A new water fountain in the Austrian city of Vienna has been described as the ugliest in Europe, possibly the world, despite costing 1.8 million euros ($2 million).

Created by the avantgarde Viennese art group Gelitin, the Austrian capital’s newest water fountain was commissioned by local authorities to commemorate 150 years of Vienna’s modern water system which provided the city with fresh water from streams in the green forests of the Alps and helped eradicate plagues like cholera. The new landmark’s design apparently symbolizes the “communal responsibility for water” and while it did win over the jury that selected Gelitin as the winner, it hasn’t done so well with the general public, especially considering its astronomical price, $2 million.

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An Italian man who was serving 30 years in prison for murdering his girlfriend was recently released from prison because judges ruled that prison food didn’t allow him to go on a diet behind bars.

In 2017, Dimitri Fricano was arrested for killing his girlfriend, Erika, during a heated argument, while they were vacationing in Sardinia. He originally told police that robbers had attacked and killed his partner, but as investigators found more and more holes in his story, he eventually admitted that he had been the one to stab her 57 times. Apparently, she had scolded him for leaving too many crumbs on the bed when eating, and he became so angry that he couldn’t control himself. Two years later, he was put on trial for murder, but he only got convicted to 30 years behind bars in 2022, due to pandemic-related delays, before being released this month for being dangerously obese and not being able to lose weight.

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An Indian man who has been separated from his wife for nearly 40 years and has been trying to divorce her for 27 years, had his request for divorce dismissed by the Supreme Court earlier this month.

It’s no secret that divorce is a taboo subject in India, a country where the legal annulment of marriage is usually only obtained in cases of clear proof of violence or cruelty by one of the spouses. Family and social pressure often force people to remain engaged in unhappy marriages, but even when one of them demands a divorce, it is rarely granted by the courts. These irrefutable facts were recently confirmed once again in a court case that made international news headlines. An 89-year-old retired Air Force Officer and qualified doctor who had been trying to divorce his 82-year-old wife, a retired teacher, for almost three decades, has once again been denied by India’s Supreme Court, despite agreeing that their marriage was ‘beyond salvation’.

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A school in the Russian town of Bolshoy Kamen has attracted a lot of criticism both from students and their parents after installing a camera surveillance system inside the girls’ toilet.

Many people view toilets as one of the few remaining places to enjoy privacy outside their homes, and even in the busiest of places. But if you are a girl studying at School no. 1 in Bolshoy Kamen, Russia, you can no longer enjoy privacy inside the toilet because of a three-camera surveillance system that feeds live footage straight to the security guard’s booth. Granted, the cameras don’t offer a view inside the toilet booths, but simply knowing that someone might be watching your every move in what is supposed to be the most private space in the school is disturbing, according to many students and their parents.

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Lazy tourists visiting scenic mountain spots in China’s Zhejiang Province can now skip mountain hiking altogether and ride giant escalators hundreds of meters long to reach the best view spots.

Tour operators in China’s Zhejiang Province have installed massive escalators on mountains to help tourists gain access to the best views with virtually no effort. Scenic scots that were once only accessible by hiking on precarious trails are now available to anyone willing to ride one of these escalators for a few seconds, minutes at most. For example, Tanyu Mountain, in Zhejiang’s Chun’an county, has an altitude of only 350 meters, but due to the precarious relief, tourists have to walk three mountains around the mountain in order to reach the summit, making it inaccessible to the elderly and young children. But thanks, to the new escalator, anyone can now reach the top of Tanyu Mountain with virtually no effort.

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A 53-year-old Russian woman sparked outrage in her home republic of Tatarstan by tying the knot with a 22-year-old man whom she had raised for the last eight years.

Aisylu Chizhevskaya-Mingalim, a well-known musician in Tatarstan and the niece of famous singer Renata Ibragimov, found herself at the center of a massive scandal after reportedly marrying her adopted son. Eight years ago, while teaching music in the orphanages of Kazan, Aisylu met Daniil, a 13-year-old boy who shared her passion for music, and after a few lessons, the two became a duet. The boy also participated in various reality talent shows, such as the “You’re Super!” project, and sang with popular Russian singer Filip Kirkorov. When he was 14, Daniil became the singer’s foster child, and they have lived together ever since. However, on October 20, the two shocked the world when they legally became married.

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A popular restaurant in Tokyo, Japan, sparked controversy for claiming to dip its delicious pork skewers in a sauce jar that has not been cleaned in over half a century.

Abe-chan, a famous pork skewer eatery in Tokyo’s Azabu Juban shopping district, was recently featured on a popular Japanese television show where it was revealed that one of the secrets to its success was a rather dubious-looking jar covered in a gelatinous mass. Apparently, this was the same sauce jar that pork skewers have been dipped in for the last sixty years, and the dark brown mass around the jar is the sauce that spilled over and hardened over the decades. According to the third-generation owner of Abe-chan, the jar has never been cleaned in the last six decades, which apparently contributes to the rich taste of the sauce.

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A 27-year-old Brazilian woman tragically lost her life after experiencing poisoning symbols associated with a chocolate candy allegedly received from a gypsy woman who had allegedly predicted her early death.

