Sergey Torop, a Russian religious cult leader who claimed to be the reincarnation of Jesus Christ, was recently convicted to 12 years in prison for causing physical and psychological harm to his followers.

A former traffic cop, Torop gained a huge religious following in the early 1991, taking advantage of the void caused by the collapse of the Soviet Union. He called himself Vissarion and claimed to be Jesus reincarnated. We first wrote about the Siberian Jesus in 2009, when he started making news headlines outside of Russia for claiming to be a reincarnation of the Son of God and traveling to other countries to convert people. Even back then, he faced accusations of fraud, but denied any wrongdoing, claiming that his church made no money whatsoever. In 2020, Vissarion was finally arrested and charged with using psychological manipulation to control and exploit his followers for labor and money. He was recently sentenced to 12 years in prison.

Read More »

Italian mechanic and YouTuber Andrea Marazzi recently made international news headlines for turning a 1993 Fiat Panda into the world’s “skinniest” drivable car.

The so-called Flat Fiat looks like something made with AI, but it’s the very real creation of a young car mechanic who wanted to build the world’s narrowest drivable car. Although it retains most of the parts of the 1993 Fiat Panda, Andrea Marazzi’s special model is only 50 centimeters wide, enough space for just a driver, and a single headlight to help the driver see at night. Marazzi spent 12 months hand-building the Flat Fiat using ‘99 percent of the original parts’ of the 1993 Fiat Panda it is based on, even retaining the four wheels, despite its’ ultra-skinny frame.

Read More »

Central India’s Madhya Pradesh Government recently suspended seven engineers for the faulty design of a 200 million rupee ($2.3 million)bridge with a 90-degree turn.

The new Rail Over Bridge in Bhopal was announced 10 years ago and cost the state of Madhya Pradesh over 200 million rupees to complete. It was supposed to improve connectivity between Mahamai Ka Bagh, Pushpa Nagar, and the station area with New Bhopal, but all it has managed to do so far is spark controversy over a major blunder in its design – a nearly 90-degree turn built into the bridge. Photos of the questionable feature recently went viral on Indian social media, raising concerns over safety and how engineers could have overlooked such a critical error.

Read More »

Japanese tech company H2L has created a capsule-like device that allows anyone to remotely control a robotic avatar just like in James Cameron’s namesake blockbuster.

Imagine sitting comfortably in one of those state-of-the-art massage chairs and being able to perform most of your daily house chores by remotely controlling a robotic avatar. it sounds like sci-fi, but according to Japanese company H2L Inc., it’s a much more realistic concept than most of us realize. Designed to be used in combination with a chair or bed, H2L’s so-called ‘Capsule Interface’ is equipped with a muscle displacement sensor, speaker, and display that allow the user to transmit bodily sensory information to a robot and use it to perform a variety of tasks. For example, by simply moving your feet slightly, the robot will walk; similarly, by simply moving your hands slightly, the robot will lift or push objects for you.

Read More »

A Thai woman who accidentally swallowed a fish bone, which got stuck in her throat, was shocked to see it eventually pierce her neck after she failed to remove it.

On June 17, Facebook user Suriyan Buppa-art posted a couple of shocking photos allegedly showing his wife’s neck with a sharp, white needle piercing the skin from underneath. The Thai man later told news outlets that his post was meant as a cautionary tale for people who enjoyed eating fish but neglected to make sure it was bone-free. Apparently, his wife was enjoying a fish soup when she accidentally swallowed a fish bone and felt a sharp pain in her neck. She tried dislodging the bone using folk remedies like eating rice and bread crust, but nothing worked, so she went to the hospital, where an X-ray exam didn’t reveal any foreign objects.

Read More »

In Dagestan and other republics of Russia’s North Caucasus Federal District, lip fillers are gaining popularity among men, sparking controversy.

Dagestan and the other predominantly Muslim North Caucasus republics are famous for their bearded, manly-looking men, but a new beauty trend is slowly chipping away at the region’s manly reputation. According to Russian media, North Caucasus men are increasingly turning to cosmetologists for lip augmentation procedures like fillers. Such behavior is still heavily frowned upon, so cosmetologists perform them during the night, when the chance of being caught are lower, and charge up to 20,000 Russian rubles ($255), compared to the standard 2,000 ($25) – 3,000 ($38), to keep the identities of their clients secret.

Read More »

A 22-year-old Czech man and his parents posed as dentistry professionals and performed dozens of root canals and tooth fillings with the help of online tutorials.

Dental procedures can get really expensive, so finding a good deal is sometimes too good to pass up, especially when you’re in a lot of pain and low on funds, but cheap dental work can sometimes be too good to be true. Take, for example, the story of a family in Havlickuv Brod, a town about 100 kilometers southeast of Prague, in the Czech Republic, who posed as dentistry professionals for two years, performing cheap procedures in an unauthorized clinic, with no medical training and only online tutorials for guidance. They performed tooth extractions, local anesthesia, root canals, and tooth fillings on dozens of patients until they were finally discovered by police earlier this year.

Read More »

Scientists at a robotics laboratory at the National University of Defence Technology (NUDT) in central China’s Hunan province recently unveiled a tiny insect-like drone suitable for surveillance and reconnaissance missions.

