Twins Separated from Bangladesh Intensive Care: Hospital

SYDNEY news update: Bangladeshi twins Trishna and Krishna have left intensive care as they continue their remarkable recovery from surgery to separate their conjoined heads, the hospital said.
The two-year-old girls, rescued from a Dhaka orphanage, moved to a shared room on the normal ward on Monday, just a week after the 32-hour operation to disconnect their fused skulls, brains and blood vessels.

“They are sharing a room together and settling into their new environment,” Melbourne’s Royal Children’s Hospital said in a statement.

“The girls are getting to know the new staff who will be caring for them now that they have left intensive care.”

The twins’ heads remain heavily bandaged but they have appeared otherwise well, with Trishna awake and talking two days after surgery and Krishna blowing a signature raspberry when she was woken from a medical coma on Saturday.

Their condition has amazed medical staff who nursed them back to fitness after they arrived in fading health from Bangladesh two years ago, and gave them just a 25 percent chance of both recovering completely from the separation.

“We’re all so proud of our children’s hospital and we’re so proud of the quality of the nurses and the staff and the doctors that we’ve got there,” Victoria state Premier John Brumby told Fairfax radio.

“This was just another great example where these two children, who I think, to be honest, many of us thought were not going to get through, have come through, fingers crossed at this stage, with flying colours.”

The girls’ 22-year-old mother, who was unable to care for the sickly babies and handed them to an orphanage soon after their birth, has said she hopes to travel to Australia to see them.

Posh to start her own modelling agency?

Victoria Beckham is joining hands with her manager Simon Fuller to start their own modelling agency, according to reports. The former Spice Girl, who already has her own successful fashion label, is reportedly in talks with Fuller to set up a new business venture in New York. “Simon knows that Victoria is very savvy when it comes to fashion

Britain’s Prince William to visit Australia, New Zealand

SYDNEY : Britain’s Prince William will embark on his first official tour of the Commonwealth in January, visiting Australia and New Zealand to ‘get to know’ the people, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said on Monday.

Prince William, second in line to the British throne, will travel to Sydney and Melbourne from January 19-21 after opening New Zealand’s new Supreme Court in Wellington.

“The visit originated from a request to the government of Australia by Prince William to visit the country so as to begin to get to know Australia and its people,” Rudd said in a statement.

The visit, Prince William’s first since he travelled here as an infant in 1983 with the Prince and Princess of Wales, is likely to renew debate about Australia’s status as a constitutional monarchy.

Queen Elizabeth II, New Zealand and Australia’s head of state, is regarded with much affection here and Rudd, although an avowed republican, has said that cutting Australia’s ties with the British monarchy is not a priority.

Prince William will meet a broad range of Australians as he focuses on his “core interests” of supporting defence personnel, helping young people fulfil their potential, and sustainable development, Rudd said.

“The Prince will also use the visit to learn more about local indigenous issues and visit the bushfire-ravaged countryside in Victoria,” he added.

British media have reported that the 27-year-old prince has arranged the visit during a break in his training to become a helicopter pilot with the Royal Air Force.

Serena Takes No 1 Ranking as Safina Withdraws

Serena Takes No 1 Ranking as Safina Withdraws, Dinara Safina withdraws from the WTA Championships with a back injury to hand the year-end top spot to American Serena Williams.

Safina’s tearful exit after just two games of her first group match against Jelena Jankovic meant 11-times grand slam champion Serena was assured of ending the year top of the pile for the first time since 2002 even before she beat sister Venus later in a midnight thriller.

Earlier at the Khalifa Tennis Centre Caroline Wozniacki and Victoria Azarenka, two players who are set to challenge the Williams sisters for major honours, went toe to toe for three hours before Denmark’s Wozniacki triumphed 1-6 6-4 7-5.

Miranda Kerr shows off hot bikini bod for Victoria’’s Secret

Aussie model Miranda Kerr gave onlookers an eyeful as she posed in a skimpy bikini for a Victoria’’s Secret promo.

The 26-year-old, who is presently dating British actor Orlando Bloom, hit the beach for the lingerie firm’’s sexy shoot in St Barths, France.

Kerr was said to have been in the equally bare company of her bikini-clad hair and make-up crew during the assignment, reports the Sun.

The star was the first Australian addition to the Victoria’’s Secret campaign.

