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Yahoo
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
NYT Strands today – my hints and answers for May 30 (#453)
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Looking for a different day? A new NYT Strands puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Thursday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Strands hints and answers for Thursday, May 29 (game #452). Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints. Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game. SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers. • Today's NYT Strands theme is… And here's the kicker… Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system. RIFLE SPEED FIRST DRAWER SEEK KEEP • Spangram has 6 letters First side: left, 5th row Last side: right, 6th row Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM. The answers to today's Strands, game #453, are… FORWARD DEFENDER GOALKEEPER STRIKER MIDFIELDER SPANGRAM: SOCCER My rating: Easy My score: Perfect Anyone interested in learning the rules of SOCCER should seek out England's official 1990 World Cup song World In Motion by New Order, which features a rap by the country's most talented MIDFIELDER of the era. 'You've got to hold and give,' John Barnes explains. 'Defend and attack, there's only one way to beat them, get round the back.' There are of course other crucial elements to association football, but essentially it's passing, tacking, and shooting at the goal all performed by the positions featured in today's word search. Once you've mastered the basics you can then learn about the offside rule and its many sub-clauses and exceptions. That should take a year or so, by which time you'll be ready to watch the 2026 World Cup in Canada, Mexico and USA. How did you do today? Let me know in the comments below. BUTTERFLY MOTH WASP FLEA HORNET DRAGONFLY SPANGAM: INSECT Strands is the NYT's not-so-new-any-more word game, following Wordle and Connections. It's now a fully fledged member of the NYT's games stable that has been running for a year and which can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile. I've got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you're struggling to beat it each day.
The National
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- The National
Edinburgh kids' festival marks 35 years of theater magic
This year's jamboree, which ends today, marks 35 years of the festival, 10 of them under the excellent, out-going director Noel Jordan. As one has come to expect of Jordan, his 2025 programme is both carefully curated and wonderfully adventurous. A case in point is the excellent physical theatre piece The Show For Young Men. Created by Scottish company Guesthouse Projects, this piece (which has its last festival show at The Studio venue this afternoon) coincides nicely with the bringing of serious charges against the notorious misogynist Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan. There has never been a better time to remind boys and young men that masculinity comes in more flavours than simply 'toxic'. In this delightful show – which is aimed at audiences aged eight to 14 and directed by Eoin McKenzie – Robbie (a 45-year-old man, played by Robbie Synge) and an 11-year-old boy (performed by the extraordinary Alfie) encounter each other on a building site. READ MORE: Nigel Farage has brought 'racism and hatred' to by-election, says John Swinney Although dressed for work, the pair can't resist the temptation to play. The plastic tubes of varying sizes, the gaffer tape and the set of metal steps on wheels are just too tempting as Robbie and Alfie find that they can bond wordlessly while putting the paraphernalia of the building trade to fun-filled uses. The duo switches the radio from its standard football podcasts to a series of musical numbers (by diverse artists ranging from Dolly Parton to New Order) that reflect their varying moods. At one stage, the choreography is supplemented by audio recordings of Robbie and Alfie talking affectionately and insightfully about each other. The piece is energetically humorous in one moment, and touchingly contemplative in the next. As a means of broaching the (often unarticulated) affection between members of the male sex, The Show For Young Men is reminiscent of Stephen Michael King's lovely children's picture book The Man Who Loved Boxes (which also took unspoken love – in this case between father and son – as its subject). Another festival show that ends with performances today is the tremendous German production Game Within A Game. Staged in the Assembly Roxy venue, the piece – which is co-produced by Munich companies Ceren Oran and Moving Borders – has its intended audience (of children aged three to seven) captivated from the outset. Large windows on wheels, constructed of horizontal slats made of elastic, allow performers to look suddenly into the audience, their eyes disappearing as quickly as they had arrived. A hand emerges here, a foot over there, all to the hilarity of the surprised and greatly amused