Chinese Education Values: To get to their school, 80 children (aged 6 to 17) in the mountaintop village of Pili, China, near the borders with Tajikistan and Afghanistan, make a 120-mile journey that includes 50 miles on foot or by camel. The most dangerous parts of the route are an inches-wide path cut into a cliff (over a 1,000-foot drop), a 600-foot-long zip-line drop and crossings of four freezing rivers (easier in winter when they are frozen solid). The kids must make the chaperoned treks four times a year -- coming and going for each of two long sessions. According to one teacher, Ms. Su, the kids generally enjoy the adventure. The government is building a road to the village, but it will not be finished until 2013.

-- Globally (except in Japan), family-run businesses underperform those run by professional managers. Japanese corporations often seem to have a talented son to take over for his father. The main reason for that, according to an August Freakonomics radio report, is that the family scions usually first recruit an ideal "son" and then adopt him, often also encouraging their daughters to marry the men. (Japanese adage: "You can't choose your sons, but you can choose your sons-in-law.") If the man is already married, sometimes he and his wife will both get adopted. In fact, while 98 percent of U.S. adoptions are of children, 98 percent of Japan's are of adults.

-- At an October ceremony in the Satara district in India's Maharashtra state, 285 girls were allowed to change their names, as each of them had originally been named the Hindi word "Nakusa," which translates to "unwanted" (expressing their parents' disappointment at not having had a son). In Satara, only 881 girls are born for every 1,000 boys, reportedly the result of abortion, given the expense of raising a girl (whose family is expected to pay for any wedding and give a dowry to the groom's family).

-- Swedish Judges Get Tough: (1) A court dismissed charges against two 20-year-old men in October, accused of having bared a passed-out, 18-year-old woman's breasts at a party and taken photographs. Since the woman was not "aware" that she was being molested, the act was not a crime, ruled the Stockholm District Court. (2) Also in October, the Falun District Court in central Sweden convicted 23 women of possession of "large quantities" of child pornography, but gave them suspended sentences, merely fining them in amounts as low as the equivalent of $375. Their male "ringleader" was sentenced to one year in prison.

-- Dubai is a city of towering, architecturally brilliant skyscrapers, but since all were built only in the last several decades, the city's central sewer system has not been able to keep up. Consequently, reported NPR's "Fresh Air" in November, only a few are hooked up to the municipal system, and the remainder must hire fleets of tanker trucks to carry away the waste water. The trucks then must queue up, sometimes for 24 hours at a time, to dispose of it at treatment plants.

-- Factory worker Billy Hyatt, who was fired in 2009 by north Georgia plastics company Pliant Corp., filed a lawsuit in August alleging illegal religious discrimination. Pliant (now called Berry Plastics) required its employees to wear stickers indicating the number of consecutive accident-free days, and March 12, 2009, was the 666th day. When Hyatt refused to wear "the mark of the beast" (embracing that number, he thought, would condemn him to hell), he was suspended and then fired.

-- The International House of Prayer in Kansas City, Mo., recently celebrated 12 consecutive years of around-the-clock musical praying, which Pastor Mike Bickle and his evangelical congregation believe is necessary to fight the devil's continuous infiltration of the realms of power in society (business, media, government, etc.). "To keep the music going," according to an October Los Angeles Times dispatch, "the church has 25 bands playing throughout the week in two-hour sets," divided between "devotional" music and "intercessions," in which God is petitioned to help some cause or place. Bickle claims that there are "thousands" of 24/7 prayer groups in the world.

-- Israelis lately experience attacks not just from the outside but from its own ultra-Orthodox communities (about 10 percent of the country, and growing), whose activists have jeered and stoned "immodestly" dressed women and girls (as young as 6) on the street, defaced women's images on billboards, forced illegal gender segregation in public facilities (including buses and sidewalks), and vandalized businesses that treat women as equals (such as one ice cream shop -- since female customers lick the cones in public). An especially violent minority, the Sikrikim, employ some tactics reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan in America.

