MAN BURIED ALIVE ESCAPED WITH THE HELP OF HIS HAT

The power of positive thinking and the Buddhist meditation techniques saved the life of a Chinese construction worker. Yes this is amazing to hear.

It was a cool early spring day in eastern coastal port of the Ningbo. Wang -Jianxin was working at a construction site in the booming city in the ground floor of a building under work. The job that day for the 52-year-old worker was to dig a five-meter ditch. There was nothing to distinguish Mr Wang from the tens of thousands of men across China laboring in one of the biggest building booms that the world has seen.

Without warning, a wall of the ditch collapsed, burying the worker Mr Wang under a huge pile of earth. Like most construction workers in China, he had little in the way of protective equipment except for his tough plastic safety helmet. It was to be enough to save his life. So , he escaped from death with the help of his hat. I think he will wear this hat even when he sleep from now onwards. .. .

HIPPO TAKING SEMINAR ... :-)

Fidel castro steps down

Cuba President, Fidel Castro announced his resignation as president of Cuba and commander-in chief of Cuba's military today, according to a letter published in the state-run newspaper, Granma.

The resignation ends nearly a half-century of an iron-fisted rule that inspired revolutionaries but frustrated around 10 U.S. presidents.

Castro revealed his plans without advance notice by publishing a letter in the middle of the night in state-run newspaper "Granma".

"I will not aspire to, nor will I accept the position of president of the council of state and commander in chief," Castro wrote. "I wish only to fight as a soldier of ideas. ... Perhaps my voice will be heard."

The news is likely to send shock waves across the Cuban island and among the tens of thousands of Cubans who have sought refugee in the United States and other countries.

SHIPS IN THEMIDDLE OF STORM

The 2007 Hurricane Season is on, with the on slaught of the monster hurricane "Dean" - a catastrophic storm and also a category five storm. I'm sure we'll all see the tv coverage of what it's like somewhere on-shore, but here are some stunning pictures of ships in heavy seas, including a wrecked oil rig platform (the likes of which they are evacuating right now, away from the hurricane's path)

NO POLLS IN BENAZIR'S CONSTITUENCY

Pakistan's Election Commission on Friday cancelled the polls in the constituency in southern Sindh province from which slain former- premier Benazir Bhutto was seeking to enter the lower house of Parliament.

"The election process was terminated in National Assembly 207 Larkana-cum-Shikarpur in Sindh due to the death of the leader Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto," the Commission said in a statement.

No fresh date was announced for polls in that constituency.

"As such, fresh proceedings will commence after this election schedule for the said constituencies is announced by the Election Commission, in due course of time and in due process of law," the statement said.

Bhutto was assassinated in Rawalpindi after addressing an election meeting on December 27 by somebody that was still a blurred one. In the aftermath of violent protests against her killing, the Election Commission postponed the parliamentary polls from Jan 8 to February 18.

Election Commission Secretary Kanwar Dilshad said the remaining candidates would not be required to file fresh nomination papers but fresh candidates would be given a chance to file papers.

Polls were also cancelled in a constituency of the assembly of the North West Frontier Province due to killing of a candidate in bomb attack.

Miangul Asfandyar Amir Zeb, a candidate who backed President Pervez Musharraf , was killed with eight others when his car was targeted with a remote controlled bomb in the troubled Swat valley last week in pakistan.

IT'S AN EGG OR A GOLF BALL?

A Python in the forests of Australia yesterday swallowed some golf balls thinking them as eggs . Later the python got sick due to digestion problem . The forest officials found out the python and the python undergone a surgery and finally survived . There are many golf courts in Australia near the forests and the people leave the balls in the golf courts after the play. Beware Pythons !!! Don't eat eggs in Australia !

FROGS LIVING INSIDE ROCKS -SO WEIRD

This mummified corpse of a frog was found in a hollow-flint 'geode' which was cracked open in 1899 by some workmen in a quarry in London. There have been many reports of frogs found inside the rocks; some still living in a kind of stupor but which revived once exposed to the air.

In 1910 a living toad was found when a piece of coal was broken open; another was found in 1906 six feet underground in a solid layer of clay piece. The most commonly found seem to be stuck inside limestone.

The theory is that a small tad-pole somehow enters a crack in a forming nodule or pocket and gets trapped in there as it grows. As it does, the smell attracts tiny insects which feed the toad and keep it always alive. Through this crack also comes water and air. This is fine for some of the many examples that have been found but makes no sense in cases where live frogs have been found in totally sealed or deeply buried pockets.

