Thursday 23 February 2012

Occupy movement spreads to Beijing lavatories



A Chinese student is hoping to become a heroine for women around the world by launching an Occupy movement of her own – in the men's lavatory – in protest at waiting times.

A female Chinese student holds a banner and protests in front of a public toilet calling for more cubicles for women during an Occupy Mens Toilet movement in Guangzhou city, south Chinas Guangdong province, 19 February 2012
A female Chinese student holds a banner and protests in front of a public toilet calling for more cubicles for women during an Occupy Mens Toilet movement in Guangzhou city, south Chinas Guangdong province, 19 February 2012
Fed up with long queues for ladies, Li Tingting led 20 women into a men's public bathroom in the southern city of Guangzhou carrying colourful placards calling for equal waiting times for both sexes.
Now, she plans to take her protest to the capital Beijing, where China'sleaders will gather next month for the annual meeting of the country's rubber-stamp parliament.
"We want senior officials to pay attention to this issue," she told AFP. "It is a big issue for many women. During the protest in Guangzhou, we conducted random surveys and found that the majority of people supported us."
Local media reported after the protest that provincial officials in Guangzhou had responded by agreeing to increase the number of women's lavatories by 50 per cent – a pledge Li says should be taken nationwide.
The issue has sparked a debate on the internet, although not everyone is impressed by the protest.

Chinese 'ghost bride' sold twice into marriage


A woman in China was sold twice into marriage within days, despite both she and the grooms being dead.

Chinese bride and bridegroom
Traditional Chinese wedding: In China they believe in ghost marriages, which is a superstition that sees dead bachelors married off so they can wander the afterlife together
The woman, from China's Hebei Province, near Beijing, died over the Lunar Year holiday, according to the Global Times.
But her family decided to sell her for a "ghost marriage", a superstition that sees dead bachelors married off so they can wander the afterlife together.
Despite Mao Tse Tung attempting to stamp out the practice after he and the Communist Party came to power in 1949, the black market for 'corpse brides' continues to thrive today.
In this case, the family sold their dead daughter, receiving 35,000 yuan (£3,500), where a spirit wedding was conducted. The two were then buried together.
Grave robbers however dug up the brides body, and were caught by police marrying her off to a dead bachelor in another town for 30,000 yuan, it was claimed.
In 2007, a man was arrested after killing and then selling six women, claiming that "killing people and selling their bodies is less work than stealing them from graves."

Sunday 12 February 2012

Office of Fair Trading spent £80 of taxpayers' money on meal at Hooters restaurant



A staff member from the Office of Fair Trading spent nearly £80 on a meal at Hooters – a restaurant famed for its scantily-clad waitresses – using taxpayer funded expenses.

Hooters, a restaurant famed for its scantily-clad waitresses
Hooters, a restaurant famed for its scantily-clad waitresses
The worker from the Government quango ran up a bill of £77.73 entertaining business contacts at the American-themed grill, where diners are waited on by busty female staff.
The meal at the Nottingham branch of Hooters in October 2009 is one scores of claims which left the OFT with a £38,000 food and drink bill over the past two years.
Figures released in response to Freedom of Information requests also show that OFT staff dined at a string of Britain’s top restaurants, including Patterson’s and Chez Gerrard in London, leaving taxpayers to pick up the bill.
Object, the pressure group which campaigns against the sexualisation of women, criticised the OFT for allowing a worker to dine at Hooters.
Anna van Heeswijk, campaign manager, said: "Hooters restaurants use women's breasts to market their burgers and they make it seem normal to view and treat women as nothing more than sex objects.
"What hope do women have for equality when it is seen as acceptable for a government office to use taxpayers' money to support a restaurant which is based on the sexual objectification and degradation of women?"
The OFT claimed the meal at Hooters was claimed by a junior official and that they had been reprimanded for the “poor choice of venue”.
According to the figures, obtained by the TaxPayers’ Alliance, OFT staff spent £1,440 at Patterson's and £1,064.47 at Chez Gerrard.
A further £100 was spent on dining at the Connaught Hotel in Mayfair, while a lunch for Japanese delegates hosted by the OFT's boss John Fingleton at Lutyens, near St Paul's Cathedral, cost £386.44.
In total, the OFT ran up an expenses bill of £572,458 between 2009 and 2011.
That included £10,000 on five-star hotels, such as the luxury Sunrise resort in Nha Trang, Vietnam, and the Grand Hyatt Hotel, Cairo, Egypt.
The TaxPayers' Alliance uncovered the figures after studying payments made using the OFT's Government Procurement Cards – publicly-funded credit cards.
Campaign director Emma Boon said: "It's preposterous that staff at the quango in charge of ensuring we don't get ripped off have spent taxpayers' money in Hooters; it's an inappropriate venue in which to conduct business.”
The OFT said in a statement: "The OFT believes Hooters was a poor choice of venue and has relayed this to the junior official in question. The money was spent on food only, and staff are permitted to fund subsistence costs when travelling away from the office on business."

Saturday 11 February 2012

Rare whisky sells for £44,000





A rare bottle of 1955 Glenfiddich single malt whisky has sold at auction for £44,000 – around £1700 a nip.


