lifestyle SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2016

Mark Healey of takes a spill down the face of a large in the second heat of The Quiksilver in Memory of surf contest at located on the of the island of in Hawaii. — AP Surfers get once-in-a-lifetime 60 foot swells off Hawaii

here are two sayings that come along with bay, producing some waves that organizers estimate were 60 humanity, and he understood the power of relationships. That Aikau died. Aikau big-wave invitational: “The bay calls the feet tall. is just the spirit Ramon has tapped into.” As a lifeguard, Eddie Aikau is said to have never had a fatal- Tday” and “Eddie would go.” For the first time in six years, Clyde Aikau is the only competitor to surf in all eight previ- Navarro came to the North Shore and worked his way into ity while on duty. When the surf was too big for most in the bay - and event organizers - gave the Thursday as a ous competitions and is the oldest at 66 to compete in this the surfing community by building mud brick ovens and sell- Waimea Bay and the crowds cleared out, Aikau would grab his powerful and sustained swell produced huge surf on Oahu’s year’s event. Thursday will be his last time surfing in the con- ing empanadas to beachgoers, Wilmott said. Navarro surfed in and take on the biggest waves around. Ultimately, North Shore. Eddie, a famed lifeguard and big-wave surfer test, he said. Clyde said the event isn’t really about competi- the first heat of the morning on Thursday, and despite only however, Aikau gave his life to the ocean in a final attempt to who once protected these shores, most certainly would have tion, fame or money. It’s about honoring his brother’s legacy catching one wave out of a possible four, earning him a mere save others. The 31-year-old Aikau was part of a team that was gone. Before the sun came up over the horseshoe-shaped of helping others and his passion for the ocean. “We are hum- 5 points out of 100, Navarro said he was just happy to be attempting to trace the route of their Polynesian ancestors Waimea Bay, organizers huddled together to make the final bled and privileged,” he said. One competitor, Ramon Navarro, involved in the event. “This is my dream,” Navarro said after from Hawaii to Tahiti aboard the traditional Hokulea canoe in call on the event, which has only run nine times in its 31-year the son of a fisherman from south Chile, embodies Eddie’s drying off from his hour-long session. “I can die happy now.” 1978. The vessel encountered rough seas and capsized. Aikau history. spirit, said event spokeswoman and longtime Aikau family Looking forward to his second heat of the day, Navarro took his surfboard and paddled away for help. He was never Eddie Aikua’s brother, Clyde, announced to a large crowd friend Jodi Wilmott. said he hoped that Eddie would “look at (him) and send (him) seen again, though the rest of the crew was eventually res- early Thursday morning that his brother’s namesake surfing Navarro is a “very unassuming, a very humble character,” some good waves.” “I’m going to try my best and enjoy it, I’m cued.— AP contest was on. “I’ve been riding Waimea Bay for over 40 years, Wilmott said. “He has a higher vision.” In 2009, when Navarro just happy to be here,” he added. Local Hawaii surfer John and today has to be one of the best days I’ve ever seen,” Aikau was invited to his first Eddie competition, he awed the crowd John Florence won Thursday’s event, catching four massive said. “It is a go!” he added as the crowd came alive with whis- when he rode the biggest wave of the day, scoring a perfect waves for a total score of over 300 points. ’s Ross tles, cheers and . They got what they hoped for as 100 on the monster breaker that towered over him. “Eddie was Clarke-Jones took second, and Hawaii’s Shane Dorian finished huge sets of monster waves crashed onto the outer reef of the a higher-vision guy, too,” Wilmott said. “He had loftier goals for third. The competition began in 1984, six years after Eddie