Some frogs have been found with the impression of their bodies so tightly jammed against the rock 'pocket' that even the skin's crackles can be seen imprinted on the sides of their frog-shaped hole ,meaning the rock formed around them somehow.

SNAKE EATING AN EGG -VIDEO

SCARY FACTS U SHOULD KNOW .....

*If you sneeze too hard, you can fracture a rib. If you try to suppress a sneeze, you can rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and die.

*Nearly a third of all bottled drinking water purchased in the US is contaminated with bacteria.

*Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over 1 million descendents.

*You are more likely to be struck by lightning than to be eaten by a shark.

*You are more likely to be infected by flesh-eating bacteria than you are to be struck by lightning.

*If you urinate when swimming in a South American river, you may encounter the candiru. Drawn to warmth, this tiny fish is known to follow a stream of urine to its source, swim inside the body, and flare it's barbed fins. It will remain firmly embedded in the flesh until surgically removed.

*When a pilot light in a gas barbecue fails to ignite the gas jets properly, it is easy for you to inhale gas accidentally while trying to light it by hand. If this has happened, when the match does light, sometimes a trail of flame will blaze from the jet onto your mouth, filling your lungs with fire. Oddly enough, you would suffocate before burning to death as the flame could consume the oxygen in every breath you would take.

*The soft plastic headphones used on airplanes create a warm, moist environment in the ear canal that is ideal for breeding bacteria. Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.

*On a plane, if the passenger in your seat on the incoming flight had serious gas, then you are sitting on a cushion full of disease-causing microbes.

*Homely criminals get 50% longer jail sentences, on average, than good-looking criminals.

35 WEIRD FACTS THAT U SHOULD KNOW

1. Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.

2. Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite.

3. There are 293 ways to make change for a dollar.

4. The average person's left hand does 56% of the typing.

5. A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes.

6. There are more chickens than people in the world.

7. Two-thirds of the world's eggplant is grown in New Jersey.

8. The longest one-syllable word in the English language is "screeched."

9. On a Canadian two dollar bill, the flag flying over the Parliament building is an American flag.

10. All of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are stuck on 4:20.

11. No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, or purple.

12. "Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".

13. All 50 States are listed across the top of the Lincoln Memorial on the back of the $5 bill.

14. Almonds are a member of the peach family.

15. Winston Churchill was born in a ladies' room during a dance.

16. Maine is the only State whose name is just one syllable.

17. There are only four words in the English language which end in "dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.

18. The characters "Bert" and "Ernie" on Sesame Street were named after "Bert the cop" and "Ernie the taxi driver" in Frank Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life."

19. A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.

20. An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

21. Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur.

22. In most advertisements, the time displayed on a watch is 10:10.

23. Al Capone's business card said he was a used furniture dealer.

24. Los Angeles' full name is "El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciuncula."

25. A dragonfly has a life span of 24 hours.

26. A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.

27. A dime has 118 ridges around the edge.

28. It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.

29. The giant squid has the largest eyes in the world.

30. In England, the Speaker of the House is not allowed to speak.

31. The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.

32. Mr. Rogers is an ordained minister.

33. The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

34. There are 336 dimples on a regulation golf ball.

35. "Stewardesses" is the longest word that is typed with only the left hand.

WEIRD FACTS-- PART 4

The first safety razor was not actually invented by King Gillette himself but by a man named William Nickerson who was Kings partner. They believed that the label bearing Nickersons name would be bad for business, plus it was Kings idea anyway.

The first time the word "hell" was spoken on TV was in an original "STAR TREK" episode entitled "City on the Edge of Forever". The exact quote was "...let's get the hell out of here...", spoken by William Shatner.

The first toilet ever seen on television was on "Leave It To Beaver".

The 'Hundred Years War' lasted 116 years.

The largest eggs in the world are laid by a shark.

The launching mechanism of a carrier ship that helps planes to take off could throw a pickup truck over a mile.

The lead singer of The Knack, famous for "My Sharona," and Jack Kevorkian's lead defense attorney are brothers, Doug & Jeffrey Feiger.

The Les Nessman character on the TV series WKRP in Cincinnati wore a band-aid in every episode. Either on himself, his glasses, or his clothing.

The lifespan of a tastebud is ten days.

The little bags of netting for gas lanterns (called 'mantles') are radioactive--so much so that they will set of an alarm at a nuclear reactor.

The longest U.S. highway is route 6 starting in Cape Cod, Massachusetts going through 14 states, and ending in Bishop, California.

