Author: Navasardian Karapet

The New York Times
July 4, 2006 Tuesday
Late Edition – Final

Ballet Medals Awarded In International Contest

By JENNIFER DUNNING

JACKSON, Miss., July 2

The cream of Jackson society was at Thalia Mara Hall on Saturday
night for the Olympic-style awarding of medals to the winners of the
eighth USA International Ballet Competition.

Senator Trent Lott, Republican of Mississippi, stood up from the
audience for a bow and stayed until the end of the gala event. A
starting field of 121 dancers from 27 countries had been narrowed to
13 medalists from 8 nations, with fans muttering about who had been
”robbed,” and ballet students screaming for their favorites. There
were corporate prizes like that from Tutu.com and the TutusDivine
Awards in addition to medals and other honors. Twenty-seven years
after its promising but rather down-home start, the Jackson
competition has clearly arrived.

It all began in 1975 when Ms. Mara, a dance writer and teacher who
died in 2003, was invited to Jackson to develop professional ballet
in the city. There were then no other international competitions in
America. Jackson was far from being a major dance city, and besides,
it was so very hot there in the summer.

But Ms. Mara brought in big ballet guns like Robert Joffrey, who had
a lot of experience with ballet contests throughout the world. The
city went into full-gear Southern hospitality mode. Today the event,
held every four years, is one of six major international ballet
contests around the world, including the biannual New York
International Ballet Competition. Ten of the 13 junior (15 to 18
years old) and senior (19 to 26) medalists had won honors in at least
two other international competitions.

American competitions now lure the subculture of professional
contestants. A performance of the ”Black Swan” pas de deux from
”Swan Lake,” danced by Misa Kuranaga of Japan, who won the senior
gold medal, and Daniel Sarabia (both of the Boston Ballet), was so
coolly polished that it looked out of place in a competition program.

But something surprising happened on Saturday night. The two demons
of international competitions — hard-sell bravura dancing and
flirtatious contemporary ballet solos for male competitors — were
much less in evidence. And the highlight of the gala, which rightly
drew the cheering audience to its feet in the evening’s only standing
ovation, was an astonishing performance of the pas de deux from ”Le
Corsaire” by Joseph Michael Gatti, a senior bronze medalist from the
United States, and Adiarys Almeida Santana, a Cuban finalist, both in
their early 20’s and soloists at the Cincinnati Ballet.

Mr. Gatti and Ms. Santana managed to make technical feats that would
have been astounding from much more experienced virtuoso performers
look like the purest and most honest ballet dancing. The tricks were
all there — dazzling multiple turns, most of all — but they were
delivered with a lack of affectation and with seamless, fluid
finishes that made rare artistry of the gimmicks.

The men tended to outdance the women this year. (No women’s junior
gold medal was awarded.) One exception was Sasha De Sola, the
16-year-old winner of the Junior Best Couple Award, with her fellow
American Mathias Dingman as her partner, who brought an intriguing
delicacy to steely bravura dancing in the pas de deux from ”Flames
of Paris.” Jurgita Dronina (senior silver, Lithuania) stood out for
the stylishness of her dancing in an excerpt from the ”Sleeping
Beauty” grand pas de deux.

But even more impressive was the easy virtuosity of the male
medalists, among them Jeffrey Cirio (junior bronze, United States);
Masayoshi Onuki (senior bronze, United States); Isaac Hernandez
(junior gold, Mexico); and Brooklyn Mack (senior silver, United
States).

Another reassuring sign was the performance by Daniil Simkin, a
19-year-old German senior gold medalist, an audience favorite and the
winner of the TutusDivine Award, who made something almost charming
of ”Les Bourgeois,” a coy solo choreographed by Ben Van Cauwenbergh
to music by Jacques Brel.

The contemporary choreography was lackluster, with the exception of
”September,” created by Ben Lida, who won an award for the witty
piece, danced by Yui Yonezawa (senior bronze, Japan), and Georgi
Smilevski.

