The benefits of cupping as a way to relieve stress, improve athletic performance and overall health have been debated at nauseam, but did you know cupping could help you cosplay as popular Nintendo villain Bowser, aka King Koopa?

Although modern cupping is usually associated with the use of glass cups, the practice can be traced back to the year 1500 B.C., when glass didn’t even exist. Back then, healers used hollowed-out animal horns to create suction, and even though bamboo and glass cups became mainstream in recent times, some street therapists still rely on buffalo horns to practice their trade. As you can see, the visual effect is quite striking.

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Every year, dozens of teams from all over Japan travel to the Japanese town of Ito to compete in one of the world’s most unique sporting events – All-Japan Pillow Fighting Championships.

Pillow fighting is an age-old pastime practiced by children of all ages all over the world. Japan is no different, only here the game has been elevated to the status of national sport, with teams made up of people of all ages competing against each other for fame and fortune. After first battling it out in regional qualifying events, winning teams meet up in the small fishing town of Ito, south of Tokyo, to compete in the All-Japan Pillow Fighting Championships, for the title of Japan’s best pillow fighters.

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Wang Tianchang and his family moved into the Gobi Desert 22 years ago, at a time when most people were running away from the encroaching wasteland. The Wangs have been fighting the desert ever since, becoming a symbol of China’s anti-desertification campaign.

Desertification is one of China’s most serious environmental problems. The great Gobi Desert at stretching along the border with Mongolia has so far eaten away about 650 million acres of the country’s land and is showing no signs of slowing down. As it moves ever deeper into the heart of China, massive sandstorms blow sand into the capital Beijing and other major cities, putting millions of lives at risk. The Great Green Wall, a reforestation program designed to create a 2,800-mile tree barrier at the edge of the advancing desert has had limited success so far, but the Chinese media machine focuses less on the shortcomings and more on the successes, using everyday heroes like Wang Tianchang and his family.

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A near-vertical cliff wall in the mountains of Shennongjia Nature Reserve, China’s Hubei Province, is home to over 700 wooden boxes which make up one of the country’s last sanctuaries for native wild bees.

Beekeeping has been carried out in China since at least the 2nd century AD, and roughly half of the world’s supply of honey comes from the Asian country, but few know that over 80% of the native bee population is now extinct. The introduction of the European honey bee (Apis Mellifera) is considered the main cause of the drastic decline of native Chinese bees. It has brought viral diseases, has been known to attack Chinese honeybee hives, and interfere with its mating rituals. Today, the Chinese honey bee (Apis Cerana Cerana) is listed as an endangered species, and the cliff-hanging hives of the Shennongjia Nature Reserve make up one of the few protected sanctuaries in the country.

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Imagine enjoying a hot cup of java or your favorite soft drink in the middle of a pond filled with beautiful koi fish that you can actually hand-feed and you get an idea of what Vietnam’s koi fish cafes are like.

When it comes to fish-themed cafes, Ho Chi Minh City has a leg up on pretty much every other city in the world. Back in 2018 we featured Amix Coffee, a flooded cafe that allowed patrons to enjoy their favorite drinks with dozens of small fish literally at their feet, but this was apparently not the only cool fish-themed venue in town. In fact, the bustling metropolis apparently has about a dozen cafes that double as koi ponds, where the popular fish swim among patrons.

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Indonesian media recently reported the bizarre story of a young man who ended up marrying both his fiancée and his ex-girlfriend at the same time, after the latter crashed his wedding ceremony.

Late last month, 20-year-old Korik Akbar, from the regency of Central Lombok in the Indonesian state of West Nusa Tenggara, was in the process of marrying his betrothed, when his ex-girlfriend burst in asking that she marry him as well, as his second wife, claiming that she couldn’t get over their relationship. Instead of making a scene, Akbar’s fiancée, Kotimah, actually agreed to the proposal and told the young man that she accepted his former fling as his second wife. So he ended up marrying the both of them in the same ceremony.

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A Chinese man had to undergo a complicated gastroscopic operation to have a 15-cm toothbrush removed from his stomach, after accidentally swallowing it during his morning routine.

The unnamed man from Taizhou, in China’s Jiangsu Province told doctors that he got up one morning, about 10 days ago and decided to follow his usual routine, which included brushing his teeth before breakfast. Only he was sleepier than usual and while brushing the teeth at the back of his mouth, he accidentally dropped the 15-cm plastic brush and it slipped into his throat. Realizing his mistake, he tried reaching after it, but the slippery plastic handle proved difficult to grab, and he only managed to push it further.

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The Guoliang Tunnel connecting the clifftop village of Guoliang, in China’s Henan province, to the outside world was carved by hand using basic tools like chisels and hammers, and is now referred to as the eight wonder of the world.

For centuries, the people of Guoliang, a small Chinese village perched atop a cliff in the Taihang Mountains, were virtually cut off from the outside world. The only way in and out of the village was the “Sky Ladder,” 720 steps carved into the mountains during the Song Dynasty (960-1279). This made it extremely hard to get things in and out of the village, so most of the 300 or so inhabitants considered moving away in search of a better, easier life. However, everything changed in 1972, when the village council decided to carve a tunnel through the mountains to finally connect Guoliang to the outside world.