The magic word "Abracadabra" was originally intended for the specific purpose of curing hay fever.

The mask used by Michael Myers in the original "Halloween" was actually a Captain Kirk mask painted white.

The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.

The name for Oz in the "Wizard of Oz" was thought up when the creator, Frank Baum, looked at his filing cabinet and saw A-N, and O-Z, hence "Oz."

The name of the Vulcan's heaven is Sha Ka Ree, this is a play on the name Sean Connery who was considered for the part of Sarek, Spock's father.

The name Wendy was made up for the book "Peter Pan."

The names of the three wise monkeys are: Mizaru: See no evil, Mikazaru: Hear no evil, and Mazaru: Speak no evil.

The national flag of Italy was designed by Napoleon Bonaparte.

The Nobel Prize resulted from a late change in the will of Alfred Nobel, who did not want to be remembered after his death as a propagator of violence - he invented dynamite.

WEIRD FACTS PART 3

The bubbles in Guiness Beer sink to the bottom rather than float to the top like all other beers. No one knows why.

The car in the foreground on the back of a $10 bill is a 1925 Huptmobile.

The car manufacturer Henry Ford was awarded Hitler's Supreme Order of the German Eagle.

The childrens' nursery rhyme 'Ring-a-Round-The-Rosies' actually refers to the Black Death which killed about 30 million people in the fourteenth-century.

The Chinese ideogram for 'trouble' depicts two women living under one roof'.

The cigarette lighter was invented before the match.

The correct response to the Irish greeting, "Top of the morning to you," is "and the rest of the day to yourself."

The cruise liner, Queen Elizabeth 2, moves only six inches for each gallon of diesel that it burns.

The Declaration of Independence was written on hemp paper.

The dome on Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's home, conceals a billiards room. In Jefferson's day, billiards were illegal in Virginia.

The dunce cap of schoolhouse fame originates from a paper cone that was placed on the heads of accused witches during the Middle Ages. When Joan of Arc was martyred, she was wearing one of them.

The Eisenhower interstate system requires that one-mile in every five must be straight. These straight sections are usable as airstrips in times of war or other emergencies.

The famous split-fingered Vulcan salute is actually intended to represent the first letter ("shin," pronounced "sheen") of the word "shalom." As a small boy, Leonard Nimoy observed his rabbi using it in a benediction and never forgot it; eventually he was able to add it to "Star Trek" lore.

The fingerprints of koala bears are virtually indistinguishable from those of humans, so much so that they could be confused at a crime scene.

The first Ford cars had Dodge engines.

The first inter-racial kiss on TV was in an original "STAR TREK" episode entitled "Plato's Stepchildren". The kiss was between Nichelle Nichols and William Shatner.

The first product Motorola started to develop was a record player for automobiles. At that time the most known player on the market was the Victrola, so they called themselves Motorola.

WEIRD FACTS-- PART 3

Soda water does not contain soda.

Some Eskimos have been known to use refrigerators to keep their food from freezing.

Soweto in South Africa was derived from SOuth WEst TOwnship.

Spain literally means 'the land of rabbits.'

Talk show host Montel Williams had a nose job.

Termites eat wood twice as fast when listening to heavy metal music.

The "Grinch" singer and voice of Tony the Tiger is a man named Thurl Ravenscroft.

The "save" icon on Microsoft Word shows a floppy disk, with the shutter on backwards.

The allele for six fingers and toes is dominant in humans.

The Andy Griffth Show was the first spin-off in TV history. It was spun-off from the Danny Thomas Show.

The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

The average scalp has 100,000 hairs. Redheads have the least at 80,000; brown and black haired persons have about 100,000; and blondes have the most at 120,000. (That is more than a thousand hairs in each square inch!)

The band "Duran Duran" got their name from an astronaut in the 1968 Jane Fonda movie "Barbarella."

The bat on the Bacardi symbol is there because the soil where the sugar cane grows is fertile from the excessive guano (bat droppings.)

The Boston University Bridge (on Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts) is the only place in the world where a boat can sail under a train driving under a car driving under an airplane.

