Hiking To RINJANI

DAY ONE : jam 1 kami tiba di bandara soekarno hatta untuk memulai perjalanan kami (DINO,BIAN AND META) menuju lombok guna berpetualang menikmati keindahan alam di gunung rinjani .. Betapa excitednya saya dan Meta untuk cepat tiba di Lombok. Jam 6 kami tiba di bandara international mataram, kami pun dijemput oleh teman (BANG DOEL namanya) yg kami kenal ketika saya dan meta berpetualang ke pulau KOMODO, Perjalanan ke rumah bang Doel sekitar 2jam, pukul 9 kami tiba di rumahnya setealah makan malam dan briffing sebentar kami pun beristirahat mempersiapkan fisik untuk esok hari .

DAY TWO : waktu di kota lombok menunjukkan pukul 7 setelah mandi dan sarapan BANG DOEL mempersiapkan logistik untuk kami bawa nanti di gunung ..jam 10 kami pun berangkat ke pos pendakian di SEMBALUN LAWANG di ketinggian 1100 mdpl kami tiba pukul 1 disana,setelah mendaptar di pos pendakian dan menyewa dua orang porter untuk memperingan pendakian ..jam 2 pm kami mulai start pendakian menuju pos 1,awal perjalanan jalur pendakian masi landai tidak terlalu banyak tanjakan banyak jalan rata dan menurun yg biasa kalo pendaki bilang BONUS hahaha..setelah 1 jam berjalan kami memasuki savana yg di dominasi rerumputan kering dan bukit2 disebelah kanan dan kiri yg memanjakan mata kami sepanjang perjalanan,,disini jalur mulai terasa agak berat banyak tanjakan dan turunan yg menguras tenaga kami .. disinilah saya dan meta merasa sangat kelelahan, sampai bang Dino pun bertanya apa kami masih sanggup untuk melanjutkan perjalanan, karna masih banyak tantangan yang akan dilewati. Saya dan Meta bersikeras untuk melanjutkan perjalanan. Setelah berjalan selama 4 jam melewati pos 1 dan pos 2 kami sampai di pos 3 di ketinggian 1800 mdpl ,porter pun langsung membuka tenda karena kami akan bermalam disini,,disini kami jg berjumpa pendaki2 lain dari kota karawang dan bekasi mereka tergolong bisa dibilang pendaki2 yg sudah uzur karena rata2 umur mereka sudah 60 tahunan dan yg paling muda pun sudah berumur 47 tahun #salute .. Setelah makan makanan yg dibuatkan porter kami pun beristirahat mempersiapkan fisik untuk besok kembali mendaki sampai ke DANAU SEGARA ANAK

DAY THREE : Selesai sarapan jam 7 pagi kami memutuskan berangkat menuju ke PLAWANGAN SEMBALUN kita berangkat bersama dengan pendaki2 dari kota karawang ..jalur pendakian menuju plawangan sembalun semakin terasa berat jalur di dominasi tanjakan bebatuan dan pasir, disinilah saya dan meta benar-benar merasakan mendaki gunung sesungguhnya! Kami mengeluh dalam hati tapi kaki rasanya tidak ingin berhenti untuk naik dan berjalan. Setelah 1 jam berjalan mulai terlihat pemandangan savana yg kami lewati kemarin dan terlihat jg laut lepas di sebelah timur sana sungguh pemandangan yg menakjubkan, pancaran matahari yang menyengat tidak mengalangi kami untuk tetap sampai ke Plawangan Sembalun. Semakin ke atas angin bertiup semakin kencang sampai suaranya seperti kereta api yg sedang berjalan, teriknya matahari pun semakin membuat pendakian kami bermandikan keringat.. Saya dan Meta beristirahat sebentar dipertengahan jalan, Bang Dino yang masih kuat mendaki meneruskan perjalanan karna beliau begitu pengalaman terhadap mendaki gunung. Jam 11 pagi kami sampai di plawangan sembalun di ketinggian 2700 mdpl berarti jarak tempuh dari pos 3 ke plawangan sembalun adalah 4 jam ..1 jam kami beristirahat disana sambil melepaskan lelah kami pun bercanda canda dengan pendaki lain yg jalan bersama dengan kami dari pos 3, Saya berpikiran mengapa saya bisa melewati jalan tersebut tadi? begitu senangnya saya bisa sampai Plawangan Sembalun. Suasana semakin akrab kami saling melemparkan canda tapi sayangnya disini kita harus berpisah dengan mereka karena tujuan mereka adalah summit/puncak sedangkan tujuan kami adalah DANAU SEGARA ANAK .. setelah 1 jam beristirahat kami melanjutkan perjalanan kali ini perjalanan kami akan menuruni bukit2 untuk sampai ke segara anak teringat pesan kakak temanku yg sudah pernah kesini sebelumnya, klo kita harus extra hati2 konsentrasi dan perlu ketepatan memilih langkah klo ingin turun dari plawangan sembalun menuju ke segara anak karena jalur disana didominasi batu2 besar dan jurang pada sebelah kanan dan kirinya dan lebar jalurnya pun tak lebih 1,5 meter .. kakaku mulai khawatir dengan keselamatan ku dan Meta tapi sementara saya dan Meta santai2 saja sambil menikmati pemandangan sepanjang jalan menurun yg curam itu hehehehe.. sudah hampir kuarang lebih 1,5 jam kami berjalan mulai terlihat dari kejauhan DANAU SEGARA ANAK, Saya beristirahat sambil melihat keadaan sekitar, betapa indahnya ciptaanNya. Betapa bahaya jalan tersebut, jika kami terpleset sedikit saja dan terjatuh mungkin nyawa kami bisa melayang karna bebatuan dan pasir sepanjang jalan kami lewati itu. Porter kami pun memutuskan untuk break sebentar kami pun memanpaatkan break itu dengan mengambil gambar DANAU SEGARA ANAK dari kejauhan ..selama kami break sering kami menjumpai bule2 yg sedang naik menuju plawangan sembalun *bule2 itu naik dari jalur pendakian senaru* sempat juga bian,meta and para porter berfoto dengan mereka ..ada kejadian yg lucu ketika kami menggangap klo bule2 itu fisik dan staminanye lebih kuat daripada orang lokal,ternyata ada seorang bule*wanita*berkata aku sudah tidak sanggup lagi2x*terjemahan dalam bahasa indonesia* sambil mengeluarkan air mata,kami pun cuma tersenyum melihat dan mendengarnya .. Setelah 30 menit perjalan kami lanjutkan kami kira setelah melihat DANAU SEGARA ANAK dari tempat kami break perjalanan sampai ke danau akan tidak jauh lagi tapi ternyata harapan cuma harapan, setengah jam,satu jam,satu setengah jam DANAU SEGARA ANAK terlihat seperti masi di kejauhan jadi kami memutuskan break untuk yg kedua kalinya, perjuangan kami untuk turun saja pun juga berat! tapi dengan keyakinan bahwa kami akan sampai pasti akan terjadi. Setelah 15 menit break regangkan kaki dan makan buah pepaya pemberian BANG DOEL kami pun melanjutkan perjalanan ada sedikit insden ketika kami jalan duluan meninggalakan porter yg sedang beres2 barang bawaan kami jalan pada jalur yg salah,untung saja porter kami melihat kami yg jalan pada jalur yg salah dan langsung meneriaki kami, jadilah akhirnya kami harus nanjak lagi sekitar 100 meter HAHHHHHHHH CAPE DEH :( hehehe ternyata porter kami bilang klo itu adalah jalur untuk ke sumber air... Kurang lebih jam 4 sore akhirnya kami tiba di DANAU SEGARA ANAK 2000 mdpl kami pun langsung mencari tempat yg bagus untuk mendirikan tenda dan tidak lupa klo kakaku sendiri sibuk mencari angle2 yg bagus untuk mengambil gambar.. setelah tenda selesai didirikan Meta dan saya menuju ke sumber air panas untuk berendam menghilangkan lelah selama perjalanan naik dan turun, rasanya untuk berendam air panas butuh perjuangan lagi. Lelahnya saat itu ! sementara kakaku lebih memilih istirahat di tenda sambil memandangi GUNUNG ANAK BARU di tengah2 DANAU SEGARA ANAK yg menurutku GUNUNG BARU itu mirip2 GUNUNG ANAK KRAKATAU di selat jawa sana hehehe... Malam pun tiba setelah makan kami langsung masuk dalam tenda dan berlindung di slepping bed masing2, ternyata rasa lelah setelah melakukan perjalanan selama seharian tak jg membuat tidur kami nyenyak karena angin yg bertiup sangat kencang menggoyangkan tenda kami sampai2 aku sering terbangun dan memikirkan bagaimana klo tenda kami terbawa angin dan sampai jatuh ke danau *tapi untunglah itu tidak terjadi*.. THANKS GOD

