Oddity Central

Oddity Central

China’s Bizarre Pet Craze – Puppies Painted with Toxic Varnish to Make Them Look Like Unique Breeds

Posted: 13 Oct 2013 02:20 AM PDT

In 2010, the Year of the Tiger,  a series of pictures showing orange puppies with black stripes caused controversy in China after they were posted online. Hoping to make a profit off them, some vendors had started selling striped dogs under the false pretense that they were a new breed.  At the time, everybody questioned the authenticity of those photos, not knowing if they were photoshopped, if the puppies where genetically altered or simply painted, but now everyone knows the truth. These are “one week puppies” a name that hints at their short life expectancy due to the toxicity of the varnish they are painted with. Believe it or not, they are still very popular in China.

It seems making your canine companion look like other animals using toxic varnish has become very popular in China. Pandas and tigers are especially sought after and dogs resembling these animals have been showing up in every city. "I have seen this kind of dog more than once in China, once in ZhuHai last fall and then in the city of Guangzhou. Both times the dogs were for sale from a street vendor, they were not all the same color, but they were all striped. The only thing I can think is that the stripes are spray painted on," a woman wrote on a forum. The coloring process used in the case of the "Bengal dogs" (tiger-skinned dogs) must have required some powerful chemicals as the people curious enough to buy a striped individual reported that the dog was very ill. "I recently bought one of these dogs in Beijing China," another person wrote . "I got it home and it was very dehydrated. I took it to the vet today and they confirmed that its hair had been dyed. It is a black dog, that gets to be about medium size. They dye the orange part, that's why the orange is never around the eyes, or nose, and the stripes are so uniform. The vet stated that the dye would wear off in about 2 months, and that the dog would be healthy unless we continued to dye the dog," he detailed.

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Danish Restaurant Serves Dishes Made with Food Thrown Away by Supermarkets

Posted: 13 Oct 2013 01:14 AM PDT

A new Danish restaurant called “Rub og Stub" is offering patrons dishes cooked with ingredients supermarkets throw away, hoping to reduce food waste and raise money for charity.  According to Sophie Sales, the co-founder of the restaurant "Too much food is thrown away in Denmark, and we wanted to do something about it." So far, the restaurant has been able to offer "everything from lamb chops and duck breast, to big bags of grapes and dairy products," Sales explains, courtesy of two supermarket chains belonging to Coop Danmark – the country's biggest grocery retailer.

The idea for Rub og Stub came from Denmark's "freegans", which are better known as dumpster divers. In an attempt to reduce food waste, these people look through trash and consume the edible morsels they find. The ingenious team thought that it would be very good to use this unconventional idea for their restaurant.The tendency to look for the freshest, most beautiful produce has a real impact on the way supermarkets do business, forcing vendors to throw out food that might not look flawless but is still safe to eat. According to Businessweek, in 2012 Americans threw out the equivalent of about $180 billion” worth of food — 8 percent more than in 2008, the last time the USDA calculated the total value of food loss from households, supermarkets, restaurants, and other food-service providers. As Sales and her team are very interested in "food, sustainability and modern consumer society," this matter is of utmost importance to them.

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