Eight support staff of Air New Zealand decided to strip down to bare (painted) skin, to help create an entertaining video, they managed to turn a boring everyday subject into fun.  They had no idea what tiger they were letting lose.

No frequent-flier sits and watches the safety video which every commercial airline is obligated to show, at the commencement of every flight anywhere in the world. Air New Zealand have overcome this obstacle by producing the ‘nothing to hide’ video, where the flight crew are dressed in nothing more than body paint, accompanied to the music, “Under My Skin’, by Auckland singer Gin Wigmore.

Filmed discretely, the video remains fully family friendly, while making the curious watch to see just how much is really going to be revealed. From hiding behind the drink’s trolley to sitting discretely on a seat, there is probably less exposed than you would normally see on a walk down Bondi Beach in Australia, on a hot sunny day. Any suggestive shots are quickly blurred away.

A far more revealing video is ‘Elave Nothing To Hide’ campaign developed by Saatchi & Saatchi, New Zealand, promoting the safety of skin products, featuring nude actors. The film crew also went nude so as to put the cast at ease. The video was launched on May 5th and has seen a rise of 500% in sales.

The fact that ‘Nothing to Hide’ is the name of a well known 1981 porn film that began with an escape out of the window and ended with a tear-jerking finale, did not deter either the Air New Zealand executive creative director Craig Whitehead, deputy creative director Craig Pethybridge, art director Janelle Herrick, copywriter Lara Philips and agency producer Vicky O’Leary, or the creators of ‘Elave Nothing To Hide’.

However if you are holding your breath watching the Air New Zealand video, waiting for some discrete nude revelation in the safety video, directed by Kevin Denholm, you have missed the point. The video is about staff having fun, as they take the most boring of subjects and make it look like they are enjoying themselves. No airline passenger would have difficulty watching the video time and again.

The same could not be said about the ‘Elave Nothing To Hide’ video. A modified version was necessary for televison.

Air New Zealand CEO Rob Fyfe, was recently voted the sexiest businessman in New Zealand. I wonder why? Perhaps the whole thing only goes to prove, it‘s not what you say, it’s how you present it.

Gambling took a whole new turn when President Vladimir V. Putin promoted a move that has taken on almost comical overtones. The Kremlin demands the gambling industry relocate to four remote regions in Russia, as far as 4000 miles from the capital. Areas so isolated, no one wants to invest in them.

However none of the chosen regions are equipped to handle the immediate transfer and no casino is expected to open for many years to come.

July 1, less than two decades after casinos were permitted to open in Russia, the industry’s workers have become unemployed.

“This is shaking my life to the core — such a blow for me and my family,” said Irina Mysachka, 32, a single mother, a supervisor at the Shangri-La Casino in Moscow.

President Putin first introduced the law in 2006, when he was prime minister. He talked of the dangers of the black jack tables and the one-armed bandits and of shady characters who control the industry.

The industry is said to have paid more than $1 billion in taxes annually. Various business organizations have been lobbying for a reprieve, but President Putin and President Dmitri A. Medvedev would not yield. “The rules will not be revised in any way,” Medvedev said last month. “There will be no backsliding.”

The gambling industry says the move will leave more than 400,000 workers without a job. The industry has been largely unregulated since the USSR’s fall in 1991, with anyone being able to obtain a license for just $50. It is said the Georgian diaspora have a large influence on gambling inside Russia. It is believed that underground casinos will be quickly established, in spite of the government’s ruling.

“Here we are, in one of the biggest, most beautiful, most expensive cities in the world,” said 29 year old Aleksei Ustinenko, “And yet other people can decide that I cannot gamble if I want to.”

Labourers have been pulling down casino signs and removing slot machines from all over Moscow. By July 1st it is claimed that Moscow would be a gamble-clean city.

The liquor laws prohibiting the sale of alchol in America during the Prohibition period of 1919 - 1933 merely made black bootlegger businesses flourish. You would think Russia had learned a lesson from this.

Around 5:30am on June 27, the 13 storey Lotus Riverside apartment building complex, still under construction and unoccupied at Lianhuanan Road in the Minhang district of Shanghai city literally fell over on its side.  One worker was killed in the incident.  According to the initial reports, the building fell over when earth was removed from under the building to form a garage. The removed earth was dumped nearby in a landfill, causing a 70 meter section of the flood prevention wall in nearby Dianpu River to collapse. This may have contributed to the collapse of the building.

