Around the Globe

March 7, 1996

Around the Globe

Speechless in South Africa A South African worker was robbed while asleep last month. According to police in Tembisa, South Africa, the thief pried open the hapless worker's mouth while he dozed, and made off with his dentures. According to police spokeswoman Petro Rossouw, "The suspect was arrested but the false teeth are still missing. We think he must have destroyed them thinking that then there could be no evidence." When asked to comment, the victim mumbled something unintelligible and drooled a lot.

Exact change and whole coins only, please When the Royal Canadian Mint issued 60 million $2 coins last month, they trumpeted the 20-year life span of the coin, compared with the one-year life of the average $2 bill. However, mint spokesman Pierre Morin said that in one week, they received 11 complaints of the bimetallic-nickel outside, aluminum/bronze inside-coins splitting apart. According to Morin, "It's a national pastime right now: let's try to dislodge the center. It's been frozen, burned, hack-sawed, driven over, and thrown from tall buildings." Engineers have been sent to the Winnipeg mint to examine the manufacturing process, according to Morin, but there are no plans for a recall.

Don't horse around with my head Chief Nicholas Gcaleka, a South African witch doctor, proclaimed his recent trip to Scotland a success. He was looking for the skull of his great-great uncle, King Hintsa. Hintsa was shot to death in the early 19th century Cape Colony Wars by a British soldier who brought the head to Scotland as a trophy. According to Gcaleka, the "spirit of a hurricane" told him the skull was in a forest near a white pony. He reportedly found the head in a cottage in a forest, with a white horse grazing nearby. Cottage-owner Charles Brooke said that he had had the skull for six years. "Before that it was in our gamekeeper's house, and we understand it possibly had some family link with the army in Africa," Brooke said. According to Gcaleka, if he brings the skull back home, peace will come to South Africa.

-Compiled by Michael Rubin from The Philadelphia Inquirer.

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