DAY FOUR : Kami melanjutkan perjalanan pukul 7 pagi untuk menuju plawangan senaru 2500 mdpl ..kami mulai berjalan dengan kaki2 yg agak kurang stabil di awal perjalanan nya saja sudah sulit kami melewati bibir2 danau jalur yang licin batu2 besar yg cadas sangatlah sulit untuk dilalui, perjalanan inilah yang saya anggap sangat sangat berbahaya! tak terbayang lagi sudah jika kami tidak bisa melewatinya. Sedangkan hari demi hari kondisi kami menurun, untungnya sudah dicas hehe setelah melewati bibir sungai perjalanan dlanjutkan dengan tanjakan2 curam, saya dan meta kewalahan melewatinya. Dengan semangat dari kakaku & porter kami tak akan menyerah, jalur ini tak jauh beda jalur naik ke plawangan senaru dengan jalur kita turun kemarin dari plawangan sembalun batu2 besar tanjakan yg curam dan jurang pada kanan kirinya bedanya kali ini kami naik bukannya turun, Semangat pulang pun trus mengiringi kami kakaku selalu meneriakkan kata2 semangatttt pada kami (bian dan meta) ketika kami sedang kelelahan. Pendakian menuju plawangan senaru trus berlanjut 1 jam, 2jam, 3jam. Tebing-tebing bebatuan kami naiki, sulit dipercaya. Lagi indahnya pemandangan sepanjang jalan kami lewati. Disini banyak monyet, badannya besar-besar, jujur saja saya takut. Akhirnya kami tiba di plawangan senaru 2500 mdpl jam 10 pagi, kembali kami mengambil break 30 menit sebelum melakukan perjalanan turun ke pos senaru. Apa yang saya pikirkan? tak percaya saya sampai disini, keluhan yang saya sudah rasakan rasanya mustahil bisa sampai disini, tapi tunggu dulu masih berjam-jam lagi untuk kami tiba dibawah. Kami kembali berjalan setelah 30 menit break kali ini perjalanan kami akan terus turun tidak ada lagi tanjakan di jalan menuju pos senaru. Saya merasa lega karna tidak ada lagi tanjakan YEAY. Di perjalanan menuju pos 3 dari plawangan senaru saya mengalami luka lecet pada jari kaki jempolnya terlihat perjalanannya semakin melamban seharusnya kami bisa menyelesaikan perjalanan ke pos 3 dengan hanya waktu 1,5 jam tapi karena BIAN jalan dengan lambat akhirnya kami sampai di pos 3 dengan waktu 2,5 jam, sangat luar dugaan salah dugaanku turunan pun bukan jalan yang harus diremehkan. Kami kembali break 15 menit setelah itu kami melanjutkan perjalanan ke pos 2 entah kenapa rasa semangat dari dalam diriku bangit dan semangat penuh, semua bingung dibuat olehku melanjutkan perjalanan dengan semangat seperti semangat seorang leader BIAN memimpin berjalan di depan langkahku cepat walaupun ada luka di kakiku sudah terkalahkan oleh semangat membara HEHEHE dan pasti sampai2 kakaku dan meta kewalahan mengimbanginya cuma porter yg bisa mengimbangi jalanku sampai2 porter pun salah prediksi, katanya kami bakal sampai di pos 2 dengan waktu tempuh 2 jam tapi ternyata kami dalam cuma 1 jam sudah sampai ke pos 2. Sampai di pos 2 kembali kami break lagi porter pun memasak makanan siang kami sesuai pesanan bian dan meta *mie goreng pedes* hahaha... Selesai makan jam 3 sore kami lanjutkan perjalanan kami ke pos pendakian senaru melewati pos 1 Alhamdulilah!!!! akhirnya kami tiba di pos pendakian senaru kalo kata pendaki ini adalah pintu surga, pukul 5 sore kami sampai. Kami istirahat sebentar di warung sambil minum2an ringan sebelum berangkat ke desa senaru mencari penginapan sebelum besok berangkat ke airport untuk kembali ke jakarta. Setelah sampai di penginapan kami mandi (airnya dingin mampus) dan berbincang-bincang, kami tidak menyangka bisa melewati Rinjani dan sampai dengan selamat, kalau tidak karena Tuhan dan kepercayaan kami bisa melewatinya mungkin kami tidak sampai dibawah. Malam sudah larut kami beristirahat untuk persiapan besok.

DAY FIVE : Setelah mandi dan packing barang2 akhirnya kami berangkat dari tempat penginapan langsung ke airport dan sore hari nya kami sampai di bandara soekarno hatta di kota kami tercinta JAKARTA THANKS TO terima kasih kepada Alllah SWT, doa2 kerabat dan teman2 kami yg menyertai perjalanan kami hingga kami akhirnya bisa kembali dengan selamat sampai di rumahdan tidak lupa kami ucapkan terima kasih kepada kedua porter (MAK RICA dan MAK IDA) yg telah sabar menemani kami selama perjalanan petualangan kami di GUNUNG RINJANI ..hehe :D

"SEBARKAN PADA DUNIA KALAU NEGRIMU LAYAKNYA SURGA, INDONESIAKU"

Maaf sebelumnya, ini bukan artikel tentang Alam semesta, tapi ini hanyalah sebuah cerita tentang Keluarga Kami yg berpetualang "Seribu Pulau" di NTB -NTT pekan kemarin. 7 Hari kami tempuh ( 12 - 18 Juni 2011)

Hari 1 :
Menginjakan kaki di Bandara Salaparang - Lombok, cuaca panas pekat. Kami di jemput dengan bis pariwiasata langsung menuju Senggigi. Hanya melihat view nya dan menjadi artis untuk foto2 session sebentar. Lalu kita menyebrang ke Gili Trawangan. That was Incredible!! Kami disambut dengan pasir putih, bersih, udara sejuk, dan ombak yg tenang..
Dan dengan Sunset nya yg indah, pantai nya yg begitu sepi, kami tidak menyia-nyiakan momment ini. FOTO Sebanyak-banyaknya!! hhaha.

