10 Things You Need to Know About Losing Weight

Hi All,

I saw this wonderful program on BBC.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00ksh7c/10_Things_You_Need_to_Know_About_Losing_Weight/
(unfortunately available only to UK users)

The best part of it is - it clears lots of myths and demonstrates the effectiveness of these simple steps with scientific evidence. The facts about Visceral Fat, Importance of Proteins, Myth of Skipping Meals, Effective Power of Common Sense, Effect of Dairy Products etc., is amazing.

First some facts - Visceral Fat (hidden fat) leads to Type II Diabetes, Can create heart disease and cancer.
Ghrelin harmone asks brain to get food esp. high calorie food to compensate.
Out body burns fat by daily activities like breathing, heart-pumping, brain ticking over etc.,
An average person should have appx. 2,000 calories/day
Some food calorie facts - Black Coffee - 10, Cappucino - 110; Toast - 125, Pastry - 270; Grilled Chicken with Salad Lunch - 250, Same with Mozerella and creamy dressing - 450; 2 Apples - 120, Bar of Chocolate - 300; Pizza with thin crust - 850, Pizza with Deep Pan Pepporeni - 1400; Bloody Mary - 125, Pina Calodan - 280;
Examples of Proteins - Lean Meat, Eggs, Beans, Fish etc.,
Examples of Carbohydrates - Pasta, Bread, Potatoes etc.,
Examples of Fats - Fried Foods, Butter etc.,

10 Tips:

1. Don't Skip Meals - Because our brain has a really primitive response to this, making us crave high-calorie, high-fat foods to compensate, and will-power may not be enough to fight it.

2. Use Smaller Plates - You'll use less food on your plate and could end up eating up to 22% less food over-all just by changing the plate size form 12 inches to 10 inches.

3. Count Your Calories - If you know which calorie laden foods to avoid, you'll be able to eat well without putting on weight.

4. Don't Blame Your Metabolism - The fact is you have simply eaten more food than your body needs and it's stored the excess of fat

5. Protein Staves Off Hunger Pangs - Protein will keep your feeling fuller for longer because protein control hunger pangs by releasing PYY Harmone which sends signal to our brain that it is full

6. Soup Keeps You Feeling Fuller For Longer - Soup is one fo the best kept secrets of dieting

7. The Wider The Choice, The More You Eat - Variety triggers our instincts to try everything and that can lead to over eating.

8. Low Fat Dairy Products (like Skimmed Milk, Low Fat Yoghurt, Cheese, Cottage Cheese and Creme Fraiche) Helps You Excrete More Fat - That is because it absorbs the fat from your stomach and goes down the drain.

9. Exercise Goes On Burning Fat, Even When You Sleep - Not only do you burn fat while you exercise, but the astonishing thing is we keep on burning fat for around 24 hours longer even when we're asleep. That is because our body fuels are made of Carbohydrates and Fats in that order. When we exercise we use up the Carbohydrates. So for the rest of the day and night, our daily activities dip in to the reserves of fat to get going.

10. Keep Moving And Lose Weight - Small changes in our daily routine (like taking stairs, walking to super-market, walking from tube-station rather than somebody picking you up etc.,) can significantly increase the number of calories we burn. JUST KEEP ACTIVE.

Re: Barcelona's Iniesta shows why technique trumps tenacity

"Spain are now unbeaten in 31 games. They had an undefeated run of 25 games before falling to Makelele’s France at the World Cup of 2006. They have been the best national team on earth for five years now." - Simon Kuper

With this kind of under-stated record, I think they should play the world cup 2010 without Spain. The winner should play Spain directly in the finals to lose!!!

As a United fan it is heart-breaking but as a football fan it is a joy and honor to see these great players (Xavi, Iniesta and co.) in action. It's just magic!!!

Pradeep

Barcelona's Iniesta shows why technique trumps tenacity

By Simon Kuper

Published: May 30 2009 03:00 | Last updated: May 30 2009 03:00

It rarely happens, but sometimes a footballer stops to savour the moment. On Wednesday night Andres Iniesta was 25 years old, in Rome, at his peak, and part of a Barcelona team that was passing rings around Manchester United. This was as good as it gets. So for a second during yet another attack he just rolled the ball around under his foot, as if tickling its belly. In Rome, Iniesta showed his sport the way forward.

