Lifestyle

Disco queen Donna Summer dies of cancer
Friday, May 18, 2012

LOS ANGELES: Grammy-winning disco legend Donna Summer, who steamed up the charts in the 1970s and 80s with raunchy hits like "Love to Love You Baby" and "Hot Stuff," died Thursday aged 63, her family said.
 
Known as the Queen of Disco, the singer whose hits also included "I Feel Love" and "She Works Hard for the Money," died in Florida from lung cancer, the TMZ celebrity news website said....

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UN: HIV may afflict almost half Asia-Pacific transgenders
Thursday, May 17, 2012

BANGKOK: Nearly half of transgender people in the Asia-Pacific region could have HIV as poor healthcare and high-risk lifestyles push infection rates to critical levels, a UN report said Thursday.

The region's estimated 9-9.5 million transgender population is bearing the brunt of the HIV epidemic, the UN Development Programme study said, adding that figures suggest 49 per cent of the community could be infected....

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Japanese family's average savings reaches $207,000
Wednesday, May 16, 2012

TOKYO: The average Japanese family has 16.64 million yen ($207,000) in savings, according to official data, more than twice the average annual salary in the nation of 128 million.
 
The number for 2011 was a 0.4 per cent increase from a year earlier, with households of two or more people holding average debt of 4.62 million yen.
 
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Asia helps drive Facebook's 1-billion goal
Wednesday, May 16, 2012

KUALA LUMPUR: As Facebook nears saturation levels in some Western countries, Asian users are helping drive the social-networking leader's march on the 1-billion-user milestone and beyond.

The Facebook-led social-networking phenomenon has profoundly impacted the region -- challenging conservative ideals, connecting diaspora communities and allowing users to circumvent authoritarian information controls....

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Money troubles raise corruption risk in football
Tuesday, May 15, 2012

ZAGREB: There are thousands of players like Mario Cizmek in football, professionals who never fulfilled their early promise yet whose passion for the game takes them to unfashionable clubs to earn a living from the game they love.

Cizmek represented his native Croatia at under-20 and under-21 level. A diagnosis of diabetes halted his rise and he never made it to the big leagues....

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Sydney's "Angel of The Gap" dies
Monday, May 14, 2012

SYDNEY: An Australian man known as the "Angel of The Gap" for his efforts to save scores of would-be suicides from throwing themselves from one of this city's most scenic look-outs has died aged 86.
 
During the almost 50 years he spent living opposite The Gap -- a notorious sandstone cliff overlooking the coast -- Don Ritchie regularly coaxed desperate people back from the edge, offering them a cup of tea and a chat....

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Twitter users in Britain given legal warning
Saturday, May 12, 2012

LONDON: The Internet is not a law-free zone, the British government's top law officer warned Twitter users Friday, adding that he would not hesitate to take action over offending posts. Attorney-General Dominic Grieve, the government's chief legal advisor in England and Wales, spoke out following a series of high-profile court cases involving postings made on the micro-blogging site....

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Rugby Sevens a world in itself
Friday, May 11, 2012

LONDON: There was a time when sevens rugby union was seen mainly as a "bit of fun" and, at elite level, a handy way of giving potential Test players in 'proper' 15-a-side rugby international experience.That time is not now. For while an expected crowd of 100,000 at Twickenham this weekend will be in a party mood for the London Sevens, the...

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Celebrity hairdresser Vidal Sassoon dies
Thursday, May 10, 2012

LOS ANGELES: Pioneering British celebrity hairdresser Vidal Sassoon died Wednesday aged 84 after a "long and courageous" battle with leukaemia, his family said.

The man credited with creating the modern bob haircut and relieving women from the rigors of old-fashioned perms was surrounded by his loved ones when he passed away at his home in Bel Air, California.
 
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Stadiums stand empty in isolated Pakistan
Thursday, May 10, 2012

KARACHI: The National Stadium was once a dusty, sweaty hell for visiting cricketers, a cauldron of heat and noise where Pakistan went unbeaten in Tests for more than 45 years.

But now, three years after international sides stopped coming to the country in the wake of a deadly militant attack on a Sri Lankan team bus, the stands are silent, deserted and rusting with disuse.
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