Each August in Urakawa, Japan, a "hallucination and delusion competition" takes place among visiting alcoholics and sufferers of mental disorders, who in principle are helped by bonding with fellow patients and revealing their failures and successes. The Bethel Festival, named for its sponsor, brings about 600 people together for on-stage presentations (sometimes in the form of song or dance) and awards a grand prize to a standout visitor (one year, to a woman who lived for four days in a public restroom after a voice in her head told her to, and in another year, to a man who had overcome a 35-year stretch of never straying more than two yards from his mother). (Some mental-disorder professionals believe the festival is too-easily mockable by insensitive outsiders.)

How does an extortionist (or kidnapper) safely collect the money that has been dropped off for him? In July, police staking out a vacant field in Colerain Township, Ohio, after leaving the $22,000 ordered by alleged extortionist Frank Pence, waited for about an hour, but Pence failed to show. Then, one officer noticed the money slowly moving across the field and finally caught up to Pence, who was pulling a very, very long, partially concealed rope from a location a distance from the drop site.

Authorities in Washington County, Ore., said in October that they would not file charges against a very weird 21-year-old woman who had felt compelled, as a tribute to her horse that had just died of old age, to get naked and climb inside the horse's carcass, to "feel one" with it. Her boyfriend recorded the extremely bloody adventure with numerous photographs (many showing her smiling joyously), which made their way onto the Internet and available to any viewers with strong stomachs. Said Deputy Sgt. Dave Thompson: "At some point in your career, you say, yeah, I've seen a lot of bad stuff (and) you see this kind of picture and you realize maybe you haven't seen everything."

A lawyer's first rule of cross-examination is to never ask a question you don't already know the answer to, but criminal defendants who act as their own lawyers typically do not get that memo. Philome Cesar, charged with about 25 robberies in the Allentown, Pa., area, began questioning his alleged victims at his trial in November. Please describe, he asked the first, what the robber sounded like. Answered victim Daryl Evans, "He sounded like you." After Cesar asked a second victim the same question and received the same answer, he decided to stop cross-examining the victims. (He was convicted of 19 counts.)

In New Braunfels, Texas, in November (2005), Robert Villarreal, 34, was sentenced to 50 years in prison after he sold drugs to the same undercover officer for the third time in a 14-year period. He had actually argued "entrapment," claiming that for the first sale, in 1988, he was so young (age 18) that he shouldn't be expected to remember later what the officer looked like.

Was Moammar Gadhafi the last of the "buffoon dictators," asked BBC News in October. His legend was earned not merely with his now-famous, dirty-old-man scrapbook of Condoleezza Rice photos. Wrote a BBC reporter, "One day (Gadhafi) was a Motown (backup) vocalist with wet-look permed hair and tight pants. The next, a white-suited comic-operetta Latin American admiral, dripping with braid." Nonetheless, Gadhafi had competition, according to an October report in the journal Foreign Policy. For example, the son of Equatorial Guinea's dictator owns, among other eccentric luxuries, a $1.4 million collection of Michael Jackson memorabilia. North Korea's Kim Jong Il owns videos of almost every game Michael Jordan ever played for the Chicago Bulls.

-- In March, William Ernst, 57, owner of the QC Mart chain of Iowa convenience stores, excitedly announced a company-wide employee contest with a prize of $10 for guessing the next worker that Ernst will fire for breaking rules. "Once we fire the person, we will open all the envelopes (containing the entries), award the prize, and start the contest again." Ernst added, "And no fair picking Mike Miller from (the Rockingham Road store). He was fired at around 11:30 a.m. today for wearing a hat and talking on his cellphone. Good luck!!!!!!!!!!" (After firing a cashier who had complained about Ernst's attitude, he challenged the woman's unemployment-compensation claim, but in October, a judge ruled in her favor.)

