The Fire that Burns- A Controversial Movie

This is another French movie that I enjoyed. If you are homophobic, this may not the right movie for you. This is a very poetic movie both visually and linguistically on a controversial TOPIC of boy to boy to man-(priestly) love. I bet this is in the list of movies banned by the Catholic Church. It has an English subtitle. Click the CC button. If it turns read, the subtitle is on. Enjoy! A study of possessive love, obsession and jealousy which transcends the gay characters and disturbing priestly abuse aspect. The actors are wonderfully committed to their characters, who were believable and complex human beings. Beautifully realized, poetic both visually and linguistically, if a bit stark. Life can be stark. At the end, I came to love the old and wise Abbot, who knows precisely the parameters of Christian love. The Church needed more like him, as we have seen in the present. The screenplay is based on a semi-autobiographical play by Henry de Montherlant (1895-1972), which he began drafting at the age of 17, a year after he was expelled from an academy because of his friendship with another student; it was not published until 1951 because of its difficult subject: romantic friendships between schoolboys. The French title La Ville dont le Prince est un Enfant is taken from the Biblical text of Ecclesiastes 10:16 "Woe to the land whose king is a child." The limited action and long speeches in the film betray its origins in a play, but the director has managed to provide some variation in the locations of various scenes. Did you enjoy this movie? Comments?

Romantic Music from the Sound Tracks of Movies

The following video features romantic music from the sound tracks of ten of my favorite movies and specifically A Single Man movie directed by Tom Ford- a famous fashion designer. Enjoy

A Single Man is a 2009 American drama film based on the Christopher Isherwood novel of the same name. It was directed by famous fashion designer Tom Ford, who had to finance it himself, as it was his directorial debut. The film stars Colin Firth as the protagonist George Falconer, a gay British university professor living in Southern California in 1962. Music Composer: Abel Korzeniowski & Shigeru Umebayashi

A 14-minute trailer from the movie, A Single man based on C Isherwood novel of the same name.

Buy Olive Oil and save the Economy of Spain and Greece

Yesterday news urged US citizens to buy Olive oil instead of any other cooking oil to help save the economic situation in Spain. This also probably true for the economic situation in Greece. Evidently, there is an oversupply of olive oil for the US market. The other country in Europe that export olive oil to the US is Italy. If all of us here in US buys olive oil instead of other cooking oil, the news is predicting we may be able to help alleviate the depressed economic situation in the above three European countries, particularly Spain. The news inspired me to search for more information about olive production and consumption in the US. Here's a short information on olive production and consumption that I found in the Internet.

Three countries are the major olive oil producers in the world. First is Spain, second is Italy and third is Greece. Together, they produce more than 75% of the world production. Spain produces around 30% of the world's olive oil, with 75% of this being produced in the region of Andalusia, particularly within Jaen province. In Italy the major producers are called "Città dell'Olio", "oil cities"; some of the most important are Lucca, whose oil is widely considered the best for acidity and stability, and traditionally used by oil merchant as a term of comparison, Florence and Siena, in Tuscany. However the largest production is harvested in Puglia. Portugal accounts for 5% of the worlds production and its main export market is Brazil.

Australia now produces a substantial amount of olive oil. Many Australian producers only make premium oils, while a number of corporate growers operate groves of a million trees or more and produce oils for the general market. Australian olive oil is exported to Asia, Europe and the United States. In North America, Italian and Spanish olive oils are the best-known, and top-quality extra-virgin oils from Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece are sold at high prices, often in "prestige" packaging. A large part of U.S. olive oil imports come from Italy, Spain, and Turkey. The U.S. imported 47,800,000 US gallons (181,000 m3) of olive oil in 1998, of which 34,600,000 US gallons (131,000 m3) came from Italy.

Olive orchards in California, and Texas and Arizona, as are producing olive oil that is appearing on USA grocery market shelves along side the Mediterranean olive oils.

Olive oil is by the way good for your health compared to other cooking oils. The reasons why most consumers do not buy it, because it is more expensive than the other cooking oils. But with oversupply of this commodity, the price is now comparable to the other cooking oils sold in your local grocery store. Buy a bottle of olive oil today and maybe help save the economy of Spain and Greece.

Are you Bored with FaceBook? "Airtime" may Relieve your Boredom

Recent news indicated that 30% of FB user are getting bored in using this social media site. One user commented that instead of checking his profile daily, he just check in on it once a week. He was ask why he is getting bored. He said FB newness has faded and to him it was just a passing fad. He wants something fresh and new. I tend to agree with the above member. So if 30% of the 900 million users of Facebook is bored, will this affect the stock price of FB? I will definitely agree, particularly if another social site can challenge FB domimance. In my article in Publish Us the other day, I posted eight sites that could challenge FB dominance. The sites are Twitter, LinkIn, Pinterst, Stumblr, Viddy, Google+ and two others sites that I have not heard before.

