Pacific University luau offers chance to share

Some of those who traveled from across the northwest for Pacific University's luau came for the entertainment: the fierce costumes and variety of dance routines.For others, Saturday's event was a chance to be nostalgic: to savor the foods, music, and atmosphere of Hawaiian culture while still on the mainland."It makes you feel like home," said Kara Yamamoto, a 21-year-old Hawaiian who came from California to attend this year's luau.For 53 years now, the college's Hawaii Club, or Na Haumana O Hawai'i, has brought people from all over the region to partake in what has become the college's largest annual production. The event has sold out for many years running, and brought more than 2,000 people to campus this year."How many times will you ever see parents come and take vacations days to help us out with luau?" asked Edna Gehring, a staff member at Pacific who also serves as the Hawaii Club's adviser.
The Saturday night performance followed a feast of Hawaiian staples such as chicken long rice, poi, kalua pork, and coconut cake, among other dishes. Other food basics could be found at the concession stands, where tins of Spam and rows of sweet rolls were sold.Traveling from Salem, Edward Doak decided to stock up on roasted Kona coffee grounds during the show's intermission. Originally from Oregon, Doak lived in Hawaii from 1986 to 1992 while he served in the Army. It's his second time attending the luau, and he'll no doubt be coming back each year, he said. Primarily for the food.Such is the point: to bring a taste of the islands to the mainland. It's why the planning board starts making preparations for the luau well in advance. And why parents of Hawai'i club members ship more than 5,000 pounds of decor and supplies from the islands in advance of the show.It's also why the dancers, musicians, and singers spend hours upon hours planning and practicing for the big night.Kawika Boro, a senior of the music school who sang 12 different numbers for the show, said the luau is his opportunity to reconnect with the music of his culture.

Texas bills sacrifice local control on issues such as knife toting

The San Antonio lock-blade ordinance is just one example of overbearing municipal regulations that risk turning regular citizens even ones who have consulted state laws to ensure they are in compliance into criminals," Stickland said.He is among a handful of lawmakers, mostly Republicans, pushing to limit local control a conservative tenet with bills that reach into other lawmakers’ districts but have no immediate effect on their own constituents.The bills include bans on some local ordinances and restrictions on school district policies. Lawmakers see tension between local control and personal rights, and there’s an ongoing debate among conservatives about how much the state needs to protect Texans from local officials."What you’re observing is the debate within the Republican Party and the conservative movement, for which there is no consensus," said Steve Munisteri, chairman of the Republican Party of Texas. "In most conservative minds, you can use government to trump local control to protect a different [constitutional] right. But the rub comes in with, when does that occur and when is that balance justified?"

Two bills by Rep. Drew Springer, R-Muenster, have drawn some fire from Central Texas lawmakers because they affect Austin and Pflugerville about 260 miles from his district north of Dallas.One bill would prohibit bans on plastic bags, a direct hit on an ordinance that went into effect in Austin in March. Officials in other cities, including Dallas, are considering similar bans.The second would cut some funds from school districts that offer benefits to people who are not employees and not dependents of employees a run at the same-sex domestic-partnership benefits offered by the Austin and Pflugerville school districts."To think Pflugerville has sued the state for more funding, while at the same time bankrolling a lifestyle most Texans do not agree with, is quite disturbing to me," Springer said when he announced his measure in February.

The Big Knife Starring Bobby Cannavale

It's opening night for the first-ever Broadway revival of Clifford Odets' The Big Knife, the showbiz drama starring Bobby Cannavale that raises its curtain on April 16 at the American Airlines Theatre. Pamphlets One Slave One Vampire Bat.The Roundabout Theatre Company revival runs through June 2.The Big Knife follows movie star Charlie Castle, a Hollywood golden boy whose studio has been forced to cover up a mistake that could have ended his career. When a woman with insider knowledge threatens to come forward, the studio heads must protect Charlie's secret and Charlie himself must decide how far he's willing to go before quitting the business for good.Cannavale plays Charlie Castle, with Marin Ireland as his wife Marion, Richard Kind as studio boss Marcus Hoff and Chip Zien as Charlie's agent Nat Danzinger. The cast also includes Rachel Brosnahan, Joey Slotnick, Ana Reeder, Billy Eugene Jones, Reg Rogers and Brenda Wehle.The production features sets by John Lee Beatty, costumes by Catherine Zuber, lighting by James F.

