Imported goblin makes 'extreme demands'

Clever Kamuyedza, a Chitungwiza businessman, acquired a money-spinning goblin from a neighbouring country to help his transport business. However, the goblin started 'to make extreme demands', so Kamuyedza called in Speakmore Mandere, known as Sekuru Shumba, and a team of traditional healers to rid him of the creature.

After three days of consultation about whether the healers could conduct the appropriate ritual, Kamuyedza brought the goblin to Sekuru Shumba's lodgings. Sekuru Shumba beheaded the goblin, and Mr Kamuyedza told his wife to fetch the agreed fee of $15,000 from the car.

At that point Sekuru shouted that the goblin was fighting back. Clara Banda, one of the healers, said there was 'a loud sound coming from the bedroom. The walls of the house were crumbling'. A blast destroyed the house, killing five people including Sekuru and Kamuyedza.

Source: Newsdze Zimbabwe, 27 January 2013

Melting money

Canada's new polymer $50 and $100 dollar notes melt in intense heat. There have been reports of wads of notes melting together when left inside hot cars, or in metal tins.

 

 

Source: The Star, 12 July 2012

Galoshins

Doctor Brown: Here comes I old Doctor Brown
                         The best old doctor in the town.
Anon:               Well doctor what can you cure?
Doctor Brown: I can cure the plague, within, without,
                         Also the palsy and the gout,
                         Bring me an old woman, three score and ten
                         The knuckle joint of a big toe broke,
                         I'll take it off and put it on again.
Anon:               Well done doctor. What is your medicine?
Doctor Brown: A wee bottle in my waistcoat pocket called:
                         Hens pens, peezy weezy,
                         Bumbie's bacon, donkey's treacle,
                         Sap of the poker, juice of the tongs,
                         Three turkey's eggs, nine miles long.
                         Put that in a mouse's blather,
                         Stir it up with a wild pig's feather.
                         Put three drops in Jack's ear
                         And he'll get up and sing a song!
Jack:                 Once I was dead but now I'm alive,
                         God bless the old doctor who made me survive.

Or, in another version:
MC:                  And what can you cure, Doctor?
Doctor Broon:  I can cure all sorts.
MC:                  And what kind o all sorts.
Doctor Broon:  Liquorice allsorts. I've got a little bottle
                         here of inksy pinksy parleyvous, all covered
                         over wi cats' feathers and midges' ribs.
                         I shall put a little on his nose.
                         I shall put a little on his toes.
                         Rise up Jack and sing a song ...

from Galoshins Remembered, ed. Emily Lyle (Edinburgh: NMS, 2011)

Base metal into gold

KARACHI/TURBAT: Thousands of old one-rupee coins were sold for millions of rupees in the Makran region on Tu
esday in what became a ‘gold rush’ in the area. Throughout the day, people spent their time looking for the humble golden-coloured coin which was being sold for as much as Rs1,000 in some cases -- though no one quite knew why. It was rumoured later in the day that it was being smuggled to Iran which was buying it because “it contained uranium”. Regardless of whether or not there was any truth in the story, the frenzy persisted all day.

“I had heard another rumour in the morning that jewellers are buying it because it’s full of gold,” said Murad Baloch, a beggar in Turbat. “I don’t care about rumours. I sold 150 for Rs45,000 and bought myself a new motorbike.” He thinks he has earned it for he has been begging for coins all his life. [...]

Source: The News International, 6 June 2012

[…] “At least seven people have asked me for the old coins since the morning,” said Ahmed, a paan-shop owner on Tuesday. “I don’t understand what the deal is.” A man offered up to Rs. 1,000 for a single coin to Ahmed, who finds it anything but believable. And he is not alone. Many paanwalas and shopkeepers told the News about being piqued by people asking for the all-but-worthless copper coin that the State Bank stopped issuing about a year ago. There were also reports that the asking price for a coin had reached Rs 2,500 on Wednesday. […] Syed Wasimuddin, chief spokesperson for the State Bank of Pakistan, said that he first found out about the rumour from a regional Sindhi newspaper which called him for his version. “It started in the interior of Sindh. The rumour is that the government has inadvertently mixed gold in the making of the ‘brown’ old coins which it soon realised and immediately stopped issuing.” 

Source: The News International, 7 June 2012

Subsequent follow-up reports in the Express Tribune, The News International, the Telegraph and Forbes.

London riots rumour round-up

An analysis of Twitter rumours spread during the London riots in a recent issue of The Guardian included the following beautiful stories:

• The London Eye was on fire
• Rioters had released a tiger from London Zoo and it was no on the loose on Primrose Hill
  
• Rioters had broken into McDonalds and were cooking their own food

Who's the Fool Now?

Martin said to his man
Fie, man, fie
Martin said to his man
Who's the fool now?
Martin said to his man
Fill thou the cup and I the can
Thou hast well drunken, man,
Who's the fool now?
Thou hast well drunken, man,
Who's the fool now?

