Our Times: January-February 2005

Wordsmith

A Macedonian teenager who created his own language has won a scholarship to the US. The boy says he came up with the language after becoming bored with conventional languages. He calls this language Sinioier, meaning “the light.” Along with his native Macedonian, he also speaks English, Italian, Japanese, French, German and Spanish. He also made up one for Lord of the Rings author J R R Tolkien.

Optical Dentistry

After losing her sight at age 15, a British woman has seen her children and grandchildren for the first time, thanks to her teeth! The 42-year-old had a tiny shard of tooth implanted in her eye during a seven-and-a-half-hour operation. The root of the tooth was used to reinforce a damaged optical tube, so that within hours she was able to perceive light and shade, colour and shape.

Origin Of Species

Anthropologists have formed a contentious theory that the original inhabitants of America may, in fact, have come from down-under. They support their claim with DNA recovered from skeletons of original populations. Anthropologists hope DNA will give a completely new and accurate concept of how the world was peopled.

In-coming! 

Plans to scatter a US man's ashes from a plane went awry when the urn containing the ashes did not scatter, but instead crashed through a roof of an Oregon home. “I feel for those people,” the owner commented, “but I think some of their relative is still in our attic.”

Immigration

The Muslim Council of Britain is backing the new rules that imams and other foreign ministers of religion will have to sit an English test before settling in England. From September they will need to prove they have a “basic” grasp of spoken English before coming to the UK. Home Office officials claim the policy is “not just to facilitate their integration but also to help them connect with a new generation of British-born Muslims.”

Trade Centres

Rebuilding confidence in the world economy after September 11, the number of “World Trade Centres” under development worldwide has increased to 26, with three scheduled for construction in Saudi Arabia, homeland of Osama bin Laden.

Digital Stalker

A Californian man has been arrested for remote stalking. The man attached a mobile phone and activating motion switch to a woman's car. When the car moved, it transmitted a signal to a satellite, then web site, which allowed the man to monitor the woman's location.