A 29-year-old man from Guangzhou, China experienced sudden paralysis of all four limbs after spending two consecutive days playing on his mobile phone. The man reportedly spent a lot of his time looking down at his handheld, but this latest gaming marathon was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Late last month, the yet unidentified gamer spent two consecutive days trying to advance as much as possible in the mobile video game he was so passionate about. In the early hours of the third day, he felt a sudden pain and stiffness in his neck. Within moments all four of his limbs went numb, and he found himself paralyzed. His family rushed him to the emergency department of Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hospital, where, after an MRI and other tests, Shen Huiyong, the orthopedic specialist, diagnosed him with cervical spondylosis hematoma. That meant that his paralysis was caused by blood clots in his cervical spinal tube pressing against his spinal cord.

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Humans have been riding horses for thousands of years, but one Ukrainian strongman proves that horses can sometimes ride us too. Champion powerlifter Dmytro Khaladzhi has been making quite a name for himself by carrying live, fully conscious horses on his back to prove his incredible strength.

Like most strongmen, Dmytro Khaladzhi does a lot of crazy stuff, like letting trucks drive over him, bending steel rods with his teeth, or driving nails through wood with the palm of his hand, but his horse carrying routines are by far the most impressive. Several videos doing the rounds online show him grabbing full-grown horses, lifting them on his back and taking a few steps with the incredible load, all while the confused animals enjoy the ride.

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We’ve all got our physical flaws and learn to live with them. Well, some don’t, but that’s what plastic surgery is for. There is one person in Zimbabwe who not only relishes his ugliness but also get awards for it. William Masvinu from Epworth has been crowned Zimbabwe’s Mr Ugly 2017 and couldn’t be prouder! It’s his fourth title, and he’s fully convinced his claim is undisputed.

William was happy with the “recognition” in general but especially pleased to wrest back the title he lost to another contestant last year. Winning ugly contests apparently requires preparation, just as beauty pageants, and the 43-year-old unemployed man will now be prepping to wow the world in the Mr Ugly World competition set to take place next year in South Africa.

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During the holiday season, the Nishi Tokyo Bus Company operates a rescue bus called the ‘Nesugoshi Kyusai’ bus (overslept rescue bus)  to pick up inebriated passengers who fell asleep and miss their stop. It meets passengers at the final station and delivers them back to their regular stop for the relatively small fee – when compared to a hotel room – of 880 yen (7.85 USD).

The rescue bus was the idea of a Nishi Tokyo Bus driver who pitched it to the company four years ago and they have been offering the service ever since. During the 2016 holiday season alone 75 passengers utilized the rescue bus, including 32 on the busiest night. This year, the rescue bus will operate every Friday evening throughout the month of December, as that is when the majority of company end-of-the-year drinking parties (called “bonenkai” in Japanese) take place.

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An Indian driver has received the Manush Sanman award for not honking once in the past 18 years. It may seem a strange award, but India is well known for the chaos of its roads, and the typical driver’s almost constant use of the car horn. Dipak Das, a Kolkata-based driver, believes that India can change this and eventually achieve peaceful, quiet roads.

Honking is a huge part of the driving experience in India, as people pretty much use them as an alternative to side mirrors. Some cars don’t even have side mirrors, while others have them folded, as to extend them outward could lead to collisions with other vehicles. Instead, Indian motorists honk incessantly to avoid collisions on the road where traffic is chaotic and so dense that cars appear just about to bump into each other at all times. Drivers honk to indicate that they’re about to make a pass or to indicate that another driver is too close. This creates unbearable noise pollution that many consider hugely detrimental to Indian society.

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It’s the stuff fairy tales are made off: parents are parted from their child, years or decades pass, and then chance or fate reunites them. This, however, is no fairy tale but a very real one and involves a Chinese couple and the daughter they had to give up to ensure her survival. And as it happens in real life, things don’t always go smoothly. Qian Fenxiang and her husband Xu Lida finally met their daughter Jingzhi, 22 years after they left her as a newborn baby in a vegetable market. The girl was adopted by an American family and grew up as Catherine Su Pohler, or Kati for short.

