Thursday, September 27, 2012
PSY can't believe with "Gangnam Style" success
SEOUL, South Korea—South Korean rapper PSY finds his success with “Gangnam Style” so unreal that he wonders if he’s being tricked into believing it — like Jim Carrey in “The Truman Show.”
PSY said Tuesday in a press conference in Seoul that he cried in disbelief when his song entered the Billboard 100 earlier this month. The 34-year-old now says he’ll go topless in joy on a stage if “Gangnam Style” tops the chart. The song’s at number 11 this week.
The music video for “Gangnam Style” has more than 270 million YouTube views and counting. People around the world are mimicking PSY’s horse-riding dance in the video.
In the 1998 movie “The Truman Show,” Carrey plays a man unaware that he lives in a reality television show.
Reese Witherspoon at 36 is a mom again to new husband Jim Toth
LOS ANGELES—Oscar-winning US actress Reese Witherspoon has given birth to her first child with new husband Jim Toth, a baby boy called Tennessee James, her publicist announced Thursday.
The actress, who won her Oscar in 2006 for her role in “Walk the Line” and who has two children by her first marriage, is doing well as is the infant.
“Reese Witherspoon and husband Jim Toth welcomed Tennessee James into their family today,” her publicist said in a statement. “Both mom and baby are healthy and the entire family is thrilled.”
Witherspoon and Toth married in March last year at her ranch estate in Ojai, California, with guests including Renee Zellweger, Salma Hayek, Sean Penn, Scarlett Johansson, Tobey Maguire and Robert Downey Jr.
She was previously married to actor Ryan Phillippe and has two children with him. The couple divorced in 2008.
As well as her best actress Oscar, her turn in 2005′s “Walk the Line” about country music legend Johnny Cash also earned Witherspoon a Golden Globe and a BAFTA award in the same category.
She was also nominated for Golden Globes for 1999′s “Election” and 2001′s “Legally Blonde.”
In September last year Witherspoon suffered minor injuries after being hit by a car while out jogging. Earlier this year her mother took her father to court on bigamy charges.
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Philippines in illegal ivory trade
Thousands of elephants are butchered every year for their ivory tusks that are carved into religious objects, including the most-prized Sto. Niño (icon of Jesus Christ as a boy) in the Philippines, a National Geographic investigation of the direct link between religion and ivory smuggling shows.
The country has become one of the destinations of the illegal ivory trade mainly because Filipinos are fond of religious statues made only of the finest materials, said the cover story of the magazine’s October issue titled “Ivory worship.” It was written by Bryan Christy, who visited the country five times for the story.
Christy went to Cebu and met one of the best known ivory collectors in the country, Msgr. Cristobal Garcia. He is “the leader of a group of prominent Sto. Niño collectors who display their icons during the Feast of the Sto. Niño in some of [the province’s] best shopping malls and hotels,” the report said.
“His anteroom is a mini-museum dominated by large, glass-encased religious figures whose heads and hands are made of ivory: There is an ivory Our Lady of the Rosary holding an ivory Jesus in one, a near-life-size ivory Mother of the Good Shepherd seated beside an ivory Jesus in another. Next to Garcia’s desk a solid ivory Christ hangs on a cross,” it said.
Heirlooms
They are not just investments but heirlooms as well, said the NatGeo report.
“Many believe that what you invest in devotion to your own icon determines what blessings you will receive in return. For some, then, a fiberglass or wooden icon is not enough. For them, the material of choice is elephant ivory,” it added.
For a Third World country where most people are living below poverty line, some may see this devotion as lavish but for others, it is “an offering to God.”
“The elaborate displays [of Sto. Niño] are often owned by families of surprisingly modest means. Devotees have opened bankbooks in the names of their ivory icons. They name them in their wills,” it said.
Christ himself
The report said some Filipinos believed that the Sto. Niño de Cebu (Holy Child of Cebu) was Christ himself. It noted that 16th century Spaniards “declared the icon to be miraculous and used it to convert the nation, making this wooden statue, housed today behind bulletproof glass in Cebu’s Basilica Minore de Sto. Niño, the root from which all Filipino Catholicism has grown.” The Sto. Niño is believed to be a replica of the icon devotees believe Ferdinand Magellan brought to Cebu in 1521.
