Reuters - Oddly Enough

Tourist treat in Berlin - city's famous toilets

BERLIN (Reuters) - For tourists tired of traditional sightseeing tours, one Berlin tour guide is offering something altogether different: a tour of Berlin's public conveniences.
Fri, 03 Sep 2010 11:42:37 +0000

Paris metro body heat to help warm building

PARIS (Reuters) - The warmth generated by human bodies in the Parisian metro will help heat a public housing project in the city centre, the capital's largest owner of social housing said on Friday.
Fri, 03 Sep 2010 16:26:31 +0000

Rat bite ruins Indian shooter's Commonwealth bid

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Indian shooter Sanjeev Rajput is blaming the sharp teeth of a rodent for robbing him of his shot at glory on home soil at next month's Commonwealth Games.
Fri, 03 Sep 2010 08:01:21 +0000

German party mistakenly hands out porn pens to kids

BERLIN (Reuters Life!) - To sweeten their first day at primary school German children are normally given a cardboard cone filled with sweets, but schoolchildren in Essen this year opened their cones to find pens which project erotic images.
Fri, 03 Sep 2010 15:54:08 +0000

Dirty jokes and papal rosaries mix in Chile mine saga

COPIAPO, Chile (Reuters) - Contact between 33 Chilean miners trapped for weeks underground and the outside world took an irreverent twist on Thursday, as the men passed dirty jokes to the surface -- and the Pope sent down blessed rosaries.
Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:37:13 +0000

Iran's first lady of skiing trains on grass

DIZIN, Iran (Reuters) - Skiing down a grassy mountain in the middle of summer is not the only unusual thing about Marjan Kalhor. She is also an Olympic competitor -- a rare thing for a woman in a male-dominated sport in Iran.
Thu, 02 Sep 2010 10:30:07 +0000

Cup of tea forces UK jet to make emergency landing

BERLIN (Reuters) - A British airplane en route to Poland was forced to make an emergency landing in Germany after a 56-year-old woman spilt a hot cup of tea on herself, German police said on Wednesday.
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 13:16:38 +0000

Top Gear's Stig finally unmasked

LONDON (Reuters) - The identity of "The Stig," the mystery test car driver on the popular BBC TV motoring show "Top Gear" was revealed on Wednesday after the broadcaster lost a legal battle to keep his name secret.
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 13:42:57 +0000

UEFA bans vuvuzelas from European competition

BERNE (Reuters) - Vuvuzelas have been kicked out of European competitions after UEFA said that the controversial plastic trumpets drowned out supporters and detracted from the emotion of the game.
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:31:34 +0000

Dutch colleges angry over sex job ads for freshmen

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A number of Dutch colleges are considering legal action against the publisher of a move-in guide for new freshmen, after the company included an ad recruiting students for jobs as online sex workers.
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 11:26:22 +0000

Cambodia aims high with record-breaking skyscraper

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Cambodia is aiming for the record books with an ambitious plan to construct Asia's tallest building, a 555-metre skyscraper worth $200 million (£130 million), Prime Minister Hun Sen said on Wednesday.
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 11:25:32 +0000

Chinese villagers forced to change untypable name

BEIJING (Reuters) - Villagers in eastern China has been forced by the country's unbending bureaucracy to change their family name as the character is so rare it cannot be typed.
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 08:11:52 +0000

France arrests man for trying to dazzle pilots with laser

PARIS (Reuters) - A man appeared in court Tuesday accused of trying to dazzle pilots with a laser beam as they were landing at France's second-busiest airport Paris Orly, aviation authorities said.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 17:30:28 +0000

Parched English fields reveal ancient sites

LONDON (Reuters) - The exceptionally dry early summer months in Britain have revealed the ghostly outlines of several hundred previously unknown ancient sites buried in fields across the English countryside.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:59:32 +0000

Tiny Antarctic creatures hint at sea level rise

OSLO (Reuters) - Tiny marine creatures found on the seabed on opposite sides of the vast West Antarctic ice sheet give a strong hint of the risks of sea level rise caused by climate change, scientists said Tuesday.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:56:11 +0000

Iran's animal man shares home with snakes, croc and monkey

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Filming with animals can be frightening for actors but a man living in a tiny apartment in Tehran with his crocodile, three snakes, an eagle and a miniature monkey says he can help.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 12:46:14 +0000

Long-lived Dutch might be bad news for insurers

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The Dutch are set to live longer -- good news for them but bad news for insurers that are expected to suffer from higher capital requirements and tighter profit margins as a result.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 11:50:23 +0000

Football star Troy Polamalu's hair insured for $1 million

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - American football star Troy Polamalu has a price on his head -- with an anti-dandruff shampoo brand taking out a $1 million (647,000 pound) insurance policy on his trademark mane of black ringlets.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 07:40:20 +0000

Chicken sexers in Japan lament the decline of an industry

TOKYO (Reuters) - Chicken sexers in Japan once enjoyed well-paid careers with overseas travel and job security but industry changes mean their expertise is not needed so widely and less people are seeking to join the profession.
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 06:00:42 +0000

"Invisible" gang leader escapes from Venezuela jail

CARACAS (Reuters) - One of Venezuela's most notorious criminals lived up to his gang's name "The Invisibles" by fleeing jail in an embarrassing turn for the government, which is under fire because of crime as an election nears.
Mon, 30 Aug 2010 17:52:36 +0000