British love their minced meat pies so much, they actually invented a contest to see who can eat the most pies in ten minutes time. Kind of like the American hot-dog eating contest, only these minced meat-filled delicacies are a lot harder to gobble-down.

This year The Big Eat took place on November 18, at Wookey Hole and it featured only British contestants. This after in 2007 American Sonya Thomas crossed the ocean to rob the Brits of their pie-eating title. She managed to eat 48 pies with the runner-up managing to swallow 15. This year the organizers wanted to have an English winner so only natives could register.

Denzil Gunner claimed the top prize this year with 41 pies. He got $1000 and a trip to the USA to participate in their various eating contests and, hopefully, humiliate them on their own soil.

An unusual restaurant recently opened in Riga, the capital city of Latvia. It’s themed as a hospital, with waiters and bartenders dressed as nurses and doctors. The tables look just like hospital operating tables, made out of stainless steel with wheel chairs or dentist chairs to sit in. The usual forks and knives have been replaced with scalpels, syringes and other medical tools, while the drinks are served in vials and medical bottles. Even the bathrooms have that crepy hospital feel.

Red crosses are everywhere and that’s the last place I’d want to grab a bite, but apparently the Hospital Restaurant is becoming really popular.

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Although getting up-close and personal with a crocodile isn’t anyone’s idea of a good time, the recently opened Crocosaurus Cove theme park, in Darwin, Australia has introduced this situation as a breathtaking attraction.

For about $80 anyone can be lowered in Choppa‘s underwater lair, in a reinforced acrylic cage for a 15 minute heart-thumping experience. Choppa is an aggressive saltwater crocodile rescued from a crocodile farm where he got into conflicts with other crocodiles. If Crocosaurus Cove hadn’t taken him in he would have been shot.

Animal activists criticized the new attraction saying it was taunting the crocodile and intruding in his environment but the staff says the animal has been given a home and is treated like a king, a much better alternative than death.

So if you’re ever in Darwin and looking for a unique thrill, head over to Crocosaurus Cove and meet Choppa. You can get the same adrenalin rush at the Crocodile Wildlife Ranch, in South Africa

Known as Dia de los Muertos in Mexico and the Mexican-populated areas of the US, this holiday dates back to the times of the Aztecs, when they celebrated Mictecacihuatl (The Lady of the Dead).  The celebration of Day of the Dead focuses on remembering and honoring friends and relatives that have died.

Dia de los Muertos is celebrated every year on November 1st and 2nd, during which time it is believed the spirits of the dead return to visit the living. People buy toys and traditional sweets for the dead children and different alcoholic drinks for the deceased adults. They build shrines on the tombs and plce the trets there so the dead can consume the spirit of the foods. Even though they are eventually consumed by the living, the foods are believed to have no nutritional value.

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China hosted the annual Acrobatic Art Festival in Wuhan, this year. The location changes every year but the exhibition is just as breathtaking every time, no matter where it’s held. The event took place in a stationary circus in Wuhan and attracted more than 2,000 spectators that were simply mesmerized by the 30 acrobatic numbers performed by artists from all around the world.

The Acrobatic Art Festival included acrobatics, animal tricks and clownery.

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Inspired by La Tomatina Festival in Bunol, Spain, about 10,000 people of Dongguan, southern Guangdong province, China, organized their own tomato fight on October 19. Over 15 tons of tomatoes were used in this over-sized food fight and this led to a huge controversy both online and in the national media. People were baffled when they saw so much good food go to waste for a few hours of entertainent, in a country where some people are still starving.

That’s a good point if you ask me, why wate food when you can’t afford to eat?

Manuel Uribe, the World’s Heaviest man Record holder, according to Guinness Book of Records, tied the not with his beloved Claudia Solis. despite losing 550lbs out of the 1,230 he weighed back in 2006 when he got his title, Uribe was not able to leave the bed he has been confined to for the past years. The bed was decorated in white and loaded on the back of a truck and carried to the place where the ceremony took place.

More than 400 people and multiple camera crews enjoyed the wedding party, but Uribe stuck to his diet and resisted tasting the five-tier cake prepared for the event. Manuel Uribe announced earlier this year that his goal is to stand up at the altar for his wedding on October 26, but unfortunately he wasn’t able to. During the couple’s first dance Claudia held Manuel’s hand while she swayed to the music.

Manuel Uribe plans to reach the weight of 220 pounds in the next few years. Good luck!

