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Home / India News / Eight killed in Bhiwandi building collapse
Eight killed in Bhiwandi building collapse
An elderly couple was killed and six others injured when a two-storey building collapsed in Bhiwandi on Sunday morning, the second such mishap in the town in a week.
Rescuers remove the rubble of the two-storey building that collapsed early on Sunday killing two people and injuring six others.(Praful Gangurde)
Updated on Aug 08, 2016 01:57 AM IST
ByMegha Pol and Arvind Walmiki, Thane
At least eight people were killed when a dilapidated building, which had been served many evacuation notices earlier, collapsed in Bhiwandi early on Sunday morning.
Rescue services dug out five people from the debris of which two died -- the owner of the building, Sajjanlal Gupta (60), and his wife, Satyawanti Sajjan Gupta (55). An NDRF team rushed to the spot and by evening six more bodies were pulled out of the debris.
The others injured were admitted to the hospital.
The 35-year-old building crashed at around 7:30 am. The building had two wings. The middle part of the building where most of the families were residing collapsed.
The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and fire brigade were pressed into service to look for the remaining people in the building. Fifteen fire brigade vehicles from Thane, Kalyan, Navi Mumbai and Bhiwandi had reached the spot to aid efforts.
"We can start the rescue operation immediately but we do not have the required equipment for the same, which the NDRF has. We have to remove the debris manually," Rajesh Pawar, Bhiwandi fire brigade officer said.
According to Sunil Bhalerao, assistant municipal commissioner of Bhiwandi Nizampur Municipal Corporation (BNMC), around 30 people from eight families resided in the building.
The building was an L-shaped structure. One portion of it comprising the stairs had collapsed, leading to the mishap, Bhalerao said.
"The building started falling from one side. We could see mud and plaster falling and later the entire side collapse. The portion which collapsed consisted of the stairs and thus the residents from the adjoining building could not come down," Ram Kesarwani, an eye witness said.
Around 22 residents from the adjoining building were removed by the fire brigade using a ladder.
The BNMC said the building had been served evacuation notices repeatedly since April 20. The water connection was also cut off on June 23 while the tap was cut off on August 5.
"In the month of May, the residents claimed that the building was in good condition and asked us to conduct a structural audit before demolishing it. We carried out the audit and submitted the report on May 30. However, they still refuse to vacate. We served another notice on June 15 and asked the power company to disconnect the power supply on June 22."
This collapse is the second such accident in the district this week; on July 31, a two-storey residential building had crashed in the town amid heavy rains claiming eight lives, including that of four children and three women, while 10 others were injured.
(with agency inputs)


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The Lost Art of Friendship: Why Everyone Feels Alone In This Connected World (Including Teens)
Home/Culture/The Lost Art of Friendship: Why Everyone Feels Alone In This Connected World (Including Teens)
Russ Ewell
Friendship Requires an Emotional Education
How Do We Lose the Art of Friendship?
A Quick Sidebar About Men and Loneliness
The Loneliness Epidemic
A Few Thoughts About Teens
7 Questions We Should Ask Ourselves About Friendship
My Leadership Notebook
Listen to the first podcast episode based on this article entitled "The Lost Art of Friendship: The Pursuit of Love"
Where is love?
Does it fall from skies above?
Is it underneath the willow tree
That I've been dreaming of?
Where is she
Who I close my eyes to see?
Will I ever know the sweet hello
That's meant for only me?
– Oliver (Film Adaption of Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens)
Charles Dickens, arguably the greatest fiction writer in history, published Oliver Twist as a three-volume book in 1838.
Being primarily a non-fiction reader in my adolescent years, Oliver Twist failed to capture my interest until I watched the film adaptation. It was the music that stirred my suppressed emotions with the song, "Where is Love?"
For weeks I went around singing the song "Where is Love" (in private of course). This was my secret, shared with no one. Something was happening to me, but I didn't understand what or why (I am giving you, the reader, insider information at this point). I only knew these feelings were a far cry from my first time watching Star Trek when after viewing several episodes, I made the decision to be like Spock, a science officer devoid of emotion and able to blunt the emotional turbulence of life with logic.
The "first officer Spock" part of my personality rose up in conflict with my inner, Oliver "the love man" Twist as I judged the sappiness of my emotionalism over "Where is Love?" to be an inefficient use of time and mental energy.
Spock and Oliver within me would be at war for some years, but there was no getting around the resonance of "Where Is Love?" Being about 12 to 13 years old at the time, it would take another 12 to 13 years to understand I was in the midst of an adolescent awakening – the discovery that emotion was not the enemy and that it didn't always have to be painful; in fact, it could open the door to amazing relationships. These amazing relationships as it turned out were friendships, with God (James 2), my wife (Ephesians 5), my kids (Psalm 127), and an assortment of incredible people who have satisfied my yearning to be known, understood, and unconditionally accepted despite my significant inadequacies and spiritual unworthiness.
My family and friends have all proven to be more loving than me as they have helped me on my journey of life by listening, sharing, understanding, forgiving, laughing, inspiring, and providing me with a circle of influences that have changed me for the better. While my dysfunctions in the area of love and relationship can at times be paralyzing, I am growing (albeit slowly) in my confidence to think about, talk about, and pursue the deeper discovery of love despite my insecurities.
Perhaps you can relate to my struggle? I stumbled out into the world uneducated, ignorant, insecure, and misguided. Yet somehow, through the humbling process of healing that the God of this life provides, I was able to discover the meaning of the words sung by Samm Henshaw when he asks, "How Does It Feel To Be Loved?"
It goes timelines, swipe right, deep like five times
Don't know what it sounds like but someone
Told me it's a little Marvin with some candlelight
A little ocean on the weekend with a can of Sprite
I mean a loving wife (oooh) OOh, love is such a mystery
I'm so perplexed by all the things my eyes have let me see
People think that love is things like physicality when in reality
It's meant to hold you down like
Gravity (How does it feel to be loved?)
How does it feel to be loved
That's what they say
Oh my, must be insane
– Samm Henshaw, "How Does It Feel To Be Loved?"
We all want to know how it feels to be loved. I believe it feels like friendship, but my fear is that we as a country and culture (whether we are secular or religious) have lost the art of friendship: the considerable understanding and skill necessary to make real friends. I believe this 'lostness' is responsible for much of the societal anger, polarization, and hate produced by the unhappiness of loneliness.
Looking back now with the perspective of experience, it is clear that my adolescent self was moved by a movie and song that stirred up my emotions, making me aware of my emotional life. They forced me to feel my loneliness, helping me to see and sense that the answer was not avoidance, but rather the pursuit of love.
