The Welsh village of Cyffylliog was “invaded” by bargain-hunting shoppers looking for a non-existent Aldi supermarket that internet trolls added to Google Maps as a prank.

The “add a missing place” feature on Google Maps can be very useful when used correctly, but when abused by pranksters, it can cause headaches for entire communities. Case in point, Cyffylliog, a quiet Welsh village in Denbighshire whose inhabitants have seen a flood of confused shoppers looking for a “phantom Aldi supermarket” that only exists as a pin on Google Maps. Believed to have been added by a local internet troll, the listing has so far led thousands of people to a grassy field, tens of miles away from the nearest checkout lane. After a milk truck became stuck on a narrow village truck trying to deliver its cargo to the phantom Aldi, locals said that they have been visited by vans trying to deliver groceries and bread to the non-existent supermarket, as well as confused shoppers led there by their smartphones.

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Russian police have been enforcing the country’s controversial anti-LGBT legislation by arresting people for dressing in ways that made them “look too gay”.

“Trying to arouse interest in non-traditional sexual relations” has been considered a crime in Russia for over a decade, but the law was usually enforced against individuals and organizations that published and promoted LGBT “propaganda”. However, a recent analysis of court documentation by an independent news outlet revealed that the Kremlin’s strategy to promote ‘traditional values’ now includes detaining and fining people for “looking too gay”. The Russian news website Verstka revealed an incident that occurred back in February of last year but was never covered by the media in which eight individuals were detained by police for wearing clothing that promoted “non-traditional sexual relations”.

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An Uzbek zookeeper tragically lost his life after going into the lion’s enclosure at a private zoo to film himself petting the large felines only to get mauled by them.

On December 17, 44-year-old F. Iriskulov was working the night shift at a private zoo in Parkent, Uzbekistan, when he decided to impress his fiancee by filming himself going into the lions’ enclosure to pet three full-grown African felines. A short clip retrieved from the man’s phone shows him unlocking the lion’s cage and casually walking in while talking to the lions and addressing them by name. At one one point, the felines, which had been lounging on wooden pallets, become alert and approach the zoo keeper who continues to film, seemingly unaware of the danger he is in. The video cuts off with Iriskulov screaming as one of the lions attacks him.

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Every year, during the rainy season, a scenic road winding through China’s Poyang Lake like a mythical dragon becomes flooded, offering a unique driving and visual experience.

Yongwu Road is the only stretch of road connecting Wucheng, one of the oldest townships in China, to neighboring townships and counties. Part of the X219 county road, this 5.05 km piece of infrastructure was built straight through Poyang Lake, China’s largest freshwater lake, making it one of the most famous tourist attractions of Jiangxi Province. But Yongwu is most popular with tourists at the onset of the rainy season, during Spring when the water level starts rising. When the level of the surrounding lake reaches about 18.6 meters, water submerges segments of the road, turning Yongwu Road into “China’s most beautiful road under the water.”

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A landlord in northern France is trying to force his tenants to leave in the middle of winter by removing the doors and windows on his property.

In France, as in many European countries, it’s illegal to evict tenants in wintertime, even if they are behind on rent. However, one landlord in Pas-de-Calais, a department in northern France, is trying to skirt around the law by forcing his tenants to vacate the property without actually asking them to leave. On December 20, a team of workers arrived at the property and started disassembling the doors and windows under the pretext of replacing them. However, the tenants claim that they just loaded up the old doors and windows in a car and drove away, leaving them to brave the cold and face potential intrusion at all hours of the day and night.

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55-year-old Hilde Dosogne of Belgium recently set a new world record for most consecutive marathons after running 366 full marathons (over 15,000 km) in 2024.

On May 30, 2024, Hilde Dosogne had already broken the women’s world record for most consecutive marathons – 150, set by Erchana Murray Bartlett – but she didn’t stop running until December 31st, when she recorded her 366th consecutive full marathon of the year. It’s a monumental achievement on par with that of the men’s category set in 2023 by Brazilian runner Hugo Farias who also completed 366 marathons. As you can imagine, running 42.195 km per day, every day, for a year is incredibly taxing on the body, but while Hilde had to overcome fatigue and bursitis (painful inflammation of the joints), she claims that the mental stress of having to show up at the starting line every day was her most difficult challenge.