I saw the man in the moon
I saw the man in the moon
I saw the man in the moon
Clouting of St Peter's shoon

I saw a hare chase a hound
I saw a hare chase a hound
I saw a hare chase a hound
Twenty miles above the ground

I saw a goose ring a hog
I saw a goose ring a hog
I saw a goose ring a hog
And a snail bite a dog

I saw a mouse catch a cat
I saw a mouse catch a cat
I saw a mouse catch a cat
And the cheese to eat a rat

Foreign workers bathe in water tanks after sex

Worries about drinking from a tainted water tank in which an Indonesian maid's body was found may have subsided, but some Woodlands residents have now revealed that they believe foreign workers are using the water stored in rooftop water tanks to bathe themselves.

About 150 residents gathered at a dialogue session with the Sembawang Town Council management and representatives from the Public Utilities Board (PUB).

Some residents claimed that they have seen workers emerging from the rooftop water tank room with bathing towels. Residents also believe that the workers have brought women to the water tank room for sexual trysts, and that the men bathe in the tanks after having sex.

Reported by AsiaOne News, 8 June 2011

The promised future

WC2, 31st May 2008

Chako Paul City

Chinese media tempted by fantasy of women-only Swedish town

The town, supposedly founded in 1820 in the northern Swedish woods by a wealthy widow, boasts 25,000 residents and a medieval castle, according to the Chinese news agency Xinhua.

A pair of blonde female sentries stand guard at the unnamed town, referred to in reports as "Shakebao" or “Chako Paul City”, and men wishing to enter risk being “beaten half to death” by police.

In addition, many of the town’s female residents turn to homosexuality “because they could not suppress their sexual needs”, the Chinese news service Harbin News reports. The story also formed the basis of a Shanghai Media Group television report.

But Claes Bertilson, a spokesperson for Sweden’s Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR), is doubtful about the claims made by the Chinese media about Sweden’s supposed “women-only” town.

“I’ve never heard anything about it,” he told The Local.

“At 25,000 residents, the town would be one of the largest in northern Sweden, and I find it hard to believe that you could keep something like that a secret for more than 150 years.”

Bertilson was also at a loss as to where the fictitious account could have originated.

“I have no idea where something like this could have come from,” he said.

Accuracy aside, the Chinese press reports provide a plethora of titillating details about life in the mythical Swedish town.

Most of the town’s all-female population is employed in the forestry industry, with many sporting a “thick waist belt full of woodworking equipment”, according to Xinhua.

And women who decide to leave the town to fulfill their carnal desires are only allowed to re-enter Chako Paul City if they agree to bathe and undertake several other measures designed to ensure that their out-of-town trysts don’t negatively affect the mental state of other women in the town.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Xinhua adds that “Chako Paul's tourism industry is increasingly prosperous”.

“Hotels and restaurants are everywhere, to receive women from around the world,” the agency reports.

Although Per Wilhelmsson of the tourist office in Umeå in northern Sweden said he had never heard of Chako Paul City, he did confirm that tourism in the area is bustling.

“Our tourism industry is doing quite well, among the best in northern Sweden,” he said.

He was fairly certain no “women-only” city existed in northern Sweden, adding that the story reminded him of a stunt carried out in the 1980s by Pajala, a northern Swedish town suffering from a different problem.

“They arranged for bus loads of women to come up to this town because there weren't enough of them,” he explained.

When asked what else might be drawing tourists to northern Sweden besides the chance to visit an isolated town filled with sexually frustrated females, Wilhelmsson had a theory of his own.

“It’s hard to say for sure, but I think part of it might be increased interest following our designation as Europe’s Cultural Capital for 2014,” he said.

The Local, 5th October 2009

The Good Ship Venus

'Twas on the good ship Venus,
By Christ you should have seen us,
The figurehead was a whore in bed,
And the mast was the Captain's penis.

CHORUS:
Frigging in the rigging,
Wanking on the planking,
Masturbating on the grating,
There's fuck all else to do.

The Captain's wife was Mabel,
Whenever she was able,
She gave the crew their daily screw,
Upon the galley table,

The cabin boy's name was Kipper,
A cunning little nipper,
He lined his arse with broken glass,
And circumcised the skipper.

The ladies of the nation
Arose in indignation,
They stuffed his bum with chewing gum,
A smart retaliation.

The ship's dog's name was Rover,
We fairly bowled him over,
We ground and ground that faithful hound,
From Singapore to Dover.

The First Mate's name was Hopper,
By Christ, he had a whopper,
Twice round his neck, once round the deck,
And up his arse for a stopper.

The Captain's randy daughter,
She fell into the water,
Delighted squeals revealed that eels,
Had found her sexual quarter.

'Twas on the China Station,
To roars of approbation,
We sunk a junk with a load of spunk,
By mutual masturbation.

The Second Mate's name was Carter,
By God, he was a farter,
When the wind wouldn't blow and the ship wouldn't go,
We'd get Carter the farter to start her.

The cook whose name was Freeman,
He was a dirty demon,
He served the crew with menstrual stew,
And foreskins fried in semen.

The Captain of that lugger,
By Christ, he was a bugger,
He wasn't fit to shovel shit,
From one ship to another.

The Third Mate's name was Wiggun,
By God, he had a big 'un,
We bashed that cock with lump of rock
For frigging in the rigging.

