Due diligence – what is it?
Essentially, it is looking at a transaction with all of the care appropriate to the particular situation. If you are involved in a merger, or an acquisition, the level of attention for your examination of the deal should be fairly intense. More often than not, people equate due diligence with an examination of the financial and legal aspects of the transaction. But there is obviously much more to making any specific transaction successful. For example, there is the matter of business strategy, and there are the people issues – the softer side of due diligence.
Management talent: The level and compatibility of leadership talent and management styles is a vital element. This is especially important in view of the fact that identifying and filling leadership positions early in the merger integration process is essential.
Retention: Success in retaining individuals key to continuing success and the work force required for continuing production is crucial to any major transaction. Retention is mostly a matter of human dynamics.
Culture: An understanding of the compatibility of the cultures of the companies involved in the transaction (and closely related to that, an identification of the values that are important to those companies) is necessary to any assessment of the level of effort required to achieve a successful merger integration.
Competencies: To ensure success it is necessary to catalog and provide for the functional capabilities, resources, methodologies, information, organizational structure, etc. required in order to achieve the strategic objectives of the new company to be created by the merger or acquisition.
Commitment: Performance levels will be impacted by any major transaction. Quickly building commitment within the work force to the accomplishment of new strategic goals is one of the first tasks of management.
And, last, but certainly not least, is the fact that soft due diligence is required in order to design a merger integration process that will ensure success, and is also required in order to accurately estimate the cost of successfully completing the merger or acquisition. Integration costs can be substantial and can be a significant factor in the decision to continue merger or acquisition action with a particular candidate.
In today's merger math one plus one never equals two! On the revenue side, one plus one must equal more than two for a successful merger. On the cost side, one plus one must equal less than two for success. Due diligence is the best way we have to determine whether these goals can be achieved. Soft due diligence is our best window into merger integration – its complexity, strategies, costs, and likelihood of success. Therefore, the information that soft due diligence yields is essential in the assessment of both the cost and revenue sides of the equation, and can be significant in the bottom line decision about whether or not to go forward with the transaction.
In realizing the full potential of your company there are significant prizes to be won with merger or acquisition. One objective would be to win market share by increasing your customer base and expanding your channels to market. Another would be to obtain more competencies, methodologies, technology and know-how to provide products and services of superior value. It is possible to achieve these objectives through bold internal building and growth strategies or through some external move such as merger or acquisition. In the successful employment of either approach (or some combination of the two) there will be major changes within the company, and there are a number of success factors to be considered in evaluating the company's ability to successfully implement these changes. In due diligence each of these factors must be evaluated in terms of its contribution to rapidly achieving the over arching strategic business goals that are at the root of the major performance improvement being contemplated.
It is important to realize that each of the success factors (which are treated below) must be evaluated within the context of the major organizational changes that will occur as a result of the merger, acquisition, or other major performance improvement initiative. These types of changes are necessarily disruptive to the organization, and that has a powerful impact on the people within the company(ies).
The human psyche seems to be change averse. One of the biggest reasons for this is the fact that with change comes confusion, ambiguity, and uncertainty. People know that familiar structures and ways of doing things will change, and, they do not yet know what will replace them. There is a deterioration of trust and people go into self preservation mode. Perhaps the newspaper cartoon character Pogo said it best: "The certainty of misery is better than the misery of uncertainty." Statistics associated with productivity during major change clearly tell us that a great deal of energy is removed from productive endeavors and applied to speculating, worrying, resisting, and complaining. Experience indicates that in all cases of major organizational change there is a productivity loss, the only questions are how severe will it be, and how long will it last. Due diligence seeks to answer these questions and provide the change agents with ideas about formulating a strategy appropriate for minimizing the adverse impacts associated with major organizational change.
Perspective: The perspective, or attitude with which the transaction is approached. Is it a "winner takes all" approach or one in which new company (many times referred to as "New Co.") is going to be better than (and probably different from) either of the predecessor companies?
Business Rationale: A strategic and compelling business rationale about how the unique strengths of the parties to the transaction will be leveraged to win in your competitive marketplace. This rationale should be used in setting standards for most of the other success factors.
Organization & Management: The organizational and management structure that will be required to best leverage the strengths of the contributing companies to accomplish a new, more aggressive set of goals.
Leadership: Define the leadership talent that is needed to formulate and implement the required changes, and build the commitment of the work force to the accomplishment of the new strategic business goals. Compare the leadership talent available within the parties to the transaction to that which is needed.
Productivity: The capability to design and aggressively implement actions to deal with productivity issues during the change and rapidly move to a higher level of performance in New Co. than existed in the predecessor companies.
Resistance: Given the new goals and changes required to accomplish those goals: identify the likely resistance to the changes, assess the capabilities to quickly and effectively overcome that resistance.
Retention: Identify key talent, key individuals and organizational competencies crucial to the achievement of the new goals and business strategies and evaluate the abilities to design and rapidly implement an appropriate retention program.
Commitment: The degree to which commitment exists and/or can be cultivated to the new compelling business rationale and strategic goals of the new entity that will be created by the transaction.
Communication: The health of existing communication systems and the capabilities that can be marshaled to design, implement and maintain the rich information exchange required to implement change, pursue strategies, and accomplish goals.
Speed: Success can sometimes depend on how fast changes can be designed, implemented and successfully completed. The capacity for action, sense of urgency, and ability to respond rapidly must be evaluated and compared against the requirements for accomplishing the company's new goals.
There are books to be written on the relationship of each of these factors to effective due diligence and successful merger integration. A few highlights are provided in this brief article.
Cultivating a correct perspective for the transaction, defining a compelling business rationale that is normatively correct, and designing appropriate management and organizational structures need to happen very early in the process. Each of these elements, especially the compelling business rationale, strongly influences the manner in which the balance of the success factors are used in due diligence and in designing a good merger integration program.
Rapid and substantial attention to overcoming resistance, maintaining retention and building commitment all contribute immediately to productivity issues. Good programs to deal with retention, resistance and commitment will result in smaller and shorter decreases in productivity than would otherwise be the case.
Communication, leadership and speed are the primary vehicles with which merger integration is accomplished and are, therefore, appropriate subjects for thorough evaluation during due diligence.
There must be a business rationale for the transaction that is compelling and inspiring. This rationale forms the purpose of the new entity that is being created. It is the centerpiece of all communication. It must describe the business purpose (that which is to be accomplished), the strategy to be used in accomplishing that purpose, why that will win in the marketplace, and why all of this is good for everyone who has a stake in the company.
Once the compelling business rationale is defined, organizational and management structures can be designed and implemented. Then work can flow much easier in maintaining retention, overcoming resistance and building commitment.
Improving the overall performance of the company is usually the basic reason for any major transaction. In the time frame immediately after a major transaction is announced the most obvious indicator of performance is productivity.
Deal with productivity issues head on. Share expectations for productivity and performance candidly with the work force. Begin immediately with a well designed program to overcome resistance to the changes that are going to occur in order to make the transaction successful and realize more of the full potential of the company. And, carry out an aggressive program of retention carefully targeted at key individuals and those with competencies essential for the immediate and long term future.
Resistance: Changes are unsettling and resistance to change always occurs! Know that resistance is out there; invite it into the open. It is better to know the nature of the resistance so appropriate actions can be taken. Driving resistance underground merely compromises the company's ability to deal with it.
Recognize that it is human nature to resist change. Craft a good program filled with information about the "why" and "what" of the changes. Pursue that program tenaciously until all changes are fully implemented. Along the way, reinforce the behavior of those who respond well to the changes, make it clear that the changes are going to occur; and to those having difficulty with the change, listen and provide assistance to help them deal with the changes.
Retention: With any major change people re-evaluate their options. Talk to any HR professional; they will affirm that is much less costly to spend a lot of extra effort on a well designed retention program than it is to replace people who leave. Compose an individualized retention program for each person who is key to the success of the transaction and the new improved business entity. Know which human resources are essential to success and invest heavily in retaining them.
Leadership: Ultimately, it is the job of leadership to make the transaction a success and to realize the new, more aggressive, strategic business goals of the improved company. This is accomplished by building commitment within the work force to the company's new strategic goals and objectives. The compelling business rationale and a proactive and intense communication program are the keys to making this happen.
Tell people "why" by being able to explain the business rationale in a compelling way to everyone in the company at his or her level. The communication program should be crafted to: (1) find out what people are concerned about, (2) address those concerns, and (3) share as much information as possible as soon as possible.
Top leadership must be very personally involved in the communication program. All leaders must be coached to under promise and over deliver. And, the effectiveness and success of the communication program must be accurately monitored on an on-going basis.
Merger integration and/or effectively managing the changes associated with any major business transaction is not easy. Neither is the soft due diligence required to identify and evaluate the elements required for success. However, the risk of failure is high and the consequences of failure in these aspects of important transactions are significant.
Make the investment to do things right; it is much better than the likely alternative. Be organized; obtain the right resources, and commit those resources. Monitor the process and expect and measure results. Look for ways to accelerate the process.
Expect uncertainty and a certain level of discomfort. Be candid and know that it is okay to admit that you do not have all of the answers just when people want those answers. Changes generate energy. Be pro-active to channel this energy in a positive direction – do not allow it to go negative through inaction. The new mission, goals and strategies point the way to doing this. Help people take responsibility for being a part of finding new ways to meet challenges and accomplish the new company goals.
Copyright 2003, Saville Consulting Service. All rights reserved. We encourage you to share this article with friends and colleagues in whole or in part if copyright and attribution are always included.