Hari 2 :
Mulai di hari ini sampai hari ke 4 selanjutnya, kami stay di kapal. Ya!! Nginep di kapal, dan di tengah2 laut. Yg ada di fikiran gw adalah "Welcome Wave" Semua mabok laut. Hahaha. Tapi seru, karena ada si Kapten Bang Dul, Mas Dino, dan Pak Diam. (1 lg lupa siapa namanya) Dan yang ga ketinggalan, yang bikin tambah seru adalah para "Bule-Bule" yang ada-ada aja kelakuan nya. Hahaha. Dari bangsal kita naek kapal, tapi sempet agak lama karena si bang oki susah turun tangga nya. Wkwkwk.
Langsung lah kita ke Gili Bola (pulau ga ada penduduknya) Kita nginep di dalem kapal. *Mabok -__-

Hari 3 :
Kita ke Pulau Moyo (Katanya Lady Diana pernah kesana, dan Prince William dan Kate middleton juga Honeymoon disana) Udah ngebayangan itu pulau Indah nya kaya apa!! Tapi sayang nya kita ga ke Resort tempat Lady Diana Menginap, tapi kita jalan kaki menuju Air Terjun nya. Dan cuma 1 kata "AWESOME!!"
Lanjut lagi ke Pulau Satonda, di dalem pulau itu ada Danau yang birruuuuuu banget!! Dan kalo kita naro kaki di air danau nya, ikan-ikan kecil langsung pada nyamperin (semacem refleksi ikan2 yg lg ngetrend sekarang)
Di pulau itu, gw nemuin 1 pohon yg gede banget, dan ada batu karang yang di iket ke batang2 daun pohon itu (jadi bergelantungan gitu batu karang nya) Ternyata, menurut kepercayaan penduduk setempat, siapa yang mengikat batu karang tersebut, suatu saat keinginan nya akan tercapai dan bisa kembali lagi ke pulau tersebut. Dan menurut Bapak yang gw wawancarai, Lady Diana juga pernah menggantungkan Batu Karang di pohon tersebut. "Pak SBY juga pernah", lanjutnya.

Hari 4 :
Makin hari makin semakin berat, ombak semalem membuat kita semua ketakutan pas waktu tidur. Ketinggian ombak hampir 1 meter, ga tau deh tuh berapa kemiringan perahunya. Wuahaha. Dengan fasilitas seadanya, kami masih tetep bisa ketawa2 dengan lawakan2 keluarga kami. Dan semakin mengenal para awak kapal dan juga para Bule-bule.
Hari ini kita ke Red Beach/ Pink Beach (Pantai ini terletak di kawasan Pulau Komodo)
Kenapa namanya Red Beach / Pink Beach ??? Jadi ternyata, Pasir pantai di pulau ini warna nya putih dan merah mendominasi. Disaat pasir terkena buih ombak, dan dengan pantulan cahaya terang, terlihat menjadi warna Pink. Dan hanya 1 kata lagi "AWESOME!!"
Setelah Red Beach kita langsung ke Pulau Komodo (Taman Nasional Komodo) Hanya 30 Menit dari Red Beach.
Dan yakkkk!!! INILAH YANG DITUNGGU2!! KOMODOOOO. Penasaran banget sama mahluk ini, yang ga ada di belahan dunia manapun, cuma ada disini, di Indonesia!!
Kita briefing dulu sebelum adventure ke dalem hutan ini, ada berbagai macam peraturan yang harus kita ketahui, tiap kelompok terdapat 2 rangers (pawang) yang membawa tongkat berbentuk huruf "V". Sang ranger menceritakan tentang
buas nya Komodo ini, banyak kejadian manusia yg di gigit bahkan di makan Komodo. Makin horor aja ini adventure.
Bahkan salah satu bule nama nya Evelyn sempet mau ngundurin diri (udah parno duluan do'i) tapi sorry, kita udah masuk di hutan, dan kita harus tetep jalan sampe ke Hill Top

Hari 5 :
Hari ini adalah hari terkahir kita bermalam di kapal. Pagi hari, kita sampai di Pulau Kelor. Dan menurut gw ini Pantai yang terbagus!! Pulaunya kecil, bersih, ga da penduduk nya. Dan disinilah baru gw mengenal Jakob *haiyah. Hahaha.
Setelah ke Pulau Kelor, sampailah kita di Labuan Bajo. 1 jam dari Pulau kelor. Kita bermalam di Labuan Bajo, dan besok paginya harus siap2 perjalanan pulang menyebrang pulau-pulau lagi.

Hari 6 :
Kita sudah sampai di Sumbawa, setelah menaiki bis dan menyebrang lautan. Sinyal-pun sudah kami dapatkan! (Nemu sinyal serasa nemu mutiara) Hahaha. Tapi perjalanan kita masih panjang, kita masih harus menyebrang lautan untuk sampai ke lombok.

Hari 7 :
Kita sudah sampai lombok, perjalanan yang melelahkan.. fiuhh.. sampainya di lombok, kami pun pergi ke tempat Mutiara, lalu ke toko kain lombok untuk beli oleh2.. (Tapi yg beli cuma Bian sama oma doang) yang laen kaga. Hahaha. Setelah itu, kami berangkat menuju Denpasar Bali. Menyebrang lautan (lagi) Terlihat Nusa penida yang indah, Katanya bagus untuk diving disana. Kalo gw fikir, lautan Indonesia emang bagus2 koq, cuma agak sedikit kurang promosi aja, atau mungkin kita yg sebagai warga negara Indonesia yang masih Kurang peduli akan Wisata Bahari kita sendiri.
Sampailah di Bali... yeyeeee, senaaaang!! Tapi sayang nya, kita cuma waktu sebentar disini. Kita makan Malam di Nasi Pecel Bu Tinuk. Eniweiiii, "Today is Oma's Birthday" Di traktir lah sama si Janiar Sinaga si raja guk-guk. #eh
Setelah kenyang, check-in di Ngurah Rai Airport, dan nyempet2in pada beli oleh-oleh di bandara. Ga terasa, ADVENTURE was TOTALLY DONE!! Masih keleyengan laut, masih teringat cumi hasil mancing, masih teringat susah seneng bareng2 di kapal, masih teringat bikin bakwan di kapal buat bule2, masih teringat semua... Ini Pengalaman yang Berarti dan Berharga. Terimakasih Muradi's, Janiar, Bang Dul, dan semuanyaaa.. :)

Dan itulah Petualangan kami, Keluarga Muradi, Keluarga terlanjur kaya (Already rich family), wkwkwk *astagfirulloooohh
Kami senang, bahagia, dapet pengalaman baru, wawasan baru, berharga, dan lebih dari kata LUAR BIASA.
Terimakasih Lombok, NTB- NTT, Indonesia

gw cuma bisa bilang : "SEBARKAN PADA DUNIA KALAU NEGRIMU LAYAKNYA SURGA"

NB: Menurut penduduk setempat, wisatawan yg datang 90% Orang asing dan Hanya 10% orang Indonesia. Benar2 miris!! Kenapa kita yg punya keINDAHAN PANORAMA yg luar biasa tp kita gak bisa menghargai.