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Hundreds of clowns from all over Central America, USA and Mexico gathered in Mexico City for the 13th Annual Clown Convention. Lasting through the week that ends on October 23, the convention has workshops and gatherings to help the clowns share their secrets and prove their talents to the audience.

Those lucky enough to be in Mexico City during the Clown Convention will be able to shop for outrageous clothing, wacky clown shoes, clown makeup and funny wigs.

Clowns are a very important and respected part of Mexico‘s culture, with many of them standing at street corners, entertainig passers-by and earning some honest pesos. there are over 10,000 registered clowns in Mexico, 3,000 of them are women.

A Chinese balance-beam artist attempted a new world record for balancing on a wire 700 meters into the air with no safety measures. Unfortunately things didn’t go exactly as planned and one false step almost ended his career and his life. Fortunately he was quick enough to grab on to the wire he was balancing on.

Though he couldn’t control his emotions and started acting all hysterical, he managed to hold-on until the cavalry showed up and got him down safely. I bet he won’t be trying to break any records in the near future.

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A true wedding marathon took place last week in the small Republic of Artsakh, internationally known as Nagorno-Karabakh. The fact that they are living in a territory disputed between Azerbaijan and Armenia, didn’t stop the inhabitants of this country to prove their  independence by organizing a wedding marathon.

700 pairs united their destinies in a ceremony that will go down in the record books as one of the biggest mass-weddings in history.

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It’s official, animals are talented painters, if the painting elephants weren’t proof enough, now Cholla, a painting horse shows his skill.

A  mustang-quarter horse with incredible painting talent, Cholla‘s works have recently been accepted into an art exhibition that will take place in Montigliano Veneto, Italy. He will be competing against 1,770 renowned artists from all over the world, and we’re talking humans, so yes, this horse has enough talent to match up to human artists. He won’t be able to claim the cash prizes if he wins but he will get a special mention.

Cholla‘s career began when his owner, Renee Chambers, bought some water colors, mixed them up, glued a piece of paper to a fence, and handed him the brush. Cholla grabbed it, started stroking and he never stopped, in fact he got better and better and now he’s a star in the USA. In case you were wondering, Cholla made the transition from the fence to the easel without hesitation, like a true artist.

The organizers of the Italian art exhibition said they were stunned when they found out the artist of the artworks they accepted was of the equine species but respected his talent even more.

Photos courtesy of Renee Chambers

21-year-old Brad Sciullo of Uniontown is the first person to ever finish eating the monster-burger known as the Beer Barrel Belly Bruiser. The burger itself weighed 15 pounds but with all the toppings (lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, onions, mild banana peppers, mayonnaise, ketchup, mustard and relish)  and the buns, it reached 20,2 pounds. Sure any man could gobble down a delicacy like this but hardly anyone could do it in 5 hours.

Brad Sciullo managed to do it, but it wasn’t easy, as he himself admits: “About three hours into it, things got tough,”and everyone can understand why. But he pushed himself to the edge and manage to finish the whole burger and won a $400 prize, 3 t-shirts, a certificate and “a burger hangover” as the owner od Denny’s Beer Barrel Pub, where the event took place.

Asked why on Earth he decided to eat the giant burger, Sciullo said “I wanted to see if I could.”

After 499-kg-heavy Jose Luis Garza died last week and countryman Manuel Uribe, who weighed 558 kg, lost 230kg and is still cutting down the pounds every day, Emanuel Yabrauh has become the new world’s fattest athlete. Yabrauh is also the world’s biggest and heaviest sumo wrestler, weighing almost 400 kg.
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There have been many cases in which animals took in cubs that didn’t belong to them, or even their species, like this adorable little pig. But I’ve never seen a monkey taking so well to a couple of tiger cubs before.

After Hurricane Hannah ravaged the state of South Carolina, the tigers of one of the zoos started acting very aggressive and were considered a danger to their young. So these two white tiger cubs were separated from their mother and adopted by a 2-year-old chimpanzee. As you can see from the photos he’s really taking parenting seriously. I wonderhow their relationship will evolve…

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A few months ago I wrote a post about the world’s tallest tower near Legoland Windsor, in England, but now it is forced to hand over the title to the new LEGO Tower in Vienna.

Built by hundreds of children near Vienna‘s city-hall, the new world’s tallest LEGO tower ended up being 29,48 meters tall, beating the previous tower of “only” 29,03 meters. The LEGO tower in Vienna was built using a crane and several support wires that secured it against strong winds. After the record was certified by an official judge from The Guinness Book of Records, the LEGO Tower was dismantled.

The Tower of Vienna was created to celebrate the festival “100 Years of Friends of Children“.

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