On Facebook, ?listen, listen, listen? woman?s NGO attacks vocal ?Little Ambiga?

On Facebook, ?listen, listen, listen? woman?s NGO attacks vocal ?Little Ambiga?

Internet memes of Sharifah Zohra Jabeen have sprouted after the SW1M president publicly berated a university student for voicing her views against the BN government in an open forum last month. ? Courtesy of pics.lockerz.com

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 15 ? In fending off cyber brickbats hurled against its president, a little-known organisation called Suara Wanita 1 Malaysia (SW1M) launched an offensive by posting on its Facebook a video link showing Sharifah Zohra Jabeen?s verbal attack against a vocal university student that has already sparked an Internet storm.

The group, which claims to be non-profit and non-government-linked, appeared proud with the uproar stirred by the lopsided exchange between its president and the Universiti Utara Malaysia (UUM) undergraduate identified as Bawani K.S. whom it labelled ?Little Ambiga? in its latest Facebook posting today, in a mocking reference to Bersih co-chair and prominent lawyer Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan.

?full vid Sharifah hentam little ambiga...............tgk mcmana bavani lari......kikikiki [sic],? said an administrator for the organisation who went by the nickname ?Ratu Naga?.

Sharifah Zohra Jabeen, who was sported donning a 1 Malaysia button badge commonly associated with the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN), shot to infamy after a 25-minute clip of her laying into Bawani at a public forum last month was uploaded on YouTube and other social media sites last week.

While Sharifah Zohra Jabeen appears to have gone underground since the video storm started, SW1M has adopted a truculent ? some say aggressive ? attitude towards the entire episode.?

In a separate post on its fanpage, a SW1M administrator identified as ?Langsi? said there was no need for the group or Sharifah Zohra Jabeen to apologise to Bawani for disrupting the latter?s speech in the forum.

?THERE IS NO NEED FOR HER TO APOLOGIZE TO BAVANI -- AS BAVANI NEED TO LEARN HOW TO RESPECT OTHER?S-- NGEH3,? Langsi posted.

Another administrator who went by the pseudonym ?Mis Natrah? also backed the SW1M president and continued to paint a belligerent picture of Bawani, alleging the student told ?fairy tales? and having ?run away? and disrespecting Sharifah Zohra Jabeen who ?have gut?s [sic]? to teach her a lesson.

The group?s defence of its president, however, appeared to have backfired as Facebook followers seemed more amused by the administrator?s extreme poor command of the English language, and responded in kind.

?Oh my!!! poor thing...you seriously need some intensive english lessons!!!? posted Facebook user Ashwin Johl.

?Whoahh..SW1M?s powderful England,? said another, identified as Han Yang Toh.

The video starts with the university students swearing an oath in the national language before cutting to the student, Bawani, who took to a microphone in a packed auditorium to speak on a court ruling on the Bersih electoral rallies last year and ask why Malaysia was unable to offer free education like other countries.

Sharifah Zohra Jabeen, who appeared to be emceeing the forum, interrupts her mid-way, telling her to ?Listen!? a whopping 11 times and even taking away the microphone from Bawani to stop the student from speaking further.

?Number one, when this is our programme, we allow you to speak,? Sharifah Zohra Jabeen said, and then added, ?Number two, when I speak, you listen.?

Sharifah Zohra Jabeen also quelled another student who attempted to speak out, saying insistently, ?Let me speak? before asking the rest of the auditorium audience: ?Students in the hall, 2,300 students everywhere. Did I give her respect? Did I give her respect? I came up to her, shook hands with her and gave her respect as another woman. Do you think I need to answer her question with this attitude??

She then labelled Ambiga an ?anarchist?, and criticised the student for highlighting the need for free education in the country, even telling her ?if you equate Malaysia to other countries, what are you doing in Malaysia??

?Go to Cuba, go to Argentina, go to Libya, go everywhere. Because all the students in this hall are happy with whatever the government does for them,? she said, and ticked Bawani off for having ?a very least of pendidikan [education]?.