Nothing like the insurrections and civil wars in the name of independence that convulsed Spanish America occurred in Brazil. When Portuguese rebels in 1820 ousted the regency in Lisbon and convoked a liberal parliament, the new government attempted to tighten the colonial ties with Brazil, which had weakened now that the royal family lived in Rio de Janeiro. The British, fearing loss of their own influence over Portugal and Brazil, advised João VI to return to Europe. In April 1821 he did so, taking three thousand members of his court but leaving his twenty-three- year-old son Pedro behind, reputedly advising him to accept the local throne if the Brazilians demanded independence.
When the Lisbon parliament demanded that Pedro return as well, he refused. On September 7, 1822, at Ypiranga, in São Paulo, Pedro, after seeking counsel from members of the Brazilian elite, dramatically threw his sword to the ground and shouted "Independence or death!" Bloodshed occurred only in Bahia, where Portuguese troops resisted, but they were driven off by a small fleet lead by British admiral Lord Cochrane. On December 1, 1822, Pedro was crowned emperor of Brazil.
Publication information: Book title: The History of Brazil. Contributors: Robert M. Levine - Author. Publisher: Greenwood Press. Place of publication: Westport, CT. Publication year: 1999. Page number: 55.


The rescue animals include sloths, monkeys, pumas, jaguars, toucans and more. Diamante is home to dozens of species of frogs, snakes, birds and a world-class butterfly observatory.
Diamante Eco Adventure Park: Zip line through the sky and enjoy spectacular views. Ride the largest, ocean view Zip Line in Central America. Enjoy aerial adventures to include Superman, the Tarzan Swing and Quick Jump.
WHAT TO BRING: Hiking shoes or sneakers, camera, bug spray, sunscreen, hat, sunglasses, and money.
Transportation from Zone 2: Four Seasons, Hyatt Andaz, Westin Conchal, Flamingo or Tamarindo.
This tour can also be upgraded with horseback riding, ATVs and jet skis (Add an additional price).


Whether you are looking for Service Industry internships locally in Philippines or all over Philippines we have got you covered. All available internships across Philippines are aggregated right here so you only need to do one search to get that dream Service Industry internship. If the Philippines page doesn't have the Service Industry opportunities you wanted then why not check out the Internships in Philippines Homepage for a complete list.


Out of this world, a beautiful Lampwork glass bead in a deep, almost black, Amethyst base with swirls of lavender and green is the eye catcher in this pendant design. Complimented with Swarovski Crystals, Bali and Sterling Silver this pendant will hang approximately 2 ½" from your favorite cord or chain.
I also have a matching Bracelet (BR-0169), Earrings (ER-0423)and Necklace (NK-0191)available in my shoppe and shown in the inset photo.