Visit Indonesia.

Religious Experiences Shrink Part of the Brain

The article, “Religious factors and hippocampal atrophy in late life,” by Amy Owen and colleagues at Duke University represents an important advance in our growing understanding of the relationship between the brain and religion. The study, published March 30 in PLoS One, showed greater atrophy in the hippocampus in individuals who identify with specific religious groups as well as those with no religious affiliation. It is a surprising result, given that many prior studies have shown religion to have potentially beneficial effects on brain function, anxiety, and depression.

A number of studies have evaluated the acute effects of religious practices, such as meditation and prayer, on the human brain. A smaller number of studies have evaluated the longer term effects of religion on the brain. Such studies, like the present one, have focused on differences in brain volume or brain function in those people heavily engaged in meditation or spiritual practices compared to those who are not. And an even fewer number of studies have explored the longitudinal effects of doing meditation or spiritual practices by evaluating subjects at two different time points.

In this study, Owen et al. used MRI to measure the volume of the hippocampus, a central structure of the limbic system that is involved in emotion as well as in memory formation. They evaluated the MRIs of 268 men and women aged 58 and over, who were originally recruited for the NeuroCognitive Outcomes of Depression in the Elderly study, but who also answered several questions regarding their religious beliefs and affiliation. The study by Owen et al. is unique in that it focuses specifically on religious individuals compared to non-religious individuals. This study also broke down these individuals into those who are born again or who have had life-changing religious experiences.

The results showed significantly greater hippocampal atrophy in individuals reporting a life-changing religious experience. In addition, they found significantly greater hippocampal atrophy among born-again Protestants, Catholics, and those with no religious affiliation, compared with Protestants not identifying as born-again.

The authors offer the hypothesis that the greater hippocampal atrophy in selected religious groups might be related to stress. They argue that some individuals in the religious minority, or those who struggle with their beliefs, experience higher levels of stress. This causes a release of stress hormones that are known to depress the volume of the hippocampus over time. This might also explain the fact that both non-religious as well as some religious individuals have smaller hippocampal volumes.

This is an interesting hypothesis. Many studies have shown positive effects of religion and spirituality on mental health, but there are also plenty of examples of negative impacts. There is evidence that members of religious groups who are persecuted or in the minority might have markedly greater stress and anxiety as they try to navigate their own society. Other times, a person might perceive God to be punishing them and therefore have significant stress in the face of their religious struggle. Others experience religious struggle because of conflicting ideas with their religious tradition or their family. Even very positive, life-changing experiences might be difficult to incorporate into the individual’s prevailing religious belief system and this can also lead to stress and anxiety. Perceived religious transgressions can cause emotional and psychological anguish. This “religious” and “spiritual pain” can be difficult to distinguish from pure physical pain. And all of these phenomena can have potentially negative effects on the brain.

Thus, Owen and his colleagues certainly pose a plausible hypothesis. They also cite some of the limitations of their findings, such as the small sample size. More importantly, the causal relationship between brain findings and religion is difficult to clearly establish. Is it possible, for example, that those people with smaller hippocampal volumes are more likely to have specific religious attributes, drawing the causal arrow in the other direction? Further, it might be that the factors leading up to the life-changing events are important and not just the experience itself. Since brain atrophy reflects everything that happens to a person up to that point, one cannot definitively conclude that the most intense experience was in fact the thing that resulted in brain atrophy. So there are many potential factors that could lead to the reported results. (It is also somewhat problematic that stress itself did not correlate with hippocampal volumes since this was one of the potential hypotheses proposed by the authors and thus, appears to undercut the conclusions.) One might ask whether it is possible that people who are more religious suffer greater inherent stress, but that their religion actually helps to protect them somewhat. Religion is frequently cited as an important coping mechanism for dealing with stress.

This new study is intriguing and important. It makes us think more about the complexity of the relationship between religion and the brain. This field of scholarship, referred to as neurotheology, can greatly advance our understanding of religion, spirituality, and the brain. Continued studies of both the acute and chronic effects of religion on the brain will be highly valuable. For now, we can be certain that religion affects the brain--we just are not certain how

The Fate of Greenland: Lessons from Abrupt Climate Change

by Philip W. Conkling, Richard Alley, Wallace Broecker and George Denton. MIT Press, 2011

Spanning more than 600,000 square miles, Greenland’s ice sheet is the largest outside Antarctica. But it is melting fast, with the thunderous sounds of icebergs calving off glaciers filling the air. This is not the first time Greenland has undergone abrupt climate change. Comparatively balmy temperatures in the 10th century allowed Norse settlers to colonize the area; the ensuing Little Ice Age coincided with their disappearance. In this book, illustrated with dramatic color photographs, four leading climate experts chronicle Greenland’s climate history and discuss what the current warming means for this frozen place and for the rest of the world.

ROCKS

Rocks are so common that most of us take them for granted—cursing when we hit them with the garden hoe or taking advantage of them to drive in tent pegs on summer camping trips.

But what exactly is a rock?

To geologists, a rock is a natural substance composed of solid crystals of different minerals that have been fused together into a solid lump. The minerals may or may not have been formed at the same time. What matters is that natural processes glued them all together.

There are three basic types of rock: igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic.

Extremely common in the Earth's crust, igneous rocks are volcanic and form from molten material. They include not only lava spewed from volcanoes, but also rocks like granite, which are formed by magma that solidifies far underground.

Typically, granite makes up large parts of all the continents. The seafloor is formed of a dark lava called basalt, the most common volcanic rock. Basalt is also found in volcanic lava flows, such as those in Hawaii, Iceland, and large parts of the U.S. Northwest.

Granite rocks can be very old. Some granite, in Australia, is believed to be more than four billion years old, although when rocks get that old, they've been altered enough by geological forces that it's hard to classify them.

Sedimentary rocks are formed from eroded fragments of other rocks or even from the remains of plants or animals. The fragments accumulate in low-lying areas—lakes, oceans, and deserts—and then are compressed back into rock by the weight of overlying materials. Sandstone is formed from sand, mudstone from mud, and limestone from seashells, diatoms, or bonelike minerals precipitating out of calcium-rich water.

Fossils are most frequently found in sedimentary rock, which comes in layers, called strata.

Metamorphic rocks are sedimentary or igneous rocks that have been transformed by pressure, heat, or the intrusion of fluids. The heat may come from nearby magma or hot water intruding via hot springs. It can also come from subduction, when tectonic forces draw rocks deep beneath the Earth's surface.

Marble is metamorphosed limestone, quartzite is metamorphosed sandstone, and gneiss, another common metamorphic rock, sometimes begins as granite.

