and I know how to talk with them."
- Miki Ando on her life in Japan.

ICE HOCKEY


"That was my mistake. I wanted to press the puck towards the goalie or to the boards, but it hit my stick and the puck went into the net. It was a big mistake, my heart is broken."
- Jin Fengling of China on deflecting the puck into her own net in the second period giving Finland a game-tying goal in a 2-1 defeat.

SKELETON


"It's a little skiddy. My shoulders are tired, I need softer handling."
- Japans' Shinsuke Tayama after coming off his sled.

"I wouldn't say there was a rivalry, but I and the Canadian team - I never see them except on the track and there are people I like more."
- Michi Hlailovic of Germany on rivalry with Canadian sliders.

View article...

DALIAN, CHINA: Dalian Wax Museum (Laxiang Bowuguan)

 

FROMMER’S

About 100m (328 ft.) north of the station is the Dalian Wax Museum (Laxiang Bowuguan; tel. 0411/8790-2006; open 8am-5pm), where for ¥30 ($3.90/£1.95) you can stroll past replicas of Jackie Chan, Sun Yat-sen, Adolf Hitler, Zhang Ziyi, and Kate Winslet -- direct from the set of Titantic, with piped-in Celine Dion music.

JAPAN AT THE OLYMPICS: Figure skating: Takahashi keeps Japan's gold hopes alive

Feb 16, 2010

Vancouver (AFP) - Daisuke Takahashi boosted Japan's bid for their first medal in Olympic men's figure skating as he virtually tied with titleholder Yevgeny Plushenko and world champion Evan Lysacek in Tuesday's short programme.

Takahashi, the 2007 world silver medallist, is sitting third just 0.60 points behind Russia's Plushenko with American Lysacek a fractional 0.05 ahead of the Japanese skater going into Thursday's free skating final.

"It was my best performance of the season," said Takahashi, who scored 90.25 points after Plushenko topped the leaderboard with 90.85.

"The audience was really good, there were lots of fans and Japanese flags and that really helped. I am glad because I haven't scored so high in a long while."

The 23-year-old claimed his fourth national title in December, underlining his comeback from knee injury which forced him to miss the 2008-2009 season.

"I'm not that much behind Plushenko on points. It is great that I don't feel under pressure going into the free skate," the Japanese added.

Takahashi's score bettered his personal best of 89.95 in competitions sanctioned by the International Skating Union (ISU), although he scored higher points in domestic events.

Nobunari Oda, 22, the runner-up to Lysacek at the Grand Prix Final in December, is within striking distance of the podium as he sits fourth with 84.85 points.

Another Japanese, 20-year-old Takahiko Kozuka, placed eighth with 79.59.

"My biggest task in free skating is to finish without a mistake and keep up the levels of my spins and steps," said Takahashi, who finished eighth on his Olympic debut in Turin in 2006.

Takahashi skated a clean short programme, opening with a triple axel and a triple lutz-triple toeloop combination.

Skating to the music of Eye by Coba, he hit level four in a flying sit spin, a straight line step sequence and change-foot spins. He punched the air at the end to a roaring crowd including Japanese waving scores of red-sun national flags.

Unlike Plushenko, neither the Japanese trio nor Lysacek attempted the high-scoring but technically demanding quadruple jump.

But the Japanese have repeatedly said that a quadruple could help them to the Olympic podium.

"Since the Nagano Olympics so many people are trying the quad jump. I think it's necessary for something like the Olympics," said Takahashi.

"To be successful I think I would like to include the quad jump in my performance. I think it's important for the future of figure skating."

Oda, who won two Grand Prix events in Paris and Beijing this season, said:

"I intend to work it in my free programme after seeing how I do it tomorrow."

Kozuka, the 2008 Grand Prix Final runner-up, said:

"I have nailed the (quadruple) jump at my will in training every day. I believe my coach (Nobuo Sato) will let me challenge that."

The Japanese men are hoping to emulate the success of their female compatriots in the Olympics.

Shizuka Arakawa won the women's title in Turin to lift Asia's first Olympic figure skating gold medal. In 1992, Midori Ito won the women's silver.