 Ingalls and sound and original music by David Van Tieghem. This marks the first Broadway revival of the play, which premiered at the National Theatre in 1949.A woman was walking to her parked car when a man approached her and forcefully stole her wallet, according to police.A boy was walking home when he was robbed by four men wearing ski masks and black clothing, according to the Arlington County Police Department. A man reported that his laptop was stolen when he got back from a walk around his neighborhood, according to police. The man went for a walk between 7:30 p.m. and 8 p.m. April 11 in the 4600 block of South 34th Street. When he returned, his computer had been stolen from the kitchen.A laptop was stolen from a home between 3 and 8:30 p.m. Saturday from the 700 block of South Ode Street, police report.

Pamphlets One Slave One Vampire Bat

The flight from Le Bourget outside Paris to my new post, Bamako, Mali was alarming, once we began flying over Africa. I did not know that the Air France Caravel aircraft, on long routes in 1968, routinely saved fuel by cutting back the engines and drifting down, then throttled up to gain altitude before drifting back down again. Alarmed, changed to charmed, but only after I  figured it out. It was very French, logical and peculiar, much less monotonous than the straight-ahead flights across America.Mali had great people and wonderful art: wood carvings, beautifully decorated masks, great pottery and hand-woven carpets and centuries old music. Some musical griot families were like European minstrels, but when they sang at a Malian nobleman’s wedding they recounted three or four centuries of the family history, an amazing feat of memory. The rich who paid them to sing were usually related somewhere down the line to tribal kings, so a lot of history was held in common. It was not uncommon for the griots to tell stories from a dozen generations in several days of singing. Their well- paid and honored performances, left Europe’s minnesingers in the dust as repositories of history. The University of Illinois has a vast collection of Malian traditional music thanks to an academic whom I met there as he collected recordings.

Mali is mostly a vast, land-locked, usually very hot, reddish plain covered with scrub and sand. Some hills and low mountains give hiding places to rebels. There is a single outstanding feature seen from the air, a river. The Niger wends across Mali in long curves from its source in the rainforest in Guinea to the Atlantic a couple thousand miles distant. The Niger fed most of Mali’s desperately poor in 1968 five millions, providing fish and irrigation water along its shores. Winter rains also flood Mali’s Niger plains, which suddenly become wide green swathes of grass.Smallpox and measles were carried by the nomadic Peuhl tribesmen who in each year follow the rains for a thousand miles, crossing several national borders in West Africa, including a passage through Mali. Their herds of skinny cattle have the same broad, sharp horns that appear in ancient Egyptian paintings.The mostly peasant Malian population sweated daily to produce a subsistence diet. Per capita cash income then was about $60 per annum, lower than that of India. The nomadic Peuhl were hard to spot to vaccinate against smallpox and measles. Mali, had, of course, its own outbreaks of other diseases.    

Casts Kathryn Morris As Lead

Alice, Sweet Alice remake plans have moved forward in a big way with Cold Case star Kathryn Morris taking on the lead role of Catherine Spages, mother to a little girl, who may or may not be a psycho killer.Morris' production company Revival House and Mosaic Media Group will co-produce this
Robot hot among surgeons but FDA taking fresh look.“re-imagining” of the 1976 classic, Tomaselli said.In the original film, Catherine's youngest daughter (Brooke Shields) is butchered on the day of her first communion. Older sister Alice (Paula Sheppard) is the prime suspect.While Alice certainly has “issues,” however, her parents can't believe she would be capable of murder. Meanwhile, a ghastly knife-wielding figure in yellow raincoat and translucent mask is offing people one-by-one.Are the crimes related? And if Alice isn't the killer, then who is?For those of us familiar with the film, director Dante Tomaselli promises surprises aplenty. In other words, don't think you've got this one figured out just because you've seen the original 100 times.

Tomaselli recently agreed to an interview with The Inquisitr in which he discusses plans for his Alice, Sweet Alice remake, and what it's like to follow in the footsteps of the original director Castle production designer and cousin Alfred Sole.He also discusses the new script, working with a larger budget, where the project's at in development, and whether we can expect Sheppard or Brooke Shields in cameos.Once that was completed I started dreaming of Alice again. Alfred contacted me and said there was a possible investor. This turned out to be a false alarm but I'm glad it happened because it got me to finally work on the script. It put a fire under me. I knew I needed a co-writer so I immediately thought of Michael Gingold, managing editor of Fangoria Magazine.We wrote a screenplay in the past together and it was a terrific experience. So he came on as co-writer and that's when the script was created. Mike brought so much to the table, a natural communicator, a wordsmith — an expert on horror cinema. Needless to say, he was a huge help.