The building did not break apart, it simply fell over on its side. Most buildings that are in a destructive mode will fall down. This one in China literally fell over, in a very unique form of construction failure.
Urgent safety checks have been ordered on a nearby nearly completed 13-storey apartment block. Other sites throughout the Shanghai have been ordered to be checked as well. Top officials warn of severe punishment for those responsible for the building’s collapse.

Nine employers of the real estate developer, the contractor and supervisor of the project have been detained. The developer’s bank account has been frozen. Home buyers had paid approximately $2,100 per square metre and were ready to move in. They are demanding their money be refunded.

A few days earlier vehicles were plunged into a river after part of a road bridge caved in. All 16 drivers and passengers from the seven vehicles were rescued.

China’s building industry has long been plagued with quality problems, from collapsing bridges and highways, to buildings, including a school building. Often the collapses are linked with corruption as both officials and contractors skimp on construction materials in order to increase profits. Some approvals have been known to be issued without proper inspections being carried out.

The question remains: Are these really the foundatoons of the building?

Just as controversy swirled around Michael Jackson’s life, so too his death is shrouded in mystery, with numerous unanswered questions.

Michael’s father, 80 year old Joe Jackson, who used to beat his boys if they sang off key, claims that his son’s death was ‘foul play’.

Leaked details of the first autopsy claim the King of Pop was bald headed, weighing a mere 112 pounds, was barely eating one meal a day and hardly sleeping.

A legacy of narcotic painkillers being injected three times a day into hips, arms and thighs, fuels rumours that the star could no longer sing and would make use of the O2 Arena’s state of the art lip synching technology. This would have limited Jackson’s personal contribution to each concert to just 13 minutes. Yet other reports said Jackson did a full rehearsal in front of some 50 technicians, businessmen and performers, in the Staples Centre arena in Los Angeles, without even taking a break, the night before he died, in preparation for the upcoming concerts.

Jackson had been due to head to London on the day of his death, in preparation for what he had believed to have been 10 concerts, which his enablers had manipulated into 50. Yet some reports say the singer was far too fragile to even contemplate the journey. One source inside the Jackson camp is reported to have said, “He has no choice. He needs the money. His people are pushing him hard.” The first of the concerts had already been postponed for five days.

Other reports say that the singer’s $600 million stake in Sony/ATV Music Publishing company, that has the copyright to all the Beatles’ songs, had fine print that will protect his share from his creditors. If that is true, the sale of Jackson’s share would go to his three children, ensuring them financial security for the rest of their lives. Others say that Sony is now in a position to regain full control of Jackson’s half share of the copyrights to The Beatles’ catalogue, as Jackson was in hock to Sony for hundreds of millions of dollars. Sony is reported to have been picking up the tab for all of Jackson’s bills.

There are reports that Jackson has left his children an inheritance of 200 original songs. Jackson was the song writer of the family, for the songs that he and his brother’s performed in the early part of his career. Others believe that Jackson’s estate will make more money during the coming 12 months, than the star made in the last decade of his life.

Rumours continue to swirl, of a huge debt that teetered on the edge of bankruptcy, to pill pushing ‘enablers’ with ties to the black militant organization, the Nation of Islam, through the children’s nanny,  Grace Rwaramba. Some believe that Jackson no longer had control over his own life and was in fact longing for death.

There are reports that the 911 call for an ambulance was deferred for 50 minutes and Jackson was dead long before he left his rented mansion. Whatever the truth is about Michael Jackson, no one will ever deny that the iconic singer died a lonely and deeply troubled man, even while people around the world perform elaborate tributes of mourning to the icon.

Ruth Madoff, the wife of Bernhard Madoff, the creator of the $65 billion ponzi scheme, the largest ever recorded, has agreed to give up her claim to more than $80 million worth of assets, for being allowed to keep just $2.5 million cash. This amount of money would have been considered only pocket change by the couple, a few months ago.

The agreement was arrived at with the federal prosecutors. The Madoff’s were claiming the nearly $70 had been accrued independent of the ponzi scheme and were in Ruth Madoff’s name.

71 year old Bernard Madoff is to be sentenced to 150 years imprisonment and is facing the rest of his natural life in prison. Madoff has not named any accomplices, though few believe he acted alone.

Ruth will be forced to look for a new home, as their $7 million apartment in Manhattan and $11 million Palm Beach house in Florida, plus a $3 million home on Long Island are all sold, besides their boats and cars. Ruth could have been facing both criminal and civil charges, though her involvement in the ponzi scheme is hard to prove. Ruth says she is betrayed and confused by the actions of her husband. “The man who committed this horrible fraud is not the man whom I have known for all these years.”