“I don’t call it extravagant,” said Fr. Vicente Lina Jr. (Father Jay), director of the Diocesan Museum of Malolos and curator of his archdiocese’s annual Sto. Niño exhibit). “‘I call it an offering to God.’ He surveys the child images, some of which are decorated in ‘lagang,’ silvery mother of pearl flowers carved from nautilus shells,” said in the report.
Crooked line
“When it comes to Sto. Niño devotion too much is not enough. As a priest, I’ve been praying, ‘If all of this stuff is plain stupid, then God, put a stop to this,’” Father Jay was quoted as saying in the report.
He went as far as saying that the ivory used for the statues were smuggled but for him, “it is like straightening up a crooked line.”
“Father Jay points to a Sto. Niño holding a dove. ‘Most of the old ivories are heirlooms,’” Lina said. “‘The new ones are from Africa. They come in through the back door,’” he was quoted as saying.
“‘It’s like straightening up a crooked line: You buy the ivory, which came from a hazy origin, and you turn it into a spiritual item. See?” Lina said, with a giggle. “His voice lowers to a whisper. ‘Because it’s like buying a stolen item,’” the report said.
Int’l embarrassment
“If this allegation is true, this illegal wildlife trade would be an international embarrassment for the Philippines and the Filipinos. This must stop,” said Antonio Oposa Jr., an environmentalist lawyer.
Oposa said his group was studying other possible legal actions it may take.
“[If these were true,] we see violations of the CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora), Wildlife Conservation Act, Anti-Fencing Law, Customs Code and others,” he said.
Probe
Without judging before hearing, Oposa said his group had asked the Department of Justice, National Bureau of Investigation and Department of Environment and Natural Resources to investigate the people responsible for the illegal trade in the country.
“We have also asked the Interpol to conduct an investigation on the people behind this illegal wildlife syndicate,” he said.
“It has long been known in the international circles that the Philippines is a source, a buyer and a conduit in the illegal wildlife trade. This must stop,” Oposa added.
Christy said he met with Garcia to understand the country’s ivory trade and to get a lead on who were behind 5.4 tons of illegal ivory and 7.7 tons that customs agents seized in Manila in 2009 and 2005, respectively, and 6.1 tons bound for the Philippines seized by Taiwanese authorities in 2006. He said the seizures represented 1,745 elephants assuming an average of 10 kg of ivory per elephant.
New ivory gets into the country from Africa through Muslims from Mindanao by bribing authorities along the way, according to Lina.
“And you just keep on paying so many people so that it will enter your country,” Lina told Christy.
Tips on smuggling
In the report, Garcia told Christy how he could smuggle an ivory Sto. Niño into the United States.
“‘Wrap it in old, stinky underwear and pour ketchup on it … so it looks shitty with blood. This is how it is done,”’ Garcia told Christy.
“Garcia gave me the names of his favorite ivory carvers, all in Manila, along with advice on whom to go to for high volume, whose wife overcharges, who doesn’t meet deadlines. He gave me phone numbers and locations,” Christy said.
“If I wanted to smuggle an icon that was too large to hide in my suitcase, I might get a certificate from the National Museum of the Philippines declaring my image to be antique, or I could get a carver to issue a paper declaring it to be imitation or alter the carving date to before the ivory ban. Whatever I decided to commission, Garcia promised to bless it for me,” the NatGeo writer said of Garcia’s advice to him.
Christy said in the report that “a few families control most of the ivory carving in Manila, moving like termites through massive quantities of tusks. Two of the main dealers are based in the city’s religious-supplies district, Tayuman. During my five trips to the Philippines I visited every one of the ivory shops Garcia recommended to me and more, inquiring about buying ivory.”