young theatregoers. Three chairs can be manipulated to become a horse to ride or a car to drive. People become puppets on invisible strings. A mischievous fox makes numerous surprise appearances, including on the head of one of the three performers. The latter moment is part of a scene in which the cast play in gloriously eccentric costumes (including a man wearing what looks like a 19th-century hoop skirt topped with the face of a sunflower). The sense of fun and the physical virtuosity of the performers are absolutely compelling. So, too, is the momentum of a piece in which the titular game within a game emerges from the unpredictable negotiations of three friends. There is friendship of a different kind in Tiébélé, a lovely piece from Théâtre de la Guimbarde (of Belgium) in collaboration with Association Wéléni (from Burkina Faso). Performed by Alex Lobo and Bérénice De Clercq, the show – which was created for children aged 18 months and upwards – invokes the traditional village culture of women in Burkina Faso. De Clercq plays a n'goni, a beautiful West African string instrument that belongs to the same family as the kora (aka 'the West African harp'), which has been popularised around the world by such great players as Ali Farka Toure, Toumani Diabaté and Sona Jobarteh. Lobo mixes clay and water to create a paste that she will use to decorate transparent screens with the kind of designs that Burkinabè village women paint on the walls of their homes. Both performers sing traditional Burkinabè songs. Together, these elements – which are enhanced by a lovely use of projected images and animations – accumulate into a wonderfully gentle and elemental feast for the senses of some of the very youngest theatregoers. Last, but most definitely not least, is Grown-Ups, an uproariously inventive show by Belgian groups Compagnie Barbarie and BRONKS. The show – which played at the Traverse Theatre – is audacious and hilarious in equal measure. Made for children aged four to 12, the piece entails four grown-up women going about their daily business. Entirely unaware that they are being watched by an audience of children, they play kazoos, arse around with DIY equipment and generally indulge in the kind of ludicrous behaviour grown-ups tend to discourage in kids. There is a Charlie Chaplin meets Monty Python aspect to the silliness of these adults. Or, at least, there is until the brilliant moment when the grown-ups' games come to a sudden halt when they finally notice that they have an audience. Following some enquiries, the adults discover that the children watching them are here to see some theatre. 'There is no theatre here', one of the performers insists. 'We are grown-ups and we are very busy.' From there – with the glorious sound of children chanting their demand for 'Theatre! Theatre!' ringing in their ears – the grown-ups give the kids an improvised performance. All they can come up with, however, is some rubbish choreography and a stupid version of Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard, complete with three rubber masks of the Russian bard himself. Elevating daftness to an art form, this cleverly conceived, beautifully structured piece speaks perfectly to the admirable programming of the always excellent Edinburgh International Children's Festival. The Edinburgh International Children's Festival ends today:
Daily Mirror
28-05-2025
- Daily Mirror
Warped killer butchered helpless student and put body parts in post
Hundreds of citizen detectives were determined to learn the identity of depraved Luka Magnotta months before he committed a brutal murder, even warning authorities he was set to kill Like several well known killers before him, twisted Luka Magnotta started out by abusing animals before he progressed to human slaughter. The murderer's sick online video of pet torture called '1 boy 2 kitten' would eventually prove to be his downfall after a group of animal loving citizen detectives tracked him down. Now 42, Magnotta is behind bars in Canada for killing Chinese international student Jun Lin, 33, who he had met on a dating site. Back in May 2012, he filmed the sick murder of his victim and posted it online, calling it '1 Lunatic 1 Ice Pick'. Posted on a gore site, the horrific video showed Magnotta in dark clothing towering over blindfolded Lin as he stabbed him a hundred times. The depraved murderer later dismembered his victim's body before mailing it to various political parties in Toronto, sparking a huge police search. His video contained clues - a poster for the movie Casablanca was above the bed, while New Order's track True Faith was playing in the background. And hundreds of cat-loving detectives were already on Magnotta's trail, coming close to catching him for his sick torture of animals. A year and a half before he murdered Lin, a Facebook group had been mobilised after Magnotta posted footage of a figure in a dark green hoodie suffocating two tabby kittens using a vacuum and plastic bag. They spent thousands of hours analysing photographs for clues and metadata which they handed to law