The Paw Print

Bang! Bang! Bang! The sound of the handball hitting the wall and the roar of the crowd cheers on the sidelines filled the aggressive atmosphere of Seward Park during OCA’s Handball Tournament.

On August 6, the Organization for Chinese Americans (OCA), hosted its first Handball Doubles Tournament to spark prevention and awareness of hate crimes. Before the tournament started, the participants had to visit an art gallery, which displayed teen-produced artworks against hate crimes.

Each of the 10 games in the tournament was a fierce battle but the semi-final game between Team Rocket and Team BCG was more exciting than even the final match. Barely anything got past Alan Yaung (Team Rocket) on power-side, the side that returns most of the ball. His teammate, Steven Zhu, added to the duo’s power with kill-shots that were virtually unreturnable. This outstanding partnership helped them win first place in OCA’s tournament.

The semi-final match had been close throughout with neither teams getting more than a two-point lead. Toward the end of the match, Team Rocket took the lead making it 24-18.

Just when the crowd lost faith in Team BCG, they countered, closing the lead at a nail-biting 24-23. Team Rocket ultimately prevailed, ending the game with the score of 25-23.

The final match between Team Rocket and Team Win was less dramatic, ending at 25-15.

Overall the tournament was fairly small but well-organized for its first time. Two referees were assigned to each match and each kept close attention to the short line and long line boundaries, which is a rare instance in handball tournaments.

OCA is still deciding whether to host another tournament, but if they do, expect a fair and organized tournament with a great deal of skill from the players.

On opening day, it was hard not to notice the long line outside of Zam Zam, a new restaurant on Starling Avenue in the Bronx. The atmosphere in the store and the smell quickly overcame me. There were golden-colored wall sheets that added an air of fashion and luxury.

In the back of the restaurant, the chef was busy serving and cooking for the customers, since only three people were working in the restaurant. He is a well-known chef who commutes from Mitali restaurant in Queens to work at Zam Zam. Though there are two more Indian restaurants along Starling Avenue and competition is an issue, his presence plays a key role in Zam Zam’s success.

The desert column has sweets that come in many flavors such as coconut, mango and more. They also serve a rice pudding that includes coconut, rice and cream on the top to match its flavor for only $4. They serve mango lassi that is specially made with yogurt, honey and mangos to bring out its taste for $2.50. The all-you can eat buffet on Fridays is a true value for $5. Customers are allowed to make your own dishes and it’s a lunch special that you cannot miss.

The curry dishes all have different taste. Some are spicy while others are sweet, but all includethe naan and rice of your choice. Cream and sauces are provided on the side for customers’ use.

The best part of the selection is the Chef’s Special, which includes four chicken dishes. Chicken kurma has this creamy and sour taste that fills the mouth with delight. It also includes two beef specials. One was korai and the other was dupiaza. It is freshly made with minced garlic, green chilli, garam masala, tomatoes, whipping cream, fresh cilantro and small pieces of meat.

The combo dishes are very inexpensive at Zam Zam, compared to restaurants nearby.For $12.45, patrons can get a dish of chicken tandoori, beef bhuna, naan, mango lassi and fried rice. The tandoori chicken is excellent. It is spicy on the outside and once you bite into the meat, you will realize that it is well cooked inside. The portion size is also pretty good as it was plenty enough for me to take home and share it with my family.

If you’re roaming around Parkchester and you are looking to eat at an Indian restaurant, Zam Zam restaurant is your stop. The foods are prepared by a well-known chief at reasonable price. You will not be disappointed if you or your buddies decide to come here to eat lunch or dinner.

Working with kids is a great opportunity to challenge oneself and to gain experience as well. It takes plenty of patience to understand the kids and to make them feel safe and comfortable when they are with you. Kids are like plants; you nurture it with care and love, they grow up tall and strong in return. Seeing the process of kids growing and being along with them makes anyone feel accomplished.

Kids are easy to understand once you listen to their hearts. Although kids may seem annoying and wild but they are actually naïve. They are trying to catch adults’ attention because they don’t want to be alone in the darkness. If kids are wild when they are with you, it’s a good sign. Kids get hyper easily and they just want to play with you and have fun. Maybe when they grow up, they won’t recognize you however; it’s such a precious memory to keep.

