From childhood, most women dream of marrying a loving man who will treat them like a princess. As they get older, their attitude may change a little, but most women still harbor that desire to be a princess for a day. But at what age should a woman get married?

The recommended or ideal age differs across the world, and from person to person. The best age to marry is the time when a woman feels mature and prepared both physically and mentally, and feels responsible and ready enough for motherhood.

Research has shown that this seems to be happening at later ages over the course of time, and this is often attributed to the emancipation of women and increased personal power.

Sometimes the age of marriage depends on a national culture. Cultural traditions can be very important. Women in Finland will marry at as late an age as 28, while Indian women may marry as young as 19 years old.

Women in India are generally taught that it is their responsibility to have as many children as possible, caring less about the husband’s duties of managing money and acquiring a house. This is different from Finnish women, who are driven to provide income and housing for themselves first before having children.

The youngest age at which a woman marries appears to be in Nigeria, at 17 years old. The traditional custom is to marry the man their parents’ recommend and raise a family. Rarely do Nigerian women get the chance to marry out of love; instead their future spouses are arranged by their parents.

The latest age at which women seem to marry is 30 years of age, in Sweden and Denmark. Feminist ideals are popular there, so women concentrate on creating and providing for their own life before starting another. They get educated and have jobs, securing a way to provide for themselves and their future children before seeking a spouse.

Medically speaking, the optimal age for marriage and bearing children is 26 years of age. A woman is usually mentally and physically mature enough to bear the responsibility of birth and raising a child. This doesn’t mean you need to wait until that age, or that, if you’re older, marriage is out of the picture for you.

Above all, the right age to marry depends on your own personal experience. While research may point towards an ideal or optimal age, it can’t measure the most important part of a marriage – love.

Driving his dream Hummer landed Indian off-spinner Harbhajan Singh in trouble on Tuesday, when he was fined by Chandigarh Traffic Police for using the vehicle without a valid number plate.

Harbhajan had to pay a Rs 3,000 fine for the offence, according to reports.

Assistant Commissioner of Police (traffic), HS Doon, said that this episode would promote better traffic sense among the general public.

The off-spinner became the latest Indian cricketer to buy the American SUV after skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

Harbhajan imported the car from England, which costs about Rs 70 lakh in India. After paying the duty, the cost of the vehicle has come to Rs 1 crore.

While Dhoni’s Hummer is silver in colour, Harbhajan has opted for a “Black Beauty”.

Harbhajan is also looking forward to shifting to a new home.

The house is under construction in the New Baradari area of the city. The plot was given by the state government for his outstanding performance in the 2001 home series against Australia.

However, he has no plans to sell off his ancestral home where he was brought up.

“It has memories of my late father Sardev Singh,” he said.

A day after shutting all schools, colleges and multiplexes in Mumbai, the civic authorities changed tack on Thursday saying there was no need to panic over swine flu.

Nearly half of the 161 people who tested positive for the H1N1 virus in the city did not even need hospitalization. Just 27 remained in hospital, officials pointed out.

“We must remember that the H1N1 virus is here to stay and we have to live in symbiosis with it. We cannot stay locked up at home. People are concerned and want more information, but they are not worried,” said Dr Singh.Across the country too, public health experts scrambled to allay fears as the toll rose to 21, with a teacher in Bangalore and a woman and a man in Pune being the latest victims.

Tuberculosis kills more people every minute, so why don’t people wear masks to stop infection? That’s how the country’s leading epidemiologists and public health experts reacted to fears about the H1N1 virus. Most of the swine flu victims either had secondary complications or were admitted too late, said health ministry officials in Delhi.

H1N1 has caused 1,77,457 infections and 1,462 deaths in 175 countries. That’s about 8 deaths in every 1,000 infections, according to World Health Organisation data.

“It’s a new flu virus, like thousands of new flu viruses that have come and gone,” said Dr Bir Singh, professor, community medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). “The virus is mild, has caused far fewer deaths than other diseases such as tuberculosis. Spending public health budget on a flu virus and burdening the health infrastructure when there are so many other killer diseases around does not make sense.”