The medalists also included Christine Shevchenko (junior bronze,
United States); Denys Cherevychko (junior silver, Ukraine); Sae-Eun
Park (junior silver, South Korea); and Kayo Sasabe (junior bronze,
Japan). The award for best senior couple was given to Davit
Karapetyan of Armenia and Vanessa Zahorian, his noncompeting partner.

For the record, Japan and the United States tied for the most medals
(four each), with one each going to Germany, Lithuania, Mexico,
Ukraine and South Korea.

ARMENIAN DELEGATION TO TAKE PART IN AN EXHIBITION OF ARMS IN MOSCOW

Yerevan, August 3. ArmInfo. The delegation of the Republic of
Armenia will take part in the international "MVSV-2006" military
equipment exhibition, started yesterday in Moscow. The exhibition
is dedicated to the 15-th anniversary of the formation of the CIS –
Commonwealth of Independent States, and is sponsored by the Defense
Ministry of Russia. The Defense Ministry informed ArmInfo that the
Armenian delegation will be lead by Deputy-Minister for Defense Yuri
Khachaturov. The main exposition is placed on the whole are of the
Pan-Russian Exhibition Center, and the other part of the program will
be represented on a polygon in the suburbs of Moscow. It is expected
that over 400 exponents from over 10 states of the world will take
part in the exhibition

Representatives of Belarus, Great Britain, France, Poland, UAE,
Israel, Ukraine, Japan will be present to the event. Also delegations
from Indonesia, China, India, Malaysia, Jordan, Venezuela, Myanma,
Uganda, Egypt, Ethiopia, Algeria, Libya, Angola, Kongo, Finland,
Yemen, Greece, Iran, Bulgaria and other states.

Racist Vandalism in Rostov

Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union, DC
Aug 2 2006

Vandals smashed windows and painted racist graffiti inside the Museum
of Russian-Armenian Friendship in Rostov, according to an August 2,
2006 report by the Sova Information-Analytical Center. The museum is
located inside an Armenian church. Vandals wrote "Russia for Russians"
and "Beat the khachi" (a pejorative for Armenians) on the walls and
set a fire to some windows. Police are investigating the incident.

ANASTAS AGHAZARIAN APPOINTED MEMBER OF RA STATE COUNCIL ON STATISTICS

YEREVAN, AUGUST 1, NOYAN TAPAN. By RA President Robert Kocharian’s
July 27 decree, Hrachia Petrosian was dicharged the post of a member
of the RA State Council on Statistics on the occasion of the end
of his officiating term. According to the information submitted to
Noyan Tapan by the RA President’s Press Office, bya another decree,
Anastas Aghazarian was appointed a member of the RA State Council
on Statistics.

Azerbaijani President held deliberation on the activity of the government in I half of 2006

Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan –
July 31, 2006

Today Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev held deliberation on the
activity of the government in I half of 2006. (APA).

Making a speech at the deliberation, Azerbaijani president spoke
of the works implemented within this year in the country, increase
of economic development, execution condition of state program for
social- economic development of the regions. During the deliberation
dealing with Nagorno Garabagh conflict, the President stated that
he continues negotiations within OSCE Minsk Group frame for removing
the problem. "Neither today nor tomorrow we will not let separation
of Nagorno Garabagh from the composition of Nagorno Garabagh, and
not agree with the term providing separation of Nagorno Garabagh from
Azerbaijan. Everybody knows it." Ilham Aliyev stated positive approach
to talks within Prague process for the settlement of the conflict.

In the meeting finance minister Samir Sharifov, taxes minister Fazil
Mammadov, economic development minister Heydar Babayev, National
Bank Managing Staff chairman Elman Rustamov, minister of agriculture
Ismat Abbasov, Minister of culture and tourism Abulfaz Garayev, and
minister of communication and information technologies Ali Abbasov
gave information to the state head about the works implemented within
6 month of this year.