At the time of Madoff’s arrest, Ruth Madoff held $45 million in municipal bonds, plus $17 million in a bank account. She also withdrew $15.5 million in the weeks leading up to her husband’s arrest. The couple was caught trying to pass pieces of expensive jewelry to family members, at the time of the arrest.

Currently Ruth has been dubbed as the ‘Loneliest women in New York’, as past acquaintances distance themselves from the beleaguered couple. “She wants enough to live on the rest of her life in peace,” said one of the legal sources who didn’t want to be named.

The questions remain – Surely the Madoff’s did not hold all their assets in one place? And is the $2.5 million a payoff for not being prosecuted alongside her husband?

The 1959 Rodgers and Hammerstein song said, “Climb every mountain, ford every stream, follow every rainbow, till you find your dream.” 49 year old Clyde Persley, married with a 4 year-old daughter, just found his dream. He won the $39 million California’s SupperLotto Plus.

If he had not taken out a lottery ticket, Persley would have continued to work hard for all his productive life. He worked as a limousine driver, picked up extra hours at the El Palomar restaurant as a fill-in and operated a candy-making machine for Santa Cruz Nutritionals.

Persley will collect his $16 million cheque in four to six weeks time, the amount he will receive after paying Federal taxes. Persley is proof that dreams can come true. Like most of us, Persley “Just wants to live a stress free life”.

Keep a Dream

Dreams keep us going and your dream could come true. Just like Persley, you could be financially secure for the rest of your life. You have a really great chance of winning the Super Draw in Win a Resort, brought to you by the YouMe Support Foundation, a non-profit charity.

When you’re the lucky winner of Seachange Lodge, a $1.8 million dollar tropical island getaway, in the South Pacific, you’ll be able to retire with an income for life, (tax free).

You could either run the property as a small 6 apartment boutique resort, or rent the apartments out long term. There is always a shortage of good long term rental properties in Port Vila, Vanuatu, one of the most stable nations in the South Pacific.

You may choose to move to the tropical island getaway and enjoy the pristine waters, wilderness and slower pace of life, or just loan the apartments to your friends and family.

Or you could walk away with a one-time fat cheque, after selling the prime, absolute waterfront real estate. You would then be free to do all those things you have only ever dreamed of doing up to now.

Well before the end of 2010 you could be a millionaire, retiring on a tropical island getaway, a world away from stress, with a regular tax free income for life.

The Odds

Your odds of winning in the Win a Resort Super Draw are a whole lot better than the California SuperLotto Plus, which were 1 in 41,416,353. You’ve got a super chance of winning because there will be only 200,000 entries, before Seachange Lodge, changes hands. Isn’t that a dream worth reaching out for, just as Persley did?

Making A Real Difference

The California State Lottery is mandated to provide 84% of all funds to be given back to the public. 50% must be given back in the form of prizes and the remaining 34% of its revenue must be given in the form of money towards education.

‘Make Me A Millionaire’ is California’s Lottery’s second television show, succeeding ‘The Big Spin’. The Lottery also funds dozens of instant-lottery Scratchers Games.

YouMe Support Foundation is not mandated to give back only a portion of funds raised, it is mandated to put all funds raised into giving high school education grants, to kids who will never otherwise have the opportunity to go to high school. No one else is helping these kids.

YouMe Support Foundation will give grants wherever there is no free education, beginning with the South Pacific nation of Vanuatu.

Life Changing

YouMe Support Foundation is not into just raising funds for giving kids the chance to fulfill their dreams, it is into changing lives. As Nelson Mandella said, “Education is the only way to make a lasting change.”

Your $49 Australian dollars will make a real difference to these kids. You only have to talk to Maimona Silas, the first student to enter the grant program. Her winning smile proves that giving these kids a chance is the best investment you will ever make.

Don’t miss out on this once in a lifetime opportunity. You could win a 7 day holiday for two to visit Seachange Lodge and check the place out, in the Monthly Draw. You could win a holiday, plus be the proud owner of a million dollar tropical island getaway for just $49 Australian dollars!

Next draw closing on 12th July. Hurry get your entry now, it could be the winning ticket at Win a Resort

Worldwide there is a deep concern over the number of people infected with the global outbreak of H1n1 virus, commonly known as swine flu – a blend of bird, human and pig flu genes. There have been 3,065 hospitalizations and 127 deaths recorded.

