QUIRKY WORLD ... A daily look at some of the world’s stranger stories
Authorities are cracking down on vendors in Bangkok’s main backpacker district selling cheap doses of balloons of nitrous oxide, or laughing gas, to tourists.
Eight vendors have been arrested since police first noticed the trend a few weeks ago along Khao San Rd, a pedestrian street lined with bars and cheap hotels, police Lieutenant Colonel Pitiphan Kridakorn said.
Each dose sells for about 130 baht (€3).
Pitiphan said the sale of drug-filled balloons started in popular beaches, such as Koh Samui, Pattaya, and Koh Pagnan — an island known for “full moon” parties fuelled by drugs and alcohol.
Illicit sales of nitrous oxide could cause harmful sideeffects to users and give the country a negative image, he said. Those arrested face up to five years in prison and a $300 (€225) fine for selling medicine without authorisation.
If the key to a long marriage is laughter, these two clowns are set.
Billy Tedeski and Patty Kulwicki tied the knot at an annual clown festival in central Pennsylvania.
The Patriot-News reports that Kulwicki literally reeled Tedeski in to start the ceremony — a bit the Pittsburgh couple performed at Clownfest two years ago.
Tedeski wore a fake nose, black lipstick, and full clown regalia as he exchanged vows with Kulwicki at the festival in Lancaster. The bride wore the same dress she’d used in the skit two years ago, plus a lace headband to go along with her flame-red wig. Guests got in on the act and so did the officiant, a fellow clown.
Children and teenagers are receiving the most pocket money on average since 2007.
The typical weekly amount being handed out to eight to 15-year-olds by their parents and grandparents is £6.50 (€7.50), marking a 52 pence-a-week increase on a year ago, Halifax found.
There has also been a rise in the proportion of children receiving pocket money over the last year across Britain as households ease their purse strings, from 77% in 2012 to 84%.
Increasing numbers of Mexicans are starting to learn Chinese.
Jose Fu, director of the Confucius Institute in Mexico City, attributes the interest to China’s growing world presence. “I think Chinese is taking the place of foreign languages that were traditionally studied, like French, Italian or Portuguese,” he said. “A lot of parents are interested in giving their children this advantage for their professional career.”
Police have seized 14 elephants in raids after busting a gang that provided the animals with false identification papers.
Natural Resources and Environmental Crime Suppression chief Norasak Hemnithi said the unregistered or illegally registered elephants were taken in simultaneous raids on tourist destinations in three southern provinces.
He said the operation followed the discovery of identification certificates issued for elephants that were not living in their registered locations and believed illegally held because they were either smuggled from neighbouring Burma or taken from the wild.
Nomophobia grips Britain
More than half the population claims to suffer from “nomophobia” — the fear of being without a mobile phone, a study suggests.
Some 54% of those surveyed said they worry about being “out of mobile phone contact” — with women 17% more likely to suffer from “nomophobia” than men.
However, only 50% of people bother to secure their devices with a password, the research commissioned by web security firm AppRiver found.
