This Tree in Germany Has Been Helping People Find Love for Over a Century

The Bridegroom’s Oak, a 500-year-old tree just outside of Eutin, in Germany, has its own postal address and actually receives around 40 letters every day. They are sent by love seekers from all around the world, in the hope that someone will read them and write back.

With so many dating apps and services available nowadays, sending letters to a tree in Germany hardly sounds like the most effective way to find love, but for true romantics, there’s really no comparison. There’s just something undeniably charming about sending a letter and allowing fate to work its magic, so the Bridegroom’s Oak remains very popular even in this digital age.

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Russian Car Enthusiast Builds Functional Mercedes G-Class SUV Out of Ice Blocks

A motorist from the Russian city of Novosibirsk teamed up with a local ice sculptor to create a unique Mercedes G-Class SUV using blocks of ice mounted on a metal chassis and powered by an old engine.

Vladislav Barashenkov, the host of Garage 54, a popular YouTube channel focusing on cars, recently went viral for an invention that’s as outrageous as it is cool – a budget version of the Mercedes G-Class luxury SUV made largely out of clear blocks of ice. But Barashenkov wanted it to be more than just a cool looking ice sculpture, so he simply had the sculptor create the body out of ice, which he then mounted on the chassis of an old UAZ 469 military utility vehicle. That made the ice SUV drivable, although riding in it isn’t as smooth as a real G-Class.

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Stylish “Dumb Phone” That Can Only Make Calls and Send Texts Wants to Cure Your Smartphone Addiction

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by all the features and apps available on smartphones these days and miss the good old days when mobile phones were simple communication devices, you’ll probably love Light 2, a stylish “dumb phone” designed to eliminate time-wasting distractions from your life.

The original Light mobile phone launched in 2015, and was about as bare-bones as a cellphone could get. You could basically only use it to make and take phone calls, but its creators, Joe Hollier and Kai Tang, recently decided that in order to improve its usefulness while still keeping users safe from smartphone distractions, the handheld needed a few extra features. The recently announced Light Phone 2 is just as tiny and stylish as the original version, but also features text messaging capabilities, an alarm clock and a headphone jack.

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Dutch Engineer Builds Face-Recognition Gadget for His Cat

To make sure his cat doesn’t have to wait too long at the door waiting to be let in, a Dutch engineer built a face-recognition gadget that identifies the feline and messages him so he can let it in.

Arkaitz Garro, a WeTransfer software engineer in Holland, doesn’t have a cat-flap on his door, so every time his cat wants to come inside, it has to wait until he or his wife notices it at the door and lets it in. That didn’t really do, so he decided to use his skills to solve the problem. Instead of installing a good old cat-flap, he decided to go for a more high-tech solution involving artificial intelligence, motion-detection sensors, face recognition software and a messaging app. You might think it’s overkill, but Arkaitz claims that it only took him a few hours to do it, as all the hardware and software he used is available to anyone.

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Hardcore Fan Covers His Entire Body in Dragon Ball Z Tattoos

With millions of fans around the world, Dragon Ball Z is one of the most popular anime series to ever come out of Japan. From cosplaying as their favorite characters, creating amazing fan art to spending their hard earned money on memorabilia, fans love to show their appreciation for the epic saga, but few have gone as far as this hardcore Dragon Ball Z fan from Thailand who covered his whole body in colorful tattoos inspired by the Japanese franchise.

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Couple Request Photo of Jeff Goldblum in Their Room, Singapore Hotel Goes Above and Beyond to Oblige

A couple visiting Singapore had a somewhat unusual request for the hotel they had booked their stay at – to have a photo of actor Jeff Goldblum placed next to their bed. I don’t know how many hotels would take that sort of thing seriously, but the Mariott Tang Plaza, in Singapore, definitely does.

The hotel received the unusual request in an email confirming the couple’s arrival, and even though the staff didn’t use the specific image attached by the client, they made sure that the couple was satisfied when they entered their room. When the visitors finally arrived, they found not one but several photos of actor Jeff Goldblum, both in the room and even in the bathroom.

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Indonesian Teen Has Allegedly Been Laying Eggs for Over Two Years

Here’s something you don’t read every day: Akmal, a 14-year-old boy from Gowa, in Indonesia, claims that he has laid 20 eggs in the last two years, with the last two popping out at the hospital, in front of doctors.

Akmal has reportedly been hospitalised several times for his bizarre condition over the past couple of years. During his latest trip to the hospital, the boy allegedly laid two eggs in front of the baffled medical staff treating him. Doctors maintain that it is impossible for eggs to form inside the human body, and suspect that the boy has either been swallowing them whole or pushing them up his backside. An X-ray revealed a large egg high up the boy’s rectum, but his father, Rusli, insists that he would never put them there himself.

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Model Gets Tattoo of Her Cat with Ink Made from Its Fur

A German model has found a way to makes sure her beloved pet cat stays with her forever. Not only did she get a huge tattoo of it on her thigh, but she had it done with a s special ink synthesised from its fur.

38-year-old Kathrin Toelle loves her two pet cats like they were her own children, and knows that she’ll miss them more than anything else when they eventually pas away. So when she heard about a new tattoo ink that would help her stay connected to her felines forever, she didn’t hesitate. Now Kathrin, who goes by the modelling name Makani Terror, sports a large tattoo of her 10-year-old cat Gizmo, made with ink from its luscious fur, and plans on getting one of her other pet soon.

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Self-Confessed Selfie Addict Takes 200 Photos of Himself Every Day

Junaid Ahmed, a 22-year-old man from Peterborough, UK, is obsessed with selfies. He can spend up to three hours getting himself ready for his daily photo-shoots, and claims to snap around 200 photos of himself, uploading the best of them to his Instagram page.

