An 80-year-old woman in Turkey risks spending over 4 years behind bars for hitting her 18-year-old granddaughter on the arm with a house slipper during an argument.

Asiye Kaytan lives with her granddaughter, Vural, in the Topraklık neighborhood of Denizli, in Southwestern Turkey. Ever since the girl’s parents split up, the 80-year-old woman has been trying to protect her, sometimes even from herself. Last year, on August 9th, after Vural came back from work, she told her grandmother that she was going out with some friends. Fearing for her safety, the old woman said she wouldn’t allow it and even locked the door to make sure Vural couldn’t go out. At one point during their argument, the young woman tried to unlock the door, and Kaytan grabbed one of her house slippers and slapped her on the arm with it. Vural instinctively retaliated by hitting her grandmother on the head with her phone. Kaytan started bleeding, and the frightened girl forgot all about partying and called an ambulance. Little did they know that what started as a family feud would eventually turn into an international news story.

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Scientists from Finland and the United States have developed a special type of chewing gum that can ‘trap’ and neutralize some influenza and herpes viruses.

When asked to think about the best thing to fight the flu and herpes with, most people probably wouldn’t say ‘chewing gum’, but according to a new study published in the Molecular Therapy journal, the humble chewing gum could prove extremely effective at fighting off certain viruses. A medical-grade gum made primarily from lablab bean powder ground from the seeds of the Lablab purpureus species, which contain a natural viral trap protein called FRIL, has shown great potential for neutralizing certain types of viruses, including influenza and herpes-causing viruses, in lab tests.

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Lightning kills most of the trees it strikes, but scientists have discovered a tree species that not only survives lightning strikes but thrives as a direct result of them.

For the longest time, there was a consensus in the scientific community that lightning could only have negative effects on trees. In the best case scenario, a struck tree barely survived, and in the worst case scenario, it was blown to smitherines. But as scientists kept venturing into uncharted territories like the Amazon rainforest and gathering data on new species, theories about lightning-resistant trees began to appear. However, it wasn’t until about a century ago that evidence of such “super trees” was discovered. Today, scientists know of at least one tree species that not only shrugs off multiple lightning strikes in its lifetime but actually attracts lightning and uses its destructive power to kill surrounding trees and hog all the sunlight and surrounding nutrients for itself.

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A Chinese man who had developed a habit of smelling his dirty socks after wearing them for a whole day has been diagnosed with fungal lung infection.

A middle-aged office worker from Chonqing, whose name was not revealed by the media, was recently admitted to the Southwest Hospital of the Army Medical University with a persistent cough. The man told doctors that his cough had worsened in recent days despite taking cough syrup and that his eyes had become bloodshot, which prompted him to seek medical assistance. After conducting CT and MRI examinations, doctors found suspicious shadows in his lower right lung, and a subsequent bronchoscopy showed that the patient suffered from a fungal lung disease caused by an Aspergillus infection. Upon questioning him about the possible causes of the infection, the doctors learned that the man had developed a habit of smelling his own dirty socks.

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A 48-year-old man and his son, 18, were recently arrested for reportedly defrauding around 100 restaurants in France’s Toulon region in the last 3 years, using a very well thought-out tactic.

Skipping out on the bill at a restaurant isn’t exactly unusual, but doing so about 100 times in a span of 3 years definitely is. On April 3rd, police in Toulon, France, arrested a 48-year-old man and his son on suspicion of defrauding dozens of eateries in the region by leaving without paying the bill. According to a recent investigation, the father-son duo had been using the same tactic successfully for three years, posing as average patrons who simply didn’t have any cash on them and whose credit card didn’t work. The father would apologize for the inconvenience and leave his ID or social security card as collateral until he returned to settle the bill. Only he never came back, opting instead to declare his card stolen and have it reissued.

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Siddharth Nandyala, a 14-year-old teenager from Dallas, has developed an AI-powered smartphone app called Circadian AI, which can detect heart disease within 7 seconds based only on sound.

It’s safe to say that Siddharth Nandyala is not your typical 14-year-old. He is the world’s youngest AI-certified professional, holding certifications from both Oracle and ARM, and he is poised to revolutionize cardiovascular disease detection with an AI-powered smartphone app capable of detecting heart disease in seconds by analyzing heart sound recordings. Circadian AI reportedly uses advanced algorithms that analyze heart sounds picked up by a smartphone and quickly provide a diagnosis that could save the user’s life. The innovative app has been tested on over 15,000 patients in the US and 700 patients in India, with an accuracy of 96 percent.

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A mountain resort in Jianxi, China, has invested millions of dollars into a massive network of giant escalators to allow people to reach its mountain peaks effortlessly.

The pain and effort of reaching the top of a mountain used to be part of the whole hiking experience, but at the Lingshan Scenic Area in Eastern China’s Jianxi Province, one will soon be able to reach a 1,500-meter-high summit simply by riding on a bunch of outdoor escalators. Aimed at allowing anyone to reach the popular mountaintop and take in the beauty of the surrounding area, this massive project was kickstarted in 2022 and is scheduled for completion next month. Recent photos and videos shot on location show dozens of interlinked escalators from the foot of the mountain all the way to the top. Although this isn’t China’s only mountain escalator installation, it is considered one of the largest and most complex.

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A 26-year-old Chinese programmer who got a vigorous neck massage to relieve pain narrowly avoided permanent paralysis after suffering a stroke.

