Word: holdings
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...Though some are happy with the money they've made, others living in valuable areas fear they'll lose their land, or lose it without being fairly compensated. Few families hold formal land titles, leaving many to rely on local authorities to vouch for them as landowners if a developer comes calling. Though efforts to provide documentation for landowners have been ramped up - almost 1 million land titles have been granted since 2004, according to the World Bank - there are millions more to go. Cambodians' scramble to secure their rights speaks to a fundamental anxiety: faith...
...Making Nice Democratic Presidential hopeful Barack Obama's offer to hold direct talks with the leaders of Iran and North Korea gave me an idea: perhaps Obama could visit Burma and persuade General Than Shwe to accept full-scale international aid [May 26]. This would be a good warm-up exercise and would give Obama a taste of negotiating with a stubborn, psychopathic dictator. Ohn Kyaw, Withcott, Queensland...
...laughing and singing." But just after 1 a.m., the Estonia suddenly listed starboard 30°, hurling passengers, vending machines and flowerpots across its passageways. In the bar, almost everyone fell violently against the side of the boat. Härstedt managed to grab on to the iron bar railing and hold on, hanging above everyone else...
...climbed up the stairwell, fighting against gravity. Out on the deck, the ship's lights were on, and the moon was shining. The full range of human capacities was on display. Incredibly, one man stood to the side, smoking a cigarette, Härstedt remembers. Most people strained to hold on to the rolling ship and, at the same time, to look for life jackets and lifeboats. British passenger Paul Barney remembers groups of people standing still like statues. "I kept saying to myself, 'Why don't they try to get out of here?'" he later told the Observer...
...disaster delivered many brutal lessons. Some were obvious - and tragic: the club had no sprinkler or audible fire-alarm systems. But the fire also complicated official expectations for crowd behavior: in the middle of a crisis, the basic tenets of civilization actually hold. People move in groups whenever possible. They tend to look out for one another, and they maintain hierarchies. "People die the same way they live," says disaster sociologist Lee Clarke, "with friends, loved ones and colleagues, in communities...