GRAND TETONS

YELLOWSTONE

ZION RIVER

GRAND CANYON!

The Slow March of Big Earthquakes

When an earthquake strikes, the shaking doesn't start instantaneously. Instead, the most violent energy spreads out from the epicenter at a relatively modest 3.5 kilometers per second. So-called earthquake early warning systems use a specially designed network of seismic stations to detect the shaking closest to the epicenter and send an alert out to people at more distant locations.

In this video of a simulation conducted by the United States Geological Survey we see how a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on the Hayward Fault in California would spread throughout the eastern half of the San Francisco Bay Area. The video runs in real-time. (Note that the ground deformation in the right panel has been magnified by 1,000 times.) In this particular scenario we see that the strongest shaking does not arrive in Livermore, about 70 kilometers southeast of the epicenter, until 50 seconds after the earthquake begins. Even with a delay for detection and processing, an earthquake early warning system would give power plants, construction sites and schools well over 30 seconds of warning time.

People Were Chipping Stone Tools in Texas More Than 15,000 Years Ago

Some 15,500 years ago early nomadic North Americans had already set up camp near Buttermilk Creek in central Texas's hill country, where they left behind impressive array of stone tools and artifacts.

Such an old habitation predates the widespread toolmaking tradition known as Clovis, which spread across the continent some 12,800 to 13,100 years ago and was once thought to mark the first wave of settlers in the Americas. The find is "unequivocal proof for pre-Clovis occupation of America," said Steven Forman, of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

The area where the tools were found, northwest of Austin, must have been an appealing campsite for millennia, because it bears a record of nearly continuous occupation from 15,500 years ago. The discovery is detailed in a new study, published online March 24 in Science.

When the makers of these tools were using the site (from 15,500 to 13,200 years ago), the region would have been slightly cooler than it is today, probably by an average of about 5 to 6 degrees Celsius—"rather amiable at that time period," Lee Nordt, of Baylor University's Department of Geology and co-author of the new study, said in a press briefing on Wednesday. But the resources in the area were likely plentiful, added Michael Waters, of the Center for the Study of the First Americans at Texas A&M University in College Station and co-author of the new study. With the rich hill country around them, "it's not surprising people came back time and time again."

The people who left the tools and fragments described in the study were likely hunter–gatherers, passing through the site from time to time over thousands of years. "This was a mobile tool kit—something that was easily transported," Waters said.

The prevalence of Clovis style tools—epitomized by fine, fluted (grooved) stone points—across the continent had suggested to many archaeologists for decades that the groups who made these tools must have comprised the first wave of settlement in the Americas. This arrival would have placed the initial migration from northeastern Asia over the Bering Land Bridge and through the Arctic corridor that opened between ice sheets at some 15,000 years ago.

This latest tool evidence, however, suggests that people were already making and discarding stone tools about 15,500 years ago, which would mean that the migration likely occurred even earlier. "You'd have to get to central Texas, and that would probably take a little while," Waters said.

Waters argues that their find of 15,528 artifacts (made from chert, a flint-like rock), which span the 2,400 years before the accepted emergence of Clovis technology 13,100 years ago, is the nail in coffin of the theory that Clovis toolmakers were the first inhabitants of the New World, the so-called Clovis-first model. "This is almost like a baseball bat to the side of the head to the archaeological community to wake up," he said.

Pantai Koka, The Next Dream Beach

Nusa Tenggara Timur - Daratan Flores tidak henti-hentinya menawarkan pemandangan alam yang eksotis. Di tengah2 petualangan Cika menyusuri keindahan alam Flores, ternyata masih ada satu tempat yang sangat menarik namun sepertinya jarang dijamah manusia (tpi jangan berpikir tempatnya di alam gaib lho ya ). Sebenarnya sudah ada jalan menuju ke tempat ini,namun kurang banyak orang yang mengetahui tempat ini karena jalan masuknya agak kurang terlihat dan papan penunjuk arahnya sudah tidak jelas lagi menunjuk kea rah mana,hehe..


Tpi jangan khawatir,Cika bakal ngasi sedikit petunjuk untuk dapat mencapai lokasi ini. Dengan ditemani oleh seorang sahabat asli putra Flores, Cika memulai perjalanan menuju Pantai Koka, The Dream Beach dari kota Maumere. Dengan menyusuri jalan yang berkelok2 selama hampir 1 jam menuju arah Ende, akhirnya Cika tiba di Kecamatan Paga yang merupakan lokasi pantai ini. Nah, setelah mencapai Paga tinggal tengok2 ke kiri jalan, karena nantinya akan ada papan petunjuk arah menuju pantai. Pada saat nyari papan petunjuk jalan mesti focus, nda boleh lirik2 yg laen (apa coba ??? :p) karena ukuran papannya cukup kecil dan posisinya sudah tidak normal a.k.a mereng kanan kiri. Kalo nda nemu jalan menuju pantai,padahal kepala udah mereng kiri karena kelamaan nyari n tiba2 sudah sampai di gerbang perbatasan kota Maumere – Ende, itu artinya jalan menuju pantai udah lewat. Tpi jangan khawatir, lewatnya ga jauh ko, coba deh telusuri lagi jalan yg dilalui sebelumnya sambil nanya2 ke warga setempat, pasti deh ketemu.

Kalo udah nemu jalannya, berarti kurang lagi beberapa menit lagi temen2 bakal melihat pemandangan yang sangat indah dan menawan. Dengan hamparan pantai putih bersih dan birunya laut sangat menyejukkan dan menenangkan hati. Dari jalan utama, tinggal menelusuri jalan kecil selama kurang lebih 15 menit. Berhubung jalannya cukup kecil dan kondisinya kurang bagus, Cika saranin sebaiknya kesini naek sepeda motor, ato kalopun menggunakan mobil parkirnya di jalan utama saja trus jalan kaki. Tpi kalo udh yg mahir naek mobil n males jalan kaki, nda papa si naek mobil, cuman ya gitu kalo seandainya ada mobil papas an dari arah berlawanan mesti nyari tempat yg kosong biar mobilnya bisa lewat

Begitu sampai di Pantai Koka, hamparan pasir putih dan birunya laut sudah menyapa Cika dan seolah2 memanggil untuk menikmati keindahan yang ada. Tidak menyia2kan waktu, Cika langsung mengambil kamera Canon Powershoot kesayangan (kamera satu2nya si,hehe) untuk mengabadikan keajaiban alam yang sangat mempesona ini. Rasanya tidak cukup kalo hanya poto2 saja, mesti merasakan juga lembutnya belaian ombak Pantai Koka. Tapi kalo mau berenang disini paling ngga mesti sudah bisa berenang, coz ombaknya cukup besar, bahkan waktu Cika berenang tinggi ombak bisa mencapai 1,5 meter. Cucok banget buat yg hobi surfing.

