THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN MONDAY, AUGUST 13, 2007
NEWS 19A
HEALTH
Glass half-full, undrinkable
Graduate student works to make water safe in Ecuador
BY SARAH NEFF
sneff@kansan.com
"Hacer camino al andar."
In Spanish it means to make a path where you walk. Maritza Yanez, Riobamba, Ecuador, graduate student, lives by this motto. She wants to make a new path in water treatment for her people when she returns to Ecuador. Yanez has a passion for water.
"My dream is to help my people",
Yanez said.
Yanez came to the United States on a Fulbright scholarship and with funding from the Los Pau Scholarship Program. Margaret Coffey, Yanez' sponsored student advisor while she is at the Applied English Center, said Yanez has a very positive attitude and has really immersed herself in the American culture. Coffey said Yanez struggled with English when she first arrived, but she did her best to communicate.
"She's really good at problem solving," Coffey said. "When something doesn't make sense to her she kind of just keeps working on it until she can get a solution that makes sense to her."
Yanez spent most of her life analyzing water at a lab at the Escuela Superior Politecnica de Chimborazo, a University in Ecuador. She found that sometimes the water was safe, but more often it was not drinkable. Many times she would find parasites in the drinking water.
"The children are sick, they are tired, they are not healthy," Yanez said. "When the children are unhealthy they can't learn, they can't study and they can't improve. It's so difficult there."
The National Resources Defense Council estimated that two in five people in the world didn't have access to safe drinking water. They also said nearly 5 million people died each year from water-related illnesses, and about 5,000 children died each day from drinking contaminated water.
When Yanez was working in the water analysis lab, she shared her results with the Ecuadorian people. She said they understood they were drinking bad water, but no one knew what to do about it. Yanez wrote papers and read many books on the subject, but still she could not bring together the organization and
expertise needed to effectively treat the water.
Yanez chose to come to the United States to earn a master's degree because all of the books she read were written here. All of the equipment used to test the water was made here. She said she wanted to learn about the culture and the organization of the United States.
"When something happens here, the people join quickly and help each other quickly," Yanez said. "I would like to learn about that; how can I do that with my people?"
Yanez wants to get an internship at a water treatment facility before she returns to Ecuador. She said the real world experience would be a valuable addition to the theories she learned. More than anything, she wants to bring the technology back to Ecuador so that her country can enjoy the basic human right to clean drinking water.
"It's so good when you see a child drinking drinkable water," Yanez said. "You feel amazing. Sometimes people don't understand that."
- Edited by Trevan McGee
INTERNATIONAL
Election gives hope to Sierra Leone
BY CLARENCE ROY-MACAULAY
ASSOCIATED PRESS
FREETOWN, Sierra Leone — Ballot-counting was under way Sunday in Sierra Leone's first presidential election since U.N. peace-keepers withdrew two years ago — a vote seen as a test of the country's transition to democratic rule.
Many Sierra Leoneans see the poll as a chance to show that they have finally emerged from a legacy of coups and a decade-long, diamond-fueled war as a multiparty state that can transfer power peacefully.
Seven candidates are vying to succeed President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah. Term limits prevent the 75-year-old leader from running for a third five-year term.
Still, there were disturbances. Late Saturday, police used tear gas to disperse crowds of youths setting up makehats roadblocks in a part of eastern Freetown.
The head of Sierra Leone's electoral commission, Christina Thorpe, said voting finished on time and without incident Saturday at most polling centers, despite rain and long lines.
Associated Press
Results from Saturday's presidential and parliamentary poll will be released progressively, with final tallies within 12 days of voting.
The most crucial period for the war-battered nation may come months down the road, when the public begins expecting real change from a new government. Despite progress since the 10-year war ended in 2002, analysts say many of the root problems that caused the conflict — corruption, poverty and unemployment — remain.
