One of the wackiest competitions on Earth and also one of the funniest.

This year’s World’s Ugliest Dog competition was held at the Sonoma-Marin Fair in Petaluma. Twelve dogs battled for the title of world’s ugliest dog, and in the end only Gus came out on top. Winers are selected from two classes, the Pedigree class and the Mutt class. Gus won the Pedigrees class and went on to beat Reggie who had won the Mutt class. After winning the competition Gus had to meet the Ring of Champions which included winners from the previous year.

Gus is a Chinese Crested, suffering from skin cancer, he only has three legs (one was amputated due to the skin tumor) and one eye (he lost the other in a battle with a tomcat) and no hair. He was adopted by a Jeanenne Teed and her daughter Janey after they had heard he was being kept in a crate in somebody’s garage.

For winning the World’s Ugliest Dog Contest, Gus got $1,600 ,which the owners say will go to his radiation treatment.

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China’s water supplies threatened by blue-green algae outbreak.

Chaohu Lake is China‘s fifth fresh water source, providing fresh water to over 300,000 people and is now being invaded by blue-green algae. Scientists say that, in order to thrive, these algae need a constant temperatures of over 25 degrees Celsius, at least 3 days of direct of sunshine and a lot of nitrogen and phosphorus. And, once again, man is to blame for this natural disaster, because it supplied the lake with the chemicals the algae needed to multiply at an increasing rate. The local area became increasingly polluted after cities became industrialized. The heavy snowfalls that eventually melted and carried the nitrogen and phosphorus into the lake, didn’t help very much either.

So, for the last 4 months the Chinese authorities have been trying to keep the situation under control while locals get involved and try to fish the blue-green algae as they know best. After all their drinking water source is at stake.

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Oh my God, the Chinese have stolen Venice.

Well, not literally stolen, but they copied it on a smaller scale. I’m talking about the Venetian Macao in China, the world’s largest casino and the third largest building in the world. It has more than 1000 slot machines and over 600 gaming tables open 24/7. So it’s safe to say you’ll find a table to lose your money at.

The Venetian is a huge complex with the central building standing over 40 stories high and costing $1,8 billion to build. It also has a smaller replica of the famous, romantic city of Venice which proves once again that Asians love to copy western culture.

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Painful but efficient.

I have to say these Chinese have a rich imagination, the needle technique to force soldiers keep their chin up is taken out of some kind of fairytale and the cross stuck to their backs…must be really uncomfortable at first but I bet it pays of in the end. Sure some may comment on the morality of these methods but they only think about the goal, not the means. Plus they have the Olympics to think about, it seams they cannot afford any imperfections.

Still I’m glad I’m glad to be living in democracy!

Shilin is a wonderful place that you must visit if you ever have the chance…

Because as an old Chinese saying goes ” If you have visited Kunming without seeing the Stone Forest, you have wasted your time” and I couldn’t agree more. Shilin is an intricate krafts formation in the south-west of China, one of Yunnan province’s most popular tourist attraction. The tall rocks, that seem to be bursting out of the ground, reach heights of 30 meters and their numbers really create the illusion that you’re looking at a petrified forest.

There are many local legends inspired by this incredible place, but the most famous one says the gods created this huge stone labyrinth for lovers to get lost in and be together. Scientists say this 2,670 square kilometers area used to be a sea and when the waters pulled back some 270 million years ago, these formation emerged and the surrounding elements eroded.

Who knew huge limestone rocks could be so beautiful…

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You’ll go to Nirvana if you buy one!

Not really, but you’ll definitely feel a lot closer to enlightenment, if you’re into Buddhism. The Buddha Phone is a very cool cellular phone that turned up on the streets of Shenzhen, China and that’s fast becoming very popular throughout the country. Before you say “oh it’s Chinese crap” you should know that besides the impressive design and decorations (they say it’s 24 karat gold plated stainless steel), it also sports a micro SD slot and a touch-screen.

I’m not very familiar with Buddhism but I have to tell you I love The Buddha Phone!

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Remember SAM, the ugliest dog ever, if you ask me.

So he died like 3 years ago, so what something like that doesn’t really die that easily you know, this kind of creature is hard to forget. SAM held the title of World’s Ugliest Dog for 3 straight years (2003, 2004, 2005) and he was striped of it by his own mortality, dying due to heart complications, at the age of 15…My guess is he looked in the mirror by mistake, but that’s less important.

SAM was a purebred Chinese Crested Hairless, but don’t imagine all of this race looks like that, oh no, he was just special. Taken in by Susie Lockheed back in 1999, SAM became an internet star, sporting his very own page on Wikipedia and some screen appearances.

To me, SAM will forever be the ultimate ugliest mutt, I don’t have a picture of him in my room or anything like that…

No link to Pixar’s animation movies, but just as interesting.

The Real Toy Story is an elaborate work of art and a homage to Chinese workers, who produce most of the world’s cheap plastic toys. It all began when German photographer Michael Wolf thought to surprise his son on his birthday. He went to the local flee-market, bought 600 second-hand toys and glued them on every available surface of the boy’s room. Upon further examination of the toys, they observed that every single one was made in China. His son said “I thought Santa and his helpers make toys” and that’s when the idea hit him. He immediately set off on a 30-day journey across California, in his van, stopping at every market and collecting all the toys that had a face and were made in China.

He managed to gather 20,000 toys which he shipped to his studio in Hong Kong, where he then sanded-down their backs in order to attach magnets. He then visited some Chinese toy factories and took pictures of the workers. He covered his studio walls with metallic surfaces and stuck the toys to them, also embedding the photos he took.

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Yeah, I know, it’s not Marlboro, but it’s Chinese so it’s not that unusual.

By using this Chinese-made device you can fool people into thinking you’ve totally gone bananas and started talking on your cigarette pack. Although I’m sure it doesn’t have all the features of the latest mobile phones, but I know I’d love to have one,especially because it comes in a luxurious box, with a gold lighter and complementary cigarettes.Here are Marlbaro’s specs:

– 900/1800 GSM/GPRS
– 1.5 inch 260k color 178×220 display
– 1.3 mega pixel camera
– microSD support
– stereo speakers
– measures 92×50.5×13 mm
– weighs 98 grams

This is what a pair of cheap, Chinese flip-flops did to someone’s feet.

A young woman bought a pair of flip-flops from a Wall-mart store for $2.44 and after wearing them for a while, she sensed a tingling sensation in fer feet so she stopped wearing them. Soon her skin started turning red and, as you can see from the photos, it didn’t stop there.

She took up the mater with Wall-mart but they told her to take it up with the Chinese producer, but eventually stopped selling the product due to multiple complaints.

As you all know, Chinese are very serious when it comes to their historical legacy, their centuries old customs and traditions, so it comes as no surprise that even though it’s rapidly becoming one of the most industrialized nations in the world they still honor their forefathers by performing ancient ceremonies.

Avery good example is this Cin dynasty traditional ceremony, performed in the city of Hangzhou. Progress is great but history is fascinating.