- Title: VARIOUS: LIFE! Review of the Year 2011 - Yearender Part 3 of 3
- Date: 15th December 2011
- Summary: NEW YORK, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES (FILE - FEBRUARY 1, 2011) (REUTERS) ***CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** START OF MEN'S RACE DOLD RUNNING UP STAIRS WOMEN RUNNING UP STAIRS THOMAS DOLD WINNING MEN'S RACE
- Embargoed: 30th December 2011 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Spain, Usa, Brazil, China, United Kingdom
- City:
- Country: Various
- Topics: Quirky,Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky,Sports
- Reuters ID: LVA3J4AXETDVH08VATVFF0V92VQ6
- Story Text: FESTIVALS
It's a little known fact, but some of the world's most enjoyed festivals involve people throwing things at each other.
Whether it's at Spain's Tomatina festival, where tens of thousands of people pelted each other with 120 tons of ripe tomatoes, or the South Korean mud festival, where extreme mud-slinging is the order of the day. Slightly gentler was the Myanmar festival which saw thousands gather on the streets of Yangon to throw water about. Large stages, paid for by wealthy individuals, were set up around the city equipped with water hoses for revellers to douse willing victims.
From water to ice and the spectacular displays it can create as seen at the 27th Harbin International Ice and Snow festival in China, with magnificent ice palaces and other creations.
Not wanting to be outdone, the Taiwanese put on their own hugely colourful display in their annual lantern festival which featured celebrations across the country, including light displays, fireworks, and a huge lantern to celebrate the new Year of the Rabbit.
Of course China also saw in the Year of the Rabbit in traditional style with deafening, and sometimes dangerous, ad hoc firework displays lighting up the Beijing skyline.
They don't need fireworks to light the darkness of Britain's ancient monument Stonehenge when thousands of revellers and druids mark the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year, there. An estimated 18,000 people converged on the prehistoric site for the festivities.
From the sublime solstice to the really ridiculous -- in Denmark the highlight of the Roskilde Festival is the annual naked run. Twenty naked people took part, with the winners getting tickets to next year's festival, presumably so they can let it all hang out all over again.
Afghanistan had not seen a music festival for three long decades until thus year's return of live rock which saw young Afghans cheering and leaping in the air to the sound of heavy bass beats.
Bands from Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Australia and Kazakhstan served up an eclectic six-hour musical feast -- from blues, indie and punk rock to electronica and death metal -- to an excited crowd of hundreds of young Kabul fans.
Of course one of the world's most famous festivals is the Rio de Janeiro carnival and hundreds of thousands of revelers flocked to the city's historic downtown area to attend one of the city's largest Carnival street parades.
On a smaller scale but just as colourful was New York City's annual Halloween parade. Giant eyeballs and skeleton puppets floated up Sixth Avenue, followed by an estimated fifty thousand participants.
EXTREME ACTION 2011
2011 was a year for never before seen feats of daring and extreme sport.
Swiss pilot Yves Rossy's latest stunt was a spectacular formation flight alongside two Albatross jets over the Swiss Alps.
The 51-year-old Swiss adventurer, who calls himself "Jetman," flew in a custom-built jet suit over the Alps in formation with the Breitling jet team.
From air to sea and Sydney's Bondi Beach lit up with colours as neon surfers took to the waves at night to welcome the start of summer.
A group of 17 surfers, comprising local board riders, their friends and some members of the local surf lifesaving club, wired their wetsuits with coloured neon tubes that glowed in the dark.
Surfing in the pitch dark looks positively pedestrian when compared to the antics of France's very own answer to Spider-Man Alain Robert who successfully scaled the 27-storey high Hang Seng Bank headquarters in Hong Kong.
He was up to his old death-defying tricks again just a few weeks later as he scaled the world's tallest tower, Dubai's 2,717 foot Burj Khalifa, although this time local regulations forced him to use ropes for security purposes.
In the Far East they know how to do extreme -- in these next few stories, extreme cold. First up, daring Chinese ice swimmers took the plunge into frigid waters to swim in outside temperatures nearing -24 degrees celsius (-11 farenheit) at Harbin's annual snow and ice festival.
Then there were the dozens of Chinese climbing enthusiasts who scaled huge, frozen waterfalls in rural Beijing in a competition which culminated in climbs on two separate waterfalls at Heilongtan - Black Dragon Pool.
In South Korea, for some recalcitrant kids it's not simply a case of being sent to their rooms to think about their behaviour. Naughty youngsters here can instead expect to be sent to a boot camp to toughen up, military style.
Wearing military uniforms -- sometimes half-naked -- and braving chilly winter temperatures, 183 students took part in this boot camp training session near a beach in Ansan, about 66 km southeast of Seoul. Students were put though military style training to develop their toughness and perseverance, made to carry rubber boats and logs while shouting on a field covered with snow. The tough training pushed some to tears.
Another extraordinary human feat saw hundreds of runners racing up the 1,576 steps of New York's Empire State Building.
Athletes from all over the world took part in the race, and this year was a record-breaker for the men. 26-year old Thomas Dold, from Stuttgart, Germany won the race for the sixth straight time.
COMPETITIONS
In addition to the major sporting championships, as ever 2011 brought us its fair share of competitions with a somewhat more select and exclusive fan base.
For starters, London hosted its very first Backward Running Championships and proved that with the element of danger always just a step away, the fastest forward runners are not necessarily the best backward runners.
Slowing the pace right down and hopping across the Channel to France, and the locals in the small village of Lagardere raced their snails. It's all ever so quintessentially French -- those snails who don't make it to the winner's podium ended up in the cooking pot and were eaten with a nice baguette.
But never let it be said there was anything remotely crusty about the competitors in Brazil's 'Mr Elderly' beauty pageant. Sao Paulo chose the city's most handsome and sprightly grandpa in a contest where looks are just as important as charisma. And it seems the ladies in the crowd appreciated all the gentlemen's efforts, including some impressive geriatric dance moves.
Age wasn't an issue for those competing in the USA's second annual national beard and mustache championships, just how much or how unusually you could grow your facial hair. Hundreds of hairy-faced folks competed in five categories: mustache, partial beards, full beard groomed, full beard natural, and the ever-popular freestyle.
And it being royal wedding year, there had to be a UK competition for the best 'Kate and William' lookalikes from across Europe. Suffice to say some were more convincing than others, and the judges' scoring certainly reflected this. In the end there were two clear winners who were in fact the only ones who looked anything remotely like the royal couple -- the convincing Orsola Rossi and Simon Watkinson.
FOOD
Chefs at the Alameda County Fair in Pleasanton, California, cooked up the world's largest hamburger.
The record-breaking whopper, including the bun and condiments, weighed in at a sizzling 777 pounds, (352 kilograms), a whopping 187 pounds (85 kilograms) bigger than the previous record holder from Canada.
Or perhaps you'd prefer a hot dog -- though probably not 62 of them in ten minutes. That stomach-churning feat was achieved this year by competitive eater Joey 'Jaws' Chestnut at the World Hot Dog Eating Contest for the fifth consecutive time.
And finally, if fast food's not your thing, you'd probably find an ingredient or two to tempt your tastebuds within Latin America's biggest ever sandwich.
Thousands of pieces of bread, lettuce, onion and tomato were mixed with more than 70 ingredients, including hundreds of litres of mayonnaise, mustard and spicy sauces. Each section of the super torta had a different flavour cooked up by local chefs in Mexico city. - Copyright Holder: FILE REUTERS (CAN SELL)
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