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Monday August 14, 2017

A 91-YEAR-OLD woman in Thailand has earned a college degree after spending more than 10 years studying for it and has received her diploma from the country’s king.

Public television broadcaster Thai PBS says Kimlan Jinakul was granted the Bachelor of Arts degree in human and family development Wednesday at the government-run Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University just outside Bangkok.

“If we do not study, do not read, do not know, then we won’t be able to speak and make sense,” she said.

Her diploma was handed to her by King Maha Vajiralong-korn Bodindradebayavarang-kun, who took the throne last year. Diplomas at Thailand’s public universities are tradition-ally handed out by members of the royal family.

“I am happy and honored that the king has graciously shown such limitless mercy,” Kimlan said, using a phrase meant to show utmost respect to Thai royalty.

Kimlan traveled with her family from their home in

Phayao province, 725 kilometers north of Bangkok, to attend the graduation ceremony.

“Sometimes she felt weary because of her health,” Kimlan’s son, Mongkol Jinakul, told Thai PBS. “But we as her children tried to cheer her on and mom studied until the end and it was a success.”

The Sukhothai Thammathi-rat Open University, which has courses catering for the elderly, this year has 199 students who are over 60 years old. It offers part-time and remote learning.

“For the elderly, we focus on practicality rather than the academic aspect,” professor Panumas Kadngaongam, acting dean of the university, said. “So the subject can be studied and put to use immediately.”

(SD-Agencies)

TITINA and Elizabeth Gist both donned their “twindividual” shirts before heading out for their fi rst night here. They do everything together. They often speak in unison. And in Gaines-ville, Florida, where they share an apartment, they’re used to turning heads.

“In our town, we only see us,” Elizabeth said. “Everyone knows us as ‘The Twins.’ ”

Not in Twinsburg, Ohio.These identical 30-year-old

twins drove nearly 1,600 km to Twinsburg for the weekend because they wanted to meet other people who get what their life is like. At the annual Twins Days festival, there are plenty of chances for that, with 1,520 sets of twins, triplets, and qua-druplets coming to this small Midwestern town for the largest such gathering in the world.

The Gist twins spoke of the many charms, oddities and irri-tations that come with twindom, and many twins nearby nodded sympathetically. One is Twin A and one Twin B. “I’m the fi rst one,” Elizabeth explained. Titina expanded: “And I’m more to-the-point.”

“When I think about what would happen if we weren’t together, if something happened to her, I literally start crying,” Titina said.

Singletons — code at the event for non-twins — just don’t understand.

That’s sort of the point of the event, twin siblings say: to cel-ebrate and recognize the unique existence that comes with being a twin. Such as Aug. 5 morning’s

Double Take Parade, in which costumed twins and their family members walk alongside themed fl oats as an old calliope plays car-nival tunes. Onlookers in lawn chairs line the residential street to watch and wave. Double- and triple-wide strollers cut through the crowds.

“Even when thousands of people come to this small town, it feels like home to them,” said Kevin McManamon, a 52-year-old Twinsburg resident.

The town of about 19,000 resi-dents is fi lled with pastel-colored Colonial homes and sits among rolling green hills. Celebrating its 200th anniversary this year, Twinsburg fashioned itself the

center of gravity for the nation’s twins and multiples. Twins Days has been celebrated here since 1976, when 37 sets of twins made it to the fi rst event. The festival now draws thousands of twins each year.

And while twin births have been increasing steadily during the past 30 years, now is perhaps the peak for twindom in the United States, partially explain-ing the festival’s surge.

When Twins Days hosted its fi rst event here, the twin birthrate hovered just below 20 sets of twins for every 1,000 live births. From 1980 to 2009, the rate of twin births surged by 76 percent — accounting for

865,000 additional twins above the expected average, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Twin births hit their peak in 2014, with twins accounting for 33.5 of every 1,000 live births in the United States. Twin births in 2015 nearly kept pace.

