WhiteBoard News for Friday, December 13, 2002

Berrien Springs, Michigan (AP):

No wonder people in this southwestern Michigan village relish the Christmas Pickle Parade. 

Where else can you sample crosscut sweets, sweet pickles, kosher dill spears, original spears, hamburger dills, genuine dills and piping hot, batter-dipped fried pickles? Not to mention the festival's specialty, chocolate-covered gherkins. 

The parade on Sunday features organizers tossing free pickles into the crowd, Santa in a llama-drawn cart, a Grand Dillmeister and a Pickle Prince and Princess. 

Chuck Voytovick, chairman of the Pickle Festival committee, said Berrien Springs embraced the pickle theme because it's unique. The parade began in 1992, inspired by a German Christmas tradition in which children search for a lone pickle on their Christmas tree. 

People from across the country call to ask about the festival, Voytovick said. He said many ask, "why pickles?" 

"If it were anything but pickles," he said, "do you think I'd be talking to you right now?" 

Voytovick said callers usually assume there are pickle farms or factories in Berrien Springs. Not so. 

"I think years ago they had some pickle farms, but that was way before my time," he said. 
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Vienna, Austria (Reuters):

An Austrian ski club transformed a generous stretch of Austrian highway into a formidable ski run on Wednesday when the wind blew its artificial snow off course. 

The club was using its snow machine near one of Austria's busiest motorways, the A1 Westautobahn, close to the German border, the Austrian auto association ARBOe said. 

The man-made snow drifts and ice patches resulted in hour-long delays for drivers near the Alpine city of Salzburg. 
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Hong Kong (Reuters):

Stuck for a Christmas gift? How about a blob of real Finnish reindeer DNA sealed in a vial topped with silver antlers. 

Richard Collins, project manager at Hong Kong-based DNA-Tech Ltd, said customer interest in the reindeer DNA had snowballed since his firm began selling it Tuesday for HK$480 (US$61.55) per sample. 

"The pendant contains the entire genetic code of a reindeer. So if, in the future, you had the technology, you could, in theory, reproduce a whole reindeer," Collins said. 

"We think it's a nice Christmas gift." 

The preserved DNA, which is purple, was extracted from blood taken from reindeer at the Finnish Game and Fisheries Research Institute near the Arctic circle, Collins said. 

As a Christmas time show of peace and goodwill, the firm plans to send pendants to prominent world leaders including President Bush, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Pope John Paul II. 

Collins' firm also offers to preserve DNA from pets -- dead and alive -- and is looking into obtaining DNA from endangered pandas, and for a source of dinosaur DNA. 
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Sydney, Australia (Reuters):

Australian bordello the Daily Planet, touting its recession-proof services, said Thursday its plans to float had met with so much interest it would bring forward its stock exchange listing to early 2003. 

Selling itself as a "very busy five-star hotel," the Melbourne-based Daily Planet said it aims to raise $5 million to pay debts and grow by offering 40.4 percent of its property arm to the public. 

The group said in July it hoped to become the world's first listed brothel within one to two years. 

"Since then we have received over 3,000 telephone and e-mail inquiries from investors all over the world, including nine million hits on our Web site," Daily Planet Managing Director Andrew Harris said in a statement. 

"With such anticipation, we resolved to expedite the listing process," Harris said. 

Prostitution is legal in some parts of Australia, but with certain curbs on it. 

The Daily Planet's gaudy Horne Street property in the Melbourne suburb of Elsternwick, has 18 themed rooms with names such as Venus and Xanadu. Some have spas large enough for several guests at a time. 
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Sinop, Turkey (Ananova):

A British archaeologist has uncovered what is probably the unluckiest church in the world.

The church was wrecked by two earthquakes, a flood, and a landslide - all of which happened while it was still being built.

It later became an opium den and after it was abandoned most of the remains were washed into the sea.

St Phocas' Church was founded on what is now a clifftop at the Turkish city of Sinop, on the shores of the Black Sea, because this is where its patron saint was martyred.

The site was discovered when the Sinop museum found pieces of late Roman mosaic washed up at the coastal village of Chiftlik in the mid-1990s.

Dr Stephen Hill, from the University of Warwick, was asked to investigate by the museum and he found not just a mosaic, but the site of a large, previously unknown 4th century church.

"It will survive into next year but its long-term future is not good. It probably won't see too many more Friday 13ths," he said.

The church's founder, St Phocas, the patron saint of gardeners and sailors, was a Christian hermit who dug his own grave the day before he was martyred by Roman soldiers in the 2nd century AD.
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Sao Paulo, Brazil (Ananova):

A Brazilian man who was caught spraying offensive graffiti on an apartment block ended up covered head to toe in his own paint.

Fabio Gomes de Oliveira was caught by a security guard as he sprayed the building in the town of Varzea Paulista, near Sao Paulo.

He says the guard, with the help of neighbours, held him on the pavement and sprayed him with the black spray he had been using on the walls.

Fabio told Jornal da Tarde newspaper that he was sprayed for about half an hour before police came and took him away.

"More people arrived and kept shouting that I deserved to be sprayed. I felt humiliated and scared," he said.

He claims, he was sprayed a bit more by police officers at the station who called him Little Zebra.

Neighbours told reporters that they were tired of gangs who sprayed walls and buildings with offensive words and symbols.

Police confirmed the man had been arrested for damaging the building and for his own safety but denied officers did anything to harm him.
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Cape Town, South Africa (The Cape Argus):

It isn't just his nose that has thrust Rudolph the Cavendish Square reindeer into the spotlight this year.

The plastic reindeer, a prominent part of the Claremont, Cape Town, mall's Christmas decorations, caused a stir because of his golden testicles - so much so that he had to be castrated to protect shoppers' fragile sensibilities.

Following several complaints from customers, particularly parents, Cavendish Square managers decided Rudolph's equipment had to go. 

They contacted Display House, the company that designed and made the decorations, and it duly unmanned the reindeer.

The company's general manager, Hein Conradie, said he had not been aware of Rudolph's not-so-private parts until being asked to castrate him.

The golden balls started life as innocent Christmas tree baubles and were stuck to one of the four reindeer used in the Cavendish display with Prestik.

The baubles were "fairly obvious" because of Rudolph's prominent placing in the display, and were "anatomically correct for an animal of that size", Conradie said. "They were about 40mm in diameter, but they weren't overly large."

Choosing festive season decorations for shopping centres could be a minefield, he said, and after 10 years he had concluded a conservative approach was best.

"Generally, we find it wiser to use sexless reindeer. Someone obviously decided to be more interesting this year."
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Chow
SuperChef
www.joeha.com