A Barisan Nasional deputy minister and the Umno Youth chief have been forced to engage in damage control to prevent its fallout from impacting the ruling coalition ahead of Election 2013.

Undergraduates in local universities have in recent years become increasingly more vocal and critical of the government, more so after the Najib administration moved to loosen the law allowing students to participate in politics, in a bid to draw support from the younger generation who are seen to make up a substantial voter demographic group.

Last year, several student groups took part in demonstrations nationwide to demand greater freedom and free university education.

?

Source: http://malaysia.rss.themalaysianinsider.com/c/33362/f/567635/s/27875beb/l/0L0Sthemalaysianinsider0N0Cmalaysia0Carticle0Con0Efacebook0Elisten0Elisten0Elisten0Ewomans0Engo0Eattacks0Evocal0Elittle0Eambiga0C/story01.htm

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Jerusalem barrier spurs illicit building boom

JERUSALEM (AP) ? Dozens of apartment towers sprouting up illicitly in an Arab neighborhood of Jerusalem are creating a fraught new dynamic in the struggle for control of the sacred city at the core of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Kufr Aqab is one of several Arab areas within Jerusalem's municipal borders that have been separated from the city by the meandering barrier Israel has built to wall off the West Bank.

While Israel tightly controls development anywhere inside the barrier, anything seems to go in Arab neighborhoods outside the structure, like Kufr Aqab.

Palestinians believe Israel is turning a blind eye to the hundreds of cheap wildcat apartments being built there, hoping the abundant housing will lure the city's Arabs to the other side of the barrier. They fear Israel will one day make the barrier the new municipal line to cement a Jewish majority in the city, whose eastern part, including the Old City with its major religious shrines, the Palestinians claim as a future capital.

"They want to empty Jerusalem of Arabs," said Ayoub Burkan, one of the newcomers in Kufr Aqab.

The 45-year-old driving instructor said he couldn't afford to buy in his old neighborhood of Ras al-Amud, close to the Old City, and moved to Kufr Aqab, where apartments cost 75 percent less. Israeli restrictions on Arab construction in the city have produced a drastic housing shortage and priced most Palestinians out of the housing market there.

Israeli officials deny they plan to change Jerusalem's boundary unilaterally.

Since Israel captured east Jerusalem in 1967, Israel has built a ring of settlements to tighten its grip on the area. These settlements, which Israel calls neighborhoods, are now home to nearly 200,000 Jews, compared to 300,000 Palestinians in east Jerusalem. In all, Jerusalem has just over 800,000 residents.

Last summer, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat fueled fears of a status change for city neighborhoods outside the barrier when, citing "security-related difficulties" in providing services there, he proposed the Israeli military take over the task. The mayor denied that his idea, which was rejected by the army, was a precursor to changing Jerusalem's boundaries.

Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev said the separation barrier is not a political border, and that a future border between Israel and a Palestinian state can only arise in negotiations. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu opposes giving up any part of east Jerusalem.

The mini-Manhattan going up helter-skelter on Jerusalem's northern edge is just the most visible sign of a chain reaction of Arab migration triggered by the barrier.

Kufr Aqab started out as a West Bank hamlet, but became part of Jerusalem after Israel captured the eastern sector of the city and the West Bank from Jordan. It extended the city's boundaries eastward into the West Bank, tripling Jerusalem's size in an annexation that is not internationally recognized. Israel included Kufr Aqab, some nine kilometers (six miles) from the city center, because it wanted to add a nearby airfield to Jerusalem's territory, historians say.

In 2002, Israel began building the barrier, portraying it as a temporary defense against Palestinian militants who had killed hundreds of Israelis in an armed uprising.

City officials say the route of the?Jerusalem segment, which keeps an estimated 80,000 Palestinians in Kufr Aqab and the Shuafat refugee camp on the West Bank side, was drawn up according to security considerations. However, Haim Ramon, at one point a government minister for Jerusalem affairs, later acknowledged the barrier was also meant to ensure a Jewish majority in the city.

