Sparrow: I’m feeling good
The indomitable spirit that catapulted him to calypso supremacy still resides in the Mighty Sparrow (Dr Slinger Francisco) in his recovery effort from a diabetic coma that put him in hospital in Queen’s New York, last September.
In a three-way telephone conversation that included founder of the Sunshine Awards Gilman Figaro last Friday night, the Birdie, now convalescing in a therapy facility in Brooklyn, and clearly in a jovial mood, sang, joked and gave the assurance that he is progressing steadily on the road to recovery.
“Let my fans in Trinidad and Tobago know that the Calypso King of the World, the supreme serenader, the one-and-only Mighty Sparrow is feeling good, and ready to take on all comers in 2014,” he said with trademark bravado, before treating us to a verse and chorus of his 1992 classic Man Will Survive. He then informed that he will be appearing on a programme to be staged at Melanie’s, an upscale restaurant/bar catering to West Indians, on Fulton Avenue, Brooklyn, this Saturday.
“I am choosing my repertoire carefully for this event, as it will also be a form of thanksgiving to the Almighty for granting me an extension of life after all I have been through the past months,” he said. Figaro, who has been a constant visitor to the bard at the facility, said Sparrow has never seemed depressed since coming out of the coma. “He always exhibits a very cheerful attitude, and is well loved and admired by the nursing staff there,” he said.
Last week, Sparrow said: “They think I am strong enough for air travel and to return home. I plan to return home very early in February and I will be performing for Carnival at Tuco Kaiso House in the Queen’s Park Savannah, Port-of-Spain.”
Source-Guardian Media
Pharrell Williams reclaims UK singles chart pinnacle
US star Pharrell Williams has returned to the number one spot in the UK singles chart with his track Happy.
Last week the singer was dislodged from pole position by Pitbull and Kesha, who have been pegged back to second place.
Ellie Goulding retained her hard-earned number one spot in the album chart with Halcyon, ahead of Beyonce's self-titled collection.
The British singer spent a staggering 65 weeks in the rundown before securing the accolade.
Elsewhere on the singles chart, Beyonce cracked the top 10 with Drunk in Love, a collaboration with her husband Jay-Z.
It secures the 16th top 10 single of her career, according to the Official Charts Company.
Swedish DJ and producer Avicii remained steady at three with Hey Brother, and Jason Derulo stayed in fourth place with Trumpets.
Fuse ODG leapt into the top 10 at number five with Million Pound Girl (Badder Than Bad), scoring his highest UK singles chart placing to date.
In the albums rundown, Gary Barlow slipped to three, while John Newman clambered one place to four.
British band Bastille went up one place to five with Bad Blood, in the week they earned four nominations for next month's Brit Awards.
Source-BBC
Sean Penn holds auction for Haiti
While many stars are awash in the gifts and parties of Golden Globes weekend, a few used their privilege to benefit the people of Haiti – and they were rewarded with an intimate performance by U2.
Bette Midler, Michael Douglas, Gwyneth Paltrow, Charlize Theron, Piers Morgan, Chelsea Handler, Sarah Silverman, Idris Elba and Kathryn Bigelow were among the guests yesterday at Sean Penn’s third annual Help Haiti Home benefit, which raised nearly $6 million for the J/P Haitian Relief Organization.
The dinner party at the Montage Hotel included a surprise performance by U2, the band’s first in four years.
The J/P Haitian Relief Organization has been working since the 2010 earthquake to provide emergency care and sustainable shelter and education to the people of Haiti. But Penn says he hopes his organization is obsolete within 10 years.
He said progress in the Caribbean nation has been miraculous despite corruption and “inaccurate, bad Journalism”.
“I’m not satisfied. I want more,” he said. “But this couldn’t have happened in the United States: This amount of clean up, this amount of resilience.”
He expects all of the people displaced by the earthquake to find permanent housing within the next two years. Nearly two million have already moved out of the emergency camps and into homes.