You actually grow with the kids during the process. You have taken responsibility and developed leadership and communication skill. At first, kids may view you as a stranger because they don’t know who you are. When you come often and play with them, they would gradually feel the tender care and attention you are giving them. It’s difficult to make kids talk to you more but once you chime in with their conversations, they will talk to you continuously. It’s a practice to learn more about them and learn how to communicate with kids or even adults. A kid that doesn’t listen to you at first listens to you now shows that you have leadership skills. You have influenced them and made him/her aware that they have to listen to you as a teacher. In order to influence kids, you have to be a good role model in front of them. A good role model does the right thing and grows as in improving oneself.

My love and curiosity for cooking is what motivates me to learn about the foods of other cultures, which vary from the traditional flavors of Hispanic foods I’m accustomed to. Luckily for me, my downstairs neighbors, the Bissessar family, are friendly natives from Guyana, a country in the upper region of South America. Chaitram Bissessar constantly offered to show me how to cook the delicious foods that he once greeted my family with nine years ago when we first moved in.

As a welcoming gesture, Bissessar showed up at our door with a bright yellow-orange plump pumpkin pie, a bowl of tossed spinach salad filled with many healthy greens, a spicy bowl of dark brown jerk chicken and a luscious mountain of creamy potatoes. All of those foods gave off distinct scents that stimulated my imagination, causing a mouth-watering world of wonderment. However, the smell didn’t captivate me as much as the kind gesture did.

A lot of Bissessar’s foods are influenced by the West Indies, also known as the Caribbean Islands, and Asian cuisines. One of my favorites is a Guyanese-style chicken chow mein. I became his apprentice one evening so he could show me how to make this dish. The meal takes 45-50 minutes to cook so we first put the water to boil for the noodles and used that time to prep the rest of the ingredients.

He washed all the vegetables and chopped up the ginger, a small hot pepper, 4 cloves of garlic, cilantro, half of a yellow onion and the bottom of a bunch of scallions. We saved the top of the scallions, along with the green and red peppers he diced, to give a crunchy texture at the end. He also defrosted diced carrots and peas which were added during the final stages.

We mixed all the ingredients in a large pot with a thin layer of olive oil. As soon as it started to simmer we added salt, black pepper and square chunks of chicken that I had diced. Once the chicken became tender, Bissessar added a lot of a dark brown spicy liquid labeled Chinese Sauce, a little bit of water and dark thick sauce called Cassareep, which he explained to me was a spice that was used a lot in Guyana and gives the chicken a dark brown color and its flavor.

The Lam’s chow mein noodles were put to boil for five to six minutes. We had to watch the time closely because nobody likes soggy noodles. After I strained the noodles, I mixed them with the rest of the ingredients in the pot.  After stirring it all together I added the final touches and topped it with the peppers, scallion, peas and carrots. Our masterpiece was colorful, with voluptuous pieces of dark chicken, long tender yellow noodles and scattered bits of orange squares. 

I let it flavors combine for a few minutes before digging in. I’m happy to report that it was a delightful success.

When you see hooks flying back and forth in the water, smell the salty ocean and fish guts, be warned, its fishing season. A fun out door activity to do in the summer is fishing. Fishing lets you be more manly and allows bonds to happen. When I go fishing with my father on Sundays, I learn a lot or we both do. Taking the bait and learning how to cut it and placing it on the hook in a special way is fun and important to catch a fish.

Some people would rather go picnicking, or dinner out in town. But fishing to me is a quality time a kid gets to spend with their parents, especially if you’re a guy. When a son and a father fish together, you have that bond of learning and quality time. The summer is the best time to fish because the weather is warm, traveling is fun and the best catch is during the summer.

Finding a location to fish is a difficult, yet you have to be patient while fishing. Fishing runs by temperature, tides, and where people are the most. The best time to fish in the summer is early in the morning like 5 am and in the afternoon when the place is cool.

Catching a big or small fish is all up to the day you’re fishing on. When I went fishing with my father last week Sunday, we caught only five small fishes. The place was too hot and fishes hate extreme hot weather. When you got the perfect day to fish, you have a lot of fun. Then sometimes you have a day when fishes feel not to come out.