My dear readers what other features do you want to see in FB, besides posting pictures, sharing videos and playing games? In my case, I would like to see the chat option updated, so that you can see someone you are chatting with if you have a web cam, similar to Skype . This wish may have come true last Tuesday when Airtime was launched..Will this new feature relieve your boredom with FB?

The following article from NBC News, was just posted recently discussing Airtime? Airtime, a browser-based video chat service, launched on Tuesday. It's shiny, new and created by Napster co-founders Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning. It's also prone to taking snapshots of your video chats and sending them to trained Airtime employees, who review them for inappropriate content.

Sounds somewhat creepy, right? That's what I thought, so I had a lengthy conversation with an Airtime spokesperson who broke down what happens in the background, while you use the service. The details will probably still leave you feeling a bit uneasy, but it's better to be informed and uncomfortable than to be caught completely off guard. As you may know, Airtime is essentially a browser-based video chat service which relies on your Facebook identity. All you have to do is grab a webcam, head to the Airtime website and login using your Facebook account — no downloads or installations are required.

The service will allow you to video-chat with your Facebook friends or match up with strangers, based on location and shared Facebook interests. (Your identity isn't revealed to the strangers until you choose to share your name, mind you.) If you're not particularly charmed by your chat partner, you can simply click "next" and go on to the next one.

As we pointed out when we first covered Airtime, the service works a lot like Chatroulette — a site which randomly paired strangers up for video chats. The trouble with Chatroulette, of course, was that many users — ahem — exposed themselves on camera. We speculated that Airtime might simply be hoping that associating its users' Facebook accounts — and in theory, their real identities — with their Airtime usage might discourage them from getting indecent. But there's oh-so-much-more to how Airtime is trying to avoid the so-called "Chatroulette penis problem."

Smile! You're in a snapshot! Airtime's spokesperson tells me that the company invested significant amounts into the technology used to maintain user safety. In fact, the team dedicated to this task is by far its largest, by head count. A large portion of these Airtime employees are trained to analyze and evaluate abusive behavior — and to nip it in the bud. According to Airtime, when you have a video chat with a stranger — meaning someone who is not one of your Facebook friends — the service quietly takes snapshots. How often these snapshots are taken is determined by an algorithm which assigns a risk percentage to each user, based on how likely he or she might be to engage in inappropriate behavior. (Factors used to determine this risk percentage include — but are not limited to — age, gender, location, and the time the service is being used.)

As soon as these snapshots are taken, the spokesperson tells me, they are analyzed by a number of automated filters, which check, among other things, for the presence of a face and the luminosity of the image. (The assumption is that you are theoretically more likely to be engaging in inappropriate behavior if you are sitting in a dimly lit room.) The Airtime spokesperson refrained from elaborating further on the nature of the other filters used to analyze snapshots, explaining that this could potentially compromise some of their effectiveness. Wait — what did you say about someone looking at my video chats? Any snapshots which are deemed to be showing potentially inappropriate behavior — which according to the Airtime terms of service includes nudity, violence, animal cruelty, drug use and more — are flagged and sent to the Airtime's Tier 1 safety team.

The trained professionals who make up this team are able to view the flagged snapshot as well as a user's snapshot history in order to best determine if he or she is engaging in inappropriate behavior. Though each snapshot is associated with an individual's Facebook user ID, Airtime assured us that safety reps are not able to view any other user information. If members of the Tier 1 safety team believe that a snapshot displays behavior which violates the service's terms of service, they will escalate it to the Tier 2 team. Members of this second team have additional training which will help them determine whether a user should be permanently banned from Airtime — and whether there is a need to notify authorities. The policy is "one strike and you're out," says the Airtime spokesperson.

Are Airtime bans really permanent? There's currently no way to use Airtime without a Facebook account. So when a member of the service's safety team bans you, he or she is banning your Facebook identity. In theory, you could try to make a new Facebook account and use that to log back into Airtime, but there are roadblocks. "You have to demonstrate social behavior before you can get on the site," explains the Airtime spokesperson. Just as a credit card company might look at your credit history, Airtime looks at your Facebook history in order to determine whether it will grant you access. If you do not have a minimum number of Facebook friends, you will not be able to get onto Airtime. This minimum friend threshold, among other factors, makes it more difficult for banned users to regain access to Airtime by simply creating new Facebook accounts.