However, an estimated 15 million to 60 million Americans are infected with the seasonal flu each year, and around 36,000 deaths. Common flu is classed as endemic –  with seasonal epidemic recurrences. In the United States alone it is estimated that common flu results in

• 3 million days hospitalization,
• 30 million outpatient visits
• medical costs of $10 billion annually
• $15 billion lost earnings annually
• Total economic burden over $80 billion annually

Compared to the annual influenza epidemics, the effect of H1n1 is mild. Starting in Mexico, there has now been an estimated 1 million people infected in America alone by the swine flu. However, for the most part the illness is mild and the patients quickly recover, according to the U.S. health officials.

Lyn Finelli, a flu surveillance official from the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said, “The estimate of 1 million victims is based on mathematical modeling”.
Symptoms of the H1n1 are similar to the regular flu. Severe symptoms of swine flu are

• trouble breathing,
• pain in chest or abdomen,
• recurring fever with rash,
• confusion,
• severe or consistent vomiting.

Swine flu has been officially called a pandemic – an epidemic of a new infectious disease that spreads through humans across a large region, to which there is little or no immunity. A widespread endemic disease that is stable in terms of how many people are falling sick, as in the common flu, is not classed as a pandemic.

The World Health Organization raised the level from phase 5 to phase 6 (more than three regions affected with the disease) on the 11th June. The last level of phase 6 was the Hong Kong flu of 1968, which killed around 1 million people.

However WHO states the severity of the swine influenza pandemic to be moderate, but the full clinical spectrum of the disease is as yet unknown. The major concern has been the number of young healthy people, with no pre-existing medical conditions, who have died from the virus.

The greatest fear is that the virus will mutate, there will be underlying conditions that will increase the effect of the virus and that health systems may not be able to cope.

WHO is not recommending travel restrictions, nor does WHO have any evidence that there is a danger in eating pork products.

Dr Ira Longini, from Vaccine and Infectious Disease institute, Hutchinson Research Centre in Seattle, Washington, says “Things such as ’social distancing’, (including wearing masks in crowded places) and seeking medical treatment can reduce the sickness by nearly two-thirds”.

Perhaps more notice should be given to the effects of the ordinary everyday variety of flu, which is the true killer lurking in our neighbourhood.

A group of nearly 26 Saudi women finally gained permission to attend a 10-day course on how to fit, stock and sell underwear. The organizers hope this will help the campaign to allow women to take their place as saleswomen in the lingerie shops.

Graduates held a small celebration in the western seaport of Jiddah, commemorating 40 hours of instruction. The major hurdle for the organizers, was to overcome the women’s embarrassment at fitting bras and learning how to deal with customer complaints, besides learning how to display the stock in an attractive manner.

Thirty-two year old coordinator of the course said, “It was a beautiful experience, but the most shocking thing for me was the bra sizes. We didn’t know how to get proper measurements before.”

Many Saudi women said they are sick and tired of being forced to discuss intimate details with male staff and having to put up with their scrutiny when they asked for a particular cup size.

A law in 2006 was passed permitting only female staff to be employed in women’s clothing stores. However, the law was never put into effect, because hard-liners in the powerful religious establishment opposed employing women in mixed environments, such as shopping malls. Almost all shops in Saudi Arabia are staffed by men, apart from one or two women-only boutiques.

In Saudi Arabia women are forced to completely cover themselves in public, not permitted to drive cars, or have a vote and must obtain permission to travel overseas. However the women are slowly finding ways to gain a small measure of freedom, from blogging on the Internet, to a campaign boycotting man-staffed lingerie stores.

The former ruler King Fahd opened a state school for girls in 1960, even though what the girls could learn was strictly regulated. However, this has led to a generation of elite educated Saudi women, while  just under a third of the nation’s women still remain illiterate. Many of the educated women are now pushing for political rights and job opportunities.

The sexes are still strictly segregated in this oil rich country. Only close relatives can stand in the same line at fast-food outlets, or travel in the same car together. Traditionalist clerics exert a very strong influence on both government and society, banning anything they think might lead to the emancipation of women.

The Saudi women live in one of the nations listed in the 54% of the world’s countries that are not rated as free, according to the annual report released by Freedom House. Countries where basic human rights and political freedom are either severely repressed, or totally unknown.

There were times when he may not have been the most loved person in the world, but he certainly was one of the most controversial, has died at the age of 50, having collapsed at his home in Los Angeles. Michael Jackson was taken to hospital in a coma, he was announced dead.

