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CNN Live Today

Helpful Tips for Holiday Travel; Apartment Building Fire in Downtown Atlanta; St. Jude's Kicks Off Donation Campaign; New Aquarium Opens in Georgia; A Look at Women's Rights in Saudi Arabia, New quarantine proposals for bird flu

Aired November 23, 2005 - 11:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(WEATHER REPORT)
KAGAN: It is now officially a good day for a swim here in Atlanta. Any day of the year the Georgia Aquarium is opening to the public. We'll take you inside for a good look right after this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MELISSA LONG, CNN.COM: 'Tis the season to wait in line at toll booths and ticket counters. The busiest travel time of the year is here. At cnn.com read about how to prevent back seat boredom if you're traveling by car to your Thanksgiving Day destination.

Experienced road trippers say plan ahead. Keep the kids busy with DVDs to entertainment them in the back seat. But don't forget about games that don't require money like license plate bingo. For adults, psychologists get enough sleep before getting behind the wheel and take frequent breaks.

If you're flying, remember to speed up your trip through security by removing your coat and shoes ahead of time so they can pass through the X-ray machine. And if you're bringing gifts, don't bother wrapping them since screeners may have to unwrap presents for security reasons. You can get more tips for stress free travel online at cnn.com/travel.

From the .comdesk, I'm Melissa Long.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: The holidays traditionally begin a season of giving. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital is kicking off its second "Thanks and Giving" campaign, and you can help with a donation while you shop this season. Veteran actress Marlo Thomas is the national outreach director for St. Jude and she joins me from Time Warner Center this morning in New York.

Marko, good morning.

MARLO THOMAS, OUTREACH DIRECTOR AT ST. JUDE: Hi. How are you today?

KAGAN: I am doing great. Let's talk about this program. So you can shop and give at the same time.

THOMAS: That's right. It's called Thanks and Giving, to give thanks for the children in your life who are healthy and give to those who are not, so that one day all the children will be healthy. And St. Jude Children's Research Hospital has their annual Thanks and Giving campaign that launches on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. And many, many stores are signed up to help us: Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, 7-Eleven, CVS, Marshall's, Kay Jewelers, oh my gosh, Brooks Brothers, Sears, Target.

KAGAN: So how does it work? You go into these stores and part of what you buy, part of the proceeds go to St. Jude's?

THOMAS: Well, what happens is you go to the store and they ask you to add a dollar on at your purchase place. And some of them are also selling bears or selling product where all the profits go to us.

KAGAN: You know, it's been a year where people have opened up their hearts and opened up their pockets so much, especially for hurricane victims. And people do want to help kids. What can you tell us about St. Jude's for people who don't live near Memphis, where it's located?

THOMAS: Well, you should know that St. Jude really impacts the lives of children of every community in this country. We immediately and freely share our research -- scientific research worldwide. St. Jude is in Memphis, but then so is FedEx. What St. Jude really is is the only research and treatment center in the country that is really dedicated to the study of catastrophic diseases in children. And nobody ever pays. Every child that comes to St. Jude, whether rich or poor, we pay for everything.

And the great Target Corporation built us a house that has 100 two-bedroom apartments for our families. And the Memphis Grizzlies built us another house for 100 families. And the Ronald McDonald House also takes care of just the St. Jude children. So we house our kids, we pay for all the food for the family, the travel, and of course, all the medication and treatment and for as long as it takes.

And once you're a patient at St. Jude, you're a patient for life. We watch you for the rest of your life. We want to be sure that you can have children if that's your choice, that your thyroid's OK, your hearing, your kidneys, your liver. We're watching them forever, because we're a research institution. And our scientists are there 24 hours a day. And every child that comes to St. Jude has both a scientist and a doctor working on his or her situation.

In fact, the Katrina victims, we airlifted...

KAGAN: Yes, tell us about that. You helped a bunch of kids that were found stuck after Katrina.

THOMAS: Well, you know, so many of those cancer victims that were hit by Katrina, their records were lost. The computers were down. Nobody knew anything about these children. And their life- saving treatments had been interrupted. And we were in the unique position of being able to go get them. And we airlifted 125 patients, brought them to St. Jude, and like all of our patients, we're paying for their care.