How long does Airtime keep these snapshots ... and why? Snapshots are stored indefinitely "for historical perspective" and to "detect abuse patterns," the Airtime spokesperson told me. This is, of course, outlined in the service's rather intimidating privacy policy. This long term storage struck me as startling, so I asked Jeff Hermes — director of the Digital Media Law Project at Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society — for some perspective. "When we talk about privacy concerns, the primary question we have is whether there is sufficient notice given to users about whether their information is going to be stored," he explained. "We review these issues from the perspective of whether there is a legal issue."

There you are my friends, FB has a new application to relieve your boredom. Welcome to Airtime!.

Bent- Another Award Winning Film

Bent is a 1979 play by Martin Sherman. It revolves around the persecution of gays in Nazi Germany, and takes place during and after the Night of the Long Knives. The title of the play refers to the slang word "bent" used in some European countries to refer to homosexuals. When the play was first performed, there was only a small trickle of historical research or even awareness about the Nazi persecution of homosexuals. In some regards, the play helped increase that historical research and education in the 1980s and 1990s. The play starred Ian McKellen in its original 1979 West-End production, and Richard Gere in its original 1980 Broadway production. In 1989, Sean Mathias directed a revival of the play, performed as a one-night benefit for Stonewall, featuring Ian McKellen, Richard E Grant, Ian Charleson, and Ralph Fiennes. After receiving critical acclaim, Mathias directed a full run in 1990, with Ian McKellen, Paul Rhys, and Christopher Eccleston, which won the City Limits Award for Revival of the Year. In 1997, Martin Sherman adapted Bent into a film of the same name, which was directed by Sean Mathias.

Eight Exotic Filipino Dishes That I have Tasted

Balut The Philippines have several exotic dishes not very popular to the western world. Besides the common balut( boiled fermented duck eggs) and dinugu-an ( blood pidding made from cow's internal organs, tripe etc..), I have tasted several other exotic Filipino dishes as follows:

1. Ginataang kuhol (Snail cooked in coconut milk) and Suso' ( escargo) There are varieties of snails being cooked and eaten in the Philippines. Ginataang kuhol or suso is sautéed with garlic, onion, ginger and pepper plus coconut milk. There are also other ways of cooking these snails. The creek under the bridge at the Chateau Du Mer Beach Resort in Marinduque is filled with Suso that my workers harvest for their lunch and dinner along with their steam rice.

2. Fried Crickets and grasshopper Crickets are usually deep fried.

3. Bull Testicles Soup- I tried to taste this one. I had not the courage to swallow a mouthful. It was just too rich for my taste buds. .

4. Adobong pusa or cat adobo or dog stew Do you know that even cats/dogs are eaten by people in the Philippines? They cook it in adobo style, sautéed with garlic, onion and laurel leaf seasoned with soy sauce and vinegar. This is a favorite appetizer during their drinking spree. I have tasted the dog stew but not the cat adobo. Who eat their pets anyway?

5. Kilawing bunog (raw young of a mudfish) These are eaten raw spiced up with vinegar or citrus juice, pepper, and salt.

6. Adobo o pritong palaka (adobo or fried frogs) Frogs can be cooked in adobo style or deep fried. It’s tastier than chicken. There are also some people in the Philippines that eat legs of bullfrogs cooked in the same manner. The native frogs thrived very well at the Chateau Du Mer Beach Resort in Marinduque. I have eaten frog legs in a French restaurant here in the US.



7. Adobong ahas (snake adobo This is cooked in adobo style. Snake is commonly eaten in Asia because of its medicinal value. It’s also a good aphrodisiac. I have tasted this dish when I was a little boy in the jungles of Panay Island during the Japanese-American War in the Philippines. It tasted like chicken.

8. Adobong bayawak/itlog (monitor lizard meat/eggs) It is sautéed in garlic and onion, ginger and laurel leaf with pepper, soy sauce, and vinegar or more popularly called adobo. This is perfect for “pulutan” (food appetizer while drinking wine or liquor). The eggs are usually cook by simply boiling it, it taste salty and delicious. Their eggs are considered exotic because it’s rare and hard to find. My workers here at Chateau Du Mer had caught several bayawaks about two years ago and made it into adobo for their sumsuman( appetizer during a drinking party)

Bizarre it may seem but these eight items listed here are eaten in the Philippines. There are other exotic dishes in the Philippines not listed here. If you need more information read the reference cited below. Want to try some?

Reference: http://trifter.com/practical-travel/world-cuisine/the-17-most-popular-exotic-foods-in-the-philippines/#ixzz1wqgQ1zto