A puppet celebrating New York City’s roots

Little Amal, a 12-foot puppet of a 10-year-old Syrian refugee, is on a 17-day blitz through every corner of the Big Apple as part of a theatre project hoping to raise awareness about immigration.

“When we talk about migration and refugees, we tend to forget that more than half of the people we’re talking about are children,” said playwright and director Amir Nizar Zuabi, the artistic director of Little Amal Walks NYC.

“The role of the project is to talk about displacement, to talk about immigration, to talk about vulnerability in different contexts and, of course, each locality,” said Zuabi.

The puppet completing a 5,000-mile trek across Europe, from the Syrian-Turkish border, through 12 countries. She has including greeting refuges from Ukraine at a Polish train station and stopping at refugee camps in Greece, and met with Pope Francis. “The core of this project is empathy, is to fight indifference, because indifference is like a stone. You can’t turn it. It’s what it is. The minute you start cracking indifference, something happens,” said Zuabi.

Home-invading python caught

Stuart McKenzie of A Snake Catchers 24/7, posted a video to Facebook showing what happened when he was called out to a home in Palmwoods, Queensland, Australia, on a report of an invading snake.

McKenzie arrived to find a ‘rather large’ carpet python that crawled up into the bottom of a recliner chair.

The snake catcher ended up having to remove the snake from the top of the chair.

“It took a while and was a delicate process, but we were able to get the snake out eventually and relocate it back into the bush,” he wrote in the Facebook post.

“One in two million” blue lobster caught

A father and son fishing in Maine caught a bright blue lobster that is a rare, 1-in-2-million sea discovery.

The crustacean — named “Lucky Blue” — was caught in ocean waters beyond Peaks Island, off the southeast portion of the state.

Luke Rand, is stern man on his dad’s boat and the two have also caught rare calico and orange lobsters over the years. His father, Mark Rand, has been fishing for more than 60 years.

The lobster, a male, legal-size, healthy crustacean, is now in a tank on display at Luke’s mother’s waterfront restaurant in Portland, Becky’s Diner. “We’re throwing it back in two weeks,” Becky said. “But for now we thought the kids would enjoy it at an aquarium close to home. We named him ‘Lucky Blue’ because he’s going back in the water and not going to be boiled.”

266 milkshake flavours earn Guinness World Record

An Arizona ice cream shop earned a Guinness World Record by offering 266 milkshake flavours — and making them all in just over an hour.

Snow Cap, an ice cream shop in Seligman, attempted the Guinness World Record for most milkshake flavours on display and the event was timed to coincide with a visit from motor oil company Mobil 1 as part of its Keep Route 66 tour.

A Guinness World Records adjudicator was on hand as the shop’s owners, the Delgadillo family, made every milkshake on the menu in about 1 hour and 15 minutes. The unusual flavours were also prepared by the shop including peanut butter and onion ring; banana and chilli; and orange and fish burger.

Published in Dawn, Young World, September 24th, 2022