The state head gave errands to government members on protection of
macro-economy stability, liquidation of possible inflation danger,
strengthening of control to budget, simplifying of mortgage, and
shortages in payment for the expenses on energy conductors’ and public
utilities fee./APA/

I HAVE NO GOVERNMENT. I’M A DISENFRANCHISED AMERICAN.

OpEd News
July 31, 2006

By Linda Milazzo

I do not kill babies. I do not kill children. I do not condone
ANY circumstance that ends the life of a child or brings harm to
innocents downed in the cross hairs of adult perversion. There is NO
circumstance whatsoever that legitimizes the murder of children. The
term "collateral damage" ascribed to dead children or to the shredded
bodies of living children is hideous.

The rite of passage from childhood to adulthood relinquishes the right
to such irresponsibility. The whole process of maturation teaches the
protection of children at all costs. Animals, both wild and domestic,
abide by these instincts unconditionally. It is the aberrant adult dog
who kills a puppy. And on the rare occasion such anomaly occurs, it
confounds attendant humans due to the sheer unnaturalness of the act.

Our expectation for the compassion of canines transcends like
expectations we hold for ourselves.

In the current debacle between Israel and Hezbollah, with the
mounting deaths of Lebanese children, it is unconscionable for
Israel to justify murdering these children by labeling them embeds of
Hezbollah. One should convulse in shame at the insidiousness of such
a declaration. To publicly declare the right to kill a child using
proximity as exoneration of guilt, forfeits any claim to humanity. To
willingly betray the life of a child, betrays every principal learned
during the "normal" ascendancy from child to adult.

To these self-righteous ideologues I say: MAY YOU ENVISION FOR YOUR
LIFETIMES THE FACES OF EVERY INFANT AND CHILD YOU HAVE SLAIN FOR YOUR
CAUSE! What a pernicious badge of inhumanity.

Sadly, this badge of inhumanity isn’t only worn by Israel who slays
the children of Lebanon. Or by the Hezbollah who slay the children
of Israel. It is worn by the Sudanese, who willingly decimate the
children of Darfur. It is worn by the Congolese soldiers who savage
the children of Congo. It was worn a dozen years earlier in Rwanda,
when willing Hutus murdered hundreds of thousands of Tutsi children in
a span of 100 days. The same badge of inhumanity was worn in Bosnia
by the Serbs who murdered Muslim children, by the Turks who murdered
Armenian children, by the Nazis who murdered Jewish children, and on
and on and on.

Throughout the history of un-civilization, the badge of inhumanity
has been worn by one genocidal ideology after another.

Shamefully, this very same badge of inhumanity is also worn by the
United States, where I live. Where the Government’s decision to
willingly overtake the nation of Iraq has triggered the murders of
tens of thousands of children. And where the ideological refusal to
support a ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel willingly adds to the
murders of Lebanese and Israeli children each and every day.

Even though Hezbollah has stated its willingness to honor a ceasefire
with Israel, Mr. Bush, along with his former incompetent National
Security Advisor and current incompetent Secretary of State, Condoleeza
Rice, believes Israel has the right to pursue its arbitrary barrage
on Lebanon, with no neighborhood, no apartment building, no hospital,
no school, no market, removed from its artillery sights.

As a resident of the United States, I am by default, in the eyes of
the world, a presumed willing supporter of the murders of Lebanese
and Israeli children. The President of this nation and members of
both Houses of Congress overwhelmingly endorse the continued military
assault by Israel upon Lebanon, which indiscriminately kills more
children every day. Just as Israelis presume the people of Lebanon
endorse Hezbollah when they share the same region, the world will
presume I endorse Mr. Bush when we share the same nation.

More egregiously, just as Israelis and Hezbollah sacrifice each
other’s children for the ‘crime’ of shared terrain, so one day may
America’s children be sacrificed for sharing terrain with the world’s
most undeniably hated man, George W. Bush.