SOME COOL WEIRD FACTS

Casey Kasem is the voice of Shaggy on "Scooby-Doo."
Cat urine glows under a black light.
Catgut comes from sheep not cats.
Cats have over one hundred vocal sounds, while dogs only have about ten.
Cheryl Ladd (of Charlie's Angels fame) played the voice, both talking and singing, of Josie in the 70s Saturday morning cartoon "Josie and the Pussycats."
Chop-suey is not a native Chinese dish, it was created in California by Chinese immigrants.
Chrysler built B-29's that bombed Japan. Mitsubishi built the Zeros that tried to shoot them down. Both companies now build cars in a joint plant call Diamond Star.
Clans of long ago that wanted to get rid of their unwanted people without killing them use to burn their houses down -- hence the statement "to get fired."
Clark Gable used to shower more than 4 times a day.
Compact discs read from the inside to the outside edge, the reverse of how a record works.
Crickets hear through their knees.
Crocodiles swallow stones to help them dive deeper.
Daniel Boone detested coonskin caps.
Debra Winger was the voice of E.T.
Despite the hump, a camel's spine is straight.
Dr. Samuel A. Mudd was the physician who set the leg of Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth, and whose shame created the statement for ignominy, "His name is Mudd."
Dr. Seuss and Kurt Vonnegut went to college together. They were even in the same fraternity, where Seuss decorated the fraternity house walls with drawings of his characters.

WEIRD FACTS PART 2

It is a criminal offence to drive around in a dirty car in Russia.
It is believed that Shakespeare was 46 around the time that the King James Version of the Bible was written. In Psalms 46, the 46th word from the first word is shake and the 46th word from the last word is spear.
It is illegal to be a prostitute in Siena, Italy, if your name is Mary.
It takes 8.5 minutes for light to get from the sun to earth.
It was illegal to sell ET dolls in France because there is a law against selling dolls without human faces.
It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.
It's rumored that sucking on a copper penny will cause a breath-alyzer to read 0.
Ivory bar soap floating was a mistake. They had been over mixing the soap formula causing excess air bubbles that made it float. Customers wrote and told how much they loved that it floated, and it has floated ever since.
Jacques Cousteau invented scuba gear while in the French resistance during World War II.
James Doohan, who plays Lt. Commander Montgomery Scott on Star Trek, is missing the entire middle finger of his right hand.
Jean-Claude Van Damme was the alien in the original "PREDATOR" in almost all the jumping and climbing scenes.
Jet lag was once called boat lag, back before jets existed.
John Larroquette of "Night Court" and "The John Larroquette Show" was the narrator of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre."
John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln in a theatre and was found in a warehouse. Lee Harvey Oswald shot Kennedy from a warehouse and was found in a theatre.
John Wilkes Booth's brother once saved the life of Abraham Lincoln's son.
June Foray, the voice of Talking Tina from the classic Twilight Zone episode "Living Doll", was also the voice of Rocky the talking squirrel from "Rocky & Bullwinkle".

WEIRD FACTS-PART 2

The longest recorded flight of a chicken is 13 seconds!
The most used letter in the English alphabet is 'E', and 'Q' is the least used!
The opposite sides of a dice cube always add up to seven!
The original name for the butterfly was 'flutterby'!
The placement of a donkey's eyes in its head enables it to see all four feet at all times!
The poison-arrow frog has enough poison to kill about 2,200 people!
The sentence "The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog." uses every letter of the alphabet!
The sloth (a mammal) moves so slowly that green algae can grow undisturbed on its fur!
The world's termites outweigh the world's humans 10 to 1!
There are more than 10 million bricks in the Empire State Building!
Thomas Edison, lightbulb inventor, was afraid of the dark!
Windmills always turn counter-clockwise. Except for the windmills in Ireland!
Your heart beats over 100,000 times a day!
A dragonfly has a lifespan of twenty-four hours.
A duck's quack doesn't echo. No one know the reason

SOME WEIRD FACTS

A cockroach can live several weeks with its head cut off - it always dies from starvation!
A crocodile always grows new teeth to replace it's old teeth!
A group of geese on the ground is a gaggle, a group of geese in the air is called a skein!
A hard working adult sweats up to 4 gallons per day. Most of the sweat evaporates before a person realizes it's there, though! it is amazing
A hedgehog's heart beats 300 times a minute on an average!
A hippo can open its mouth wide enough to fit a 4 foot tall child inside!
A hummingbird weighs less than a penny!
A 'jiffy' is actually an unit of time for 1/100th of a second!
A lump of pure gold the size of a matchbox can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court!
A quarter has 119 grooves on its edge, a dime has one less groove!
After eating, a housefly regurgitates its food and then eats it again!
Apples are more efficient than caffeine in keeping people awake in the mornings!
Bulls are color blind, therefore they will usually charge at a matador's waving cape no matter what color it is -- be it red or neon yellow!
Camels have three eyelids to protect themselves from blowing sand!
Cat urine glows under a black-light!
Dogs and cats, like humans, are either right or left handed... or is that paws?!
Every time you lick a stamp, you're consuming 1/10 of a calorie!
Human teeth are almost as hard as rocks!
Human thigh bones are stronger than concrete!