“More than once I was asked if I was a priest. In almost every shop someone proposed a way I could smuggle ivory to the US. One offered to paint my ivory with removable brown watercolor to resemble wood; another to make identical hand-painted statuettes out of resin to camouflage my ivory baby Jesus. If I was caught, I was told to lie and say ‘resin’ to US Customs. During one visit a dealer said Monsignor Garcia had just called and suggested that since I’d mentioned that my family had a funeral business, I might take her new, 20-pound Sto. Niño home by hiding it in the bottom of a casket. I said he must have been joking, but she didn’t think so,” Christy said.
On sick leave
The Philippine Daily Inquirer repeatedly called Garcia through his two mobile phones on Monday afternoon but there was no answer. It was learned that the monsignor was on sick leave and was in Manila.
Christy said the Philippines’ ivory market was small compared with, say, China’s, but it is centuries old and staggeringly obvious.
“Collectors and dealers share photographs of their ivories on Flickr and Facebook. CITES, as administrator of the 1989 global ivory ban, is the world’s official organization standing between the slaughter of the 1980s—in which Africa is said to have lost half its elephants, more than 600,000 in just those 10 years—and the extermination of the elephant. If CITES has overlooked the Philippines’ ivory trade, what else has it missed?” Christy said.
Vatican suspends Cebu priest
CEBU CITY—Msgr. Cristobal Garcia has been suspended and stripped of all his positions in the Archdiocese of Cebu on orders of the Vatican while the Holy See investigates the child abuse case that stemmed from accusations that he molested altar boys more than 20 years ago in the United States.
Msgr. Achilles Dakay, Cebu archdiocese media liaison officer, said Garcia’s suspension happened months before the monsignor was implicated by a National Geographic article on the illegal trade of ivory in the Philippines.
Dakay’s announcement came after the Department of Environment and Natural Resources said that Garcia could face up to four years in prison unless he could show proof that he legally acquired his huge collection of religious icons made of ivory.
The National Bureau of Investigation said it was gathering evidence against those involved in the illegal sale of ivory, which an environmentalist lawyer calls the “new blood diamond” in the international trade.
NatGeo said the demand for ivory in the Philippines has resulted in thousands of deaths of African elephants.
Dakay said Garcia was suspended by Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma in June on instructions of the Vatican because of the ongoing investigation of the child abuse case filed against him.
As part of the penalties, Garcia is not allowed to say Mass in public and hear confessions, and has been stripped of his positions in the archdiocese, including his chairmanship of the committee on worship.
Palma, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, had informed Garcia about his suspension, which might have affected the latter’s health, Dakay said.
Diabetic, hypertensive
Garcia, a diabetic and hypertensive, is on sick leave. He was confined at a private hospital in Manila. Before that, he had been staying with a sibling in Manila while he sought medical treatment.
At a news conference at the Archbishop’s Palace here on Wednesday morning, Palma confirmed Dakay’s statement that Garcia had been removed from his positions in the archdiocese.
“You might notice you have not seen Monsignor Cris since June because he’s out of Cebu,” Palma said. “He is no longer connected with any of the post he occupied before.”
Palma said the investigation of Garcia’s child abuse case came long before the monsignor was embroiled in the controversy involving ivory trade.
“With regard to the matter of Monsignor Garcia’s past, the case has been elevated to the Holy See and it has initiated the investigation into it long before the present controversy erupted,” Palma said in a prepared statement.
“I have also fulfilled the Holy See’s instructions regarding the submission of documents and acting upon related consequences,” he added.
Garcia was a Dominican priest working in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in the 1980s when he was accused of child abuse.
He was later expelled after a nun reported to the police that an altar boy had been found in his bed in a Los Angeles rectory.
An article by The Los Angeles Times reported that Garcia was accused of molesting two youths in 1980 and 1984.
In a Dallas Morning News interview, Garcia was quoted as saying that he did have sex with the two altar boys but claimed that he was the one who was “seduced and raped.” His accusers, however, found his claims absurd.
Rosales brought him back
Garcia also claimed that his reputation had been tarnished because of his family’s wealth and that a cardinal had given him clemency after a review of a psychological report on him and materials from the Dominicans.
Dakay told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that what he knew was that Garcia was the last priest ordained by Cebu Archbishop Julio Cardinal Rosales before he died in the 1980s.
