Restaurant Creates An Indigestible Soup Bat

Bat Soup

 In a restaurant located in Malaka, Sudan, you can try some local cuisine at very reasonable prices. Tofu, vegetables, fish, fried, fish soup, beef and shrimp integral part of the menu, but what really draws attention may seem rather indigestible for most of us.Indeed, what makes the place different is his bat soup. That's right, bat! OK, so not one of those mystical bats attacking people (they feed on fruit), but it's not a very inviting dish.

The bat is cooked in coconut milk, ginger and local spices. After boiled for several hours, is ready to be tasted.

Check out the photos.

Ten Films to Avoid in 2011

We have a bad feeling about this.We advise you to stay away from these 2011 turkeys.

Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher" in No Strings Attached" (Paramount Pictures)

As professional movie watchers, part of our job is figuring out what movies are actually worth watching. You know, separating the good from the bad, the wheat from the chaff, the "National Treasures" from the "National Treasure: Book of Secretses." And as the 2011 release schedule shapes up before us, we're seeing a few risky propositions being put forward -- movies that might turn out to be considerably less than the sums of their parts.

Let's take a look at the list... as a strictly hypothetical exercise, of course. You never know; that "Transformers" threequel could be the movie that finally makes people hail Michael Bay as the modern-day equivalent of Michelangelo Antonioni. Autobots have their existentialist moments, right?

 No Strings Attached (January 21)

Ivan Reitman's comedy -- in which Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher play "sex friends" trying to keep their relationship strictly physical -- doesn't seem to aspire to be anything more than a frivolous rom-com. But it arrives at the worst possible time -- just as "Black Swan" has people taking Portman seriously as a powerhouse actress. Are people who've staggered out of Darren Aronofsky's demented psychodrama going to turn around and head into another theatre to see Portman coasting through something that looks like a second-rate Katherine Heigl vehicle? It seems like this might have been better served by a few more months on the shelf, just to put a safe distance between it and the Oscar movie. 

Just Go with It (February 11)

The premise of Adam Sandler's latest comedy gives us hives: Fearing commitment to girlfriend Brooklyn Decker, Sandler tells her he's married -- and then ropes single mother Jennifer Aniston and her kids into pretending they're his family so he can continue the lie. (Unexpected attraction, presumably, ensues.) Now, Sandler hasn't made a proper romantic comedy since the underrated "50 First Dates," so maybe he's spent the intervening years taking his time, waiting for the perfect project to land in his lap. That'd be great, right? That would mean he actually cares about the movies he chooses to make, rather than churning out pap like "Grown Ups." Yes, let's just go with that -- and hope this movie turns out to be something recognizably human, rather than a comedy about the most selfish and manipulative man on the planet. 

Big Momma’s: Like Father, Like Son (February 18)

It's been 11 years since "Big Momma's House" became a huge hit for Martin Lawrence, casting him as an FBI agent forced to go undercover as a morbidly obese woman -- and paying off in crowd-pleasing laughs aplenty. Now that Tyler Perry has cornered the market on such projects, you'd think Lawrence would be able to move on... but things have been a little slow for him recently, so here he goes again -- and he's dragging Brandon T. Jackson ("Tropic Thunder") along for the ride as his character's son, who must go into hiding at a girl's school after he witnesses a murder. It's just like "Sister Act," if Whoopi Goldberg had climbed into a culturally insensitive fat suit instead of a nun's habit. And taken a blow to the head. We are dubious as to the comedic value, is what we're saying. 

Red Riding Hood (March 11)

Casting Amanda Seyfried in a new version of the Little Red Riding Hood story? Kind of brilliant, since Seyfried already looks like a fairy-tale version of an innocent maiden. Retelling the story from the perspective of said maiden, who's caught between a wealthy landowner (Max Irons) and a penniless woodsman (Shilo Fernandez) while the local clergy (Gary Oldman and Lukas Haas) hunt a werewolf that's been terrorizing the village? Sure, why not? But then someone went and hired Catherine Hardwicke -- director of the first, worst "Twilight" movie -- which means the result is likely to be slow as molasses, inconsistently acted and cheesy as all hell. It might still be a massive hit, but doesn't anyone want it to be good? 

