The Chained Tree of Peshawar, in Pakistan, has been under arrest since 1899, when a British officer decided to teach it a lesson for moving away from him. It has remained chained ever since.

125 years ago, a drunk British officer by the name of James Squid performed one of the most bizarre arrests in history in Landi Kotal, a town near the Torkhan border. Convinced that the tree was trying to get away from him as he struggled to approach it, Squid ordered it chained to the ground and placed under arrest. The chains have remained in place ever since, and a plaque tells the story of the arrest for curious tourists.

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Every year, Japanese pesticide company Earth Corporation holds a ‘transcendence ceremony’ at the Myodoji Temple in Ako City to honor insects that sacrificed their lives for research purposes.

Earth Corporation prides itself on being the ‘no. 1 preferred household insecticide company in Japan’, a status it has achieved over decades of research and trial & error. In order to test the efficacy of its products, the company uses them on various species of insects at a proprietary research facility in Ako City, and some of those bugs inevitably die in the process. The company breeds the bugs it uses for testing, but that doesn’t make their sacrifice meaningless, and to show that it doesn’t take the tiny creatures for granted, Earth Corporation holds an honorary ceremony at the Myodoji Temple in Ako City.

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The Swan Car is regarded as one of the craziest, most eccentric vehicles ever to hit the streets and one look at it is enough to explain why.

The Swan Car was commissioned in the early 1900s by Robert Nicholl ‘Scotty’ Matthewson, a wealthy British engineer living in Calcutta. It’s never been clear why he was so obsessed with swans – maybe because he lived in Swan Park, next to Calcutta Zoo, which was home to many beautiful swans – but he loved the birds enough to travel to England in 1909 and placed a very special with JW Brooks and Company of Lowestoft, Suffolk – a swan-shaped car. The following year, the unique vehicle arrived in Calcutta and immediately became the talk of the town. It was unlike anything anyone had ever seen, or would ever see again for that matter, and came with some intriguing features.

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Chinese media reports that a growing number of pet owners are putting their animals through painful cosmetic procedures in order to give them rounded ears inspired by Mickey Mouse.

Most cats and dogs have naturally pointy or droopy ears, but a new disturbing trend sweeping through China these days has pet owners ignoring common sense and their animals’ physical and mental well-being for the promise of stylish ‘Mickey Ears’. Apparently, some shady pet clinics will slice part of the animal’s ears off to achieve the Mickey Mouse look, but there are also a variety of special clamps available online for pet owners disturbed enough to perform the procedure themselves. Recent coverage of this bizarre trend sparked controversy online, with most of the general public urging authorities to ban the ‘Mickey Ears’ procedure and punish those who would torture defenseless animals purely for cosmetic purposes.

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Mori Ouchi, a cozy cafe in Tokyo’s laidback Shimokitazawa district, is famous for only catering to pessimists and people with a generally negative mindset.

Negative people tend to get a bad rep and are constantly told to be more positive, but, if you think about it, is there really anything wrong with being negative? The founder of Mori Ouchi, a small cafe in Shimokitazawa, Tokyo, certainly doesn’t think so. A self-described gloomy person, he got the idea for like-minded people over a decade ago but only decided to open it three years ago, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The man had always felt like negative people were more sensitive and more easily hurt than others, so he created a space dedicated exclusively to them.

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‘Star Wash’, a small, family-owned car wash on the outskirts of Santiago de Chile, is being sued by LucasFilm, the company that owns the Star Wars brand, for allegedly plagiarizing its property.

Matias Jara, the owner of Star Wash, was in the process of registering his brand with the Chilean patent authority when he received a lawsuit from LucasFilm. The Disney-owned company reportedly wanted to stop the registration of the Star Wash name, arguing that the brand could be confused as being affiliated with Star Wars. However, Mr Jara is contesting the suit and claims that the name is different enough not to be confused with the LucasFilm property, adding that they are not selling movies of branded products. Apparently, the Star Wars copyright does not cover car cleaning services.

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Tokyo restaurant Sushiya no Nohachi reportedly serves great sushi, but it is most famous for its gimmick – making the world’s smallest sushi with a single grain of rice.

Located in Asakusa, a slightly quieter part of Tokyo, Sushiya no Nohachi is the place to go if you want to enjoy the tiniest, most adorable sushi in the world. Each piece is made with only a grain of rice and a tiny slice of topping wrapped in the thinnest piece of nori. Every served piece is actually perfect, which hints at the amount of work and patience that goes into making them. They are the work of Hironori Ikeno, the chef of Sushiya no Nohachi, who came up with the idea in 2002 when a client asked him how small he could make his sushi. He answered, “as small as a grain of rice”, and proceeded to demonstrate that he wasn’t kidding. Over the years, the eatery became internationally famous for making the world’s smallest sushi.

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The Amber Yantar, a new electric vehicle prototype from Russia, has been dubbed the world’s ugliest car because of its bizarre, unattractive design.

Car prototypes usually have eye-catching designs that capture viewers’ imagination. Even if the vehicle that reaches the production line turns out to be very different, or if it never actually goes into production, prototypes are an exciting way of showcasing a car brand’s vision of the near future. But that isn’t always the case. Take, for example, the new Amber Yantar, an EV prototype designed by Avtotor, a Russian carmaker based in Kaliningrad, in collaboration with the Moscow Polytechnic Institute. It was revealed to the public less than a week ago, but it has already become the laughing stock of the entire internet, with photos of its unflattering exterior doing the rounds on social media.