The virus is going to be around and cause more infections in the months to come. It’s time, the experts said, to learn to live with H1N1. “H2N2 and H3N2 were the common seasonal flu strains infecting humans and now there’s H1N1, which had been circulating in swine for three decades,” said eminent scientist Dr NK Ganguly, former director general Indian Council of Medical Research.

“It’s a flu virus, so people susceptible to seasonal flu are also susceptible to H1N1. The people dying are the same as those at risk from seasonal flu — infants, the elderly and people with existing diseases and compromised immunity,” said Ganguly.

“We must remember that the H1N1 virus is here to stay and we have to live in symbiosis with it. We cannot stay locked up at home. People are concerned and want more information, but they are not worried,” said Dr Singh.

In Mumbai, the health authorities are now trying to build “blanket immunity” in the community by giving Tamiflu to anyone who shows symptoms of H1N1.

“Even in UK, if a doctor sees that a patient has symptoms, he immediately puts him on Tamiflu. We can’t wait for the test report,” said Dr Jairaj Thanekar, Executive Health Officer of the civic body.

And it was not harmful to take the drug even if one tests negative for H1N1, claimed Sanjay Oak, director of medical education and KEM Hospital dean.

“Ten tablets of Tamiflu will not cause any harm,” he said.

The government declared a holiday on Friday for Mumbai and suburbs but home quarantine appeared to be the last thing on people’s mind as they prepared to enjoy the unexpected long weekend.

In Delhi, people accepted schools closing down without a murmur, but did not hesitate to visit multiplexes and malls with their friends and family.

And H1N1 is unlikely to affect the Maharashtra Assembly poll schedule as no political party had requested for postponement, said Chief Election Commissioner Navin Chawla.

“In fact, the matter did not come up for discussion… We’re keeping a close watch [on the pandemic],” said the chief election commissioner.

It was a reality show scheduled to last for two months. But eight of the 10 celebrities on Sony Television’s Iss Jungle Se Mujhe Bachao have reportedly already packed their bags.

This came after Akashdeep Saigal, a contestant on the show, performed a task called ‘Fill your Face’ where he had to put his face into a jar filled with snakes, meal worms and bugs.

When Akashdeep returned to the camp, his face was swollen after being bitten by the bugs.

The incident shook the rest of the contestants and eight of them reportedly decided to walk out of the show.

“He doesn’t accept defeat and neither do I. So I want him to stay on and see what happens. It’s a challenge. When he left here we were very nervous, the kids were very nervous. All in all, I am wishing him all the best,” says Waluscha Robinson, ex-model and wife of contestant Marc Robinson.

According to reports, the contestants are now asking for more money to return to the show.

Though the channel denies any monetary demands, they do admit that the contestants have been complaining about the quality of food that they are having to eat - which at times includes frogs.

“Had he been treated on the site, none of this would have happened. So the frustrated participants will talk about it. It’s their job,” says Programming Head, Sony Entertainment Television, Gurdip Bangoo.

The channel now faces a bigger problem of not having a show to broadcast if the contestants do not agree to return to the jungle.

Pampered pets can now have an enjoyable trip with the introduction of the first pet-only airline, lunched from a Long Island airport on July 14. PetAirways vows to provide kennel-in-the-sky service for pampered pets, and offers free in-flight pet treats, comfy crates, and a climate-controlled cabin.

“It’s great to know he’ll get there safely and we don’t have to worry,” the New York Daily News quoted Jim Gentilini (62), of Binghamton, NY, who was checking in his daughter’s chocolate lab named Bear, as saying.

The idea for the fur-friendly airline came when CEO Dan Wiesel had to check his Jack Russell terrier into the cargo hold on a cross-country flight.”It was stressful for me and it was stressful for the dog,” Wiesel, of Delaney, Fla, said.

PetAirways is starting out with a single Beechcraft plane that once seated 19 human passengers, and the plane has been gutted to provide space for 50 pets.

Onboard, the plane will also be a veterinary assistant, who will ride on every flight along with the pilot and co-pilot.Tickets for the airline, which is starting out by flying once a week from Republic Airport in Farmingdale to Baltimore, Chicago, Denver and Los Angeles, starts at $149.