The Express Tribune hi five - February 24

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Strange fruit fruits youve never heard off.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE,, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

Hi Light

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Strange fruit

Are you bored of bananas? Sick of strawberries? Over oranges? Well then you should try to expand your fruit horizons. You’ve probably read about the world’s weirdest things, places, people, animals and plants.

How about fruits? There are thousands of edible fruits on earth; some of them are truly odd looking but tasty nonetheless. Take a look at ten of the wackiest fruits from around the world.

Ackee

Cherimoya

This fruit is one of the strangest fruits ever found.

The ackee is sometimes called a “vegetable brain” because only the inner, brain-shaped, yellowish parts are edible. This fruit is found in the West African region and is also cultivated in Jamaica, Haiti and Cuba. The ackee is the national fruit of Jamaica and is actually eaten as a vegetable. You must be wondering, what does it taste like? Well when cooked, it looks and tastes like scrambled eggs!

The cherimoya, often called the ice cream fruit, is sometimes called the king of fruits. In fact a long time ago, only kings and queens could eat this royal fruit. This fruit might remind you of custard apples (known as Shareefa in Pakistan), that’s because it’s from the same family. The difference is in the taste. The cherimoya tastes like a mixture of bananas, coconut, strawberries, and mangoes. Some people also taste pineapple and papayas. Some even say it tastes like bubblegum!

Cupuaçu

Salak (Snake-fruit)

Found in the tropical rainforests of Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, and northern Brazil, this fruit has a very hard outer shell. Can you guess what it smells like once you cut it? The pulp inside smells like a mix of chocolate and pineapple! That’s because this is related to cacao, the bean from which chocolate is made. In fact, the pulp of the Cupuaçu is so similar to cocoa butter that it’s sometimes used in cosmetics. Does it also taste like chocolate? Sadly no, the juice has been said to taste like a pear and banana.

Some fruit names are deceptive; Grapefruits don’t taste like grapes and Road Apples don’t look like a road (they taste awful, too.) This one pretty much hits the nail on the head. Salak fruit, also known as the snake fruit, comes from Indonesia. These fruit get their name from their red brown, scaly skin. Pinching the end of the fruit causes the skin to come off, and the inside looks like a piece of garlic. When you eat it, it will feel like you’re eating apples, really sweet and tangy apples.

Rose Apple You might have seen this fruit, it’s also known as Champoo and it is one of the most interesting exotic fruits on the planet, just for the fact that it smells and tastes a lot like roses. Unfortunately they are rarely found in markets around the world because they spoil very quickly after being picked. These fruits have are crisp, crunchy and have a delicious fresh flavour. It can be eaten whole but as with apples, many people prefer to leave the core. Did you know that rose apples are boiled in hot water to make scented rose water!

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

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Miracle Fruit The miracle fruit may be the most unusual fruit you’ll ever eat! This little berry from tropical West Africa has some real magical powers: When you eat a piece of the strange fruit, it makes everything sour taste sweet for the next hour or so. That means, after eating some miracle fruit, you can eat lemons like they were candy.

Foods that have a tangy taste will become sugary sweet. Even a bitter drink could be mistaken for a milkshake! The fruit itself does not contain a lot of sugar, and tastes only mildly sweet. In Japan, miracle fruit is popular among diabetics and dieters.

Hi Light

Pitahaya This fruit is also called the dragon fruit and it really looks like something a dragon would eat. According to legend, the fruit was created thousands of years ago by fire breathing dragons. During a battle when the dragon breathed fire the last thing to emerge would be the fruit. When the dragon was slain the fruit was collected by the victorious soldiers and presented to the Emperor as a treasure. To eat this fruit, you have to peel it like a banana. The inside looks like a kiwifruit because of the black crunchy seeds. People say that it tastes like a mixture of strawberries, watermelon and kiwis.

African Horned Melon Sometimes called the African cucumber or jelly melon, this is a really bizarre fruit horned melon. It is grown around the world, especially in New Zealand and California. In Asia it is called the ‘blowfish fruit’ because of its oval melon-like shape with horn-like spines. The melon has a thick spiky yellow skin, while the inside is a bright green, jelly like flesh. Its taste has been compared to a mixture of cucumber and kiwi or a combination of banana, cucumber and lemon. You can eat the peel too!

Breadfruit Lucuma What looks like a round avocado, tastes like butterscotch and sweet potato?

Lucuma! It’s always strange to eat something that doesn’t taste like what you think it should taste like, right? For instance, if you were to eat a red candy and find it’s actually grape flavoured. That’s the best way to describe the Lucuma. It looks like a fruit but it tastes like caramelised sugar, butterscotch and vanilla! In Peru, this fruit is so popular that it is sold as an ice cream flavour.