And we've saved these kids' life. In fact, we just had a child on this morning on the "The Today Show," Brianna Cuerva (ph) who was just lost. Her mother was terrified. They didn't have their records and if we hadn't rescued her, she'd be in a lot of trouble.

KAGAN: You came to the help of a lot of kids. Thanks and Giving...

THOMAS: So shop with us, shop with us on Friday Thanks and Giving day for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. Buy our books and CD called Thanks and Giving.

KAGAN: Yes, tell me about the book and CD.

THOMAS: We have a book and CD called Thanks and Giving all year long. And it has got great people, Sarah Jessica Parker, Billy Crystal, Faith Hill, Hilary Duff, Robin Williams, just wonderful folks that all entertain with the CD and the wonderful book and all the royalties of course go to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.

KAGAN: Well, if it's anything like the "Free To Be You and Me" series that I grew up with and absolutely adored, then it's going to be a big success.

THOMAS: Thank you, thanks so much.

KAGAN: ... be good to a lot of kids. Marlo Thomas, good luck and good luck to you. And thank you.

THOMAS: We'll see you in the malls on Friday.

KAGAN: OK. I accept the invitation. Thank you.

The invitation today is for those of you interested in the Georgia Aquarium. It's opening up to the public. Get your flippers ready. We're going for a swim with Chad Myers after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: I'm here in the control room of CNN World Headquarters. We're watching a number of breaking stories, including this fire right here. It's actually not that far from us here at CNN. It's here in Atlanta between -- if you're familiar with Atlanta, the streets of Boulevard and Highland.

We understand that this apartment complex empty when it caught on fire but they're obviously doing a -- have a tough job ahead of them trying to knock down that fire before it might spread to any other surrounding buildings.

While we watch that, we want to go about, I don't know, three, four miles away from where that building is burning. Lots of water, tons of water, the Atlanta Aquarium. Look at that beautiful beluga whale. The Georgia Aquarium is opening today to the general public. It's the biggest in the world. The tanks hold 8 million gallons of water and they feature 100,000 fish and sea creatures. Our Chad Myers is getting a firsthand look at this incredible new complex.

Chad, good morning.

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Good morning, Daryn. This time I'm actually in front of the reef, the ocean reef itself. A replica of a reef of the South Pacific. And you will notice behind me there are fish in the reef and it's very bright in here. This is a huge skylight cut in the middle of this building because sunlight is an important feature for a coral reef.

Coral reefs don't grow at 15,000 feet below sea level because there's no light down there. And here is the coral reef itself. Now every part of this yet is coral. Some of it is still manmade. But Bruce Carlson, one of the vice presidents here of the Georgia Aquarium, joining us now.

I want you to tell me and tell our viewers how this was such a hands-on part for you that you didn't want to take any coral from a living reef and move it here. You actually grew this coral or someone did for you, right?

BRUCE CARLSON, V.P. EXHIBITS CONSERVATION: Conservation is a big part of the Georgia Aquarium. So we didn't want to harm any coral reefs to make this one. All of the corals that we have right now are cultured corals. None of them came from the ocean. I just had a lady ask me, how did you bring this reef in? We didn't bring it UPS. We could have but we didn't. Most of this is a fiberglass reef overlaid with live coral. The next two years that grow up and overtake the whole reef.

MYERS: Now you were telling me earlier that this reef is going to look different every time you come in because you're going to keep adding species and taking some of the fake -- the fiberglass stuff out. So it's going to look different every time you come to the aquarium, right?

CARLSON: Exactly, every six months you come back, the corals will have grown more, we'll have more corals in there. It's like a garden in early spring. And you want to come back in the summer and later in the year to see it really in bloom.

MYERS: I want you to tell me about the one-ton or two-ton -- the rocks that you made, put in the South Pacific, in Fiji somewhere, and brought back here. What was that all about?

CARLSON: Sure. Again, because of conservation, we didn't want to take rocks directly from the reef. So we had rocks made out of concrete and a little sand, even some pumice to make them a little lighter. But two years ago we had those placed in the ocean Fiji, halfway around the world, then they were airfreighted, five metric tons of those rocks. They are now placed all over this reef. Each rock is a little miniature ecosystem full of life. And that will reproduce and cover this whole aquarium over the next few years. MYERS: Now it wasn't full of life when you put it in the ocean but over the two years that it was sitting there soaking, that's when it got the little pieces in the (INAUDIBLE), right?

