Hong Kong - Around the world, families are looking with apprehension at the upcoming Christmas festivities, prepared to tighten their belts as the global financial turmoil takes its toll. In wealthy Hong Kong, however, people are still ready and willing to splurge, spending 17,600 US dollars a head on lavish Christmas extravaganzas.

One of the city's upmarket restaurants, Aqua, is advertising what it calls the ultimate Christmas feast - a flamboyant, no-expense spared seven-course dinner at 1,290 US dollars per person.

Indian equities lost their strength and fell into the depressing zone because of heavy profit booking.

IT, consumer durables, realty stocks gained ground, whereas oil & gas and banking stocks went down.

BSE Midcap and Smallcap index surged 0.20% and 0.61% respectively.

The 30-share index BSE Sensex, today, opened with a gain of 300.05 points at 10,931.17.

In the previous day (Tuesday, Nov 4) session, the Sensex closed the day after gaining 293.44 points, while the NSE Nifty zoomed 98.25 points.

Washington, November 5: An Indian-origin researcher at the University at Buffalo has found that the brains of obese mothers’ babies can get programmed to induce obesity in adulthood, while they are still in womb.

Biochemist Mulchand Patel’s findings are based on a study of obese rats.

His study has shown for the first time that the metabolic programming occurs in the foetal hypothalamus, the area of the brain responsible for maintaining body weight throughout life.

Manila - American national Kenneth choked, his eyes tearing up, as he quietly watched on a giant television screen as thousands of supporters of Barack Obama broke into cheers amid news he was elected the United States' next president.

"It's amazing" was all Kenneth could say as he joined hundreds of people at an election watch at the lobby of a posh shopping mall in Manila set up by the US Embassy to monitor the presidential race.

London, Nov 5: Children who play violent video games are likely to display high levels of physical aggression, say researchers.

Two studies from Japan and the United States have shown that violent video games have harmful effects on kids and adolescents.

The study including more than 1,2000 Japanese youths aged between 12 and 18 as well as 364 children aged nine to 12 in the US has shown that despite cultural differences and disparities in crime rates, children across the spectrum were equally affected by violent video games.

Nairobi - Kenyans took to the streets early Wednesday morning to celebrate Barack Obama's election to the White House as the nation's president declared a national holiday.

In downtown Nairobi and in Kibera, one of Africa's largest slums, people dressed in suits on their way to work joined those who had stayed up all night watching the election returns to dance and chant Obama's name.