Oliver Twist awakened my emotional awareness, leading me on a journey to understand my emotional life. But without an emotional education, it was more difficult and painful than it needed to be. So I write to help others avoid the pain and, for those who have experienced the pain, to discover how to let go of yesterday, while working today with a vision for a better tomorrow.
Yet what is distinctive is just how selective we are about the topics we deem it possible to educate ourselves in. Our energies are overwhelmingly directed toward material, scientific, and technical subjects and away from psychological and emotional ones.
– The School of Life: An Emotional Education
Visit a high school and you will find students in English, algebra, and history classes. They are involved in chess and technology clubs, play football and basketball, and seek every opportunity to pad their resume of accomplishments to smooth their path into the best university possible.
Much anxiety surrounds the question of how good the next generation will be at math; very little around their abilities at marriage or kindness. We devote inordinate hours to learning about tectonic plates and cloud formations, and relatively few fathoming shame and rage.
Students leave high school ready for many aspects of life, but rare is the graduate prepared to navigate his/her emotional life. This is because in a world where we are required to take tests to get a driver's license, style someone's hair, and graduate from school, we provide little to no education for those getting married, preparing to have and raise kids, or any of the other relational aspects of life. Those are the areas that provide the greatest tension, stress, and grief when done ineffectively.
We are all in desperate need of an emotional education – the very thing capable of helping us nurture and strengthen the relational aspects of life. Let's face it, more often than not it isn't our failure to understand the philosophy of Nietzsche or Einsteinian principles of physics that sink our lives. What sinks us most often is our failure to navigate relationships, the emotional aspects of life, and yet we continue to neglect and diminish the need for emotional education.
"The assumption is that emotional insight might be either unnecessary or in essence unteachable, lying beyond reason or method, an unreproducible phenomenon best abandoned to individual instinct and intuition. We are left to find our own path around our unfeasibly complicated minds—a move as striking (and as wise) as suggesting that each generation should rediscover the laws of physics by themselves."
As Alain de Botton introduces the concept of an "emotional education" in "The School of Life," in so doing he takes aim at our education system.
"The contemporary education system proceeds under two assumptions about how we learn. First, it believes that how we are taught matters far less than what we are taught. What educates students is—it's believed—the soundness of certain arguments, not especially the manner of their delivery. Teaching should not rely on gloss and charm. It is not, and should never be, a branch of the entertainment industry."
Inherent in his analysis is the observation that our current education system possesses the weakness of focusing on the extrinsic (the what) rather than the intrinsic (the how). This approach is not limited to academics; we do the same in companies, places of worship, and athletic fields of play (There are many outstanding exceptions, but they tend to be exceptions and not the norm).
Extrinsic motivation focuses on "the what" – our outward behavior. The aim of those who influence us in this way is to bring us into compliance with a system of thought and behavior, to get us to conform to the structure or curriculum.
Intrinsic motivation focuses on "the how." The aim of those who influence us in this way is to teach us from the inside out, believing that when the inside is convinced and truly educated, then the capacity to understand increases. This empowers us to not merely learn the curriculum but to understand its value, meaning purpose, and application to life.
Neither Mr. de Botton nor I think everything we learn will be easy or enjoyable, but he says what I believe, which is that the extrinsic, or "human hard drive," approach to education has significant limits and will leave anyone taught in this way with significant emotional deficits.
…the education system assumes that once we understand something, it will stick in our minds for as long as we need it to. These minds are envisaged as a little like computer hard drives: Unless violently knocked, they will hold on to data for the long term. This is why we might imagine that education could stop at the age of twenty-two, once the important things have been imbibed.
Alain de Botton makes a compelling case for emotional education, what I describe as intrinsic teaching, that which is necessary for life beyond twenty-two. After we learn the essential functional subjects of life from high school and college, those which qualify us to work and earn, too many of us are left with little awareness or understanding of how to process the "major truths about our deeper selves."
But an emotional education may require us to adopt two different starting points. For a start, how we are taught may matter inordinately, because we have ingrained tendencies to shut our ears to all the major truths about our deeper selves. Our settled impulse is to blame anyone who lays our blind spots and insufficiencies bare, unless our defenses have first been adroitly and seductively appeased. In the face of critically important insights, we get distracted, proud, or fidgety. We may prefer to do almost anything other than take in information that could save us.
My experience, observation, and research taught me that we are at an emotional crossroads in America and the world. While we are educated enough to create wonders like artificial intelligence, those same educations provide us with few solutions to the problems tearing our countries and cultures apart.
We are brilliant enough to automate the inanimate but not to understand the animate. We are coming apart at the seams because of our emotional inability to manage the complexity of human, not robot, life. Our struggle is with people, understanding and respecting our differences, learning to connect and work with each other without hating or destroying each other.
As a result, we are becoming more and more effective at creating the capacity for digital connection but are growing less and less effective at emotional connection. This has brought us to a difficult and dangerous place where we have lost our understanding of and capacity for human relationships.
We seem to have forgotten, or perhaps we never learned, the importance of emotional education and the capacity to make friends, leaving us lonelier than we have ever been.
Turkey Creek Jack Johnson:
Why do you do it?
Doc Holliday:
Wyatt Earp is my friend.
Friend? Hell, I got lots of friends.
– Tombstone
One of the best ways to receive an emotional education is through friendship. For this to occur, these friendships must be built from the inside out, intrinsically rather than extrinsically.
When we live extrinsically, everyone and no one is a friend. We have no meaningful definition of, the expectation for, or discriminating criteria to help us distinguish between friend and acquaintance. Mere outward behavior and being in physical or digital proximity is all that seems necessary for many to consider someone a friend.
The art of building friendships is lost precisely because we choose to build superficial rather than deep relationships. Deep relationships are built intrinsically, from the inside out. We develop a meaningful definition for, the expectation of, and discriminating criteria which allow us to differentiate between an acquaintance and a friend. While we enjoy our acquaintances and treat them with kindness, we understand that the difference between these and those who we call friends is only that the latter eliminate loneliness from our lives.
Loneliness comes when we are surrounded by acquaintances yet still feel alone. It is better to have one real friend than 10 acquaintances.
The truth of this principle and distinction is brought to life with emotional resonance in the classic 1993 western Tombstone. Doc Holliday, played by Val Kilmer in what should have been an Oscar-nominated performance, joins Wyatt Earp, Turkey Creek Jack Johnson, and a couple of others to track down the outlaw "cowboys." Holliday is sick with tuberculosis but refuses to leave. Turkey Jack Johnson tells Holliday he should be home in bed and then asks, "Why do you do it?"
Doc Holliday's response is profound as he says, "Wyatt Earp is my friend." Turkey Creek Jack Johnson responds with incredulity saying, "Friend? Hell, I got lots of friends," to which Holliday responds, "I don't."