text:
Book by Joe Masteroff
Music by John Kander
Lyrics by Fred Ebb
Directed by Nicholas Christo
Choreographed by Kelley Abbey
Presented by David H.Hawkins
Hayes Theatre, Sydney until 5th March 2017.
Athenaeum Theatre Melbourne from 1st May 2017
Performance on 19th January reviewed by Bill Stephens OAM
The cast of the David Hawkins production of "Cabaret"
Continuing in the long line of inventive small scale reworking's of classic musicals at The Hayes Theatre, David Hawkins's new production of the Kander and Ebb musical "Cabaret" is nothing short of brilliant. For those who only know the show from the Liza Minnelli film, this production will be quite a revelation … and all the better for that.
This production subtly refocuses the spotlight on the journey of the Cliff Bradshaw character, rather than Sally Bowles, revealing a whole new set of possibilities, of which director, Nicholas Christo and choreographer, Kelley Abbey, take full advantage. It also returns the show closer to the original Christopher Isherwood stories which inspired it.
An explosive combination of impeccable casting, imaginative staging, red hot choreography and a sizzling band, has produced a fire-cracker production which had the audience at this performance screaming for more.
Paul Capsis as The Emcee
Heading the all-star ensemble cast, Paul Capsis, as The Emcee, is completely mesmerising, offering one of his most unforgettable creations. Preposterous makeup, oozing decadence from every pore, and all the charm of a snake, he completely owns the stage, defying the audience to tear its eyes away from him as he struts and flirts outrageously.
With her flaming red hair, creamy white skin and long show-girl legs, Chelsea Gibb not only looks stunning, but is remarkably affecting, as the lovable, silly, doomed cabaret singer, Sally Bowles. The realisation of what she has lost, and the inevitable fate that awaits her, is strikingly portrayed in her sensational interpretation of the title song, which provides a brilliant high-point in the show.
The first person, and the last, you see in the show, is Cliff Bradshaw, arriving and departing Berlin. Bradshaw is charmingly portrayed with an air of bemused detachment, and a fine singing voice, by handsome Jason Kos. At first, curious but uncommitted, he willingly submits to the temptations proffered, but finally flees the city, without Sally, when he can no longer cope with the results of his profligacy.
Cliff and Sally join The Emcee in the Kit Kat Klub for clever new staging of "Two Ladies", "The Money Song" and "Sitting Pretty", moving more of the focus on to them without detracting from the Emcee.
Chelsea Gibb as Sally Bowles
Stylish performances from Debra Krizak as Fraulein Kost, Marcus Graham as the manipulative Ernst Ludwig, Kate Fitzpatrick , heartbreakingly defiant as Fraulein Schneider, wringing every ounce of pathos and almost stopping the show with her performance of "What Would You Do? ", and John O'May, touchingly bewildered as Herr Schultz, add considerable gloss and star power to an already classy production.
The rest of the cast is made up of triple threats, Michelle Barr, Michelle Smitheram, Nick Jones and newcomer, Matthew Manahan, who makes an eye-catching entrance playing a young German, Rudy. Everybody doubles in small roles, giving the impression that the cast is much larger than it actually is, an impression enhanced by the full-throated vocals, lightning fast costume changes, and dazzling dancing.
Lindsay Partridge leads the terrific band tucked in behind James Browne's witty costumes, and atmospheric setting which includes members of the audience seated at tables, and which transforms seamlessly from decadent cabaret room to run-down boarding house at the blink of an eye. Members of the cast efficiently take care of necessary props as they enter and leave the stage. No hiding mischievous Andrew Worboys however, popping onstage with his accordion, just to prove that even the orchestra is beautiful.
This production is destined to become the hot ticket wherever it's playing. Don't miss out; get yourself a ticket while there are still some available.
This review also appears in AUSTRALIAN ARTS REVIEW www.artsreview.com.au
Still Life (Sydney Festival)
Still Life by Dimitris Papaioannou (Greece – Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens) at Carriageworks Bay 17, January 27-29, 2017.
Visual Concept, Direction, Costume and Lighting Design – Dimitris Papaioannou
Sculpture Design and Set Painting – Nectarios Dionysatos; Sound Composition – Giwrgos Poulios
Performers: Kalliopi Simou; Pavlina Andriopoulou; Prokopis Agathokleous; Drossos Skotis; Michalis Theophanous; Costas Chrysafidis; Dimitris Papaioannou.
Still Life: figure of Sisyphus
Going to the theatre, at least at Carriageworks, can be an emotional risk. As I sat down in the 30+ degrees of the huge ex-railway workshop to think about Still Life, my mood was not helped when I overheard a terribly enthusiastic conversation involving a woman toting a laptop and headset, who may have been (or not) a party to this production – like Stage Manager, perhaps. She wore a large transparent plastic earring inscribed with the words (at least on the side I could see) in pretty cursive script: Fuck off.
Is this Life, still? What sort of Life is this, anyway?
So, shocked out of my almost anger at what seemed another imported pretentious European bit of 'high art', about which I didn't dare interview this woman, I began to think a bit more rationally about this very Still Life, with it's long, highly-interminably long, sequences. Should I describe a bit, then analyse; or just let my feelings go?
It was like watching an early silent movie in slow motion. You remain watching as an outsider because there's little to see which engages you, especially at this speed – just an occasional visual joke for a bit of a giggle. So you keep watching, just in case. But the several scenes have no reason to be connected together, at least as far as I could work out.
Well, after the end, on the long weekend train ride from Redfern to North Ryde, I imagined some possible meanings….but here's what happened.
We weren't allowed in until starting time, so didn't realise that the man seated on the stage in a low spotlight, watching us, was performing. I thought maybe he would remind us to switch off our mobiles. Then, just as we were all settled (the large Bay 17 was about two thirds full), someone marched across the stage and performed an old circus clown's trick. He snatched the chair from under the seated man – who, of course, remained seated exactly as before, but without the chair. This event had no connection to anything else that happened for the next hour and a half.
I had read the program, which seemed to say that the work was based on the Sisyphus myth – about the man condemned to pushing shit uphill forever. So I thought I knew what the next scene was about, as a man dragged what turned out to be a wall, coated with bits of plaster which kept falling off, all the way from upstage centre to downstage centre. He rested, holding up the leaning wall against his back – until it fell onto him and he began to bodily break through, by which time we realised that there was another man (or two) behind the wall.
Still Life: the women breaking through the plaster wall
Bits of the other man came through to the front, intertwined with bits of our original man, until it was hard to know which bit was which. This sequence developed when a woman came through from behind, as bits of her undressed bits of the front man and re-dressed his in women's gear. This inter-twining looked as though it might go somewhere story-wise, especially when the two women broke through, but was so deliberately slowly done that it stopped being funny – but never became anything else.
I did start to think about women breaking through the glass ceiling, even though this was a plaster wall, but in the end the last man (or it may have been a woman) standing dragged the wall away, and that was that.
Still Life: Woman in the Wind
The next scene was a woman behind a transparent flexible pane, downstage centre. (Aha, I began to think – a glass wall, if not a ceiling). But no. Men came down, stood behind her and shook the flexible pane to make her long flowing dress shake about as if in a wind. Each man moved her a little way upstage, and after a very long time when she reach fully upstage, she picked up the pane as the spotlight went off, and she went off. And that was that.
After this were several more scenes: a man carrying and dropping rocks (which really did seem heavy, or was it just a sound track that made them loud when they hit the floor?). Aha, I thought, here's good old Sisyphus. But he just came and went, leaving bits of rock all over the place. And that was that.
Up to now all the men had been dressed in suits, but next was a workman with a long-handled spade – which got used in other scenes from here on. This man shovelled his own feet in a deft manoeuvre to keep walking towards downstage, and behind him was a woman carrying rocks (a bit smaller than in the previous scene), which she dropped one by one until suddenly dropping them all at once, so he had to shovel them aside. Apparently he was very sexy, so she dropped his daks and underpants so we saw his bare backside. He leaned forward (facing upstage) while she climbed up (in bare feet) and balanced (she actually fell off first time – in the act, or not?) and so he carried her on his bare bum, oh so slowly, back upstage until they disappeared. And that was that.
That looked like the end of anything obviously to do with Sisyphus. For the next very long time people (back in suits, I think) found the ends of very long strips of gaff tape stuck to the wooden stage floor, which made fingers-down-the-blackboard type noises with deeper echoes because the floor was made of hollow rostra boxes, as they spent a very long time ripping all these strips from straight and circular lines, knocking away bits of plaster and rocks as they went. When that was finished, then that was that.
Then a man in a suit, with some help from another one, managed to balance on things like rather large bricks. He was good, but when that was done, that was that.
Still Life: Sunrise with Shovel
But then the shovel got used to push up as far as it could reach into the lower surface of the translucent huge balloon-like structure which had been hanging all the time from the stage roof, with dry ice mist making it look like a cloud. When the bottom was pushed up, and a large circular Fresnel lamp lit up from upstage pointing just about horizontally at me in Row N, the whole filmy material floated, giving an impression very much like a sunset over water with a more orange light, and while the shovel man (in a suit, not a workman) and another sat down to watch on the stage (with their backs to us), the light changed and became a sunrise.
Visually, the effect was wonderful, but when it finished, that was that. Until out of upstage gloom came a fully set-for-a-sumptuous-lunch table, moving very slowly downstage especially because the bottom of each leg was placed on the top of a man's head – no hands (except that some changed, like soccer players coming on from the bench, and hands were used to make the transition).
This table was carried off the stage onto the auditorium floor, at which point chairs appeared and all the cast sat down to eat. The audience was not invited – in fact we were completely ignored. So a number of people decided this was the end and started leaving the theatre. There was a little more action, but nothing significant, and so the audience decided it was time to clap. So the performers got up and left via the stage wings, lights went down, we clapped more and the cast came out for a conventional 'curtain'.
And that was that.
In my later wondering, I went back to the program. It quotes Albert Camus referring to the Sisyphus myth, saying "The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."
Then I thought, remembering the broken paving in the streets of a very poor-looking Athens when I was last there, perhaps all those broken rocks and plaster walls are meant to represent the Greek economy. But then is the sumptuous lunch supposed to mean, like Camus' Sisyphus, just be happy. Or was the lunch entirely cynical, saying it's OK for those who can afford lunch, and don't pay their income tax, but be damned to the rest of the Sysiphuses, men and women, struggling forever with their rocks, walls and gaff tape.
The program also refers to Dimitris Papaioannou as "Rooted firmly in the fine arts" and becoming "more widely known as the creator of the Athens 2004 Olympic Ceremonies". So that's that, then. I wonder.
STORYTIME BALLET - THE NUTCRACKER
Music by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Choreography by Marius Petipa
Production and additional choreography by David McAllister
Canberra Theatre Centre January 21st – 24th 2017
Performance on 22nd January reviewed by Bill Stephens
Continuing its delightful series of fairy-tale ballets for children, which began last year with "The Sleeping Beauty", The Australian Ballet has this year produced an even more appropriate ballet, "The Nutcracker". Designed to introduce children as young as three to the world of classical ballet, both ballets have been artfully scaled down to a running time of around 50 minutes, and presented with a narration which explains the story as the ballet progresses. Many grandmas and grandads also found this narration surprisingly informative. Included is just enough judicious audience participation to keep the young target audience thoroughly engaged, without interrupting the integrity of the ballet.
Edward Smith (Prince) Chantelle van der Hoek (Clara)
The experience commences right at the doors of the theatre, as dozens of excited young princes, princesses and ballerina's arrive, and kit up with magic wands and jewelled tiaras from the merchandise shop. Some even manage to contain their excitement long enough to ooh and ah over the display of historical costumes worn by famous dancers in past Australian Ballet productions.
For the Storytime Ballet production of "The Sleeping Beauty" the company used existing costumes and set-pieces from previous productions, but for "The Nutcracker", brand new costumes, and an impressive setting, were designed by Krystal Giddings, who has used this production to try out some ideas she has for a full scale version of this work in 2018.
Down with the lights, and out with the wands, as the young audience is transported to a Christmas party at which Dr. Drosselmeyer (Sean McGrath) is entertaining some rather naughty kids, with some clever magic tricks.
Drosselmeyer addresses the audience directly, to thank them for being at the party and invites them to help him make magic by waving their wands when he says the magic word. He also explains the purpose of the Nutcracker doll which he presents to Clara (sweetly danced by Chantelle van der Hoek) who gets upset when one of the boys snatches the doll from her and breaks it. Not to worry, Drosselmeyer puts a bandage on the nutcracker doll, waves the magic wand, and it's fixed.
Chantelle van der Hoek (Clara) Sean McGrath (Drosselmeyer) Jack Gibbs (party guest)
When the party is over and all the guests leave, Clara falls asleep, then the nutcracker doll transforms into a handsome prince who invites Clara and Drosselmeyer to travel with him to a magical world where they are entertained by dancing sweets, and saved from some villainous rates by the prince and his toy soldiers.
What is so impressive about this production is how beautifully it is danced. David McAllister has retained the Petipa choreography, but adapted it where necessary, omitting some of the longer, slower dances including the Pas de Deux, Waltz of the Flowers and Arabian Dance, in favour of the more energetic numbers, to compress the ballet into one act.
An important aspect of the Storytime Ballet is the opportunity it offers for performance experience for the Australian Ballet's young emerging dancers, so all the dancers work as an ensemble taking on different roles at different performances.
Kelsey Stokes,(Columbine) Lucien Xu (Harlequin)
At this performance, Chantelle van der Hoek was quite enchanting as Clara. Lucien Xu was a dashing Nutcracker Prince. Saranja Crowe stood out with her eye-catching performance as the Spanish Dancer. Kelsey Stokes, costumed unusually in a lovely plum-coloured tutu, was every little girl's fantasy, in a faultlessly executed performance of the Sugar Plum Fairy's solo. The three Mirlitons in their striped stockings looked spectacular, as did the Harlequin and Columbine.
With every member of the cast dancing with accuracy and confidence and so totally engaged in their roles, the disappointment among the young capacity audience of budding young ballet dancers, at the realisation that this performance was about to end, when the Prince lifted Clara high above his head in the final ensemble number, was palpable.
Judging from the excited babble and energetic pirouettes in the foyer after the performance it was obvious that this performance had certainly whetted the appetite of its target audience, and wild horses won't keep them away when the next production of Storytime Ballet comes to town.
Audience member and possible future ballerina after the performance
Photos by Jeff Busby
Paradise Lost.
Adapted and performed by Christopher Samuel Carroll. Bare Witness Theatre Company. Belconnen Arts Centre. January 26-28 2017.
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
Christopher Samuel Carroll in Paradise Lost. Photo by Richard Lennon
Christopher Samuel Carroll is the master of the solo performance. His recent performance at Smith's Bookshop introduced audiences to Victorian cartographer, adventurer and raconteur Benedict Cooper Sullivan. For his latest venture into the challenging and often confronting realm of solo theatrical performance, Carroll mounts the gargantuan task of adapting John Milton's epic seventeenth century masterpiece, Paradise Lost. Written in twelve books of blank verse, Milton's monumental poem traces the story of Lucifer's fall from grace into Chaos, his summoning of the legions of fallen angels to wage war upon God, and his eventual vengeful seduction of Eve culminating in the eviction of Adam and Eve from their lost Paradise in the Garden of Eden.
In a performance lasting a mere hour, Carroll's remarkable talent shines through. Alone on the stage, dressed only in a loin cloth to mask his genitals and with shaven head, Carroll assumes the essence of Butoh to strip bare all vestige of the civilized being and render homage to the rolling language of Milton's mesmerizing verse. As he recounts the events of Satan's quest for initial redemption and ultimate revenge, lithe sinews contort, twist and turn, conjuring characters and transforming the verse into the skilful utterance of the poem's biblical characters. The art of Butoh, born of Japan's struggle for identity, following the occupation of Macarthur in the wake of the nation's terrible defeat, reveals the struggle to overcome oppression. Daubed in a chalk-white body wash, the sinewy limbs soar like threatening gargoyles of the air or slither serpentine . Limbs twist into the luring temptation of Satan's silvery tongue or sensually descend with lustful guile. The dance of Butoh inhabits the domain of Satan's evil intent in a performance that is as beguiling and mesmerizing as the epic grandeur of Milton's swelling tale of Paradise Lost.
Only a couple of metres away from Carroll in the intimate performance space of the Belconnen Arts Centre, I am lured into the sonorous sound and shifting rhythms of Milton's ambitious verse. It rolls over me in waves of sound breathing forth from Satan's malevolent heart, sometimes, sweet and innocent, often devious and sinister , laden with corrupt intent, disguised with tempting allure and then ascending to monstrous threat. Carroll has me in his thrall, the masterful performer, weaving his adaptation with variation and changing emotion. Butoh, the Dance of Darkness and Transformation fuses with Milton's glorious design to "justify the ways of God to Man" and both display the moral virtue of all time to battle the evil that possesses all mankind.
Christopher Samual Carroll as Satan in Paradise Lost. Photo by Richard Lennon
Carroll's training in mime, movement and mask at Ecole Jaques Lecoq in Paris and his work with a Butoh company is evident in a performance that transcends the conventional or mundane. It is the powerful artistry of the professional that revives the marvel of Milton's epic work. Naturally, it cannot hope to encompass all twelve books of Paradise Lost. What it does is lend voice to the blind poet across the centuries and introduce audiences once more to one of the greatest works every written in the English language. Combining Milton's eloquence, theme and rolling verse with the stark and vulnerable muscularity of Butoh merges time and universality, leaving an audience not with the detail of a story that passes in a wave of sound and movement, but a sense of humanity's vulnerability and evel's powerful influence that reaches towards faith for confirmation of all that is good and everything that is evil. One leaves Carroll's adaptation with an affirmation of goodness, a moral as true as Time itself.
The shifting episodes of this epic tale and the transformation of character and emotion are highlighted by Gillian Schwab's superb lighting changes, at times bathing Satan in a celestial light or casting Carroll into the bleak and dangerous shadows of desire and dire intent. I was expecting, after the gentle introductory music that led us into the theatre in the footsteps of an usher, in Japanese gard and moving with Noh-like slowness more use of music to accompany the different events of Carroll's daptation. Only his voice and movement told the tale of Satan's version of events. The lack of musical accompaniment did not detract from an absorbing and original interpretation, but it may have heightened engagement with the power of the changing episodes.
That aside, Carroll's performance is a tour de force display of the actor's craft, physically absorbing, vocally engaging, emotionally exciting and creatively innovative. As Belconnen Arts centre's inaugural artist-in-residence for 2017, Carroll bring s to the theatrical tapestry of our city a rare opportunity to see a masterful performer present a monumental work of English Literature in a style that compels attention.