An ex-fashion student and model, Junaid treats every day like a photo-shoot and even calls himself the ‘selfie king’. To make sure he looks his best for his 50,000 Instagram followers, the young man gets weekly facials, has his eyebrows done and spends hours in front of the mirror applying makeup. Over the years, he has also undergone several cosmetic procedures, including veneered teeth, chin fillers, cheek fillers, jawline fillers, lip fillers, botox under the eyes and on the head, tattooed eyebrows and fat freezing. That’s a lot for anyone, let alone a 22-year-old, but Junaid claims it’s all worth it as long as he gets the attention he seeks on social media.

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Swedish Funeral Agency Wants to Use Artificial Intelligence to Allow People to Chat with the Dead

A funeral agency in Sweden is currently seeking volunteers for a project that it hopes will offer people comfort by allowing them to speak to their deceased loved-ones.

First of all, if you’ve already read something about this on sites like Mail Online or Sputnik News, you should know that most of the information they present is truly ‘fake news’. No, Swedish scientists are not trying to create robots or androids that are “fully conscious copies of dead relatives”, in fact, I’m not even sure any Swedish scientists are involved at all. This is actually about a Swedish funeral agency called Fenix wanting to create bots (computer programs, not actual robots) powered by artificial intelligence that can offer comfort to living relatives of the deceased.

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Self-Taught Artist Is on a Mission to Create Incredibly Detailed Sketches of Every City in the UK

Two years ago, English artist Carl Lavia set out to create a large-scale sketch of Birmingham, one of the largest cities in the UK, using photos he took himself while walking around the city, as well as aerial footage from books and google maps to help him piece the whole thing together. The result of his work was so impressive that Lavia decided to dedicate years of his life to sketching out all 69 cities in the United Kingdom, in great detail.

44-year-old Carl Lavia started drawing when he was just 5, and has been doing it ever since. After spending most of his childhood drawing imaginary cities, the self-taught sketch-artist fulfilled his dream of sketching the impressive cities of his homeland. With the help of his project partner, Lorna Le Bredonchel, Carl spends weeks walking around the cities he plans on reproducing, to get a feel of the atmosphere that makes them unique, but also stopping to take photos and do sketches of sections he finds particularly interesting. He then uses these bits of information, as well as aerial imagery to create large-scale sketches of each city. The whole process, from research stage to the completed sketch can take several months.

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The Complicated Case of a Death Row Inmate Who Can’t Remember His Crime

67-year-old Vernon Madison has been on death row for over three decades and was supposed to be executed in 2016, but after a series of strokes allegedly wiped out his memories of fatally shooting a police officer, his lawyers have been trying to suspend his death sentence. The U.S. Supreme Court will now have to decide if it is lawful to execute a murderer who does not remember his crime.

Madison was supposed to receive the death penalty in May of 2016, for the 1985 murder of a police officer. Shortly before the sentence could be carried out, his lawyers intervened, arguing that as a result of several strokes, the inmate had suffered neurological damage and could no longer remember his crime. A previous ruling of the Supreme Court stated that mentally incompetent prisoners cannot be executed, but also that some of them may be ruled competent to be executed as long as he or she understands their punishment and why they are receiving it. This leaves a lot of room for interpretation by state courts, so Vernon Madison’s execution has been scheduled and postponed several times in the last two years. It is now up to the Supreme Court to rule if it is lawful to have a man executed for a crime he doesn’t remember.

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Russian Parents Agree to Fake Their Own Deaths to Help Convict Son That Tried to Have Them Killed

A 22-year-old man from Sochi, Russia, was recently busted by police after his parents help prove he tried to have them assassinated by posing for photos of their fake bloody murders.

The shocking story of a young man who tried to have his parents and sister killed so he could inherit their wealth first appeared in Russian media earlier this month, with even more disturbing details surfacing later, as the criminal confessed to police. Apparently, police learned of the man’s diabolical plan from a friend of his, to whom he had confided in. To make sure he was serious about killing his family, police set up a meeting between the man and an undercover policeman posing as a professional hitman. Their worst fears were confirmed when the man gave the “assassin” all the details he needed to get into his parents’ house, like the location of the security cameras and of their guard dog, as well as a plan of the home. He allegedly offered the “killer” 3 million rubles ($54,000), one for each of his murdered family members.

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Indian State Becomes World’s First to Offer Free Cosmetic Breast Surgery to the Poor

When thinking of ways to assist the poor, offering free breast augmentation or reduction surgery is probably not the first thing to come to mind, but that didn’t stop health department officials in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu from doing it.

Most governments are tackling poverty problems the old fashioned way, trying to make sure that unprivileged citizens have access to food, water, a place to live and basic healthcare. The Indian state of Tamil Nadu, on the other hand, is taking a slightly different approach, becoming the first state in the world to offer free cosmetic breast surgery to both impoverished women and men. These procedures are currently funded by the state health department, but authorities are trying to get health insurance providers on board to cover them as well.

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Indian Groom Forced to Marry Another Woman After Bride-to-Be Rejects Him Because He Is Balding

An Indian groom returned home with a different wife that the one he had originally intended to marry, after his bride-to-be refused to go ahead with the wedding upon seeing that he was balding.

Dr. Ravi Kumar’s family had arranged his weeding to a girl in Sugauli village, Bihar, more than a year ago, and all there was left wad for the couple to finally meet and get married in a traditional wedding ceremony. As the set date of February 18, approached, Kumar, a neurosurgeon, traveled with his family from New Delhi to Bihar, but he never actually met his bride-to-be until his wedding day, which turned out to be a big mistake. After all the rituals were completed and all there was left for the betrothed couple was to enter the wedding pavilion to be married, disaster struck. Kumar removed his traditional headgear and his bride-to-be noticed that he was balding.

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