Besides lending his time and his fame to the cause, Penn also gave his vintage El Camino to benefit his organization. It sold for $100 000 at auction yesterday.
The earth is such a tiny speck in the universe that the only thing that makes sense is to take care of those on the planet with us, he said. He promised to reward those who participated in the auction.
Midler, Paltrow and Kevin Bacon cast bids. Paltrow’s husband, Coldplay front man Chris Martin, won an exclusive art piece from Banksy for $650 000. CNN newsman Anderson Cooper, the evening’s host, gave the biggest donation: His auction bid of $1.4 million won a sculpture to be made from Penn’s 65 discarded firearms.
U2’s three-song performance – stunning in a hotel ballroom – followed a tender, acoustic performance earlier in the evening with Bono, guitarist The Edge and Haitian singer Anaelle Jean-Pierre.
Emma Thompson noted the contrast between the Help Haiti event and other pre-awards-show parties.
“I’m here for awards season,” she said, “and this is the first night I’ve been having a good time.”
Source-AP
New York Yankees' Alex Rodriguez in season doping ban
Baseball's highest paid star, Alex Rodriguez, has been suspended for the entire 2014 season in a doping scandal.
The ruling by arbitrator Fredric Horowitz means the New York Yankees slugger will lose more than $22m (£13m) for the games he is missing.
The 38-year-old is one of a few players who have been linked to a closed Florida clinic which allegedly supplied banned performing-enhancing drugs.
Rodriguez, popularly known as A-Rod, said he would fight to reverse the ban.
He attacked Saturday's ruling - in response to his appeal - as "one man's decision, that was not put before a fair and impartial jury, does not involve me having failed a single drug test, is at odds with the facts".
He added: "I have been clear that I did not use performance-enhancing substances as alleged... and in order to prove it I will take this fight to federal court."
The ban is the longest in the sport's history for doping and raises the possibility that Rodriguez - arguably baseball's biggest star - will not play again.
The Major League Baseball union, said it "strongly" disagreed with the ruling but recognised that "a final and binding decision has been reached".
Rodriguez was suspended last year along with 13 other players include the Texas Rangers' Nelson Cruz, Jhonny Peralta of the Detroit Tigers, and Everth Cabrera who plays with the San Diego Padres.
They each received a 50-game ban but Rodriguez was the only one to appeal.
They are the latest players to fall foul of the doping allegations which have plagued the sport.
Major League Baseball, the organisation governing the sport, has said Rodrigez's punishment was over "his use and possession of numerous forms of prohibited performance-enhancing substances, including testosterone and human growth hormone, over the course of multiple years".
He was also accused of "attempting to cover up his violations" by obstructing the investigation.
The accusations against Rodriguez emerged from a major investigation into a shut Florida drug clinic, Biogenesis, that allegedly distributed performance-enhancing drugs to a number of professional baseball players.
Rodriguez was accused of interfering with the Major League Baseball investigation into Biogenesis, resulting in a harsher penalty, correspondents say.
He previously admitted using performance-enhancing drugs while playing for a Texas team between 2001-03, but had denied using steroids since.
He was named Most Valuable Player in baseball's American League three times.
The divorced father of two's earnings for 2013 were over $30m (£19.5m) according to Forbes.
Rodriguez has previously been romantically linked to a string of celebrities, including pop singer Madonna and actresses Kate Hudson and Cameron Diaz.
After years of inflated batting statistics - and arm muscles - during what has become known as baseball's "steroids era", the extent of doping in the sport was laid bare in a 2007 report by former Senator George Mitchell.
The sport subsequently strengthened its drug-testing policies and created an investigative branch to prosecute such offences.
Source-BBC
Big Relief and Bigger Rematch for Peyton Manning
For exactly a year, Peyton Manning had lived with the duplicitous burden of being the N.F.L.’s best quarterback and an underachieving one. On Sunday, the anniversary of a stinging home loss to the underdog Baltimore Ravens, Manning and Broncos fans awoke to a full-page photograph of the quarterback under a dark cloud against a towering Denver Post headline: A Legacy Under a Cloud.