Carroll will be taking Paradise Lost to the Perth Fringe World Festival and the Adelaide Fringe Festival. I strongly urge a return Canberra Season so that all passionate theatre lovers and practitioners can witness this extraordinary and original performance.
Ich Nibber Dibber (Sydney Festival)
Ich Nibber Dibber by post. Campbelltown Arts Centre, January 20, 21, 27, 28, 2017.
Post, Lead Artists – Mish Grigor, Zoë Coombs Marr and Natalie Rose
Designers: Lighting and Production Manager – Fausto Brusamolino; Set and Costume – Michael Hankin; Sound – James Brown
Dramaturg – Anne-Louise Sarks
Ich Nibber Dibber is a new genre which I term 'sit-up comedy', rather than old-hat standup. Whether or not you could or should wash a hat, or throw it out when it gets too dirty and just get a new one, was quite an important issue. As important as, if God is dead, as Nietzche said he was, now that Nietzche is also dead, how might he be feeling when he gets to heaven and finds that God isn't dead after all?
The three women of the theatre company post spent their hour and ten, each perched up on a 2 metre post, draped in loose white material somewhere between a bedsheet and a wedding dress, and talked – regurgitating ten years' worth of off-task banter from selfie videos actually recorded between their on-task writing sessions creating shows such as Oedipus Schmoedipus (reviewed on this blog January 25, 2014 and about to go on tour in South America!) and many others.
I could also call it 'reality theatre', except that no-one got voted off. This was because they laughed at each other as much as we laughed at (or rather, with) them, both during the performance and, for those of us who stayed, during the following Q&A session.
Their ten year odyssey began when Mish and Zoë were 18 and 19 and Nat was 43. Burst of laughter. 23! says Natalie. Fascinating how their manner of speaking, what my drama teacher called 'acting acting' – to prove that you know what you are doing – was just right for that young age, but gradually changed, to the almost subliminal background accompaniment of pop music to match the history, to the point where maturity raised the question of being over the hill (at 40! says Natalie, not 30!), looking down the barrel of middle-age and menopause.
What made me sit up, thinking back to my 1950s upbringing when women's body parts were strictly never to be mentioned (still like Queen Victoria's ankles in the nether regions), was the excruciating details provided of women's internal bodily functions. I know this is all cool, nowadays, because all the women around me (who constituted about 90% of the audience) were metaphorically tweeting LOVL – laughing out very loud!
The most excruciating image of giving birth, from Natalie – whose efforts were being videoed (you never know, we might be able to use this in a show), except that the computer had 1950s qualms (probably overheating) and switched itself off for the climactic moment – was when she described herself in the "push" phase as feeling like a Bodum coffee plunger (except that all the mucky stuff came out the bottom). Bottoms and what come out of them also got a good run with repeats throughout the rapid fire talk.
One experience I missed back in 1972 was to read Ways of Seeing by John Berger. The women's talk included Mish looking up on her phone and quoting what he wrote about how women are always conscious of how they appear to others, to men and to other women, so they are always "seeing themselves" as if they are an art object. This took the show out of continually divergent apparently silly but very funny talk for just a minute or so, but to me seemed to be the serious theme behind these women's work.
Discussion in the Q&A gave them the opportunity to talk about how, as young actors still in youth theatre orbit, they had had to learn that they had no choice about being seen by their audience as female, and how, in accepting that fact, they could present women on stage in new ways. Oedipus Schmoedipus was a great example, where blood all over them took on new meanings, especially for men in the audience, as well as confirming for women what they already knew.
This led as well to talk about the business of being actors and designing a performance of themselves changing over the ten years. Although their actual talk as originally recorded seemed discontinuous, they found themselves editing out (though keeping the true timeline) and so realised that there is a story – a through line – about their developing maturity, in contrast to their other shows where absurdist discontinuity was the experimental theatre mode.
So once again the Sydney Festival has produced a winner, and a very interesting comparison about the perception of women to put alongside the very successful humorous and emotionally affecting transgender presentation from Canada: Tomboys Survival Guide (reviewed here January 26, 2017).
Maybe I can retitle these women's teenage-nonsense-German Ich Nibber Dibber as the Upfront Modern Women's Comedy Better Than Survival Guide.
Tomboy Survival Guide (Sydney Festival)
Tomboy Survival Guide by Ivan Coyote and Band (Canada) at Magic Mirrors Spiegeltent, Meriton Festival Village, Hyde Park North, January 25-29, 2017.
Storyteller and Writer – Ivan Coyote; Bass Guitar – Pebbles Willekes; Drums – Sally Zori; Trumpet – Alison Gorman
Claire Cain Miller in the New York Times (June 8, 2015) has written: "The recent debate over public restroom access for transgender people has prompted some questions on just how big an issue this is — how many people are affected by such rules? The size of the transgender population is tricky to estimate….There are no national data, but two studies have tried to quantify or describe the transgender population in the United States."
The results suggest that somewhere between 0.3% and 0.5% of the total population is transgender.
Ivan Coyote's Tomboy Survival Guide is designed for these people and their parents, focussing on "misfits and boy-girls and butches and lady mechanics. It's a show for nelly boys and drama queens and anyone who ever put the camp in camping."
In fact, I found his storytelling, set to a range of music from about the days of Cat Stevens' Tea for Tillerman to today, and his direct talking to us, left me much more seriously affected than this comic description. His sense of humour was a bright shield for what for so many is a tragedy underneath.
But, as he concluded, "our freedom depends on society changing, not us changing."
This is because people may be born with physical sexual features along a spectrum. Being between male/female may mean behaviours and feelings are different from assumed conventional norms. What do you, as a parent, do when your very young daughter really does behave like a boy?
The story to demonstrate this was when Ivan's favourite uncle visited when Ivan was four. This happened in northern Canada, while the uncle was visiting from New Zealand, and explains why this uncle became Ivan's favourite.
When Uncle knocked on the door, it was opened by Ivan (at that time having a girl's name which was not revealed), standing with one hand behind her back. Uncle shook her hand and introduced himself to "my niece", who responded: "Do you want to see a dead gopher?"
Quick on the uptake uncle replied, "Only the last few days I've been thinking about seeing a dead gopher." At which point, Ivan produced his other hand, holding up a very flat, bloodied, road-killed small possum-sized gopher for inspection.
He said to us it took until he was 44 years old to become fully comfortable as transgender, even though his mother always fully supported him through difficult situations when he was a child. One reason it took so long is simply that only quite recently have people begun to accept the fact of transgender, distinct from male or female. In fact the Michigan Coalition to End Domestic and Sexual Violence (www.mcedsv.org) gives this list: "lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender, queer, heterosexual, or questioning. Trans: This term is used as an umbrella term and can include anyone who identifies as transgender, transgenderist, or transsexual. Transgender: This term has many definitions."
The evidence that all four in the group are both trans and comfortable (at least as much as any of us might be) was the quality of the writing, humour, music and especially their singing a "hymn" to conclude the show which just about brought the Spiegeltent down. This show is not complaint but a celebration with pride. The cheers and standing ovation in return showed our pride in their work as performers as well as for their personal human qualities.
For me, the most important message was to standard men. Don't deny feminity in oneself; don't get locked into 'being a man' with all its implied aggression and violence; treat women genuinely as equals. And when your daughter wants to show you a dead gopher, accept the offer and, as Ivan's mother finally did, let 'her' dress in corduroys instead of skirts. And always support your children in what they know to be their true feelings.
And provide toilets so that any sex may safely use them. Which was the case at the Sydney Festival, at least right next door to the Spiegeltent, where each toilet was a separate, private cubicle. With a washroom open to all. Well done, Sydney Festival.
It's not easy, but it's the change society must make. Then the tomboys can do more than just survive. They can thrive as Tomboy Survival Guide shows they can.
Huff (Sydney Festival)
Huff by Cliff Cardinal. Native Earth Performing Arts (Canada), at Seymour Centre, Reginald Theatre, January 24-28, 2017.
Playwright/Performer – Cliff Cardinal
Director/Dramaturg – Karin Randoja
Designers: Set and Costume – Jackie Chau; Lighting – Michelle Ramsay; Sound – Alex Williams
Huff begins and ends with the actor's head entirely encased in a transparent plastic bag: the very frightening possibility that all parents fear for their young child. His hands are tied behind his back. Within three minutes, he must persuade a member of the audience to rip the bag off and promise never to give it back, no matter what he says.
Is this theatre, where we come for entertainment, seated in comfort? Or is this a threat in reality?
Fortunately the second audience member he selects satisfies him that she will not give the plastic bag back. 70 minutes later she is true to her promise – but he has more plastic bags in his pocket. He gaff tapes a new one on, but at least this time his hands are free and at the last minute he rips the bag off, gasping.
But we know he might yet try again.
To have two couples at different times walk down the centre aisle in this very small theatre, almost to within touching distance of the solo performer, then turn and demonstrably make their exit, is some kind of measure of what you might expect from Huff.
Except that these people did not have the patience – even I felt I needed – to reach the point of understanding where this play would take me. I came to Huff after having just seen Which Way Home (reviewed here January 22, 2017), by an Australian Indigenous writer and performer with such a different feeling and style. Is it so different for this North American/Canadian Indigenous writer/performer?
Yet the social issues in both their families, and even their cultural traditions were not dissimilar.
'Tash' in Katie Beckett's play grows up without a mother, with her single-parent father trying to cope with properly bringing up two sons and his daughter who needs his protection and guidance in the modern city world far away from his traditional country and spiritual guides: especially among the birds.
Soon after the second couple had left the audience in Cliff Cardinal's play, we get the picture together of this teenage boy brought up on a Reservation, going to a Reservation school staffed by 'whites', brought up by a father – a traditional 'warrior' unable to cope with the inevitable frustrations of modern life – worse than faced by Tash's Dad, who at least found work to support his family.
The boy's mother had become an alcoholic to avoid her husband's violence, and finally hanged herself in the forest. His elder brother has just done the same. He himself, now that his father has used his mother's sister as a replacement and his guiding grandmother is no longer capable of keeping things together, is now fixated on suicide.
In this boy's spirit world, will Trickster destroy him too, or can the calming 'huff' of Wind – the breath out, the exhalation of peace – keep him going?
How different is this story from those we often hear from many Aboriginal communities in this country, while we argue about celebrating Australia Day on the date when Captain Phillip stuck a flag in Eora country and declared ownership by the British Crown?
Why did those people walk out, I wonder? I think perhaps because the structure of the play for the first half hour or more is 'bitty' in the extreme. Cliff Cardinal plays all the characters, including Wind and Trickster, his mother, his aunt, his grandmother, his father, the uncomprehending school teacher, his brother and other 'friends', and a radio presenter from Shit Creek Radio reading the news – of the burning down of a motel, the setting alight of the forest, and the authority's searching for the criminals. But the news reader doesn't know of the children's plan to burn down the school – only not yet carried out because of the elder brother's death.
It took me a while into the final stages of the performance to understand that this teenage style, over-the-top bravado skit format, was correct for the character of the young boy. I had to go back to remember teaching Year 7.
That's what makes this play so terrifying, to be made to understand why it is that so many young Indigenous children take their own lives. And worse, because those people who walked out early missed the point – the reason for going to the theatre in the first place. For me their leaving, and the manner of their leaving, was a question of respect – for the writer, the performer and the people Cliff Cardinal represents in this work.
KING ROGER
By Karol Szymanowski
Directed by Kasper Holten,
Revival director Amy Lane
Conducted by Andrea Molino
Opera Australia, Sydney Opera House until 15th February 2017
This extraordinary staging by Opera Australia in the Sydney Opera House is the first time Szymanowski's "King Roger" has been performed in Australia. A co-production with the Royal Opera House and Dallas Opera, this production was first presented in Covent Garden, and these performances in the Opera House are the culmination of Opera Australia's Artistic Director, Lyndon Terracini's long held ambition to introduce this opera to Australian audiences.
Steffen Aarfing's act 1 setting for "King Roger"
Premiered in Warsaw in 1926, "King Roger" turns out to be a musico-psychological examination of the composers own struggles with issues of his sexuality at a time when homosexuality was hidden. These struggles are represented through a situation involving a fictional King Roger 11 of Sicily (Michael Honeyman), troubled by a demand from his subjects that he punish a young shepherd (Saimir Pirgu) accused of blasphemy for preaching freedom, pleasure and love.
King Roger's wife, Roxana (Lorina Gore), is drawn to the teachings of the shepherd, and persuades the king to arrange a private meeting to allow the shepherd to explain himself. At this meeting the king finds himself attracted by the shepherd's seductive urgings
Michael Honeyman and Lorina Gore
King Roger and Roxanne
Szymanowki's music is melodic and inventive, demanding massive choral and orchestral resources. Probably the only conductor in the world to conduct this opera from memory, Andrea Molino deftly moulds the Sydney Children's Choir, the Opera Australia chorus and orchestra into an intoxicating kaleidoscope of luscious sound to compliment director, Kasper Holten, and designer Steffen Aarfing's compelling visual concept.
The cast of Opera Australia's production of "King Roger"
Steffen Aarfing's Act 11 setting
Though sometimes presenting a wall of sound, the music is surprisingly transparent, and Molino takes great care to ensure that the musical detail is apparent to the listener.
The opera commences quietly, gentle choral music suggesting a cathedral. But slowly a huge sculptured head of the king is carved out by lights and dominates the stage for the first act. As the opera continues, the head revolves to be inhabited by the king and a troupe of muscular young men who writhe and disport themselves erotically in a strikingly vivid portrayal of the king's mental state.
The final act takes place around a bonfire of burning books, culminating with the king arriving at his decision and being transformed by the golden morning sun.
Although much of the opera is static, and the libretto fairly incomprehensible, the intent of the opera always remains clear. The direction is careful to ensure that the attention of the audience is always focussed on the protagonists, never allowing the spectacle to distract from the emotions being portrayed by the impeccably chosen cast.
Displaying impressive stage presence in the role of King Roger, Michael Honeyman employs his superb dramatic baritone voice to great effect, convincingly portraying his character's mental anguish without resorting to melodrama. As his queen, Roxana, Lorina Gore delights with her lustrous silvery tone and glamourous stage presence. Her confident interpretation of the demanding score confirming her as one of Opera Australia's most accomplished and exciting singers.
Saimir Pirgu as The Shepherd
As the third member of the triangle, Saimir Pirgu, in his first appearances with Opera Australian, having sung this role previously in London, was perfect casting in the role of The Shepherd. His confident demeanour, delightfully bright, flexible tone and suave good looks made it easy to believe in his power to bewitch both king and queen and their subjects.
Completing an outstanding cast, Gennadi Dubinsky and Dominica Matthews, as the Archbishop and the Deaconess, and James Egglestone as the king's advisor, Edrisi, each contributed thrilling singing and intelligently considered performances in an outstanding production destined to become a treasured experience for anyone lucky enough to experience it.
Michael Honeyman and the Opera Australia chorus and dancers
Act 111 of King David
Photos by Keith Saunders
This review also appears in "Australian Arts Review" www.artsreview.com.au
The Legend of Ben Hall
A refusal to submit to authority has pride of place in movies from down under. Here we expect a film about a 19th century bushranger, who robbed the banks and the filthy rich, to be a spirited journey with a man of the people. A man like Ben Hall, whose reputation has for some reason faded over time against that of bushranger turned folk hero, Ned Kelly.
When at large, Australian bushrangers were feared for the brutal criminals they were, but some were charismatic rogues who people were prepared to hide when the police came knocking. And the authorities weren't clean skins either which helps explain why early last century when bushranger films appeared on screen, the audience cheered them on. So boisterously, the authorities banned them. Too popular.
Some of the bushranger—mostly blokes, though there is at least one woman on the record—weren't complete blaggards either. Hall, who was mown down by police in 1865, had some land he leased and a wife and child before he took to a life of crime. He has some cachet in having never shot a policeman dead, though the same cannot be said for other members of his gang, John Gilbert and John Dunn.
The newspapers of the day reported quite a crowd at Hall's funeral in Forbes, NSW. A revealing observation. Hall was on the wrong side of the law, but he was reputedly courteous, brazen, loyal and often a step ahead of the police. Moreover, he was handsome and a daredevil horseman. All in all, an appealing package. It explains why Hall became an object of interest for writer-director Matthew Holmes and the subject of his recent film, The Legend of Ben Hall.
Unfortunately, the fascination does not translate into the result the filmmakers clearly hoped for. The action-adventure locations look fabulous but, critically, Ben Hall's character is seriously underwritten. As for the case for Ben Hall as legend? We're not there yet.
As the central character, Jack Martin does his best to be well-meaning and dashing, but he doesn't have good dialogue to work with, and nor do most of the others. A hold-up of Cobb & Co coach, a key dramatic moment, is heavily over-played failing to ignite much tension. Nor do the scenes of the gang when they have their guard down inject the rollicking, irreverent humour we could all have done with. For a period film, the contemporary tone of the dialogue is jarring, and at odds with the effort that has been put into making costume and other period detail visually authentic.
The film achieves its vision to some degree with the action, in the stirring scenes of men on horseback, galloping through bushland and across high country. In this way, it becomes a valentine to the magnificent bush wilderness, like The Man from Snowy River, but falls short of showing us what Ben Hall means to us today. The film's visual grandeur and lush heroic score insist on the man as legend, but it's more a question of 'tell' than 'show'.
The Legend of Ben Hall arrived on screen late last year and had a limited release. If the filmmakers are planning companion bushranger films as reported, they would do well to go for it by building flesh and blood characters of complexity and contradiction, and leaving the myth-making alone. There's no reason to think the bushranger genre has played itself out yet.
Also published at Jane's blog
Labels: film
Which Way Home (Sydney Festival)
Prize Fighter (Sydney Festival)
The Encounter (Sydney Festival)
SHADOW HOUSE PARTY
6D World Tour of Australia
The Season (Sydney Festival)
THE LISTIES 6D
Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare (Sydney...
Anthropologies Imaginaires (Sydney Festival)
Peter Pan - Ickle Pickle