Horrifying, but not unlikely, if Bush is allowed to stay on.

As the daughter of a Jewish American mother and Italian American
father, a second generation American living in the United States,
I am bound by the laws of this nation, governed by its regulatory
agencies, and represented to the world by its elected officials. But
when the beliefs and behaviors of those elected officials are in
constant moral opposition to my own, I can no longer permit them to
represent me. I refuse to have the citizens of the world, my global
brothers and sisters, believe I am a willing partner to imperial
atrocities. Worst of all, to the murder of children.

If one unquestioningly subscribes to the mantra "America, love it or
leave it," one is blind to the more essential mantra, "Humanity, love
it or grieve it." My refusal to be morally distorted by George W.

Bush can only be accomplished by relinquishing all connection to
his governance. As of now, I don’t know how to categorize the state
of residing in a nation as a full citizen while not governed by its
leadership. I didn’t vote for this leadership and I’m not willing
to remain a voiceless mass falsely portrayed by the Bush imperial
regime. I must somehow broadcast beyond the borders of America
that residing within its boundaries are millions of leaderless,
unrepresented lovers of peace trying unceasingly to win back their
nation. Not just to save America. But to save the whole world. To
save the children. The children.

For now, I’ll contend I’m a Bush government ex-patriot living in the
United States. I won’t seek out another nation. This is MY nation and
I’m a viable entity within it. I uphold its Constitution. I pay my
taxes. I make my living. I honor my neighbors. I feel no superiority
to those beyond its borders. I share conscientiously in our nation
and our planet.

But I have NO GOVERNMENT. I’m a disenfranchised American. George
Bush doesn’t know my heart. He’s never looked in my eyes and seen my
"soul." If he did look in my eyes, he’d see a disenfranchised American
looking back. Not with warmth or admiration. Not as a member of his
electorate. But as an ex-patriot of his government who resides within
the nation. A disenfranchised American.

America, leave it or SEIZE IT. Humanity, know it and show it. Save
the children!! Save the children!! Save the children!!

In Lebanon. In Israel. In Iraq. In sub-Saharan Africa. In Aceh,
Indonesia. In Haiti. In the Dominican Republic. In South and Central
America. In North America.

Save the children… the way adults are supposed to do.

(cross-posted on winogradwatchdog.com)

Linda Milazzo is a Los Angeles based writer, educator and activist.

Her writing has appeared in numerous newspapers, magazines and
domestic and international journals. She’s a member of CodePink
Women For Peace and Progressive Democrats of America. Over the past
three decades Linda has divided her time between the entertainment
industry, community projects and education. A political and
social activist since the Vietnam War, Linda attributes her
revitalized-fully-engaged-intense-head-on-non- stop-political activism
to the UNFORTUNATE EXISTENCE OF GEORGE W. BUSH and her disgust
with greed-ridden American imperialism, environmental atrocities,
egregious war, nuclear proliferation, lying leaders, and global
tyranny. Whew… try saying that one three times fast…

inda_mi_060731_i_have_no_government.htm

PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
Communication and Information Department
Contact: V.Rev.Fr.Krikor Chiftjian, Communications Officer
Tel: (04) 410001, 410003
Fax: (04) 419724
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:

PO Box 70 317
Antelias-Lebanon

Armenian version:

&quo t;ISRAEL MUST STOP ITS MASSACRE OF LEBANESE PEOPLE"
Stated His Holiness Aram I

"What has happened this morning in Kana, South Lebanon by Israel, is
outrages, inhuman and against the international law and conventions" said
His Holiness Aram I in a statement made to the international press. "I
simply don’t understand how Israel describes as ‘a technical error’ the
shelling with his advanced and sophisticated war machine a building where
children, women, seek and disable people have taken refuge. All sorts of
justification or clarification provided by Israel are unacceptable in the
face of this human tragedy" said His Holiness.

