Remember the gut wrenching scene from Apocalypto, where Jaguar Paw’s wife uses ants’ pincers as sutures on her young son? Turns out it was inspired by a real medical treatment used in part of Asia, Africa and South America.

According to survival expert Cody Lundin, who starred on the Discovery reality show Dual Survival, army ants – soldiers that guard the rest of the colony – are known for their whopper mandibles. “I know that in ancient China, they were used as sutures by a lot of native peoples,” he explained on the show. “Take it on both sides of your wound and it’s going to clamp down on your flesh, and when you pinch off the body, it will hold that wound shut. Once they bite on, they don’t let go. You can physically pull their body away from their head, and they will stay embedded in the flesh.”

Read More »

The headquarters of NetDragon Websoft – China’s most popular internet provider – looks quite conventional from the ground, but aerial footage shows that the building is actually a replica of the iconic Starship Enterprise!

NetDragon chairman Liu Dejian, a huge Star Trek fan and self-described ‘Uber Trekkie’, reportedly spent $150 million over a span of six years to construct the USS Enterprise-shaped office. When it was finally ready in 2014, he chose to remain rather low-key about it. But when a fan spotted a satellite image of the badass building – about the size of three football pitches – it eventually stirred up a social media frenzy. Drone footage was soon released online, making Star Trek fans all over the world drool with delight.

Read More »

For most of us a cruise around the world aboard a luxury ship is nothing but a fantasy, but for Lee Wachtstetter it’s everyday life. The 86-year-old has been living on the Crystal Serenity cruise ship for the last seven years, hardly ever setting foot on dry land.

The Florida woman sold her five-bedroom home in Fort Lauderdale shortly after she lost her husband ,Guy Mason Wachtstetter, to cancer, and moved into the stateroom of a Holland America Line ship. When that ship discontinued its dance host program, she moved to the 1,070-passenger Crystal Serenity, where she has been living for the past seven years!

Read More »

In a phenomenal display of creativity, artist Marc Schneider has managed to transform ordinary metal screws into an art medium. He painstakingly arranges thousands of gray scale screws to create detailed portraits that look like black and white photographs.

Schneider starts by taking a photo and modifying the pixels into a gray scale template. Using the pixelated photograph as a reference, he uses thousands of hand sprayed screws to replicate the photo on a block of wood.  “I enjoy working in a medium that embodies strength and durability, allowing the viewer to touch the art and experience the unique surface created by thousands of screws,” he wrote on his website. “The meticulous approach in the creation of my screw art portraits is medicine for my soul.”

Read More »

A shopping mall in Shanghai recently sparked controversy with its special, super-sized parking spaces for female drivers. The pink-colored spots are six meters long by three meters wide, making them half a meter larger than normal parking spaces. Although mall staff insist that they are intended to make parking safer and more convenient for women, plenty of netizens have deemed the move sexist.

The four pink-colored spaces on the B1 level of Wandu Center, on Xingyi Road, feature the image of a woman, similar to the ones used to designate restroom doors, on the floor and the walls behind them are to be painted pink for easy identification. Men are obviously not allowed to use these spots, but strict action won’t be taken against those who do, at least not at first. “Whether the ladies-only spaces will be properly used still depends on public awareness,” said mall employee Li Ming.

Read More »

The curious case of the bizarre facekini strikes again! In case you don’t remember, it’s a nylon mask that covers the entire head, leaving holes only for the eyes, nostrils and mouth. The Chinese invention is meant to be used as beachwear, protecting wearers (mostly women) from sunburns and jellyfish stings. It first made an appearance in 2006, and the present “fourth-generation” avatar has managed to enter new levels of weirdness!

Read More »

Lata 65 is a highly unusual urban art workshop in Lisbon, Portugal, that teaches elderly women the basics of street art. Although graffiti is generally perceived as a part of youth culture, the workshop has introduced the quirky art form to over 100 senior citizens around the city. It gives groups of elderly women the chance to team up with prominent street artists and literally paint the town red. They bring color and charm to otherwise neglected and run-down neighborhoods, by making their own stencils and creating their own street tags.

Read More »

Six-year-old Amina Al Musa is a seemingly normal child: She goes to school and loves playing hide-and-seek. But her after-school snack is so unconventional that it has attracted media attention across the world. Amina happens to be breastfed by her mother every single day, and the little girl seems to love it!

Extended breastfeeding is highly unusual in today’s world, which is why Amina’s case is making headlines. At age 52, her mother – belly dancing expert and human rights activist Maha Al Musa – is one of the oldest women in the world to be breastfeeding. Although she’s garnering a lot of interest and some criticism, Maha says that she’s only responding to her daughter’s natural desire.