Fishing during the summer is very exciting and it’s good to spend quality with friends or family. If you want something to do during the summer, then go fishing. I am sure you would enjoy yourself and it will give you something to do rather than staying home.

Central Park’s Rumsey Playfield became the center of attention on Friday, July 30, when hundreds lined up as early as 6 a.m. to see six-time Grammy Award winning alternative hip hop band, the Black Eyed Peas. The band took part in Good Morning America’s free summer concert series. The cheering fans (who call themselves pea bodies) filled the park chanting “Black Eyed Peas! Black Eyed Peas!” and taking enough photos to make the crowd feel like there was paparazzi everywhere.

 In the short 30-minutes set, The Peas performed three songs from their latest album, “The E.N.D,” which stands for Energy Never Dies. The songs, “Boom Boom Pow,” “Rock That Body” and “I Gotta Feeling” were crowd pleasers and will probably be played at every concert on the band’s current world tour. The Black Eyed Peas full house concert brought spark to Central Park that even Will.i.am, the band’s head rapper felt. He told GMA’s Tonya Rivero that “it felt awesome” to play in Central Park.

 The performance was full of uplifting danceable music and creativity. The back up dancers sported robot-looking outfits during “Rock that Body.” The artists were fearless, joining their back up dancers during some choreographed routines and at other times letting loose.

 Coming to a live concert, like this one, gives fans a more real way to experience the music and the Peas brought enough energy to match the audience’s excitement.

 During the after-show interview that aired as part of Good Morning America, the multi-platinum recording artists were told that their song “I Gotta Feeling” was the first track to have six million downloads, returning the bolt of joy that the band is best known for giving its audience.

 Good Morning America’s next concerts feature the Jonas Brothers (Aug. 13) and Rihanna (Aug. 20).  

A battle between two rookies was the main event at World Wide Boxing Gym in the Bronx on Aug. 6. Two fighters entered their champion-size ring as (0-0) but one left as (1-0).

Jose Lopez faced off with Anthony Drayton. Jose, 17, has an in-boxing style and a specialty for using a one-two combo, which is a straight and a jab combined.

Anthony, 17, who started boxing about four months ago is a brawler-style boxer and is known for his signature haymaker, a powerful straight that he carries in his toolbox.

Jose had somewhat of an advantage since he is an in-boxer. In-boxers usually try to close the gap between themselves and their opponents, so Jose might not let Anthony get a chance to counter. On the other hand Anthony is a brawler, which is a boxer who just throws a barrage of punches at his opponent.

The rules of the game are very simple. There are about five ten-minute rounds. The first person to get knocked down three times or KO’d (knocked out) loses. Both boxers have the same Ever Last gear on with the red shorts so no one could cheat.

Right off the bat, Anthony threw jabs as if he was trying to drown Jose in a sea of punches. Jose tried to back up in the turtle, which is a blocking move, but Anthony’s onslaught of jabs was putting him off balance. Jose could not counter and took a jab to the face. And with that he went down. It only took the referee to count to five before Jose popped up just like a daisy in the desert.

Anthony continued to throw quick jabs to get Jose in a barrage of fists. But this time Jose bobbed all of Anthony’s jabs so that he could get into his zone of range. Once Jose was in his zone, he quickly capitalized on Anthony with a fury of jabs to the ribs. After getting a couple of hits on Anthony, the bell rang and round 1 was over.

The damage had already been done to both boxers. Jose had taken quite a lot of damage to his head while Anthony had taken just as much pain to his ribs.

The second round did not last as long as the first round. Jose surprised everyone by getting a one-two combo on Anthony’s face. The crowd was shocked when Anthony was still standing after the blow he took. He surprised everyone more when he KO Jose by hitting him with a haymaker to the face.

Now Jose did his best and got a lot of good hits in, but Anthony just ate them all like candy. Both boxers put up a good first fight. One thing that was very memorable about this match was that even though Jose lost, when he woke up from the KO he spit the blood out of his mouth and went over to shake Anthony’s hand. It was great sportsmanship, the type that you only see in a book.

In his latest album, Cut Chemist experiments with African beats, incorporating them into his usual hip hop music to produce a surprisingly interesting combination.