Xiao Zhang (pseudonym), a young IT professional from Changsha, China’s Hunan Province, often suffered from neck pain due to spending many hours at his desk. After learning that traditional massage could help relieve neck pain, he decided to try it out at a local massage parlor. Everything was going great until he felt a sharp pain in his neck during a more vigorous maneuver by the massage therapist, which was shortly followed by a strong headache. He didn’t think too much of these symptoms, but the very next morning, he woke up with numbness and weakness of the left side of his body, as well as slurred speech. Scared, the 26-year-old rushed to the Second People’s Hospital of Hunan Province, where he was diagnosed with a secondary cerebral infarction.

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After being spotted by a Russian photographer in Bangkok, a young street sweeper became an overnight sensation in her native country and landed various modelling gigs with established brands.

The movie-worthy rags-to-riches story of Noppajit “Meen” Somboonsate began last month when the 28-year-old single mother of two was noticed on the streets of Bangkok by Russian photographer Semyon Rezchikov. Meen was out doing her job as a street sweeper and didn’t even notice when Rezchikov, mesmerized by her natural beauty, took a photo of her from a distance. He later approached her to show her the photo and commend her on her beauty. He filmed the whole encounter with his phone and later posted it on his TikTok where it quickly went viral. People were blown away by the beauty of the young street sweeper and wanted to know more about her. Before long, she was being approached by media outlets and modelling agencies.

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Authorities in Montgomery Township, Pennsylvania, have introduced wavy lane patterns on some streets in an effort to slow down traffic in the area.

Driving along Gray Lane in Montgomery Township for the first time must be quite the trip, both literally and figuratively. That’s because the regular lane patterns have been replaced by wavy, zig-zag lines that look like they were painted by a drunk. But they are wavy by design. According to Montgomery Township officials, the unusual patterns were deemed as the best solution to discourage speeding on some of the municipality’s streets. Police sources told local media outlets that the “traffic-calming measures” were installed in response to numerous complaints about certain streets being used as “speedways”.

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A Chinese man has already been evicted from rented apartments twice this year because of his unusual pet – a gentle black buffalo calf.

Mr. Chen, a 30-year-old retired boxer who currently works as a part-time fitness and boxing coach from Foshan, China’s Guangdong Province, has become an overnight celebrity because of his unusual house pet. Back in January, Chen bought himself a buffalo calf as a pet. He had planned on getting a dog, but the more he thought about it, the more the buffalo calf made sense. He claims the animal is a constant reminder that he should work hard to reach his life goals, but at the same time, he should take caution not to become a workhorse. To each their own, we say, but Chen’s unusual choice for a pet has landed him in hot water with at least two landlords, but he refuses to give up on ‘Bull Demon King’ and is currently looking for another place to rent.

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Indonesian social media influencer Ratu Thalisa was recently sentenced to two years and ten months behind bars for telling a picture of Jesus that He needed a haircut.

A court in Medan, Sumatra found Thalisa guilty of spreading hate speech against Christianity, as well as disrupting “public order” and “religious harmony” in Thai society, after she responded to a comment that told her to cut her hair to look more like a man by holding up a picture of Jesus Christ and saying: “You should not look like a woman. You should cut your hair so that you will look like his father.” Just a few days after making the remark in a TikTok video, five Christian groups filed complaints against her, accusing her of blasphemy. In addition to jail time, the court ordered Thalisa to pay a fine of around $6,200.

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Turkish police recently arrested a network of scammers who preyed on people’s desire to get rich quickly by selling them fake treasure maps and charging them extra to help them sell the “priceless” loot.

As part of a complex operation conducted in 9 Turkish provinces, dozens of con artists collaborated to defraud unwitting victims of more than 50 million Turkish lira ($1.3 million) using fake treasure maps. The suspects reportedly traveled around rural areas of the country, showing hand-drawn treasure maps on artificially aged pieces of paper to villagers looking to get rich overnight. The maps were very detailed and featured nearby locations that the victims were familiar with, unlike the scammers, who claimed to be from far away. As they had problems navigating the area to reach the treasure, they offered to sell their maps for a fee. But this was only half of their admittedly witty scam.

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A Kansas babysitter got the shock of her life when she tried to show a child that there was no “monster” under their bed, only to find a complete stranger hiding there.

It sounds like a cheap scare right out of a horror movie, but it happened just a few days ago in Kansas. A babysitter looking after children in the town of Great Bend was trying to calm a toddler down after they told her there was a “monster” under their bed. That’s one of the most common fears in small children, and one of the easiest ways to calm them down is to show them that there is nothing to fear. Only in this case, there really was someone under the child’s bed, an unknown man who had been hiding there for who knows how long.

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A Chinese barbecue restaurant has gone viral for selling bamboo skewers seasoned with a mix of spices, chili, and spring onions to people looking to enjoy the flavor of barbecue without the calories.

Last month, Chinese media reported the hottest late-night snack in Southern China, an unusual “dish” called Spicy Bamboo Skewers. Thought up by a barbecue restaurant owner in Shaoyang, Hunan Province, the unusual treat consists of bamboo skewers seasoned with a mix of spices, chili, and spring onions before being tossed on the barbecue to add a bit of smokiness to the mix. The wooden skewers are then sold in batches of 50 for just 10 yuan ($1.4), making them both affordable and delicious. Just in case you’re wondering, you don’t eat the bamboo skewers, instead you suck the flavor off of them as a guilt-free snack.

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