The World’s Smallest Cell Phone Looks Like A Toy

When it comes down to it, we all love to marvel at the world’s smallest blanks, but they’re generally not that practical. That’s why we doubt we’ll ever find ourselves snapping pics with the world’s smallest camera, keeping fish in the world’s smallest aquarium, or shooting targets with the world’s smallest revolver. But the world’s smallest cell phone might make sense… assuming you don’t need to play Angry Birds, browse the internet, or do anything other than make phone calls. Actually, okay this is probably just as useless as those other things. Still, Japanese company Wilcom thinks the tiny new Strap 2 phone will be a big hit… presumably among people who like working gadgets that look like doll toys from the early 2000’s. Available in white, black and pink, the phone features a one-inch display and an antenna. It will be available in Japan for $380.

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8 Most Extreme Cultural Body Modifications

It is impossible to say who the first people were with stretched ears, or why they did it. Today, many cultures (including our own!) practice the art of ear stretching for many different reasons. Religion, coming of age ceremonies, warding off evil, sexual enhancement and physical beauty are common motivations. However, that just barely scratches the surface as there are many other reasons, as well. People all over the world still practice ear stretching. From the Masai tribes in Kenya to the Huaorani tribe in the Amazon Basin, stretched ears are still a common sight. It is a fascinating testament of human culture that a Western youth can walk into a piercing shop to select stretched ear jewelry while a Hmong youth in Thailand selects from an array of silver tubes.

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The Apatani tribe lives in the Ziro valley in the state of Arunachal Pradesh in India's northeast. Apanti women were considered the most beautiful among the Arunachal tribes; so beautiful, in fact, that they had to make themselves look unattractive as protection from invaders from other tribes. Hence, Apanti women wore large wooden plugs in their noses, a tradition not carried forward by the younger members of the 26,000 people-strong tribe today.

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Most Dinka boys and girls don't cry when the local sorcerer takes a red-hot knife to their dark faces. If they wince or cry or react to the pain they will lose face in the community, so it's best to sit through the process in peace. Facial scarification is practiced throughout Sudan, and various marks across the faces of tribesmen give identity to the tribe and beauty to its women.

Men of the Dinka tribe in South Sudan scar their faces with three parallel lines across the forehead in a rugged display of courage to the tribe. Dinka boys receive their scars around adolescence to mark the transition to manhood, when they take the responsibilities of the other men in the nomadic tribe.

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For some people, this would be totally extreme, but for local Thais, this is completely normal. They ignore the pain because this ritual is a rite of passage to adulthood. This is an annual ritual performed in public to announce to the whole world that they have become adults.

The vegetarian festival in Phuket sees a great deal of devotional activities in the Chinese communities. Trance and heavy piercing are part of the tradition. This festival is held on the Southern Thai island of Phuket every year in October. Most impressive are the processions that are held almost every morning during the ten days of the festival. The processions feature devotees of the different city shrines which act as "mediums" for the Chinese Gods. Some of the mediums put sharp objects (mostly metal objects) through their cheeks as an act of devotion for themselves and for the whole community. Other rituals that are performed include walking barefoot over hot coals and ascending ladders with bladed rungs.

All the mediums act involuntarily while in a trance, which allows them to endure the long piercing sessions. Although the wounds are said to be healed completely after the service, scars accumulate on their faces year after year.

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Human tooth sharpening is the practice of manually sharpening the teeth, usually the front incisors. Historically, many cultures have practiced this form of body modification. In Bali, teeth were filed down because it was thought that the teeth represented anger, jealousy, and other similarly negative emotions. The teeth were also sharpened as a rite of passage for adolescents. Teeth filing was also used by Aborigines for spiritual reasons, similar to assorted Vietnamese and Sudanese tribes. In Mayan culture, the teeth were sharpened, and sometimes had designs carved into them, to distinguish those in the upper-classes. Many cultures would sharpen their teeth to imitate animals, such as the Wapare of inter-tropical Africa, who sharpened their teeth to imitate sharks, as well as kicking out some mandibular teeth during puberty.

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Though scarification is done by people all over the world, it is practiced heavily by Sepik River tribes in Papua, New Guinea as part of an initiation ceremony for men. This is only a small part of a ceremony that lasts for weeks and includes public humiliation, but it's ridiculously painful. The elders of the tribe use razor blades to cut the young men all over their bodies in a pattern that closely imitates the rough skin of an alligator. They believe that the alligator will then consume any semblance of a boy left in their bodies, and they will become men.

