A Japanese woodworker has developed a “three-dimensional wood inlay” technique that allows him to create exceptional artworks that require no coloring whatsoever.

From intricate carpets carved right into wood flooring, to whimsical furniture that looks warped and cracked, we’ve feature some awesome wood art over the years, but I think it’s safe to say that the creations of Japanese woodworker Toru Fukuda are on a whole other level than anything we’ve ever showed you before. The young craftsman garnered attention recently for his latest work, a simple wooden board with droplets of water on it. Only that water is actually wood that only looks like water. And that’s just one of the incredible creations Fukuda has produced, some of which look too good to be true.

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‘Mojie Ringo’ is a Japanese technique of harnessing the power of the sun to create beautifully decorated apples without the use of any sort of chemicals.

For centuries, apple growers in Japan’s Aomori Prefecture have been creating stunning heirloom apples by using the mojie ringo technique. The process is fairly simple, as basically implies depriving the apples of sunlight for a period of time and then applying stencils to ensure that some portion of the apple peel remains discolored. Most often than not, mojie ringo apples are decorated with messages and symbols of good fortune and prosperity, and are offered as gifts.

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The Screambulance is a new haunted house experience in Japan designed to offer the most terrifying experience in a very tiny space, while abiding by social distancing rules.

The Covid-19 pandemic has really taken a toll on the entertainment business, and haunted house experiences are no exception. So now companies are coming up with creative workarounds to stay in business and offer people the scares they crave while abiding social distancing protocols. One such ingenious service is the Screambulance, a mobile haunted house experience in the form of a bloody, beatdown ambulance with an even scarier interior, and a zombie-like staff to boot.

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Poltys mouhoti, aka the Rolled-up Leaf Spider, is a fascinating arachnid that uses incredible camouflage to protect itself from predators during the day.

Native to Vietnam, but also spotted in other Asian countries like Cambodia, Thailand or Malaysia, the aptly-named rolled-up leaf spider is part of the Poltys genus of spiders, which numbers 43 known sub-species, most of which have this amazing ability to mimic plant parts as a self-defense mechanism. They accomplish this by tucking their legs in towards their abdomen, and extending a long, stem-like appendage outward. Even their body has a brown and green coloration and a shape reminiscent of a broken branch, which enhances the camouflage even more.

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A small, oval-shaped face with a well-defined and pointy V-line chin is one of the most coveted female beauty features in many Asian countries, and they can apparently get it by simply sucking on a bottle-shaped gadget for 10 minutes a day.

You can buy pretty much anything online these days, but every once in a while we stumble upon products so bizarre that they make us scratch our heads an wonder who would ever pay money for them. Case in point, this weird beauty accessory on Chinese shopping platform TaoBao, which is supposed to help reshape users faces, if they suck on it for just 10 minutes a day. Marketed as an electric facial exerciser, the bottle-shaped gadget apparently vibrates up to 880 times per minute and it’s these high-frequency vibrations that somehow stimulate facial muscles and reshape your face.

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Who knew watching and listening to a bartender chop block of ice into translucent jewels with a santoku knife could be so satisfying?

A Tokyo bartender recently got his five minutes of online fame after a video of him carefully turning blocks of ice into beautiful jewels went viral on Twitter, getting over one million views. It doesn’t sound like anything remotely interesting, but I spent close to an hour today just watching him slice the ice into almost perfects cubes and then cut the corners and sharp edges to create these crystal-like cubes for his patrons.

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Egor Onopko, an up-and-coming blogger from Vladivostok, Russia, managed to attract a lot of media attention and make some nice pocket money by turning the right side of his neck into advertising space for interested individuals and businesses. No one really believed Onopko, who goes by “onokonda” on social media, would go through with the idea when he first announced it on Instagram, but last week, he posted visual proof that he had gone through with it, adding that he made around 1 million rubbles ($13,500) from the 10 sold advertising spots.

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Percival Lugue, a graphic artist from the Philippines, has been collecting toys from various fast food chains since he was just 5-year-old. Now, at age 50, he holds the Guinness Record for the most fast food toys in the world, over 20,000 of them.

Lugue has held the record for the largest collection of fast food toys since 2014, when his tally stood at around 10,000 unique items, but he has been busy consolidating his record ever since, and now he has more than 20,000 toys. Like any child, he always liked playing with the toys he got with his fast food meals, but he always took care of them, so he was able to start his epic collection pretty early. Over the years, he has collected new items from various fast food chains, like McDonald’s, Burger King and even the Philippines’ favorite brand, Jollibee, and compares the excitement of adding a new toy to his collection to experiencing Christmas morning as a kid.