She entered the fashion industry in her early teens after winning a 1997 Australian nationwide model search.

Shahid Afridi, To Join South Australia For Twenty20

KARACHI: South Australia have signed Shahid Afridi for the Twenty20 Big Bash this summer as a replacement for the spinner Ajantha Mendis.

The Redbacks had announced the recruitment of Mendis in July but he is now unavailable due to Sri Lanka’s planned tri-series with India and Bangladesh in January.

South Australia’s Big Bash campaign begins on December 29, when Pakistan will be involved in the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne.

However, Afridi has not played Test cricket since 2006 and is not expected to feature in their Test squad, which would leave him free to take part in the full Twenty20 competition.

“We narrowly missed out on finals last season and these signings are definitely a boost to our quest to qualify for the Champions League this year,” South Australia’s high performance manager Jamie Cox said.

“I have made no secret of the fact that I view the Big Bash competition as the most commercial on the domestic calendar and the inaugural Champions’ League also provides fantastic opportunities for young players to showcase their skills on the world stage.”

Afridi should be a valuable Twenty20 asset for South Australia; he was the player of the tournament at the 2007 ICC World Twenty20 and averages 21.05 with the bat and 15.73 with the ball from his 24 Twenty20 internationals. Other international signings for the Big Bash include Chris Gayle (Western Australia) and Dwayne Bravo (Victoria).

Lasith Malinga was to join Tasmania and Victoria had attracted Muttiah Muralitharan but both men are likely to be unavailable for the same reason as Mendis. The West Indies allrounder Kieron Pollard is on New South Wales’ radar and the states have until Christmas Eve to confirm up to two international recruits.

Lindsay mistakes perfume bottle-shaped cake for real thing!

Lindsay Lohan is said to have mistaken a perfume bottle shaped cake at the Victoria’s Secret Beauty Velvet fragrance launch, for the real thing.

Thinking the cake baked in the shape of a giant perfume bottle was real, she put her hand out to lean on it.

An onlooker at the Lexington Avenue store witnessed the incident.

“She accidentally poked a hole right in the middle of it,” the New York Post quoted the onlooker as saying.

Lohan and Brazilian lingerie lovely Alessandra Ambrosio then burst into giggles.

Cobras, Bangalore Through to CL Semi-Finals

NEW DELHI: Cape Cobras eased past Victoria in the Champions League – but both sides qualified for the semi-finals after Bangalore beat Delhi in the later game.
The Cobras game was reduced to 17 overs after the start was delayed when a suspicious bag was found at the ground.

When play did start, Monde Zondeki struck twice in the first over to leave Victoria reeling at 0-2, but steady progress saw them recover to 125-5.

But Henry Davids smashed 69 not out to see the Cobras home by eight wickets.

That result eliminated Bangalore from semi-final contention – but the Royal Challengers bounced back to overcome Delhi Daredevils, also by eight wickets, to knock their Indian rivals out of the competition.

It means none of the three star-studded Indian Premier League teams will be playing in the semi-finals.

The security alert – which saw an Under-22 cricketer from Jammu and Kashmir arrested, questioned by police and released without charge – delayed the start of the opening game by nearly two hours.

When the players eventually arrived from their hotel it was Victoria who were caught cold as Rob Quiney was caught at fine leg off the first ball of the match and Zondeki bowled Brad Hodge two balls later.

Andrew McDonald, who took 4-21 in Victoria’s last game, further pressed his all-round credentials with 29 not out but the South Africans’ target of 126 always looked well within their reach, even with Herschelle Gibbs missing from their side.

Captain Andrew Puttick pulled the first ball of the Cobras innings for four but soon fell to Peter Siddle.

However, this brought Davids to the crease – and he saw his side home, hitting seven fours and two sixes while sharing important stands with Derek Brand (29) and JP Duminy (18 not out).

Bangalore skipper Anil Kumble, celebrating his 39th birthday, asked Delhi to field first after winning the toss – and opener Virender Sehwag got the Daredevils off to a flier in his usual swashbuckling style, making 47 from 29 balls before he holed out at mid-off.

After his departure, Delhi were unable to keep up the pace, and Tillakaratne Dilshan (20) was caught and bowled attempting one of his signature “Dilscoops” over the wicketkeeper’s head, while England discard Owais Shah gave Kumble (3-20) his third wicket.