"The Lost Art of Friendship" occurs imperceptibly, with the busyness of life acting like a fog obscuring our vision just enough to erase the yellow double lines on the road of life, those lines which distinguish between friend and acquaintance. Before we realize it, we have become Turkey Creek Jack Johnson calling everyone friend because we have diminished our belief in, the expectation for, and commitment to the unique and powerful experience of being friends.
I'd like to tell you about a guy I know, a friend of mine. His name is Brian Piccolo. And he has the heart of a giant, and that rare form of courage that allows him to kid himself and his opponent, cancer. He has a mental attitude that makes me proud to have a friend who spells out 'courage,' 24 hours a day, every day of his life. Now you honor me by giving me this award. But I say to you here now Brian Piccolo is the man who deserves the George S. Halas award. It is mine tonight… and Brian Piccolo's tomorrow. I love Brian Piccolo. And I'd like all of you to love him too. And so tonight, when you hit your knees, please ask God to love him.
– Gale Sayers (accepting the George S Halas award)
Tombstone is not the only movie to say a word about friendship, particularly friendships among men. There is an older and more emotionally vulnerable movie that addressed the possibilities for friendships among men, the classic 1970s made-for-TV film Brian's Song.
Real friendship tends to be difficult for men and boys. We are taught early on that our emotions can lead us into the "dark arts of human vulnerability," something best avoided. But if we must mess with this type of dark magic, then we may believe our only hope for success is under the tutelage of a girlfriend or wife (something I agree with and applaud because they often help us understand vulnerability is not actually a dark art, just as Harry learned from Hermione, Professor McGonagall, and Ginny Weasley).
One way or another, men and boys, as well as those who care about us, must understand that without help we are likely to be among the most isolated and lonely.
With this in mind, there is an exceptional and extreme truth worth noting: lonely men are most likely to be the perpetrators of violence in the form of mass shootings (What do most of America's shootings have in common?, Why many mass shooters are 'loners').
Obviously, the majority of men and boys will not become mass shooters, but the underlying frustration, anger, and discouragement experienced by lonely, isolated, and emotionally repressed men can unleash many other unhealthy behaviors, most of which can be thwarted with healthy friendships.
The Uncomfortable Truth about Male Loneliness is an honest depiction of the messiness involved with building healthy male friendships, identifying emotional emptiness, embracing vulnerability, and letting these experiences serve as our emotional education. While the path the writer takes may be different than ours, his effort to wrestle with male loneliness is illuminating. Particularly important is the need for us to understand the ability to have vulnerable conversations, make meaningful connections, and sustain emotional engagement.
This type of emotional education is an elusive process for most men. More often than not we find ourselves swept up into the epidemic of loneliness consuming the world. Many like myself have responded to loneliness by replacing the desire for intimacy with the pursuit of ambition. Unless someone teaches us, we will mistake group activity, team achievement, and the camaraderie of competition for relationships and friendships. We will be lonely.
"The Lost Art of Friendship" is my attempt to discuss this awkward and undiscussable subject not only for men but for everyone, to provide solutions and inspire all of us to help each other overcome the loneliness which so pervades our country, culture, and personal lives. Not only men, but women and children, find loneliness difficult to identify or admit. Of that we must become more aware so we are motivated to change.
Something I have learned about my life and the lives of the hundreds I have spoken to about their emotional and spiritual lives is that loneliness is experienced more often than admitted. Sometimes we are unaware of our loneliness, filling the empty space created by our emotional and spiritual isolation with noise and activity so we can avoid exploring the foreboding emptiness of our aloneness.
The problem of loneliness cannot be avoided. It requires our attention because it has become dangerous, so much so that in 2018 Britain appointed a Minister of Loneliness (UK Appoints a Minister of Loneliness). Japan followed their lead and did the same in February of 2021.
Japan has experienced a 750-person increase in the number of people who have committed suicide totaling 20,919 in 2020. These are lonely deaths that "involve people dying inside their homes and remaining undiscovered for long periods of time" (Japanese Minister Appoints 'minister of loneliness' to Cabinet).
Lest we think this is a problem from which the United States has escaped, we need only read "The Lonely Century" by Noreena Hertz who writes, "In the United States almost one in five people do not have a single friend at work," a fact that predates the coronavirus and gives us another perspective on why so many may prefer to work from home.
Atlantic magazine tackled this question of loneliness in an article by Stephen Marche entitled, "Is Facebook Making Us Lonely," where he revealed the fact that, "According to a major study by a leading scholar of the subject, roughly 20 percent of Americans—about 60 million people—are unhappy with their lives because of loneliness."
Mr. Marche writes compellingly of how our social interactions leave much to be desired as "We meet fewer people. We gather less. And when we gather, our bonds are less meaningful and less easy." And all of this was before the coronavirus pandemic.
What shocked me most was his contention that "We have outsourced the work of everyday caring."
In the face of this social disintegration, we have essentially hired an army of replacement confidants, an entire class of professional carers. As Ronald Dworkin pointed out in a 2010 paper for the Hoover Institution, in the late '40s, the United States was home to 2,500 clinical psychologists, 30,000 social workers, and fewer than 500 marriage and family therapists.
As of 2010, the country had 77,000 clinical psychologists, 192,000 clinical social workers, 400,000 nonclinical social workers, 50,000 marriage and family therapists, 105,000 mental-health counselors, 220,000 substance-abuse counselors, 17,000 nurse psychotherapists, and 30,000 life coaches. The majority of patients in therapy do not warrant a psychiatric diagnosis. This raft of psychic servants is helping us through what used to be called regular problems. We have outsourced the work of everyday caring.
– Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?
We need mental health care workers now more than ever, but their therapeutic skills cannot eliminate loneliness when we have no friends, and the lack of friends is not only a problem when it comes to our emotional health but our physical health as well.
We need professional careers more and more, because the threat of societal breakdown, once principally a matter of nostalgic lament, has morphed into an issue of public health. Being lonely is extremely bad for your health. If you're lonely, you're more likely to be put in a geriatric home at an earlier age than a similar person who isn't lonely.
You're less likely to exercise. You're more likely to be obese. You're less likely to survive a serious operation and more likely to have hormonal imbalances. You are at greater risk of inflammation. Your memory may be worse. You are more likely to be depressed, to sleep badly, and to suffer dementia and general cognitive decline.
We need friends for our mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical health. My belief is that our loneliness exists because we no longer understand what it means to be friends, nor do we know how to make, sustain, and grow our friendships.
Teenagers are experiencing punishing loneliness during this pandemic. This experience is chronicled by Ellen McCarthy in "The loneliness of an interrupted adolescence."
The pandemic has punished people of all ages, overwhelming parents, isolating grandparents, shortchanging kids. But the emotional fallout for teenagers has been uniquely brutal. At just the age when they are biologically predisposed to seek independence from their families, teens have been trapped at home. Friends — who take on paramount importance during adolescence — are largely out of reach, accessible mostly by social media, which brings its own mix of satisfying and toxic elements.
