The Malaysian Insider :: Features
The Malaysian Insider :: Features |
| The Spirited Traveller: Berlin’s booming bar scene Posted: 29 Nov 2011 01:53 AM PST  A man takes a picture with his iPad of the Brandenburg Gate as it is illuminated during the Festival of Lights in Berlin on October 12, 2011. ― Reuters pic "Nightlife is booming," declares Helmut Adam, the Berlin-based editor of Mixology magazine. "You have more and more classic and upscale cocktail bars, but Berlin has always been famous for its massive underground. Bars still pop up on every corner with second-hand furniture and bottled beer and shots as the main staple." He adds one more urgent note: "Berlin has NO curfew. You can go 24/7." In many ways, it seems like Berlin is making up for lost time. From 1961 to 1989, the city was divided by the Wall, marking the Cold War standoff between East and West. Now, the former East Germany's central bank building has been transformed into the swanky Hotel de Rome, and its Bebel Bar (here) is among Adam's recommendations. The space is grand and high-ceilinged, with separate rooms for discreet conversations. A plus for deal-makers: "It's open in the afternoon." Meanwhile, the once bomb-damaged Mitte area has been rebuilt into a vibrant district full of exciting bars and clubs, such as trendy Tausend (www.tausendberlin.com/). Whether East or West, what to drink? "If there's an iconic drink, it's Mampe," Adam advises, a bitter liqueur usually consumed as a shot, and identified by the elephant on the logo. Some Berlin bartenders even sport an elephant tattoo as a tribute. Elsewhere, keep an eye out for the Buck & Breck cocktail, made with Cognac and absinthe. It's a fairly obscure drink and likely only has a presence in Berlin because cocktail historian Dave Wondrich mentions it in his book Imbibe! It's on the menu of Becketts Kopf (www.becketts-kopf.de/), an after-work spot known for its excellent drinks and impeccable service. Lauded new speakeasy Buck & Breck (buckandbreck.com/) even takes its name from the drink. It is also a prime spot for impressing clients if you can score one of the 14 precious seats. Still awake and ready for more? Head over to the legendary Berghain (berghain.de/), "the most famous club with the toughest door in Berlin," Adam recommends. "Don't go there before midnight." RECIPE: Buck and Breck (Adapted from Imbibe! By David Wondrich) The name is derived from the popular epithet given to the 1856 Democratic Presidential ticket of James Buchanan and John C. Breckinridge. Wondrich cites as the original source Cocktail Boothby's "American Bartender, 1900." Water Superfine sugar 1.5 ounces Cognac 2 dashes Angostura Bitters 1 dash absinthe Champagne Rinse the inside of a Champagne flute with water and swirl to coat inside of glass. Discard liquid. Fill flute with superfine sugar, coating inside to make glass appear frosted. Discard excess sugar. Fill glass with Cognac, bitters and absinthe. Top with cold Champagne. ― Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
| Laptop Wi-Fi said to nuke sperm, but caveats abound Posted: 28 Nov 2011 09:19 PM PST  Laptop friend or foe? — Reuters pic In a report in the venerable medical journal Fertility and Sterility, Argentinian scientists describe how they got semen samples from 29 healthy men, placed a few drops under a laptop connected to the Internet via Wi-Fi and then hit download. Four hours later, the semen was, erh, well-done. A quarter of the sperm were no longer swimming around, for instance, compared with just 14 per cent from semen samples stored at the same temperature away from the computer. And 9 per cent of the sperm showed DNA damage, threefold more than the comparison samples. The culprit? Electromagnetic radiation generated during wireless communication, says Conrado Avendano of Nascentis Medicina Reproductiva in Cordoba and colleagues. "Our data suggest that the use of a laptop computer wirelessly connected to the internet and positioned near the male reproductive organs may decrease human sperm quality," they write in their report. "At present we do not know whether this effect is induced by all laptop computers connected by Wi-Fi to the internet or what use conditions heighten this effect." A separate test with a laptop that was on, but not wirelessly connected, found negligible EM radiation from the machine alone. The findings fuel concerns raised by a few other research teams. Some have found that radiation from cell phones creates feeble sperm in the lab, for example. And last year urologists described how a man's sitting with a laptop balanced on his knees can crank up the temperature of his scrotum to levels that aren't good for sperm. So between the heat and the radiation from today's electronic devices, testicles would seem to be hard-pressed. But that was not at all clear, said Dr Robert Oates, who has managed to father two kids despite having both a laptop and an iPad. Oates, president of the Society for Male Reproduction and Urology, told Reuters Health he did not believe laptops were a significant threat to male reproductive health. "This is not real-life biology, this is a completely artificial setting," he said about the new study. "It is scientifically interesting, but to me it doesn't have any human biological relevance." He said that so far, no study had ever looked at whether laptop use had any influence on fertility or pregnancy outcomes. "Suddenly all of this angst is created for real-life actual persons that doesn't have to be," said Oates, of Boston Medical Centre. According to the American Urological Association, nearly one in six couples in the US have trouble conceiving a baby, and about half the time the man is at the root of the problem. While the impact of modern technology is still murky, lifestyle does matter, researchers say. Earlier this month, a report in Fertility and Sterility showed that men who had a diet rich in fruit and grains and low in red meat, alcohol and coffee had a better shot at getting their partner pregnant during fertility treatment. "You should be keeping yourself healthy," including staying lean, eating healthy foods, exercising, not taking drugs and not smoking, agreed Oates. And for those laptop worries, he mused, "I don't know how many people use laptops on their laps anyway." — Reuters Full content generated by Get Full RSS. |
| You are subscribed to email updates from The Malaysian Insider :: Features To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 ulasan:
Catat Ulasan