By 2005, the barrier in northern Jerusalem was finished and Kufr Aqab residents now had to endure long waits at barrier checkpoints to reach jobs and schools in their city.

Initially, many Arab city residents moved to areas inside the barrier to avoid such hardships. But this drove up already high housing prices in east Jerusalem.

Moving to cheaper West Bank suburbs was a dangerous option. Leaving Jerusalem's city limits would put them at risk of being stripped by Israel of their Jerusalem residency permits, which grant them freedom of movement and access to Israel's health care and social services.

Suddenly, Kufr Aqab became an attractive option again. After the barrier was built, city building inspectors stopped coming to Kufr Aqab, residents said. Contractors responding to a huge demand began building densely packed apartment towers ? a jarring sight in generally low-rise Jerusalem.

These days, Kufr Aqab's main road, which leads from the Jerusalem barrier's Qalandiya crossing to the West Bank city of Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian self-rule government, is lined with high-rises, many still under construction.

Khaled Matouk, his wife Suhair and their four children are among the thousands of recent arrivals.

The physician, who grew up in the Old City, said he was forced to leave his previous home in the West Bank when Israel suspended his health and pension benefits for living outside the city limits. Matouk, 48, said he couldn't afford to rent or buy in areas inside the barrier, leaving him only with Kufr Aqab.

Burkan, the driving teacher, said in some ways, the absence of any local authority makes life in Kufr Aqab more relaxed. "But it's (also) difficult because there are no good streets, no (proper) sewage system, no green areas and only random building," he said.

Barak Cohen, a city spokesman, said the city continues to provide health and education services, but that a security threat in the area hampers other city services. He did not elaborate.

There are no firm population figures because of the neighborhood's administrative limbo, but estimates range from 40,000 to 60,000. In all, about 120,000 of Jerusalem's 300,000 Arabs live outside the barrier, estimates Ahmad Sublaban of Ir Amim, a group that promotes an equitable solution for Jerusalem.

There are barely any signs of an Israeli presence in Kufr Aqab, except for a clinic linked to Israel's health care service and a city-funded community center. An Israeli army marker near Kufr Aqab, spraypainted in Hebrew on a large cement block, reads "Entrance to Ramallah," a warning to errant Israelis that they should turn back at this point.

Daniel Seidemann, an Israeli lawyer and Jerusalem activist, called the chaos in Kufr Aqab an expression of the "absurdity and unsustainability" of Israeli policy in the Arab areas of the city.

It appears only an Israeli-Palestinian partition deal could end Kufr Aqab's limbo, but that seems increasingly unlikely.

Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas have failed over the past four years to agree on the framework for renewing negotiations, and Netanyahu seems poised to be re-elected next week. At the same time, Israel has announced ambitious plans for more Jewish settlements in east Jerusalem.

In the meantime, the unregulated construction boom is causing long-term damage to areas like Kufr Aqab that would form the urban core of a future Palestine, said Ahmed Saleh, an official in the Palestinian Planning Ministry.

"One day, when we have a state, this area will be a huge obstacle to any planning and development," he said.

___

Associated Press writers Mohammed Daraghmeh in Ramallah and Dalia Nammari in Jerusalem contributed reporting.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/jerusalem-barrier-spurs-illicit-building-boom-075016718.html

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Taxiing plane clips parked jet at Fla. airport

1 day

The Associated Press

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. --?Authorities say no one was injured when two airplanes got into a sort of fender-bender at a Florida airport.

Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue says a taxiing Spirit Airlines Airbus A-320 clipped a US Airways Airbus A-320. The US Airways jet was parked Monday night in a remote area away from the gate at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

Spirit spokeswoman Misty Pinson says a flight from Atlanta was taxiing to its gate when its left wing clipped the parked plane. Pinson says all 162 passengers on board got off at the gate as normal, and the plane returned to service.

Authorities say the US Airways aircraft was left with a gash in its tail section.