enforcement, convinced that just like serial killers like Ian Brady, the as yet unidentified Magnotta would go onto kill humans. The internet sleuths identified a wolf blanket on the sick footage as one that retailed on eBay and could be shipped internationally from the US. From plug sockets to the size of the twin beds in the clip, everything was analysed to try and find the video's location. The breakthrough came when one of the sleuths received a message: "The name of the kitten vacummer you are looking for is Luka Magnotta." Searching online found the man named seemingly living the life of a jet-setting top model, with wild rumours suggesting he had dated both Michael Jackson and Madonna. Narcissistic Magnotta had created a false online profile for himself - in reality he was born in Toronto and became a stripper and porn star. Convicted of defrauding a vulnerable 21-year-old woman, he later filed for bankruptcy and in his quest for fame entered reality TV shows and created countless websites and news articles about himself. When he failed to become a star he progressed to kitten torture, which did capture the public's attention for all the wrong reasons. Now armed with a name, the determined internet sleuths tracked Magnotta to a location in Toronto where police found he had already moved out. The twisted torturer next made a video called 'Python Christmas ', which showed a live kitten being fed to a snake, before another showing a kitten being drowned in a bathtub. The sick clips were filmed in Islington, North London and Magnotta went onto meet a reporter from The Sun newspaper who had been alerted by the citizen detectives. Chillingly, the killer later sent an email to the reporter which warned: "Next time you hear from me it will be in a movie I am producing that will have some humans in it, not just pussies... Once you kill and taste blood it's impossible to stop." Magnotta's warning sadly came true five months later. After body parts were distributed, the killer's studio apartment in Montreal was found complete with a blood soaked mattress and he became one of Interpol's most wanted. And it was a Berlin internet cafe worker, Kadir Anlayisli, who snared him in the end - the eagle-eyed news lover recognised the killer looking up articles about himself. Magnotta had achieved his dream of being famous and in 2014, he was jailed for 25 years in Montreal for first degree murder. He will become eligible for day parole in June 2034. His story was told on Netflix docu-series, Don't F**k with Cats'.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Soaking in the Past at the Cruel World Festival
The very first Cruel World festival at Brookside at the Rose Bowl was held over two sweltering 90+ degree days in 2022, daring denizens of gloomy music and ghoulish dress-up to brave the California sun in their fishnets to see their favorite artists live in an outdoor festival setting. Saturday's wet and rainy 2025 edition may have been more appropriate in terms of environment for a goth and new wave assembly, but it didn't appear to be as successful, and the rain wasn't even the main problem. Economic struggle has affected us all, from gas to groceries and especially entertainment like concerts. Coachella, now a mainstream pop extravaganza, barely sold out its GA tickets this year in its first weekend, and the second weekend didn't sell out at all. Beyonce, who kicked off her Cowboy Carter Tour with five nights at Sofi Stadium did ultimately sell out, but it wasn't quick, and cheap seats were released each night to fill the venue. Niche and nostalgia fests like Cruel World can be hot tickets but the bill has to be right— and the formula can't last forever unless it evolves. C.W. has attempted to do that as its grown, dipping into poppier acts from the 80's and expanding its scope into the 90's and 2000's alongside 80's bands and new ones inspired by them. But excitement for this year's line-up never matched the first incarnations which featured comeback shows from post-punk legends Bauhaus (2022) and Siouxsie Sioux (2023), and pop-friendly new wave poster boys Duran Duran (2024). At this year's Cruel World —headlined by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and New Order, with secondary bill-toppers including the Go-Go's, Devo, OMD, Death Cult, Garbage, Madness, Til Tuesday, She Wants Revenge and Alison Moyet— the bad weather definitely put a damper on things, but the atmosphere was clearly diminished regardless, from the vendor count to the crowd itself. Musically, there were more hits than misses, but some of the misses were Order closed out the night on the main Outsiders Stage with a whimper, and even a vibrant light and laser show couldn't save them. Lead singer Bernard Sumner's vocals were on the weak side of acceptable, but his energy was lacking to the extent that we wondered if he even wanted to be there. The band have a handful of heartfelt hits that bring a lot of us back to a wistful time in our lives. For me, songs like "True Faith" and "Bizarre Love Triangle" recall teen breakups, unrequited loves, house parties and clubs (right there in Pasadena) where they all played out. New Order's music is melancholy in the best possible way, especially from the Gen X perspective— upbeat sonically but haunting lyrically. Saturday the band didn't come close to conveying the emotion that made them so special in their heyday. Even their Joy Division material lacked angst. 