One Super Bowl championship in a 16-year career is not enough, apparently, to keep away the doubters — especially in Colorado, where fans are starved for a title that Manning, 37, is supposed to supply.
As with last season, these Broncos were 13-3, seeded first and granted home-field advantage in the playoffs. Accompanying them into this postseason, though, were a sense of dread and the faint sound of a ticking clock.
Fending off a late surge by another underdog opponent, Manning and the Broncos slipped past the San Diego Chargers, 24-17, in a divisional-round playoff game at Sports Authority Field at Mile High.
It was just enough to give the Broncos a home date next Sunday against Tom Brady and the New England Patriots for the A.F.C. title, the latest installment of the N.F.L.’s favorite reality series, Manning versus Brady.
“It always feels good to get a win at this time of the year,” said Manning, reminded that it was his first playoff victory since the 2009 season. “Everyone wants to keep playing, right?”
Denver’s performance on a cool and windy day was clunky and workmanlike and nearly overcome. Shut out through three quarters, San Diego scored 17 fourth-quarter points to put intrigue into a rout. It started to feel like last year, when the Ravens tied the score on a 70-yard touchdown pass with 31 seconds left, and Denver lost in double overtime.
The Ravens eventually won the Super Bowl. The Broncos gathered themselves for another chance — this chance.
On Sunday, Manning’s two third-and-long completions to tight end Julius Thomas kept the ball from the suddenly hot Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers. Suspense ended with Manning kneeling to kill the final seconds from the clock.
“This was a pretty intense game,” Manning said. “Philip got hot there in the second half. And I didn’t want to give them the ball back there at the end.”
Manning completed 25 of 36 passes for 230 yards and 2 touchdowns, with an interception. He was asked after the game whether a postseason exam of his surgically repaired neck weighed on his mind, leading him to consider that this could be his final season.
“What weighs on my mind is how soon I can get a Bud Light in my mouth,” Manning said.
Article courtesy of The New York Times
Kaepernick mimics Cam's TD pose
Colin Kaepernick did his best Cam Newton impression during Sunday's NFC divisional playoff game, mocking the Carolina Panthers quarterback's post-touchdown "Superman" pose.
After scoring on a 4-yard scramble that gave the San Francisco 49ers a 20-10 lead in the third quarter, Kaepernick pretended to pull his jersey apart from the middle of his chest, clearly imitating Newton's preferred celebration.
Kaepernick then mimicked buttoning up his shirt before kissing his biceps in what has become his trademark celebration.
Kaepernick referred to the celebration as "just a little shout out" following San Francisco's 23-10 victory in Carolina.
When asked who he was referring to, Kaepernick responded, "I think you know the answer."
Newton, who threw two interceptions in his postseason debut, did not seem amused by Kaepernick's celebration.
"It's not the first nor the last time somebody does that," Newton said before leaving his postgame news conference.
It was the fourth career playoff victory for Kaepernick, who was selected in the second round of the 2011 NFL draft with the 36th overall pick -- 35 spots after Newton was selected first overall by the Panthers.
Kaepernick indicated earlier this week that being selected 35 spots after Newton has helped motivate him, claiming that his draft spot is "not something I'll forget." The 26-year-old Kaepernick reiterated that sentiment following Sunday's game.
Source-ESPN
2013 a hard but fruitful year, say Bolt, Fraser-Pryce
As expected, Usain Bolt and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce walked away the RJR Foundation National Sportsman and Sportswoman awards for the year 2013 in a glittering ceremony at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel on Friday night.
Netball aficionado Molly Rhone won the prestigious Sagicor Iconic Award; veteran jockey Winston Griffiths was presented with the Chairman's Award and schoolboy Javon Francis ran away with the People's Choice Performance of the Year award.