Glenfiddich Janet Sheed Roberts Reserve which sold at auction in London to an anonymous telephone bidder for £44,000. 


The bottle of Glenfiddich Janet Sheed Roberts Reserve was sold at auction in London to an anonymous telephone bidder.
It is the second of 11 bottles to be released to the public.
The first sold at Bonhams in Edinburgh in December for a record breaking £46,850, topping the previous world record of just under £30,000 for a bottle of single malt.
The 11 bottles of the 1955 tipple are being released to honour Janet Sheed Roberts, the granddaughter of William Grant who founded the Glenfiddich distillery.
Mrs Roberts, who celebrated her 110th birthday in August, is the oldest living person in Scotland, a spokeswoman for the distillery said.
Proceeds from the sale at the Honourable Artillery Company will go to Walking With The Wounded, a charity dedicated to the retraining and re-education of injured servicemen and women.
The distillery is also supporting a group of injured veterans from the charity who are attempting to conquer Everest.
in 2010, a 64-year-old Macallan malt and Lalique crystal decanter fetched $460,000 (£298,000) at an auction in New York.

Friday 10 February 2012

Toilet training posters for Swansea University students



Swansea University students are being given toilet training after complaints about the state of the loos on their campus.

Toilet posters from Swansea University informing students of toilet etiquette.
A toilet poster from Swansea University informing students of toilet etiquette 
They have blamed "cultural differences" in the way that the toilets are used by foreign students.
A university spokeswoman said: "The posters were produced to help address cultural differences that were unfortunately causing damage and hygiene issues.
"Swansea University is a multi-cultural campus community and the informational posters were produced, for use in both male and female facilities.
"The information was produced in conjunction with the International College Wales Swansea and displayed in key areas around the campus.
"Since the inception of these posters, the situation has greatly improved in the affected areas."
But the posters have sparked outrage at the university which has 18,000 students and boasts alumni including author Kingsley Amis, rock star Nicky wire of the Manic Street Preachers and England cricketer Simon Jones.
Law student Stephanie Preedy, said: "We all needed good A-levels to get into university, yet they don't think we know how to use a toilet?
''It's ridiculous and quite belittling."
Hannah Prosser, a third year English student said: "Most of us found the posters quite funny until we realised it wasn't meant as a joke."

Tuesday 7 February 2012

'Oldest living thing on earth' discovered



Ancient patches of a giant seagrass in the Mediterranean Sea are now considered the oldest living organism on Earth after scientists dated them as up to 200,000 years old.

Scientists say a patch of ancient seagrass in the Mediterranean is up to 200,000 years and could be the oldest known living thing on Earth. Australian researchers, who genetically sampled the seagrass covering  40 sites from Spain to Cyprus, say it is one of the world's most resilient organisms - but it has now begun to decline due to global warming.
Scientists say a patch of ancient seagrass in the Mediterranean is up to 200,000 years old 
Australian scientists sequenced the DNA of samples of the giant seagrass, Posidonia oceanic, from 40 underwater meadows in an area spanning more than 2,000 miles, from Spain to Cyprus.
The analysis, published in the journal PLos ONE, found the seagrass was between 12,000 and 200,000 years old and was most likely to be at least 100,000 years old. This is far older than the current known oldest species, a Tasmanian plant that is believed to be 43,000 years old.
Prof Carlos Duarte, from the University of Western Australia, said the seagrass has been able to reach such old age because it can reproduce asexually and generate clones of itself. Organisms that can only reproduce sexually are inevitably lost at each generation, he added.
"They are continually producing new branches," he told The Daily Telegraph. "They spread very slowly and cover a very large area giving them more area to mine resources. They can then store nutrients within their very large branches during bad conditions for growth."
The separate patches of seagrass in the Mediterranean span almost 10 miles and weigh more than 6,000 tons.
"If climate change continues, the outlook for this species is very bad," he said.
"The seagrass in the Mediterranean is already in clear decline due to shoreline construction and declining water quality and this decline has been exacerbated by climate change. As the water warms, the organisms move slowly to higher altitudes. The Mediterranean is locked to the north by the European continent.
"They cannot move. The outlook is very bad."

Sunday 5 February 2012

Pensioner dies after swallowing dentures during sex session with prostitute


A 74-year-old man died when he swallowed his dentures during a sex session with a prostitute.

The Taiwanese man choked on his dentures during sex with a prostitute, authorities say
The Taiwanese man choked on his dentures during sex with a prostitute, authorities say Photo: ALAMY
The pensioner collapsed at the end of a 30-minute session with the 62-year-old hooker.
Paramedics rushed to the scene but the man, known as Chen, was pronounced dead by the time he arrived at hospital.
Medical staff later found his dentures stuck in his throat, following the incident in New Taipei City, Taiwan.
The man died in Taipei, Taiwan
The prostitute told authorities: "He fell back onto the bed. His eyes were open but he was not moving although I shook his body and tried to wake him up."
Prostitution is illegal in Taiwan but only the women, and not their clients, are penalised and face a fine of up to £600 if caught.
However, in recent years there have been plans to decriminalise the world's oldest profession but with strict rules