DAVID ADAMS writes about the odder side of life…
• An Italian village that has promoted itself as “COVID-free” is offering people the chance to purchase houses for just $1, provided the new owners make a promise to renovate. Cinquefrondi, which has had no reported cases of the disease, is located in the southern region of Calabria, a region which has one of the lowest number of coronavirus cases of any in the country. Mayor Michele Conia told CNN “Operation Beauty” aims to reverse a trend for younger residents to leave in a bid to find work. “Finding new owners for the many abandoned houses we have is a key part of the Operation Beauty [mission] that I have launched to recover degraded, lost parts of town,” he says. Would-be residents are required to provide a deposit of up to €5,000 which is forfeited if they fail to renovate within three years of purchase.
Picture of Martin Margins Spectacles on the TradeMe website
• An unusual pair of centuries old spectacles, rescued from a landfill in New Zealand, have sold at auction for more than $NZ,8,000. Known as ‘Martin Margins Spectacles’, the eyewear, which has a steel frame and horn or tortoiseshell inserts, is believed to have been made around 1760 by the workshop of London optician Benjamin Martin. They were found by staff at a Wellington landfill and have now been auctioned online with a final bid of $NZ8,150. Winning bidder Aaron Smylie told Radio New Zealand he was into “quirky things”. “They are unique, I haven’t actually found that design on the [inter]net as such, there were quite a few designs of them, which from what I can gather, depicts the age as well…anything like that, that’s really intricate in design, attracts my eye.”
• Poland accidentally invaded the Czech Republic recently – but it was apparently all a mix-up. NPR reported that the Czech Foreign Ministry had confirmed the incident in late May near the village of Pelhřimovy in which Polish soldiers had crossed the border into the Czech Republic in the mistaken belief they were still in Poland and, in the interests of keeping borders closed during coronavirus, had “mistakenly deterred our citizens from entering a church on the Czech territory”. Poland’s Foreign Ministry told CNN the case was “only a minor misunderstanding that was quickly cleared up”.