– Ellen McCarthy, "The loneliness of an interrupted adolescence."
What teens are experiencing is worth examining for readers of all ages. According to Ken Duckworth of the National Alliance of Mental Health, "one in five Americans suffered from some sort of mental illness before the pandemic, and that number is now two in five (Pandemic Pushes Mental Health to the Breaking Point)," which means the teen experience is reflective of emotional distress we are all experiencing.
A June survey by the Centers for Disease Control found that a staggering 26 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds reported having serious suicidal thoughts in the past 30 days, compared with 16 percent of 25- to 44-year-olds and less than 4 percent of people ages 45 and older. And mental health visits to emergency rooms by 12- to 17-year-olds increased 31 percent in 2020 compared with the previous year.
– Ellen McCarthy, "The loneliness of an interrupted adolescence"
The emotional health of teens is an indicator of a societal problem. The Kaiser Family Foundation reports that "During the pandemic, about 4 in 10 adults in the U.S. have reported symptoms of anxiety or depressive disorder, a share that has been largely consistent, up from 1 in 10 adults who reported these symptoms from January to June 2019."
In addition to anxiety and depressive disorder, 36% report difficulty sleeping with 32% having difficulty eating. 12% report an increase in alcohol consumption or substance abuse with 12% reporting a worsening of chronic conditions.
We may not all be therapists but any of us can become a friend, and right now there is an urgent need for friendship.
The type of friendship capable of reducing the loneliness and emotional distress of life is described by the following answers to 7 questions based on reflections from the William Deresiewicz essay "The Death of Friendship."
1. What is the difference between friendship and distraction?
Having been relegated to our screens, are our friendships now anything more than a form of distraction?
– The Death of Friendship, William Deresiewicz
Each one of us will have a variety of relationships. Whether these people are parents and siblings, girlfriends or boyfriends, co-workers or classmates, acquaintances or neighbors, the question is: will any of them become friends?
A common mistake is to identify relationships as friendships when the only purpose they serve is to distract us from the uncomfortable, difficult, or painful. When we use relationships for distraction, they are not friendships. Friendships are different. We rely on them to help us through the uncomfortable, difficult, and painful.
The man of too many friends [chosen indiscriminately] will be broken in pieces and come to ruin, But there is a [true, loving] friend who [is reliable and] sticks closer than a brother.
– Proverbs 18:24 (AMP)
The questions and answers which follow are designed to help each of us seek out and build friendships, the type of relationships with an uncommon depth, devotion, and connection.
2. Have we forgotten what it means to be friends?
In retrospect, it seems inevitable that once we decided to become friends with everyone, we would forget how to be friends with anyone. We may pride ourselves today on our aptitude for friendship – friends, after all, are the only people we have left – but it's not clear that we still even know what it means.
We cannot be friends with everyone, otherwise, friendship has no meaning. This does not mean we walk around telling people they are not our friends, but that we develop our own understanding of and definition for friendship, then devote ourselves to building the uncommon depth and connection characteristic of these unique relationships.
Building these types of friendships will require three things:
A sizable investment of time
A willingness to take the initiative
Commitment to deep conversation
3. Do we accept as truth that friendship is rare?
The idea of friendship in ancient times could not have been more different. Achilles and Patroclus, David and Jonathan, Virgil's Nisus and Euryalus: Far from being ordinary and universal, friendship, for the ancients, was rare, precious, and hard-won.
In our desire to be kind, inclusive, and caring we can diminish the quality of our friendships as we resist the truth that friendship is rare, precious, and hard-won.
British Anthropologist and Evolutionary Psychologist Robin Dunbar writes in "How Many Friends Does One Person Need?" that we can all "distinguish friends from acquaintances by how we feel about them," with friends being "those we want to spend time with, whereas acquaintances are those whose company is more of a momentary convenience."
At the same time Dunbar says "we make even finer judgments than this in real life," because when we "look at the pattern of relationships within the group of 150 that constitutes our social world, a number of circles of intimacy can be detected. The innermost group consists of about three to five people."
According to Dunbar this group of three to five constitutes "the small nucleus of really good friends to whom you go in times of trouble – for advice, comfort, or perhaps even the loan of money or help."
While Dunbar says there are additional groups of ten and thirty that are close, it is these three to five who form the circle of intimacy Deresiewicz describes as those rare, precious, and hard-won friendships we each need.
4. What are the qualities of character necessary to build friendships?
Friendship was a high calling, demanding extraordinary qualities of character – rooted in virtue, for Aristotle and Cicero, and dedicated to the pursuit of goodness and truth.
There are three qualities of character necessary to form that circle of intimacy described by Robin Dunbar as Deresiewicz' rare, precious, and hard-won friendships.
The first quality is loyalty, those people with whom we share a willingness to stick through both the good and hard times. The second quality is empathy, those unselfish enough to spend time thinking about others and not only themselves.
The third and final quality of character is forgiveness. Forgiveness is a choice to love unconditionally, and it is the characteristic that binds all the other qualities together.
5. What does a real friendship look and feel like?
As for the moral content of classical friendship, its commitment to virtue and mutual improvement, that, too, has been lost. We have ceased to believe that a friend's highest purpose is to summon us to the good by offering moral advice and correction. We practice, instead, the nonjudgmental friendship of unconditional acceptance and support – "therapeutic" friendship, in Robert N. Bellah's scornful term.
The highest form of friendship helps us from the inside out. These friends are loyal, empathetic, and forgiving, which helps us feel safe enough to seek and welcome their advice and correction.
Friends like this usually set an example for us in three areas. First and foremost, they are curious about us, wanting to know our hopes, dreams, and plans. Second, they are transparent about their lives, sharing the good, bad, and ugly sides. Finally, they are vulnerable about the emotions connected to their transparent sharing of their good, bad, and ugly, such that we know they have our best interests in mind because they have hidden nothing from us.
6. How do we increase the depth of our friendships?
We seem to be terribly fragile now. A friend fulfills her duty, we suppose, by taking our side – validating our feelings, supporting our decisions, helping us to feel good about ourselves. We tell white lies, make excuses when a friend does something wrong, do what we can to keep the boat steady. We're busy people; we want our friendships fun and friction-free.
Friendships should make us better. This requires depth. Friendships capable of increasing their depth share three qualities.
First, these relationships are purposeful. They understand the need to help each other, are committed to it, and then seek to bring the best out in each other. Second, these relationships share an uncommon trust which allows them to speak any necessary truth in love.
Third, friends like these practice emotional and spiritual endurance which allows them to push through the obstacles to ever-deepening friendship.
