With the beer kegs ready to pour at Munich's Oktoberfest on Saturday, the big news in Bavaria is that the premier, Guenther Beckstein, says you can drink two liters of beer (well over 4 pints) and still drive back to your hotel or home.
With a local election looming mid-Oktoberfest, the media grabbed Beckstein's comment that you could drink two one-liter glasses of beer in two hours without a problem--but police, doctors and other politicians are politely disagreeing.
The premier has since gone back on his statement--saying it was a "rather unsuccessful contribution"--but it wouldn't have mattered much to budget travelers: Beer has become so much more expensive this year that two liters might be financially out of the question, even if it apparently won't make us too drunk to drive.
He may be the country's longest-serving Republican senator, but Ted Stevens was indicted today on seven felony counts of making false statements in a corruption case. Prosecutors say the 84-year-old took gifts of more than $250,000 in exchange for political favors.
Stevens says he's innocent of all charges, and he's the first senator to face a federal indictment since 1993.
Despite his statements, the senior senator is dogged by corruption allegations. So in honor of these latest charges, we've mapped some of the more, uh, controversial places that he's been involved with. Unfortunately we couldn't find an address for his notorious "series of tubes."
While you probably all thought Vegas or Hollywood were the places to go if you want to see famous people, we're about to explain that it's really the remote mountain highlands in Papua New Guinea that you should be heading for. That's because not just Elvis, but a few others like Tom Jones and various kings and queens, are registered as living in PNG and ready to vote in the next election.
Confused? So were PNG government officials when they discovered that voter registration rates in five of the most remote provinces in PNG are well over 100%. That's when they checked the list and found, in fact, more than one Elvis Presley, and all the rest. Getting into this rugged countryside to confirm the list is proving difficult, so Elvis, if you are really alive, you're within your legal rights to rock up to vote in the next PNG election. And Elvis-spotting tours should head south.
We woke up this morning to the news that Prince Charles wants McDonald's banned. Everyone's screaming about it. Such a ban--and this is assuming he was being serious--would be a lost cause in Britain, but perhaps not so much in the United Arab Emirates (where the suggestion was made). If they want McDonald's out and McDonald's puts up a fight, the UAE will build a giant, diamond-encrusted, multi-billion dollar robotic lion and keep Micky D's out.
So, what if you are seeking solace from the golden arches? Where can you travel to be free from the Big Mac, or any of its international incarnations? The best answer we've found so far comes from Yahoo!. You can roam free in Benin, the Federated States of Micronesia, and Tajikistan, for starters. Those 'stans always come through.
How long does it take to paint a rocky mountain face green? Well, if you've got seven workers, about 45 days. That's the discovery of Chinese officials who decided that the best solution to the deforestation of Laoshou mountain--a result of quarrying--was simply to paint it green. After all, office workers at a new government building nearby have to look at it all day.
Plenty of people are unhappy about it: from those who say the feng shui of the area's been destroyed, to others who have calculated that the $60,000 spent on painting could have actually planted trees and bushes over a much wider area. But others think that green paint is "the new green": who needs to save the environment when you can just make it look the right color? Perhaps tourists will soon see a bright green Great Wall of China, just to make sure it'll still be visible from space even through all our pollution.
Did Napoleon revisit Waterloo? Do Southerners make pilgrimages to Appomattox? Probably not, which makes it all the stranger that Prince Charles, heir to the English throne, would make a detour on a quick trip Stateside to visit the city of Philadelphia.
His Royal Highness was on this side of the pond to receive a Global Environmental Citizen award from Harvard according to People.com, but he and wife Camilla also visited New York City's Harlem neighborhood and two Philly landmarks, Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell, which of course have been written into American history as two of the most sacred sites in the birth of our nation. How did he end up there? Maybe he heard, as savvy travelers know, that both sites are free to the public, including the Independence Hall tour, provided you're willing to wait in line with all the other patriotic Americans.
No word on whether Charles jumped up and down in front of the hall yelling, "It should have been mine! It should have been mine!" before heading to the Academy Ball, a white-tie gala celebrating the 150th anniversary of the U.S.'s oldest functioning grand opera house, the Academy of Music. He and his old lady flew in on a scheduled BA flight, but given the recent kerfuffle over his carbon footprint, a switch to Silverjet couldn't hurt.
Years before Bangkok's new Suvarnabhumi airport even opened, a reporter from the Bangkok Post discovered cracks in its runways. Now that Suvarnabhumi's problems are very much out in the open, the higher-ups who caved for their former prime minister's demands owe Sermsuk Kasitipradit an apology. He's the staffer who was straight-up canned (another was "asked to resign") when Thaksin put pressure on the Post to retract the negative story on his pet project airport.
Sermsuk told Al Jazeera (yup) his story, explaining how he was "investigated" and eventually fired. The Press Council of Thailand is now seeking some sort of compensation on behalf of both Sermsuk and his former boss, Chadin Tephaval. Should Sermsuk not return to the Post, we'd happily host him here if it meant whipping some American airports into shape.
Bangkok's new Suvarnabhumi airport, the multi-billion dollar pet project of ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra, is in trouble. It was set to be Asia's glitziest, but has instead been called an embarrassment, among other things.
Cracks in taxiways and a bathroom shortage are just a couple of the problems that have popped up at the airport, and the bill for repairs could top $45 million. Now the decision to reopen the old Don Muang airport has officially been handed down: it will handle all domestic flights while repairs are made at Suvarnabhumi, and perhaps go back to receiving them permanently.
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by amandak
