Daily Dose: 03/31/08

» Skyline Guard Blossoms
» Philippine Foreign Service Examinations Start May 4
» Yankees’ Matsui Gets Married, Pulls Fast One on Jeter and Abreu
» Cambodian ‘Killing Fields’ Survivor Dith Pran Dies
» New York Assemblywoman Organizes Book Drive for National Library Week
» Japan’s Soul Food Debuts in U.S.
» ‘Bleach the Movie: Memories of Nobody’
» Hong Kong Filipinos Protest Philippine President
» Philippine President Vows to Fight Corruption

BAY:

Skyline Guard Blossoms

SAN BRUNO, Calif. — Skyline’s superb 5-foot-5 sophomore Marie Colon was the reason why the Trojans advanced to the California Community Colleges playoffs in their second year back as a program after a lengthy 26-year hiatus.

Colon, 19, earned first-team Coast Conference honors this season, as well as third-team all state.

“What I’m proud of the most is what we’ve accomplished as a team,” Colon said. “My individual accomplishment is not as important to me as my team accomplishment.”

Colon, who didn’t know she was going to play basketball out of high school, was set to go to College of San Mateo when then-Skyline coach Brittany Lindhe saw Colon at a Daly City showcase game.

“The whole experience was for me to improve,” said Colon, who has developed moxie, an attitude that all game-changing players need to have. “It definitely took time for me to gain confidence in my game.”

— The Daily Journal

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Philippine Foreign Service Examinations Start May 4

SAN FRANCISCO — The Department of Foreign Affairs recently announced that the Board of Foreign Service Examinations will conduct the Foreign Service Officer Qualifying Test on May 4, the written examination on Aug. 20-22 and the oral examination on Dec. 3-5, to recruit candidates for appointment to the position of foreign service officer.

The qualifying test will assess the applicant’s general ability on verbal, numerical, analytical and management concepts. Those who pass this test will be allowed to take the written examination on the economic, political and social conditions of the Philippines. Applicants must also possess not only facility in oral and written communication, but also on foreign language. Testing centers outside the Philippines will be at the Philippine embassies in Washington, D.C., and Vienna and the Philippine Consulate General in Dubai.

Applicants to the FSO exam must be Filipino citizens, not more than 35 years of age on Dec. 31, and have completed a four-year course or its equivalent.

NATION:

Yankees’ Matsui Gets Married, Pulls Fast One on Jeter and Abreu

TAMPA, Fla. — Hideki Matsui, New York Yankees baseball star, flew to New York on March 26 to get married, after making a wager at the start of spring training with teammates Derek Jeter and Bobby Abreu about who would wed their girlfriends first.

Matsui said Jeter, who claimed not to have a girlfriend, has one year to get married to win the bet. Yankees outfielder Abreu, who said he has a girlfriend, has six months to win the bet.

Since Matsui said he knew six months ago he was going to get married, he was able to pull a fast one on his teammates, who both said on March 27 they would play off their losses immediately.

“Sometimes you should get all the information before you make a bet,” said Yankees manager Joe Girardi, who got a good laugh out of it.

When asked if he got married just to win the bet, Matsui laughed and said, “Maybe.”

— Associated Press

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Cambodian ‘Killing Fields’ Survivor Dith Pran Dies

NEW YORK — Dith Pran, the Cambodian-born journalist whose harrowing tale of enslavement and eventual escape from that country’s murderous Khmer Rouge revolutionaries in 1979 became the subject of the award-winning film The Killing Fields, died on March 30 at a New Jersey hospital of pancreatic cancer. He was 65.

Dith was working in Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital, when the Vietnam War reached its chaotic end in April 1975 and both countries were taken over by Communist forces. Eventually, Dith resettled in the United States and went to work as a photographer for The New York Times.

It was Dith himself who coined the term “killing fields” for the horrifying clusters of corpses and skeletal remains of victims he encountered on his desperate journey to freedom.
“Pran was a true reporter, a fighter for the truth and for his people,” said Sydney Schanberg, his former colleague.
Dith spoke and wrote often about his wartime experience, and remained an outspoken critic of the Khmer Rouge regime.

— Associated Press

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New York Assemblywoman Organizes Book Drive for National Library Week

FLUSHING, N.Y. — On March 30, Assemblywoman Ellen Young kicked off a community book drive with the Flushing Library, HSBC Bank and WJ Bookstore to benefit local libraries. The book drive precludes National Library Week, which falls on the week of April 13.

