It’s funny. You don't have to go to the cinema to see the wildest plot twists – life
is the best scriptwriter there is! So today I'm going to tell you the craziest stories
that ever happened in real life. But pay attention, 'cause one of them is not what it seems...
Jack, the baboon The nineteenth century was pretty tough for
a lot of people, and signal man James White was one of them. He worked for the Cape Town-Port
Elizabeth Railway service and was often called the “jumper,” since he always used to
jump between railcars. But one day this habit bit him back – he fell and lost both of
his legs. After this scary incident he decided that he needed an assistant and got a baboon
(who he later named Jack) to get the job done. What, you think the baboon can't do it? Well,
joke's on you 'cause Jack worked at the station for 9 years and never made a single mistake!
The railway even employed him officially, paying the baboon about 20 cents a day. Jack's
service ended in 1890, though – he died of tuberculosis.
The longest performance Have you ever been to a concert that seemed
like it lasted for ages? If so, don't forget to tell me who's performance it was in the
comments! Well, German musicians and philosophers decided to play a musical piece for ages (literally)
and chose John Cage's Organ²/ASLSP for the job. They followed the composer's instructions
to play it “as slow as possible” and thought that 639 years would be just enough. Considering
the fact that the musical piece has been played at St. Burchardi church in Germany since 2001,
it won’t end until 2640. What a time to be alive!
Raising Chicago If you're from Chicago, I have a very fascinating
historical flashback for ya! In the 19th century, Chicago was just a few feet above the Lake
Michigan water level which brought all kinds of problems. The water couldn't drain properly,
so the streets constantly became a muddy mess. Creating a system for good draining was way
too expensive and long, so the authorities went for the second best option – raising
the whole city a couple of feet up! And even though it seems kind of impossible, the bold
plan slowly started to become more and more real. It took about two decades to raise the
city up. And the most exceptional thing is that Chicago's busy life never stopped! People
were staying in hotels, visiting restaurants, and going to the grocery stores while all
these buildings were raised inch by inch every single day. Mind blowing!
The luckiest woman People have gone through some seriously dangerous
situations, but nothing compares to what Polish-German paraglider Ewa Wisnierska faced back in 2007.
On Valentine's Day, Wisnierska decided to fly a little to prepare for the upcoming paragliding
world championship, despite the not-so-great weather reports. And it turned out to be her
worst decision – eventually, Wisnierska got trapped in the upraft of two thunderstorms!
No matter how much she tried to get out, she was still lifted to a height of more than
32,000 feet (9,700 m). Low temperature and the lack of oxygen took their toll and Wisnierska
lost consciousness. Thankfully, after some time the paraglider started to fall, so she
came around and landed successfully. Her breathtaking story moved everybody so much that ABC1 and
France 5 did a whole film about it called Miracle in the Storm.
Hoover, the talking seal In 1971 a baby seal was found on the shore.
As it turned out, its mother had died, so a man named George Swallow took it home and
named it Hoover. Hoover grew pretty fast and spent tons of time with his “dad,” slowly
mimicking George's accent and catchphrases. However, one day Hoover got so big and needed
so much food that Swallow couldn't keep him anymore and gave him away to the New England
Aquarium. At first Hoover was silent – he didn't say a word for 5 whole years. But as
he began to feel more comfortable around new people and surroundings, Hoover started talking
again! His golden phrases included “Hello there” and “Come over here.” Of course,
the talking seal quickly became famous and even appeared on Good Morning America.
Mysterious disappearance Back in the twentieth century something really
weird happened in Australia. A couple who decided to have a picnic in the forest called
the police, saying they found a body in the woods. They were too afraid to go near it
and waited for policemen. The police and ambulance that came soon after examined the grey-skinned
and wounded body and stated that the person was still alive. A quick trip to the nearby
hospital revealed a shocking discovery – about 80 percent of this strange human's system
was completely different, so the doctors had no idea how to improve the situation. As everybody
was anxiously looking for ways to solve the mystery, the body simply disappeared from
the locked and guarded hospital ward! Needless to say, nobody knows what really happened
to this very day. Spooky!
Risky bet In 1956, a fearless American pilot, Thomas
Fitzpatrick, made a bet that he could land a plane on the streets of New York. He stole
a single engine plane from the Teterboro School of Aeronautics in New Jersey and flew it all
the way to New York, winning the bet. He got lucky and only received a 100 dollar fine,
as the plane's owner didn't press charges. However, just two years later the story repeated
itself – Fitzpatrick was at a bar and told the bartender all about his crazy bet. The
bartender didn't believe him, so Thomas stole another plane and landed right in front of
Yeshiva University. This time he got his punishment – Fitzpatrick was sentenced to 6 months
in prison.
Penguin love In 2007 two of the cutest penguins, Grape-kun
and his mate Midori, were transferred to Tobu Zoo. At this point these lovebirds had been
together for almost a decade! However, this didn't stop Midori from leaving Grape-kun
for a younger penguin. This really broke Grape-kun – he isolated himself from the other penguins
and started to spend less and less time interacting. That was until the zoo decided to put up a
cutout of the anime character Hululu near Grape-kun's enclosure. Believe it or not,
the penguin fell in love! He could spend hours looking at Hululu and tried to do everything
he could to reach the cutout. Unfortunately, he was already 20 years old at that time,
and his health wasn't getting any better. He died the same year and in 2018 Tobu Zoo
displayed another touching cutout – this time Hululu wasn't alone, the illustration
of Grape-kun was standing right next to her. Oh, the power of love!
The lawn chair flight Have you ever seen the movie Up? Well, long
before it came out, one man actually went on a daring balloon adventure! Sort of. Larry
Walters always wanted to be a pilot. But his dream would never come true because of his
poor eyesight. One day he decided to do a flight of his own – he bought 45 eight-foot
(2.4 m) weather balloons, filled them with helium, and strapped himself into this lawn
chair. He also took a pellet gun (to shoot the balloons to go back down), a camera, a
CB radio, a couple of sandwiches, and a beer. And he really did need all of that, as he
managed to climb all the way up to 16,000 feet (4,900 m)! He spent about 45 minutes
in the sky, shooting several balloons. But as he went down, the balloons' cables got
caught in a power line, causing a 20-minute blackout. Luckily, Walters landed safely after
all. His crazy adventure was awarded the “At-Risk Survivor” title in the famous Darwin awards
and sparked a new kind of sport called cluster ballooning.
Rabbit pregnancy Back in 1726 England had one of the biggest
controversies of its long history. A young woman named Mary Toft gave birth to something
that looked a lot like several animal parts. She sent them to doctor John Howard. He didn't
believe her at first but then she showed him other animal bits from her birth experience
(some of them looked a lot like rabbit pieces) and he decided to look into this strange case.
Mary's story quickly became extremely popular – so popular that the British Royal Family
sent their own investigator to find out what's going on. After tons of investigations and
examinations (and a couple more rabbit deliveries from Mary), the truth finally came out – Mary's
scary and mysterious story was nothing more than a hoax! Apparently, her husband, Joshua,
simply bought young rabbits and helped his wife fool the world. I don't know about you
but I definitely don't wanna know how these two came up with this wild idea!
So remember what I said at the beginning – yep, now’s your turn to determine which of these
stories is actually fake! Let me know down in the comments! If you learned something
new today, then give this video a like and share it with a friend.
But – hey! – don’t go anywhere just yet! We have over 2,000 cool videos for you
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Stay on the Bright Side of life!