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How do I complete my postal vote pack?
I have spoilt my postal vote pack. Can I have a replacement?
I have marked my ballot paper incorrectly. What do I do?
I have lost all or part of my postal vote pack. Can I have a replacement?
I haven't received all or part of my postal vote pack. Can I have a replacement?
What ID do I need for a replacement postal vote pack?
To apply for a postal vote visit the Register to vote page.
There are instructions and diagrams included in your postal vote pack which tells you how to complete your postal vote.
You can apply for a replacement postal vote pack if you have spoilt either your ballot paper and/or postal voting statement.
Place the spoilt ballot paper and/or postal voting statement, along with the full contents of the postal voting pack (all ballot paper, postal voting statement, Envelope 'A' and Envelope 'B' - regardless of whether or not any of these have been spoilt) in a plain envelope.
Please note: you must not return the spoilt pack in Envelope 'B'. Please use a plain envelope.
A replacement postal voting pack cannot be re-issued until the spoilt ballot paper and entire contents of the postal voting pack are returned to the council.
Once received, a replacement postal voting pack will be issued by post (or by hand if you would like to pick it up from County Hall, Beverley - please contact the electoral services team in advance to arrange a collection time).
If the request for a replacement postal voting pack is made between 5pm, the day before polling day and by 5pm on polling day itself, the spoilt documents must be returned by hand to County Hall, Beverley as in these circumstances the replacement pack can only be issued by hand. Please contact the electoral services team in advance to arrange a time to return your spoiled pack, and collect your replacement. There will be a slight wait whilst your replacement pack is prepared.
If you have marked you ballot paper incorrectly, block out the incorrect marking and place a 'X' in the correct place (although a '√' will be accepted).
Visit your nearest customer service centre with one primary or two secondary proof of identity* and any part of the postal voting pack that has not been lost. Upon receipt of this information the postal vote team will issue a replacement pack by post direct to the voter.
Contact the electoral services team to arrange a time to come to County Hall with one primary or two secondary proof of identity* by contacting Electoral Services. A replacement pack will then be issued in person.
* By law, the Returning Officer must be satisfied as to the identity of the person making the request which is why you have to provide proof of identity.
I haven't received my postal vote pack. Can I have a replacement?
Visit your nearest customer service centre with one primary or two secondary proof of identity* and any part of the postal voting pack that has been received. Upon receipt of this information the postal vote team will issue a replacement pack by post direct to the voter.
What identification do I need for a replacement postal vote pack?
If you have lost part or all of your postal vote pack, or not received all or part of your postal vote pack, you will need to provide us with proof of identity before we can reissue you with a replacement postal vote pack.
You can either provide one primary or two secondary proofs of identity.
This must be an official document that includes a photograph of the voter (a sealed photograph), together with the voter's name.