ALIEN IN THAILAND

While it is unclear from the photos what is lying on the table but the local residents of this small town in Thailand claim that this “creature” was born by a cow!

Weird Creatures Found on Deep-Sea "Mountain Range"

Abundant new and rare marine species have been discovered on a deep-sea mountain range in the middle of the North Atlantic, scientists say. Exotic worms, colorful corals, unusual sea cucumbers, and a plethora of weird fish are among the creatures that scientists spotted on a recent expedition to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, an underwater range that divides the North Atlantic Ocean in two.

At least one new species, a tiny crustacean called a seed shrimp, is likely new to science, researchers said.

Another exciting find was a "spiral poo worm," an animal first identified in 2005 that deposits spiral-shaped feces, some of which have been found in the fossil record dating back hundreds of millions of years.

"We found lots of these primitive species," said expedition leader Monty Priede, director of the Oceanlab research center at Britain's University of Aberdeen.

The expedition brought together an international team of 31 scientists coordinated by the Norway-based MAR-ECO project and the global Census of Marine Life program initiative.

Over five weeks, the researchers explored and mapped more than 1,500 square miles (3,900 square kilometers) of the deep-sea ridge between Iceland and the Azores islands off Portugal.

"It was like going to a new country," Priede said.

Undersea Alps

Using the latest technology, including remotely operated underwater vehicles, the researchers were able to observe creatures living between depths of 2,600 and 11,500 feet (800 and 3,500 meters).

Until now this region of the ocean had scarcely been explored because of its remoteness and depth.

But the latest findings show that the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is teeming with life. Many species found in abundance there had only recently been discovered and were thought to be very rare. "The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is roughly equivalent in size to the European Alps and is one of the largest areas of habitat available in the ocean," Priede said.

Compared to long, thin sections of the ocean floor that lie closer to continents, the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is much larger and more varied, he said.

The ridge is thought to have a major effect on ocean currents, which influences the productivity and biodiversity of the ocean.

And as is the case with mountain ranges on land, some species prefer one side to the other, Priede said.

"We see different species living on the American and European sides of the ridge," Priede said.

The team brought back thousands of specimens for analysis and left behind six automatic observing stations to provide a continuous feed of measurements and photos over the next two years.

Further voyages planned for 2008 and 2009 will retrieve this equipment and collect more samples, Preide said.

The Most Dangerous Roads in the World

1. Magnificient Guoliang Tunnel Road in China
- Road that does not tolerate any mistakes

In our post about The Most Dangerous Roads in the World we mentioned a few roads that imperil the lives of motorists, or just make it really miserable. The following roads did not quite make the list, but continued to pop up in conversations around the world. They may not be "deadly" as such, but certainly require a keen concentration on driving, as the rock walls in many of them are not known to be a forgiving substance.

The road shown here is the Guoliang Tunnel in Taihang mountains (China). It has been built by villagers themselves, which is an inspiring story in itself:

"Before 1972, the path chiseled into the rock used to be the only access linking
the village with the outside world. Then the villagers decided to dig a tunnel through the rocky cliff. Led by Shen Mingxin, head of the village, they sold goats and herbs to buy hammers and steel tools. Thirteen strong villagers began the project. It took them five years to finish the 1,200-metre-long tunnel which is about 5 meters high and 4 meters wide. Some of the villagers even gave their lives to it. On May 1, 1977, the tunnel was opened to traffic."

The wall of the tunnel is uneven and there are more than 30 "windows" of
different sizes and shapes. Some windows are round and some are square, and they range from dozens of metres long to standard-window-size. It is frightening to look down from the windows, where strange rocks hanging form the sheer cliff above and a seemingly bottomless pit lying below. A village, opposite the tunnel, appears to hang on the precipice.


2. Taroko Gorge Road in Taiwan (Chungheng)

Another one of quite unforgiving roads, consisting of tunnels carved in the mountain rock.





























3. Pasubio (Vicenza), Northern Italy

This is an ancient road, converted to a hiking trail. Mountain bikers love it for the spectacular views, cool tunnels and hair-raising precipices... Some cars (presumably small italian kind) climb the hairpins to service the guesthouse built there.