Chasing 139 to win, Bangalore’s Manish Pandey retired hurt after two overs, while Dirk Nannes removed fellow opener Robin Uthappa cheaply.

But Indian veteran Rahul Dravid (32 not out) and big-hitting New Zealand batsman Ross Taylor (65) – who was dropped twice – took the game away from Delhi with a stand of 93 in just under 10 overs.

Taylor, who hit six fours and four huge sixes, was eventually bowled attempting another big hit at Nannes, but Virat Kohli smashed four fours from one Amit Mishra over to take Bangalore to the brink of victory – and former India captain Dravid brought up the win by hitting the first ball of the 16th over for six.

Champions League Two Matches Today

KARACHI: Two matches to be played in Champions League on Saturday. The first counter will take place between Cap Cobras and Otagos while IPL Champions Deccan Charges will face Summer Set in second match.

Pakistan’s first sports channel Geo Super will telecast two matches live from India.

Australian-based teams were on the top on Friday when New South Wales defeated Eagles by six wickets and Victoria easily beat Delhi Daredevils in second match.

NASA Blast The Moon Surface In Searching Of Water

WASHINGTON: The United States blasted the surface of the moon Friday with two rockets on a mission to look for water below the lunar surface that could be used by astronauts on future space missions, NASA said.
At 1130 GMT the LCROSS satellite crashed into the Cabeus crater floor near the moon’s south pole at around 5,600 miles (9,000 kilometers) per hour, followed four minutes later by a shepherding spacecraft equipped with cameras to record the impact.

Grainy thermal images carried on the US space agency’s television station showed colder blue sites and warmer red sites on the moon’s surface, but there was no apparent light flash as the rockets made impact.

NASA said the blasts would kick up a plume of lunar dirt to an altitude of about 6.2 miles (10 kilometers) and produce a flash lasting about 30 seconds.

Cameras mounted on the 1,965-pound (891-kilogram) shepherding spacecraft were to beam live footage of the initial impact as the craft flew through the debris plume, collecting and relaying key data back to Earth before it too plows into the moon.

“The LCROSS science team is making their preliminary assessment of approximately four minutes of data collected from the LCROSS Spacecraft. Observatories involved in the LCROSS Observation Campaign are reporting in,” the mission website said after the impact.

“We don’t anticipate anything about presence or absence of water immediately. It’s going to take us some time,” cautioned Anthony Colaprete, project scientist and principal investigator for the 79-million-dollar LCROSS mission, which is also the first preparatory mission of the Constellation program that aims to send Americans back to the moon by 2020.

Colaprete projected it would take several days for analysts to evaluate the data and several weeks to determine whether and how much hydrogen-bearing compounds were found.

Ahead of the launch, Victoria Friedensen, LCROSS program executive, said she was feeling “a lot of exhilaration, a little sadness.”

“I never thought I’d work on something as interesting,” she told NASA television.

NASA scientists will be looking at what spews out after 350 tonnes of debris is ejected from the cold, dark Cabeus crater, staking its hopes on water in the form of ice.

The crater is 62 miles (100 km) across and between 1.6 and 2.5 miles (2.5 to four km) deep.

“We’re hunting for how water ice was stored and trapped in these permanently shadowed areas over billions of years and we want to find out how much there is,” explained Peter Schultz, a professor of geological sciences at Brown University who helped design the mission.

The mission comes just two weeks after India hailed the discovery of water on the moon with its Chandrayaan-1 satellite mission in partnership with NASA.

Scientists had previously theorized that, except for the possibility of ice at the bottom of craters, the moon was totally dry.

Finding water on Earth’s natural satellite would be a major breakthrough in space exploration and pave the way toward future lunar bases for drinking water or fuel, or even man living on another planet.

“This could be the place that we could go to mine water for a permanent lunar base,” said Schultz.

“It tells us something about how water was delivered to the moon and other planets in a sort of cosmic rain, meaning impacts from comets over eons.”

Friedensen said interest levels in the project were high because of the potential if water were found.

“If we had it there, we could actually make exploration be a bit more sustainable,” she said. “We could make fuel on the moon.”

But much uncertainty surrounds NASA’s future missions to the moon, as a key review panel appointed by President Barack Obama’s administration said existing budgets bar a return to it before 2020.

The last manned mission to the moon, Apollo 17, took place in 1972.

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