Swinging Bridge, a simple yet hard-to-master game that has been around for about a decade, has been growing in popularity all over China.

Ever try to keep your balance on a wobbly rope bridge as someone else was purposely shaking it to make you fall off? Welcome to Swinging Bridge, the competitive balance game that really puts players’ body coordination and balance to the test. It is usually played by a dozen or so players split into two teams on opposite sides of a wobbly bridge above a shallow pool filled with water or soft mattresses to cushion the fall of those who can’t keep up with the rhythm. Each team tries to swing the bridge from one side to the other to put the other team off balance until one side remains standing. It’s a simple premise, but staying on your feet as the bridge moves at dizzying speeds requires perfect balance and coordination.

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The town of Kudrovo, in Russia’s Leningrad Region, is home to the country’s largest residential building, a giant oval-shaped monstrosity featuring 3708 apartments and 35 different entrances.

Completed in 2015 as part of the massive ‘Novyy Okkervil’ residential complex on the outskirts of Kudrovo, Russia’s largest residential building got its first international coverage in 2021 when aerial photos of it made it to the first page of Reddit, getting over 50,000 upvotes and thousands of comments. People were equally fascinated and freaked out by the enormous building, and many compared it to a human anthill. The comparison is not as farfetched as it might seem, because the concrete oval of Kudrovo is home to between 11,000 and 18,000 people (reports from Russian media vary) all technically living under the same roof.

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Animal lovers and animal rights activists the world over are asking for a boycott of the Bully Cat, a hairless breed becoming increasingly popular among people fascinated by extreme body shapes.

The bully cat is a relatively new feline breed that takes the characteristics of the hairless sphynx to a whole new level while adding other problematic features. This particular hairless breed has stubby short legs and heavily wrinkled skin that animal experts claim is prone to horrifying health problems. Believed to have originated in the United States only a few years ago, the bully cat quickly became popular overseas as well, particularly in the UK where animal welfare organizations recently began sounding the alarm about what they are calling a designer fad with painful consequences for the animals being exploited by unscrupulous breeders.

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Crocs teams up with DC Comics to create a surprisingly cool-looking version of its ubiquitous Classic Clogs inspired by arguably the best Batmobile ever designed.

The Croc brand has always been associated with comfort, but rarely with style. Nevertheless, the company has always come up with ways of surprising its faithful fans, teaming up with various other brands for intriguing collaborations. Its latest such venture resulted in the recently-released Batman x Crocs Classic Clog “Batmobile”, a limited-edition version of its Classic Clogs inspired by the design of the Batmobile featured in the 1989 Batman movie and its sequel, Batman Returns.

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The Nepalese capital city of Kathmandu is home to a peculiar shrine to goddess Vaisha Dev, the patron saint of toothache, where people suffering from dental problems nail rupee coins on an old tree trunk as offerings.

Located on a narrow street in Kathmandu, between Thamel and Kathmandu Durbar Square, the Toothache Tree is undoubtedly one of the most unusual tourist attractions in the Nepalese capital. The Vaisha Dev shrine is said to be a stump cut from the mythical tree known as Bangemudha, but it’s almost impossible to tell that it is a tree at all, as it is completely covered in Nepalese rupee coins nailed onto it. Although it is impossible to know just how old this unique shrine really is, some sources claim that it dates back to the Lichchhavi kingdom that existed in the Kathmandu Valley from approximately 400 to 750 CE. Even though modern dentistry has been practiced in Kathmandu for decades, people still come to the Toothache Tree to nail coins, hoping the goddess will release them of their dental problems.

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A Russian chess player is facing a lifetime ban from official competitions after allegedly trying to poison an opponent by spreading mercury compounds on her chess board.

Amina Abakarova, a 40-year-old chess player from the Russian Republic of Dagestan, stands accused of trying to poison another female player during a chess tournament in Makhachkala. Surveillance footage from the Dagestan Classical Chess Championship shows the 40-year-old woman spreading a substance later identified as mercury on the chess board and pieces that would later be used by another player, Umayganat Osmanova. CCTV footage clearly shows Abakarova walking to the table where Osmanova was about to play and tampering with the chess board and pieces before casually walking away so as not to draw attention. Her actions would have probably gone unnoticed had Umayganat Osmanova not begun to experience symptoms like nausea and dizziness just 30 minutes later.

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Antonio “El Diablo” Riano, a fugitive wanted by US authorities for almost two decades in connection to a fatal shooting in Cincinnati, was recently found working as a police officer in Mexico.

In December of 2004, four days before Christmas, Antonion Riano got into an argument with a 25-year-old man at a bar in Cincinnati, Ohio. Their bickering continued outside the watering hole where surveillance cameras caught Riano pulling out a gun and then shooting the other man in the face, killing him. The man nicknamed “El Diablo” (Spanish for ‘The Devil’) then went on the run and managed to escape authorities despite a nationwide manhunt. Riano went to visit his sister in New Jersey before disappearing again, this time for almost 20 years. He remained on the US’ most wanted criminals list, but investigators stopped actively looking for him after a few years, until recently when one detective found El Diablo through social media.

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Coca-Cola is consumed all around the world, but nowhere is it more popular than in the Mexican state of Chiapas, where the average person drinks 821.2 liters of Coca-Cola per year, roughly 32 times the global average.