Firefighters were called to the scene, but there was no fuel leak from either aircraft. ?

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/travel/taxiing-plane-clips-parked-jet-fla-airport-1C7785095

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After A Shaky Year Of IPOs, Venture Capitalists Now Bearish About ...

Editor's Note: This article by Suzanne McGee originally appeared on The Fiscal Times.

The old year ? 2012 ? will go down in the record books as a good one for investors, as the S&P 500 (INDEXSP:.INX) eked out a double-digit gain of 13.4%. But to remind ourselves of the volatile and uncertain path that brought us to this point, and to give us more insight into what might lie ahead, perhaps it?s better to delve into the world of the IPO market, and the views of venture capitalists and CEOs of startup companies still hoping to take their own businesses public in 2013 or beyond.

The IPO market shows just how readily spooked investors could be in 2012. As the IPO specialists at Renaissance Capital noted in their year-end review, proceeds were at their highest level since 2007, before the financial crisis hit ? but that was largely due to Facebook?s (NASDAQ:FB) outsize offering. And by the time bankers pinned a final valuation to the Facebook IPO, storm clouds already were gathering on the horizon. Already-jittery investors seized on the botched deal ? overpriced and bungled when the Nasdaq exchange couldn?t cope with the initial flurry of orders ? as a sign that they should dial down the amount of risk in their portfolios and shun companies making their public market debuts. As a result, the IPO market froze solid for about a month, and when it resumed activity proved spasmodic and readily derailed by news of everything from the ongoing debt crisis in Europe to the apparently futile negotiations to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff.

Indeed, all of the top-performing IPOs of 2012 were priced before Facebook arrived on the scene ? and none of them were household names of the same kind as the social media giant. HomeStreet Inc. (NASDAQ:HMST) soared 115% over the course of 2012, after going public in February. GuideWire Software (NYSE:GWRE), one of the year?s cluster of successful enterprise-software offerings favored by investors opting for proven business models over Facebook-style buzz, ended the year up 70%.

As of mid-December, according to data from Dealogic, the average 2012 IPO was up 14%, but that figure masks a large number of disappointments, as well as the fact that no single sector was clearly leading the way higher. Top performers, as tracked by Renaissance Capital, included technology, health care, financial and business services companies. And the final two months of the year turned out to be the second-slowest on record since financial crisis.

The picture this paints is one of uncertainty. The Facebook IPO may have been the biggest venture-backed deal of its kind ever, but if you exclude that, Renaissance Capital noted, VC-backed IPOs were down 16% in number and 43% by the amount of proceeds raised. That can?t be encouraging for venture investors, even as the IPO pipeline continued to grow in the second half of the year. One (anonymous) startup CEO, asked by the National Venture Capital Association for his thought on the environment for the new year, responded succinctly: ?More of the same. Difficult environment to raise private capital. Difficult IPO market. Very few companies will be started.?

It hasn?t helped that investors have been steadily pulling money out?of actively managed mutual funds, which tend to be a primary source of capital upon which bankers can draw when bringing a company public. Instead, those investors have opted for investing in exchange-traded funds (ETFs), tied to indexes that tend to be made up of established stocks. That?s particularly true of the most liquid and most favored ETFs, linked to the S&P 500 and other well-known indexes. On the margin, a fund manager aware that investors are more skeptical about his or her ability to beat the index, and conscious that investing in newly public companies is a more risky if potentially more lucrative endeavor, may steer clear of all but the most blue-chip of IPOs.

The result? An increasingly bearish view of 2013 on the part of the venture capital industry. Only 27 percent of venture investors expect to increase the rate at which they invest, while a large majority of the portfolio companies surveyed by the NVCA say they will be expanding their operations; 47% of venture funds in the survey say they expect to invest less in 2013. Both groups believe that consumer technology companies will find it harder than ever to obtain capital, and that early-stage capital will be the hardest of all to find. Those startups that do get funded will find that the terms favor their venture investors, survey respondents agreed. And only 7% of the companies surveyed believe an IPO is in their future.