Menikmati keindahan alam Pantai Koka seperti tiada habisnya, sayangnya keindahan ini belum dimanfaatkan secara optimal. Dalam bayangan Cika, seandainya jalannya diperlebar dan diperbaiki, papan petunjuk arah dibuat dengan design menarik dan permanen, ada fasilitas hotel/cottage, restaurant di pesisir pantai tentunya akan menambah pesona pantai ini. Apalagi ditambah dengan promosi wisata yang gencar ke mancanegara pasti akan semakin banyak wisatawan yang berminat untuk mengunjunjungi Pantai Koka dan tempat2 menarik lainnya di Flores.

PANTAI NGURBLOAT

MALUKU - Terletak di desa Ngilngof berjarak sekitar 17 km dari Tual terdapat sebuah pantai yang sangat indah dengan hamparan pasir putih yang halus seperti tepungyaitu pantai Ngurbloat. Pasir di pantai ini sangat halus seperti tepung...sungguh luar biasa, baru kali ini saya menjumpai pantai dengan pasir yang sangatputih bersih dan sehalus tepung.

Dan menurut informasi bahwasanya pasir di pantai Ngurbloat merupakan pantai dengan pasir paling halus di dunia.Banyangkan sungguh amat mengagumkan alam Indonesia.

Kata Ngurbloat ini sendiri berasal dari bahasa Kei yang berarti " Pasir Panjang". Pantai ini memanjang sekitar 3 km dengan dihiasi nyiur yang melambai -lambai ditiup angin menambah keindahan pantai Ngurbloat. Pantai ini sangat cocok untuk menikmati sunset, berjemur dan berenang.

Di sini juga terdapat guesthouse yang disewakan sehingga pengunjung bisa sejenak melepaskan kepenatan dalam aktifitas sehari - hari dengan menginap di pantai Ngurbloat. Untuk lebihmemanjakan wisatawan di sini juga terdapaat makanan tradisional seperti ikan bakar, embal dan sayur sir-sir.Embal adalah makanan tradisional yang terbuat dari singkong.

Untuk menuju pantai Ngurbloat dapat ditempuh dengan menggunakan mobil sewa seharga Rp 400,000,- sehari belum termasuk BBM, selama sekitar 30 menit dari kota Tual.

Seconds before the big one

Earthquakes are unique in the pantheon of natural disasters in that they provide no warning at all before they strike. Consider the case of the Loma Prieta quake, which hit the San Francisco Bay Area on October 17, 1989, just as warm-ups were getting under way for the evening’s World Series game between the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland A’s. At 5:04 p.m., a sudden slip of the San Andreas Fault shook the region with enough force to collapse a 1.5-mile section of a double-decker freeway and sections of the Bay Bridge connecting Oakland with San Francisco. More than 60 people died.

Over the years scientists have hunted for some signal—a precursory sign, however faint—that would allow forecasters to pin­point exactly where and when the big ones will hit, something that would put people out of harm’s way. After decades spent searching in vain, many seismologists now doubt whether such a signal even exists.

Ballerinas, Berlin

Ballerinas prepare to hit the stage at a theater in Berlin. In the past decade, an emergence of world-class ballerinas and choreographers has led to a rising interest in German ballet

Sunset falls on a Maasai boy on Kenya's Masai Mara National Reserve.

Beach and bush only begin to describe the variety of offerings awaiting visitors to this vaguely trapezoidal nation south of Sudan and Ethiopia whose southern edge slips into the Indian Ocean. • Often described as an Africa in miniature because it provides a taste of nearly all the continent's attractions, Kenya is peopled by a welter of different ethnic groups, each having arrived in one of countless migrations from the far corners of the continent and beyond. • Want to see the world's most intense traffic jam? Check out the wildebeest migration in the Masai Mara National Reserve

Indonesia facts

Indonesia is a vast equatorial archipelago of 17,000 islands extending 5,150 kilometers (3,200 miles) east to west, between the Indian and Pacific Oceans in Southeast Asia. The largest islands are Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo), Sulawesi, and the Indonesian part of New Guinea (known as Papua or Irian Jaya). Islands are mountainous with dense rain forests, and some have active volcanoes. Most of the smaller islands belong to larger groups, like the Moluccas (Spice Islands).

Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous nation, is 86 percent Muslim—and the largest Islamic country, though it is a secular state. Indonesians are separated by seas and clustered on islands. The largest cluster is on Java, with some 130 million inhabitants (60 percent of the country's population) on an island the size of New York State. Sumatra, much larger than Java, has less than a third of its people. Ethnically the country is highly diverse, with over 580 languages and dialects—but only 13 have more than one million speakers.

After independence from the Netherlands in 1945, the new republic confronted a high birthrate, low productivity, and illiteracy—areas in which progress has since been made. The government used a "transmigration" policy to address uneven population distribution by relocating millions of people from Java to other islands. Unity and stability are improving, although outer areas of the archipelago resent domination by Java. The Asian financial crisis hit Indonesia extremely hard. Public unrest, including violent rioting, forced President Suharto—in office since 1967—to resign in May 1998. One year later Indonesia conducted its first democratic elections since 1955.

The democratic government faces many problems after years of military dictatorship. Secessionists in the regions of Papua and Aceh (northwest tip of Sumatra) had been encouraged by East Timor's (now Timor-Leste) 1999 success in breaking away after 25 years of Indonesian military occupation. A 2005 peace agreement with Aceh separatists led to 2006 elections and a cooling of the tension. Militants on Papua still engage in a low-level insurgency. Militant Islamic groups have become active in recent years, and religious conflict between Muslims and Christians recently flared in Sulawesi and the Moluccas. The island of Bali, a center of Hindu culture, suffered a terrorist bomb blast in 2002 that killed more than 200 people—mostly tourists. Three years later, in 2005, the country was hit by the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami, which killed more than 220,000 Indonesians.

Export earnings from oil and natural gas help the economy, and Indonesia is a member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Tourists come to see the rich diversity of plants and wildlife—some, like the giant Komodo dragon and the Javan rhinoceros, exist nowhere else.

Lengkuas Island, Belitung. Indonesia

The Dutch built this lighthouse in 1882. The view from the tower is so beautiful, really beautiful, 360 degrees around the island.

South sulawesi, INDONESIA

SITU GUNUNG LAKE, INDONESIA :)

How far from Fukushima will fallout pose a health risk?

As the condition of the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station in Japan continues to deteriorate, nuclear safety experts, government regulators and health physicists are keeping close watch on the situation to determine the danger—both real and hypothetical—that the incident poses to people near the plant.

Japanese authorities have carved the area around Fukushima into two zones, recommending that individuals within 20 kilometers of the plant evacuate and that anyone living 20 to 30 kilometers from the plant take shelter and stay put. Nevertheless, after initially supporting that action the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) took the dramatic step March 16 of recommending that Americans within 80 kilometers of Fukushima Daiichi evacuate the area.

U.S. federal guidelines set a much smaller standard perimeter for radiation hazards, leaving some puzzled as to why U.S. authorities would recommend such a large evacuation zone for Japan. (The 80-kilometer radius is larger than that implemented for the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in what is now Ukraine, after which 115,000 people were evacuated within roughly 30 kilometers of the nuclear site.) And although radiation measurements in the vicinity of Fukushima have varied greatly, it appears that exposures outside the 20-kilometer radius have not exceeded levels that would be cause for action in the U.S.