The people of Chiapas consume more Coca-Cola than any other people on the planet, about 2.2 liters of it per day, which makes it more popular than drinking water. Coca-Cola is sold and advertised virtually everywhere in the state, and it’s almost as cheap as water, Most people don’t consume it as a treat, but as a way of keeping themselves hydrated throughout the day, and many have no clue that they are addicted to it. The iconic soft drink has been present in Chiapas for over half a century and is so deeply ingrained in the local culture and even in its religious practice, that people can’t imagine their lives without it.

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A suspension bridge stretching 150 meters over the Dadong River Gorge in Chongqing, China, has been dubbed the world’s scariest suspension bridge because of how unsafe it looks.

For the past couple of years, clips of heavy construction vehicles traversing a narrow, flimsy-looking bridge suspended about 300 meters above a wide river gorge have constantly been going viral on social media leaving people wondering about its safety. Although it spans 240 meters, this terrifying wonder of engineering has no towers or base for support, relying only on four steel cables to support vehicles up to 45 tonnes in weight. It’s only wide enough for one vehicle to traverse, and despite featuring safety nets on each side, one wrong move can spell disaster. It’s tricky enough to navigate in normal conditions, but imagine having to do so on a particularly windy day.

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A Wuhan beauty clinic is being accused of tricking a mentally-challenged 19-year-old man into getting a boob job by claiming that he could then make money through live-streaming.

The 19-year-old young man, whose mother claims he has the mind of a 5-year-old boy, reportedly applied for a job at the unnamed beauty clinic, which provided “full board and a monthly salary of 3,000 yuan ($400)”. However, after asking about potential job opportunities for men, he was told that he should first undergo a breast enlargement surgery and then begin working after he recovered. The man’s mother surnamed Lu, recently unveiled chat archives between her son and beauty clinic staff in which he is assured that boob jobs are ok for men as well and that such procedures were very popular among live-streamers. Despite expressing doubt at first, the impressionable youth agreed to get the surgery and even pay for it.

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Made with 400 grams of solid gold and decorated with 152 sapphires, the Louis XIII Fleur de Parme is recognized as the world’s most expensive cigar lighter.

French luxury brand S.T. Dupont started working on the Louis XIII Fleur de Parme cigar lighter at the special request of Steven Hung, a Hong Kong billionaire with a passion for French history. The client had very specific requirements that made it obvious to Dupont that this project could only be carried out by a special designer with an intimate knowledge of French culture and history. Enter Princess Tania de Bourbon Parme, a direct descendant of Louis XIII, but also a renowned designer, who spent six months working with a team of 80 artisans to produce a unique art piece worthy of the title of ‘world’s most expensive cigar lighter’.

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40-year-old Yoshitaka has been happily married to 65-year-old Aki for over eleven years, despite only learning about the age gap between them on the day before their wedding.

Yoshitaka was only 29 when he met the love of his life. Aki was running a Japanese-style bar and after making some small talk, they realized they had very much in common. They had both gone through failed marriages and were raising children alone, and after visiting Aki’s bar a few times, Yoshitaka asked her out on a date. The Japanese man could tell she was a bit older than him, but he never guessed her real age and she didn’t reveal it either, fearing that it would just scare him away. She was 54 at the time, but told Yoshitaka that she was 44, and he never suspected anything. Aki was always cheerful and her smooth skin didn’t betray her age, so she was able to keep her secret for seven years, up until the day before their wedding.

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Fat-tailed sheep are a type of domestic sheep mainly found in arid areas and known for accumulating fat, mainly in the rear part of their bodies, which not only gives them a unique look but also helps them stay cool in extreme heat.

Native to the Middle East and North Africa, fat-tailed sheep have been around for thousands of years, but some people are still oblivious to their existence, mainly because of their geographical distribution. In the 5th century BC, the Greek historian Herodotus wrote about fat-tailed sheep and how shepherds made small wheeled carts to keep their animals’ droopy tails from touching the ground. Although there are several fat-tailed sheep breeds, most of them have broad fat-tails where large amounts of fat are accumulated in buttock-like deposits in the hind parts of a sheep, on both sides. Some of them end up looking like they had a Brazilian butt lift, which makes them really popular with breeders.

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A small shrine along the treacherous Gata Loops in India’s mountainous Ladakh region has become famous for the large number of plastic bottles left as offerings to a spirit known as the Ghost Of The Gata Loops.

Bicycle and motorcycle racers traversing the Gata Loops as part of their Trans-Himalaya tours are often confused by a large pile of plastic bottles around what looks like a makeshift shrine. Some confuse it for simple pollution, a consequence of the increase in popularity of the region with adventure tourism enthusiasts, but the explanation for this bizarre sight in the middle of nowhere is much more intriguing. Many of those who attempt to cross the Gata Loops leave water bottles at the shrine as offerings for the Ghost Of The Gata Loops, the wandering soul of a poor man who died here decades ago due to thirst and extreme cold. Some people believe that passing by without leaving a water bottle will upset the ghost and bring them bad luck on their arduous journey.

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A 38-year-old woman in China has been living in a nursing home for the elderly after becoming ill due to overwork and looking for a way to slow things down in her life.

Ms. Yang had been working as a screenwriter in the film and television industry for 11 years when the hectic schedule and extreme work volume started taking a toll on her health. Earlier this year, she became sick and needed to be hospitalized. Doctors told her that she needed to take it easy on herself or she would experience even more serious health problems, so the 38-year-old woman decided to find a way to slow things down. Both her parents had passed away and she had no other close family, so she started looking for a place where she could both relax and recuperate. While browsing the internet for answers, she read about a retirement home and about how calm and slow life was there, so she decided to try it for herself.

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