Bolt, 27, who was recently named IAAF Male World Athlete of the Year and Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, was copping the RJR National Sportsman of the Year award for the fifth consecutive year, following his outstanding performances at the 2013 World Championships in Moscow where he won three gold medals in the 100m, 200m and the 4x100m relay.
"For me, this year was a wonderful year. It was hard; a lot of ups and downs, but overall it was a great season," said Bolt, who was neatly decked in a grey suit, black shirt and black and grey tie.
"I had a lot of support from all over the world, including my family, my friends, and I want to thank everyone for that. I want to thank RJR for keeping this one more year and giving me a cheque," he said laughing.
"You guys have showed me so much love, and the energy that I have gotten this year is just continuing to grow in so many ways," he added.
Like Bolt, Fraser-Pryce added the RJR National Sportswoman of the Year award to the IAAF Female World Athlete of the Year following a dominant season in which she copped three gold at the Moscow World Championships and walked away with the historic Diamond League sprint double titles.
"I would like to say thanks to the RJR Foundation and its selection committee for choosing me again this year, it's very sweet," she said with a chuckle.
"It was a hard year. It was a year that met my expectations, seeing that I worked hard. I was fully committed to the task ahead and I completed it," she noted.
"It was an effort from me that was collective; my managers, my teammates as well, my coaches and, of course, my family and my friends. I always said the 2013 sportswoman of the year comes over into 2014 and I hope it's a blessing of a good start to days to come," said Fraser-Pryce.
Source-Jamaica Observer
McCullum, Ronchi partnership set up T20 win for NZealand
An unbeaten sixth-wicket partnership between Brendon McCullum and Luke Ronchi rescued New Zealand from a precarious position to win the first Twenty20 International against West Indies by 81 runs yesterday.
The 85-run stand from 43 balls helped the hosts to 189-5 batting first and restricted West Indies to 108-8 after 20 overs.
Wicketkeeper/batsman Andre Fletcher, who joined the team this week, was West Indies' highest scorer with 23. Fletcher joined Johnson Charles (16) following the dismissal of Lendl Simmons without scoring.
Nikita Miller and Samuel Badree batted out the West Indies' innings, finishing on 15 and 14, respectively.
Nathan McCullum (4-24) and James Neesham (3-16), led the bowling for New Zealand.
Earlier, New Zealand reached 189-5, thanks mainly to Brendon McCullum and Ronchi, who frustrated the West Indies' bowlers. Both batsmen closed their side's innings unbeaten on 60 and 48, respectively.
Tino Best, who made the initial breakthrough with the dismissal of Martin Guptill for 25, finished with 4-30 from four overs and Nikita Miller had 2-26 from three overs.
The two teams wrap up the two-match T20I series on Wednesday in Wellington.
SCOREBOARD
New Zealand
M Guptill c Charles b Best 25
J Ryder c Charles b Miller 22
B McCullum not out 60
R Taylor c Bravo b Miller 5
C Munro c Fletcher b Best 22
C Anderson c Powell b Best 0
L Ronchi not out 48
Total: 189/5 (20 Overs)
Extras: (b 5, w 1, nb 1) 7
Fall of Wickets: 1-38 (Guptill, 3.5 ov), 2-56 (Ryder, 6.4 ov), 3-66 (Taylor, 8.6 ov), 4-103 (Munro, 12.2 ov), 5-104 (Anderson, 12.5 ov).
Did not Bat: N McCullum, T Southee, A Milne, J Neesham.
West Indies Bowling: Badree 4-0-25-0, Best 4-0-40-3, Narine 4-0-46-0, Miller 3-0-26-2, Bravo 4-0-24-0, Russell 1-0-23-0.