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Liu Liange, former Chairman of the Bank of China, allegedly convinced his son to break up with his fiancée just so he could court and marry her instead.

Liu Liange most recently made news headlines in November of last year when he was issued a suspended death sentence with a two-year reprieve for accepting 121 million yuan ($17 million) in bribes and issuing illegal loans of over 3.32 billion yuan ($450 million) during his tenure Chairman of the Bank of China, but he previously became known for his love of young women. After divorcing his first wife, Liange remarried three times, with people remarking that his wives got younger and more attractive each time, culminating in his controversial fourth marriage to his son’s ex-fiancée.

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A team of Texas high school students is being sued for allegedly forcing players to do up to 368 pushups in under an hour during a grueling training session that put their lives at risk.

Former Rockwall-Heath High School coach John Harrell and a dozen assistant coaches stand accused of having junior varsity football players do nearly 400 pushups with no rest and no water breaks in a 50-minute training session that landed some of them in the hospital for several days. According to a lawsuit filed by one of the players’ parents, on January 6th, 2023, dozens of junior varsity players hoping to make the varsity team were punished for every mistake made during their 50-minute training session with 16 pushups. There were 23 mistakes counted, so they had to do a total of 368 pushups. Following the grueling workout, 26 players were diagnosed with or had symptoms of rhabdomyolysis, a potentially deadly medical condition that causes muscle tissue to break down and enter the bloodstream.

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A 32-year-old Indian man admitted to cutting off four fingers on his left hand to avoid having to continue working as a computer operator at a relative’s company.

Learning to say ‘no’ sounds easy, but for some people, it can be harder than crippling themselves for life. Case in point, a Gujarat man who staged an “accident” that left him missing four fingers on his left hand to avoid having to tell his boss that he wanted to quit his job. Earlier this month, Mayur Tarapara showed up at a police station in his native city of Surat to report that four mingers were missing from his left hand. He claimed to have been riding his motorcycle to a friend’s house when he suddenly felt dizzy and passed out on the side of the road. When he woke up 10 minutes later, four fingers on his left hand had been chopped off. Police initially believed that the man’s fingers had been stolen for black magic rituals, but their investigation found huge holes in Mayur’s story.

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A Japanese company came up with the genius idea of selling plastic bags of popcorn as an edible alternative to conventional cushioning materials like styrofoam pellets and cardboard.

Azechi Foods, a popcorn manufacturer and delicacy wholesaler in Japan’s Kochi City, has become famous for using and selling popcorn not just as a snack but as a cushioning material. The company’s manager, Shihoko Wada, had been struggling to promote popcorn on the Azechi Foods online store where people mainly bought delicacies when she was inspired by a laptop repair technician at a management seminar. The man used Umaibo sticks (cylindrical puffed corn snacks) as a cushioning material, and while some in attendance found it funny, for Wada it was a revelation. Not only could the popcorn be used as an actual snack after use, but it was also an incredible opportunity to attract attention.

“If Umaibo can be used as a cushioning material, then I thought the popcorn that our company makes could also be used as a cushioning material,” Shihoko Wada told Gendai Magazine. “Once it’s finished serving its purpose as a cushioning material, it can be eaten, so it doesn’t become useless garbage. Above all, I thought that the customers who received it would be happy with the surprise, they would get a sense of value, and it would also help improve the company’s image.”

Wada’s idea was to package the popcorn in a transparent plastic bag that had “not edible” printed on it, only with the ‘not’ crossed out, and then use the bags as cushioning material in the packages they sent all over the country. People loved the idea and before long, photos of the bags started going viral on Japanese social media.

Azechi Foods filed for a trademark registration and soon started receiving orders from all sorts of businesses, like a company that sells used video games, a greengrocer, a wine seller. etc. As photos of its unique cushioning material went viral online, the number of orders increased and they even got requests for coverage from national TV outlets.