(Via)

The lip plate, also known as a lip plug or lip disc, is a form of body modification. Increasingly larger discs (usually circular, made from clay or wood) are inserted into a pierced hole in either the upper or lower lip, or both, thereby stretching it. Archaeological evidence indicates that labrets have been independently invented no fewer than six times, in Sudan and Ethiopia (8700 BC), Mesoamerica (1500 BC), and Coastal Ecuador (500 BC). Today, the custom is maintained by a few groups in Africa and Amazonia.

In Africa, a lower lip plate is usually combined with the excision of the two lower front teeth, and sometimes all four. Among the Sara people and Lobi a plate is also inserted into the upper lip. Other tribes, such as the Makonde, used to wear a plate in the upper lip only. In many older sources it is reported that the plate's size is a sign of social or economical importance in some tribes. However, because of natural mechanical attributes of human skin, it seems that the plate's size often just depends on the stage of stretching the lip and the wishes of the wearer.

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The Kayan women of Northern Thailand are known for the exquisite and incredible brass coils they wear around their necks. They are often called the "long necks" or the "giraffe women" by outsiders and can wear up to 25 coils, which many never take off.

Myth has it that the women will break their necks or be unable to support them if the coils are removed but this is simply not true. Maeneng, above, is the matriarch of her village, and while she is the only one to wear 25 coils, she often helps adjust and repair the coils of other women.

Children are often given their first set of coils at age 5. This consists of a set weighing about 4 1/2 pounds, then new rings are slowly added. In actuality, the Kayan women do not have their necks elongated; instead, it works in the other direction. As the weight of the coils press down, the clavicle is lowered, and with each addition to the neck rings it falls further, compressing the rib cage as well. The shoulders finally fall away to give the appearance of an elongated neck.

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After rape and murder of three young girls, signs of lapses in investigation

Bhandara, Maharashtra: It has been nearly two weeks since three sisters aged 11, nine, and six were raped and murdered  in the  Bhandara district of Maharashtra, but in the tiny village where they lived, nobody has been arrested yet.  The police admits it has suspects but has not been able to zero in on them due to the lack of eyewitnesses.

Shockingly, sources have confirmed that the autopsy in the case seems to have been conducted in a rather unprofessional manner, which could impact the case at the trial stage itself, if the culprits are caught.

Sources say an autopsy was performed by a panel of doctors from the district headquarters in Bhandara  who were not forensic experts.

Fingernail clippings and hair samples of the girls were not collected, which is a requirement for cases of sexual abuse. The post-mortem was reportedly not correctly filmed, which could hurt the case in court.

The day that her daughters were found dead, their mother told NDTV,   "I want the culprits to be caught and hanged in public."

The girls went missing after school on February 14. Their bodies were spotted by a local farmer two days later in a well when he came to water his fields. He then informed the police. The bodies were recovered from the well located just off the major road in the area, the Nagpur-Raipur Highway.

Members of the autopsy team say the police pressured them to hurry with the autopsy.  Speaking to NDTV, Bhandara Superintendent of Police Dr Aarti Singh said, "The police cannot decide who would conduct the post-mortem. If the autopsy team did not have forensic experts to conduct the autopsy, they should have informed us. They are the authority and they should have suggested alternatives."

These details emerged on a day when a team from the National Commission for Women visited the area. Nirmala Samant Prabhavalkar, who heads the team, told NDTV, "It is true that the police were slow to start with the investigation, but now they are exploring all possible options and angles." She added, "There seem to be contradictions in the post-mortem report itself and that is probably the reason why they have not been zero in on anyone even though they have suspects."

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GIANT SINKHOLE DESTROYS CITY

A roughly 30-story-deep sinkhole appeared Sunday in Guatemala City.  Officials believe the giant sinkhole will continue to get larger and they have evacuated nearby neighborhoods in fear that they may be swallowed by the earth.  Scientists are questioning what is at the bottom of the hole.

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Top 10 Pictures That Shocked The World

It has often been said throughout time that a picture is worth a thousand words. Any picture may be worth a thousand words, but only a few rare photos tell more than a thousand words. They tell a powerful story, a story poignant enough to change the world and galvanize each of us. Over and over again…

From the iconic images of Omayra Sanchez’s tragic death to the horrifying images of the Bhopal Gas disaster in 1984, the power of photography is still alive and invincible.

Here is my top 10 list of photos that shocked the world:

10. Kosovo Refugees (Carol Guzy)

 

Carol Guzy, the first woman to receive a Pulitzer Prize for spot news photography, received her most recent Pulitzer in 2000 for her touching photographs of Kosovo refugees.

The above picture portrays Agim Shala, a two-year-old boy, who is passed through a fence made with barbed wire to his family. Thousands of Kosovo refugees were reunited and camped in Kukes, Albania.


