Marilyn Monroe dumped in trash yard

This iconic pose was turned into a 26-foot tall sculpture by American artist Seward Johnson was placed in down-town Chicago and later moved to Palm Springs due to repeated vandalising incidents.

Johnson named it "Forever Marilyn" and some unnamed Chinese artists turned the same sculpture - with her white dress,red lips and sexy pose - into a 30-foot tall stainless steel statue, weighing about eight tons. The giant statue of Marilyn Monroe, which took about two years to complete, adorned a business centre in Guigang.

But it was only six months that the statue was displayed there. With no reason given suddenly it was removed and dumped in out of all places at a garbage collecting company yard.

Why was the statue of Marilyn Monroe sent to the trash dump? This is the question for which everyone is interested in finding out the answer. Captions The giant statue of Marilyn Monroe dumped face down at Chinese garbage collecting company yard.

A man posing with Seward Johnson's Forever Marilyn statue in Palm Springs.

Bride wears dress with 99,999 pearls

Peng Yu, 58, is a rich man with romantic ideas. He runs a pearl company in Beihai, southern China's Guangxi Province. His first wife died years ago and as his new bride, Yang Pingzhi was a pretty and dainty specimen, he wanted to overwhelm her with his love and generosity.

Although it took almost a year to complete his romantic creation he did not mind and in the end he presented her with a dazzling wedding gown, decorated with 99,999 pearls.

Someone may ask why 99,999 and not 100,000 pearls?

It is because the number nine is pronounced in Chinese is the very same as words,"long-term" or "forever". Hence Peng Yu's wedding gown contains the meaning of loving his bride forever.

The bride was quite touched in wearing this wedding dress enriched with Peng's undying love.

Peng invited a Hong Kong designer to make the gown, and bought 99,999 light water pearls to make this gown.

The pearls were sewn onto the gown with the help of seven friends of the bride, and just the pearl sewing part took the seven sisters a year to finish.

The final wedding gown weighs nine kilos.

Although the people at Guinness have probably seen just about everything, considering the wedding gown not only took a year to complete but was also decorated with 99,999 pearls indicates that Peng might have a very good chance of winning!

And as a post script if finances ever get tight for the couple, the pearls on the dress might offer some economic solace, one at a time.

Exploding watermelons: an agricultural disaster in China

It was as if a war had been staged in the 100 acres of farmland in Danyang, eastern China.

The flying pips, shattered shells and wet shrapnel still haunt farmer Liu Mingsuo who tried to chemically boost his fruit crop of ripe watermelons.

The massive crop of watermelons started bursting right before his very eyes.

The agricultural authorities blame the explosions on Liu and other agricultural workers for mistakenly applying forchlorfenuron, a growth accelerator.

The unfortunate farmers, most of them new to growing watermelons,were chasing easy money by spraying their fruit crop with this growth stimulator not recommended for watermelons.

The incident has become a focus of a Chinese media drive to expose the lax farming practices, short-cuts and excessive use of fertiliser behind a rash of food safety scandals. It follows discoveries of the heavy metal cadmium in rice, toxic melamine in milk, arsenic in soy sauce, bleach in mushrooms and detergent borax in por, added to make it look like beef. Compared to such cases of dangerous contamination, Liu's transgression was minor, but it has gained notoriety after being picked up by the state broadcaster, CCTV.

The broadcaster blamed the bursting of the fruit on the legal chemical forchlorfenuron, which stimulates cell separation but often leaves melons misshapen and turns the seeds white. According to media reports the farmers had sprayed the fruit too late in the season and during wet conditions, which caused the melons to explode like "landmines". After losing three hectares (eight acres), Liu said he was unable to sleep because he could not shake the image of the fruit bursting. "On May 7, I came out and counted 80 [burst watermelons] but by the afternoon it was 100," he said. "Two days later I didn't bother to count any more." About 20 farmers and 45 hectares around Danyang were affected.

The fruit could not be sold and was instead fed to fish and pigs.

In the past week, the People's Daily website has run stories of human birth control chemicals being used on cucumber plants in Xian, China Daily has reported Sichuan peppers releasing red dye in water, and the Sina news portal revealed that barite powder had been injected into chickens in Guizhou to increase their weight.