S. KOREA: Top 10 Foods: Bulgogi

Bulgogi, well known overseas

In the 1950s of Korea, some restaurants offered roast meat after cutting into thin slices, which helped shorten cooking time and make meat tender, as thick meat was generally tough and not grilled fast.  Later, cooking utensil was changed from grill to pan, enabling guests to put boiled rice into beef gravy gathered on the pan.  Thus, ordinary people who could not afford the expensive meat often could eat meat and rice more economically.  This method of roasting meat slice on a pan has continued and expanded, which has become bulgogi of today. 

Bulgogi and Galbigui (grilled beef ribs) are the most favored foods of the Koreans.  Of all the Korean dishes, perhaps bulgogi is most widely known overseas.  Bulgogi not only represents Korean food but also symbolizes the food roasting culture of Korea.  As bulgogi is not pungent, foreigners who experience the food first time can enjoy its taste easily.  Through bulgogi, garlic and soybean paste that are the main ingredients of bulgogi condiments can be also experienced.


Roasting meat while seasoning them on-site is not the only way of cooking bulgogi.  ‘Hot pepper paste bulgogi’ is a kind of bulgogi cooked by storing meat in hot pepper paste for some time before roasting them.  In the past, there was ‘soybean paste bulgogi’ but it has faded away since the method of using hot pepper paste was introduced.  Pork can be also roasted after seasoning or burying them in hot pepper paste. 

Normally bulgogi is eaten along with kimchi and ssam (wrapping in lettuce or leafy vegetable). In many cases, Korean foods are not taken as a single dish but taken together with other foods.  This habit has been cultivated through long experience that certain combinations of foods, when taken together, bring about harmony and synergy effect in taste and nutrition.

To eat with ssam, bulgogi is laid on lettuce or leafy vegetable and added with a little soybean paste before wrapping and putting it into mouth.  Vegetables mainly used for ssam are lettuce and green perilla, and sometimes crown daisy, dandelion and aster leaves are used. 


The custom of eating ssam is a unique culture found only in some areas of Mongolia in addition to Korea.  'Ssamjang' (ssam paste) has been developed not long ago, which is prepared by mixing soybean paste with hot pepper paste in a suitable proportion to generate best taste of ssam. 


Taking rice, vegetables and ssam paste together with bulgogi will not only help achieve harmonized nutrition but also remove greasy taste arising from dining on meat.  Besides ssam, kimchi is also a desirable side dish to accompany bulgogi, as it helps reduce fatty taste of meat. 

View Article in Food in Korea

EARTHQUAKE UPDATE: Quake rocks China-Russia-North Korea border region

Associated Press, 02.17.10, 10:18 PM EST

BEIJING -- A magnitude 6.7 earthquake rocked the region where China, Russia and North Korea meet Thursday, the U.S. Geological Survey said. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.

Though area residents said they did not feel the quake, office towers in Beijing - about 770 miles (1,240 kilometers) away from the epicenter - swayed slightly for about a minute.

The quake occurred 335 miles (540 kilometers) below the earth's surface.

With earthquakes centered deep underground, sometimes those close to the epicenter don't feel it while people further away notice some shaking, said the duty officer at the Seismological Bureau of Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in northeast China's Jilin province. He refused to give his name as is common among Chinese officials.

The Korea Earthquake Research Center said there was no damage in North or South Korea and that quakes occur in that region about once a year.

The USGS said the epicenter was on the Russian coast along the Sea of Japan, 61 miles (98 kilometers) west-southwest of Vladivostok, about 70 miles (110 kilometers) east of China's Yanji city in Jilin province.

View AP Article on Forbes

OLYMPICS: Mixed bag for Americans in short program

Johnny Weir

Johnny Weir

Posted: Feb 17, 2:26a ET | Updated: Feb 17, 2:56a ET

VANCOUVER (AP) -- While Evan Lysacek thinks about dusting off a special spot in his trophy case,Johnny Weir , well, just plain dusts.

Lysacek left the Pacific Coliseum on Tuesday night in second place after the men's short program. One more dynamic performance in the free skate and the defending world champion will leave the Vancouver Olympics with a medal. Maybe even gold.

"I had some pressure coming in as a reigning world champion and I felt it," Lysacek said. "To be able to go out and silence all of that really felt good."

