This Giant Panda Knows How To Pose For Selfies With Tourist

A cute giant panda has stolen the limelight of Chinese social media for its exceptional sense of photography. The black-and-white bear, living in south-west China's Chengdu city, seems to know how to strike poses as a tourist took selfies with it. Pictures show that the eager animal even tried to grab the selfie stick at one point. The pictures first appeared on China's social media platform on January 11.

The panda was being looked after by the Dujiangyan Panda Base in the Chengdu city. The woman was a tourist and she was trying to have pictures taken with the panda, which is a service the centre offers. A total of six pictures were released. 

Two of them were taken by an onlooker and showed the bear snuggling up to the woman held the selfie stick. In the pictures, the panda looked right into the mobile phone, appearing to be curious. The other four pictures were said to be the selfie pictures the woman had taken. 

The panda appeared to adopt a professional pose, putting its right paw under its chin in one image. In another picture, the animal enjoyed his bamboo while staring into the lens. Chinese media are smitten with the photogenic panda. They praised that the animal should know the best camera angle to look skinny and beautiful in pictures. 

Founded in 2011, the Chengdu  of Giant Panda Breeding is specialised in re-introducing the bears into the wild. The centre is a part of the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding, which has around 108 bears in captivity, the largest artificial breeding populations of pandas in the world. In March, 2016, another panda at the centre was caught snuggling up to its keeper, giving him a kiss before posing for a selfie with the man.

“World’s Saddest Polar Bear” moved to ocean park after outpouring of out...

Global anger at the plight of 'the saddest polar bear in the world', who was caged in appalling conditions in a Chinese shopping mall, has borne fruit, with the mall owners agreeing to send him back to the ocean park where he was born. 

Earlier this year a viral video of the three-year-old bear, called Pizza, slumped on his side, her mouth quivering, broke the hearts of animal lovers around the world. Pizza repeatedly thumped his paws against a metal door and chucked ice lumps about with his mouth before falling asleep in a dark corner. 

The owners of Grandview Shopping Mall in the city of Guangzhou in southern China came under huge pressure both nationally and internationally and they have now relented and grudgingly agreed to move Pizza to an ocean park in northern China. They said it was a 'temporary' move - suggesting they plan to renovate the aquarium where he was housed - but gave no more details. The mall owners announced on the Chinese social media platform, Weibo, they were sending Pizza back to the park, where he was born and where he will be reunited with his parents. 

Dr Peter Li, from Humane Society International, said: 'Pizza the polar bear has endured a life of deprivation and suffering in his small, artificial glass-fronted room at the shopping mall, so the news that he's getting out at last makes me very happy and relieved for him. 'But we implore the mall to make this a permanent move for Pizza and to not condemn him to return. At last he will feel the sun on his fur, sniff fresh air and see the sky above him in the company of his mum and dad. 'No amount of renovation could ever make a shopping mall a suitable place for this animal, and to send him back now would be cruel and heartless.' 

Qin Xiaona, director of Capital Animal Welfare Association, said: 'It's a good decision, the right decision for Pizza, but it's not the end. 'Temporary is not good enough. Now we hope that Grandview will learn from this episode and move Pizza permanently so that he never again has to endure the dreadful life in a shopping mall. 

Pizza was the main attraction for the aquarium in the shopping centre and there was a constant stream of tourists snapping selfies against the enclosure's glass panels. Children sporadically thumped against the glass and aquarium staff did nothing to stop them. The three-year-old polar bear had barely enough room to turn around in as he was gawped at from all angles by visitors to the shopping centre attraction.

Heartbreaking moment little girl finds her missing dog roasted and ready for sale

Published on 31 Mar 2015

The tears of a child over her lost pet are hard to look at. But the story is more gut wrenching as it becomes clear this girl found her pet roasted and ready for sale at a local meat vendor. The photographs showing the young girl crying have gone viral on Vietnamese social media, after she allegedly spotted her family's dog on sale at a local meat vendor after it had gone missing for several days. The unnamed girl, thought to be about five years old and from a village in northern Vietnam, spotted the dog for sale, after it had been slaughtered, roasted, and placed in a flat basket. Her tragic response has brought back long-running discussion on social media in Vietnam, as well as in neighbouring China, about the ethics of eating dogs. Stories about strays or other dogs taken from the street and sold in unhygienic conditions to the public are common with a growing number of clashes between people looking for dogs to cook and sell ending up in clashes with dog owners. Eating dog meat is not illegal in China, and there is an annual dog eating festival in the Chinese city of Yulin, with an estimated 10,000 dogs slaughtered at the summer solstice event every year. In response to international outrage China said it was clamping down on the illegal street dog meat sellers, forcing it instead into authorised premises. They want the dogs to come from authorised traders and not be harvested off the street where they may have diseases that could pose a risk to human health and subsequently be butchered in unhygienic conditions. Only recently a raid happened in the Shunyi District of China’s capital Beijing where customers were given the chance to pick their dog from a cage before it was slaughtered and screened in front of them.

Mutant pig with human face and penis on its forehead draws crowds and cash offers

Published on 9 Feb 2015

A farmer says he was inundated with cash offers for a pig born with a human face and a penis on its forehead after photos of the newborn 'mutant' went viral.

Friends and neighbours of Tao Lu rushed to his property in Yanan township in the city of Nanning, China, after news of the deformed pig spread.

One of the last to be born in a litter of 19, the little piglet was described by witnesses as having a human face and a penis on its forehead.

And when a local newspaper published pictures of the bizarre-looking animal, several people contacted Tao, offering to buy it.

Sadly, the animal died after being rejected by its mother and refusing a bottle.

Tao, 40, said: "It was a large litter, and the mutant was one of the last of 19 piglets to be born.

"All the others were normal, just this one was really bizarre.

"It is a shame it died, I could have got more money for it than for the rest of the family put together based on what people were offering me on the phone."

The farmer said he had intended to put the pig on display to attract visitors.

One person who saw the animal first hand, Wu Kung, 32, said: "I was one of a dozen people who went there to see the piglet, and it really did have human face and exactly like he said, a penis growing out of its forehead."