-- Even in a flagging economy, Christie's auction house in New York City was able to attract a record sales price for a photograph. In November, a 1999 photo by German artist Andreas Gursky, of a scenic view of the Rhine River, sold for $4.3 million. (It is possible, of course, that buying the actual waterfront property that Gursky photographed from -- to enjoy the same view every day -- would have been less expensive.)

-- Unfortunately, Manulife Financial Corp. is a Canadian firm, and thus it had a very bad year. If exactly the same company had been magically relocated to anywhere in the United States, it would have had an outstanding year. Under Canada's hard-nosed accounting rules, Manulife was forced to post a loss last year of $1.28 billion. However, under the more feel-good U.S. accounting rules, according to the company, it would have shown a profit of $2.2 billion and been flush with $16 billion more in shareholder value.

-- Following October arrests by Nigeria's Abuja Environmental Protection Board, authorities learned that local prostitutes earned premium fees by selling their customers' semen to "juju priests," who use it as "medicines" in rituals. Police who rounded up the sex workers found inventories of condoms with the necks tied.

In the course of an October story on an ill-fated Continental Airlines flight during which all restrooms in coach were broken, the reporter for the Star Tribune of Minneapolis sought reactions from experts. Calling the toilet failures a "bad situation that hasn't been addressed" was Robert Brubaker, a spokesman for something called the American Restroom Association, "a Baltimore-based advocacy group for toilet users."

-- An Oxford University researcher reported in August on the African crested rat, which is so ingenious that it slathers poison, from chewing the A. schimperi plant, onto an absorbent strip of fur on its back as protection against predators many times larger. The researcher observed first-hand a dog quivering in fear after just one failed mouthful of a crested rat's fur in his laboratory. The noxious goo is also used by African tribesmen on their hunting arrows.

-- Researching the Itty-Bitty: In October, Popular Science dubbed researcher Gaby Maimon of Rockefeller University as one of its "Brilliant 10" for 2011 for his monitoring of neurons in the brains of fruit flies. Maimon first had to immobilize the flies' brains in saline and outfit their tiny neurons with even tinier electrodes -- so that he could track which neurons were firing as the flies flapped their wings and carried out other activities (work that he believes can be useful in treating human autism and attention-deficit disorder).

-- Oh, Dear! (1) An October Associated Press dispatch from New Orleans warned that "Caribbean crazy ants" are invading five Southern states by the millions, and because their death triggers distress signals to their pals for revenge attacks, up to 10 times as many might replace any population wiped out. Said a Texas exterminator, of a pesticide he once tried, "In 30 days I had 2 inches of dead ants covering (an) entire half-acre," and still the ants kept coming, crawling across the carcasses. Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi are currently the most vulnerable. (2) Biologists found a shark fetus with one centered eye inside a pregnant dusky shark off the coast of Baja California Sur, Mexico, in October. A marine sciences lab in nearby La Paz confirmed that the unborn baby, which filled up a researcher's hand, had the extremely rare congenital "cyclopia."

Japan's Showa University School of Dentistry has for several years been training future practitioners using life-sized synthetic patients from Orient Industry, based on the company's "sex dolls," and recently upgraded to the fancier silicone dolls with human-feel skin that can cost as much as the equivalent of $9,000 when sold to perverts who custom-order young women for companionship. According to a July CNN report, advanced robotics added to the Showa version allow the doll to utter typical patient phrases, to sneeze, and (when trainees mishandle tools) to gag.

Police in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, arrested a much-too-zealous expert on local cemeteries in November, suspected of digging up the bodies of 29 women buried in the city and taking them to his apartment. Local media identified him as prominent historian Anatoly Moskvin, 45, possessor of "certain quirks," including making solitary forays through the hundreds of graveyards in the region. Police found the mummified corpses, outfitted in dresses and headscarves, in Moskvin's home, along with an assortment of plastic dolls wearing frilly dresses.