'Blue Monday' a hit so well-known, it veers into wedding reception playlist territory (it played at mine anyway) felt limp as well. By contrast, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, who played just before New Order, were mesmerizing and powerful. It felt like they had something to prove, though Cave's transcendent performances always kind of feel that way. He may be a legendary dark music figure —from his time in the Birthday Party to his Bad Seeds and Grinderman projects— but he doesn't have the American radio hits that many from Saturday's bill did. Some Reddit and social media groups doubted him as a headliner, pointing out his lack of populist appeal. They were proven wrong on Saturday, and we're guessing many of the same naysayers became new fans this past weekend. The Bad Seeds turned in the best headliner set of the day led by Cave's eternally visceral, passionate, theatrical presence up front. Even when no one in the crowd knew the words to sing along to classics like "Frogs" and "Tupelo," or the band's latest, "Wild God" (read our conversation about the record HERE), he had everyone enraptured from start to finish. Across the Brookside Golf Club grounds at the Sad Girls stage, The Go-Go's played in between the two headliners. Sound-wise, they had some problems but their energy made up for it. These ladies are L.A. legends of course, and it was nice to see them get the spotlight twice, first at Coachella and then at C.W. Dressed in sequins, lame and colorful prints, the band brought lots of exuberance to their set full of hits like "Our Lips are Sealed," "Vacation" and "We Got the Beat," which were joyful if imperfect, leading guitarist Jane Wiedlin to remind fans that they started out a bit sloppy too, playing at the legendary Hollywood punk club The Masque. Other retro sets that made the soggy Saturday worth trekking: Blancmange, whose hits "Don't Tell Me" and "Living on the Ceiling" sounded just as sharp as they did when we first heard them on K-ROQ 106.7 and DJ Richard Blade's local new wave TV show MV3; Alison Moyet, arguably one of the most powerful voices of the 80's, giving us chills-inducing takes on Yazoo faves "Situation," "Only You" and "Don't Go;" the Buzzcocks poppy-punk bops which still have bounce even without Pete Shelley. It poured during all these sets but it didn't matter; each made their own did Madness, whose ska-flaired pop is proving timeless on stage (and in TV commercials); Devo, who've shown they basically can't give a bad performance at this point, with ebullient sets at the first Cruel World and last year's Darker Waves as well as Sat.; OMD, a vocals-driven group whose hits like "If You Leave" and "Enola Gay" still sparkled; and Death Cult (for many of us, their closing nod to the Love era with "She Sells Sanctuary" made the set). Beyond Cave, who is really in a class by himself —or at least, right next to Peter Murphy, Siouxsie and Morrissey from past fests— the strongest sets of the day came from Garbage and She Wants Revenge, two somewhat younger bands who've been around the block but clearly still have a lot of hunger on stage and in their hearts. Rather than simply playing their hits and hoping they still sound good, both added nuances to their best known numbers and served up new material they're been working on that actually got us excited to hear more. Dressed in a colorful ruffled frock, Garbage's Shirley Manson really connected with the crowd talking about the Butch Vig-led band's 32 year journey and conveying what an honor it was to share the stage with so many influential artists. She also begrudged her band's slot against Devo, playing the opposite stage at the same time, and thanked everyone for being there. Garbage may not have fit with the festival's 80's-heavy or goth thematics on paper, but songs like "#1 Crush," "Paranoid," and especially "Only Happy When Rains" were perfect vibe-wise and Manson made them sound and feel of the rain. She Wants Revenge's Justin Warfield was the only one to truly celebrate Saturday's weeping clouds, likening the day to the perfect "goth prom." Indeed, the grey clouds made for a sexy and moody backdrop behind him as he crooned hits like "These Things" and "Red Flags and Long Nights."A Psychedelic Furs cover, a new song and the early 2000s-era band's now iconic hit "Tear You Apart" (which won new fans when a vampiric Lady Gaga seduced and bludgeoned someone to the track in American Horror Story a few years ago) represented everything Cruel World can and hopefully will continue to be: dark and dramatic energy, killer hooks and lyrical reverence for the outsiders and weirdos who made music so interesting and intoxicating decades ago. See more photos from Cruel World by photographer in the photo gallery below: View the 48 images of this gallery on the original article