Weir is sixth and will need help to even get on the podium, trailing Japan's Daisuke Takahashi by 8.15 points for the third spot. He was so edgy heading into competition that Weir broke out the cleaning spray at the apartment he shares with ice dancer Tanith Belbin in the athletes' village.

"Last night I was nervous, so I Pledged everything," he said. "Some people eat, some people drink, some people smoke. I Pledge."

The third American, two-time national champion Jeremy Abbott , was "heartbroken" after flopping his way to 15th.

"I don't where it went wrong and I don't know why," said Abbott. who skated exceptionally well at the U.S. championships last month.

Nothing went wrong for Lysacek, whose shot at a medal in 2006 was ruined when, ravaged by flu, he crashed his way to 10th place in the short program. His brilliant free skate got him up to fourth.

Now he can put that behind him.

Lysacek will go first in the final group Thursday night. Takahashi, just .05 behind Lysacek, has the third-from-last spot, followed by Weir and Plushenko.

That leaves Lysacek needing to post a high number and hope it's enough to make him the first American winner of Olympic men's gold since Brian Boitano in 1988.

But he knows how difficult it will be to overtake Plushenko, who could become the games' first repeat gold medalist in men's figure skating since Dick Button in 1952.

"He has one major advantage over everyone, and that's an Olympic gold medal," Lysacek said. "He has power mentally because he has what we all want. I think it's going to take some mighty fine skating to get that power away from him."

Weir isn't concerned about challenging Plushenko. He didn't consider himself a medals possibility when he arrived in Vancouver, even though he's won three U.S. titles and, as recently as 2008, took world bronze.

"I actually had fun tonight, and that's something I haven't been able to say for a long time," said Weir, who quit for a few weeks last spring after bombing so badly at the U.S. championships he failed to make the world team. "I felt like I really showed my heart."

Abbott couldn't complete a triple axel or a triple lutz. Still, he promised not to pack it in despite having little shot at a high placement.

"I'm going to have to do a lot of digging in the next two days, because I'm not going to give up," he said. "I'm not going to leave it here. I'm not going to leave my games on that experience."

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JAPAN: Where Giants Dance and Crash in Japan

Sumo wrestlers performing the opening ceremony on Jan. 11 at a tournament at the Kokugikan, Japan’s national sumo stadium in Tokyo.  Ko Sasaki for The New York Times

January 24, 2010

By ALIDA BECKER

AT the edge of the balcony, a tiny woman was screaming. The elderly couple in the next row were jumping up and down. Below us, all around the ring at the Kokugikan, Japan’s national sumo stadium in Tokyo, a roaring crowd hurled seat cushions into the air. My husband and I looked at each other in amazement. After two weeks of travel among the intently well-behaved, rigorously unflappable Japanese, were we about to have a peek behind that decorous facade?

Well, yes and no.

Certainly the huge, nearly naked wrestlers had little to hide. But even in their diaper-like loincloths, they maintained a dignified swagger. And while the crowd erupted in spontaneous shouts and demonstrations, the competition was carefully choreographed, full of rituals and pageantry. Nobody argued with the referee, not even the loud fan in the back who had brought an ample supply of beer. As for the apparently no-holds-barred wrestling — a flurry of pushing and grappling, like a skirmish between the schoolyard’s two biggest bullies — it was preceded and concluded by courtly bowing.

Like so much we’d already encountered in Japan, sumo turned out to be a mix of the seemingly approachable and the utterly confounding. It’s hard, after all, to let your hair down when it’s arranged in a topknot whose traditional shape hasn’t changed for centuries.

If cricket is a slow-moving mystery to most Americans, then sumo — in which bouts are usually over in a matter of seconds — is a puzzlement of a whole different order. The basic goal is simple: force your opponent to be the first either to step out of the roughly 15-foot-diameter ring or touch the ground with anything but the soles of his feet. The sport has been based in the Ryogoku neighborhood of Tokyo, on the east bank of the Sumida River, since the 17th century, although the 1980s-era stadium, which seats 11,000, looks as if it might have been teleported from Cleveland or Omaha. Except, of course, for the drum tower out front, a flimsy box on stilts where men bang out a fierce rhythm high above the crowds.

