An Ethiopian farmer has lost almost one-third of his life savings - to rats.
The 52-year-old farmer from central Ethiopia didn't trust banks, and fearing that a house fire might burn his money if he kept it indoors, decided to stash his cash in a haystack.
But rats in the haystack ate nearly 2,000 pounds worth of the 6,200 pound deposit.
The unnamed farmer is thought to be reviewing his banking arrangements.
If you're going to break out of prison, you might as well do it properly.
Police in Chile this week discovered a tunnel intended to get prisoners out of the Colina II jail, but it wasn't the sort of cramped, claustrophobic and dangerous structure you see in the movies.
The 230-foot long tunnel resembled an underground mine structure, built with cement and wooden beams, with electrical power, carts for hauling away dirt and rock, and nearly high enough in some places for an adult to stand upright.
Police said the wives of two prison inmates had hired four experienced miners to build the escape tunnel, which led from a nearby house toward the facility and was less than 100 feet short of the prison when it was discovered.
Police heard about the tunnel while monitoring prisoners' telephone conversations as part of an investigation into drug trafficking.
A special notice from newsreader and blogger, John Turner.
On Monday 31st March 2008 I shall read the International News on SaintFM for the last time.
My period as Manager of the Bank of St. Helena comes to an end on that day, and so I will no longer be coming into town early to open up the bank and read the International News.
This weblog will stop then, too. I hope the stories have amused you and thank you for your supportive feedback.
I will continue broadcasting on SaintFM on Wednesday afternoons, from 16:30-19:00h GMT, presenting "Rock+". In that programme I also feature the strange items from the world’s press that have been part of the International News for the last three years. If you can, please join me then.
Best wishes
JT
A Finnish library user apparently thought 'better late than never' and quietly returned a book that had been on loan for more than 100 years.
The library sticker inside the cover, and the old-fashioned handwriting on it, showed the book was officially loaned out at the beginning of the last century. The library had long since lost track of the loan but was pleased to welcome it back into its collection.
The library is also keen to talk to the book's returner, but he or she chose to remain anonymous.
SaintFM thinks that may be because, if Finland's files for overdue books are about the same as St. Helena's, the fine will be in the region of £3,000.
If you don't fancy the green beer we highlighted last Friday, how about red beer instead?
The communist state of North Korea, best known for its poverty, propaganda and nuclear sabre rattling, has developed one of the highest-quality beers in the region.
Early this decade the country bought the brewing plant from a disused brewery in Wiltshire, dismantled it, shipped it to North Korea and reassembled it. After a little fine tuning the new beer, described as a full-bodied lager a little on the sweet side, went on sale and is said by foreigners who have tried it to be infinitely superior to the mass-marketed beers available in South Korea.
Better still, a 640 ml bottle of sells for about 35 pence.
But do not expect to see North Korean beer invading overseas markets any time soon. North Korea says it simply doesn't have the infrastructure to package and ship the beer for export.
SaintFM wonders why it is that North Korea can work out how to make nuclear weapons but can't manage to export beer.
The president of South Korea, Lee Myung-bak, says that if government staff have time to play golf they are not working hard enough.
Lee, a former construction boss, is widely known to start work at 7:30 am, and expects his staff to do the same. He says Government workers, including himself, are the people's servants, so should work harder than their masters, the people.
For the presidential staff there is no actual ban on playing golf, but the threat is clear. "When you're working hard there's never enough time, so it would be a feat to be playing golf," he says.
Professional golfer Tripp Isenhour has hit a Birdie. Indeed, it was almost an Eagle. And he's in big trouble over it.
The golfer is facing possible jail after his golf ball hit and killed a hawk that is protected by conservation laws.
Isenhour has admitted hitting the ball at the hawk, but has denied trying to harm it. "I was trying to simply scare it into flying away", he said.
If convicted of cruelty to animals and killing a migratory bird, Isenhour could face a fine and up to a year in jail.