A Sierra Leone woman casts her vote Saturday in presidential and parliamentary elections at a polling station in Freetown, Sierra Leone. The war-battered West African country held its first elections Saturday since U.N. peacekeepers left nearly two years ago, a vote that will test whether the diamond-rich West African country can transfer power peacefully after years of conflict.
Vice President and ruling party candidate Solomon Bonere, 69,
is considered the front-runner. Saturday's victor must take more than 55 percent of the vote to avoid a run-off between the top two finishers.
The hope is that a peaceful vote will pave the way for development in a country where diamond wealth is difficult to see in fetid slums and dilapidated roads.
》 COURTS
KU will not forward letters University warns students cited for illegal downloads
BY MAGGIE VANBUSKIRK
Jenny Mehmedovic, coordinator for information and technology policy and planning, said the
In late July, the Recording Industry Association of America sent 408 pre-litigation settlement letters to 23 universities. The University of Kansas notified individual students by mail if it received a complaint connected to a student's IP address. The University will not, however, forward students the RIAA pre-litigation letters, which will give students the opportunity to settle out of court.
mvanbuskirk@kansan.com
The University is refusing to forward pre-litigation letters from the recording industry to its students on the grounds that doing so could be an invasion of student privacy.
provision of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, Internet service providers such as the University are not liable for customers' online activity if the provider immediately removes or disables a user's access to identified material in a copyright infringement complaint.
Mehmedovic said the University operated by an internal process of response when it received a complaint. It sends the appropriate user a letter from the University notifying them of the problem.
Digital Millennium Copyright Act does not obligate the University to forward the letters to students. It also will not release any identifying information without a court order or subpoena.
Todd Cohen, director of University Relations, said the first responsibility of the University was to protect the privacy of its network users and notify users of the problem and the rules.
In past years, the University operated a three-strikes policy, in which students were allotted three warnings about their illegal activity before getting their Internet privileges revoked. This fall, the University is enacting a zero tolerance policy, in which students lose Internet access on the first notice of copyright infringement.
"My understanding is that the University's best practices viewpoint is to protect its students and show compliance to the rules but not to act as a legal agent," Cohen said.
Edited by Trevan McGee
According to the safe harbor
WORLD
Amulets protect superstitious Thai
BY AMBIKA AHUJA ASSOCIATED PRESS
BANGKOK, Thailand — They can cost a small fortune, resemble '80s disco jewelry, and are arguably un-Buddhist, but many Thais seeking psychic insurance in troubled times are snapping up so-called Jatukam Ramathep amulets, coin-shaped talismans with supposed magical powers.
The Jatukam amulets, coveted by millions of people in Thailand — and available on eBay for those living elsewhere — have become big business, as believers, collectors and speculators drive a farriving market. Rare ones reportedly command prices of more than $30,000.
The craze has led to at least one death as a mob stamped for a particular rare amulet.
"People turn to superstition when they feel that religion and other social as well as judicial systems are no longer providing them the security and justice they need," said respected archaeologist Srisak Vallibhotama. "It's a reflection of the kind of society we live in."
At least one well-known monk derides the fad.
Most amulet owners are fairly discreet, wearing them under shirts and blouses. Serious believers carry more than one and as many as a dozen, though such ostentatiousness is usually associated with policemen and criminals — who understandably seek all the protection they can get.
"I was in a number of car accidents before. Once I started putting these amulets in my taxis and around my neck, my car has been safe no matter how many hours I am on the road each day and how tired I am," said Surasak Mansee, a Bangkok taxi driver, who has three amulets draped on his rearview mirror and two more around his neck.
"I don't know what you think, but my wife has also won some lotteries and we are happier than
ever," he said.
Phra Payom Kalayano, the abbot of a temple in the Bangkok suburb of Nonthaburi, produced chocolate cookies that resembled the amulets and called them "Four bites." Stamped on them are four of the buddhas teachlings on how to become wealthy.
"I want to remind people that becoming rich is about discipline and hard work, not magical amulets," he said.
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