Inside, past the women handing out souvenir fans and the concessions selling hot dogs, a first glimpse of the ring brings back memories of the old Spectrum in Philadelphia. But unlike Mike Tyson or Marvin Hagler, these gigantic brawlers retreat to their corners not to be toweled off and patched up but to toss around handfuls of purifying salt and sip water from a bamboo ladle, then delicately pat their mouths on a folded cloth. The referee, dressed in a brilliantly colored kimono complete with a tall black headdress and a ceremonial fan, might have wandered in from the set of a Kabuki play. Up above him, where a Jumbotron might be, is the stylized roof of a Shinto shrine.

And that’s where the real explanations begin: sumo’s roots lie far back in Japanese history, as a performance to entertain and appease the spirits of Shinto, the animistic native religion whose shrines are still tended throughout the country, often co-existing with Buddhist temples. Established as a court ritual in medieval Japan, sumo wrestling gradually became a means of employment for samurai warriors in times of peace and emerged as a professional sport in the early 20th century.

Even now, though, it can seem to the outsider like a highly stylized kind of performance art. There’s a strangely lulling rhythm to the parades of contestants, the marching displays of the sponsors’ banners, the solemn recitations, even the ferocious stomping and high sideways kicking before the individual wrestlers square off. Then, in an instant, the pace changes: there’s a flurry of movement, and one wrestler is hurriedly sent off in defeat. (To add insult to injury, the loser is called the shini-tai, or “dead body.”)

Sumo is both high-stakes and hierarchical. The wrestlers live in training stables near the stadium, each one run by a master who regulates everything from what they can eat to what they can wear. Junior members act as servants to more highly rated wrestlers and enter the sport at the lowest level of its six divisions. They can move up only by performing well in the half-dozen tournaments held throughout the year — and, in the same way, their superiors can be bumped down.

Each tournament lasts 15 days, with the lowest-ranking entrants beginning competition at 8:30 in the morning. The audience grows as the day progresses, with the top two divisions competing from midafternoon until around 6 in the evening. There are no weight classes, but finesse can sometimes foil sheer bulk: an agile smaller wrestler, if he’s sufficiently skilled, can catch a 400-pound behemoth off balance. Then again, that jelly-bellied guy who looks like Santa on steroids may have the arms and legs of a body builder. Good luck getting him to move even an inch.

Foreigners can be admitted to sumo stables, but the sport’s governing body has acted to limit their numbers. The two currently active yokozuna, or grand champions, are from Mongolia, and among their strongest challengers are wrestlers from Bulgaria and Georgia. In 1993, Chad Rowan, a Hawaiian fighting under the name Akebono, became the first foreign-born competitor to achieve grand-champion status.

And what about the tournament we attended in September? That pillow-throwing melee was caused by the upset of a Mongolian favorite, who on the final day ended up tied with his rival at 14 wins and 1 loss each. In a playoff, the baby-faced yokozuna called Asashoryu celebrated his 29th birthday by collecting his 24th championship cup, using what The Japan Times described as “an underhanded frontal belt grip” and a “beltless arm throw.”

I’m still not entirely sure what that involves. But I am sure it’s not the sort of thing you ought to try at home.

DRUMS, PAGEANTRY AND BOWS

Championship sumo tournaments are held six times a year, rotating among Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka. For the current Tokyo tournament, which ends Jan. 24, tickets ranged in price from 14,300 Japanese yen, or about $154 at a rate of 89 yen to the dollar, for ringside boxes with Japanese-style seating (on the floor) to 2,100 yen, or about $23, for general admission in the balcony, where the seating is Western style. The next tournament starts March 14 in Osaka.

The English-language Web site of the Grand Sumo Association (sumo.or.jp/eng/) has detailed — and somewhat mind-boggling — information on how and when tickets may be bought. The Lawson and FamilyMart convenience stores in Tokyo also sell tickets, as does the Japan Travel Bureau, a national tourist agency with offices throughout the country (jtbusa.com/en/default.asp). In addition, hotel concierges can usually arrange tickets for early tournament rounds on fairly short notice.

