Meet Fat Albert, the overweight polar bear

The bear, named ‘Fat Albert’ by locals, is hugely overweight because an average polar bear should weigh around 450kg, but this polar bear weigh a whopping 679kg!

Many claim he’s one of the fattest in the world, earning him the nickname ‘Fat Albert’ (a character from a famous American sitcom).

Albert’s size isn’t all his fault. He lives in Alaska, USA, where the locals throw out large amounts of whale blubber to the bears as a sign of ‘respect’.

Photographer Edward Boudreau captured candid shots of the bear just as the villagers had harvested a whale. They would cut a large portion of the whale and blubber and drag it four miles out of town for the bears to find.

This stops the bears from travelling into town to harvest and disrupting the process.

This is a tradition, as a sign of respect to the incredible animals, is thousands of years old.

Karachi’s martial artist makes record

Muhammad Rashid, a martial artist from Karachi, Pakistan, broke a Guinness World Record when he used his elbow to crush 256 walnuts in only one minute!

Guinness World Records reviewed the evidence of the attempt and announced that Muhammad Rashid had broken the record of 229 walnuts, which was set by Indian martial artist Prabhakar Reddy.

Rashid is a multiple record-holder, having previously set Guinness Records for breaking walnuts with his head, as well as smashing beverage cans with his elbow and coconuts with his head.

Chef spreads joy with ‘Coronaburger’

You’ve got to eat it, to beat it: That’s the philosophy of one Hanoi, Vietnam chef who is attempting to boost morale in the Vietnamese capital by selling green, coronavirus-themed burgers.

Laughing in the face of the global pandemic, Chef Hoang Tung and his team now spend their days moulding dozens of green-tea stained burger buns complete with little ‘crowns’ made of dough to resemble microscopic images of the virus.

The shop has sold around 50 burgers a day, despite the growing numbers of businesses in Vietnam which have been forced to close because of the virus.

Policeman wears coronavirus helmet

A police officer in India has taken a new approach to the coronavirus pandemic. Rajesh Babu donned a helmet made to look like the virus to frighten people when they saw him out on patrol.

He told Asian News International: “We take all the steps, but still people come out on the streets. Therefore, this corona helmet is one of the steps we are taking to ensure that people are aware of the seriousness of the police.

“The helmet is an attempt to do something different. When I wear this, the thought of coronavirus comes into the minds of the commuters.

“Especially, the children react strongly after seeing this and want to be taken home.”

Published in Dawn, Young World, April 11th, 2020