9. War Underfoot (Carolyn Cole)

Los Angeles Times photographer Carolyn Cole took this terrifying photo during her assignment in Liberia. It shows the devastating effects of the Liberian Civil War.

Bullet casings cover entirely a street in Monrovia. The Liberian capital was the worst affected region, because it was the scene of heavy fighting between government soldiers and rebel forces.

8. Thailand Massacre (Neil Ulevich)

Neal Ulevich won the 1977 Pulitzer Prize for a “series of photographs of disorder and brutality in the streets of Bangkok, Thailand” (Pulitzer.com).

The Thammasat University Massacre took place on October 6, 1976. It was a very violent attack on students who were demonstrating against Field Marshall Thanom Kittikachorn.

F. M. T. Kittikachorn was a dictator who was planning to come back to Thailand. The return of the military dictator from exile provoked very violent protests. Protestors and students were beaten, mutilated, shot, hung and burnt to death.

7. After the Storm (Patrick Farrell)

Miami Herald photographer Patrick Farrell captured the harrowing images of the victims of Haiti in 2008. Farrell documented the Haitian tragedy with impressive black-and-white stills. The subject of “After the Storm” is a boy who is trying to save a stroller after the tropical storm Hanna struck Haiti.

6. The Power of One (Oded Balilty)

 

 

In 2006, Israeli authorities ordered the evacuation of illegal outposts, such as Amona. Oded Balilty, an Israeli photographer for the Associated Press, was present when the evacuation degenerated into violent and unprecedented clashes between settlers and police officers. The picture shows a brave woman rebelling against authorities.

Like many pictures on this list, “The Power of One” has been another subject of major controversy. Ynet Nili is the 16-year-old Jewish settler from the above picture. According to Ynet, “a picture like this one is a mark of disgrace for the state of Israel and is nothing to be proud of. The picture looks like it represents a work of art, but that isn’t what went on there. What happened in Amona was totally different.” Nili claims the police beat her up very harshly. “You see me in the photograph, one against many, but that is only an illusion – behind the many stands one man – (Prime Minister Ehud) Olmert, but behind me stand the Lord and the people of Israel.”

 

5. World Trade Center 9/11 (Steve Ludlum)

The power of Steve Ludlum’s photos are astounding, and the written description only tends to dilute the impact. The consequences of the second aircraft crashing into New York’s WTC were devastating: fireballs erupted and smoke billowed from the skyscrapers anticipating the towers’ collapse and monstrous dust clouds.

4. After the Tsunami (Arko Datta)

 

One of the most representative and striking photos of the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami was taken by Reuters photographer Arko Datta in Tamil Nadu. He won the World Press Photo competition of 2004. Kathy Ryan, jury member and picture editor of The New York Times Magazine, characterized Datta’s image as a “graphic, historical and starkly emotional picture.”

“After the Tsunami” illustrates an Indian woman lying on the sand with her arms outstretched, mourning a dead family member. Her relative was killed by one of the deadliest natural disasters that we have ever seen: the Indian Ocean tsunami.

Bhopal Gas Tragedy 1984 (Pablo Bartholomew)

 

2. Operation Lion Heart (Deanne Fitzmaurice)

Pulitzer Prize award winning photojournalist Deanne Fitzmaurice won the highly respected award in 2005 for the photographic essay “Operation Lion Heart.”

“Operation Lion Heart” is the story of a 9-year-old Iraqi boy who was severely injured by an explosion during one of the most violent conflicts of modern history – the Iraq War. The boy was brought to a hospital in Oakland, CA where he had to undergo dozens of life-and-death surgeries. His courage and unwillingness to die gave him the nickname: Saleh Khalaf, “Lion Heart”.

Deanne Fitzmaurice’s shocking photographs ran in the San Francisco Chronicle in a five-part series written by Meredith May.

1. Tragedy of Omayra Sanchez (Frank Fourier)

 

Frank Fournier captured the tragic image of Omayra Sanchez trapped in mud and collapsed buildings. The eruption of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano in Colombia 1985 triggered a massive mudslide. It devastated towns and killed 25,000 people.

After 3 days of struggling, Omayra died due to hypothermia and gangrene. Her tragic death accentuated the failure of officials to respond quickly and save the victims of Colombia’s worst ever natural disaster. Frank Fournier took this photo shortly before Omayra died. Her agonizing death was followed live on TV by hundreds of millions of people around the world and started a major controversy. May her soul rest in peace…

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Man Eaten by fish, Man eaten by cat fish

For all those crazy guys who go 'noodling' for catfish and stick their arms down the fish's throat!! This would be 'all the catfish you can eat.'