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The “Class of Life” is a controversial program introduced in various Japanese middle-schools where students spend months raising and getting attached to fish, before having to decide whether to eat them or not.

A part of the Sea and Japan Project sponsored by Nippon Foundation, the Class of Life was introduced in a number of schools across Japan in 2019, with the goal of teaching young students about the work that goes into land-based aquaculture, the challenges the activity involves, and last but not least, the importance of life. To this end, students in classes 4th to 6th are entrusted with a number of small fish and tasked with raising them to maturity for at least six months and up to a year. The controversial aspect of the program is that at the end, the students need to decide the fate of the fish, whether to release or eat them…

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Chinese media recently reported the case of a 14-year-old boy who shocked police when he accused his father of “illegal child labor”, because he had been forced to do chores around the house.

The bizarre incident allegedly took place this week in Ma’anshan, China’s Anhui province. Sick of seeing his son with his hands and eyes glued to his smartphone, and ignoring his homework and studies, a parent decided to give the boy a taste of life’s hardships, and asked him to put down the handheld and do some housework. Angry with his father making him take a break from his phone, the reportedly smartphone-addicted teenager snuck out of the house when his father wasn’t paying attention and went straight to the police station. There, he proceeded to accuse his father of “illegal child labor”.

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South Korean media recently reported the bizarre and sad story of an elderly couple who spent the last decade of their lives hoarding tons of trash for their 40-something son who refused to leave the house and find a job.

SBS, a South Korean national television network presented the shocking story of Choi, a 75-year-old man from Gwangju, who over the last decade turned his two-storey house into a dump full of garbage gathered from the city streets and from trash cans. Convinced that one man’s garbage is another man’s treasure, the pensioner literally filled up his entire house with junk, before doing the same with the balconies and even the yard. As you can see from the photos below, the house was quite literally buried in trash.

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While most real-estate firms try their best to conceal potentially disturbing details about the properties they are trying to sell or lease, one Japanese company puts these details front and center, focusing on the advantages haunted or spooky houses have.

Jikko buken, the Japanese term for “accident properties” are a controversial aspect of Japanese culture. The term describes generally undesirable homes, be it because of their proximity to cemeteries or crematoriums, or because of disturbing events that took place in them, from suicide, to accidental deaths or even murder. Because Japanese law states that any potential buyer or renter needs to be notified about any such details, the term “accident property” is generally used. But while most real-estate companies avoid giving details about the “accidents” in their listing, Jobutsu Estate, aka Buddhahood Real Estate, has built its business model around giving potential clients as many disturbing details as necessary.

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Having been running for the last 15 years, TV Asahi’s Zenryokuzaka is one of Japan’s most longstanding television shows, which is a bit strange considering its simple premise.

Every night at 1:20 a.m., Monday to Thursday, thousands of people tune in to TV Asahi to watch the latest episode of Zenryokuzaka, a bizarre show featuring women running up steep streets. Each episode lasts no more than six minute, including the opening and closing credits, and focuses solely on following the protagonist as she runs up the street. It’s an extremely simplistic concept, even for late-night TV, but one that has somehow remained popular in Japan for the last 15 years.

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A Chinese woman was forced to lie to her grandmother, and even recruit someone to do the same, for 13 years, just to avoid breaking the old woman’s heart.

Chinese media recently featured the heartbreaking story of a young woman who decided to deceive her own grandmother for over a decade, knowing that the truth would be to much for her to bear. Cheng Jing, a 46-year-old woman from Xi’an, recently lost her grandmother, who died at the ripe old age of 100, but for the last 13 years of her life, she did everything in her power to make the old woman believe that her daughter was still alive. Jing’s mother had died in 2003, but knowing that the news would devastate her grandmother, she resorted to recruiting someone to imitate her mother’s voice over the phone to spare her granny the heartache.

Jing’s mother, Cheng Congrong, and her grandmother had always been very close, and even after Cheng developed lung cancer in 2003, she still called her mother as often as she could to let her know she was alright. Knowing that she didn’t have much to live, Congrong even recorded dozens of voice messages and asked her children to play them to their grandmother so she wouldn’t worry.

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A Buddhist monk in Shanghai, China, has dedicated more than half of his life to caring for stray dogs, rescuing and taking care of tens of thousands of them since 1994.

53-year-old Zhixiang is the head monk of the Bao’en Temple in Shanghai, but nowadays his disciples take care of most of the day-to-day business, as he spends all his time taking care of the rescued animals. There are currently around 8,000 dogs, not to mention hundreds of cats, as well as chickens, geese and peacocks in Zhixiang’s care, but he’s been rescuing abandoned and stray animals since 1994, so he is used to it. Over the years, he has learned to administer medicine and give the animals shots, as taking them all to a vet would be too costly, and only recently started taking donations from other animal lovers, as a ways to make ends meet.

Zhixiang’s mission as a rescuer of stray animals began in 1994. He was riding in a car on the highway when he witnessed a cat being hit by another vehicle. It wasn’t dead, but it was left severely injured, struggling to crawl to the side of the road with only two paws. It’s an image that the Buddhist monk hates to remember and the one that pushed him to start rescuing strays.

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