Last week, temperatures in north Indian cities like Churu, Hissar, Narnaul and Amritsar hovered around 0 degrees centigrade. And shivering residents huddled around bonfires and sought warm comfort in street stalls selling hot winter desserts like gajar ka halwa (a sweet carrot confection). Gajar ka halwa and winter is synonymous in north India. Made with seasonal carrots, reduced milk, and sugar, this flavorsome winter dessert is had in copious amounts in India, Bangladesh, and even Pakistan to keep the spirits high and the chills away. Gajorer halwa, gajar pak, and gajrela are a few other names that the dish is known by.…
Author: zenger.news
This was the year we learned a whole new vocabulary — lockdown, PPE, furlough, Covid-19. It was the year that the facemask went from being inconceivable to being (almost) ubiquitous. It was also the year when businesses and industries crashed, unemployment rose dramatically, events were canceled, airports ground to a halt, and loneliness and separation became a way of life for people everywhere. It was a year dominated by recession, sickness and death. It was the year of corona. There is absolutely no denying it — 2020 was a horrible year. And if all the heavy global disruptions of the…
As the sun sets over the horizon on Mumbai’s Aarey Road, 57-year-old Shahjahan Shaikh routinely trudges along a serpentine queue of auto rickshaws, clutching a stick. The middle-aged man appears vaguely familiar, a virtue synonymous with extras in film and TV who are known for their malleable ability to furnish crowd scenes, lay motionless among a heap of bodies in war sequences, and other nondescript parts. But Shaikh, who has been a junior artist in films, TV shows and music videos for over 30 years hasn’t been on a film set ever since shoots were suspended to curb the spread…
In early December, after a lull of nine months, tourist spots in the Nilgiris in southern India finally opened their doors to tourists. The Nilgiris literally translates to “blue hills.” This picturesque region has three main towns — Coonoor, Ooty or Ootacamund and Kotagiri. With its quaint colonial charm, abundant flora and fauna and stunning landscapes, the Nilgiris is one of India’s most popular tourist destinations. The climate and picture-perfect surroundings made it the ideal place for the British to set up townships there in the early 19th century. Tourists today enjoy lush tea gardens, gorgeous lakes dotting the hills, stately…
And the most beautiful face of 2020 is: Yael Shelbia, a model, actress and Israel Air Force soldier. Shelbia, 19, appears in the No. 1 spot of this year’s 100 Most Beautiful Faces list, released in December by TC Candler & The Independent Critics, an entertainment website that has compiled and published the rankings annually since 1990. Though it was her first year winning first place, Shelbia has appeared on the coveted list several times in the past, including when she ranked 14th in 2017, third in 2018 and second in 2019. Screenshot/YouTube/TC Candler & The Independent CriticsShelbia’s face, if…
VALENCIA, Spain — A deformed man whose rare tumor made one side of his face and body look melted has undergone a series of surgeries to give him a more normal life. Ali Amnad Rifi, 30, from a village in Morocco, suffers from severe neurofibromatosis, which has seriously affected his body. However, coming from a poor family, he had no means to pay for medical care. That was until he got an offer of help from a renowned reconstructive surgeon, Dr. Pedro Cavadas, who arranged to bring him to his clinic in Valencia, Spain, a year ago. By them, Cavadas said…
BERN, Switzerland — World-renowned mountain runner and cyclist Andrea Huser, 46, died while trying to cross a stream during training. Huser suffered a 460-foot (roughly 120-meter) fall down a steep slope in the Swiss Alps. The incident happened in the ski resort village of Saas-Fee, located in Saastal, in the canton of Valais. Andrea’s lifeless body was found by workers from the Saastal rescue station in late November, after she was reported missing to the Bern, Switzerland, police the previous night. The police conducted a helicopter search. The runner apparently slipped on a high slope while trying to cross an…
ROSH PINA, Israel — It’s one of the most iconic images of the Wild West: a cowboy herding his cattle on the open plain. Noam Azran is an Israeli version of the classic cowboy — a passionate rancher living in the Upper Galilee. But he’s ready to give up the romance of the open plain for technology that will reduce his herding costs and give him time with his family. Azran’s company, BeeFree Agro, is developing “Joe,” an autonomous drone system Azran has dubbed the world’s first “click and herd” solution — or, if you will, “a personal herding assistant.”…
KOLKATA — India, Taiwan and Thailand are the Asian economies most recently added to the United States’ currency manipulation watch list. The three countries are on the “monitoring list,” which now includes China, Japan, South Korea, Germany, Italy, Singapore and Malaysia. Vietnam and Switzerland have been tagged as a currency manipulators. The countries are named in a U.S. Treasury report to Congress on Dec. 16. Regarding Vietnam and Switzerland, the report states: “Treasury assessed, based on a range of evidence and circumstances, that at least part of its exchange rate management over the four quarters through June 2020, and particularly…
TAMIL NADU — The Indian government has extended the suspension of certain sections of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code by another three months until March 25, 2021. The code was initially suspended in June for six months due to the economic slowdown during the pandemic. Since many businesses have been forced businesses to shut down during the pandemic, the suspension protects them from being taken to insolvency proceedings due to default during this time. Fresh cases continue to be filed for companies that defaulted before the pandemic. The Ministry of Corporate Affairs suspended sections 7,9 and 10 of the code, which…