A 24-year-old Chinese man who visited a hospital to complain about sharp pain in his right ear was shocked to learn that he had an entire family of cockroaches living in his ear canal.

Identified only as “Mr. Lv”, the young man arrived at Sanhe Hospital, in Guangdong Province, southeast China, last month, complaining of sharp pain in his right ear, and a sensation like something was crawling and scratching in his ear. Dr. Zhong Yijin, an ear, nose and throat (ENT) specialist at the hospital examined the man’s ear canal and was shocked to see a full-grown German cockroach and over 10 of its offspring running around.

Read More »

If you’re keen on trying the blackest coffee around, you may want to give the Matte Black Latte at Round K cafe in New Your City a Try. As the owner of the place puts it, “it’s black like my soul”.

When people say they want their coffee black, they usually mean they want it with no cream or sugar, but Round K owner, Ockhyeon Byeon, wanted to give it a more literal meaning. To him, black coffee was just a dark brown, so he started thinking of ways to make the popular drink actually black. At first, he used different types of activated charcoal, which we’ve seen used in many other goth treats, like pitch black fish and chips, or jet black cheddar cheese, but then he settled on coconut ash, which not only gave the product its dark color, but a nutty flavor as well.

Read More »

66-year-old Benjamin Schreiber is very much alive, but hasn’t stopped him from using his death as a way of explaining that he actually served his life sentence for murder.

When Shreiber collapsed in his prison cell in 2015, doctors had to resuscitate him five times, which technically means that he died for a brief period of time before being brought to life. Three years later, the convicted murderer filed for post-conviction relief, claiming that he was being held in prison illegally. He figured that because he had briefly died in 2015, he had technically served his life sentence and should be a free man. His sentence was supposed to end when he died, right? the fact that he had been resurrected didn’t matter.

Read More »

Government office workers in the Indian city of Banda, Uttar Pradesh state, recently drew a lot of attention online for wearing motorcycle helmets indoors to prevent head injuries in case the roof collapsed on them.

Photos of electricity department employees working at their office in Banda while wearing these large motorcycle helmets on their heads have been doing the round on social media ever since Indian news agency ANI shared them online. According to several sources, the government employees aren’t huge motorcycle fans, they’re just wearing the protective head gear in case the roof of the dilapidated building they work in starts to fall apart. They told reporters that they first reported the dangerous state of the office building several years ago, but no one did anything about it, so they decided to start wearing helmets.

Read More »

Onion hardly seems like the best vegetable to base a soft drink on, but Onionade doesn’t contain the kind of onion you’re used to, but a new type that not only doesn’t make you cry when you chop it, but it unusually sweet as well.

Back in 2016 we reported on one of the most interesting inventions to come out of Japan in the past few years – a tear-free onion named “Smile Ball”. Developed over a period of 14 years by scientists at House Foods Group, Smile Ball onions release almost no tear-inducing compounds when chopped or eaten raw, and have a much sweeter taste than regular onions. Available in Japanese grocery stores for the past two years, Smile Balls have been marketed mainly as tear-free alternatives to the common onion, but now its producers want to promote the vegetable’s sweetness and pleasant flavor as well. And what better way to do that than by producing an onion-based drink called Onionade?

Read More »

Wuxia (martial arts and chivalry) novels and films are very popular in China, but while most people are content just reading or watching the exploits of fictional heroes, some go to extremes in order to experience these adventures themselves.

Jin Yong is considered one of the greatest and most popular wuxia writers in history, and his novels have enjoyed massive success among both Chinese communities around the world and have been translated in several foreign languages. His works have inspired dozens of martial arts movies and TV series, and if news reports in Chinese media are to be believed, they’ve even pushed some die-hard fans to live their lives behind, venture into the mountains, and train like Yong’s fictional characters.

Read More »

A team of researchers from the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Nanjing University recently unveiled an innovative display that is thin and flexible enough to be worn on skin, like a type of temporary tattoo.

Having to check a stopwatch to see your time while running, or looking at your smartphone screen to see who is calling may soon be things of the past thanks to a new and revolutionary human-machine interface that allows information to be displayed directly on human skin. Called alternating-current electroluminescent (ACEL) display, this new invention consists of an electroluminescent layer made of light-emitting microparticles sandwiched between two flexible silver nanowire electrodes. The ceramic nanoparticles embedded in stretchable polymer make this ACEL display brighter than any other, allowing it be clearly visible even in a well-lit room.

Read More »

A North Carolina woman who got a power washer for her birthday is using it to turn her concrete driveway into a canvas for ephemeral art, and draw a lot of attention online in the process.