Iniesta, his teammate Xavi and Barcelona's coach Josep Guardiola possibly don't share much DNA, but in football terms they are brothers. The first brother, Guardiola, emerged 20 years ago as the definitive Barca playmaker: effectively the side's quarterback, who launched almost every attack with a perfect pass. The second brother, little Xavi, was better. Finally, almost a decade ago, a tiny white-faced teenager showed up at Barca's training. Guardiola studied Iniesta for a bit, turned to Xavi, and said: "You've seen that? You'll push me towards the exit, but that guy will send us both into retirement."

It took a while. In 2006, when Barcelona last won the Champions League, Iniesta appeared only as a substitute. But inside the club, everyone knew he was coming. Last year I asked Barcelona's then coach Frank Rijkaard to name the player with the perfect personality for top-class football. Rijkaard hummed and hawed, but finally, in triumph, shouted out the right answer: "Andres - Andres Iniesta! He's always there in training, always tries, and is just a wonderful footballer."

Iniesta's magical year began in Vienna last June. In the final of Euro 2008, his Spanish team passed rings around Germany. Vienna prefigured Rome. Both times, Iniesta, Xavi and their buddies seemed to be playing piggy-in-the-middle against Europe's second-best team. Germany and United chased ball in the heat. It wasn't fair.

Barcelona have to play like that. "Without the ball we are a horrible team," says Guardiola. "So we need the ball." Barca are too little - perhaps the shortest great team since the 1950s - to win the ball by tackling. The unofficial minimum height for top-class football is about 5'8", and Xavi, Iniesta and Lionel Messi are below it. The minimum for central defenders is about 6'0", and Carles Puyol is below that. So Barca defend either by closing off space through perfect positioning, or by keeping the ball. Johan Cruijff, Dutch father of the Barcelona style, teaches: "If we have the ball, they can't score."

Modern football is supposed to be manlier. Managers talk about "heart", "grit" and "bottle" and kilometres covered. What Iniesta showed in Rome is that these are secondary virtues. Football is a dance in space. When everyone is charging around closing the gaps, you need the technique of Iniesta to find tiny openings. In Rome, he barely mislaid a pass. Sometimes he'd float past United players, his yellow boots barely marking the grass. Occasionally he hit little lobs, a sign that he knew this was his night.

We know how good United are. That's the measure of how good Barca were in Rome. In games at this level, some very respected players get found out. It happened to United's Ji-Sung Park and Michael Carrick, but also to Wayne Rooney. Excellent with his right foot, he is helpless with his left. Barcelona covered his one foot.

When it was over, Barca's players celebrated with their fans behind the goal; but as we looked from players to fans and back again, it was impossible to say which was which. Iniesta is a Barca fan. On Wednesday he was one of seven starting players raised in Barcelona's academy, the Masía.

Had he popped into the VIP buffet elsewhere in the Stadio Olimpico, he'd have seen a portent. Eusebio, Portugal's star of the 1960s, was hanging around alone in a blazer. Every few seconds, someone would come up to hug him, or just express awe, and Eusebio would smile. He must do this 100 times a week. A year ago, you couldn't have imagined Iniesta in old age receiving such honours. You can now. In Rome Rooney called him "the best player in the world at the moment". Iniesta's next target: the world cup 2010.

simonkuper-ft@hotmail.com

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009

End of DREAM???

I know United lost but still it was a great spectacle and honor to watch Iniesta, Xavi, Messi and co. Complete football played with impeccable belief.

I know nobody, not even the hard-core fans of United, not even Sir Alex Ferguson grudge the honor and victory to Barcelona but still I would have been happy if United played the United way and the defence was successful on the night.

Nevertheless, I'm happy that Barcelona did not humiliated United. I'm truly happy with 2-0 rather than 6-1 or 6-2 which was a possibility on a night when Barcelona controlled the game, the ball and the result for 80/90 minutes.