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text:
Lecanographa är ett släkte av lavar. Lecanographa ingår i familjen Roccellaceae, ordningen Arthoniales, klassen Arthoniomycetes, divisionen sporsäcksvampar och riket svampar.

Källor

Bildgalleri

Sporsäcksvampar
Lecanographa

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Jerrod has enjoyed living in North San Diego County for the past 27 years. He studied at San Diego State University and holds a Bachelor's Degree in Economics. He joined San Diego Realty Co.® in 2007 to work aside from his Brokers' Jeffrey Hogue and Tyler Belong who are real estate attorneys. He has 11 years of residential and commercial real estate experience and has been recognized as one of the San Diego Magazine's Five Star Real Estate Agents for the past three years. An accolade issued to only the top 7% of all realtors in San Diego County.
Before joining San Diego Realty Co.®, Mr. Waller acquired residential loan experience with Wells Fargo and Union Fidelity Mortgage, during which time he ranked within the top 10% in loan volume from 2003-2007. Mr. Waller utilizes his real estate and loan experience in advising clients regarding all aspects of their real estate transactions. He combines time-tested marketing techniques with creative newer sales approaches to achieve quick sales at top-dollar for his clients.
He holds membership in the National Association of Realtors, San Diego Association of Realtors, Real Estate Brokers' Association of La Jolla, and the County of Riverside Multiple Listing Service. He is an active member of the Sonoma State University Lacrosse Alumni Association and of the Labrador and Friend's Rescue Group. Mr. Waller donates a portion of each sale to the Labrador and Friend's Rescue Group.


text:
Javier Hernanz Agüería (Arriondas, 1 de febrero de 1983) es un deportista español que compitió en piragüismo en las modalidades de aguas tranquilas y maratón.