CARLSON: Exactly, because the little rocks have little holes in it, they have bacteria and little mollusks, snails, crustaceans, all sort -- plants especially growing on those rocks. And then we can just transport them in here. They are kind of like guilt-free rocks from the ocean.

MYERS: So this is a guilt-free reef.

CARLSON: It's guilt-free reef.

MYERS: How many thousand gallons here?

CARLSON: One hundred and sixty-five thousand gallons, it's the largest living coral reef in the United States.

MYERS: In a closed system. I mean, we have the coral reef down by Key West and Marathon, but that's open, the water keeps coming.

CARLSON: That's right.

MYERS: This water doesn't go anywhere, it stays and circulates.

CARLSON: This is an incredibly difficult reef to manage because we have to completely recycle the water. We don't waste any water. We run it through a very sophisticated filtration system. We have to balance the Ph, the alkalinity and the calcium. Corals need calcium. A very narrow range for all of those. If we don't meet that range, the coral won't live.

MYERS: This is one big chemistry experiment and so far it's going very well. Thank you very much, Bruce.

And, Daryn, we're going to be back later in the day, of course, taking you to all the different exhibits, especially the one that everybody really, the whale sharks, 6.1 million gallon tank there. And the divers are in there now cleaning it up. We'll give you a sneak peak at that.

KAGAN: Chad, you know, on that coral reef, I had read in the local paper that they did a site survey where they wanted to build the aquarium and they weren't going to even build it there until they could make sure that no high rises would block the sunrise and the sunlight at the key moments so that that coral reef could thrive.

MYERS: The sunlight is so important that they had to make sure that all the sight lines to the sun for the entire day were going to stay clear forever. And right, you couldn't put a 20-story condo to the west of here and block all of the sun. Didn't want that.

KAGAN: It's a cool place. Chad Myers, thank you.

MYERS: It is. You're welcome. KAGAN: Let's update you now about this story that we're following about four miles away from where the Georgia Aquarium is. This an apartment fire, it's still very much under way, still engulfed. We are getting some updated information that there actually were some people in this apartment when it started, but they have all been safely evacuated from the apartments at Pine and Boulevard in midtown Atlanta. No injuries have been reported. The fire department in Atlanta does say the blaze started on the apartment building second floor. More pictures and information as it becomes available from here in Atlanta.

KAGAN: Now we take a trip far away to Saudi Arabia. And we're talking about women there. Their rights are restricted and freedoms are few. But women's rights activists are finding their voice in Saudi Arabia. And there are subtle signs of change.

Senior international correspondent Nic Robertson reports from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): Life for girls in Saudi Arabia doesn't get more daring than this. At the wheel of a virtual car, Anan's (ph) not sure if she'll drive when she grows up, not because she's crashing but because women are banned from doing the real thing.

MAHA FITAIHI, WOMEN'S RIGHTS ACTIVIST: This is a house for ladies who can -- widows and divorced.

ROBERTSON: In her chauffeur-driven car, as she drives me around her hometown, Jeddah, women's rights activist Maha Fitaihi sees change.

(on camera): How long do you think before you could be driving around these streets?

FITAIHI: I would say maybe few months.

ROBERTSON: That sure?

FITAIHI: It will have a backlash, I'm sure, from some people who don't believe in woman's role in life.

ROBERTSON: The more religious extremes?

FITAIHI: Yes. And expected, but we're ready for that, yes.

ROBERTSON (voice-over): Female drivers are a hot issue. Video clips like this purporting to be women flaunting the law, driving in Saudi Arabia are popular in the growing youth counterculture of video messaging.

Fitaihi, though, wants more than just being allowed to drive. She wants religious extremists responsible for repressing women's rights to radically reform their attitudes. She wants respect. FITAIHI: I want to see that when you talk to me, you listen to me and you talk me in the eyes. You look me in the eyes and you respect me as a woman and you take what I say as a woman.