The Kodak moment reunion was made possible by the note Qian left with her baby girl. Kati’s adoptive parents, Ken and Ruth Pohler of Hudsonville, Michigan, were deeply moved by the contents and decided they would tell the girl one day if she wanted to know. When the day of the revelation came in 2016, Kati was 21 and a college student. It took another year before she got to meet her birth parents on the famed Broken Bridge in Hangzhou.

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A 22-year-old woman from Hong Kong has undergone over 30 plastic surgery procedures in a bid to impress her boyfriend. Berry Ng began getting the procedures when she was only 17, as she wanted to look more like western supermodels. She now regrets her decisions.

Berry NG claims that her plastic surgery addiction began when she saw a beauty center offering affordable student packages that cost HKD 799 (102 USD) for three injections. However, over the course of a few hours, the beautician persuaded her to go for a more expensive package costing HKD 17,000 (2175 USD). Berry was so pleased with the results that she began to seek more treatments and soon found herself addicted to cosmetic surgery. However, things got even worse when she was 20 years old and entered into a romantic relationship with a man nine years her senior.

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Consider yourself a person of bold fashion choices AND have 210 pounds ($280) to spare? In that case, the tube scarf created by Bulgarian knitwear designer label Dukyana could be just the winter pick for you. Beware, though: this piece of woolen clothing has no arm holes and is really a beige mohair tube that covers the entire body from the neck down, folding over the shoulders. Lots of people have lots to say about this product, some declaring that it resembles a giant sock.

Dukyana is the trade name chosen by a Bulgarian woman called Milena Bunalova, who offers the clothes knitted by herself and her five-member team through third-party retailers and her own website. According to the label, the tube scarf (or sock dress or however you choose to describe it) is a fashion statement. Dukyana hopes the creation will become a hit this winter and sees it as an excellent solution for ladies who favor long walks out in the chilly air. The label also says that the fashion article does not stretch and hugs a woman’s body tightly.

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An interesting vacancy has just opened up in the Philippines: the country no longer has a “Cobra King” after the person holding that title has died. The irony is that Elies ‘Peter’ Lenturio, also known as the Philippine snake whisperer, met his end through an act of revenge on his pet cobra: he was bitten by the snake and retaliated by cutting its head off and drinking its blood.

It seems that Elies’s mistake was ingesting the blood. Cobras are extremely poisonous snakes and people in general would be terror-struck if bitten, not to mention dead without immediate treatment. However, the Cobra King had gotten numerous snake bites over the years and knew how to treat himself. He would not go to the hospital that day, choosing to have a few drinks instead and then head home to sleep it off. It turned out to be his last night on earth: he started foaming at the mouth and going rigid, much to the surprise of his family. Elies was rushed to hospital, but he was pronounced dead on arrival.

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What was supposed to be a bit of fun turned into a crying game for Arran Maye, a 28-year-old plumber from Leicester. While vacationing with 20 friends in the Spanish city of Benidorm, the Briton invested 9 pounds ($12) in a henna tattoo that left him sporting a handlebar mustache and a chin beard. The idea was to get into the spirit of Benidorm Fiesta, a local fancy dress festival, but things went from bad to worse when Arran experienced an intense allergic reaction to the henna ink, which may leave him with permanent scars.

Adam Lewis, another member of the British partying bunch, got the same tattoos as Arran, but while his tattoos faded within a few days, Arran’s were much more problematic. On top of the excruciating pain he experienced, his face ballooned and started oozing puss. It tuned out that the henna used on Arran was an illegal variety called black henna, which contains the chemical PPD. It caused a severe allergic reaction and ultimately landed him in intensive care, with one of the consequences being potentially permanent scars in the shape of a handlebar mustache and a small beard.