This is one of the most upbeat and optimistic groups of CEOs and investors in the country ? indeed, being a venture capitalist or running a startup requires as much unquenchable enthusiasm as it does hard-headed pragmatism. Even if Renaissance Capital is correct in its prediction that we simply aren?t seeing some of the potential IPO activity because it is sinking into a de facto shadow market thanks to the passage of the JOBS Act (which enables companies to raise money from the general public without filing for an IPO with the SEC), the attitudes tell us just how great the uncertainty has become.

Finding a way to contain the damage that might be done to the economy and to the standing of the United States in the eyes of its trading partners by a final step off the edge of the fiscal cliff would be one positive step to restore confidence not only to financial markets in general but to this segment, which serves as a kind of leading indicator. But the story behind the year-end data suggests that caution may be the watchword throughout the financial markets for 2013.

For more from The Fiscal Times:

2012 Stock Market Winners and Losers

GOP Is Blowing It by Pandering to Tea Party

The Real Cost of Obama's Moribund Immigration Policy

Follow The Fiscal Times on Twitter @TheFiscalTimes.

No positions in stocks mentioned.

Source: http://www.minyanville.com/business-news/markets/articles/after-a-shaky-year-of-IPOs/1/2/2013/id/47058

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anaerobe lynda: ?change? using hypnosis and NLP - Self Help ...

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Source: http://loydhardy.typepad.com/blog/2012/12/anaerobe-lynda-change-using-hypnosis-and-nlp-self-help.html

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Source: http://accessconference.org/windsurfing2012-2/

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Self-Improvement: Taking a Step in the Right Direction | Frederick L ...

Posted by Frederick | Posted in Uncategorized | Posted on

0

You want to improve yourself, and this explains why you are reading this article right now. It is very possible to ?get there,? only if you are willing to take the right steps in the right direction. Before you take off, you need to have the right mentality about self-improvement. The reason why ?get there? is in quotes is because ?there? does not exist. Self-improvement is not a destination but a journey. If you have the right mentality and take the right steps, you will not fail along the way.

If you have embarked on the journey of self-improvement, have a pal to whom you are accountable for your progress. This keeps you motivated to your goal. For instance, if your aim is to lose two pounds every month, having an accountability friend will keep you glued to the goal, because you will not want to weigh yourself in their presence only to find that you have lost nothing or you have in fact added two pounds!

Be an accountability pal to yourself. This means that you will track your progress based on results. An achievement of a certain goal can be quite motivating, thus enabling you to achieve even more in the next step. One rule in self-improvement about goals is that a goal is not a goal if it is not quantifiable and assessable.

As you push towards the goal, find the ?why? in all that. The ?why? is usually the motivating factor behind every goal. For instance, the ?why? behind you wanting to sell one hundred muffins a day may be a pending debt. Your aim for losing a total of ten pounds may be fitting in your wedding gown or simply a promise you made to your husband. Any time you think of this goal, you cannot help but say no to that offer for an ice cream treat!

Make incentives and rewards for yourself along the way. For instance, give a $100 bill to an accountability pal to keep as an incentive. When you achieve the goal by a certain set time, the pal is to return the cash to you. However, if you do not make it, let the cash be given to a certain charitable trust (you should have decided which one before giving your pal the money). Reward yourself when you achieve a goal. For instance, if you make your target sale, promise yourself something, for instance a new outfit or a pizza treat. Enjoy the journey as much as you can; do not get too overwhelmed about the goal.

Source: http://fcrouter.com/uncategorized/self-improvement-taking-a-step-in-the-right-direction.html

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Realtor applauded for saving horses | OurValley.org

Sheila P. Miles, a real estate agent with Long & Foster realtors New River Valley office was honored with the 2012 Good Neighbor Award from the New River Valley Association of Realtors on Dec. 6. She received the award in recognition of her hard work and devotion to a horse rescue program, Winterfrost Farms, owned by her daughter.