That was the first time we come up on the TV. We are eight ladies.

ROBERTSON: Her path from mother of five to reformer began in earnest is TV appearances following September 11th.

FITAIHI: Just talking the every day life as a mother and as a wife, living a life and want to have a better life.

ROBERTSON: She felt Saudis were responsible for the attacks in the U.S. and her country need to change. She discovered she wasn't alone.

FITAIHI: I was shocked by the -- some of messages and telephone calls.

ROBERTSON: Many women supported her view that narrow religious education is the root of the Saudi problem, stemming from the empowerment of conservative religious leaders following a botched revolt against the royal family.

FITAIHI: That incident of 1979 had an impact on our TV, our schools, our education, our daily life, you know, everywhere we were not allowed to speak out.

ROBERTSON: Fitaihi is devoted to Islam. She prays five times a day. To do less would allow religious extremists to derail her agenda.

FITAIHI: My mission that I would like to differentiate and to show the differences between what is from Islam and what is from social practices and customs.

I was living here in...

ROBERTSON (on camera): In the center?

(voice-over): Nowhere is her calculated bucking of the social norm more obvious than when she shows me where she grew up.

(on camera): This is busy.

(voice-over): For a woman to be in public with an unrelated man is banned by religious police. For it to be filmed for Western television is a first for me. It is a sign of change.

In the markets, female migrant workers, she sees optimism and reality in equal measure.

FITAIHI: Two years ago, it was only maybe three, four women. You see now how many? Saudi women themselves, they don't want to get into this now because they don't know that maybe that she's going to be harmed, maybe she's going to be hurt, maybe she's going to be hearing some. But the more we have like this, I'm sure in two years' time you'll find some Saudis sitting here.

ROBERTSON: Her optimism is based on trust in the new Saudi monarch, King Abdullah, in whose hands women's fortunes here lie.

(on camera): Just looking along this rack of magazines and newspapers gives an indication of the subtle and slow change on women's issues. This magazine, for example, features a picture of Saudi Arabia's king and a woman on its cover. It would have been unheard of several years ago, unlike many publications these days, features more articles relevant for women.

(voice-over): And elsewhere, women are getting minor victories. Girls can now study engineering, women can join chambers of commerce, both formerly off limits. But fundamental changes like equality and law are nowhere in sight.

Fitaihi has been fighting for her own college-age girls. She knows the final push may come from them.

FITAIHI: The new generation is rejecting that power without logic. They would like -- and this is their cause of their Internet and the TV, satellite TVs and the exposure.

ROBERTSON: More than 60 percent of the country is under 16. Seventeen-year-old Saleh (ph) knows what she wants and is breaking social norms to tell us.

"It would be better if women could drive," she says. "It would be easier on the family."

By the time Anan is Saleh's age, she may well be driving. And if she keeps practicing, she'll likely do just fine.

Nic Robertson, CNN, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAGAN: Well, it might not be as far as Saudi Arabia, but you might be getting ready to head off somewhere to celebrate Thanksgiving. Coming up, a look at the nation's weather outlook for this very busy holiday travel day. Stay with us. The most updated travel information is up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Once again, we're watching this fire that appears to be burning out of control in Atlanta, midtown Atlanta. It is between Pine and Boulevard, if you're familiar with the city. A big apartment complex, big apartment building on fire. We now know that there were people inside when this fire broke out on the second floor in one of the apartments. But apparently everyone got out safely. No injuries are reported.

Onto medical news now. Concerns about a bird flu pandemic are behind new quarantine proposals from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC wants to require airlines to report all illnesses and death on a flight and they want it reported to the agency. Ships arriving from overseas would face similar rules. Currently the CDC has the authority to quarantine people suspected of carrying nine illnesses, those range from smallpox and Ebola to tuberculosis and SARS. The most recent addition, a possible pandemic flu was put on the list in April.

Log on to cnn.com/health for the latest on health and medical fronts. We have a health library and info on diet and fitness.

(WEATHER REPORT)

KAGAN: I'm Daryn Kagan. International news is up next. Stay tuned for "YOUR WORLD TODAY," Michael Holmes and Zain Verjee are here after a quick break. Have a great Thanksgiving.

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