Features

  ISLAMABAD / AP Ahmad Waqas Goraya couldn’t see anything through the black hood, but he could hear the screams. A blogger with a penchant for criticizing Pakistan’s powerful military and taking the government to task, Goraya was kidnapped in January along with four other bloggers. “I could hear the screams of torture,” he said in a telephone interview with ...

  BOSTON / AP Students are developing a virtual reality game based on James Joyce’s “Ulysses” as part of a class at Boston College. The goal of “Joycestick” is to expose new audiences to the works of one of Ireland’s most celebrated authors, as well as to give a glimpse of how virtual reality can be used to enhance literature, ...

  Emirates Business For all those who think that Maldives is exclusively a honeymoon destination need to visit Maldives to know that the beautiful islands of Maldives have a lot more to offer. The Maldivian cuisine is worth a try. Milaidhoo Island has opened the first modern Maldivian restaurant in the Maldives, called Ba’theli. It is one of the few ...

  TRENTON, NJ / AP Cardboard boxes certainly aren’t new technology. But when they’re linked to a practice that started in Finland decades ago to help babies sleep safely, they’re taking on a new purpose as so-called baby boxes make their way to the U.S. Parents are beginning to take baby boxes home from hospitals along with their newborns. A ...

  Emirates Business Taiwan is a breathtaking island which is a host to a variety of terrain such as green mountains with rich flora and fauna, sea, natural hot springs and a lake surrounded by forests. A nature lover or a shopaholic, a foodie or an adventure seeker, Taiwan is perfect for all… Scenic attractions… Sun Moon Lake, a major ...

  AP A remote Eskimo village on a tundra-covered island in western Alaska is hoping to counter its steep unemployment rate and achieve greater self-sufficiency through one of its few resources: reindeer meat. Mekoryuk’s tribal government is expanding its commercial reindeer venture with a herd introduced a century ago to Nunivak Island, 40 miles off the coast in the Bering ...

  CATSKILL, NY / AP Not only did Thomas Cole paint the lush mountain landscapes that inspired the Hudson River School art movement of the 19th century, he also painted on the walls of his home. Lost beneath layers of paint for more than a century, the patterned borders below the ceilings were rediscovered several years ago and are now ...

  AP Dalia Rhodes’ wedding dress went down the aisle twice: Once at her wedding in 2015, and again a year later after she sold her gown to a stranger online. “I just wanted someone else to enjoy a pretty dress,” says Rhodes, who used the website Once Wed to sell it for $800, about half of what she originally ...

  ROME / AP Lucia Annibali’s face was rebuilt for the price of atrocious pain and 18 surgeries after an acid attack ordered by her ex-boyfriend corroded her eyelids, cheeks and forehead almost to the bone and left her nearly blind. The man she enraged with a breakup, like her then a lawyer in an Adriatic resort town, is now ...

  NEW YORK / AP Daniel Houghton was just 24 years old when he became CEO of Lonely Planet in 2013. Since then, he’s restructured the company, expanded its digital presence and, to the surprise of many who feared he’d kill off Lonely Planet guidebooks, he’s grown the print side of the business. The company now has 33 percent of ...