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A Japanese skeleton enthusiast recently got his five minutes of online fame after posting photos of an impressive chicken skeleton he managed to put together out of the bones of a rotisserie chicken he ate.

Mr. Kudo, a Japanese man who dreams of transforming his home into a museum-of-sorts filled with all sorts of animal skeletons, managed to wow millions of Twitter users with his latest creation – an almost perfect chicken skeleton assembled out of the bones of a rotisserie he himself gorged on. On April 28th, he took to Twitter to post before and after photos of a roasted chicken he had bought at a discount from a supermarket in Akita, Kanagawa Prefecture, a few weeks prior. The preserved chicken skeleton, showcased on the same disposable platter that came with the roasted dish, blew everyone away, and for good reason, it looked better than the specimens you see in most museums.

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Yin and Yang Fish is a controversial dish where the body of a fish is cooked, while the head is kept fresh so that it moves its mouth and eyes while it is being eaten.

From fish that smells like a public toilet, to a cheese as hard as rock and even a fish-head-stuffed pie, the world is full of weird foods, but few dishes can be described as truly disturbing. Well, the dish you’re about to discover is one such rarity. Reportedly invented in the early 2000s, by a restauranteur in Chiayi City, Taiwan, Yin and Yang fish, also known as “dead and alive fish”, is definitely not a dish for the faint of heart. It consist of a whole fish, usually carp, whose body has been cooked and covered in sauce, but whose head is maintained raw so that its mouth and eyes are still moving while it is being eaten.

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A Japanese company is working on a quirky container-like bag for live fish, suitable both for pet owners wanting to take their favorite fish on walks, and fans of super-fresh sashimi…

Known as “katsugyo bag” this portable fish tank is shaped like a long tube with a transparent middle section, a handle and a gauge, which, if I had to guess, monitors the oxygen saturation of the water. It is being developed by “Ma Corporation”, and aims to become a more elegant, efficient and environmentally-friendly alternative to the old water-filled plastic bag.

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A talented Japanese artist uses airbrushes and classic brushes to transform generic plastic figurines of popular anime characters into custom works of art.

The mysterious artist, who goes by MA Man on social media, specializes in taking commercially available figurines of popular anime series from series like Dragon Ball or JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure and giving them the custom treatment and turning them into awe-inspiring artworks. Ma Man uses both airbrushing and classic painting techniques to emphasize the figurine’s features, like their muscles or the creases of their clothes to make them look as cool and detailed as possible.

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A 27-year-old Russian man who has been imploring viewers to vote him out of a Chinese boy band reality show for months, has finally got his wish, but not before making it all the way to the final.

Vladislav Ivanov, a translator and part-time model from Vladivostok, Russia, is finally free after two grueling months. Earlier this year, the 27-year-old, who speaks fluent Chinese, got a gig to support to Japanese contestants on a Chinese reality-show that would culminate in the forming of a new boy band. Ivanov agreed, but upon arriving on the tropical island where the show was to be filmed, his good looks kept getting him confused with the contestants. The show’s director noticed this, and knowing that he could speak Chinese, persuaded him to participate in the reality-show, and “live in a new way”. It turned out to be one of the biggest mistakes of his life.

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Almost nothing is what it seems on the internet these days, and this 53-year-old man posing as a woman in her 20s on social media is perfect proof of that.

If you’re familiar with FaceApp, you probably already know about its switch gender option, which lets you see what you would look like as the opposite gender. It’s all in good fun, but one Japanese male fan of the app has managed to build quite an impressive following on social media by transforming himself into an attractive, realistic-looking young girl. The 53-year-old man, who describes himself as “addicted to FaceApp”, spends his free time taking selfies, editing them and uploading them on his social media profiles.

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A small village located on the banks of the Yangtze River, in Sichuan Province, has become known as one of China’s premier suppliers of ornamental stones, generating millions of dollars in revenue every year.

Positioned in an idyllic location, right next to China’s largest river and surrounded by green, forest-covered mountains, Hejiaba village gets a decent number of tourists every year, but tourism isn’t the most profitable local business. That title goes to the collection and sale of ornamental river stones; not the small ones that fit in the pocket as good luck charms, but heavy boulders that enthusiasts all over China pay good money on to add them to their collections. It’s estimated that Hejiaba village generates around 20 million yuan ($3.08 million) annually from the sale of this virtually inexhaustible resource.

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