Revealed to the general public on CCTV 7 (China Central Television’s military channel), the tiny drone featured flapping wings and hair-thin legs, making it almost indistinguishable from real insects. They have the potential to revolutionise various industries and applications thanks to their tiny size, which allows them to access virtually any space and blend into all sorts of environments undetected. Although marketed primarily as a perfect candidate for military reconnaissance missions, many believe that it could be used by the Chinese government for surveillance purposes.

  Read More »

The Chinese City of Chongqing recently set a new Guinness World Record by staging a massive light show with no less than 11,787 drones.

China has become famous for its large-scale drone light show, but “Charming Chongqing”, an event hosted by the city of Chongqing, set a new standard for grand drone light shows and set a new Guinness World Record in the process. It is estimated that more than 100,000 people showed up in downtown Chongqing to watch the world’s largest drone light show on the night of June 17, and they were not disappointed. No less than 11,787 small drones illuminated the night sky, coordinating to form various shapes and written messages that energized the crowd.

  Read More »

A Texas man recently made the shocking discovery that he had somehow become married to the woman he had just broken up with, without his consent.

Imagine breaking up with someone only to find out the next day that you are legally married to them, even though you never even attended a marriage ceremony. This is the bizarre experience of a Texas man who claims he was married to his ex-fiancée without his knowledge. The 42-year-old man, whose identity has not been revealed, admitted to having been in a committed relationship with 36-year-old Kristin Marie Spearman and visiting the Wayne County clerk’s office to get a marriage license. However, the pair never made it to the altar. They got into an argument, and the man told Spearman that he didn’t want to be in a relationship with her, but his ex-fiancée had other plans…

Read More »

Ghana’s Drunkard Association has given the country’s government a three-week ultimatum to lower alcohol prices for both beverage vendors and consumers.

One may be tempted to think that the Drunkard’s Association is just a stupid gimmick to draw the public’s attention, but this is one of Ghana’s most well-known informal organizations, boasting a member count of over 6.6 million people across the African nation. In a viral post on X (Twitter) last weekend, the association’s president, Moses Onyah, popularly known as “Dry Bone,” decried the continued rise in prices for alcoholic drinks, fueled by a surprising appreciation of the national currency, the cedi. The frustrated members of the group marched through the city of Accra and demanded that the government lower alcohol prices.

Read More »

A 50-year-old Moroccan man was recently acquitted of sexual assault charges after impersonating a muscular Italian man on Tinder to sleep with a woman.

In one of the most bizarre legal cases we’ve ever covered, a Belgian man of Moroccan descent allegedly deceived a 47-year-old woman into sleeping with him by posing as a muscular Italian man named ‘Ben’. In 2018, the accused and his “victim” met on the popular dating app Tinder and agreed to engage in consensual sexual relations inspired by the hit book and movie series Fifty Shades of Grey. The woman agreed to be blindfolded during their encounter to better recreate the Fifty Shades of Grey atmosphere, but at some point, she felt like something was off, so she took off her blindfold to discover that the Italian hunk she had met on Tinder was a Moroccan man with a visible belly.

Read More »

A Chinese motorist claims that his new Xiaomi SU7 Max driver fatigue warning keeps triggering because of his really small eyes.

Mr. Li, a young driver from China’s Zhejiang Province, recently bought the luxurious Xiaomi SU7 Max, a beautiful EV sedan powered by a powerful motor capable of taking the car from 0 to 60 mph in just 2.78 seconds. It’s one of the most coveted electric cars in the world right now, but for Li, it has been a pain to drive. Soon after taking his new ride out for a drive, the Chinese man started hearing the “Please focus on driving” warning sound, even though he was not distracted and was watching the road in front of him. The message “Focus on driving, pay attention to safety” kept showing up on the car’s digital display as well, and it took him a while to figure out that his eyes were the problem.

Read More »

A 70-year-old Spanish beekeeper was so upset about being stopped by traffic police that he set his bees on the officers, causing them to take shelter in a restaurant.

An unusual incident took place last Friday, on the N-II road in Cervera, a small town in the Catalonian province of Lleida. A local police patrol noticed that the driver of a van wasn’t wearing a seatbelt and was driving erratically, so they pulled him over. The 70-year-old man immediately set the tone of the interaction with the phrase “I should have run you over!” and things only got more heated from then on. Suspecting that the man was under the influence of alcohol, the officers asked him to take a breathalizer test, which yielded a result of 0.38mg/l, but when they asked him to repeat the procedure to confirm the first reading, the driver became really upset and threatened to kill them.

Read More »

Inspired by iconic stock markets like Wall Street, Qingdao Beer Exchange is a unique bar concept where beer prices fluctuate in real time according to customer demand.

Located in Qingdao, China’s unofficial beer brewing capital, the Qingdao Beer Exchange offers a unique beer drinking experience, with patrons being able to purchase various types of beer at constantly changing prices directly influenced by their purchases. A dynamic circular display above the large venue shows real-time prices and sales data, with the most purchased beers surging in price and the least purchased brews getting a discount. Rising beer prices are displayed in red, and falling ones in blue. Prices can only fluctuate by 10 percent every day, to ensure that no serious market manipulation occurs, and the beers are reset to base price every day. Every week, based on sales data, the facility considers lowering the base prices of the beers and temporarily increasing the price fluctuation range to 20 percent.

Read More »