Oddity Central

Oddity Central

Woman Says She Is Virgin Mary’s Cousin 65 Times Removed

Posted: 25 Apr 2014 03:27 AM PDT

Mary Beth Webb, from Murrysville, Pennsylvania, is making  some tall claims about her ancestry. She considers herself to be the 64th great-granddaughter of Saint Joseph Ben Matthat Arimathaea, who is considered to be Virgin Mary's paternal uncle. So that makes her the Virgin Mary's cousin, 65 times removed.

Mary has been looking into her ancestry since 2010, and it has taken her two years to spot her connection to Saint Joseph. Saint Joseph of Arimathaea is credited in the Bible for providing the tomb in which Jesus Christ's body was placed after his execution on the cross.

The idea to research her ancestry came from her other bizarre ritual – speaking to the dead. When she lost her brother to cancer in 1999, she started communicating with him and also with her dead parents. Mary's cousin was always the medium for these conversations – she conveyed messages from Mary's parents that included details she could never have known about. Mary herself admitted that there was no way her cousin could have known some of the stories.

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Chinese Man Collects 5,000 Bras in 20 Years, Wants to Open Bra Museum

Posted: 25 Apr 2014 02:31 AM PDT

Chen Qingzu, a 56-year-old health worker from South China's Hainan province, has a very bizarre hobby – he collects brassieres. In the past 20 years, he has amassed over 5,000 bras of various colors, shapes and sizes. Chen now wants to start a museum to display his entire bra collection.

Now, before you write-off Chen's hobby as a fetish, you might want to hear his version of the story: "It's my job to educate the public about the importance of health checkups, but my special interest is as an advocate for female health relating to their breasts and this was a good way of going about it," he said. "Many women wear tight or smaller-size bras to show off their figures, which would do harm to their breasts."

Chen said that most of his bras were donated to him by college girls after he visited their campuses to talk about breast health. He told the girls about the dangers of wearing ill-fitting bras and asked them to give him theirs. "Many girls thought I was a bra fetishist," he said. But when he explained that he was only trying to promote well-fitting bras, the students were convinced and handed over their ill-fitting ones to him.

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A Sport Called Motoball – It’s Like Football Only with Motorcycles

Posted: 25 Apr 2014 01:41 AM PDT

What do you get when you combine football and motorcycles? The answer is Motoball, a motorized sport generally unknown in America, but fairly popular in Europe. As you can guess, it's no dainty game. Right from the noise and fumes, to the daredevil stunts that players perform on their motorcycles, Motoball is a truly hellish, cutthroat version of soccer. The relatively unknown sport is largely played in Europe, where many countries even have national teams. Some of the best Motoball players in the world are from Russia.

A Motoball match is played on a regular football field, complete with goal posts. There are two teams of five players each – four riders and a goalie, who is the only one not riding a bike. The players on motorcycles chase a large ball that is 40 cm in diameter and weighs about one kilogram. As the bikers speed towards the ball, they stop the motorcycle with just one foot and draw the other foot back to kick the ball. The matches are officiated by two referees, assisted by two linesmen. A match is split up into four 20-minute periods.

The goalies stand in a red area that is marked as a driver-free zone. The rest of the grass, mud or concrete field is pretty much free for the eight riders to tear after the ball, at speeds as high as 65 miles per hour. Expert maneuverability skills and lightning-fast reflexes are key in Motoball matches, as is the ability to shoot the ball accurately from the motorcycle seat. There are a few rules set in place for safety, like no smashing, but that doesn't keep the players from getting hurt.

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