The next Mate's name was Andy,
By God, that man was randy,
We boiled his bum in red-hot rum,
For coming in the brandy.

The Fourth Mate's name was Morgan,
A homosexual Gorgon,
A dozen crow in rows could pose,
Upon his sexual organ,

On the trip to Buenos Aires,
We rogered all the fairies,
We got the syph at Tennerife,
And a dose of clap in the Canaries.

Another cook was O'Malley,
He didn't dilly dally,
He shot his bolt with a hell of a jolt,
And whitewashed half the galley.

The Captain was elated,
The Crew investigated,
The found some sand in his prostate gland,
He had to be castrated.

Another Mate's name was Paul,
He only had one ball,
But with that cracker he'd roll terbaccer,
Around the cabin wall.

The Boatswain's name was Lester,
He was a hymen tester,
Through hymens thick he'd shove his prick
And leave it there to fester.

The engineer was McTavish,
And young girls he did ravish,
His missing tool's at Istanbul,
He was a trifle lavish.

A homo was the Purser,
He couldn't have been worser,
With all the crew he had a screw,
Until they yelled, "Oh, no sir."

'Twas in the Adriatic,
Where the water's almost static,
The rise and fall of arse and ball,
Was almost automatic.

The ship's cat's name was Hippy,
His hole was black and shitty,
But shit or not it had a twat,
The Captain showed no pity.

So now we end this serial,
Through sheer lack of material,
We wish you luck and freedom from
Diseases venereal.

Red mercury

JEDDAH: The feverish search for Singer sewing machines driven by a superstitious notion that they possessed mysterious powers to fulfill every human wish has lost its tempo as the common man is slowly realizing that it is another ploy to dupe the naive public, particularly in Saudi Arabia and Jordan.

Nobody has yet been arrested on the charge of launching the hoax claiming that red mercury inside the machines can capture a wish-granting genii and convert its owner to an Aladdin with the Magic Lamp, a fantasy almost every child in the Middle East knows.

However, it is yet a mystery how the sewing machine has been elevated to the status of the magic lamp.

Interior Ministry spokesman Mansour Al-Turki described the rumors “as false and deceptive” in a recent statement.

Following the rumor, the price of a Singer machine reportedly catapulted last week.

“There is no such thing as red mercury except in the world of superstition and magic,” said Khaled Kamakhi, former rector of the Institute of Research and Consultancy at Taiba University in Madinah.

According to rumors going around on the Internet, a sewing machine can be proved to contain red mercury if a phone signal cuts off when held close by. Buyers from street stalls were using their mobile phones to test the machines, Al-Watan newspaper reported yesterday.

Commenting on the rumor Kamakhi said, a strong static electricity field could be the cause of disruption in the mobile line.

According to conspiracy theorists, red mercury was developed by Soviet scientists in the 1980s, but its existence has since been covered up by US military because of its potential use as a weapon of mass destruction.

Ahmad Bushaala, a teacher of inorganic chemistry at Taiba University, said the rumors about red mercury were circulated by Russian scientists in the early 1980s after developing a smart nuclear bomb that could kill people without harming the buildings and streets.

According to an article in the Russian newspaper Pravda in 1993, red mercury was a superconductive material used for producing high-precision conventional and nuclear explosives.

It was also reported that Russian businessmen offered red mercury for sale throughout Europe and the Middle East and found many buyers who would pay almost anything for the substance even though they had no idea what it was all about.

The tendency of easily being carried away by rumors has been lampooned by messages appearing on mobile phones and websites, such as “I adore you more than red mercury” or “I love you more than an old Singer machine.” Another message suggested the name Singer for a new baby.

"Source of Singer hoax remains a mystery", Arab News 17th April 2009

Other reports in the press this week:

Sewing machine frenzy in red mercury hoax

Saudi Arabia gripped by "red mercury" hoax

Man cuts losses in Singer scam

Paying the price for red mercury mania

"Red mercury" rumors gain ground

Big Rock Candy Mountain

One evening as the sun went down and the jungle fire was burning
Down the track came a hobo hiking and he said boys I'm not turning
I'm headin for a land that's far away beside the crystal fountains
So come with me we'll go and see the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains there's a land that's fair and bright
Where the handouts grow on bushes and you sleep out every night
Where the boxcars are all empty and the sun shines every day
On the birds and the bees and the cigarette trees
Where the lemonade springs where the bluebird sings
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains all the cops have wooden legs
And the bulldogs all have rubber teeth and the hens lay soft boiled eggs
The farmer's trees are full of fruit and the barns are full of hay
Oh, I'm bound to go where there ain't no snow
Where the rain don't fall and the wind don't blow
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains you never change your socks
And the little streams of alcohol come a-trickling down the rocks
The brakemen have to tip their hats and the railroad bulls are blind
There's a lake of stew and of whiskey too
You can paddle all around 'em in a big canoe
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains the jails are made of tin
And you can walk right out again as soon as you are in
There ain't no short handled shovels, no axes saws or picks
I'm a goin to stay where you sleep all day
Where they hung the jerk that invented work
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

I'll see you all this coming fall in the Big Rock Candy Mountains