How would you like to drink green beer? A brewery in Australia is betting that its customers will.
The beer isn't coloured green, and the production process and taste are exactly as they were before. But all the greenhouse gases generated in the production of the beer, from the picking of the hops to the empty bottle landing in the recycling bin, have been offset by planting trees. Trees absorb the major greenhouse gas, CO2, and produce oxygen, thus improving the environment.
The beer is called Cascade Green, and the company's marketing manager said all of the tree-planting costs of the new beer will be absorbed by the company and will not be passed on to consumers.
SaintFM wonders if CO2 producing companies on St. Helena could be persuaded to make a similar investment in the Millennium Forest.
A Japanese company has announced plans to get its staff drinking at the company's expense.
Managers at Japan General Estate Co who supervise 20 or more people will have a budget of around 1,500 pounds a month to take them out drinking. Managers with fewer than 20 workers will have 1,000 pounds a month.
The company says the move is intended to help with staff communication.
Japan General Estate is renown for its other unorthodox work policies, such as paying extra to employees who do not smoke.
SaintFM asked SHG’s Social Development Planner Ann Muir if drinks on the company will be part of the new employment legislation proposed for St. Helena . She said it wouldn't be required but that wouldn't stop employers from introducing it on a voluntary basis.
A Japanese pin-up model has walked free from court because of the size of her breasts.
The bikini model was accused by a man of kicking a hole in the wooden door of his room and crawling inside, apparently because he was with another woman.
In court her defence counsel held up a plate showing the size of the hole, and showed that she could not have squeezed through it with her 44-inch bust.
As a result the Tokyo High Court threw out the case, saying there was reasonable doubt over the man's account.
So who works harder; you or your boss?
The vast majority of American workers say they do.
77 percent of respondents to a poll by an employment website argued they toiled longer and harder than the occupants of the manager's office.
The survey company highlighted the rising gap between boardroom pay and that of ordinary staff in America as a key reason for the survey's results.
If, like me, you feel that if you hear songs by Barney or the Teletubbies one more time you will go mad, there may be light at the end of the tunnel.
Former rock musician Ray Andersen, who played with the likes of Bruce Springsteen and Meat Loaf, has turned his attention to music for pre-school children.
Recently in south London the newly-styled "Mr Ray" performed to an audience who stood on their seats strumming wildly on copycat rock guitars, or jumped around like punk rockers. There were even bouncers do deter potential crowd surfers and stage divers. The audience were mostly between three and four years old.
The new music is called "Kindie" -- a combination of kids' and "indie" or independent music, and aims to oust the grinding of "The Wheels on the Bus" from the family car CD player.
And Mr Ray is not alone. The emerging set of Kindie musicians, including bands like They Might Be Giants and Green Means Go, want their own children to enjoy real music that engages both them and their parents.
For clips and more details go to http://www.mrray.com
Everything you ever wanted to know about leap years.
We have leap years because our calendar counts a year as 365 days, but a complete revolution of the earth around the sun takes around 365 days and 6 hours. After four years, roughly an extra day has accumulated, so an extra day is added to that year to keep the calendar coordinated with the sun.
That is not precise enough, however, so every 100 years, at the turn of the century, the year is declared not a leap year, even though its number is divisible by four. So the year 2100 will not be a leap year.
However, you may remember that 2000 was a leap year, despite being the turn of the century. This is because, for even greater precision, every 400 years the century year is declared a leap year, despite all the preceding rules. So 2000 was a leap year and so too will be the year 2400.
And if that wasn’t enough, some scientists claim that every 4000 years it should switch again. Hopefully by the year 4000, when this first occurs, agreement will have been reached on whether or not that year is a leap year.
In most countries people born on 29th February are required to treat their birthday as falling on 28th February in non-leap years, so you can’t claim to be twenty when you are really eighty.