7. Are you willing to invest in building quality friendships?
The fact of the matter is that one cannot have a profound connection with more than a few people. Time prohibits it. Deep friendship requires cultivation over the years—evenings before the fire, long walks together, and lots of time for talk. It requires keeping the television off so that the two of you can log in with each other. If your social calendar is too full to provide for such intimate bonding, it should be pared. "True happiness," said Ben Jonson, "consists not in the multitude of friends, but in the worth and choice."
– The Friendship Factor, Alan Loy McGinnis
"The Friendship Factor" was the first book to make me think about the importance of friendship, and that how I had been building them was more careless than careful. Over the years I have come to understand the truth of the statement that, "deep friendship requires cultivation," and in so doing discovered three final qualities in which we must invest if we want to build friendships as exceptional as they should be.
Admiration is an underestimated yet essential quality for building friendships because it is admiration that prevents the destructiveness of envy and jealousy, two things responsible for unraveling countless relationships.
When we have a genuine admiration for our friends, it leads to a second quality in which we should invest: developing a vision for our friend, where we have an exceptional belief in their possibilities.
Finally, when we have practiced the approximately 15 ways to reclaim "The Lost Art of Friendship" in the answers to these 7 questions, we will receive the blessing of all these investments, which is the uncommon joy of true friendship.
The following are my handwritten notes illustrating my thoughts and ideas still in development. I'd like to give you a window into my thought process each week, in hopes that it will inspire you to unleash your own creativity and embrace imperfection. You can download them here.
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Home / News / Press Release / IBIB / Buddhist monk Thich Thien Minh is victim of harassments and death threats
UBCV Patriarch Thich Huyen Quang declines to meet Thich Nhat Hanh in Binh Dinh
Buddhist monk Thich Thien Minh is victim of harassments and death threats
PARIS, 25 March 2005 (IBIB) – Buddhist monk Thich Thien Minh, member of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV) released in a government amnesty after 26 years in re-education camp, sent an urgent communication to the International Buddhist Information Bureau (IBIB) this morning reporting that he is the victim of continuous harassments by Security Police, and has received repeated phone calls threatening him with death if he does not cease all contacts with overseas human rights organizations and stop denouncing Vietnam's human rights and religious freedom violations in the foreign media.
Thich Thien Minh, who is currently living with his young brother and his family in the southern province of Bac Lieu, told IBIB that he has been living in a state of permanent insecurity since his release on 2nd February 2005. Security Police maintain the house under 24-hour surveillance, follow him everywhere and question all his visitors. Recently, Security agents placed a jamming machine in a nearby house to prevent him using a mobile phone. All his correspondence is confiscated.
Over the past two weeks, Thich Thien Minh said he had received numerous anonymous phone calls in the middle of the night from persons who threaten to beat him up or kill him. Some warned that he would be the victim of a "car accident", then taken to hospital and injected with substances that would drive him mad, paralyse him or make him dumb. Others said he would be assaulted by gangs and beaten to death. Some of the calls, made by people speaking with Northern or Southern accents, also threatened Thich Thich Minh's brother, Huynh Huu Nghia, who is teacher in a local school. They said that he would lose his job, and that they would hire local thugs to beat, maim or kill him and his wife.
On March 23rd, a delegation of Security officials from the Ministry of Public Security in Hanoi, headed by Mr Tan, came to Bac Lieu and summoned Huynh Huu Nghia for questioning at a local hotel. On March 24th, the delegation came to visit Thich Thien Minh at his brother's home, along with a number of local Security officials. A member of the Hanoi delegation named Hiep brought a video camera and filmed the house meticulously. The Security officials told Thich Thien Minh to stop giving interviews to international radio stations and sending petitions overseas, specifically mentioning his Petition to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom in which he urged the United States to maintain Vietnam on its list of "Countries of particular concern" for violations of religious freedom, and appealed for the release of prisoners of conscience and the re-establishment of the legitimate status of the banned UBCV. They warned Thich Thien Minh that he must "bear the consequences" if the US enforced sanctions against Vietnam. They also ordered him not to reveal details about detention conditions in re-education camps or names of political prisoners to the international media and human rights organisations.
l UBCV Patriarch Thich Huyen Quang, 87, currently under house arrest at the Nguyen Thieu Monastery in Binh Dinh (Central Vietnam) has asked the International Buddhist Information Bureau to inform international opinion that he will not receive Thich Nhat Hanh and his Plum Village delegation who are coming to Binh Dinh at the end of March. Thich Nhat Hanh, a France-based Vietnamese monk, is on a 3-month speaking tour of Vietnam sponsored by the Vietnamese government and the State-sanctioned Vietnam Buddhist Church (VBC) with a delegation of 190 monks, nuns and followers from the sect he has founded overseas. He is scheduled to spend several days in Binh Dinh to give Dharma talks to promote his sect. Patriarch Thich Huyen Quang formally announced his refusal to receive Thich Nhat Hanh to the State-sponsored VBC's Executive Committee in Binh Dinh on 20th March 2005.
The UBCV Patriarch had previously raised his concerns on Thich Nhat Hanh's visit in an "Open Letter" to Communist Party Secretary Nong Duc Manh, President Tran Duc Luong, Prime Minister Phan Van Khai and National Assembly Chairman Nguyen Van An on 21st February 2005, in which he protested the government's ban on Thich Quang Do travelling to Binh Dinh to visit him : "The Communist Party and State has authorized a delegation of several hundred Buddhists from an overseas sect to visit Vietnam with full freedoms of movement and speech. Yet they prevent Buddhist monks who live in Vietnam… from travelling and spreading Buddhist teachings".
At the same time, monks at the famous Thap Thap Monastery in Binh Dinh, where Thich Nhat Hanh also planned to speak, have informed IBIB that they too have declined to receive Thich Nhat Hanh because their Superior monk Venerable Thich Vien Dinh is currently under house arrest. Venerable Thich Vien Dinh, who is Deputy Head of the UBCV's Executive Institute (Vien Hoa Dao) as well as Superior monk of both the Thap Thap Monastery and Giac Hoa Pagoda in Saigon, was placed under house arrest in Saigon in October 2003 during a fierce wave of repression against the UBCV. Since then, he has been forbidden to travel and subjected to ceaseless Police harassment and surveillance. On 19th January, Thich Vien Dinh wrote to Thich Nhat Hanh expressing concern that his visit had damaging effects for religious freedom in Vietnam, especially for members of the banned UBCV, whose leaders are virtually all under house arrest. "I don't know if you did it deliberately or inadvertently, but in any case, you have timed your visit at a very inopportune moment [following the government crack-down on the UBCV]. It gives the impression that you are letting yourself be used as a propaganda tool to embellish the image of the regime" .
