Global Oddities

Internationally acclaimed musician, Elton John, left CNN’s Larry King dumbfounded on “Larry King Live”, when the British-born maestro honestly admitted he didn’t know the web address of his HIV/AIDS foundation.

Larry King was interviewing the music icon on Monday, February 25, 2008, and had asked him to tell viewers who might wish to make donations the address of his HIV/AIDS foundation. Sir Elton looked lost and confessed he did not know the web address of his philanthropic foundation which reportedly made a record $6.5 million grant investments in HIV/AIDS related projects in 2007.

When Larry King told Elton the address of the foundation (www.ejaf.org), the musician was grateful and replied: “I’ll remember that.”

The police in a west Canadian town of Wetaskiwin were surprised to find a totally drunk driver at the lobby of their station. The man had wandered inside without being arrested.

It turned out that in his stupor, the driver had parked his car near the station, strolled in and relaxed at the lobby, possibly mistaking it for his home or destination.

The policemen who found him were responding to a call by some neighbors early in the morning when they noticed the man. The driver had gained access to the lobby because it was unlocked after the cops had gone home the previous evening.

He has since been charged with impaired driving

Source: Reuters, Thu Feb 21, 2008.

Teenage students at a Japanese girls’ school were shocked when they discovered that one of their “colleagues” turned out to be a 39-year-old man. The man had dressed up in the school’s uniform which he bought on the internet and wore a long wig.

According to the Tokyo police, the man, Tetsunori Nanpei, said he was dressed up as a student and was taking a stroll near the school at Saitama, north of Tokyo, when some students who were standing by the gate screamed upon seeing him.

In his panic, Tetsunori ran into the school’s compound and decided to mingle with other students as a way to hide himself. He was soon discovered and took to his heels, losing his wig in the process. But his luck ran out. He was caught and handed over to the police.

The incident occurred last week.

Source: Reuters, Fri Feb 22, 2008.

An 80-year-old man, Mohammed Addillahi, chopped off his wife’s arms and inflicted wounds on her head when he discovered she was building a house without his consent. The incident occurred at the coastal city of Mombasa in Kenya.

The 60-year-old woman, Mariam Kavava, said her family had just finished their supper and she was praying when her husband suddenly attacked her.

Upon hearing her cry for help, some rescuers rushed to the scene and almost lynched her husband. Some neighbors battled hard to rescue him. Both husband and wife are reported to be in critical condition at the Coast General Hospital.

Source: Khadija Yusuf, The Standard, Feb. 21, 2008.

A new craze has hit the West African country of Ivory Coast: women are now rushing to buy and inject themselves with drugs that are supposed to enhance the size of their bottom. A dose of the drug costs as little as $2.

This “big bottom” mania is inspired by a song by two Ivorian musicians, DJ Mix and DJ Eloh. In their song titled “Bobaraba” which means Big Bottom, the musicians were full of praise for women with lavish bottoms.

According to DJ Mix, the song was made “as a tribute to women because African women are defined by the shape of their bottoms.”

Reports say that once “Bobaraba” is played at any night club, the floor will be fully packed, with various “Bobarabarians” trying to outdo one another with their spectacular big-bottom-shaking dancing styles.

Source: John James, BBC News, Abidjan
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/7233565.stm
Published: 2008/02/18 11:36:55 GMT

In October last year, a happy French man landed in Vilnius (Lithuania) for a weekend of romance with a lady he met on the internet but found himself in big trouble.

The lady invited the lover-boy to “her” apartment where, to his surprise, she and her friend robbed him of his cash, credit cards and other items, then handcuffed him to a water pipe and disappeared.

Days later, he managed to break the pipe and started yelling for help through the window. Some sympathetic neighbors heard him and thought there was a fire in “his” apartment and quickly called the fire brigade. He was later rescued.

Source: The Baltic Times, December 19, 2007

When some traffic policemen in Tartu (Estonia) stopped an apparently drunk driver last August, little did they imagine they were in for a shock: the driver was blind.

The policemen noticed the disability whey they tried to get the man do the breathalyzer test and he could not see the air bag.
More surprise awaited the policemen when they discovered that the 20-year-old blind man named Kristjan was driving the car under the guidance of a teenage passenger who was visibly drunk.

Upon investigation, the policemen further discovered that Kristjan had committed the same offence at an earlier date and that he was the registered owner of an Audi 80 car.

Source: The Baltic Times, December 19, 2007

At an extra-ordinary press conference, at which virtually all the diplomats in The Gambia (Africa) were present, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Crispin Grey-Jonson, stated calmly but most definitely clearly the Gambia government’s view that Carnegie Minerals (Gambia) Ltd, an Australian-owned company with a British managing director, had engaged in criminal deception against the people and government of The Gambia.

“We gave them a license to mine for Zircon, Silicon and Ilmenite”, explained Grey-Johnson. “And they declared to us that they were mining and exporting these three minerals.

“They sent out huge quantities of mined metric tons of sand to Australia and onward to China. When we sent samples of the sand for laboratory tests abroad, the results came back showing that in addition to mining Zircon, Silicon and Ilmenite, the company was also exporting Titanium, Iron Ore and Uranium”.

Uranium is used in the production of nuclear materials. Police are investigating the matter.

Source: Dida Halake, Gambia Daily Observer (Feb 15, 2008)

In January 2005, an unknown gang of miscreants and jokers assigned themselves the task of defacing political campaign billboards in Lisbon, Portugal’s capital city, a few weeks to the country’s general election.

Some of the large and expensive billboards had funny additions: big red stickers on the noses of the pictured party leaders, giving them a strong resemblance to clowns.

Incredibly, one of the billboards stood outside the Socialist Party’s headquarters, which was located next to a police station. Whoever defaced the billboard needed to have used a ladder to accomplish the task, yet the police never saw him or her.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online
Jan 24, 2005

Source: Rebecca Quaicoe Duho
Daily Graphic
February 12, 2008

A landlord in Accra, Ghana, decided to teach one of his tenants an unforgettable lesson by beating him up and setting his room on fire.

The landlord, James Quaye, had gone to announce a rent increase when the tenant, 73-year-old Mensa Badu, uttered a few words that infuriated him.

Mr. Quaye reportedly left the scene and returned afterwards with a stick with which he meted out “justice” to the aged tenant.

When the tenant managed to flee from the beatings he was receiving, the enraged landlord activated his “plan B’: he forced his way into the tenant’s room and set his belongings and the room on fire.

The landlord has since been arrested by the police.