Each year, a few people were drowning or disappearing mysteriously in Huadu's Furong Reservoir. It was not until recently, when the son of a government official went swimming, in the reservoir and was drowned, that the secret was revealed.

It is a 3 meter long man-eating catfish whose head alone is 1 meter wide! After cutting up the catfish, people were surprised to find the remains of another man inside!

Swimming in the reservoir is now forbidden because it is feared another similar man-eating catfish is still lurking in the waters

 Detailed Analysis 

According to this email forward, the very large fish shown in the attached photographs is a man-eating catfish caught in the Furong Reservoir, a large lake located in China's Huadu District. The message claims that human remains were found inside the giant fish and suggests that it, and possibly other "catfish" like it, are responsible for the "mysterious" disappearances of people in the area.

However, the claims in the message are nonsense. The photographs themselves are genuine, but they do not depict a catfish, man-eating or otherwise. Instead, they show a whale shark. Whale sharks, which are the largest living fish, are filter feeders that live in the ocean. Despite their size, whale sharks are not considered harmful to humans. A Wikipedia entry about whale sharks notes:

This species, despite its size, does not pose significant danger to humans. Whale sharks are actually quite gentle and can play with divers. Divers and snorkelers can swim with this giant fish without risk apart from unintentional blows from the shark’s large tail fin

The following photographs, which are obviously part of the same series, show the whale shark being skinned and cut open to reveal the fish's entrails. They are generally left out of the prank email, presumably because the obvious lack of human remains inside the fish tend to "give the game away"

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World’s Largest Butterfly

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10 Rare Strange Syndromes Nobody Would Want to Have

When it comes to health problems, there is always somebody doing worse than you are. Imagine how awful things would be if your illness made you do strange unacceptable things? How strange and unacceptable? Find out by reading about the 10 rare strange syndromes below.

Progeria Syndrome

  

In a society focused on retaining their youth by plastic surgery and anti-aging creams, you wouldn’t want to wish this on them. An extremely rare genetic affliction, progeria is a condition of premature aging. Occurring in about one in eight million, most do not live beyond the age of thirteen. Some of the signs and symptoms are small fragile bodies, wrinkled skin, and heart disease. If you have ever heard a teenager moan and groan about how they wish they were older, you might want to share this with them.

Cotard’s Syndrome

 

Coming in at number 7, you might not want to watch too many undead movies after this one. Cotard’s syndrome is the delusional belief that you are truly dead, no longer exist, are rotting away, and have lost all your internal organs. It can even include the idea that you are immortal, although cases like this are rare. This syndrome is named after Jules Cotard. Jules describes a patient during a lecture who denied the existence of God, the Devil, several parts of her body, and even her need to eat. This patient later believed she was eternally damned (since she didn’t believe in the Devil, go figure) and could no longer die a natural death. What did she really die of? Starvation, naturally.

Foreign Accent Syndrome

Ever spent the day around someone with an accent and later find yourself talking like them? Imagine waking up from a severe head injury and finding you do it all the time. Foreign accent syndrome is just that. You start talking with what appears to be a foreign accent. Not to be confused with speaking another language entirely. Doctors believe this comes from a severe brain injury or stroke and causes the person to seem to talk with a foreign accent. It makes the person speak their own language with a dialectical or foreign accent. Usually the person who is afflicted with this condition finds it easier to use the accent differences throughout their everyday speech rather than struggle between their natural accent and the foreign one.

Locked-in Syndrome

Remember the movie “Awake”? A patient was totally aware of their surroundings while being operated on and had no way of letting the surgeons know. Number five will leave you paralyzed, literally. Locked-in syndrome is a body paralysis where you can only move your eyes. Unable to move, you are still able to think, hear, and see what goes on around you. The cause of this disorder is still uncertain. Some speculations of the causes vary from traumatic brain injuries, medication overdoses, a stroke, or brain hemorrhage.
Erik Ramsey suffered a stroke after a car accident when he was only 16 years old. This is believed to have caused him to have Locked-in Syndrome. In 2008, Esquire magazine documented his story. To help him communicate, doctors worked with Erik to create a communication system using a computer, through brain implants, that reads electronic signals when Erik thinks of certain words or sounds. Only able to say short, basic words, doctors believe Erik will eventually be able to communicate better.

Proteus Syndrome

 

Named after the Greek sea god, Proteus, even he would not want this condition. Proteus syndrome causes an overgrowth of skin, fatty tissues, blood, bones, and muscle tissue. It is a progressive illness so children may not show any symptoms of this condition at birth.
This extremely rare disorder would have gone further unnoticed where it not for the “Elephant Man” himself, Joseph Merrick. He earned this title by the huge facial tumors and gray tint to his skin. All of his body was affected except for his left arm and genitals. Merrick later died in his sleep from a dislocated neck due to the sheer weight of his head.