End of DREAM???....so what! beginning of a new journey again!!!

Hail United!

Re: Indian democracy has an ugly side

Dear Mr. Rachman,

Thanks for the article in today's FT. Your facts are almost right but analysis is wrong on "It is certainly true that the political future of China looks more uncertain and alarming than that of India". It is not just that I dis-agree with that, it is plainly wrong.

The reason is political future of any country or community is dependent on the inherent strengths that includes a) infrastructure and resources b) rule of law c) institutions and democracy - in that order.

For instance, a country which does not have infrastructure and resources will have no political future at all. Why do you think 34% of internal India is under the control of Naxals?

For instance, a country which doesn't implement the rule of law if you don't have money, contacts or connections will have no political future at all. Why do you think 128 of the 543 MP's are criminals in the official sense. But the rest will not do anything, unless you pay or you have 'connections'

China is far ahead in infrastructure and rule of law than India. Would naxals or terrorist groups dare to challenge the govt. of China?

Can you kindly answer to this - a govt. (India's congress govt.) which cannot protect it's own people from naxals or terrorists and cannot maintain the basic rule of law, how can it give any political future to the country or have any political future at all?

Infact, forget the rule of law or protection from terrorists, in the next 5-10 years, if things don't improve on basic infrastructure, most of the population will struggle to get basic drinking water. What political future will that lead to?

The matter of fact is, the concept of democracy in ideal western sense works when some conditions are met viz., a) basic infrastructure b) rule of law c) educated population. In the absence of these, the only way forward is the Chinese way. That should be used as a model template across the poor world. And that is a fact whether one likes it or not.

Finally, a small bridge in any town or city of India will take atleast 5 years to build. In the same period, the Chinese will lay more than 800,000 kms of motorways.
Similarly, a single power plant (remember Enron in Maharashtra in 90's) takes atleast 10 years to build and operate. The Chinese add more than UK's capacity every year.

I hope you don't mis-understand my comments. But as you rightly say, Indian democracy has jot just an ugly side but it is running out of time to survive.

This is not a pessimistic view but it is a ugly fact which needs to be accepted and acted upon.

Regards,

Pradeep Kabra
Indian democracy has an ugly side

Published: May 18 2009 19:30 | Last updated: May 18 2009 19:30

Pinn llustration



“A billion people, in a functioning democracy. Ain’t that something.” George W. Bush’s awestruck musings on the wonders of Indian democracy will be echoed all around the world this week.

Despite a sharp economic slowdown and a series of destabilising terrorist attacks, India’s 420m voters have just calmly voted the Congress party back into government, with a much increased majority.

In western capitals, admiration for the maturity of Indian democracy will be mixed with relief. There were fears that a government led by the rightwing BJP would take a more confrontational line with Pakistan – widening the conflict in south Asia in new and dangerous ways. Investors also seem to be impressed. The stock market shot up 17 per cent in the wake of Congress’s victory.

Political scientists have spent years demonstrating that democracy rarely survives in poor countries. India is a triumphant exception to this rule. Despite the fact that a quarter of its population live below the poverty line, the country has been a functioning democracy for almost the entire period since independence in 1947.

Indian democracy is indeed a wonder to behold. But this fact can lead to some unwarranted starry-eyed conclusions about the country. At this moment of euphoria, four common notions about Indian democracy deserve to be doused with a little scepticism.

First, it should be remembered that the country’s democracy is not always a beautiful sight. Manmohan Singh, the 76-year-old prime minister who has just won re-election, is a charmingly intellectual and courtly figure. But while Mr Singh is an impeccable frontman, the country’s politics has a much sleazier and more disreputable side.

In most countries when politicians are slammed as “criminals” this is simply vulgar abuse. In India, it is often the literal truth. The British public, currently hyperventilating about expenses fiddles in the UK parliament, might be interested to know that 128 of the 543 members of the last Indian parliament had faced criminal charges or investigations, including 83 cases of murder. In a poor society, gangsters can and do use muscle and money to force their way into parliament.