The Beaver (Spring 2011, date to be determined)

On the one hand, Jodie Foster has demonstrated considerable grace and wit as a filmmaker, so her latest directorial effort is something we can all look forward to. On the other hand, "The Beaver" is a movie about an emotionally damaged man who communicates with his friends and family through a hand puppet, which would sound completely insane even if that man wasn't Mel Gibson. The announcement that the film will make its bow at the edgy South By Southwest festival suggests the movie's worth defending... but given that Gibson's spent most of the last few years turning himself into a freak show of global proportions, it's going to be a very hard sell. 

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (May 20)

Sure, the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series played itself out, story-wise, somewhere in the first hour of the third movie. But that movie made a lot of money, so here comes Part Four, with squabbling seafarers Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) and Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) racing none other than Blackbeard (Ian McShane) to find the Fountain of Youth. Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley have moved on, so producer Jerry Bruckheimer has recruited Depp's "Blow" co-star Penelope Cruz to play his fiery romantic interest -- and tapped "Chicago" Oscar-winner Rob Marshall to take over for director Gore Verbinski, which seems like a bit of a leap. They're also releasing this one in 3D, which really doesn't seem like the best idea for a movie set on water. Perhaps you understand our lack of enthusiasm now. 

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (July 1)

On some level we can't fully understand, we feel kind of bad for Michael Bay. Yes, his movies are phenomenally successful and he's paid very, very well. But we all know his movies kind of suck -- and when it comes to the "Transformers" movies, they suck on an almost spectacular level. "Dark of the Moon" finds the Autobots and Decepticons trying to beat each other to the lunar surface where a lost spaceship holds a crucial secret -- so we can brace ourselves for another two and a half hours of visually and aurally incoherent giant-robot smackdownery -- and this time, in eye-popping 3D! Still, we're willing to go if there's a scene where Shia LaBeouf undergoes explosive decompression after being teleported into the Sea of Tranquility. 

Zookeeper (July 8)

 

We don't mean to beat up on Adam Sandler, really we don't. But you know that thing he does where he uses his box-office clout to greenlight silly movies for his friends? Well, the good intentions that let Rob Schneider make two "Deuce Bigalow" movies are back in force with this Kevin James comedy, which finds a bunch of captive animals acting as Cupids to help their beloved keeper get lucky. The trailer makes it look like "Paul Blart, Mall Cop" meets "Madagascar" -- with Sandler, Sylvester Stallone and Cher supplying the voices of the digitally enhanced animals, and James looking awfully freaked out. Can't blame him, really.

One for the Money (July 8)

Katherine Heigl's latest quirky romantic comedy casts her as a newbie bail bondswoman whose first case is ex-boyfriend Jason O'Mara. And let's not mince words: It sounds straight-up horrible, as though Heigl saw "Ugly Truth" co-star Gerard Butler in "The Bounty Hunter" and decided she wanted to make a movie just like it -- though we can't imagine why anyone would want to make a movie just like "The Bounty Hunter." Which is why this movie isn't at the top of our must-see list. Really, is it at the top of anyone's? 

Alvin and the Chipmunks 3D (December 16)

Do you think Justin Long wakes up screaming when he realizes he's contractually obligated to make another one of these things? Anyway, he's making another one of these things. At press time, nothing was known of the film beyond its release date, but given that the previous films starred Jason Lee and Zachary Levi, we're hoping this one casts their NBC stablemate Donald Glover ("Community") as the munks' latest caretaker -- he was the Internet's choice to play Spider-Man, you know!

Kim Kardashian's harsh on 'Teen Mom'

“Teen Mom”

Kim Kardashian has slammed the MTV show “Teen Mom” after reading a report about the alarming teen pregnancy rate at a Tennessee high school. The reality star stated in a blog post that the girls on "Teen Mom" are becoming idolized. "Having a baby so young shouldn't be seen as the trendy thing to do," Kardashian said.

Mom, kidnapped baby reunited after decades

she believed she was her daughter. DNA tests provided confirmation.