Read More »

17-year-old Lamont Cathey, who was jailed for breaking into a pizza parlour in Chicago, is proving to be a costly inmate to handle. For the past 16 months, mentally disturbed Cathey has been consuming metal objects – ranging from toe screws to needles, to drawing pins, and even strips of leather. He has been rushed to the prison’s hospital 24 different times to have these items removed, costing the State a whopping $1.3 million!

Cathey used to be a promising basketball player until he was accused of stealing money from a safe at a pizzeria over a year ago. He is yet to go on trial, and as he waits for a sentence, he has taken to eating “anything he could get his hands on” around his cell. He reportedly swallowed parts of a security camera, tore apart a $50,000 hospital bed, and broke open a medical device to swallow the parts inside.

Read More »

While plagiarism is generally abhorred in artistic circles, controversial artist Richard Prince makes millions by brazenly duplicating others’ work. In his last project, ‘New Portraits’, he took screenshots of 37 Instagram photographs (without permission), blew them up, and displayed them at the Frieze Art Fair New York. One of the portraits – posted by a woman called Doe Deere – reportedly sold for a whopping $90,000!

The portrait in question depicts Deere styled in blue hair, identical to the doll she’s holding. “No I did not give permission and yes, the controversial artist Richard Prince put it up anyway,” Deere wrote on Instagram, where she has 328,000 followers. “It’s already sold ($90k I’ve been told) during the VIP preview. No, I’m not gonna go after him. And nope, I have no idea who ended up with it!” She hashtagged the post #modernart and #wannabuyaninstagrampicture.

Read More »

A Czech TV show is making waves for its controversial format, depicting the brutal lives of ordinary people under Nazi rule. The reality show, titled ‘Holiday in the Protectorate’, features a modern family living in recreated conditions of the German occupation during the WWII. A prize money of 1 million Czech Krunas (over $40,000) awaits the family if they manage to survive the two-month ordeal.

The three-generation family was selected after rigorous auditions in which 200 other families participated. The show was recorded in the summer of 2014, and the 8 hour-long episodes will be airing from May 23 to June 13. Although the family participated in normal tasks typical of that time period, like harvesting crops or milking cows, they also went through wartime struggles like food rationing, frequent hunger, simulated air raids, intimidation by Nazi informants, and interrogations by the Gestapo.

Read More »

Long before selfies became a way of life, this Alaska man began to take pictures of himself every day. Now, 16 years later, Jonathan Keller has released an extraordinary time-lapse video consisting of a whopping 5,840 pictures of his face! The three-and-a-half minute video shows his transformation from a 22-year-old young adult to his current 39-year-old self.

Keller’s project, titled ‘Living My Life Faster’, began on October 1, 1998. Ever since, he’s been taking one picture of himself every single day, wearing the same emotionless expression. His goal, it seems, is to show that the daily changes to his appearance are almost insignificant when viewed in chronological order. But the ‘before’ and ‘after’ pictures show that he has indeed aged visibly.

Read More »

In a bid to live her life to the fullest, artist Michelle Poler has decided to face 100 biggest fears. She’s calling the project ‘100 Days Without Fear’ and her goal is to do one thing that scares her, every day for 100 days.

Originally from Venezuela, Michelle recently moved to New York to get a Master’s Degree in Branding at the School of Visual Arts. She revealed that the experience of living in the city inspired her to take on the project. “Trying to control New York has been a nightmare,” she said. “But what has really pushed me to pursue this project was not the controlled lifestyle I left behind, it is the frustration of not enjoying this city and life in general to the fullest.”

Read More »

11-year-old child prodigy Tanishq Abraham is in the news for graduating from college with not one, not two, but three different degrees. The talented kid from California made headlines last year as well, for completing high school at the age of ten and earning a congratulatory letter from President Barack Obama. And now, just a year later, he’s finished college with three associate degrees.

Last week’s graduation ceremony at the American River College in Sacramento was attended by Tanishq’s parents – his mother Taji, a vet, and his father Bijou, a software engineer. His sister Tiara, also a child prodigy, was present as well. They cheered for Tanishq as he was awarded associate degrees in math and physical sciences, general science, and language studies. He wore a rainbow colored scarf that his grandmother had knit specially for the occasion, and a cap with his favorite Toy Story-quote: ‘To Infinity and Beyond.”

Read More »

Men in drought-stricken Indian villages often take a second or even a third wife whose sole purpose is only to bring water to the family. They make several long trips to distant water sources every single day, carrying large vats of water on their heads.

Life is hard in dry villages, like Denganmal, 150 km from Mumbai. Husbands are busy farming and tending to the animals, while the women do house chores and raise the children. However, someone still needs to bring water from sources often several kilometers away, for about 8 months out of a year, when there is no rainfall in the area. That’s why having two or even three wives is not at all uncommon in these parts. The men only have children with their first wives, while the other’s sole purpose is to provide water for the family, in exchange for a roof over their heads and the social status of wife. They are paaniwaali bais, water wives.

Read More »