Assemblywoman Young stated, “I’m happy to kick off this book drive to benefit our local libraries in anticipation of National Library Week. During these tough economic times, library services are in greater demand than ever before, as people of all ages use libraries to improve their knowledge and enhance their literacy skills. I encourage everyone to participate in this effort in order to keep our local libraries at the forefront of our communities.”

HSBC Bank helped kick-start this endeavor with a generous $500 donation toward the purchase of books at Flushing Library, and WJ Bookstore also contributed by committing 500 books to the drive.

COMMERCE:

Japan’s Soul Food Debuts in U.S.

NEW YORK — Ippudo, Japan’s acclaimed ramen emporium, makes its international debut with the launch of Ippudo New York in the East Village on March 31.

“I am thrilled at the opportunity to introduce New Yorkers to the many tastes and flavors of Ippudo’s ramen,” said founder Shigemi Kawahara, who is also known for revolutionizing the ramen industry in Japan. “Ippudo New York is the first step in taking the new ramen culture around the world.”

Each Ippudo is known for serving a unique signature ramen dish, and all of the locations offer seasonal dishes. Ippudo N.Y. will serve five types of ramen, including the two famous signature ramen dishes: Shiromaru classic, a white pork broth ramen and Akamaru modern, a bolder red broth seasoned with garlic oil and Ippudo’s secret hidenotare sauce.

While Ippudo N.Y. is a modern ramen brasserie, it still embraces Hakata with the warm oak-filled interior that invokes Hakata’s rustic charm and is infused with a contemporary aesthetic.

ARTS:

‘Bleach the Movie: Memories of Nobody’

SAN FRANCISCO — VIZ Media LLC, one of the entertainment industry’s most innovative and comprehensive publishing animation and licensing companies, has announced that it has secured the license from TV Tokyo Corporation, Shueisha Inc. and Dentsu Inc. for Bleach the Movie: Memories of Nobody in the Americas, Europe and Oceania. The feature film, which will be aimed primarily at teens and older teens, will have a limited theatrical release in major cities throughout North America this summer with the DVD release to follow in winter 2008. Bleach the Movie: Memories of Nobody is inspired by the successful animated television series Bleach airing on Adult Swim, which is based on the best-selling manga series by Tite Kubo. Bleach is a tremendously successful multimedia property internationally. This success has further spawned an array of related video games, apparel, action figures, trading cards and other merchandise.

GLOBAL:

Hong Kong Filipinos Protest Philippine President

HONG KONG — Hundreds of Filipinos in Hong Kong, mostly domestic workers, demonstrated on March 30 to demand the resignation of Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo as she arrived for an investment conference.

The protesters gathered outside the five-star Grand Hyatt hotel where Arroyo was expected to stay. They chanted slogans in Tagalog, such as “Gloria Arroyo step down” and “Oust Arroyo.”

“We want her to go back home and face all the charges against her, like corruption, human rights violations and the neglect of her government to overseas Filipino workers,” said Eman Villanueva, secretary general of the United Filipinos in Hong Kong.

The Senate has been investigating allegations that Arroyo, her husband and a former elections chief benefited from huge kickbacks in an aborted US$330 million deal with China’s ZTE Corp. to set up a nationwide broadband network.

Arroyo’s office has dismissed the charges as hearsay. She has survived three opposition impeachment bids and at least four failed coup attempts.

— Associated Press

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Philippine President Vows to Fight Corruption

PAMPANGA, Philippines — President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo vowed on March 28 during the 2008 Philippines Development Forum at the Fontana Convention that her administration will continue working hard to further improve the banking and finance system, strengthen tax collection and broaden its tax base, and reduce, if not eliminate, corruption and red tape.

Among those who attended the forum were Cabinet members, top businessmen, foreign creditors and donor countries.

Her administration has laid out programs to sustain the inflow of investments, invest heavily in human and physical infrastructure, strengthen anti-corruption initiatives and cut red tape, and blunt the blow of the rising cost of energy, including rice in the world market particularly to the poor.

“We will fight for the economy, education and the environment. We will fight to feed the poor, improve job creation, and do everything in our power to mitigate the global forces increasing the price of commodities like oil and rice,” she said.

Compiled by Irene Aranya