The differences in the responses of the U.S. and Japan to the crisis highlight the lack of detailed information on the rapidly shifting condition of the crippled nuclear plant, the inexact science of predicting what might happen next, and the difficulty of weighing the risks and benefits of taking various types of protective action.

The NRC's recommendation for a widespread evacuation stems not from the present conditions but from projected radiation exposures in a worst-case scenario, according to agency spokesperson David McIntyre. "Basically it was projections by our protective measures team based on what information we had available, what was going on at the plant, weather conditions, and so on," McIntyre says. "They projected into the short-term future and reached the conclusion that in the near term people out to 50 miles [80 kilometers] would exceed the exposure levels at which we would recommend action."

U.S. guidelines recommend protective measures, usually evacuation, if individuals are expected to receive 10 to 50 millisieverts (mSv) of radiation. (A sievert is a measure of ionizing radiation equal to 100 rems; a rem is a dosage unit of x-ray and gamma-ray radiation exposure; one millisievert is 0.1 rem.) The average American absorbs 6.2 mSv a year from natural and man-made radiation sources.

In the U.S. each nuclear power plant is surrounded by an "emergency planning zone," extending 16 kilometers in each direction, which would bear the brunt of radioactive fallout from a nuclear accident. The U.S. regulations are predicated on the assumption that most partial meltdowns would not expose individuals beyond 16 kilometers to dangerous radiation levels, and that even in worst-case accidents "immediate life-threatening doses would generally not occur outside the zone."

Outside the immediate vicinity of the nuclear site the primary danger is not radiation emitted directly from the plant as high-energy photons or other subatomic particles but airborne radioactive material released from a damaged reactor into an atmospheric plume. The material in that plume, as it undergoes radioactive decay, gives off dangerous radiation primarily in the form of gamma rays and can pose additional hazards if inhaled, swallowed or absorbed through the skin to emit radiation from inside the body.

"Internal exposure is very different than contamination you can walk away from," says Jerrold Bushberg, a health and medical physicist at the University of California, Davis. "If there's a plume that passes overhead and some of the material precipitates down, you may be externally contaminated, but it's nothing that a change of clothes and a shower can't take care of."

The "shelter in place" recommendation made by Japanese authorities for individuals between 20 and 30 kilometers from Fukushima Daiichi is intended to minimize ingestion of radioactive material and to prevent skin and clothing from becoming contaminated as the plume deposits radionuclides around the area.

So far, those precautions seem to be sufficient. "Those are appropriate actions to take to keep the dose to the population below one rem," or 10 mSv, says Richard Vetter, a professor emeritus of biophysics at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. "If the actions are taken and the doses are in fact lower than one rem, they will experience no health effects. There's a possibility to calculate a statistical increase in cancer in that population, but those are below the levels at which epidemiological studies have shown an effect."

The Japan Broadcasting Corp. (NHK) reported March 17 that measurements registered radiation levels of 0.17 millisievert per hour at one location 30 kilometers northwest of the site. Those levels were anomalously high—at most other locations the levels were roughly 1 percent to 10 percent that much—and would have to persist for 60 hours to deliver 10 mSv of radiation. "Currently the levels over there are not that concerning," Vetter says.

What is more, expanding the size of the evacuation zone can have its own liabilities. "When you evacuate people, you have to make a risk-informed decision," says Stephen Musolino, a health physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y. "Evacuation is not always the best way to avoid a radiation dose." Sheltering in place is a very effective form of protection, Musolino says, because moving farther from the accident site does not necessarily mean escaping the radioactive plume. "The plume is going to generally go in one direction unless there's a wind shift," he says. "You could evacuate into the plume."

The NRC's McIntyre says that the recommendation for additional evacuations in Japan is not incompatible with the standard 16-kilometer evacuation plan for a U.S. accident. "The 10-mile [16-kilometer] zone was always conceived as something that could be expanded as the situation warranted," he says. McIntyre notes that the NRC's shift—from publicly backing Japan's handling of the accident to publicly recommending a much stronger response—stems from the fact everyone is reliant on the Japanese authorities for accurate, up-to-date information on the situation. "Part of this is the difficulty in obtaining and assessing data. We're dependent on the Japanese for the data, pretty much," he says. "We're trying to get the information and assess it. Yesterday the information we had led our team to conclude that it was time to take action."

Patricia Milligan, a health physicist with the NRC's Office of Nuclear Security and Incident Response, says that the evacuation assessment was "based on the great uncertainty surrounding the situation," including "some of the issues with communications surrounding the event." The Japanese recommendation, she says, "was certainly appropriate. Ours is much more conservative."

Whether or not a turn for the worse at Fukushima Daiichi would endanger residents beyond 20 kilometers, individuals in Tokyo, some 200 kilometers from Fukushima Daiichi, appear safe; those in the U.S. are almost surely beyond danger. "Tokyo is certainly at risk of having some radionuclides blown over in a plume," Vetter says. "I don't think they would be of sufficient concentrations to cause problems." Bushberg of U.C. Davis says it would be very unlikely that Tokyo would see any substantial harm from radioactive plumes. "That's a pretty significant distance," he says.

As for the reported runs on potassium iodide—a drug that blocks the uptake into the thyroid gland of radioactive iodine from fallout plumes—on the U.S. west coast, "I think that's being a little unnecessarily cautious," says Edward Christman, a health physics consultant with Christman Cua Associates in Princeton, N.J., and an assistant clinical professor at Columbia University.

"It's certain that at the moment there is no concern whatsoever for the west coast or Hawaii, for that matter," Bushberg says. "It would be hard to imagine a release so catastrophic that it would endanger people on the west coast."

Vetter notes that sensitive monitoring equipment in the U.S. may in fact detect fallout from Japan, but the levels will be negligible from a human health standpoint. "It's inconceivable that we would have health effects in this country as a result of this accident," he says.

sweet 16th JEWE :)

happy birthdaaaaayyyyy sweety, cuty, and super sexy pal. all the best for you, wish joy and happiness in your life ya jewee-ks. keep rocks girl!! God bless you :)

Fast Facts about the Japan Earthquake and Tsunami

Why was Japan's March 11 earthquake so big? One answer is the large size of the fault rupture as well as the speed at which the Pacific Plate is continuously thrusting beneath Japan, U.S. Geological Survey (U.S.G.S.) scientist Tom Brocher told KQED News. People felt shaking in cities all over Honshu, Japan's main island.

Below are some more facts and figures relating to the causes and consequences of the world's fifth-largest earthquake since 1900.

