Fun_People Archive
30 Aug
Weirdness [444] - 9Aug96

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Fri, 30 Aug 96 15:44:57 -0700
To: Fun_People
Subject: Weirdness [444] - 9Aug96

Excerpted-from: WEIRDNUZ.444 (News of the Weird, August 9, 1996)
		by Chuck Shepherd

* Abdala ("El Loco") Bucaram was elected president of Ecuador in July, six
years after he briefly fled to Panama to avoid corruption charges.  In the
campaign, Bucaram sang in his own ads and reminded voters of his tenure as
a moralistic police commissioner of the city of Guayaquil in the 1980s,
during which he sometimes jumped off his motor scooter to rip the skirt hems
loose on women who were showing too much leg.  He downplays his Hitler-like
moustache, blaming it on his incompetence at shaving. [New York Times,
7-22-96]

* In July in Dadeville, Ala., Mr. Gabel Taylor, 38, who had just prevailed
in an informal Bible-quoting contest, was shot to death by the loser.
[Montgomery Advertiser-AP, 7-19-96]

* In an April Associated Press story, Levent Yueksel's and wife Sherri
Kane's 32-seat Dardanelles restaurant in Philadelphia, Pa., was profiled,
not for its food but for its attitude:  According to a sign in the window,
the restaurant refuses to serve "negative people" (who are also referred to
in the sign as "assholes").  Say Yueksel and Kane, that includes people who
smoke, who are rude, who demand their food in a hurry, or who want the music
turned down.  The owners say they insist on respect "for the people who feed
you." [Newark Star Ledger-AP, 4-22-96]

* Malaysian Gurcharan Singh announced in April that he was marketing a
breakthrough, $40 "disposable circumcision device" approved by Muslim
religious authorities.  It is described as resembling a corkscrew and is
called the Tara Klamp. [Edmonton Journal, 4-17-96]

* Recently, Budapest, Hungary, novelty shopkeeper Ferenc Kovacs, 45,
introduced condoms that, when unrolled, play one of two tunes ("Arise, Ye
Worker" or "You Sweet Little Dumbbell").  And Marc Snyder of Oakland,
Calif., has marketed a $3.95 talking condom using similar technology but
with message options ("You turn me on" or "I love you" or "Thank you for
your business").  And a food company executive in Poland, Dariusz Napierala,
announced in May that he will soon offer a "tourist survival kit" of canned
meat, plastic utensils, tea, and a condom. [Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
(Ontario, Calif.)- AP, 6-16-96] [San Francisco Chronicle, 3-15-96] [AP
wirecopy, 5-30-96]

* Last year, at a reception for the African/African-American Summit, Inc.,
conference in Senegal (a conference attended by Jesse Jackson and the late
Ron Brown), the Club Med Senegal resort staged a skit in which two white
staff members appeared in blackface, with white lips, garish clothes, and
white gloves to perform a musical number, and a riot nearly ensued.  (In
May 1996, offended organizations and individuals filed a $5 million lawsuit
against Club Med in New York City.) [New Orleans Times-Picayune-New York
Times, 5-12-96]

* In March in North Adams, Mass., on a public-access cable TV program about
papier-mache masks, Ms. Royce Patton, 28, abruptly changed the subject and
accused a former neighbor of allowing two of her kids to have sex.  Patton
named the family, ran a video of all of the woman's seven children, and used
obscenities in describing them.  The former neighbor said the dispute with
Patton was really over loans of money and a bottle of suntan lotion.
[Columbia Tribune-AP, 4-3-96]

Copyright 1996, Universal Press Syndicate.  All rights reserved.
No commercial use may be made of the material or of the name
News of the Weird.

© 1996 Peter Langston