News of the Weird: July 5, 2018

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I’m Not Dead Yet!

When Juan Ramon Alfonso Penayo, 20, of Santa Teresa, Paraguay, failed to return after leaving his home on Thursday, June 14, his family assumed the worst. The town lies on the border with Brazil, reported the BBC, and is a hotbed of illegal drug activity. Police found a charred body three days later and called Penayo’s family, who accepted that the burned-beyond-recognition remains had to be him, and they proceeded with funeral arrangements. At the ensuing wake, Penayo walked nonchalantly into the room wondering whose funeral it was. The non-Penayo body was returned to the morgue.

Mother and Child Reunion

Samen Kondorura was joined by dozens of male relatives mourning his mother’s death in North Toraja, South Sulawesi, Indonesia, on Friday, June 15, as they carried her coffin to a lakkean—a wooden stilt structure upon which the departed are placed during traditional funeral ceremonies. As they hoisted the coffin up a bamboo ladder, The Jakarta Post reported, the ladder broke, and the coffin fell, striking people in the crowd—including Samen, himself, who suffered a severe head injury and died on the way to the hospital.

Cardboard Javier Scores Big

During the 2014 World Cup, five friends in Durango, Mexico, made a pact to travel to the 2018 tournament in Russia. They saved their money, bought a bus, painted it in Mexico’s colors and booked passage for themselves and the bus on a ship going to Spain, where, The Daily Mail reported, the friends planned to drive the bus to Russia. But just before they boarded the ship in April, one of the five, Javier, told his friends his wife had put the kibosh on his trip. So, the remaining four did the next best thing: They made a cardboard life-size cutout of Javier, looking grumpy and wearing a shirt that says, “My wife didn’t let me go,” and set off for Russia. “Cardboard Javier” has been very popular at the soccer venues, attracting female admirers, appearing on the big screen, crowd-surfing and being photographed with fellow football fans from all over the world.

Weird China

• A woman in Wenling, China, was so thrilled to be driving the Ferrari 458 she rented on Thursday, June 21, that she recorded herself on her iPhone while waiting at a stoplight: “First time driving a Ferrari! This truly is the most amazing feeling!” she said. But within minutes, reported The Daily Mail, she swerved out of control, striking a metal traffic barrier and a BMW X3, destroying the front end of the $660,000 Ferrari and heavily damaging the BMW. Neither the driver nor her passenger was injured in the accident—physically, at any rate.

• Mr. Li of China’s Guangdong province went to the doctor on Friday, June 15, at Pingshan Hospital in Shenzhen after feeling discomfort and pain in his ear. Using an otoscope scan, the doctor discovered a live cockroach burrowing into the 52-year-old man’s ear canal. “It’s still alive, still moving,” the doctor can be heard on video saying, according to The Daily Mail. She cut the roach into pieces to remove it and disinfected Li’s ear with alcohol… just in case it had laid eggs.

Weird Weiner

Visitors crowding into a Vancouver, Canada, street festival on Sunday, June 17, were invited—at $38 each—to try a new health craze: Hot Dog Water. The drink is marketed as a gluten-free, Keto diet-compatible, post-workout source of sodium and electrolytes, and every sleek bottle— which promises to help with weight loss—also contains a hot dog. It’s also a prank. Hot Dog Water CEO Douglas Bevans told Global News the product was dreamed up as a response to the “snake oil salesmen” of health marketing. In small print at the bottom of the sales sheet is this disclaimer: “Hot Dog Water, in its absurdity, hopes to encourage critical thinking related to product marketing and the significant role it can play in our purchasing choices.” Touché.

© 2018 ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION