The real world news from 2025!

If you found the front pages of 2025’s newspapers a little gloomy, we’ve dug around all the back pages instead, to find some of the more lighthearted or downright peculiar stories you might have missed from the world news over the past 12 months.

JANUARY

Awkward Apples

The year kicked off with some essential news coming out of China, where influencer Zhu Miaolin argued that men should cover their protruding Adam’s apples with a miniature bra, just like women are asked to cover their own chests. It seems like she wasn’t the first to suggest the idea, with some retail platforms in the country already selling cloth covers for the throaty projection most typically seen on males. It was reported that 7,000 pig-shaped Adam’s apple “bras” had been sold to date.

FEBRUARY

Whale of a Time

A father-and-son kayaking adventure off the coast of Chile took a bizarre turn when the son was scooped up in the mouth of a humpback whale for a few seconds before being unceremoniously spat back out. A video of the incident quickly went viral, with the swallowed kayaker describing a “slimy texture” during the experience. Experts later confirmed that the animal could not have finished its meal even if it tried, because a humpback’s throat is only about the size of a household pipe.

MARCH

Pay Dirt

According to a 7 March report in the South China Morning Post, online stores are selling “bank soil” to buyers looking for a slice of good fortune. The soil is dug up from potted plants inside major Chinese banks, or from green areas around the buildings, then sold for up to S$150 a portion, for its supposed power to “enhance wealth and dissolve bad energy”

APRIL

Moon Mess

During NASA’s Apollo missions from 1969 and 1972, waste products were jettisoned from spacecraft to make way for lunar samples. And when we say jettisoned, we mean… left on the Moon. A total of 96 bags of faeces, urine and vomit are up there to this day, and now NASA has launched a competition, the LunaRecycle Challenge, inviting scientists and innovators to develop technologies to convert the waste into water, energy or fertiliser. Prize for the best solution? US$3 million.

MAY

Buzz Kill

Bears love honey – we all know that from the Winnie-thePooh stories, right? But a bear in Ohio has taken this food fondness a step further. In May, a beekeeper in the town of Bazetta reported that a bear broke into his apiary and ate not just a whole lot of honey, but also the frame of a hive, all the wax, and an estimated 10,000 to 50,000 bees. No, we’re not pollen your leg.

JUNE

Spanish Missteps

No visit to Rome would be complete without a look at the famous Spanish Steps. But we’re glad you weren’t there in June, when an 80-year-old man took a wrong turn in his Mercedes-Benz and drove straight down the picturesque staircase in the manner of Jason Bourne. Unlike Bourne, he got stuck halfway down, and a crane was required to extract the vehicle. He later tested negative for alcohol, telling police he was “on his way to work”.

JULY

Career Climb

To get a university scholarship, you usually need awesome grades and an impressive interview. At Seoul National University, a new scholarship has been launched that rewards students for summiting mountains. The Misan Mountain Hiking Scholarship provides funding for 70 applicants who climb any six of the highest and trickiest peaks in South Korea, recording their feats on an app.

AUGUST

Minty & Hairy

Scientists from King’s College London have discovered a new toothpaste ingredient that may lead to better protection for damaged teeth: your own hair. The keratin in hair, skin and wool apparently produces a protective coating that mimics natural enamel. The team said while people could eventually be encouraged to collect their own hair to extract keratin for their morning and evening clean, current prototypes are being made with sheep’s wool instead.

SEPTEMBER

Growing Apart

Influencer and Mariah Carey impersonator Suellen Carey announced her divorce in September… from herself. After sharing her unconventional wedding ceremony with followers earlier in the year – dubbing her decision to selfmarry as “sologamy” – she followed up with the sad news that she couldn’t make the marriage work. The reason? She found her own company “exhausting”.

OCTOBER

Orange Sabbath

A farm in Southampton in the UK marked the passing of iconic rock singer Ozzy Osbourne by breaking a Guinness World Record with a mosaic of pumpkins designed in the image of the heavy metal singer – and Ozzy’s wife Sharon and daughter Kelly both attended the unveiling ceremony. In other October pumpkin news, a Utah man farewelled his 35-year-old Geo Metro car by dropping an 800 kg pumpkin on it from a height of 14 storeys.

NOVEMBER

Wordle of God

Pope Leo XIV revealed an all-important nugget about his life in the Vatican in November, when he told a videoconference with young American Catholics that he starts each day with a Wordle puzzle. Not only that: unlike many players who strive for a strategic advantage by using words stacked with common letters (like “RAISE” and “SLATE”) he uses a different starting word every time! We wonder if he was playing back on 29 May 2024, when the winning word was “PAPAL”.

DECEMBER

Jewel Fool

New Zealand police were given an unenviable task in December when they were required to monitor a man suspected of swallowing a limited-edition Fabergé egg pendant after stealing it from Partridge Jewellers in Auckland. After six days, the S$25,000 pendant “emerged” from the suspect’s gastrointestinal tract without the requirement of medical intervention, and he was promptly arrested.

This article on the real world news from 2025 first appeared in the January 2026 edition of Expat Living. You can purchase the latest issue or subscribe so you never miss a copy!