Although the bags of popcorn are more expensive than conventional cushioning materials like styrofoam or cardboard, they also come with a few definite advantages: they can be eaten, and thus eliminate the risk of waste, which can’t really be said about other cushioning or filler materials, most of which end up in the trash after one use.

Azechi Foods currently offers two package sizes – 40g and 13g – but Azechi Foods hopes to start offering it in other sizes, as well as other styles of packaging to keep customers entertained.

An Indian devotee who accidentally dropped his iPhone into the collection box at a Hindu temple while making a donation was told that the phone was now the deity’s property and could not be returned.

Last month, a Chennai man who was visiting Arulmigu Kandaswamy Temple in Thiruporur with his family to offer prayers, felt his iPhone slip out of his pocket and into the hundial – a metal donation box – just as he was making offerings to the temple’s patron deity. The man, referred to only as Dinesh, approached temple officials and explained the incident, demanding that his handheld be returned. To his surprise, they refused, claiming that rules did not permit them to return anything placed into the hundial, willingly or accidentally, because it is the deity’s property.

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In a bizarre trend sweeping Chinese social media, young women pose with fake silicone belies to make sure they look their best in their pregnancy photos even though they aren’t yet pregnant.

There was once a time when being single and pregnant was considered a stigma in Chinese society, but today, young women go as far as to fake their pregnancy even if they’re not even in a relationship just to make sure they capture the special moment at their very best. In a craze that has been sweeping the nation, Chinese women in their early 20s pay for fake pregnancy photos to ensure they have beautiful maternity memories later in life when they may not have perfect figures and wrinkle-free faces. The so-called “premade maternity photos” started attraction online after a popular influencer shared her own fake pregnancy photo session online, but the trend has apparently been around for a while.

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A three-inch jawbreaker candy managed to live up to its name after causing a 19-year-old woman to literally break her jaw by trying to bite into it.

Canadian student Javeria Wasim had seen videos of people biting into small jawbreaker candies, but she had never seen anyone successfully bite through a big three-inch jawbreaker, so she decided to try it. It turned out to be the worst decision of her life because she only managed to dent the outer layer of the hard candy when she felt a piercing pain in her lower jaw. The young woman’s friend then pointed out that one of her teeth was chipped and when Javeria checked it herself, she realized that another tooth felt wiggly when touched. At this point, the 19-year-old student could barely open her mouth without screaming in pain, so her friend called an ambulance. An X-ray later showed that the reason her tooth was wiggly was that she had fractured her mandible in two places trying to bite into the jawbreaker.

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Belarussian fashion brand ZNWR has been getting a lot of attention for its latest creations, a line of garments made from transparent bubble wrap.

Fashion brands are known for pushing the boundaries, but sometimes their ideas are so out of bounds that they look downright silly. Case in point, the newest offerings of Belarussian brand ZNWR – a line of clothing made of plastic bubble wrap. The weird garments were recently spotted by a TikTok user Yana in the ZNWR store located in Minsk’s Dana Mall and quickly went viral on the video-sharing platform with over 100,000 views. The clip features two bubble wrap garments, a transparent dress priced at 280 Belarussian rubles ($86), and a jacket with a 380 rubles ($116) price tag. Apparently, the new line of plastic clothes was created for people looking for something truly extravagant to wear on New Year’s Eve.

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A young Chinese woman suffered second-degree burns on her head by splashing herself with hot water that she threw into the air on a cold night hoping it would instantly freeze.

You’ve probably seen this Instagramable winter trick before: a person steps out on an extremely cold day and hurls a container full of hot water into the air. The cold temperature causes the water particles to freeze in mid-air, creating a fine mist. It’s definitely cool to watch from the comfort of your warm room, but recreating it is not as easy as you might think. One young Chinese woman named Jiang Nu learned that firsthand last week when she attempted the trick only to have hot water droplets fall on her head, causing second-degree burns.

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