After Garcia was expelled by the Dominican Order, Dakay said Rosales brought him back to his hometown in Cebu and took him in the archdiocese as a diocesan priest.
But Dakay said Garcia could no longer go back to the United States after his conviction in the civil aspect of the case. He, however, didn’t know if Garcia was ordered to pay damages.
Garcia made monsignor
It was during the time of Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal, Rosales’ successor, that Garcia was named monsignor.
Garcia later became a high-profile priest in Cebu and has been known for his vast collections of religious icons, including Sto. Niño made of ivory, and paintings. His collections are usually displayed on exhibit every January as part of the festivities leading to the annual fiesta of Cebu’s patron, Señor Sto. Niño.
Publication manager
Garcia was also given various positions, including the chairmanship of the Commission on Worship. He was also business manager of “Bag-ong Lungsoranon,” the official publication of the Cebu archdiocese and spiritual director of Bukas Loob ng Dios and the World Apostolate of Fatima.
He was also a founder of the Society of the Angel of Peace in Talisay City, and rector of the Archdiocesan Shrine of Jesus Nazareno, also in Talisay.
Dakay said he thought the child abuse case against Garcia had been considered closed until Palma was informed by the Vatican about an ongoing investigation.
Sin, crime
“He must have repented and was sorry for what he did because it was a sin. But the crime remained. The Vatican went on investigating it,” Dakay said.
“What happened in the States could be a crime. If it was also a sin on his part, it was forgiven. He had repented,” Dakay said.
But he added the criminal case was elevated to the Vatican and was now the subject of an ongoing investigation.
Dakay said he didn’t know when the case was revived. “I don’t know why it reached the Vatican as a Church case.”
“We have been communicating with the Vatican. We didn’t know that there was an investigation. We didn’t know that it was revived,” he said.
‘Soften’ penalties
Dakay said Palma was appealing to the Vatican to soften the penalties on Garcia apparently due to the monsignor’s health condition and his contribution to the archdiocese.
Garcia left for Manila several weeks ago to seek medical treatment. He had been in and out of the hospital because of hypertension and a heart ailment.
Dakay said some Cebu priests saw Garcia in Makati City last week with his bodyguard and private nurse, “looking very sick.”
“He is now in hospital,” he added.
Dakay said Garcia, an expert in liturgy, had been printing the prayers of the archdiocese.
How to smuggle ivory
In his article titled “Ivory Worship” in NatGeo’s October issue, Bryan Christy, who visited the Philippines five times for the story, said Garcia advised him on how to smuggle religious icons made of ivory to the United States.
“‘Wrap it in old, stinky underwear and pour ketchup on it … so it looks shitty with blood. This is how it is done,’” Garcia told Christy.
Christy said Garcia also gave him the “names of his favorite ivory carvers, all in Manila, along with advice on whom to go to for high volume, whose wife overcharges, who doesn’t meet deadlines. He gave me phone numbers and locations.”
“If I wanted to smuggle an icon that was too large to hide in my suitcase, I might get a certificate from the National Museum of the Philippines declaring my image to be antique, or I could get a carver to issue a paper declaring it to be imitation or alter the carving date to before the ivory ban. Whatever I decided to commission, Garcia promised to bless it for me,” Christy said of Garcia’s advice to him.
Christy said that “a few families control most of the ivory carving in Manila, moving like termites through massive quantities of tusks. Two of the main dealers are based in the city’s religious-supplies district, Tayuman. During my five trips to the Philippines I visited every one of the ivory shops Garcia recommended to me and more, inquiring about buying ivory.”
Hide it in coffin
“More than once I was asked if I was a priest. In almost every shop someone proposed a way I could smuggle ivory to the US. One offered to paint my ivory with removable brown watercolor to resemble wood; another to make identical hand-painted statuettes out of resin to camouflage my ivory baby Jesus. If I was caught, I was told to lie and say ‘resin’ to US customs. During one visit a dealer said Monsignor Garcia had just called and suggested that since I’d mentioned that my family had a funeral business, I might take her new, 20-pound Sto. Niño home by hiding it in the bottom of a casket. I said he must have been joking, but she didn’t think so,” Christy said.
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