Speaking about the Israeli attack on Lebanon of the last three weeks, Aram I
said: "Was it a ‘technical error’ the shelling by Israel the UN observer
post in South Lebanon, which took the lives of four UN observers? Was it ‘a
technical error’ the pounding of the civilian cars, ambulances, and trucks
carrying humanitarian aid to the refugees? Was it ‘a technical error’ the
destruction of roads, bridges, electricity supplying centers and
infrastructures? Was it ‘a technical error’ of bombarding buildings which
housed hundreds of families?"

Then His Holiness emphatically stated: "This war must stop. It must stop
immediately and without any condition. Innocent people are being killed,
families are being destroyed; Lebanon is on the brink of collapse and people
are still dealing with diplomacy. One cannot remain indifferent before human
slaughter. Life is sacred. It is a gift of God. We must protect human life
by all means. The UN and the powers of this world must act on this firm
basis. This is the realistic way of dealing responsibly with this complex
and critical situation. First protection of life and only then creation of
proper conditions for diplomacy and for the settlement of the conflict.
Therefore, I join my voice to that of the Spiritual Leaders, both Moslem and
Christian, of Lebanon, to appeal to the international community, for an
immediate cease-fire", said His Holiness.

In his concluding remarks Aram I said: "We pray for these innocent people,
the new martyrs of Lebanon. May God accept them in His heavenly Kingdom".

##
The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the history and
mission of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of the
Catholicosate, The Cilician Catholicosate, the
administrative center of the church is located in Antelias, Lebanon.

Death, by any other name

The Straits Times (Singapore)
July 30, 2006 Sunday

By Janadas Devan

ON WORDSCONCENTRATION camp – the phrase automatically conjures in

our minds Auschwitz and Dachau, Buchenwald and Treblinka.

Actually, the phrase first occurred in English in the late 19th

century, long before the Nazis came on the scene. It was first

applied to the camps that the British established in South Africa

during the 1899-1902 Second Boer War.

Modelled on the camps the Spanish set up in Cuba in 1895 to

‘concentrate’ rural populations in settlements from which

anti-Spanish Cuban insurgents could be excluded, the South

African camps were established in areas where Boer guerillas were

active. Their intent was both humanitarian – to protect Boer

civilians from the ravages of war – as well as anti-insurgency –

to deny guerillas the aid and support of civilians. In the event,

the camps failed on both counts, for thousands of South Africans

confined in them died from disease and malnutrition.

The British had better luck with concentration camps in the

Malayan Emergency – though, of course, by then they were no

longer called ‘concentration camps’ but ‘New Villages’. Like the

Boer War camps, these villages were meant to concentrate the

rural population (in this case, more than 500,000 Chinese

Malayans) in secure locations so as to deny Malayan Communist

Party insurgents support and sustenance. The United States tried

the same scheme during the Vietnam War, but, lacking the

experience and skill of the British, its ‘Strategic Hamlet

Project’ in South Vietnam failed.

In what category would one place Palestinian refugee camps?

Serviced by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA),

there are 59 such camps today, spread across Jordan, Lebanon,

Syria, the West Bank and Gaza. The UN designates more than four

million Palestinians as refugees. Some camps were established as

long ago as 1949, following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, their

original occupants long dead, only to be replenished by their

descendants and fresh refugees from successive Arab-Israeli wars.

They certainly do not resemble by any stretch of the imagination

Nazi death camps. But nor do they resemble British Malaya’s ‘New

Villages’. They resemble most the original concentration camps,

the ones the British established in South Africa more than a

century ago – places of refuge that turned malignant. Only, in

this case, the malignancy is not biological but ideological.

Why is the world surprised that virulent organisations like Hamas

and Hizbollah thrive in the Middle East?

GENOCIDE – the word derives from the Greek genos, people or race,

and the Latin cida, cidium or caedere, kill. The Oxford English

Dictionary defines it thus: ‘The deliberate and systematic

extermination of an ethnic or national group.’