Second, just because India is a democracy, it does not follow that it will automatically side with fellow-democracies around the world. Mr Bush’s interest in Indian democracy was more than purely intellectual. The former president made a conscious decision to form a strategic alliance with India – and to cut the country a special deal over nuclear weapons – because he felt that democracies should be natural allies.

The Americans are carefully building a new special relationship with democratic India, partly to counterbalance authoritarian China. It is certainly true that relations between the US and India have been getting steadily warmer, driven by commerce, Indian immigration to America, the English language and – to a degree – common values.

But India is a major power with its own interests and its own distinct take on the world. It will not automatically fall into line with western policy, whether on sanctions against Iran or a world trade deal. And if realpolitik dictates, India is perfectly capable of cosying up to a dictatorship, such as the Burmese military junta.

The sleazy side of Indian democracy has led to a third common notion – popular in the authoritarian parts of Asia: the idea that democracy imposes a sort of tax on India. For many years, it was held that India suffered from a “Hindu rate of growth” because of its inefficient government. Growth in recent years, which has increased to an average of 9 per cent, should have put paid to that idea. But it is still true that, for all the virtues of its political system, Indian governance has failed hundreds of millions of people. Rates of poverty and illiteracy are much higher in democratic India than in authoritarian China.

Euphoria about modern India has led to a fourth mistaken idea: the notion that democracy has given the country a deep and unshakable stability. It is certainly true that the political future of China looks more uncertain and alarming than that of India, Asia’s other great subcontinental nation. But India still faces serious threats to its internal stability. The Indian Premier League is a new cricket tournament that has demonstrated the country’s growing wealth and cultural power by drawing in the best players from all over the world. However, the threat of terrorism is now so severe that this month’s tournament had to be relocated to South Africa. The country’s parliament and most prestigious hotels have come under attack in recent years.

While terrorism can be blamed on outsiders, India is also facing a serious internal insurrection. The notion of Maoist guerrillas roaming the countryside sounds like it belongs to another age – and is certainly at odds with the image of a modern India of commuter airlines and high technology. But over the past five years the Naxal insurgency has grown in strength – attacks on trains, mines and industrial sites are on the rise.

It is indeed marvellous that a country that is so large and so relatively poor can manage a peaceful, democratic transition. The new Indian government should also be able to use its stronger majority to renew the process of economic reform. But there are still some unappealing realities just behind the beautiful facade of Indian democracy.

gideon.rachman@ft.com

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009

The Big 'iffffffffffffffffffffffffff'

I think what Mr. Colao is forgetting is a) he is late to the party b) he forgot to bring the wine c) now in haste he is entering the wrong party.

What it means is in the world of digg and widgets, why would somebody pay for content unless it is from WSJ or Economist or FT or some specialized info. And why would not these mentioned sources sell their content directly via a widget?

So, the 'if' you mentioned is actually 'ifffffffffffffffffffffffffffff'

Pradeep Kabra

Re: Face value - Call the carabiniere
May 14th 2009
From The Economist print edition


Vittorio Colao has an ambitious plan to boost Vodafone’s fortunes—and rescue the media industry

STRAIGHT is not always the best way up. Vittorio Colao, now the boss of Vodafone, is a prime example. In 2004 he left the world’s largest mobile operator by revenues to run a company in an entirely different business: RCS MediaGroup, an Italian media conglomerate. He returned to Vodafone only two years later after a row with RCS’s main shareholders, having gained some valuable insights. One is that telecoms and media firms are culturally very different—knocking on the head the idea that Vodafone ought to become a content provider. In addition the newspaper business showed him that rivals can share important infrastructure, such as distribution. “After all, they compete on their editorial quality,” says Mr Colao, “not in driving trucks around.”

That may help explain the thinking behind the ambitious project Vodafone announced on May 12th. It is a bold attempt to rally some of the industry’s biggest operators to build a joint global platform through which software companies and content providers can sell things to mobile subscribers. If it is a success— admittedly, a big if—it will help address two of the criticisms levelled at Vodafone: that it is too big for its own good, and that mobile operators are destined to end up as “dumb pipes”, mere utilities that transport data to and from handsets.