It is thought Jackson’s death could possibly be related to a large injection of Demerol, given to the singer for pain, after a rehearsal for 50 comeback concerts. It was believed that Jackson had managed to kick a morphine and Demerol addiction, but has experienced health concerns since the early 1990’s.

Dr Conrad Robert Murray, cardiologist from Houston, Texas, was reportedly with  Jackson when he lost consciousness. Murray had been living with Jackson in his rented mansion, in the role of a personal physician. Police are now searching for Murray, who has disappeared, leaving his car outside Jackson’s house.

Entertainer extraordinaire, businessman and recording artist, the seventh of nine children of the Jackson family, whose sensational singing gift was discovered when he was just 6 years old. He was later referred to as the ‘King of Pop’, just as Elvis Presley has been dubbed the ‘King of Rock and Roll’.  Some likened his unique dancing style to Fred Astaire and in particular Jackson’s ‘Moon Walk’. Jackson’s entertaining life spanned almost four decades.

Jackson revolutionized the music world, being the first to make music visual through videos, rather than merely audio. Jackson was also the first African-American entertainer to successfully break the black and white barriers on MTV, an American music cable television network, based in New York. His very distinctive high tenor vocal style heavily influenced hip hop, pop, as well as many contemporary artists. Jackson sold 61 million albums in the US alone.

Jackson supported 39 charities, as well as donating and raising millions of dollars for benefits and his own charity. Oprah Winfrey’s interview with Jackson in 1993 became the most-viewed non-sport program in the history of the United States.

Changing his appearance to a lighter skin, narrower nose, as well as controversial and at times bizarre behavior in his private life, drastically damaged his public image. Jackson made an out of court settlement when accused of molesting a child in 1993.  Reports of the the singer suffering financial difficulties surfaced in 2006, after the child sex abuse trials of 2005.  It is believed the musical icon died around $400 million dollars in debt.

Twice married, having fathered three children, another cause for controversy, Jackson’s closest companion was a pet chimpanzee named Bubbles. Elizabeth Taylor has always been a high profile friend of Jackson.

Jackson is one of the few artists to be twice inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Jackson also appears several times in the Guiness World Book of Records, including an entry as the ‘Most Successful Entertainer Of All Time’ and the biggest selling album of all time.

From July 13, 2009 – March 6 2010, Jackson was to perform concerts to over one million people, at London’s O2arena. Sales for the tickets to the concerts broke several records. The first ten concerts alone would have earned the iconic singer around $100 million. The concerts were organized by entrepreneurs who recently bundled Jackson’s debt into one place. Reports say that Jackson’s finances were getting back in order, but the concert promoter, AEG Live, is facing the task of refunding $85 million in ticket sales, for the sold-out concerts.

The question is what will happen to Jackson’s three children - Prince Michael Jackson aged 12, Paris Michael Katherine aged 11 and Prince Michael Jackson11 aged 7? Children who never went to school, living a nomadic life with their famous father. Michael Jackson was the only parent the children knew.

“Hilary Clinton’s a monster,” blurted out one of Barak Obama’s top advisers during the run up to the presidential election, in March 2008, after Clinton attacked Obama’s inexperience in foreign policy.

This was the furtherest thing from the minds of the people who gathered at a recent private dinner party at former Secretary of State Madeline Albright’s Washington home. Diplomats from five previous administrations,  joined together to honour the current Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, James Baker, Lawrence Eagleburger, Warren Christopher, Albright, Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice. The only one missing was Alexander Haig.

It is still not clear if 61 year-old Clinton will continue with her scheduled visit to Italy and Greece after undergoing surgery to her elbow which was fractured in several places in a fall, as she headed for her car, in the basement of the State Department. Clinton was on her way to a meeting at the White House, officials said.

Obama may have been kept waiting on this occasion, but it is doubted that Presidents’s right hand woman will be held back by any damage to her right elbow, as she heads the battle for ‘women in high places’, as was witnessed when Clinton was the guest speaker for the Emily List luncheon. Emily List is a 24 year-old organization dedicated to increasing the power and presence of women in politics. Emily List came into being around the same time Clinton entered the political arena.

Having weathered the Clinton-Lewinsky White House scandal, an impeachment, a failed health reform and 8 years as First Lady, one can only wonder what really goes on in the State Secretary’s head as she walks one step behind Michelle Obama. One thing is for certain, Hilary Rodham Clinton has no intention of going away quietly. Ellen Malcolm introduced Clinton at the Emily List luncheon as “An exceptional figure in American life and a powerful role model for women for our country and for the world.”