Diversity is our strength, and everyone, including persons with disabilities, has important contributions to make. That was one of the overarching messages at the 10th Special Olympics 2013 World Winter Games in South Korea this month, where athletes Tae Hemsath and Henry Meece -- born in South Korea with developmental disabilities -- returned to their birth country as Special Olympics athletes. Tae competed as a snowshoe racer, Henry as a snowboarder.

I can't remember how many times I've seen the first Die Hard. Likewise the first Rocky movie, the first Rambo, First Blood, also the first... These franchises inevitably went downhill - perhaps not as steeply as Rocky, but still a disappointment. (OK, Aliens, the second in the series, was the exception). Perhaps this is a stand-in metaphor for America's power and promise, always delivered first with an impressive bang, until reality sinks in.

The biggest hit in Chinese cinema is a marketable contemporary comedy of the ilk of The Hangover. Would it succeed in the US? Something unspoken lay behind expectant articles in the film press for its US opening: the idea that this could be the point when cinema's trade winds stopped blowing from west to east, and the reverse became possible.

Though Greek culture is famous for its sociability and its nightlife, the country’s economic crisis is making people spend a little more time at home with their TVs. And with Greek TV channels looking for cheaper content, the airwaves are now filled with imported Turkish soap operas, says Asli Tunç, head of the Media School at Istanbul Bilgi University.

For the past few years, as China’s emergence has cast an increasing shadow over the region, Canberra’s strategic thinkers have tried to interest New Delhi in the concept of the “Indo-Pacific” as the two former colonies of Britain, now two leading democracies, find common ground.

The authors have been looking too much at what the US is espousing and not at what the US is actually doing in the Asia-Pacific. Most tensions between the US and China seem to be smoothly dispersed and resolved through very subtle diplomacy, such as the deal done about the fate of Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng, who took refuge in the American Embassy last year.

Bangkok governor candidates have been painting a rosy picture of the capital under their stewardship, but what's glaringly missing from their campaign bullet points and speeches is the policy and vision of Bangkok as a city of arts and culture. "Art and culture must be on the master Bangkok agenda, not something on the side.... We're talking about 'soft power' and how the creative industry can generate income."