Carlina White was just 19 days old in 1987 when she was taken from her crib in a Harlem hospital. Her mother, Joy White, say she always believed her daughter was still alive. Decades later, on Jan. 4, 2011, White was contacted by a woman named Nejdra Nance who told her she believed she was her daughter. DNA tests provided confirmation.

Dolly Parton 9 to 5 Musical

Birthday Appearance 9 to 5 The Musical' in Chicago tonight

DOLLY PARTON, the 65-year-old American country singer, is set to make a birthday appearance at a showing of '9 to 5 The Musical' in Chicago tonight (19th January 2011) according to the Chicago Sun Times. The musical, which Parton wrote her first Broadway score for, is currently midway through a national tour. 

In 1980, Dolly Parton starred on the big-screen movie 9 to 5.  The movie celebrated its 30th anniversary in December.  In the movie, Dolly Parton plays one of three female employees of an egotistical, lying, sexist, hypocritical bigot boss.  The trio find a way to turn the tables on him. The movie has been made into a musical and is coming to the Fabulous Fox Theatre in St. Louis, Missouri on February 8-20, 2011.

When “9 to 5: The Musical,” the screen-to-stage Broadway musical closely based on the 1980 comedy starring Lily Tomlin, Jane Fonda and, of course, Parton herself appeared on Broadway in 2009, the producers were faced with the Dixie Stampede problem. The movie — with its beloved title song about tumbling out of bed to face the quotidian drudgery of office work — is inextricably linked with Parton, who wrote all the music and lyrics in the score and whose personality imbues the entire show.

Yet Parton could not, for obvious reasons, be there in person. And whereas Parton's fans in Pigeon Forge might have been happy with a video, that was deemed a tad too tacky for Broadway.

Not any more. The show did not do so well on Broadway. And the national touring production of “9 to 5” features Parton herself. A lesson has been learned from the Dixie Stampede.

“We felt people really wanted to see Dolly,” said Mike Isaacson of Fox Theatricals, the producer of the show. And thus at the road version of “9 to 5: The Musical,” which opens in Chicago Wednesday night, Dolly they will see.

“I am the face of the clock.” said Parton, in a recent phone interview. “I talk about the 1970s over the vamp of ‘9 to 5.' I just like being able to welcome people to the show.”

A beloved figure in industry circles — where her hard work, humility, business smarts and multifarious creative talents are all widely respected — Parton is known for her hands-on involvement. Isaacson said Parton showed up for auditions for the tour, first terrifying the actresses who were called back and then putting them at ease.

“She'd just shout out ‘Hi, I'm Dolly,' said Isaacson, recreating the moment when Parton's hand rose and famous East Tennessee twang rang out through the rehearsal space.

“I've been working this ‘9 to 5' job for 30 years,” Patron said, explaining her presence. “I feel like I know these characters by heart.”

Parton, of course, is one of those artists whom people think they know but is, in fact, difficult to categorize. “I really don't consider this a country musical, “she said of “9 to 5.” “The only country song in it is ‘Backwoods Barbie.' Sure, there's a little Dolly flavor to all my music. But people had a preconceived notion that if I wrote it, it had to be country.”

Those were people, presumably, who were unaware that Whitney Houston's massive hit “I Will Always Love You” was penned and first recorded by Parton. Not only is country a malleable notion, but there is plenty of the big city in Parton.

The touring production, Parton says, has a “cozier feeling” that the Broadway prototype, which felt overblown and missing its roots. And the show, which is directed by Jeff Calhoun and now stars Dee Hoty, no longer has to worry about Broadway pundits. It is travelling to the heartland where it is more likely to reach its natural audience.

But if you talk to folks at the Dixie Stampede, and at Dollywood, they'll tell you that Dolly does show up quite regularly at those locales. She might not be able to be everywhere at once, but she knows how to choose her moments to appear in three dimensions.

Chicago is a high-profile city — a second opening, really for “9 to 5.” The Chicago Bears are currently sucking up a lot of oxygen in town and sometimes, video is not enough. Dolly Parton didn't get to be Dolly Parton without an innate sense of those moments.

And thus Wednesday night at the Bank of America, a red carpet will be rolled out in front of the theater. An American icon is expected to make her entrance and head backstage. And when the curtain rises, the welcome will be personal.