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The Balance Seekers with Dr. Esther Sternberg

Until recently science offered no proof that ancient practices like yoga and meditation did anything more than temporarily make us feel good. But now advances in medical research are revealing that these modalities and other natural approaches can lower blood pressure 8-14 points, reduce back-related health care costs 40%, double the growth rate of premature babies and help to make us well and fight disease.

Like a good mystery, The Balance Seekers takes on the challenge of decoding the secrets of ancient healing practices. Our host, medical researcher in the science of mind-body interactions, physician Dr. Esther Sternberg, leads us on a personal journey into the history, effectiveness, and medical understanding of practices such as acupuncture, visualization and deep breathing.

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Breaking Bread: Africa

Each week Breaking Bread: Africa takes five adventurous travelers on an intriguing and unpredictable journey through Africa to experience its magnificently diverse culinary delights. Join renowned African Chef Pierre Thiam as he prepares, trains, and cajoles this motley crew to meet the challenge of creating a feast for invited dignitaries, celebrities, or just plain folks. Can they learn enough to pull it off?

Our trek begins as Chef Pierre takes the cast to Senegal in western Africa. He teaches them not only about the culture, but also how to cook a local meal under local conditions. Chef Pierre uncovers the secrets of dishes like, the famous “Joloff rice” (red rice and fish) from Senegal and “Acara” (black-eyed pea fritters) from Mali.

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Planet Barbecue with Steven Raichlen

Fifteen years ago, Steven Raichlen embarked on an extraordinary journey. He set out to travel the world's barbecue trail—to experience the world of live-fire cooking from Indonesian sate to Indian tandoori to Italian bistecca alla fiorentina. He explored how a country's barbecue reflects its culture and how that culture determines what people grill. His 500,000-mile odyssey has taken him to more than 50 countries on six continents. And now that adventure comes alive in all its sizzling excitement in a PBS broadcast extravaganza: Planet Barbecue ™.

Planet Barbecue will take TV viewers on a mouth-watering tour of the world’s barbecue traditions, from the kebab parlors of Istanbul to the churrascarias of Brazil to an authentic South African safari brai. Along the way, we’ll meet Japan’s most acclaimed yakitori master, a madcap barbecue iconoclast in Spain (grilled eggs and smoked ice cream, anyone?), and the octogenarian owner of the most famous grill parlor in Morocco. We’ll visit a reconstructed Neanderthal village in southwestern France (to learn how our prehistoric ancestors grilled); a tandoor factory in New Delhi (to watch the construction of the world’s oldest type of barbecue pit), and a kiln built into a Japanese cave used to make bincho tan—the world’s most expensive charcoal.

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Passing Gas with Gary Gladstone

Join New York photographer Gary Gladstone, a character with a wry sense of humor, as he and his assistant Alex travel to places with funny names like Suckerville, ME; Knockemstiff, OH; and Scratch Ankle, AL to find a person that captures the essence of the town’s name. In each episode, Gary visits towns, such as Ding Dong, TX or Hell, MI, where he has just one day to find his subject and shoot a portrait. This quest gives Gary and his viewers an unscripted, entertaining glimpse into Small Town, USA.

Gary Gladstone is the author of the popular book, “Passing Gas, and Other Towns Along The American Highway and its sequel “Reaching Climax”. Gary’s photos have appeared in the New York Daily News, Life, Look, and The Saturday Evening Post. He is a popular lecturer and panelist who uses humor to entertain and inform his audiences.

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Gonzo with Barbara Flanagan

A mindset, a mission, a journey... retool everyday life with creativity, mischief, and delight…discover your sensory obsessions and use them to electrify everything you do.
Designer and Gonzo host Barbara Flanagan keeps surprising us as she shows how to re-vamp and re-design normal routines, like taking a shower, eating a meal, washing the dishes, or driving a car, fusing utility with delight and celebrating the lost art of resourcefulness.

Gonzo Design sees creative potential everywhere. There’s no custom, no object and just about no one too humdrum to undergo a good Gonzo transformation.

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Click here to listen to Renard Cohen's "Patriot Acts"

Indivisible

Mass deportations, round-ups, secret trials, sneak and peek searches, no fly lists, unfettered surveillance and a government empowered to declare anyone an enemy and take away the most basic freedoms. It’s America in 2008 under the USA PATRIOT Act.

The feature-length documentary Indivisible tells the story of some of the teachers, librarians, business owners, police chiefs, politicians and activists changing history today –risking their own freedom to protect liberties once guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

At this critical time in US history when over 421 cities (and counting) and 3 states have passed resolutions against the PATRIOT Act, Indivisible will take us into the lives of those targeted and into the heart of a movement of unprecedented resistance. We’ll meet immigrants and activists, leaders and ordinary folks. Through candid interviews and personal photographs we’ll meet survivors of World War II round-ups of Japanese Americans and the McCarthy inspired COINTELPRO attacks on freedom of association and dissent. This historical perspective will make it painfully clear that we’ve been here before, and beg the question, "Did we learn anything?"

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Simonds' Soups and Salads with Cynthia Simonds

Food nourishes us. It gives us energy – fuel for our bodies. Author of Fresh Maine Salads and Superb Maine Soups, series host Cynthia Finnemore Simonds nourishes both body and mind with salads fit to be the centerpiece of the meal and soups both fragrant and mesmerizing.

Simonds’ Soup and Salad brings us to the origin of fresh, local ingredients, and their use in this unorthodox chef’s recipes.

Shot on location, Cynthia talks to growers about an ingredient’s background, production, and collection. We will venture to places like Wisconsin, with its bold cheeses; to South Carolina and its free-range chickens; to places like Maryland for supple crabs and Maine for enormous lobsters.

Back in the kitchen, Cynthia will demonstrate how easy it is to make dinner not "out of the box" but without the box..