Lucas “Cut Chemist” MacFadden is a Los Angeles DJ, recognized for his distorted music that brings together various elements from different genres and time periods. His brilliant work comes from listening to old records he collected. He takes old beats that people forgot and revolutionizes them in to his own swag.

Working with turntablist DJ Shadow, Cut creates a series of ingenious songs on his latest album, “Sound of the Police.”

All the songs on his new album are used a single turntable, a mixer, a Boss RC-50 loop pedal, and a particular interest in Ethiopian and Afro-Brazilian tunes. In the first half of the album, he produces a unique texture of slow Ethio-jazz, and Sudanese music. In the first song “Jungle Beat,” Cut gives a smooth beat of drums, while at the same time he splashes in the tunes of legendary Ethiopian musician Mulatu Astatk.

Cut makes the mix more dense and complicated as he goes deeper into the album. By placing slugs on the turntable to repeat different beats, he speeds up the tempo transcending the beat into another time period about 20 minutes in to the album. He plays Sudanese music and then goes straight into hip hop or an instrument that flows with the beat he’s playing.

Mixing the African music with hip hop is something Cut has never done before, but the mixture is successful and the beats flow together.

The final song, “Adidas to Addis” highlights the blend of hip hop with African culture. The song is a mixture of Ethiopian jazz and electro programming. Cut bangs the hip pop in with long lasting scratches on the mixer to let the singer’s voice ring out at the end of the song.

This level of combination is what Cut has been looking for and he expressed to his audience that he has achieved that.

Deeper in to the album, listeners may feel as if they are traveling through the regents of these countries. For now, “Sound of the Police” is showing that the DJ industry is stepping forward from their limitation of modern music to crafting a unique art of themselves.

The president of Pakistan just returned home from his tour from England. Just a couple of days ago, Pakistan was hit hard by floodings that killed nearly 1600 people and nearly 13.8 million people were affected by it. While he was away in England, the government failed to help the people. The president received harsh criticism from his people for the lack of interest while his country was hard hit by one of the worst natural disasters.

The president is an unpopular figure in Pakistan and this issue is going to hurt his political career. There were reports that said that the president took off for a visit in France and Britain. What made it worse was that there were several reports that said that he visited his family’s elegant chateau in France. The president is fearful of coming out in the public because he is afraid of being assassinated.

The president is planning to go to Islamabad today and propose a rehabilitation program that will help the people. Unfortunately, his work of restoring the nation came days after the disaster.

This action should have been taken seriously and much earlier. He could have saved many more lives if he had been in the country and gave orders to his Cabinet members. But the president is unfaithful to his people and his trip showed his lack of interest for the Pakistani people.

People are dying and the president is in England preparing for his son’s political career and enjoying time with his family. The president should be responsible knowing that they took a huge task in protecting the people. Such action of the president should not be tolerated and should be condemned by the people. People have gathered in thousands and demonstrated their frustration towards the president.

If Pakistan wants to restore its city back to norm, people have to realize that this president is doing more harm then good. He should be thrown out of office. He is irresponsible and corrupt. They should put someone in power who is trustworthy and one who will not be corrupt like Zardari.

I will never forget the level of intimidation I felt, going into my boxing gym for the first time signing up. The people I saw there were so strong and powerful. Even the girls were making me nervous to the point were I almost did not want to start boxing at all.

My mom took one look at me and said are you ok? I simply said yeah its just I have never felt this weak before. She asked me one more time if I wanted to back out and all I could say was not at all in a quivering voice.

In my head though, I was thinking what am I doing here. I am not a fighter at all, so why am I here to sign up for boxing. I have never taken a fist to the face or been hit really hard. I have had only one real fight in my life so why am I trying to become a fighter. I was really just figuring out that I was weak. I’ve had never felt weak before going into that gym. It was almost like a brick wall was blocking my way and I was trying to move it but it just would not budge. At that moment, you really feel useless.

It was a good thing that I went through that experience though. Ever since that day I have been practicing to get just as good as the fighters in my gym. That intimidation I felt was really a backbone for me training hard. It gave me goal to become the best in my gym. Without fear and intimidation, you really can never progress.