WHAT A GRAPE IDEA Farmer Richard Bering of Effingham, Ont., farmer is growing popcorn after giving up on his vineyard. "It's pretty exciting because we've never grown popcorn before," Bering said.
Growing regular field corn, though, is old hat for Bering and his family, who operate White Meadows Farms, known for its maple syrup. With the domestic juice grape industry virtually dried up, the entrepreneurial Bering thought popcorn might be an interesting and practical replacement.
He's only growing 2 1/2 acres to start,to see how things go.
APPALLED IN NEPAL Scores of Maoist activists protested outside the venue of the controversial "Miss Nepal" contest on Thursday, saying the beauty pageant was an insult to women.
The former civil war rebels chanted "you can't expose the women" as they sat on the street outside a high security army club in the heart of Kathmandu.
SINGLE LADIES SINGER SINGLED OUT Malaysia's opposition Islamist party wants U.S. pop star Beyonce to cancel a planned concert in this southeast Asian country, two years after it prevented the singer from performing, citing moral issues.
Foreign acts often draw protests by the Pan Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), whose youth wing succeeded in forcing Beyonce to cancel a 2007 concert and sought last year to prevent Canadian singer Avril Lavigne from performing in this mainly Muslim country of 27 million people.