Miles has always had a passion for helping horses that no one else wanted and instilled this in her daughter Reagan. From this passion came Winterfrost Farm and the program known as Ride-a-Rescue, which leads trail rides on rescue horses that have been nurtured back to health.

Sheila Miles (far left) leads a trail ride at Winterfrost Farms near Radford. Submitted Photo.

The program is designed to be a community activity that is fun and helpful at the same time. Not only do participants get to go out on trail rides, those rides also give a horse that once had no future, a future and a job.

The funds generated from the trail rides are then turned around and used for the care of the rescue horses including pasture and barn rental fees, vet bills, equipment and feed.

Miles? participation and contributions include giving riding demonstrations, leading trail rides, caring for equipment, feeding, putting up hay, fixing fences, administering medicine as needed, cleaning barns, hauling horses, and anything else that needs to be done.

In addition to the countless hours Miles devotes to rescue horses, she also participates in the annual Long & Foster United Way Campaign, the American Cancer Society Relay for Life, the Long & Foster Annual Community Service Days, supply and food drives and is active in her church.

?Sheila is very deserving of this award because she is always quick to lend a hand, her strong back and/or offer up a prayer for family, friends, and animals in need. She is dependable, kind and extremely loving,? said Long & Foster staff member Stephanie Slocum.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 31st, 2012 at 12:06 pm and is filed under FEATURES, News Messenger, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

Source: http://ourvalley.org/realtor-applauded-for-saving-horses/

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Survivor: Bus crash like dream of 'world ending'

Workmen move the bus which plummeted 200 feet down an embankment in rural Eastern Oregon Sunday, killing nine and sending multiple to hospitals, Monday, Dec. 31, 2012. Survivors of the bus crash said Monday some passengers were thrown from the tour bus through broken windows after the vehicle skidded out of control, smashed through a guardrail and went down. (AP Photo/The Oregonian, Randy L. Rasmussen)

Workmen move the bus which plummeted 200 feet down an embankment in rural Eastern Oregon Sunday, killing nine and sending multiple to hospitals, Monday, Dec. 31, 2012. Survivors of the bus crash said Monday some passengers were thrown from the tour bus through broken windows after the vehicle skidded out of control, smashed through a guardrail and went down. (AP Photo/The Oregonian, Randy L. Rasmussen)

A piece of heavy equipment strains to move a bus which plummeted 200 feet down an embankment in rural Eastern Oregon Sunday, killing nine and sending multiple to hospitals, Monday, Dec. 31, 2012. Survivors of the bus crash said Monday some passengers were thrown from the tour bus through broken windows after the vehicle skidded out of control, smashed through a guardrail and went down. (AP Photo/The Oregonian, Randy L. Rasmussen)

Jaemin Seo, 23, a Korean student from Vancouver, B.C., speaks Monday Dec. 31, 2012, in Pendleton, Ore., about waking up to people screaming and then being thrown from a bus that crashed in rural Eastern Oregon, Sunday. The crash killed nine and sent multiple people, including Seo, to hospitals. He was injured in his arm and leg. (AP Photo/The Oregonian, Randy L. Rasmussen)

A guardrail where a bus overran and plummeted 200 feet down an embankment in rural Eastern Oregon Sunday, killing nine and sending multiple to hospitals, remains mangled Monday, Dec. 31, 2012. Survivors of the bus crash said Monday some passengers were thrown from the tour bus through broken windows after the vehicle skidded out of control, smashed through a guardrail and went down. (AP Photo/The Oregonian, Randy L. Rasmussen)

PENDLETON, Ore. (AP) ? Investigators in Oregon are trying to piece together the final moments before a tour bus carrying 48 people careened down the side of a steep hillside, ejecting some of the passengers and killing nine.

Police said Monday they still weren't sure how fast the bus was travelling before the crash on a partly icy highway in a rural mountain pass east of Pendleton. The bus was carrying tourists, many of them Koreans, on the final leg of a nine-day tour of the western United States.