Fernanda Silva Valoz da Cruz Pinto fell ill on August 3rd, experiencing severe stomach pains, vomiting, nosebleeds, and excessive salivation. She was rushed to Santa Casa de Misericórdia Hospital, but there was nothing doctors could do, and she died in the early hours of the following day. According to initial information provided by her family, Fernanda had told them that she had received a chocolate candy from a supposed gypsy fortune teller in the center of Maceió City who had also predicted that she would die very soon. She ate the candy that very same day, then fell ill and started experiencing poisoning symptoms.

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Japanese couple Hiromi and Hidekazu Takeda have been married for many years and even have a child together, but they live an hour apart from each other and have never shared a home.

‘Separation marriages’, aka weekend marriages or living apart together (LAT), have reportedly become very popular in Japan, because they allow couples to experience the best of both worlds- on one hand, they enjoy each other’s love and support, but they also get to maintain an individual lifestyle without worrying about their partner. Basically, a separation marriage allows couples to experience the combined benefits of being married and being single, but it is important that the relationship be based on mutual love and respect.

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21-year-old Brooke Bruk-Jackson was crowned Miss Universe Zimbabwe, which means she will represent the African nation at the next Miss Universe pageant.

Held for the first time in 22 years this past week, the Miss Universe Zimbabwe beauty contest sparked racial controversy in the African country, with many claiming that the winner is not an accurate representation of Zimbabwe’s general population. Born and raised in Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital city, Brooke Bruk-Jackson is also white, which for many is apparently a problem. Her crowning as Miss Universe Zimbabwe ignited a fiery debate on social media, with vocal critics arguing that her title is tainted by racial bias, and that she only won because she is white.

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Danish artist Jens Haaning has been ordered to repay the Kunsten Museum in Aalborg 532,000 kroner ($76,000) after handing in two blank canvases as artworks in a project he named ‘Take the Money and Run’.

In 2021, Jens Haaning, a Danish conceptual artist whose work focuses on power and inequality, was commissioned by the Kunsten Museum of Modern Art in Aalborg to recreate two of his earlier artworks for which he had used a bunch of banknotes to represent the average income in Denmark and Austria. The artist agreed and the museum provided about 532,000 kroner ($76,000) for him to recreate the art pieces, including a fee of 40,000 kroner. Only when the museum staff unpacked the two artworks from Haaning, they found two blank canvases titled ‘Take the Money and Run’.

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11,000 runners out of the 30,000 participants at last month’s Mexico City Marathon have been disqualified by organizers for cheating by cutting out sections of the 26.2-mile course.

Marathon cheating is not exactly unheard of. In fact, it occurs at almost every major event, and offenders include some of the world’s most acclaimed athletes, like Australian ultramarathon runner Joasia Zakrzewski, who was accused of using a car during a race, or Kelly Agnew, who allegedly hid in portable toilets to avoid running several race laps. However, this year’s Mexico City Marathon may have set a new record for the highest number of disqualifications due to suspected cheating. A whopping 11,000 runners, more than 1 out of 3 participants, were disqualified for using various means of transportation to cut out sections of the race.

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Text with Jesus is a new instant messaging application powered by ChatGPT that allows users to chat with Jesus Christ and other biblical figures impersonated by the popular artificial intelligence program.

Created by Cat Loaf Software, an app-development company in Los Angeles, the new messaging program features a plethora of biblical characters, from Jesus to Judas and the rest of the apostles, and even First Testament protagonists like Ruth, Job, and Abraham’s nephew, Lot. And, if your dark side ever takes over, there is even an option to chat with Satan. The app was launched recently and has been getting mixed feedback online. Reactions have varied from amusement to accusations of blasphemy and heresy, which is really not that surprising considering the sensitive topic. For some people, religion is the most sacred thing in their lives, so they don’t take lightly anything they consider offensive.

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The removal of two prominent Chinese female track runners from the IAAF world rankings has reignited the debate surrounding their gender following previous accusations that they were actually men.

Liao Mengxue and Tong Zenghuan first made international news headlines during the 2019 National Athletics Championships, when they won the 4x400m relay race as part of a team representing Hunan Province. However, people didn’t focus on their athletic prowess as much as on their appearance. People didn’t think they looked feminine enough and accused them of being men posing as women to gain an unfair advantage in women’s athletic competitions. Some claimed they had Adam’s apples or that they had too much ‘junk’ in the groin area to be women, but the controversy eventually died out. Until recently anyway, because now the debate has been reignited by Liao and Tong’s exclusion from the new IAAF (International Association of Athletic Federations) world rankings.

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An Atlanta man who lost his house after the city tore it down by mistake is now facing a lawsuit to have the entire property foreclosed unless he pays the $68,000 demolition costs.

Everett Tripodis’ property in Atlanta’s historic West End is now an empty lot, but until a few months ago he actually owned a home there, one that the city demolished without so much as a warning. Technically, they did send out letters notifying the owner that the property had been labeled unfit for habitation, but they sent them to the wrong address, in a different zip code, about 1.4 miles away. Tripodis and his mother had bought the century-old house as an investment and had been working on remodeling it when the city decided to tear it down. To make matters worse, the city of Atlanta is now suing the owner of the property and threatening to foreclose on the empty land unless he covers the cost of the demolition, $68,000.

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