Magnitude, according to USGS: 9.0

Speed at which the Pacific Plate is smashing into the Japanese island arc: 8.9 centimeters (3.5 inches) per year

Speed at which the San Andreas Fault in California is slipping: about 4 centimeters per year

Size of the rupture along the boundary between the Pacific and North American plates: 290 kilometers (180 miles) long, 80 kilometers across

Approximate length of Honshu island: 1,300 kilometers

Years since an earthquake of this magnitude has hit the plate boundary of Japan: 1,200

Duration of strong shaking reported from Japan: three to five minutes

Greatest distance from epicenter that visitors to the USGS Web site reported feeling the quake: About 2,000 kilometers

Distance that the island of Honshu appears to have moved after the quake: 2.4 meters

Change in length of a day caused by the earthquake's redistribution of Earth's mass: 1.8 microseconds shorter

Normal seasonal variation in a day's length: 1,000 microseconds

Depth of the quake: 24.4 kilometers

Range of depths at which earthquakes occur in Earth's crust: 0 – 700 kilometers

Top speed of a tsunami over the open ocean: About 800 kilometers per hour

Normal cruising speed of a jetliner: 800 kilometers per hour

Length of warning time Sendai residents had before tsunami hit: eight to 10 minutes

Number of confirmed foreshocks to the main shock: four

Magnitudes of the confirmed foreshocks: 6.0, 6.1, 6.1 and 7.2

Number of confirmed aftershocks: 401

Worldwide average annual number of earthquakes over magnitude 6.0: 150

The Vampire Diaries

OOOOOOOOOOOO My God. almost all of my classmate are watchin #TVD and now we're so freakin out. can't hardly wait for next episode of season 2 :_( it'll be shows on april 17th. guess why, it's tooooooo looonngggggggg that i have to wait... :(

How to Cool a Nuclear Reactor

The 8.9 magnitude earthquake in Japan is causing problems for at least one of its fleet of nuclear reactors—and authorities have shut down 10 of the country's 55 units. Tokyo Electric Power confirmed that pressure had been rising inside reactor No. 1 at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on the northeast coast, one of the largest nuclear power plants in the world. That means cooling water is not getting to the reactor core, causing a build up of steam inside the containment vessel. The problem, according to Japanese media reports, is a loss of grid electricity to run the pumps that bring in cooling water. The backup diesel generators that are supposed to provide emergency power in that case are out of order, according to the Japan Atomic Industrial Forum, but replacements were being taken to the plant. (Similar diesel generators were providing power to the nation's Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant, which recycles spent nuclear fuel.)

As a precautionary measure, the Japanese government has declared a nuclear emergency and asked people living within three kilometers of the facility to evacuate and people living within 10 kilometers to remain indoors. Tokyo Electric Power, for its part, planned to vent some of the radioactive steam from inside the containment building.

Scientific American spoke with Scott Burnell, public affairs officer at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the government agency charged with monitoring the safety of the 104 nuclear reactors in the U.S., about what it takes to cool down a reactor.

The reactor that was not cooling properly in Japan, the Fukushima Daiichi No. 1 reactor, was a boiling-water type. How are these different from pressurized-water reactors in terms of cooling?
Particularly useful to boiling-water reactors is a system that is steam driven. It does not require an outside power source. Steam generated by the heat of a cooling down reactor has enough force to run a turbine, which then runs a pump that provides coolant to the core. That sort of system is supposed to withstand an earthquake, and that can run for an extended period. It's a self-limiting condition. That system does use batteries for the controls, but it can also be operated manually. So even in the face of a complete station blackout—you don't have any power at all—there are methods for using the steam-driven pump to continue to keep cooling going.

A Visual Tour of the Massive Earthquake and Tsunami That Hit Japan [Slide Show]

At 2:46 pm local time March 11, an 8.9-magnitude earthquake struck Sendai, a port city of one million residents in northeastern Japan. It was the largest earthquake recorded in Japan in the last century.

The earthquake razed entire towns, buckled highways and swayed skyscrapers as far away as Tokyo, 300 kilometers to the southwest. Four-meter-high walls of water charged through coastal cities, sweeping away cars and houses, and setting factories ablaze. Tsunami warnings were issued across the Pacific Rim.

BARCELOOONNNAAAAA <3

East Java

such a beautiful place :)

Evolution Abroad: Creationism Evolves in Science Classrooms around the Globe

As the familiar battles over evolution education continue to play out in U.S. state legislatures and school boards, other countries are facing very different dynamics. Much of the world lives outside of any law that requires separation of church and state, making creationism trickier to disentangle from public school curricula.

Many countries have only recently started taking a systematic look at how the topic of evolutionary theory and biology is addressed in classrooms. Early research suggests that not only does anti-evolution instruction make its way into science classes worldwide—from the European Union to Southeast Asia—but in many regions, it also seems to be on the rise.


"We've got to have teachers who understand the nature of science—what makes science a science and what makes theories so strong and robust," says James Williams, a science education instructor at the University of Sussex in England.

When evolution is challenged as "just a theory," he notes, even well-informed teachers and curriculum designers sometimes neglect to counter that theories (such as the theory of gravity or electromagnetic theory) are not hypotheses in want of further evidence, but rather the sturdiest truths and descriptions of how the material world works that science has to offer. In many places, though, the rise of more fundamentalist belief systems—and the politicization of those beliefs—is jeopardizing progress toward stronger science instruction. The landscape of evolution instruction around the globe is a varied and rapidly changing one, impacting students from Canada to China. Here is a look at where the issue stands in the U.K. and E.U., and in some countries with majority Islamic populations.

A late introduction to Darwin in the U.K.
Even as the home country of Charles Darwin, the U.K. leaves formal evolution education until ages 14 to 16, which, Williams says, is "very late to start thinking about it." And when evolution is introduced in biology classes, it is kept as a relatively separate topic. "To me that's odd—it's like trying to teach chemistry but not putting atoms at the center," he notes.


Introducing the concepts of evolutionary theory at an earlier age and keeping them more central to the curriculum could help to solidify the topic in students' minds and minimize the opportunity for misconceptions to arise, he notes. "When somebody has a misconception in science, if it's embedded, it's incredibly difficult to change."

Williams says that he has noticed a slow increase in the quantity of creationist teaching in the U.K., but it is still mostly at parochial schools and newer "free schools" (which are similar to U.S. charter schools in that they are government-funded but free from many of the regulatory strictures applied to public schools). But that does not mean that the issue does not come up in the public school classroom. In one survey around 40 percent of teachers reported being challenged by students about evolution, suggesting that there needs to be solid training for U.K. teachers whose general "understanding of evolution is very, very poor," Williams says.

Some U.K. pro–intelligent design (ID) groups are also pushing to include "alternatives" to evolution in the country's national curriculum. One group, known as Truth in Science, calls for allowing such ideas to be presented in science classrooms—an angle reminiscent of "academic freedom" bills that have been introduced in several U.S. states. A 2006 overhaul of the U.K. national curriculum shifted the focus of science instruction to highlight "how science works" instead of a more "just the facts" approach. Although the update has been positive in some respects, it also creates more room for purportedly science-based groups that back ID to try to introduce alternative viewpoints of life's origin—in the name of critical thinking and classroom analysis. A healthy classroom debate about alternative energy sources or even the mechanisms of evolution, Williams suggests, is a great use of the newer approach to teaching science. But framing a biology classroom discussion about whether evolution occurs should not be allowed, he says.

Wedneshitday

what a day. we have to create this blog to get a score............ enjoy --"

Ian Somerhalder

Early Life and Career

Somerhalder was born and raised in Covington, Louisiana, the son of Edna, a massage therapist, and Robert Somerhalder, an independent building contractor. He embarked on a modeling career from age 10 to 13, and by the age of 17 he decided to go into acting.