WhiteBoard News for Tuesday, April 22, 2003

London, England (Wall Street Journal):

Some of the chocolate eggs on sale this year may break the Easter Bunny's bank.

At the Pierre Marcolini chocolate shop here, a 90-centimeter-high egg decorated with mock lace and gold leaf sells for £650 ($1,020.75). 

For the slightly less extravagant, La Maison du Chocolat in New York's Rockefeller Center is offering a handmade egg about half that height for $495. In Brussels, the Mary Chocolatier boutique sells a 30-centimeter-high egg packed with chocolates, some with fresh cream fillings, others filled with dark chocolate mousse in five degrees of bitterness. It weighs 3.8 kilograms and costs 230 euros ($248.70).

Even mass-market chocolate makers are selling pricier eggs. In Britain, Nestle SA's most expensive chocolate egg this year retails for £9.99 ($15.75), twice what it charged for last year's top model. In the U.S., Mars Inc.'s Ethel M unit sells chocolate eggs designed as gifts for as much as $120 and chocolate bunnies for $150.
==============

Kyoto, Japan (Ananova):

A resourceful Japanese businessman is marketing gold-coated lumps of human excrement as lucky charms.

Entrepreneur Koji Fujii says he merely wants to bring happiness and good luck to his country in a time of hardship and misery.

The 52-year-old from Kyoto said: "Everybody wants to have a little piece of luck for himself, especially nowadays. At the moment the only news people hear is bad. From a poor economy, to scandals in politics and war."

He adds anyone would be happy to receive a "little piece of poo" as a present. "People like products that are humorous and look nice," he said.

The words for 'luck' and 'poo' are very similar in Japanese.

The seven-centimetre-high piles of golden excrement will be available in supermarkets across the Kyoto-Osaka region and will cost around £10 ($15.77) each.
============

Vladivostock, Russia (Pravda):

A group of Russian train conductors needed hospital treatment after smashing their heads repeatedly against a train window to find out who had the strongest forehead.

The conductors came up with the contest as a way of passing time on the 3,000 mile journey from Novosibirsk in Siberia to Vladivostock.

The men were treated in hospital after stopping the train midway through the journey at the town of Vyazemskaya and demanding medical help, Pravda reports.
=============

Rome, Italy (Reuters):

Does your wife make your life hell, humiliating you in front of friends and family, insulting you day after day and even berating you for not giving her pleasure in bed? 

Italy's highest court has ruled that this is not exceptional, and if you divorce your wife you must still pay her alimony, according to a report in the daily Il Messaggero. 

The Court of Cassation has ruled that Antonio Giulia, a Naples magistrate who left his wife after 10 years of such treatment, was nevertheless at fault for ending the marriage and should pay up, the paper said. 

"That woman massacred me for 10 years," a bitter Giulia said after the ruling. His ex-wife, Maria, argued that her behavior was normal in a married couple and she could not be blamed for a few "outbursts." The court agreed, but Giulia was seething. 

"Not a day went by without her humiliating me in front of everybody. She would even scream at me that I no longer satisfied her sexually. And now I have to support her?" 
==============

Chow
SuperChef
www.joeha.com