The Web site of The Japan Times, a daily English-language newspaper, provides useful background reporting as well as maps and directions to the sumo stadiums, at japantimes.co.jp/sports/sumo_schedule.html.

RUSSIA: On this day: 17 February

On February 17, 1740, according to the decree of Empress Anna Ioannovna, two court jesters were made to marry and a house made entirely out of ice in the center of St. Petersburg was constructed in honor of the event.

In 1730, Empress Anna Ioannovna ascended the throne. Anna did not want her court to be inferior to the courts of the European monarchs, so she conducted balls, masquerades and theater performances regularly. She had six jesters to entertain her, and Avdotia Buzheninova, an aged unattractive woman, was one of them. One day, Avdotia jokingly complained to Anna about not being married, and Anna promised Avdotia to marry her off to another jester, Mikhail Golitsyn. This wedding was not to entertain the Empress and the Court, and it had to be spectacular.

In spite of being a court fool, Mikhail Golitsyn had the title of prince. In 1729, Golitsyn’s wife died, and he went to Italy to cast the grief away. In Italy, he fell in love with a local woman, and turned Catholic to marry her. When Mikhail and his new wife returned to Moscow, Mikhail had to conceal both the marriage and the change of religion, but the secret service learned everything quite soon. Mikhail was forced to divorce, his wife was sent back to Italy, and Golitsyn was made Anna’s court jester. The new duties of the 51-year-old Mikhail included sitting in the basket near Anna’s study and bringing kvass to her.

Anna announced her decision to the courtiers, and they convened the “Masquerade Commission” to work out the plan of the wedding. The Commission developed the project of the unique ice house for the celebration. The winter of 1739 – 1740 had been extremely cold, so such a construction was possible.

The house was built from ice blocks, and its decorations and interior were made of ice, without using any other materials. Its facade was about 16 meters long; the house was five meters wide and six meters high. A porch divided the building in two halves, with two rooms in each half: living room and dining room in one, bathroom and bedroom in another. The House was furnished with ice furniture – there were tables, armchairs, sofas, a bed and a sideboard with tableware. The tableware was made of ice too, and so were the candles. To light the candle one had to first smear it with the petroleum. In the ice fireplace burned ice logs, also smeared with petroleum.

Along the roof was a gallery decorated with sculptures, and in front of the house there were two ice cannons, which could actually fire. The fountains – two ones shaped like dolphins, and the largest one, in the shape of an elephant – threw out jets of burning petroleum. In the ice bathhouse, built near the main building, one could take a steam bath.

On February 17, 1740, Golitsyn and Buzheninova got married in a church. Then, after the celebratory dinner, the newly-weds couple got into the cage on an elephant’s back, and the wedding procession headed to the ice house. That procession consisted of about three hundred people of different nationalities, dressed in their national costumes. Horses, pigs, deer, goats and dog teams were harnessed to their sleighs. When the couple entered the ice house’s bedroom, two guards stood at its door to stop the jesters from leaving before morning.

After the celebration, the spectacular frozen construction remained intact until the spring. When it started to melt, some of sculptures and the biggest ice blocks were transported to the palace’s own ice-house. Golitsyn and Buzheninova moved to Golitsyn’s manor near Moscow. Buzheninova gave birth to two children and died in 1742. After her death, Golitsyn got married again, and died in 1778 at the age of 90.

View Article on RT

OSAKA, JAPAN: Best Sights of Osaka

“Best Back-to-the-Future Airport Train”

Rapi><t, Osaka

 

“Best Day Trip from Osaka”

Nanko Bird Sanctuary (Yacho Koen), Osaka

Access: Yotsubashi Line subway to Suminoue Koen station, then New Tram Line to Nakafuto terminal, than a 1.6 km cycle or leisurely stroll.

“Best Nerd Watching”

Den-Den Town, Osaka (Nihonbashi)

Access: Tanimachi Line subway to Ebisucho station, exit 1A.

“Best Rainy Day Out”

Panasonic Square, Osaka

Access: A five minute walk from Kyobashi station on the Keihan and Tsurumi lines subway in the Twin 21 building.

 

To read more about this and other best sights, restaurants, bars, entertainment, shopping, and services, pick up a copy of The Best of Kansai by John Frederick Ashburne.