more than skin-deep

Beauty queens of the world, tip your crowns to Ei Yupar Win. This winner from Myanmar is hardly your regular itsy-bitsy bikini-clad, eye-candy stuff. She?s just won the first beauty contest to be held in the country after 43 long years (the ruling military junta had banned all such pageants in 1962, saying they were detrimental to Burmese culture). Ei Yupar, a student of English and a public relations officer, won three million kyat (US $3,000) in a contest that asked for more than just beauty ? proof that the country is finally ready for an image makeover. She will represent Myanmar in the Miss ASEAN Culture contest to be held in Jakarta in February 2005. Once you start something...

Ei Yupar Win

Shaken and stirred

A classic case of rock, shock and barrel. Music band Prestorika was just doin? its stuff, shaking up Delhi?s swinging circuit further, when the five fresh-faced students suddenly found themselves in high-brow company. The Betty Trask and Whitbread award-winning author Patrick Neate happened to be visiting last week and asked the band for help with his poetry reading. Why did he select Prestorika for the job? Because just a while ago, they?d won the all-India Campus Rock Idol contest despite heavy competition. ?Ya know, apna Neate asked our bassist, JD, to help him with his rhythm while he read out poetry. And JD and he got together,' says drummer Nitesh Vasandhani proudly. The result was a one-of-a-kind evening at the British Council in Delhi, where the poet rapped, and the band played on. Neat.

lcountry singer shania twain PRETended she didn?t mind when she was told that an unauthorised movie was being planned on her. I don?t care about it, my life has no secrets, I?m a regular bloke ? she bragged. Bloke, eh?

Sultan of the screen

Another proud moment for the Fellowship. The Lord of the Rings 3 has been voted the best film of 2004 by the BBC?s Film 2004 Show. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, starring Kate Winslet and Jim Carrey, came second. Just to jog your mind, the first two movies of the Rings trilogy also topped in 2002 and 2003.

Cool clones

Nicky, the cloned cat

Little Nicky is all we needed to demonstrate the might of geneticists. Nicky the cat is the first commercially-produced clone designed by the Genetics Savings and Clone company of Texas to suit the needs of a customer. The cat was cloned from the DNA of a 17-year-old cat ? owned by a woman identified as just Julie ?for the princely sum of $50,000. Rights groups have already started grumbling, but the company is unfazed. Requests for five more such cats have already been made, and a cloned dog, set for production in May, is in the pipeline. Place your orders.

AWARD OF THE WEEK

Goes to musicologist Philip Gossett of the University of Chicago who has won a $1.5 million award to continue his study of 19th-century Italian opera.