Dianna Wood, a retired office worker from Burlington, North Carolina, had been wanting her own power washer ever since she used one to help one of her friend’s mother to get her hose ready for sale. She loved it so much that when her birthday came around, her husband knew exactly what to get her as a present. For over a month, she used it clan the patio, the dirty shutters, the fence around her home, and even the garbage cans. It was great, but by the time she got started on her concrete driveway, Dianna was already looking for way to spice things up. So instead of just cleaning the concrete, she decided to use the power washer to exercise her artistic talents.

Read More »

A 36-year-old mother got so worked up because her son couldn’t understand how to solve a math problem while doing homework that she suffered a heart attack.

Parenting in general can get pretty tough, and I can attest that trying to explain math to a child can be frustrating, but according to a recent news report from China is can be literally life-threatening. A 36-year-old mother, surnamed Wang, had to be rushed to the hospital on November 1st after suffering a heart-attack while doing homework with her 9-year-old son. She was apparently explaining a math problem to him and got so frustrated that he didn’t get it that her heart gave out.

Read More »

A popular seafood restaurant in Singapore has been criticized online for its “cruel” claw machine which gave patrons the chance to catch a live crab for $5 a token.

The chief executive of House of Seafood has had to issue a public apology after a viral video showing people using a pink claw machine to catch live crabs drew a lot of criticism both from the general public and Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA). In a statement posted on Facebook, Francis Ng claimed that the live claw machine was actually meant to educate children about marine life, while critics of the controversial attraction said that it caused unnecessary harm to the crustaceans and encouraged people to see the live creatures as thing to be won in a game. As a result of the backlash the claw machine attracted, House of Seafood decided to temporarily close the machines at all of its locations.

Read More »

A 36-year-old woman from Amugagara, in Uganda, made national news headlines for marrying three men at once after her monogamous relationship failed.

The daughter of a Christian pastor in Uganda’s Teso community, Ann Grace Aguti had been at odds with her clansmen ever since she decided to get multiple husbands. However, she always defended her choice by saying that she had been married to only one man, like it is customary in her community, but her husband had turned out to be a big disappointment. She had wanted a “tender, loving husband, who can provide all my needs as a housewife,” but he turned out to be utterly useless, so she left him and decided to try her luck again, this time with multiple men at once.

Read More »

Two executives of a cosmetic company in China recently drew praise for an unusual way of thanking their staff for their loyalty and hard work – getting on their feet and washing the feet of their most hard-working employees.

Chinese bosses are notorious for subjecting their employees to arduous and horrific punishments for not reaching company sales goals – like making them crawl on all fours in public or eat cockroaches – but the heads of an unnamed cosmetics company in Jinan, China’s Shandong Province, recently proved that they are capable of exceptional display of gratitude. In a viral video that has been doming the rounds online this week, the two female executives can be seen getting down on their needs and washing employees’ feet.

Read More »

An English teacher at a private school in China’s Inner Mongolia region was forced to make a public apology after having bought a fake tuberculosis diagnosis online, just so he could take a longer vacation for China’s National Day.

The teacher, identified only as Mr. Du, reportedly paid 470 yuan ($67) for a fake chest scan and doctor’s diagnosis on the internet, both of which showed that he was suffering from tuberculosis, a serious and highly contagious pulmonary disease. He then presented the documents to his employers, hoping it would convince them to approve a lengthier medical leave, allowing him to prolong his China’s National Day vacation. Only he never considered how serious his fake diagnosis actually was.

Read More »

Artisans at London-based design studio Bompass & Parr teamed up with scientists at the Aerogelex laboratory in Hamburg, Germany, to transfer the properties of the world’s lightest solid material into an edible dessert.

Aerogel was invented in 1931, by American chemist Samuel Kistler as part of a bet he made with fellow scientist Charles Learned over who could replace the water in gels with air, without causing shrinkage. With an air content of  95% – 99.8%, aerogel is recognized as the lightest solid in the world, so it made sense for designers at Bompass & Parr to try and emulate the making-of process of aerogel to create the world’s lightest dessert.

Read More »

A 42-year-old man in India’s Uttar Pradesh state lost his life trying to eat 50 boiled eggs in one go, as part of a stupid bet he made with a friend.

On Monday, November 3rd, Subhash Yadav, 42, and a friend sat down to at get a bite to eat at the Bibiganj market in  the Jaunpur district. At one point, the pair began to argue and as their conflict escalated Yadav bet his friend 2,000 rupees (about $28) that he could eat 50 boiled eggs right then and there. His friend accepted, so they bought 50 eggs from a vendor and Yadav set out to down them one by one. Everything was going well and he was actually making good time, but as he popped the 42nd egg into his mouth, he suddenly fell unconscious.

Read More »