That has occurred countless times over the centuries, but the

word was first coined only in 1943 by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish

Jewish scholar, in his book Axis Rule In Occupied Europe. And it

became a definable crime under international law only in 1945,

when it appeared in the third count of the United Nations’

indictment of 24 Nazi leaders.

HOLOCAUST – from the Greek holos, whole, and kaustos, burnt, thus,

holokauston, a sacrifice to the gods consumed wholly by fire.

Unlike genocide, this is an old word, occurring first in English

in 1250. William Tindale used it in his 1526 translation of the

Bible (‘A greater thynge than all holocaustes and sacrifises,’

Mark 12:33), as did John Milton in his 1671 Samson Agonistes

(‘Like that self-begotten bird/ In the Arabian woods embossed,/

That no second knows nor third,/ And lay erewhile a holocaust’).

The word did not have the connotation it does now.

In the 19th century it was applied to catastrophes in general,

and by 1950 it came to refer specially to Nazi Germany’s

extermination of Jews, Romani, Serbs and other ‘undesirables’. An

estimated 12 million people were killed during the Holocaust,

about half of them Jews. Israelis prefer to use the term Shoah,

‘calamity’ in Hebrew, to refer to the Nazi genocide because

‘holocaust’, with its suggestion of a sacrifice or offering to

the gods, seems offensive.

‘Never again’ – Israelis can say that, and make it stick, in part

because we have a word for the calamity that occurred in mid-20th

century Europe (Holocaust or Shoah), and a definable term in

international law to describe such crimes (genocide).

What recourse did persecuted peoples have before we got such

words? Consider what happened in Turkey between 1914 and 1918,

when 1.2 million to 1.5 million Christian Armenians died,

according to the estimates of most international scholars. (The

Turkish authorities cite a lower figure – 600,000 – and claim

most of the deaths were due not to state-sponsored killings, but

to disease and famine.)

H.G. Wells does not mention the event in his Outline Of History,

published just two years after the worst of the killings were

over in 1918. Nor does J.M. Roberts in his History Of The World,

first published in 1976.

Amazingly, Wells’ last mention of the Armenians in his History is

a reference to their role in transmitting the Black Death to

Europe. ‘It passed by Armenia to Asia Minor,’ he tells us of the

pestilence. ‘It reached England in 1348. Two-thirds of the

students at Oxford died.’ Oh my! The death of half the Armenians

in the Ottoman Empire certainly pales by comparison.

Roberts simply reports: ‘With Bolshevik help (Mustafa Kemal)

crushed the Armenians.’

It was not till recently that historians took to describing what

happened to the Armenians as ‘genocide’. Before, it was at best

the ‘Armenian Massacre’ or the ‘Great Calamity’. Never again –

somehow ‘massacre’ or ‘calamity’ isn’t as efficacious in making

that stick as ‘genocide’ or ‘Holocaust’.

What words do Palestinians have to describe the disasters that

have befallen them? Nothing like the Holocaust visited them, no

genocide, but they were afflicted by terrible disasters

nevertheless.

In 1917, there were 690,000 Palestinians in Palestine, compared

to 85,000 Jews. When Israel was established in 1948, about

700,000 Palestinians became refugees. Palestinians refer to 1948

as al-nakba, Arabic for ‘catastrophe’.

Every American and European, including US President George W.

Bush, would have heard of the ‘Holocaust’. How many, including Mr

Bush, would have heard of al-nakba? And if they have heard of the

term – which continues to resonate powerfully in the Arab mind –

how many would be moved by it?

New York Times columnist Tom Friedman wrote yesterday: ‘There

will be no new Middle East – not as long as the New Middle

Easterners, like Rafik Hariri, the former Lebanese prime

minister, get gunned down; not as long as Old Middle Easterners,

like (Hizbollah leader) Nasrallah, use all their wits and

resources to start a new Arab-Israeli war rather than build a new

Arab university; and not as long as Arab media and intellectuals

refuse to speak out clearly against those who encourage their

youth to embrace martyrdom with religious zeal rather than meld

modernity with Arab culture. Without that, we are wasting our

time and the Arab world is wasting its future.’