The UBCV's Deputy leader Venerable Thich Quang Do also declined to receive Thich Nhat Hanh during his visit to Saigon in January-February 2005. On 18th February, Thich Quang issued a letter stating that Thich Nhat Hanh had sent envoys four times to request a meeting, but he had refused. He said that his name was not on the list of visits submitted by Thich Nhat Hanh to the Vietnamese government, and he did not want to be visited "sneakingly".
In fact, Venerable Thich Huyen Quang, Thich Quang Do and other UBCV leaders are deeply concerned that Vietnam is using Thich Nhat Hanh's visit as a show-case to "prove" increased religious tolerance in Vietnam at a time when it is in fact stepping up religious repression, not only against Buddhists, but also against Mennonite Protestants, ethnic Montagnard Christians, Hoa Hao, Cao Dai followers and all the religious communities. In September 2004, Vietnam was blacklisted by the United States as a "country of particular concern" for its egregious violations of religious freedom, and it must prove within the coming weeks that it has made tangible progress in this domain. Thich Nhat Hanh's highly-publicized visit is one of the arguments used by Hanoi to support its false claims of increased respect of religious freedom.
This post is also available in: Vietnamese
Tags Thich Huyen Quang Thich Nhat Hanh Thich Quang Do Thich Thien Minh Thich Vien Dinh UBCV
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PICS: 10 of the most daring Oscars looks of all time
Red carpet watchers rejoice. The Oscars are happening in-person this year and a formal dress code is on the cards.
We have been getting our much-needed fix of glitz and glamour thanks to the BAFTAs and the SAG Awards recently, but the Oscars remain the creme de la creme of red carpet style.
'A fusion of inspirational and aspirational' style is being encouraged on the night, Town & Country reports.
To get you in the mood, we have taken a look back at the most daring dresses to grace the Oscars red carpet and it includes a swan dress and even a pair of bicycle shorts.
Edy Williams (1986)
Edy Williams (1986) at the Oscars. Pic: Getty Images
Google the most controversial dresses in Oscars history and you will likely find two particular entries dedicated to the actress and 60s glamour girl, Edy Williams.
While she famously wore a leopard print bikini to the Oscars in 1974 she followed it up with an embellished dress that brought a whole new meaning to the term 'barely there' in 1986.
She opted for a mini dress made purely from strategically-placed strings of pearls, that was pretty much it.
Cher (1986)
Who could forget this iconic look Cher wore to the 1986 Academy Awards Pic: Rex
Cher also rocked a scantily-clad ensemble at the Oscars that year.
After being snubbed for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, the songstress enlisted the help of Bob Mackie to create a showstopping ensemble that gave a sartorial two fingers to the Academy for not taking her seriously as an actress.
The jewel-encrusted bralette with a matching low-rise skirt paired with thigh-high black books would have been enough to cause a fair ruckus, it was the enormous feathered 'mohawk' headdress that really caused a commotion.
On the night, Cher took to the stage to announce the nominees for Best Supporting Actor and smiled proudly as she kicked off her speech by saying: 'As you can see, I did receive my Academy booklet on how to dress like a serious actress.'
Demi Moore (1989)
Pic: Barry King/Getty Images
Demi Moore made waves at the Oscars when she arrived on the red carpet on the arm of her then-husband Bruce Willis wearing a pair of bicycle shorts.
There were a number of reasons why Demi's hybrid dress and bodysuit was a scene-stealer.
It brought 80s drama to the star-studded night, from the velvet long sleeve embroidered corset to the tapestry-lined train covered in a metallic floral jacquard print and, of course, the lace-trimmed bike shorts, which oddly are right on trend right now.
Kim Basinger (1990)
Kim Basinger and brother. Pic: Getty Images
Is it a gown? Is it a tuxedo? Kim Basinger's satin gown still has fashion fans asking questions today.
The LA Confidential star designed her Oscars dress herself and divided critics with her new take on a ballgown.
Whoopi Goldberg (1993)
Whoopi Goldberg during 65th Annual Academy Awards. Pic: WireImage
Every year we can't wait to see what colour reigns supreme on the Oscars red carpet and Whoopi Goldberg embraced vibrant colour at the Oscars in 1993.
The Oscar-winner wore a multi-coloured jumpsuit on the night (with matching print heels and all) with a purple and green satin coat and skirt over it.
Susan Sarandon (1996)
Nicolas Cage & Susan Sarandon during The 68th Annual Academy Awards. Pic: WireImage
More volume! More tulle! More lace! As we know, the Oscars red carpet is all about drama and Susan Sarandon's 1996 ensemble had that in spades.
The American actress took home the Oscar for her performance in Dead Man Walking that year and her voluminous satin Dolce & Gabbana gown with its unusual shade of copper brown really made a splash.
She walked the red carpet with a pair of shades on too. Legend.
Bjork (2001)
Bjork during The 73rd Annual Academy Awards at Shrine Auditorium. Pic: FilmMagic
Bjork's swan dress really needs no introduction, and even after two decades, it is still ruffling feathers.
The Icelandic songstress, who was nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Song that year, ripped up the fashion rulebook when she arrived wearing a crystal-encrusted bodysuit and a dress with a feathered bodice and a sculpted swan's head by Macedonian designer Marjan Pejoski.
She 'laid' eggs as she walked the red carpet and firmly landed herself in the fashion history books for one of the most iconic looks of all time.
Jennifer Connolly (2002)
Jennifer Connelly during The 74th Annual Academy Awards. Pic: FilmMagic
Nude is always a heavy hitter when it comes to the red carpet but sometimes celebrities don't quite get the shade right to complement their complexion.
Jennifer Connolly wore a Balenciaga dress for the Oscars in 2002 which saw her taking home the golden statue for Best Supporting Actress in A Beautiful Mind.
Her gown with dramatic while still soft and featured layers of distressed ruffles and she topped it off with a sheer peachy scarf.
Hilary Swank (2003)
Hilary Swank wearing Jimmy Choo shoes with Chad Lowe. Pic: WireImage
We think Hilary Swank will have a hard time ever topping her brilliant backless Guy Laroche gown from 2005 and her dress from the Oscars just two years previously could not have been more different.
Hilary wore a pink cocktail dress, with a sheer ombre tulle overlay, and finished it off with a pair of sweet strappy Jimmy Choos. Very grown up girlie glamour vibes.
Uma Thurman (2004)
Uma Thurman during The 76th Annual Academy Awards. Pic: WireImage
While stars are usually gunning to be given the crown for best dressed, Uma Thurman purposely wanted to land herself on the Worst Dressed list back in 2004 to shake things up.
The Kill Bar actress chose a floaty dress with a twist by Christian Lacroix wearing a high-low tulle dress that featured a dirndl-style vest that also had a blue satin that tied around her waist.