(1) Japan's National Police Agency revealed in August that during the five months following the tsunami-provoked nuclear disaster, super-honest searchers had turned in wallets containing the equivalent of $48 million and safes containing cash of the equivalent of $30 million. (2) In August, the school superintendent of Fresno County, Calif., refused $800,000 in guaranteed salary and said he would run the 325-school system for three years on less pay than a first-year teacher makes. (3) Employees at the dump yard in Pompano Beach, Fla., gave Brian McGuinn zero chance of ever finding the custom-designed ring he had given his wife but had accidentally tossed in his trash at home on Oct. 30. Facing nine tons of 10-foot-high rotten eggs, dirty diapers and other garbage (which made him vomit), he found the ring within 30 minutes.

Russia's long-running Moscow Cat Circus/Theater, reported in News of the Weird in 1998, is still in service, astonishing all who ever tried to train a cat. In the United States, Samantha Martin runs her own similar show (at such venues as Chicago's Gorilla Tango Theatre in March (2009)) featuring the Rock Cats trio on guitar, piano and drums, as well as a tightrope-walker, barrel-roller and skateboarder, among other performers. Martin admitted to a Chicago Tribune reporter that the cats' music "sucks," in that "when they're playing, they're not even playing the same thing," and anyway she has two backup drummers because her regular is prone to "walking off in a huff," sort of "like diva actresses." "This is why you don't see trained cat acts. Because . . . the managers can't take the humiliation."

Enterprising reporters get stories by earning the trust of their sources, which Simon Eroro of the Post-Courier (Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea) obviously did. At a banquet in November, the News Limited (Rupert Murdoch's empire) awarded Eroro its "Scoop of the Year" honor for reporting on militant tribal fighters of the Free West Papua movement -- a scoop he had to earn by agreeing to undergo a ritual circumcision, with bamboo sticks, to prove his sincerity. (Some of the rebels still wear penis gourds whose size varies with the status of the wearer.)

-- An Illinois appeals court finally threw out a lawsuit in August, but not before the two-year-long battle had created a foot-high pile of legal filings on whether two "children" (now ages 23 and 20) could sue their mother for bad parenting while they were growing up. Among the claims were mom's failure to send birthday cards or "care" packages during the kids' college years and calling her daughter at midnight to ask that she return home from a party (and once failing to take the girl to a car show).

-- Todd Remis, an unemployed stock-market research analyst, filed a lawsuit in 2009 against the photographer of his 2003 wedding, citing breach of contract because the 400 shots taken during the ceremony failed to cover several key moments, such as the "last dance." A November 2011 New York Times report pointed out that Remis is demanding not just the return of his $4,100, but for the photographer to pay for re-creating the missing scenes by covering travel expenses for all 40 guests to reconvene. (Remis and his wife have divorced; she has returned to her native Latvia, and Remis does not even know how to contact her.)

-- Consumer Rights: (1) Jonathan Rothstein of Encino, Calif., filed a lawsuit in September against Procter & Gamble for selling its Crest toothpaste in "Neat Squeeze" packages, which Rothstein said make it impossible to access the last 20 percent of the contents, thus forcing consumers to buy more toothpaste prematurely. (He wants Procter & Gamble to return 90 cents to everyone who bought Neat Squeeze packages.) (2) Sarah Deming of Keego Harbor, Mich., filed a lawsuit in September against the distributor of the movie "Drive" (starring Ryan Gosling) because its trailers promised fast-driving scenes (like those in the "Fast and Furious" series), but delivered mostly just drama.

(1) A recent vicious, unprovoked attack in Toronto by Sammy the cat on Molly the black Labrador (bloodying Molly's ear, paws and eye) left Molly's owner without recourse to Ontario's or Toronto's "dangerous pet" laws. The owner told the Toronto Star in November that, apparently, only dangerous dogs are covered. (2) Maya the cat was central to a recent contentious British immigration case when a judge seemed to favor residence for a Bolivian national because of Maya. The judge had concluded that the Bolivian man and his British partner had established a close-knit "family" relationship because of the need to care for Maya.