Ganó una medalla de bronce en el Campeonato Mundial de Piragüismo de 2018 y cinco medallas en el Campeonato Europeo de Piragüismo entre los años 2004 y 2018.

En la modalidad de maratón, obtuvo una medalla de plata en el Campeonato Mundial de 2003, en la prueba de K2.

Participó en dos Juegos Olímpicos de Verano, en los años 2004 y 2016, obteniendo el quinto lugar en Río de Janeiro 2016, en la prueba de K4 1000 m.

Estudió Derecho en la Universidad Católica San Antonio (UCAM) de Murcia. En noviembre de 2021 fue elegido presidente de la Real Federación Española de Piragüismo.

Palmarés internacional

Piragüismo en aguas tranquilas

Piragüismo en maratón

Referencias

Enlaces externos

Lista de medallistas olímpicos y mundiales en piragüismo (1936-2007): parte 1, parte 2. Federación Internacional de Piragüismo .

Piragüistas de España
Piragüistas de España en los Juegos Olímpicos de Atenas 2004
Piragüistas de España en los Juegos Olímpicos de Río de Janeiro 2016
Deportistas de España en los Juegos Olímpicos de Atenas 2004
Deportistas de España en los Juegos Olímpicos de Río de Janeiro 2016
Deportistas de Asturias
Alumnado de la Universidad Católica San Antonio
Dirigentes deportivos de España
Parragueses


I've written before about comic book superheroes as ancient gods that still survive in our culture. They represent our most enduring grasp of right and wrong, the archetypes that come to us across the ages (see my post on Ur-memory of those ideas here), incredibly across thousands, perhaps even millions of years. Looking at Green Lantern on a lunchbox or backpack, that seems an absurd assertion. Perhaps we tolerate this pantheon of pagan deities in an era of mainstream Millennial religions precisely because the ancient gods have dwindled down to figures in comic mythologies that we tell children and youths; and these myths are not taken that seriously.
Yet the archetypes embedded here still have weight. They also constitute serious commercial interests. That raises the question of why these archetypes over the past twenty years, and especially in the last ten (when DC has been under Dan Didio's leadership), have been undermined? Why is DC Comics, the original classic superhero comics company, so preoccupied with the breakdown of heroes and heroism? Why are their heroes dying? Why are their characters being wiped from existence or rebooted in ways that taint them? What does it mean when their core values are stripped from them? Why are they being benched and sidelined? And why are the Outsiders, classic Titans, Justice Society, and Doom Patrol the key casualties in this reboot? I've commented on the JLA-centric generational and Bat-commercial aspects of the reboot which left the JSA, Doom Patrol and Titans out in the cold here; and my posts on what the Titans and Doom Patrol signify are here and here. There's a good series of posts this week on what fans are losing as the DCU dies, over at It's a Dan's World (here).
This is what Millennial comics should do: DP fighting a sentient black hole in front of the Large Hadron Collider. Doom Patrol vol. 5 #2 (November 2009).
We who are about to die salute you! That's the gladitorial rallying cry of DC's ill-fated superteam known as the Doom Patrol. On Valentine's Day, DC Comics announced the cancellation of several titles. Among these was the fifth incarnation of Doom Patrol, written by Keith Giffen and drawn by Matthew Clark. This cancellation to 'free up' creative talent for production of the summer comics blockbuster Flashpoint has prompted outcry from the DP's fans (there is a petition asking DC to save the title here). This series had poor sales but great reviews; it was considered by many to be the publisher's most sophisticated title. Today, the last issue of the series hits comic shops.
Why? What makes any comic, belonging to a genre known for its clichéed action and romance, its cheesy borrowings from the epics, mythology, pulps, mystery, horror, romance and science fiction even come close to having pretensions?
Comics are sometimes one of the areas of pop culture where certain ideas are tested before they become mainstream. This series of blog posts on the 'Revolving Door of Death' is about the use of death in comics as a means to finding new values of heroism - a new moral compass - in times that are rapidly changing. That change involves pushing the boundaries of superheroism past the point of no return. In that regard, the Doom Patrol fits right in - and the title is still unique.
First, the Revolving Door of Death. Comic book creators, especially mainstream publishers Marvel and DC, have earned a lot of criticism over the past twenty-five years for cheapening death and rebirth when they used them repeatedly as sensational devices for making money. More surprisingly, post 9/11, the editors at DC Comics have killed off hundreds of heroes. Then, in a bid to make comic book killings 'more serious,' they recently announced that their characters will no longer be reborn. But the deaths of superheroes continue. This trend suggests a high degree of confusion and ambivalence. DC has continually worn down the moral stature of its heroes. The company has made them ever more flawed and weak - while building up its villains. DC is letting evil win.
Why? Does this reflect a crisis in American culture? Last week, DC had Superman renounce his American citizenship in Action Comics #900, a move which won the editors a lot of criticism in comics forums and the mainstream media. Does this chime with the intense, politicized commentary against American campaigns abroad? Marvel Comics, echoing the 1960s' voice of social criticism, can jump on that train without any problems. But DC, the classic American comics company, is in a strange, ambiguous place right now. Like her exhausted troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, America's heroes in the DC Universe are being pushed to the breaking point. The question is where DC will go with this existential crisis and soul searching. Comic books thrive on taking their characters to the greatest extremes possible, within the current bounds of taste and story-telling. The catharsis comes when the heroes triumph against all odds. DC has yet to pull off that gigantic catharsis. Its creators are still in the midst of dragging its characters down deeper and deeper.
The Nascar accident which almost kills Cliff Steele. Doom Patrol vol. 5 #21 (June 2011).
In this context, the Doom Patrol is unusual, because they are already ahead of all of DC's other heroes as far as being pushed past the limits goes. They were always a team 'out there,' beyond the pale. DP stories demonstrate how changes and challenges to our concepts of life and death are transforming our society, our consciousness and our moral attitudes.
In the first part of the 20th century, the evolutionary scientists were expressing the idea that maybe cosmic radiation, which we've lived with on earth for our whole history, might have caused some changes to our DNA. Radiation can do that. At the same time, people were learning about evolution, which depends on random changes. I think that caught their imagination. That connection between radiation and evolution. I remember one of the earliest stories I read where they put this guy into a chamber and irradiated him, and he evolved before their eyes. Really he would have just died, but the idea remains.
Superman, Spider-Man, Captain Atom and Doctor Manhattan are all examples of Nietzsche's Übermensch; sometimes they have Messianic qualities; or they are scientists, caught in a nuclear accident; and sometimes they are Everyman figures who are suddenly raised above all others. Characters with similar origins include The Ray, Captain America, The Atom, X-Ray, the Nexus Fusionkasters and Apollo. All of them are anthropomorphized versions of qualities we attribute to the power of radiation, whether cosmic, solar, elemental or nuclear. Most of pulp fiction's characters respond to radiation by acquiring superpowers such as strength, energy manipulation and flight; but some endure a separation of body and soul by nuclear means. Some gain the ability to travel through time; and some achieve immortality. Below the jump are the most popular radiation-powered heroes in the order in which they historically appeared. In some cases, there are later versions of the same character.
Tozo (10 August 2008). © By David O'Connell.
I09 has just reviewed a great Web comic that has been running since 2007: Tozo - The Public Servant. The comic is an excellent example of Retro-Futurism.
In the 1980s, the Judas Contract took the Titans to the top of the industry. They were DC's flagship counterpart to Marvel's X-Men, but done steadfastly in DC's style, which heavily references eternal moral values. By the 1990s, DC had passed the Titans' high water mark. New editor Jonathan Peterson revived the Titans recipe by adding Marvel flavour to it. Peterson's run is a prime example of what top DC characters look like when they are all Marvelled up.