Speaking about the inspiration behind the standout ensemble, she told The Hollywood Reporter: 'The dress didn't do that thing that people are in the mood for, which is what most people had... Everyone looked the same. Everyone had it down to such a perfect tee in their spaghetti-strapped, sequinned or chiffon, body-hugging, gym-hour promoting things. You get bored.'
Meanwhile, we can't wait to see what the stars wear this year. And the Oscars goodie bags are so lust-worthy, there's even an Irish product in there too.
Bruce Willis And Demi Moore. Pic: Jim Smeal/Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images
Bjork, Oscars 2001. Pic: Rex
Whoopi Goldberg at the Academy Awards. Pic: Getty Images
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The greatest problem that we struggle with today is not social media.
It isn't capitalism, commercialism, politics, or the government.
It's insecurity, fear of looking stupid, and being excluded from groups.
Do you believe me? It's true.
I mean who doesn't want to be accepted and feel like they belong to a group?
Even loners want to belong to a family or have at least one or two close friends to confide in when they need someone.
However, you might find it challenging to be liked and trying to live within an idealistic frame of mind.
What do I mean by that? I mean, you may be trying to align your thoughts and actions with your values, and also wanting everyone to like or respect you for saying the right things at the same time.
Well, guess what. It ain't gonna happen.
I didn't want to say the wrong thing and look stupid.
But what I didn't realize at the time was that he was trying to teach me a very valuable life skill. He was trying to teach me critical thinking skills–to think on my own. He was trying to teach me to be comfortable with my own answers, and not be afraid to look stupid.
It goes along with trying to find answers from everyone else, and not trusting your own answers. Your answers might make you look stupid.
Wanting approval comes from way back in our childhood. We all wanted approval from our parents, teachers, siblings, friends, love interests, coaches, and mentors. No one wants to look stupid in front of authority figures or people we are trying to impress.
When you really needed approval, was it always there? Not likely. It often doesn't happen at the right times, or it doesn't happen at all.
You find out eventually that people are just human. Even authority figures and guardians are looking for the same thing–answers–security. They also look for approval from their partners, colleagues, spouses, and leaders.
Sometimes they get it. Sometimes they don't.
They might not want to admit it, but they also struggle with insecurity and self-doubt all the time.
Insecurity can rear it's ugly head in a variety of forms.
It may cause you to work on projects you're not excited about. It might have you obsessing over problems and regrets that you can't change anymore.
Alan Watts wrote a book called The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety. He explains that we live in an age of unprecedented anxiety. Spending all our time trying to anticipate and plan for the future and lamenting the past, we forget to embrace the here and now.
We are so concerned with tomorrow and yesterday that we forget to enjoy today. Drawing from Eastern philosophy and religion, Alan Watts shows that it is only by acknowledging what we do not and cannot know that we can learn anything truly worth knowing.
In The Wisdom of Insecurity, he shows us that in order to lead a fulfilling life, we must embrace the present and live fully in the now.
The unhealthy need for approval and obsession with insecurity is fueled by unhealthy emotions: guilt, shame, anger, and blame.
None of these emotions are a healthy foundation for relationships with yourself or other people.
Another book called The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living by Dr. Russ Harris explains that the way most of us go about trying to find happiness ends up making us miserable, driving the epidemics of stress, anxiety, and depression.
By clarifying your values and developing mindfulness, a technique for living fully in the present moment, helps you escape insecurity and find true satisfaction in life.
If you want to live a life of purpose, you'll need to let go of your need for always wanting and needing approval. You'll need to be willing to follow your instincts and learn to figure things out on your own without the fear of looking stupid. It's the only way to become truly self-sufficient.
If you trust yourself and the way you feel, you'll find that the truth was always there… if you'll be honest with yourself.
If you must talk to someone and get some real input or perspective, have the courage to spend some time with that person and have a real conversation over coffee or lunch.
It takes practice. It also takes effort in self-care and self-love. If you truly love and respect yourself, you'll deal with the difficulty of being honest with yourself, even if it is painful.
If you don't face painful truths and try to correct them, you will inevitably repeat negative patterns in the future, and you can't afford to waste time doing that.
Your time in this world will be gone in the blink of an eye.
You don't need to live the rest of your life in fear of what others think.
Relationships are meant to be deep, genuine, personal, and authentic. And yes, they are also painful. Conflict is inevitable and it's necessary to grow. It's also healthy, and one of the surest ways to intimacy.
When conflict arises, the only thing you should be concerned with is getting clarity and moving on with whatever you are working on. Too many times, people think conflict means hostility, shouting, defensiveness, and abuse.
People who are afraid of conflict or think of it in the wrong way are missing the whole point.
The only way to be secure in who you are comes from believing in your convictions and values for the right reasons–because you know they are true and worth standing up for.
I may not believe in what you believe, but I can respect you for what you believe, as long as you don't force your beliefs on me.
When you truly believe and know who you are, then you can act with complete honesty and genuineness. You won't come off desperate or fake. If you don't succeed in your plans, life will go on.
You will eventually attract opportunities and relationships that resonate with someone that sees your perspective. Keep trying.
It is absolutely ridiculous when people avoid asking for advice because they don't want to look incompetent or stupid.
Yet, research from Harvard Business School found that when you ask people for help, directions, or advice, it actually makes other people believe you're MORE competent.
We have memory problems at all ages.
There is no sense in pretending otherwise.
Admit your insecurities, and in doing so, you can gain confidence and security.
You can't please everyone. So, there is no sense in thinking that way.
You're going to fail a lot. Everyone does. Get used to it.
Picasso created thousands of pieces of art, and only a few are considered to be his great works.
Edison had almost 2000 patents, and we only recognize a handful of them.
Perfectionism breeds procrastination. If you wait to achieve perfection, nothing would ever get done.
Life is a series of refinements.
It isn't about you and your insecurities.
It's not about approval or disapproval.
It's about overcoming fear of failure.
It's about getting over fear of looking incompetent and stupid.
See that quote by Einstein above? Let's change that.


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May 26, 2019 / 3:08 AM / 2 months ago
Cricket: Win over India means little for World Cup, says New Zealand's Taylor
LONDON (Reuters) - New Zealand have moved to temper expectations ahead of the Cricket World Cup after their six-wicket victory over India in a warmup match on Saturday, with conditions likely to be more conducive to batting during the tournament.
Cricket - ICC Cricket World Cup Warm-Up Match - India v New Zealand - Kia Oval, London, Britain - May 25, 2019 New Zealand's Ross Taylor in action Action Images via Reuters/Andrew Couldridge
New Zealand skittled India out for 179 in the 40th over at The Oval with only all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja's 54 saving the tournament favourites from an embarrassingly lower total.