Lucuma ice cream is more popular than chocolate, vanilla, or strawberry!

You may be wondering, what this strange sounding ‘thing’ called Breadfruit is? Well, Breadfruit is a large tree that is very common in Southeast Asia. The fruit of the breadfruit tree is similar to bananas, since it can be eaten raw when ripe, and cooked when unripe. Okay, so what does the breadfruit taste like?

Well, lots of people say it tastes like freshly baked bread, others say that it tastes like a potato! The fruit is very popular in the South Asian islands and is eaten in many different ways. It can be boiled, cooked, and made into chips and fried!

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THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

4 Fridge Magnet : d e d e e n s ie l p p u S • Bottle caps (try not to bend them when you remove them from the bottle) • 1/2 inch strong button magnets • Very strong glue

By Shamama Shabbir

Instructions: These cool bottle cap magnets can be made easily with the bottle caps from your favourite drink bottles! Start by saving your favourite bottle caps. If you need a bottle opener, take your time so you don’t bend the cap.

You can make the magnets just by gluing the button magnets to the back of the bottle caps. The magnet is very strong, so it is important to use very strong glue or else the bottle cap will come off when you try to remove the magnet from a metal surface.

If you are using a plastic cap fill the cavity with the clay, press the Plaster of Paris inside; allowing it to dry; than glue the magnet while the clay is fresh.

To decorate the top side of the magnet you can stick your favourite stickers, formic sheets or you could even paint something yourself.

Cereal Rainbow

Supplies needed: • Fruit Flavoured Circle Cereal (Such as Fruit Loops) • Paper Plate • Craft Glue • Scissors How to make it: • Separate all of the cereal by colour. Put each colour in a bowl.

• Cut the paper plate in half so you have a half circle (one paper plate will make two rainbows). Follow the curve of the paper plate and glue the fruit cereal on it to form a rainbow. Let the glue dry.

Remember kids, always get permission from your parents before you start. It’s always a good idea to have a helper nearby.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

World wide weird Get your weekly dose of the unusual and funny from across the globe!

Mini back-flip Back-flips are usually reserved for the gymnastics mat, the football field or the basketball court but a daredevil rally driver has performed the world’s first 360 degree back-flip in a car in the French Alps.

Guerlain Chicherit, 31, successfully landed the Mini car after a 75ft jump for the stunt, at Tignes, which took four years to plan.

“Before the jump it was crazy. I was alone in the car before the start and I just had to do it, everything was ready,” he said.

He added: “I had to arrive at 60kph and be full throttle in the kicker to get the right rotation. In the jump, I knew the balance of the car was good and it took me maybe 20 seconds to realise I had landed on my wheels. When you attempt something nobody has ever achieved before, the stress is really high but the only way is to just try it.”

SOURCE: WEB.ORANGE.CO.UK

Bird invasion Millions of birds have descended on a small Kentucky city this winter, fouling the landscape, scaring pets and raising the risk for disease in a real-life version of Alfred Hitchcock’s horror film, The Birds.

The blackbirds and European starlings blacken the sky of Hopkinsville, Kentucky, before roosting at dusk, turn the landscape white with bird poop. “I have seen them come in, and there are enough that if the sun is just right, they’ll cloud your vision of the sun,” said Hopkinsville-Christian County historian William Turner. “I estimate there are millions of them.”

Although the birds have not turned on humans as in the classic 1963 Hitchcock movie featuring vicious attacks on people in a small northern California town, the city has taken defensive measures.

The south-central Kentucky city has hired a pest control company to get rid of the interlopers. Henry Jako, general manager of McGee Pest Control, said crews use air cannons and “bird-bangers” - similar to bottle rocket fireworks aimed into the trees where the birds roost.

Historian Turner said that the blackbird invasion this year is the worst he’s witnessed since the late 1970s, when Hopkinsville suffered a similar bird blitz. SOURCE: REUTERS

Chess invasion

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A designer has created an ‘out of this world’ chessboard - based on the retro arcade game Space Invaders.

Tommy Hills, 34, has replaced the Queens with motherships, the Kings with turrets, and the rooks with shields.

All the pieces - including the alien pawns - are laser-cut from fluorescent red and yellow acrylic.

Hills hopes the board will appeal to gamers, chess players, and “anyone with a nostalgia for classic games”.

He added: “It’s an interesting comparison between the mindless button mashing of video games in a virtual space versus the thoughtful strategic play of chess on a physical space.”

