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| - From a man swallowed by a whale who lived to tell the tale to a hero pig and a boy called Karl Marx... Your weekly roundup of offbeat stories from around the world: It was meant to be the climax of a decade-long build up -- thousands of pink chrysanthemums blooming as one -- but Japan's Olympic euphoria has been further deflated by hard news for its condom makers. They intended to shower athletes with 160,000 ultra-thin prophylactics given that the Olympic Village is notorious as a place where the world comes together. With many athletes already worried whether Tokyo's recyclable cardboard beds would stand up to the congress of the most high performance bodies on the planet, the condoms have also been found wanting. Despite building a new factory to meet the expected Olympic rush, manufacturers discovered the rules only allow latex, effectively banning their barely-there 0.01mm polyurethane sheaths. "When I learned about the requirement, I thought, 'Oh my God... can that be right?" an industry source told AFP. Worse was to follow. The Tokyo rulebook specifically warns athletes to "avoid unnecessary forms of physical contact". But many doubt they will be able to hold themselves back given that the traditional post-competition coupling has left a trail of broken beds from Athens to London and Rio. Aside from the condoms, the makers say their cardboard beds won't fold. "As long as they stick to just two people in the beds, they should be strong enough to support the load," the manufacturer assured AFP. We don't know yet if condoms form part of the five-year plan of a young Indian man called Socialism who got married last weekend with his proud older brothers Leninism and Communism looking on. Certainly they won't help the spread of communism that three generations of the Mohan family from Tamil Nadu have dedicated their lives to. Their father A. Mohan, a district secretary of the Communist Party of India, is one of millions in the south who are still true believers despite the fall of the Eastern Bloc. Indeed Tamil Nadu's chief minister is one M.K. Stalin. Mohan insisted his sons' names are not unusual -- some of his "comrades" gave their children names such as Moscow, Russia, Vietnam and Czechoslovakia. And the family tradition has continued, with Leninism naming his son after Karl Marx. "Now I am waiting for a grand-daughter from one of my sons, who I will name Cubaism," added Mohan senior whose preference for ideology over personality no doubt led him to dismiss Fidela and Chelita. It has been a sad week in China which mourned one of its great people's heroes, Zhu Jianqiang otherwise known as "Strong Pig". The porker became a national icon in 2008 after surviving 36 days under rubble after the terrible Sichuan earthquake in which 90,000 people died. "Strong Pig" lifted the nation's spirits by miraculously surviving on a bag of charcoal and rainwater. When he was pulled from the rubble he was so thin he looked more like a flabby goat. Despite China's love of pork, "Strong Pig" was spared and has since been a major draw at a museum near the city of Chengdu. The pig who was garlanded with awards for "vividly illustrating the spirit of never giving up" finally succumbed to "old age and exhaustion" on Wednesday aged 14, or 100 in human terms. Pakistani police officers are being grilled after they flipped out when they were refused free burgers from a trendy takeaway in Lahore. The corrupt cops rounded up 19 staff at a branch of Johnny & Jugnu and held them for seven hours when they refused them freebies, leaving customers to go hungry. But the chain bit back, reporting the police. "This is not the first time something like this has happened... but we want to make sure this is the last," it said. After an outcry, nine police were suspended, with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan even weighing in to hold police top brass to the flame. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, a humpback whale swallowed an American diver off Cape Cod in the very same waters where "Jaws" was shot. Michael Packard was fishing for lobsters when he was swallowed by the Leviathan. "I felt this huge shove and the next thing I knew it was completely black," he said after being released from hospital. "I was in his closed mouth for about 30 to 40 seconds before he rose to the surface and spat me out," he added. Packard and another fisherman who was there insist this is no fisherman's tale. Locals agree but say there was no danger he would have ended up in the belly of the beast like Jonah and Pinocchio. While toothless humpbacks have enormous mouths to scoop up krill, their throats are too narrow to swallow a human. bur-fg/jmy/bp
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