Robot hot among surgeons but FDA taking fresh look

The biggest thing in operating rooms these days is a million-dollar, multi-armed robot named da Vinci, used in nearly 400,000 surgeries nationwide last year - triple the number just four years earlier.But now the high-tech helper is under scrutiny over reports of problems, including several deaths that may be linked with it, and the high cost of using the robotic system.There also have been a few disturbing, freak incidents: a robotic hand that wouldn't let go of tissue grasped during surgery and a robotic arm hitting a patient in the face as she lay on the operating table.
Some doctors say yes, concerned that the "wow" factor and heavy marketing are behind the boost in use. They argue that there is not enough robust research showing that robotic surgery is at least as good or better than conventional surgeries.Many U.S. hospitals promote robotic surgery in patient brochures, online and even on highway billboards. Their aim is partly to attract business that helps pay for the costly robot.

The da Vinci is used for operations that include removing prostates, gallbladders and wombs, repairing heart valves, shrinking stomachs and transplanting organs. Its use has grown worldwide, but the system is most popular in the United States."We are at the tip of the iceberg. What we thought was impossible 10 years ago is now commonplace," said Dr. Michael Stifelman, robotic surgery chief at New York University's Langone Medical Center.For surgeons, who control the robot while sitting at a computer screen, these operations can be less tiring. Plus robot hands don't shake. Advocates say patients sometimes have less bleeding and often are sent home sooner than with conventional laparoscopic surgeries and operations involving large incisions.But the Food and Drug Administration is looking into a spike in reported problems. Earlier this year, the FDA began surveying surgeons using the robotic system. The agency conducts such surveys of device use routinely, but FDA spokeswoman Synim Rivers said the reason for it now "is the increase in number of reports received" about da Vinci.

North Charleston woman accused of stabbing uncle

Several alleged incidents involving knives over the weekend, with the suspects making their initial appearances Monday afternoon.Tracy Lynn Schildt is accused of stabbing a man Saturday evening; she faces a felony count of assault with a weapon.According to court documents officers responded to a report of a stabbing at a residence on 2nd Avenue North. Upon arrival officers allegedly found a man with a bleeding stab wound in his left side just about the waist of his pants.He and his wife both accused Schildt of the incident.Documents state that when authorities located Schildt a knife with a serrated blade was stuck in the ground nearby.During Monday’s initial appearance, Man Convicted of Killing High School Football Star.Schildt told District Judge Dirk Sandefur she was acting in self defense; her bond has been set at $30,000 dollars.Also facing charges, Rainbow Cloud Peters, accused of violently chasing another man with a knife Saturday evening.

Peters is charged with one felony count of assault on a police officer and misdemeanor charges of obstructing a peace officer and resisting arrest.Police reportedly received several phone calls about a man chasing another man with a knife.They found Leroy Bolton, 51, lying in the street with his T-shirt covered with blood. Bolton told officers Carlin Davis stabbed him, according to the incident report. Davis is Bolton’s niece, and they both live in an apartment at that address. At first her female friend told police she was one who stabbed Bolton, but she later told police she was trying to protect her friend and Davis stabbed her uncle, according to the report.According to court documents Peters resisted arrest and was tasered after several minutes of confrontation.

Man Convicted of Killing High School Football Star

oanna Rehart and Deandre Brown, both 30-year-old Oakland residents, were arrested in connection to the armed robbery of a man police say was trying to solicit a prostitute. The robbery occurred at around 12:45 a.m. Monday near the Stevenson Boulevard and Besco Drive intersection after the victim met up with a woman who posted an online escort ad, police said. As the victim was talking to the woman on the street, a man pushed him to the ground, pointed a .45 caliber handgun and robbed him of $100. Though the victim vehemently denied calling the escort, phone records indicated that he placed repeated calls to her prior to the robbery. The pair were arrested the next day on suspicion of robbery.More than 350 business, civic and political leaders heard Fremont Mayor Bill Harrison deliver a state of the city address that focused on economic development. "We as a city no longer want to be the Bay Area's best-kept secret," Harrison said at a luncheon Thursday organized by the Fremont Chamber of Commerce. Harrison got the biggest applause when he refererred to plans by Seagate, a manufacturer of computer disk drives, to put a research and development center on the site of the bankrupt solar company whose campus is visible from Interstate 880. "The Solyndra chapter of Fremont's history is officially closed," Harrison said.

His 24-minute speech covered a lot of ground, from the city's improving budget picture to the less encouraging state of the city's paved arteries.Opposition groups held a series of rallies earlier this week in protest of a proposal to rename Alvarado Middle School. Many of those participating in the protests are descendants of Alvarado’s original families who claim the Alvarado name is sacred to the community and "should under no circumstance be changed," organizers said. "[We] recognize what the Filipino community is doing and respect that, but feel the history of the area should not be taken away in such a manner," said Joseph Garcia, 17, a member of "(Old) Alvarado United," the neighborhood group organizing the protests.