The Star
21-05-2025
- Politics
- The Star
Reform era draws to a close in Indonesia
JAKARTA: Twenty-seven years after Indonesia emerged from the shadow of authoritarian rule, the nation now stands at a crossroads, as it reaches what some pro-democracy advocates describe as 'the end of political reform,' marked by the dismantling of democratic institutions and the return of authoritarian tendencies. The fall of Soeharto and his New Order regime on May 21, 27 years ago, marked the beginning of the Reform era, a transformative period that ended the military's roles in civilian and political affairs, strengthened democracy, promoted greater regional autonomy and fostered a freer press, among other reforms. In the years that followed, Indonesia became widely regarded as a rare democratic success in Southeast Asia, as it held regular competitive elections, empowered a vibrant press and civil society, and established independent institutions that symbolised a decisive break from authoritarian rule, such as the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK). New era? Now, after more than two and a half decades have passed, some pro-democracy advocates and experts suggest that the reforms may be over, or at least nearing their end, as the nation drifts further from the spirit that defined the Reform era. 'One by one, the key mandates and institutions of reform have been dismantled, from anticorruption to civilian control over the military, everything the Reform era stood for has been undone,' said Wijayanto of the Institute for Economic and Social Research, Education and Information (LP3ES). 'At this point, we have to admit that political reform in Indonesia is over. This is the close of an era and the rise of a new one, defined by authoritarianism dressed in democratic clothing,' he added. Among the earliest signs of this shift, he said, was the declawing of the KPK, which once stood as a symbol of the Reform era's commitment to transparency and accountability. The amendment of the KPK Law in 2019 stripped the once-independent anticorruption agency of its autonomy by placing it under a supervisory council appointed by the government. Civil society, which has long been considered a crucial safeguard of Indonesian democracy, has also been under growing pressure, marked by a pattern of intimidation and online surveillance, as well as harassment targeting activists, students and academics, Wijayanto said. Nicky Fahrizal of the Jakarta-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said democratic backsliding began in the final years of Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo's presidency, when legal and constitutional norms were increasingly bent to serve political interests. An example was the controversial Constitutional Court ruling that altered the age eligibility rules for elections and which effectively enabled Jokowi's son Gibran Rakabuming Raka to run for vice president alongside President Prabowo Subianto. The trend has only accelerated under Prabowo, Nicky said, pointing to his growing reliance on the military to deliver his programmes, which was further reinforced by the recent passing of the amendment to the Indonesian Military (TNI) Law allowing active-duty officers to take on more civilian roles in government. Nicky noted that the Reform era is drawing to a close, describing the country as transitioning into a 'hybrid regime', a system that maintains democratic facades like elections and civil liberties while quietly reintroducing authoritarian characteristics. 'We have entered the post-Reform era,' he said. 'But what's happening isn't the strengthening of democratic or civil institutions, but the rise of a hybrid regime. Democracy is still maintained, but only in a formal and superficial way.' Historical whitewashing The potential nomination of late president Soeharto as a national hero and the plan by the Prabowo administration to release new history books have added to concerns about the rehabilitation of the former strongman's legacy. 'What we're seeing is an effort to rewrite history and portray [Soeharto's] New Order regime as not all that bad,' Nicky said. 'This historical revisionism is dangerous because the reforms began as a response to the New Order's suppression of civil liberties, corruption and human rights abuses.' The attempts to rewrite history not only reflect strong nostalgia for the New Order among political elites, but also the broader public consciousness, with the military gaining traction in local politics and police officers being regarded with reverence by rural people, said Wijayanto of LP3ES. 'We haven't truly left [New Order] behind. It still lives in our minds, it's seen in the public's admiration for military figures and uniforms. This isn't just about Soeharto as a person, but about the kind of regime that existed with him,' he said. Presidential Communications Office head Hasan Nasbi and State Secretary Supratman Andi Agtas were not immediately available for comment. - The Jakarta Post/ANN