And lastly, for those ladies intending to take advantage of the convention that says a woman may propose marriage on 29th February, there is something you should know. Tradition dictates that if the man rejects your proposal, he should soften the blow by providing a kiss, one pound currency, and a pair of gloves or a silk gown.
[source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_29]
An Israeli man has caused a storm by querying why his home is not covered by Israeli TV weather maps.
In a letter to the Israel Broadcasting Authority the man asked why national TV weather forecasts did not include Jewish enclaves in the occupied West Bank, such as the one in which he lives.
The IBA replied that the areas in question were excluded because they are (and I quote) "not part of the state of Israel".
Whether the territories,occupied by Israel in 1967, are legitimately part of Israel is at the heart of the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
However, the IBA back-pedalled quickly onto safer ground. It issued an open letter stating that it omitted Jewish settlements purely because they were too small to warrant a separate mention.
The settler who made the complaint claims he was not trying to make a political point and simply wanted to know his local weather forecast.
Police dogs in the city of Dusseldorf are being fitted with rubber shoes to protect their paws while walking the beat.
Police dog handlers say shards of glass and other sharp objects get stuck between the cobbles of Dusseldorf's old town and are dangerous for the canine squad.
Some 20 German shepherd dogs will show off their new footwear at a police fashion show in March.
Whether the female dogs will be issued with matching handbags and hats was not revealed.
Despite Ireland's rich musical tradition, and a record seven Eurovision wins, the nation’s song finished last place in the 2007 Eurovision song contest. And now, the nation’s entry for the 2008 contest is a turkey. Almost literally.
The song “Irelande Douze Point” (that means, Ireland Twelve Points) is sung by a glove puppet, Dustin the Turkey.
Dustin is better known for his burps and thick Dublin accent, and when the song was first played it attracted both applause and boos from the audience.
Irish music star Bob Geldof, who has released a duet with Dustin, denied he was unfit to represent the country just because he is a turkey. "The mere fact of his being a turkey should give Ireland the edge," Geldof said.
Scientists have known for some time that the Earth will eventually become uninhabitable when our sun expands in the final stages of its life. And now they think they know when it will happen.
A team at the University of Sussex, working in conjunction with scientists in Mexico, have studied similar stars and say first the seas will begin to evaporate, filling the air with water vapour and causing runaway global warming that will kill all life as we know it. Then the earth will spiral slowly into the sun and be incinerated.
They suggest either pushing the earth out of its orbit to move it further from the sun, or building a fleet of interplanetary 'life rafts' to carry humans to new planets, further from our dying sun.
The good news is that we have a little while to make a plan. They say the sun's changes won't have much effect for at least a billion years.
SaintFM thinks that on current performance we'll probably have destroyed the planet ourselves long before then.
Scientists around the globe spend their time trying to solve the world's problems; such as climate change, energy shortage, hunger, and snapping rubber bands. Now they have made progress, on the last one at least.
A group of French scientists have made a rubber band from material that can heal itself after a break. All you have to do is press the broken edges back together for a few minutes. The bands can be broken and repaired over and over again.
And the bands are made from recyclable materials which can be broken down with heat, so they are environmentally friendly, too.
Whether the bands can also be persuaded not to fly off and hide in a dark corner wasn't revealed.
A man in Germany was angry when his girlfriend lit up a cigarette in his home and refused to put it out.
So angry, in fact, that he used the entire contents of a fire extinguisher to put out the cigarette, caking her and the apartment in powder.
A police spokesman said "it looked like a bomb had gone off in there."
It seems he was successful in putting out the cigarette. The flames of passion between them also seem to have been extinguished.
A car that can be driven underwater is set to be unveiled at this year's Geneva International Motor Show.
Like something out of a James Bond film, the 'Squba' is a convertible sports car that transforms into an electrically-propelled underwater vehicle that can descend a depth to 10 metres.
The open-top design of the car is described as a safety feature, so passengers to get out quickly during an emergency, though it does mean they all have to wear scuba diving gear.
Prices have not yet been announced.