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A group of South Korean students recently sued the Government for millions of dollars in damages because their teachers ended a life-changing exam 90 seconds earlier than they should have.

The Suneung, South Korea’s college admission exam, is notoriously long and difficult, and its implications are literally life-changing. Not only do the results of the Suneung determine students’ college placements, but also their career options and relationships, so it’s no wonder that everyone, from the students and their families to the South Korean government takes the Suneung very seriously. During the 8-hour exam, South Korea closes its air space and delays the opening of the stock market to help students concentrate. So when a teacher recently ended the exam 90 seconds early, it was a very big deal with serious legal consequences.

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A prison in the Brazilian state of Santa Cantarina recently replaced its guard dogs with a flock of geese that supposedly make loud noises when they detect strange noises, like someone trying to escape.

In this day and age, prison complexes feature state-of-the-art detection systems that make it very difficult for inmates to escape undetected. Still, regardless of technological advancements, it’s always a good idea to have a backup analog detection system as well, in case the sophisticated stuff fails. Human guardians and guard dogs are usually the norm, but some prisons use some unlikely alternatives. For example, several prisons in Brazil have replaced guard dogs with geese, which they say are not only just as effective, if not more so, but also cheaper to maintain. Apparently, geese have very good hearing and will make loud noises whenever they detect strange noises, thus alerting the human guards.

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Tokyo’s Ikebukuro shopping district is home to the world’s largest gashapon capsule toy store – a 1,250m² area decked with over 3,000 gashapon machines filled with various figurines.

Gashapon machines have been a big part of Japan’s recreational culture for over half a decade, but while these toy capsule-filled machines are ubiquitous in the Asian country, the Mecca of gashapon machines is the Gashapon Official Store in Ikebukuro, Tokyo. It features over 3,000 coin-operated machines and probably millions of collectible toys and figurines. Using most of these machines requires a few hundred yen – from ¥200(~$1.33) to ¥500 (~$3.32) – but if you’re feeling generous, you can spin the wheel at the much more expensive ‘premium’ machines, which can cost up to ¥2,000 (~$13.27) on average for one random toy.

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A Chinese company has replaced its year-end employee bonus program with another scheme designed to promote exercise – enticing financial rewards for employees who exercise on a daily basis.

Guangdong Dongpo Paper, a paper company in Guangdong Province, China, recently made international headlines for replacing its traditional performance-based employee bonus scheme with one based on athletic performance. To promote a healthy lifestyle among its 100 employees, management decided to reward them based on how much they exercise. For example, an employee will be eligible for a full monthly bonus if they run 50 km a month. They will get 60 percent of the bonus for running 40km, and 30 percent for 30km. Running enthusiasts stand to get a 30% bonus if they can prove they ran over 100 km in a single month.

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A Florida scuba diver claims he has been best friends with a 15-foot-shark named Emma for almost 23 years now, describing her more like a playful dog than an apex predator.

Jim Abernethy and Emma first met in 2001 when he removed a fishing hook from her mouth, and they’ve been inseparable ever since. Every time Jim goes into the water in the area of Tiger Beach, in the Bahamas, she comes around and rubs heads with him as a sign of affection. It’s not the kind of behavior most people expect from a huge, 15-foot-long tiger shark that could easily tear a human apart, and that’s exactly what makes Emma the perfect poster girl in Jim Abernathy’s ongoing mission to change people’s perceptions of sharks.

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Book conservationists have launched an effort to locate thousands of 19th-century books containing ’emerald green’, a rare and coveted pigment created with the help of arsenic.

Before the industrial revolution, books were leather-bound artisanal creations that took a lot of time and effort to produce, but the invention of bookcloth changed everything. It was both cheaper and easier to make, but it also allowed for the use of pigments to make book covers more appealing. For example, one of the most popular bookcloth colors of the late 19th century was a vibrant green that came to be known as Paris green or emerald green. No other pigment even came close in terms of intensity, and although a series of arsenic poisoning accidents were reported during that time, the demand for it was so strong that manufacturers didn’t even consider canceling production. Tens, maybe even hundreds of thousands of emerald green books were produced until the risk of arsenic poisoning became a big enough issue and the pigment was finally pulled from production, and thousands of them are still in libraries and private collections today.

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A South Korean woman made international news headlines for legally adopting her adult best friend after a medical emergency made her realize that they needed a stronger connection to take care of each other.

44-year-old Eun Seo-ran grew up in a stereotypical South Korean patriarchal family in which her father was the breadwinner and her mother was consigned to the role of homemaker, serving her husband’s family. She slaved for them her entire life, but never got so much as a bit of gratitude from her spouse, but she made sure that Seo-ran followed another path in life. She never even allowed her in the kitchen as a young girl and always told her to preserve her freedom. Eun Seo-ran vowed to never end up like her mother, and decided to not get married or have children. To this day, she believes that it would be irresponsible of her to get married, but she also understands that there are situations where family members are the only ones who can help…

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