Ross Taylor then top scored with 71 as the 2015 finalists coasted to 180-4 in 38 overs.
The 35-year-old Taylor, however, said New Zealand had the benefit of exploiting a green-topped pitch early on, which saw them reduce Virat Kohli's side to 39-4 in the 11th over.
"It is a warm-up and you have to take what you want out of it," Taylor told reporters. "Time out in the middle for most of the batters is crucial."
Taylor added that familiarity with conditions should benefit tournament hosts England, with New Zealand experiencing a similar boost in 2015 when they played all of their pool matches, quarter-final and semi-final at home before the final in Melbourne, which they lost by seven wickets to Australia.
"I think that's what makes England the favourites," Taylor said. "They know these conditions very well.
"But there is a lot of cricket and some good cricket needing to be played before we even think about semi-finals and finals.
"If you get off to a good start and get onto a bit of a roll and make the semi-finals then you're only two wins away from lifting the trophy."
Opening bowler Trent Boult, who took 4-33 off 6.2 overs against India, added that pitches around England and Wales were already starting to look dry, which would aid batters as the tournament progressed.
"It was nice to see it swinging around a little bit and I would like to see that everywhere but there are some good wickets around the country ... (and) I think the other wickets look quite dry," Boult said.
"The biggest challenge will be when its not swinging or nipping around a little bit, then how do we take wickets ... (because) we know what early wickets does to any batting side."
New Zealand play West Indies in another warm-up in Bristol while India face Bangladesh in Cardiff, with both games on Tuesday.
Reporting by Greg Stutchbury in Wellington; Editing by Peter Rutherford


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CPW
Vascular Intelligence Center
Preventric Announces New CEO and Executive Leadership Structure
BIRMINGHAM, AL, October 26, 2020 – Preventric Diagnostics, Inc, a leading provider of revolutionary digital therapeutics and vascular health intelligence solutions, today announced that Mark Belcher has been promoted to President and Chief Executive Officer and a new leadership structure. These key changes will best support Preventric's growth and strategic vision.
Marks' vacated seat as Chief Operating Officer has been filled by Rosson Richardson, who was formerly acting as Executive Vice President of Investor Relations. William K. Holbrook will assume the role of Chief Financial Officer and Chief Legal Officer
"The team's talent, record of innovation and progressive, strategic leadership has created a solid foundation that will be key to accelerating growth for our digital health solutions," states Mark Belcher.
Mr. Belcher was previously President of Pilar Ventures, LLC where he worked with a number of companies assisting them accessing capital and advising them on strategy and planning. He also managed several other endeavors after serving as President and Chief Development Officer of the Baptist Health System Foundation where he successfully oversaw the organization's growth and innovation pipeline. He has held key leadership roles in several companies over the last 25 years and been active in Birmingham's vibrant startup community as an advisor and mentor.
Mr. Richardson was previously Sr. Director of Real Massive and was Director of Capital Markets at Enverus, formerly known as Drillinginfo. Mr. Richardson's background includes finance, business development, operations, and private equity. Richardson will focus his efforts on the day to day business operations as well as serve as the key liaison between Preventric and their investors.
Mr. Holbrook was Chief Operating Officer of Sterne Agee before the acquisition of the firm by Stifel Nicolaus and Company. Prior to Sterne Agee, Mr. Holbrook was a corporate securities attorney for various prominent Birmingham law firms. During that time, he has served as outside counsel for several of Birmingham's publicly traded companies and serves on the Boards of Directors for technology startups across the southeast.
Preventric exists to deliver clinically superior vascular data that helps people live longer and healthier lives
info@preventric.com
Copyright Preventric Diagnostics, Inc. 2021 - All Rights Reserved


Mexico's largest semi-automated terminal Lazaro Cardenas, operated by the Netherlands-based APM Terminals, has officially started operations as it welcomed its first vessel, the 9,600 TEU Maersk Salalah.
With the first phase of the terminal complete, APM Terminals Lazaro Cardenas occupies an area of 49 hectares, with a quay of 750 meters in length for ships and a depth of 16.5 meters.
"Today is a milestone as we add an additional operational terminal to our portfolio," Morten H. Engelstoft, CEO of APM Terminals, said.
"We have a significant portfolio across Latin America, and this will be our second terminal in Mexico after Yucatan. We are pleased to be a contributor in helping Mexico to reach its growth ambitions," Engelstoft added.
By the final phase of the terminal buildout, which is scheduled to happen between 2027 and 2030, the terminal's water depth will increase to 18 meters.
By then, the terminal will have a quay 1.5 km long in a total area of 102 hectares and a capacity of 4.1 million TEUs, operated by 15 ship-to-shore (STS) cranes and 10 rail tracks, providing intermodal access.
The total investment cost for the full project is expected to reach some USD 900 million, according to APM Terminals.
Posted on February 28, 2017 with tags APM Terminals, Lazaro Cardenas, Maersk Salalah, Mexico.


Your Happiness: It's Friday the 13th--Are You Superstitious?
Black cats, bad luck, elevators and creaky doors. It's Friday the 13th, and I'm curious: Are you suspicious about anything?
How about you? Concerns about Friday the 13th? Phobias? Superstitions? Share!
Is it stress or a panic attack?


For the past two months I have been working as a student assistant helping to sort through the Las Vegas Jewish Federations archive. I have worked through around forty-eight of the estimated fifty-five boxes that were donated to UNLV's Special Collections. Doing so has been wonderful and has taught me a lot about the Jewish community in Las Vegas. Today, while working to identify people in pictures, I ran across a real Jem of a picture from 1945. The picture is from the Las Vegas Morning Tribune's Sunday, March 11, 1945 edition. The photo features a boy holding a Torah surrounded by men in uniform and plainclothes.
I was deeply intrigued by this photo as I have not seen many 1940s photos in the Federations collection. Since I was curious I headed to the libraries first floor to see if I could find it on microfilm. After much searching, and giggles at the 1940s cartoons, I found the newspaper page I was looking for along with an additional photo and a small article. Talk about successful research.
The article stated that the Torah dedication program was held in the base chapel at the Las Vegas Army Air Field on February 25. The Torah was donated for the duration of the war by the Beth El Congregation of Phoenix, Arizona. The photo features Las Vegas Jewish leaders such as Mark Schulman the Las Vegas B'nai B'rith president (far left), Nate Mack (second from left), as well as Rabbi Max H. Kert (third man) who came from the Olympic Jewish Center of Las Vegas.
Pearl Harbor was bombed seventy-five years ago today and finding this photo on the anniversary of that event was a nice reminder to me that just because history is over does not mean that it is not relevant. This photo prompted me to think about aspects of WWII and the history of Las Vegas that I had not though of before; mainly that religious ceremonies and life went on despite unusual circumstances.


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