It could take a month or more to determine whether the driver, a 54-year-old man from Vancouver, British Columbia, is at fault and whether he'll face charges, Oregon State Police Lt. Gregg Hastings said Sunday.

The bus was traveling westbound in the left lane of Interstate 84 when it hit a concrete barrier, veered across both westbound lanes and plunged through the guardrail and 200 feet down the embankment, Hastings said. The National Transportation Safety Board said the bus rolled at least once.

When the tour bus came to a rest, terrified passengers looked for their loved ones.

"People screamed and yelled," said Jaemin Seo, a 23-year-old student from Suwon, South Korea studying in Vancouver, British Columbia. "Some mothers screamed to find their son or daughter."

Seo said he was awakened by screaming and was ejected from a broken window as the bus careened down the hill. He suffered a broken ankle, a gash in his arm and shallow scratches across his face.

Police have not released the names of the nine people who died. The survivors ranged in age from 7 to 74.

The passengers were supposed to arrive Sunday night in Canada, where their journey began. Instead, they were taken by ambulance and aircraft to 10 hospitals across three states.

Amid the chaos, authorities struggled to identify some victims or locate their relatives, many of them living half a world away in South Korea. At least one survivor, a man in his early 20s, had yet to be identified.

The crash occurred near a spot on the interstate called Deadman Pass, at the top of a steep, seven-mile descent from the Blue Mountains. Though there were icy spots where the crash occurred, that was nothing unusual for this time of year, said Tom Strandberg, a spokesman for the Oregon Department of Transportation.

He said a sanding truck had applied sand a few hours earlier and was behind the bus making another run when the crash occurred. The sand truck driver was among the first at the scene.

Berlyn Sanderson, 22, of Surrey, British Columbia, said she also was thrown from the bus.

"It's kind of like one of those dreams you have of the world ending," Sanderson told reporters.

Rescuers faced the challenge of bringing survivors 200 feet up a steep cliff, Pendleton Fire Chief Gary Woodson said. They descended the hill and used ropes and baskets to help retrieve people from the wreckage in freezing weather.

Some survivors were carried on backboards by six or eight rescuers. Others were hoisted in baskets, and an all-terrain vehicle arrived toward the end of the operation, Woodson said.

The NTSB said two investigators were expected to arrive at the crash site. They will look into why the bus left the road, the condition of the road at the time, the condition of the guardrail, the actions of the driver, and the operations of the company that owns the bus, the agency said.

Yoo Byung Woo, a 25-year-old survivor, said it was snowing and foggy at the time. She told the Oregonian newspaper that one passenger was frightened and asked if they could take another route. Some passengers were dozing when the driver slammed on the brakes.

Yoo said rocks smashed through windows after the bus crashed through the guardrail and rolled down.

Umatilla County Emergency Manager Jack Remillard said the bus was owned by Mi Joo Tour & Travel in Vancouver, B.C. A bus safety website run by the U.S. Department of Transportation said Mi Joo has six buses, none of which have been involved in any accidents in the past two years.

A spokesman for the NTSB, Peter Knudson, said seatbelts aren't required on such buses. "We have been concerned about this for some time," Knudson said.

The Red Cross has been offering food, clothing and hotel arrangements for survivors as they are released from the hospital.

Jake Contor, a Pendleton resident who speaks Korean and helped translate for the Red Cross, said he had spoken with several survivors.

"The stories have been fairly consistent: braking, swerving, sliding on the ice, hitting the guardrail, then sliding down the embankment," Contor said.

He said the passengers told him the bus left Boise, Idaho, on Sunday morning and was supposed to arrive in Vancouver that night. The survivors who spoke to Contor were seated at the back of the bus and said it appeared that the front and center of the coach sustained the most damage.

The interstate links Boise and Portland through the Blue Mountains and the Columbia Gorge.

___

AP correspondent Jeff Barnard in Grants Pass, Ore., contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-01-01-Tour%20Bus%20Crash/id-2be4fbddb9944f39bdb5e49d5d3b88f9

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