-- Unclear on the Concept: (1) Licensed Texas physician Akili Graham, 34, who gives paid motivational speeches on healthy living ("How to Deal With Stress"), was arrested in October in Houston and accused as the front man for four "pain clinics" that allegedly dispense prescription drugs illegally. (2) A chief child-abuse investigator for the Catholic Church in Britain, Christopher Jarvis, 49, was sentenced in October following his guilty plea to possession of over 4,000 child-sex images on his computer. Jarvis had been hired in 2002 to protect against pedophiles' access to church groups.

-- Why People Love Washington: U.S. Rep. Tom Graves of Georgia told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in August that he and a partner had "settled" the lawsuit brought by the Bartow County Bank for failing to repay a $2.2 million loan they had taken out in 2007. Graves has been a staunch advocate for governmental fiscal austerity and voted against raising the federal debt-ceiling in August. However, he had balked at repaying the $2.2 million (though he had signed a personal guarantee) because, he said, the bank should have known when it made the loan that Graves would be unable to pay it back.

-- Violinist Martin Stoner, 60, who lost his job after 25 years and who is suing the New York City Ballet for age discrimination, petitioned federal judge Robert Patterson to disqualify himself from the case because he is too old (88) and, according to Stoner, has vision and hearing problems.

(1) Management consultant Graham Gibbons, 42, was on trial in Cardiff, Wales, at press time, charged with making a clandestine video of himself and his then-girlfriend in bed. Gibbons denied being a pervert, insisting that he made the video to analyze, for "efficiency," the "time and motion" of his "performance," as he might do for corporate clients. (Despite his alleged improved lovemaking, the girlfriend broke up with him.) (2) West Virginia roadkill-cooking activist David Cain told Bloomberg News in October that he generally supported Volvo's new driver-safety technology that warns of objects ahead in the road. Cain pointed out that it was just a warning, that the driver "could still choose to run over something that's good for eating."

In November, Tommy Joe Kelly, unsuccessfully acting as his own lawyer, was convicted of slashing a stranger's tire by an Austin, Texas, jury, despite his explanation. "OK, I'm going to tell you the truth on this one," he said from the witness stand. "It doesn't sound right, but it is. I ... had hemorrhoids at that time, super duper bad." (There have been 391 tire slashings in Kelly's neighborhood over the last four years, but he was charged with only one count, and sentenced to 10 years in jail.)

Robbers Easily Subdued: (1) Dale Foughty, 56, was charged with robbing a convenience store in Jacksonville, N.C., in October, despite attempting to intimidate the clerk by dressing as Spiderman. However, the clerk poked Foughty in the stomach with a broom, sending him away empty-handed. (2) Cody Smith, 18, was charged with snatching a woman's purse in Johnson City, Tenn., in November. The victim chased Smith into nearby shrubbery, entangling him long enough for her to recover the purse. (3) Two men, attempting a robbery of the Ace Smoke Shop in Altadena, Calif., in July, fled after grabbing only part of the store's cash. They were frightened off by the manager's barking Chihuahua.

The tactic of "patience" is usually employed when police believe that a suspect has ingested drugs for smuggling, i.e., nature will take its course, and the drugs will appear in the toilet sooner or later. On Oct. 12, Nigerian comic actor Babatunde Omidina (known as "Baba Suwe") was detained before a flight at the Lagos airport because authorities suspected that he had ingested drugs to smuggle to Paris. Omadina denied the charge, but police locked him up and began monitoring his bowel movements. On Nov. 4, Omadina was released without charges following 25 "evidence"-free movements.

The divorce of Anton Popazov and his wife, Nataliya, is about to go through (in 2008), but the couple are still contractually committed to the Moscow State Circus, where their act includes Nataliya's shooting an apple off of Anton's head with a crossbow. The Times of London asked Anton during a show in Sheffield, England, in February whether he was afraid. "I still trust her because Nataliya is very professional," he said. "(T)he show must go on."