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Onobrychis sintenisii är en ärtväxtart som beskrevs av Joseph Friedrich Nicolaus Bornmüller. Onobrychis sintenisii ingår i släktet esparsetter, och familjen ärtväxter. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Externa länkar

Esparsetter
sintenisii


Born and Thread was founded on the 12th of December 2012, with a sole focus to set the new standard in t-shirt print quality and customer service, since then we have been honored to have been chosen by so many of our customers as their preferred garment supplier, printer and packaging experts.
We have said it before and we'll say it again, at Born and Thread we live and breathe t-shirts. We won't be beaten on print quality and our customer service is second to none. If you have an idea for printing apparel for your brand or business, get in touch with us today for an obligation free quote!
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Ultimately we want you, the customer, to be stoked with your printed garments and feel the same pride and passion wearing it as we did printing it for you.
Below you can see some of the customers we have had the pleasure of working with, producing t-shirts, caps, embroidered garments, business cards, stickers and even doing custom design work for them as well.
As you can see we are here to help and service a wide variety of companies, brands and artists to deliver them the best possible printed merchandise and customer service available.


Beautiful 2 Acres Wooded Building Site, Awesome views, all wooded, very private, property currently has no improvements on it and has not been perk tested. Phone/Electric available at the road but not ran into property. Great location, almost halfway between Coleman & Peshtigo, Coleman school district.


EMNIST dataset has multiple different subsets.
Get the specified number of MNIST examples (test or train set), with optional shuffling and binarization.
Get the label assignments for the given set as a character array.


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eCase Login
The Contagion Effect of Mass Shootings
George L. Vergolias
Ironic as it sounds in the United States, we've seen a burst of mass shootings and attacks in the past few months. Since June of this year we've seen 6 such attacks:
6/14/17 Alexandria, Virginia – firearm attack on a US Congressman and his aides at a baseball field; 1 killed, 5 injured
8/12/17 Charlottesville, Virginia – vehicle attack by a white nationalist directed at protesters; 1 killed, 19 injured
9/24/17 Antioch, Tennessee – firearm attack at a church service; 1 killed, 8 injured
10/1/17 Las Vegas, Nevada – firearm sniper-like attack from the 32nd floor of a hotel room, down on a group of country music concert-goers; 59 killed, 527 injured
10/31/17 New York City – vehicle attack on a crowded public bike path; 8 killed, 12 injured.
11/5/17 Sutherland Springs, Texas – firearm attack at a church service; 26 killed, 20 injured.
The media covers these events and their rapid succession with shock and surprise. Yet, those of us in the threat management and forensic community have long known anecdotally, and in the past 10 years increasingly through empirical research, that such a "contagion effect" is a reality.
The contagion effect refers to the increased likelihood of subsequent mass attacks by other, unrelated assailants in response to widespread media coverage of a prior mass shooting or attack. The effect is significant and time-limited in most instances. Towers and colleagues (2015), published in PlosOne Journal, used statistical predictive modeling to compare mass shootings in real-time to the probability of subsequent attacks, based off of three well-respected databases of such attacks covering hundreds of cases.
We find significant evidence that mass killings involving firearms are incented by similar events in the immediate past. On average, this temporary increase in probability lasts 13 days, and each incident incites at least 0.30 new incidents (p = 0.0015). We also find significant evidence of contagion in school shootings, for which an incident is contagious for an average of 13 days, and incites an average of at least 0.22 new incidents (p = 0.0001). On average, mass killings involving firearms occur approximately every two weeks in the US, while school shootings occur on average monthly. We find that state prevalence of firearm ownership is significantly associated with the state incidence of mass killings with firearms, school shootings, and mass shootings.
There's a lot in this statement, our focus here is on the "contagion" aspect. So why? Why does contagion occur, what is the rationale behind it? It's both simple and complex.
First the more complex. There are two primary biological modes of violence – affective vs. predatory. They each have different neurochemical processes and anatomical structures that operate in the brain, and they cannot occur simultaneously.
Mass shootings are almost always predatory (or targeted) violence, meaning it is well planned, controlled, focused, non-emotional and highly cognitive in nature. This mode of violence is rare statistically but devastating when it occurs. Think of a cat stalking a bird from 50 feet away, or an Army sniper.
Affective (or reactive) violence, by comparison, is a "fight or flight" response. It is most often a function of context and access at the time of anger or emotional arousal, often poorly controlled, largely unplanned, typically not focused but instead erratic and impulsive. This is by far the most common mode of violence, observed in most domestic violence situations, school/bar fights, sports-related conflicts, and any context when emotions are heated. Think of a cat cornered by a large Rottweiler.
So, what explains the contagion effect to propel predatory violence? Now the more simple explanation. At its most basic level it comes down to "monkey see, monkey do."
Predatory attackers almost always show a deep-seated sense of inadequacy, feeling misunderstood and under-appreciated by the world. Poor coping skills, narcissistic personality features, lack of empathy, and sense of alienation (and often shame) permeate their self-disclosures, social media posts, and statements to confidants. As an attempt to bolster that low sense of self, they seek ways to bolster their presence, their reputation, their sense of self, their fame.
This isn't all that unusual. We are a culture of the "selfies" and of social media self-promotion, and the mass killer wants the same, yet he (and almost always it's a he) lack the social and emotional skills to get those needs met pro-socially so they resort to more destructive means. We know this because they tell us so – Harris and Klebold from Columbine; Cho from Virginia Tech; Holmes from Aurora, CO; Dylan Roof from S.C., Elliot Rodger, from Santa Barbara, CA; Omar Matteen from Orlando, FL; and so on – left us clear statements of their needs, thoughts, intentions, and motives.
Carrying out a mass killing offers immediate dramatic stardom through the stage of death. "Who cares if I win the Golden Globe for the most evil, heinous actor. At least I won a Golden Globe!"
High-profile and well-covered killers in the media have always inspired others. The frightening part is that every day there are many people thinking about carrying out a mass attack, "What if I did that . . . .". Then they see someone else do it, and they see how much a "loser" that assailant is, how lowly they seem to be, how pitiful their life is. Yet instead of that being a deterrent akin to "Why would I want to be like him?", because of their narcissism, it becomes a motivator, an inciter, an accelerator akin to "If that loser can do it, I certainly can, I can do it better . . ." And the added benefit of "Look how famous he is, NOW everyone knows him, I want that for myself, and I'll be even more famous . . ."
The narcissism, coupled with deep anger and rage, becomes a frightening recipe. Add in suicidal ideation to the mix, and the recipe worsens – if you're alienated from society, feel unfairly treated and isolated, have strong impulses to lash out at others, desire fame at any cost to others, AND you're suicidal, there isn't much left to hold one back from "going out in a big way."
That is the behavioral impetus behind the contagion effect. Let's be clear; the media coverage does not unilaterally force one forward to commit an act of violence. It does not otherwise take one who is not on a trajectory of predatory violence and suddenly put them on that trajectory. Rather, it acts as an accelerator for some, and to such a statistical degree that we can predict an increased risk in those next 13 days.
The contagion effect was regionally and geographically anchored in the past, mostly due to local newspaper coverage. But in the past 15-20 years with the increase of internet and social media, we now have seen the regional effect erode. We are all one world, and the contagion effect is now global.
How can we use this to our advantage?
One way NOT to use this data point is to over-react. Mass attacks and shootings are increasing in the past 7 years or so, but still statistically rare (about the risk of being killed by lightning for any one American). We don't have to bunker down in our basements for 13 days after every mass killing.
Where this data point is useful is when we have an identified person that we think, or know, is already on a trajectory of predatory violence, and then a mass killing or shooting occurs and is widely covered in the media, that is the time to check in with them and gauge how they are responding. Are they accelerating? Do they feel emboldened? Are they moving into a preparatory mode? As well as other risk factors that can spike.
This is not an easy task, and it requires special training and experience to effectively do, and do well, yet it's another insight we can use for finding the needle in the haystack before the needle becomes a dagger (or gun) that kills innocent people.
George Vergolias
VP, Medical Director
About the Author: George Vergolias, PsyD, LP is a forensic psychologist and threat management expert serving as Vice President and Medical Director for the R3 Continuum. As part of his role of Vice President and Medical Director of R3 Continuum, he leads their Threat of violence and workplace violence programs. Dr. Vergolias is also the founder and President of TelePsych Supports, a tele-mental health company providing involuntary commitment and crisis risk evaluations for hospitals and emergency departments. He has over 20 years of forensic experience with expertise in the following areas: violence risk and threat management, psychological dynamics of stalking, sexual offending, emotional trauma, civil and involuntary commitment, suicide and self-harm, occupational disability, law enforcement consultation, expert witness testimony, and tele-mental health. Dr. Vergolias has directly assessed or managed over one thousand cases related to elevated risk for violence or self-harm, sexual assault, stalking, and communicated threats. He has consulted with regional, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, Secret Service, and Bureau of Prisons. He has worked for and consulted with Fortune 500 companies, major insurance carriers, government agencies, and large healthcare systems on issues related to work absence management, workplace violence, medical necessity reviews, and expert witness consultation.
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Донт — фамилия.

Известные носители:
 Донт, Якоб (1815—1888) — австрийский скрипач, композитор и музыкальный педагог. Сын Йозефа Валентина Донта.
 Донт, Йозеф Валентин (1776—1833) — австрийский виолончелист.