When Mr Colao was appointed as Vodafone’s boss a year ago, he was not expected to come up with grand plans. Vodafone was no longer the global collection of wireless baronies that Sir Christopher Gent, the firm’s swashbuckling boss, had put together in the 1990s through a series of daring acquisitions. But Sir Christopher’s more down-to-earth successor, Arun Sarin, did not quite manage to make the pieces fit together. Vodafone’s subsidiaries have yet to gain much from their parent’s huge size, says Robin Bienenstock, an analyst at Bernstein Research. Mr Colao seemed to be just the man to fix this. In the 1990s while working at McKinsey, a consultancy, this reserve officer in the Italian Carabinieri and graduate of Harvard Business School had helped set up Omnitel Pronto, an Italian mobile operator, and later became its boss. In 2000 it became part of Vodafone and is still one of its most profitable units, thanks in part to his early work.

Just cutting costs and improving efficiency, however, is not enough in today’s mobile-phone industry (though Vodafone’s annual results on May 19th are expected to show that Mr Colao is rather good at it). The market for its main product, mobile telephony, is rapidly maturing in many rich countries. This prompted Mr Sarin to take control of several operators in developing countries that still boast rapid growth. Beyond that, operators have set out in search of new frontiers. One is mobile-data services, a market that is finally taking off after years of hype.

The problem for Vodafone and other operators is that they are trying to catch up. They have long offered such services, but steered users towards “walled gardens” of pre-approved content from which they could take a cut. This stifled the market and left an opening for other firms to create mobile-data platforms of their own. Apple led the way with its elegant iPhone and its “App Store” that gives users easy access to thousands of applications, and lets software developers charge for them. This inspired similar app-store platforms from other technology giants, including Google, Nokia, Microsoft and RIM, the maker of the BlackBerry.

Yet it is this variety that will allow Vodafone back into the game, argues Mr Colao. To make his point he enthusiastically presents visitors to his office at the firm’s headquarters in Newbury, an hour’s drive west of London, with two charts. The first, titled “Today: Complexity”, shows many boxes linked by arrows. A software firm must write several versions of its applications for different platforms, for example, and the owner of a particular handset is usually restricted to a particular platform. Mr Colao’s other chart, titled “Tomorrow: One relationship”, is centred on a big, red box labelled “Vodafone Services”. This is an über-platform that would allow programmers to write an application which could then run on other platforms, and would also provide essential sub-services, such as determining a user’s location and, most importantly, charging for downloads. Mr Colao promises not to be “too greedy”: Vodafone intends to pass on 70% of revenues to developers, the same share as Apple does.

One platform to rule them all

The idea of enabling a single piece of software to run on lots of devices has been tried before, but has never really succeeded. Software firms may feel more at home working with partners in the computer industry: mobile operators are widely seen as lumbering giants, if not greedy predators. And consumers may prefer handset, platform and software to come in a tightly integrated package, as with the iPhone. Most importantly, rival platform-owners are unlikely to co-operate, and might even scupper the project by introducing deliberate incompatibilities.

Still, Vodafone has one thing in its favour: size. It has more than 290m subscribers worldwide, all of whom are potential customers for software firms and content providers. And Mr Colao’s scheme is also backed by China Mobile, the world’s largest operator by subscriber numbers; Softbank, a Japanese conglomerate; and America’s Verizon Wireless, in which Vodafone has a 45% stake. If they realise their plans to launch their own app stores based on the new platform, the potential market will be more than 1 billion subscribers and span the entire globe.

Success is by no means guaranteed, but Mr Colao is not known for giving up easily. Indeed, it was his single-mindedness that got him into trouble at RCS. And if his plan takes off, he says, it could help save media, which he says is still his “second love”. Vodafone’s scheme would give publishers a way to charge small sums, or micropayments, for content—and put right “the big mistake they have made on the internet: giving their content away for free.” Will the industry, and consumers, play along?