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We all have our phobias. Some people run for their lives at the sight of insects or reptiles, others hate tight spaces like elevators, or stepping on the roof of a tall building. And while most people can live perfectly normal lives despite their phobias, there are also those who let the fear dominate their lives. A case in point is a doomsday-fearing octogenarian in the U.S. state of Utah, who dedicated more than three decades of his life to building bunkers and cabins on state and Government land and stuffing them with provisions and weapons.

The Iron County Sheriff’s Office, which is investigating the case along with the FBI and other law enforcement bodies, has so far declined to identify the man, revealing only that he resides in the town of Parowan. According to official information released so far, the man acted out of fear that the world might end or that society as we know it might somehow collapse. The structures he built are located in a forest bordering the ski town of Brian Head.

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German architect Marc Wübbenhorst has to drink at least 20 liters of water a day or risk dying from dehydration. The 35-year-old suffers from the rare metabolic disease Diabetes insipidus, which causes intense thirst and the frequent excretion of large amounts of diluted urine. If Wübbenhorst stops drinking water, his body starts to dry out, and he can die of thirst in a matter of hours.

Constant thirst has been a part of Marc Wübbenhorst’s life for as long as he can remember. It’s nothing like the thirst a normal person experiences, because it doesn’t go away after drinking a glass or two of water. His body can’t hold any water, as his kidneys eliminate the fluids almost as fast as he ingests them. Marc can never ignore his thirst for more than an hour, because he starts to experience severe symptoms of dehydration, like cracked lips, dizziness and confusion. These are symptoms that most adults experience after two or three days of fluids deprivation.

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A 70-year-old widowed grandmother from Devon, England, was left homeless after thieves stole her 40-foot, £30,000 static caravan by lifting it from its base, putting it on a low loader trailer and just driving off with it.  They broke into the yard s.

The victim, Sonia McColl, believes that the unusual theft is somehow connected to her activity as the founder of the Park Home Owners Justice Campaign. She had been tirelessly campaigning to protect homeowner rights, an effort that didn’t sit very well with  unscrupulous mobile home site owners. McColl told reporters that she was in the process of moving from Dorset to Devon after suffering multiple death threats for her campaigning. She had recently bought a static caravan in Willand, near Cullompton, but never imagined it could get stolen. She now has nothing left but the curtains that she had intended to fit in her new home. The static caravan was unfortunately not insured, leaving McColl penniless.

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Ever heard of Russia’s healing pyramids? They are the work of Dr. Alexander Golod, a Ukrainian scientist who claims that they have the power to prevent diseases, enhance the potency of medicines, cure impotence and even control the weather.

Dr. Golod, a Moscow-based scientist and defense engineer, began building his mysterious pyramids in 1990. By 2001 he had completed 17 of them in various parts of Russia and the Ukraine. By 2010 that number had increased to over 50 pyramids worldwide, with the majority in Russia and the Ukraine. Each pyramid has an internal framework of PVC pipes that are then covered with sheets of fiberglass to form smooth faces. They were designed to fit the Golden Section phi ratio of 1 to 1.618, a standard ratio found in nature that can be used to create beautiful, natural looking compositions. This proportion makes the structures steeper than the Egyptian pyramids, with a slope of about 70 degrees. The top is nearly twice as high, relative to the perimeter of its base, making Golod’s pyramids look more like church steeples or obelisks.

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A Russian woman has left her husband after she recognized the view from her bedroom window in a photo on another woman’s Instagram account and realized that he was cheating on her.

Yulia Agranovych, a former model turned pediatric dentist, from St. Petersburg, was browsing through her Instagram feed one morning, when she noticed a familiar sight in a photo posted by a certain Vlada Abramovich. It was the same view she admired daily from her bedroom window, so she continued looking through other woman’s gallery and discovered several images of her husband, Nazar Grynko. Yulia decided to confront him about the photos.

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