Professional surfer Ramon Navarro (left) makes the drop on a wave while professional surfer Jamie Mitchell loses control and wipes out at Waimea Bay Professional surfer Jeremy Flores flashes a ‘shaka’ sign after exiting the water at Waimea in Waimea, Hawaii. —AFP Bay in Waimea, Hawaii. Home Centre receives Service Hero ‘Gods of Egypt’ Film Review Award for superior customer service t a certain point in “Gods of Egypt,” an extrava- young thief who dreams of freeing Horus from his self- the living, or the enormous proto Starship Enterprise ome Centre, the largest home retailer in number of votes. Customers have always been gantly silly foray into Afroasiatic mythology imposed exile. And so, with the help of his fetching that Ra navigates through the heavens, every night the Middle East, was awarded the our prime focus and this recognition reflects Afrom the director Alex Proyas, one wounded lover, Zaya (Courtney Eaton), and under the nose of doing battle with what appears to be a thunder cloud HService Hero CSI award in the Home our long-standing dedication to providing deity begs another to show him mercy-a futile request Set’s right-hand man, Urshu (Rufus Sewell), Bek breaks with teeth. At times the camera stays still long enough Furniture category. The brand was recognized exceptional customer service. This win moti- as far as his enemy is concerned, but one that may into the palace’s booby-trapped vault and steals back for you to take in the ornately bejeweled details of Liz for its commitment to providing outstanding vates us to sustain our customer satisfaction strike a more receptive chord with the compassionate one of Horus’ eyes. Palmer’s costumes, though unfortunately, this also service and value to its customers at the index as we strive to remain the preferred viewer (which is to say, any viewer who would buy a Now sporting a sexy eyepatch, the lord of the air gives you time to study the almost surreal disconnect Customer Service Assessment Awards held on home shopping destination in the region.” ticket to “Gods of Egypt”). Since the film enters the- determines to seize his revenge against Set and take between foreground and background in every artifi- 15th February 2016 at JW Marriott, Kuwait. Votes are placed based on the service aters already in its death throes-undone by toxic word back the crown. First, however, Horus must address a cial-looking frame. Service Hero is the Arab world’s only 100% dimensions of reliability, speed, product quali- of mouth, much criticism of its predominantly white few complications, such as the fact that his former As ever, Proyas doesn’t skimp on spectacle, though consumer powered customer satisfaction ty, value, location, staff quality, call center and cast, and an opening-weekend box office projection squeeze, Hathor (Elodie Yung), is now bedding down it’s a disappointment when the Sphinx inevitably index which rates 16 industry categories such website quality. Customers were also asked to of about 10% of its $140 million production budget- with his nemesis, their love nest strategically posi- shows up and disgorges her riddle; you want to tell as cafÈs, retail banks, mobile operators, home make a comparison between the expected perhaps a little kindness would not be misplaced. tioned next to a towering obelisk that underscores her to either slow down and enunciate or get the hell furniture, electronics, airlines among others for and actual experience of the service and rate So here goes: Yet damned if Proyas doesn’t put it all Set’s lust for conquest and his nagging infertility back to Vegas. The movie’s action highlight finds two customer service. After nominating leading factors including overall satisfaction and loyal- out there with a lunatic conviction you can’t help but issues. evil goddesses, Astarte (Abbey Lee) and Anat (Yaya brands in every category, Service Hero begins ty. Service Hero has partnered with American admire, immediately earning this Lionsgate release a the voting process which lasts for a year. Customer Satisfaction Index and members of place in the 2016 pantheon of gloriously watchable Launched in 2010, this index has measured European Society of Opinion & Market follies. With its burnt-yellow cinematography, its exces- over 100,000 consumer voices covering more Research, ensuring results are impartial, objec- sively gilded production design and its blinding flash- than 300 private sector companies in Kuwait tive and accurately reflect the voice of the con- es of sunlight, “Gods of Egypt” at times doesn’t suggest and has also recently expanded to UAE. sumer. Recently, Home Centre won the Most a movie so much as a giant cinematic tanning salon-all Competing against 15 large multinational Admired Retailer of the Year award in the the better, perhaps, to darken the pearlescent skin brands in the home furniture category, Home Home and Housewares category at the 5th tones of most of the actors on display (an effect that Centre, which has 5 stores in Kuwait, was hon- Annual Images RetailME Awards 2015, where it can be further enhanced with your purchase of murk- ored by Service Hero based on votes which was also conferred with the 2015 - 2016 Global maximizing 3D glasses). were placed by customers in Kuwait from 2015 Innovation Middle East Award. The opening scene sweeps us over the streets, to 2016. Mederic Payne, CEO of Home Centre roofs and pyramids of a prosperous ancient Egypt, a said: “We are honored to have received this kingdom ruled over by the wise and compassionate prestigious award by securing the maximum Osiris (Bryan Brown). For centuries Osiris has allowed his lowly mortal subjects to dwell in harmony with the gods, who tower over everyone thanks to the latest advances in digital height-modification technology. Everything changes, however, at the coronation of Osiris’ son, Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), also known as the lord of the air. Shortly before the crown can pass, in storms Osiris’ Hathor, incidentally, is described in the production Deng), chasing after Horus and Bek on enormous fire- jealous brother, the desert god Set (Gerard Butler), notes as “the goddess of love, music and alcohol,” breathing cobras, forcing our mismatched heroes to who promptly murders the king in full view of the hor- which means that she presumably would be in a posi- put their heads together. Coster-Waldau and Thwaites rified public, then defeats his nephew Horus in a duel tion to do something about Marco Beltrami’s epically manage a passable, bickersome on screen chemistry and gouges out his eyes. It all happens so quickly, and tumescent score, or at least to ensure that no one that drives the movie toward its big moral epiphany, with such dynamic “Virtua Fighter”-style whooshings walks into “Gods of Egypt” without a beer in hand. In a which is the importance of treating even one’s so- of the camera, that you barely have time to register movie where the deities transform at will into winged, called inferiors with compassion and decency, as such head-scratching details as, say, the fact that Set is animal-headed Hasbro figurines, or where Geoffrey Horus slowly learns to see the worth of his mortal sub- way too young to be Osiris’ brother, or the hilariously Rush’s white-robed sun god Ra reliably bursts into jects and the entwined nature of their destinies. unexplained provenance of Butler’s Scottish accent. craptacular CG flames, the drinking games pretty But really, who is “Gods of Egypt” kidding? Like so But don’t think too hard about it. It’s magic! much write themselves. many of Hollywood’s sword-and-sandal offerings, this Related Box Office: ‘Gods of Egypt’ Falling Flat, Coming off “I, Robot” and “Knowing,” Proyas hasn’t interminable ersatz epic consigns most of the human ‘Deadpool’ Still King Some time later, Set has estab- exactly been in his element for a while, but every so race to a sea of digital extras while subjecting its lished a new reign of terror in which mortals, once free often the elaborate kitsch and clutter of his visual immortal characters to more than two hours’ worth of to enter the afterlife, must now buy their way in with design clears away for the sort of striking effect that big-screen deification. —Reuters treasure. Meanwhile, said mortals have now been sen- reminds you of the impassioned fantasist who gave us tenced to a lifetime of hard labor, including Bek “The Crow” and “Dark City”-a small sandstorm that (Brenton Thwaites), a wily, handsome and quite boring becomes a portal between the lands of the dead and