The main driver of the increase since 1980 is assisted reproduc-tive technologies, most com-monly with in vitro fertilization (IVF). Though fertility treat-ments such as IVF account for 1.6 percent of babies born in the U.S. each year, it’s estimated that 36 percent of all twin births are a result of IVF and fertility drug treatments. (SD-Agencies)

U.S. federal researchers study-ing critically endangered North Pacifi c right whales sometimes go years without fi nding their subjects. Last weekend they got lucky.

A research vessel in the Bering Sea photographed two of the animals Aug. 6 and obtained a biopsy sample from one, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced Thursday.

NOAA Fisheries research biologist Jessica Crance was on board the Yushin Maru 2, when the whales were spotted. The ship is part of the Pacifi c Ocean Whale and Ecosystem Research program, a collaborative effort headed by the International Whaling Commission. Using an acoustic recorder, and between sounds of killer whales and walrus, Crance picked up faint calls of a right whale east of Bristol Bay, Alaska.

The sounds came from an estimated 16 to 51 kilometers away and the ship headed west, she said in a blog entry. After four and a half hours, despite the presence of minke and humpback whales, and only a few calls from the right whales, the rare animals were spotted.

The two right whales are part of the eastern stock that number just 30 to 50 whales, said Phillip Clapham, head of the cetacean program at NOAA’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle.

A French whaling ship recorded the fi rst kill in 1835 and reported seeing “millions” of others. That claim was exag-gerated but it drew hundreds of other whalers to the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea, Clapham said.

Within 14 years, Clapham said, the overharvest of the slow, buoy-ant animals sent many whalers through the Bering Strait to hunt bowhead whales instead.

Studying North Pacifi c right whales is complicated by the expense of reaching their habi-tat in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea. Critical data remains unknown, including their winter habits and many of their pre-ferred summer feeding areas for copepods, a tiny crustacean plankton.

“We don’t know what habitats continue to be important to the species,” Clapham said.

The biggest threats to the ani-mals are fi shing gear entangle-ments and ship strikes, Clapham said. (SD-Agencies)

Thousands of twins gather in US town

A right whale. File photo

A set of twins at the Twins Day’s celebration in Twinsburg, Ohio. Xinhua/AFP

91-year-old Thai womanearns bachelor’s degree

Kimlan Jinakul

Scientists spot rare whale

IMAGINE a father’s distress when his two daughters, ages 11 and 18, found an alligator in their home’s backyard… all the way in Canada.

Sophie Ertsinian, 11, and Christina Ertsinian, 18, of Ham-ilton, Ontario, were getting out of the pool on a sunny, humid day when they spotted the 1.5-meter-long alligator.

They originally thought it was a pool toy their dad had left out as a prank.

“As [Sophie] was drying off, she saw it sitting in the sun,” their dad Walter Ertsinian said. “She goes, ‘I think it’s an alliga-tor. Did dad buy an infl atable alligator to play in the pool, or is it a joke?’”

Then, Sophie noticed its feet move and screamed.

Sophie and Christina got closer to the gator to check it out as it stood still, but ran into the home screaming when the reptile turned its head.

“Sure enough, there was an alligator,” said Walter, who fi nally came to check the back-yard after several moments of hesitation. “I didn’t know if it was injured or just sleeping, I’m not familiar with the animal or how it reacts.”

When he dialed 911 and the operator asked if he needed paramedics, police, or fi refi ght-ers, he responded, “None.”

“I have an alligator in my back-yard,” he told the operator. “I’m not pranking you, I’m serious.”

As animal services made their way to the home, Walter started fencing the reptile in using a picnic table and other loose fur-niture around the backyard.

“It turned around and it was making its way toward us a little bit,” Walter explained.

Eventually, an animal con-trol offi cer arrived and Walter fi lmed offi cials taking the animal away.

“If this were in Florida, this would not even be a story but up here, it wouldn’t survive the winter exposure,” he said, speculating the alligator might have been someone’s pet. “To have one up here is totally odd and rare.” (SD-Agencies)

Kids mistake alligator for toy

The alligator in the backyard of Walter Ertsinian’s home. SD-Agencies