Vale remora….

It is with great sadness that we announce the death of remora.

remora was a founding member of Punjapit & a great friend to all at the shed.

With sincere sympathy,

robin

‘Hachidan’ Putin promoted to Judo elite

Russian President Vladimir Putin was elevated to judo’s elite Wednesday when the sport’s world governing body presented him with the eighth Dan belt, the third-highest honour.

Putin received the accolade, three days after turning 60, from the International Judo Federation (IJF), which called him “a perfect ambassador for our sport” because of his position as the head of state.

“It is a great honour for our international federation, as well as for the entire judo community, to count among us a very high personality of his reputation and standing,” IJF president Marius Vizer said.

“President Putin represents a high expression of the Judo Values in the world.”
Putin will not need a new belt, as the red-and-white stripes of an eighth Dan belt are identical to his previous sixth Dan belt. Both are rated higher than black belt.

The ranking is known as ‘Hachidan’ in Japanese. Only a handful of practitioners have reached the highest tenth Dan level.

Putin was judo champion of his home town Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, in his youth and starred in the instructional video Let’s Learn Judo With Vladimir Putin in 2008.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/284591/hachidan-putin-promoted-judo-elite.html

by The Punjapit Alliance

Closed for a End of Summer Holiday

Management has asked us to take End of Summer vacation….

So Punjapit is going to be closed & will reopen mid October.

(Arf will be guarding “the SHED”)

Closed for the Weekend…. Spring Cleaning

Thu 12th April, 2012 will be… Walk On Your Wild Side Day

 

Be Unpredictable! Walk On Your Wild Side Day is a chance to do something no one would ever expect you to. Today is a day to embrace your inner wild streak – to wearing nothing but neon pink, dying your hair green for a day, or showing everybody who ever said you couldn’t that you could.

by robin + Verve & Elan

Kosei Inoue gives his impressions of the UK

by The Punjapit Alliance

Recycling Toilets into School Desks: Madness or Genius?

Toilet manufacturer Jianguo Gao, hailing from Shijiazhuang, northern China, may well be on the border between genius and madness. There’s no denying, however, that he has invented a new way to recycle, pushing the envelope and the definition of the word far beyond conventional borders.

Gao has discovered a way to transform standard-sized unused toilets into fully functional portable lap desks. He created a special platform that replaces the cistern lid, which will salvage many toilets officially declared as sub-standard by converting them into desks and donating them to local schools. Gau stands by his unique idea, believing it will prevent hundreds of perfectly good, unused toilets from being discarded every year.

“We have lots of toilets that we would otherwise throw away … It is wasteful, and if we can find a use for them, we should. They are brand new and have never been used so there is no hygiene issue,” said Gao in response to critics. School children can sit backwards on top of the toilet seat and work from a fixed position. Gao has generously donated hundreds of toilet desks to local schools. Madness aside, has Gao flushed out a winner? So it would seem for all concerned.

http://www.weirdasianews.com/2012/03/06/recycling-toilets-school-desks-madness-genius/

by robin