Werewolf Syndrome [Hypertrichosis]

 No, this isn’t like Jacob on Twilight. At least he can control his transformation. Part of many circus sideshows, the wolfman has an overabundance of hair. Hair growth is accelerated all over the body in most cases. In others, it only shows up in certain areas. Julia Pastrana spent her life as the bearded lady in the circus. Her condition was so severe that she even grew hair on the palms of her hands. One family in Burma had this disease for four generations. On the bright side, you will be one of the best hair donators for wigmakers.

Lesch-Nyhan Syndrome

 

A rare inherited disorder created by the lack of certain enzymes, it causes a build-up of uric acid. Although it causes severe gout and kidney disorders, self-mutilation is the disorder’s most striking feature. At the age of two or three years old, the children might start biting their own fingers and lips, moving on to head banging, vomiting, spitting, even eating their own feces. Motor function can be so severely affected that the individual may never learn to walk and will have to use a wheelchair for the rest of their lives.
In 2009, an experimental screenplay was created by a local artist, a Professor of Theatre, and a group of undergrad students from Allegheny College called “Chewing your Fingers to the Bone”. It involved several storylines related to this illness. A primetime show, Nip Tuck, also had an episode where a patient needed plastic surgery after chewing off his own lips.

Jerusalem Syndrome

 

Next time you take a vacation, you might want to reconsider making a pilgrimage to Jerusalem after reading this. This mental disorder involves the presence of obsessive ideas, experiences or delusions that are religiously based, triggered by a trip through Jerusalem. Such delusions may be that the affected person believes himself to be an important religious figure, a need to be clean and pure by taking several baths and showers, compulsive clipping of finger and toe nails, and the need to shout Bible verses and psalms.
There are several reported cases of mentally balanced individuals that turn psychotic while in Jerusalem. It is characterized by an intense religious theme and has been known to affect not only Jews, but also Christians and Muslims of many different backgrounds. Such affected individuals will recover after being removed from Jerusalem. Go figure.

Lazarus Syndrome

 

And the dead shall rise! You might want to make a note in your living will that the doctor should wait five or ten minutes before pronouncing you dead. Who knows. You may just have this disorder. Lazarus Syndrome is the spontaneous start of circulation after unsuccessful attempts at CPR. Although rare and the causes are pretty much unknown, the body restarts by itself, reviving the person.
There have been a few documented cases of this disorder. A 61-year-old Delaware woman was pronounced dead and sent to the morgue after repeated attempts to resuscitate her. The morgue attendant later found her alive and breathing. In the UK, a 27-year old man had died of from an overdose of heroin and ecstasy. After trying to resuscitate the man for over 20 minutes, he was declared dead by the doctors. After about a minute, the nurse noticed the man’s heart started beating and they successfully helped to revived him. The man fully recovered.
One of the theories for explaining this rare phenomenon is the buildup of pressure in the chest due to resuscitation efforts followed by relaxation and expansion when the CPR stops. This expansion is thought to trigger the heart’s electrical impulses and thus restarting heartbeat.

Dr. Strangelove Syndrome [Alien Hand]

 

If you ever watch the first Evil Dead or Dr. Strangelove movie, you will understand this one. This disorder is the belief that your hand has a mind of its own, literally. Also called the Alien hand syndrome, the patient believes his hand moves and does things completely on its own, with no regard to command of the brain. It is believed that the “alien hand” will perform such actions as manipulating tools, undoing buttons, and removing clothes. The person is often unaware of the activities of his hand until it is brought to his attention.
Considered to be an unusual neurological disorder, it is believe to occur when the two hemispheres of the brain are separated as in cases of epilepsy or sometimes occurs during brain surgeries, strokes, or infections. The wayward hand is often given a name and considered to be a separate entity. At times, the actions between the two hands seem to go against each other. One example of this is a patient who attempted to smoke a cigarette. His “good” hand placed a cigarette in his mouth, only to have his “evil” hand quickly remove it and throw it away. What was that saying about the one hand knowing what the other is doing?

 

 

 

 

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Redback Spiders Eat Snakes

IT’S a spider-eat-snake world out there –
if you believe these images.
Dramatic photographs sent to our sister paper The Cairns Postthis week show a 14cm-long snake entangled in the web of a redback spider.
The snake had apparently died from the spider’s poisonous bite, and was off the ground and caught up in the web.

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