Rice field art in the country of the rising sun. Each year these guys make new images on their field by planting rice in different patterns making various images. They use different sorts of rice for color. The result is amazing as you can see. It’s a pity they only last as long as it’s time to harvest the rice.  (more…)

  Abandoned  Russian artifacts and installations from bizarre military/scientific research, strangely futuristic forms left to rust and decay - to be found by a curious photographer.     “Master” stumbled upon this installation close to Russian city of Istra (50 km from Moscow) quite by chance, and these mysterious shots were percolating for a while around the web, until the answer was found. According to this little, cryptic, and quite secretive website, the weird alien-like towers are the Experimental Grounds for High-Voltage Generation, the only open-air kind in the world. Amazingly, it’s still in use… as the powerful lightnings rip through the night and the darkened forest - much like in “The Prestige” movie.  (more…)

  Be careful when digging holes in Russia! At a Construction site in Chelyabinsk city, a 5 foot long ’something out of this world’ was caught. While digging a foundation ditch at a construction site, workers discovered an underground river. Later, they noticed some movement in the water. They threw in some of their lunch, and it stirred even more. They eventually caught this creature and pulled it out of its home. They said it was aggressive and tried to bite them, so in a big panic they killed it. You be the judge fact or fiction… Does anyone know what this is?    

The line goes down the block, at five in the morning.

The Tsukiji Market, in Tokyo, has some of the freshest sea food you will ever see, let alone taste. This gigantic, sprawling epicenter of Japanese seafood commerce features hundreds of restaurants, kitchen wholesalers, and forklifts traveling at breakneck speeds. Octopus meatballs, grilled eels, and uni - sea urchin gonads - are all available, at not unreasonable prices.

For years, the tuna auctions were a must-see: starting from 5am, gigantic tunas are laid out for the highest bidder. In 2008, the first specimen sold for over six million yen - about $60,000 dollars. This was not a record: in 2001, a 400+ lb. tuna sold sold for over twenty million yen. More than anything, tourists would flock to this auction, if only to see for one hour the cutthroat competition that only a fishing empire can produce.

Sadly, this same sort of competition has run several fishing stocks to near extinction, at least commercially. In 2006, one investigation discovered that Japanese had illegally caught three times their fishing quota - for the past twenty years, every year. It was a fraud worth $2 billion, in bluefish tuna alone.

These days, tourists are no longer allowed to attend the tuna auction. Officially, camera flashes were distracting auctioneers. But unofficially, tourists just didn’t want to get up at 4am - and had stayed up all night, drinking.

It’s cannibalism at its sweetest.

The body bakery, in Thailand, specializes in delicious body parts. Made out of dough, raisins, cashews and chocolates, this specialty draws up to a hundred customers a day. The baker isn’t merely macabre - he’s an artist.

Kittiwat Unarrom has a master’s in fine art, but a family in the baking business. Sixty miles from Bangkok, he applies his art skills to the otherwise innocent profession of breadmaking. Faces seem especially popular, but the bakery provides tasty pastries for every limb.

Kittiwat’s ‘Human Bread‘ unnerved the neighbors at first - but the business is still going strong. And Kittiwat likes to suggest that there is a lesson in all of this: not to put so much stock in outward appearances.

They are revered, praised, and toasted.

They are cherry blossoms - sakura - and they bloom for mere days. In Japan, their arrival is a national event: wide-eyed newscasters narrate elaborate national maps, explaining how one particular region is in 60% bloom. When forecasters get their predictions wrong, by even one day, they issue national apologies.

They are both beautiful, and an excuse to drink sake. They bloom in unbelievably bright colors, and the Japanese stream out en masse to sit in gardens and have picnics as the petals fall. The tradition is known as hanami, and just so happens to coincide with the beginning of spring, the end of the academic year, and multiple other excuses for the Japanese to throw a party.

For a few days only, you can even buy cherry blossom tea. It is surprisingly salty.

It’s like a cross between Halloween, and a riot.

In Japan, the mochi nage is performed to bless a new home. After the frame has been completed, a Shinto temple is erected on top of the house. Here, the carpenters and home owner give thanks to the house’s spirit, and wish for luck in the coming years - usually with a toast. Meanwhile, someone pours sake around the house’s foundations. House spirits love sake.

Throughout the ceremony, a crowd gathers on the ground below. Each person - from young children to the very elderly - carries a plastic bag. These bags are - for the moment - empty.

After the ceremony is complete, rice cakes (mochi) are thrown to the people below - and they fight. The crowd rushes to stuff their bags with rice cakes, which in ancient times was a symbol of happiness. In more modern times, the gleeful mob also elbows each other for other symbols of happiness - which, in Japan, can sometimes include packages of instant ramen.

Foreigners are often shocked at the violence - which is all, of course, in good fun.

It is the world`s only parasite museum.

Its centerpiece is a 8.8 meter tapeworm. Selected from a collection of thousands, three hundred or so specimens dot the two stories of Meguro`s Parasite Museum - in Tokyo, next to the Otori-Jinga shrine. The second story includes an interactive world map: press a button for a specific disease, and it will light up wherever the disease is present. There are many, many lights.

The museum was founded in 1953 from the private funds of general practitioner, Satoru Kamegai - and with parasites from his private collection. Born in 1909, the doctor was still finding parsites up until his death in 2002. He found, and exhibited, some rare parasites he found in the body of a coelacanth - when he was 92.

The museum is free - and they`ve had some financial trouble - but they do have a gift shop. T-shirts are availale, as well as some keyrings with tiny, encased parasites.

In Japan, square footage is worth its weight in gold.

They are the province of travelers, and Japanese businessmen who miss their last train. These hotels are available all over major Japanese cities - especially Tokyo, where even cemeteries are housed in skyscrapers. These hotels closely resemble youth hostels - the sleeping berths are two meters long at the most, and maybe a meter wide. You can roll down a screen for privacy. But this is Japan, so the entire operation is often sleek, and spotless.

They are actually quite cozy. For anywhere from 3-5000 yen (~$30-50), you get a bathrobe, free showers, and often wireless internet. The capsules themselves come with radio, alarms, and a television. Toiletries like razors, shaving cream, and so forth are also available - allowing hungover Japanese to show up at the office the next morning, looking fresh as a rose.

The only thing they can’t guarantee is that your bunkmate won’t snore.

There is a house in South Korea shaped like a toilet.

It is the work of no mere waste-obsessed eccentric. This house was built by none other than Sim Jae-duck, the chairman of the organizing committee of the Inaugural General Assembly of the World Toilet Association. Jae-Duck’s organization exists to draw attention to one thing: the criminal lack of sanitary toilets the world over.

For almost half of the world’s population, toilets don’t exist. Without the miracle of indoor plumbing, diseases like cholera can run rampant. In Africa, a movement to ban plastic bags has a sanitary basis: no latrines in sight, residents of Nairobi’s slums would defecate in the bags and throw them out the door.

Back in South Korea, this house has a name: Haewoojae, or “a place of sanctuary where one can solve one’s worries.” The house contains two bedrooms, a few guestrooms, and four deluxe toilets outfitted with elegant fitting and top-of-the-line water conservation. Its center houses a toilet showroom.