Misconception

Growing up in Cairo, Ola Hafez had wanted to wear the traditional veil. Her parents forbade it. "They wanted to make sure I understood the commitment I was making," she explained. Wearing a veil, they said, was not a rite of passage to be taken lightly only to be discarded later. So it wasn't until 15 years ago, when she was 20, that Hafez started wearing a veil as a way of maintaining the appropriate modesty prescribed by her religion and culture.

The young and the old will display their creative artwork, ceramics and photography today at an exhibit designed to close the generational gap and foster a good image of people living in nursing homes. Work by artists ranging in age from 104-year-old Florence Alsberge to 5-year-olds at the Conejo Adventist Elementary School will be hanging at the Ventura Estates Retirement and Health Care Center, 915 Estates Drive, from 3 to 5:30 p.m.

J.R. Henderson plays basketball as if he has better things to do. He scowls, he sighs, he rolls his eyes and looks at the ceiling. For four seasons he has done this. For four seasons you have wanted to run to midcourt and grab him and say, "Uh, J.R., are we keeping you from something?" Then came Saturday at the Pond, where the UCLA senior forward battered one of the best forwards in the country for 40 minutes, leaving New Mexico's Kenny Thomas and 14,274 fans with a nagging question.

Dr. Arthur Wisot and Dr. David Meldrum Hartley & Marks 272 pages, $19.95 Southern California is home to some of the world's finest reproductive specialists. And, happily for people who live elsewhere, they all write books. This latest consumer guide to treatments for infertility comes from two highly respected practitioners and UCLA professors.

In colorful, multiethnic rites, the growing Southern California Buddhist community Sunday celebrated Buddhism's most important holiday and sought to combat what religious leaders call misunderstanding in the Christian world, especially by the Vatican. Buddhist clergy dressed in ceremonial robes--some in bright orange, yellow or crimson and others in black, gray or blue--chanted in seven languages outside the ornate Wat Thai Temple in North Hollywood.

Now that the presidential race is underway, and staunch Republicans--Newt Gringrich (a former history professor) and Sen. Robert Dole, (presidential aspirant), both of whom have taken issue with the "new" American history taught in U.S. classrooms--are busy garnering endorsements for the GOP, is it safe to assume this topic is moot? If Republicans once more dominate Congress, can change be far behind? Many Americans support Gingrich and Dole's stance.

Now that the presidential race is underway, and staunch Republicans--Newt Gringrich (a former history professor) and Sen. Robert Dole, (presidential aspirant), both of whom have taken issue with the "new" American history taught in U.S. classrooms--are busy garnering endorsements for the GOP, is it safe to assume this topic is moot? If Republicans once more dominate Congress, can change be far behind? Many Americans support Gingrich and Dole's stance.

Mess up this story and you'll pay, an inner voice warned. Someone will be laying on a curse, conjuring up an evil spirit. Poking pins in a reporter doll. After all, who suffers if you pooh-pooh voodoo? You do. Anyone who has ever seen a zombie movie knows that. So maybe it was a mistake to paraphrase singer Keely Smith the other day when Westwood's top voodoo expert stuck out his hand and introduced himself. "So, how long has 'That Old Black Magic' had you in its spell?" Donald J.