West Indies (Target: 190)
J Charles c Ronchi b Neesham16
L Simmons c Ronchi b Milne 0
A Fletcher c Ryder b N McCullum 23
K Powell c Guptill b N McCullum 12
D Bravo c Ryder b N McCullum10
A Russell c Guptill b N McCullum 0
C Walton c Munro b Neesham9
N Miller not out 15
S Narine c Milne b Neesham 0
S Badree not out 14
Total: 108/8 (20 Overs)
Extras: (lb 2, w 7) 9
Fall of Wickets: 1-11 (Simmons, 1.4 ov), 2-31 (Charles, 4.3 ov), 3-53 (Powell, 8.3 ov), 4-59 (Fletcher, 10.1 ov), 5-64 (Russell, 10.6 ov), 6-75 (Bravo, 12.5 ov), 7-77 (Walton, 13.3 ov), 8-77 (Narine, 13.5 ov).
Did not Bat: T Best
New Zealand Bowling: T Southee 4-0-36-0, A Milne 4-0-15-1, J Neesham 4-0-16-3, N McCullum 4-0-24-4, C Anderson 4-0-15-0.
Result: New Zealand win by 81 runs
Toss: New Zealand won the toss and elected to bat
Man of the Match: Brendon McCullum
Twenty20 International Debuts: K Powell & C Walton
Umpires: Chris Gaffaney & Derek Walker
TV Umpire: Gary Baxter
Match Referee: Chris Broad (England)
Reserve Umpire: Wayne Knights
Source-CMC
Mexico vigilantes clash with Knights Templar cartel in Michoacan
A group of vigilantes in Mexico has seized the small town of Nueva Italia after clashing with alleged members of the Knights Templar drug cartel.
More than 100 men entered the town in western Michoacan state on Sunday morning and disarmed local police.
There were exchanges of fire with alleged gang members before the vigilantes occupied the town.
The vigilante group was set up by residents who say the army and the police have failed to protect them.
The Knights Templar has been fighting the New Generation cartel, from neighbouring Jalisco state, for control of criminal activities in the area.
Vigilantes, also known as self-defence groups or community police, have been active in several Mexican states.
In Michoacan they control several towns. A few days ago they launched an offensive, occupying the towns of Paracuaro and Antunez.
They say they are advancing towards Apatzingan, the alleged headquarters of the Knights Templar gang.
Federal troops were nowhere to be seen during the invasion of Nueva Italia, according to the AP news agency.
In Paracuaro, local reports say they were initially backed by the local population.
But later, residents rioted and set fire to many of the vigilantes' vehicles in a failed attempt to expel them.
The self-defence groups have been accusing of siding with the New Generation cartel. They deny any involvement.
Correspondents say the clashes in Michoacan will be a major challenge for President Enrique Pena Nieto, who was elected a year ago promising to boost the economy and reduce violence levels.
More than 70,000 people have died in drug related violence in the past six years.
Source-BBC
Haiti marks devastating earthquake anniversary
The people of Haiti have been remembering the victims of a devastating earthquake that struck the country four years ago, killing more than 250,000 people.
Across the country people have attended special religious ceremonies.
President Michel Martelly laid a wreath at a mass grave in Saint Christophe, where many victims were buried.
Some 150,000 people are still living in temporary accommodation.
The government issued a decree declaring 12 January a day of remembrance and reflection.
The shallow seven-magnitude earthquake struck on a Tuesday afternoon. The epicentre was just outside the capital, Port-au-Prince.
At least 1.5 million people were left homeless, in a country with a population of about 10 million.
Four years after the quake, signs of destruction are still everywhere.
Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, has struggled to rebuild its infrastructure, despite millions of dollars in aid pouring into the country.
President Martelly said a year ago that only a third of the money pledged after the 2010 earthquake had actually been delivered.
"Where has the money given to Haiti after the earthquake gone?" asked Mr Martelly.
"Most of the aid was used by non-governmental agencies for emergency operations, not for the reconstruction of Haiti."
Mr Martelly, who came to power after the quake, estimated the material cost of the disaster at £13bn (£8bn).
But demonstrators have gone to the streets in recent months to demand the president's resignation, denouncing the high cost of living and accusing the government of corruption.
Since the earthquake, the Caribbean nation has been affected by landslides and hurricanes, as well as an epidemic of cholera and rampant crime.
Source-BBC