Fans can buy the entire board and 32 pieces for £41 (Rs6,125) or two stand-alone pieces for £6 (Rs891). SOURCE: WEB.ORANGE.CO.UK

Reporting paws Police officers in the West Midlands could be in the dog house after a police dog apparently filed a witness statement.

The brief statement, on behalf of police dog Peach, read: “I chase him. I bite him.

Bad man. He tasty. Good boy.

Good boy Peach.”

The ‘statement’ was signed at the bottom with a print of the Alsatian’s pawmark. It was reportedly written in response to a barrage of requests from the Crown Prosecution Service for an account from PC Peach on a crime.

Officers are said to have become frustrated after they continually told the CPS that Peach was a dog.

But it seems the joke report may have consequences as the force is now being investigated. “The matter will be investigated,” Julian Harper, from West Midlands Police, said. SOURCE: WEB.ORANGE.CO.UK

Meteorite fragments selling like hotcakes Zipper tie Zip me up please… No, not the jacket, zip up the tie!

A US designer has invented the perfect garment for men who struggle to fasten their ties. Josh Jakus has come up with a zip-up tie which he says fastens perfectly every time.

It comes in three different sizes and can be bought in blue or grey for £42 (Rs6,275).

Jakus, from California, said: “My other designs are made with zippers and felt, and my company had surplus of both of these materials. I was trying to find a use for the extra material and started coming up with different ways to create a new and unique idea. At one point I put a zipper around my neck and the idea was born - it was pretty easy to figure it out from there.”

He continued: “The tie is perfect for any occasion where you want to both look good and different at the same time. I don’t think it will replace the original tie - there are a lot of people who would prefer to stick with the tradition - that’s fine with me.” SOURCE: WEB.ORANGE.CO.UK

A tiny chunk of meteorite is equal to a tidy profit for some enterprising Russians. Last week’s big fireball event has had an interesting side effect, as amateur treasure hunters have headed out into the wilderness hoping to pick up a meteorite or five and sell the pieces for a large sum on the Internet.

Scientists have noted that there are plenty of meteorite pieces near Chelyabinsk, Russia that need to be found. In the days since, “chunks of meteorite” have shown up on outlets like eBay, now is not a good time to buy and most serious collectors are staying away.

The biggest problem is that many of the rocks posted are fakes. Secondly, while a meteorite is cool, the Russian meteorite has been found to be made of chondrite, which is the most common type of meteorite, thus making it less valuable. Perhaps the historical value of the pieces of meteorite will keep the cost high, but more than likely, the numbers will be down at some point.

Still, whether the pieces of meteorite are real or faux, they are currently selling like hotcakes. So, if you’re up for spending outrageous prices for a piece of history, go for it. SOURCE: THEDAILYBEAST.COM

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

Did you know?

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s n i g i r O d r o W Alarm!

Did you know that the word alarm (previously known as alarum) was once used to order people to war? The word alarm comes from the Italian phrase: all’arme! “To arms!” In other words: Men, take up your weapons! Soon enough the phrase was introduced into English, where it came to mean the sound itself, perhaps a trumpet’s blast or a drum’s roll. After that, alarm started being used to describe what people felt when a trumpet was sounded.

How to say 'What’s your name?' in different languages!

Afrikaans Basque Breton Bulgarian Catalan Cornish Danish Dutch Esperanto Estonian Folkspraak French Galician Greenlandic Hungarian Indonesian Italian Japanese Kinyarwanda Latin Lithuanian Malay

Wat is jou naam?

Nor zara?

Petra eo da anv?

Kak se kazvash Com et dius?

Pyth yw dha hanow?

Hvad hedder du?

Hoe heet je?

Kio estas via nomo?

Mis on teie nimi?

Wadt bin din Namen?

Comment est-ce que vous vous appelez ?

Como te chamas?

Qanoq ateqarpit?

Mi a neve?

Siapa nama anda?

Come ti chiami? o-namae wa nan desu ka Witwa nde?

Quid est nomen tibi?

Kuo tu vardu?

Siapa nama anda?

Cool facts The “sixth sick sheik’s sixth sheep’s sick” is said to be the toughest tongue twister in the English language.

If you sneeze too hard, you can fracture a rib. If you try to suppress a sneeze, you can rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and die.

Stewardesses is the longest word typed with only the left hand.

Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.

There is a Butterfly in Brazil which has the colour of chocolates and also smells like chocolate.

Giraffe can clean their ears with their tongue.

Both humans and Giraffe have the same number of bones in the neck.

The Statue of Liberty’s index finger is eight feet long.

The word “set” has the most number of definitions in the English language.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

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Fun & games

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THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 24, 2013

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