All that is profoundly true. But it is also profoundly true that

we are wasting their time if we do not acknowledge their

memories. Al-nakba – the catastrophe will continue to lay waste

the Middle East till there is an independent Palestine next to

Israel. Neither Jews nor Palestinians can have a future by

refusing to acknowledge the past of the other.

‘If you prick us, do we not bleed?’ A Jew, Shakespeare’s Shylock,

asked that.

Before You Leave Cashmere, Wash.

The Sunday Oregonian (Portland, Oregon)
July 23, 2006 Sunday
Sunrise Edition

KATHRYN KURTZ, Special to The Oregonian

Liberty Orchards is the birthplace of Aplets & Cotlets candy and not
to be missed before you leave Cashmere.

The story of this candy grew from immigration, friendship, patriotism,
innovation –and too much fruit. Specifically Armenia, World War I
and surplus apples.

It began early last century in Seattle. Two Armenian immigrants –Armen
Tertsagian and Mark Balaban –became friends. These new American
entrepreneurs found little success making yogurt or running an ethnic
restaurant, so they headed for drier weather and new opportunities east
of the Cascades. In the vale of Cashmere at the edge of the Cascades,
Tertsagian and Balaban bought an apple orchard and named it Liberty
in celebration of their new adopted country.

To survive tough financial times and make use of surplus fruit during
World War I, they began making apple-plum jam and drying apples. The
dried fruit went to nourish American soldiers overseas. Soon, a
longing for the Near Eastern fruit candies they had loved as kids
took them into the kitchen to cook.

By 1920 their experiments with apples and English walnuts became the
distinctive candy they named Aplets, followed soon by Cotlets, made
from apricots and nuts. The cornstarch and powdered-sugar-dusted,
two-bite, jellylike candies haven’t changed much in 86 years.

Liberty Orchards no longer grows fruit, buying instead from local
farmers. President Greg Taylor, grandson of a founder, runs the
company; all the stockholders are family members. Twenty-eight
flavors of fruit candy are made, among them peach, blueberry, grape
and raspberry, as well as nut-free, sugar-free and chocolate-covered
varieties.

Visitors can tour the factory, including the nut-sorting room, kitchen
and packaging room. Free samples inevitably lead to purchases at the
Candy Store.

Before you leave: Tour Liberty Orchards and buy a box of Aplets &
Cotlets.

Where: 117 Mission Ave., Cashmere, Wash.

Hours: 8 a.m.-5:30 p.m. weekdays, 10 a.m.-4:30 p.m. weekends. Free
15-minute tours leave every 20 minutes.

More info: 1-800-888-5696,

Before You Leave appears on the fourth Sunday of the month
in Destinations. Reach Kathryn Kurtz, a freelance writer, via
[email protected].

A brutal, competitive world

The Independent – United Kingdom; Jul 30, 2006

The tragic case of Jessie Gilbert has shed new light on the world of
competitive chess, which, far from the genteel, intellectual pastime
many consider it, can often be brutal, exhausting and fiercely
competitive.

Just last month, at the Chess Olympiad in Turin, two grandmasters –
England’s Danny Gormaly and Armenia’s Levon Aronian – took their
rivalry to a new level when Gormaly, 30, reportedly punched Aronian in
the face. The dispute, thought to be sparked by rivalry over female
grandmaster Arianne Caoili, demonstrated the pressure-cooker
atmosphere of major chess tournaments.

Chess prodigies can run an increased risk of emotional or social
problems as they grow up, says Linda Blair, clinical psychologist at
the University of Bath. She said it was not their high spatial ability
that was the problem, but the way people, particularly parents,
responded to and focused on that ability. Too often, this resulted in
the best players being seen as eccentric or "loners". JT