Unusual Friendship

A pair of month-old Sumatran tiger twins have become inseparable playmates with a set of young orangutans, an unthinkable match in their natural jungle habitat in Indonesia’s tropical rainforests.

The friendship between 5-month-old female baby primates Nia and Irma, and cubs Dema and Manis, has blossomed at the Taman Safari zoo where they share a room in the nursery.

After being abandoned by their mothers shortly after birth, the four play fight, nipping and teasing each other, and cuddling up for a shared nap when they are worn out.

”This is unusual and would never happen in the wild,” said zoo keeper Sri Suwarni, bottle-feeding a baby chimp on Wednesday. ”Like human babies, they only want to play.”

The four have lived side-by-side for a month without a single act of hostility, she said.

Indonesian tigers and orangutans are both endangered species, threatened by rapidly shrinking habitats.

Conservationists estimate there are fewer than 700 Sumatran tigers still alive, while fewer than 60,000 orangutans remain in the wild. Around 90 percent of the jungle has been destroyed by illegal logging, poaching and cut-and-burn farming practices on Borneo and Sumatra islands.

The exceptional friendship will likely be short-lived, said veterinarian Retno Sudarwati, because as the animals grow up their natural survival instincts will kick in.

”When the time comes, they will have to be separated. It’s sad, but we cant’ change their natural behavior,” she said. ”Tigers start eating meat when they are three months old.”

Source: Boston Herald

Unusual Clock Mechanisms

Cryptic Time Pieces, Rarely Seen Designs

Even James Bond would be challenged to quickly tell the time from these watches, even with his spy gadget experience. Well, telling the time does not seem to be the point here; these items exist only because of their exuberant, glamorous or wacky design. Most of the watches shown here are vintage, some are antique; for the more recent examples of "nutty time pieces" read this article




























(images credit: 1nah.ru)

Swiss watch maker Angular Momentum has fun with various bizarre layouts:



This model is appropriately called "Mystery Time Dispay":



Do you really need hour, minute or second hands?
(the dials themselves rotate in this case)



...even more stylish offering in the same vein: no hour, minute or second hands:
(read more about it at YankoDesign - via)





Other stylish classic watches are made by various prestigious firms, like
Carlo Ferrara - "Dancing Régulateur":




(Source: Journal.vz.ru)

Some of the impressive designs from
Audemars Piguet, Jean d'Eve, Jacob & Co. and others approach art in their sophistication and glamor:
(more here)


Harry Winston's Rare Watches - Opus 6



Piguet Maserati



Parmigiani Bugatti



Harry Winston's Opus V
- starting price 100k USD (read more here)


And finally, simplicity itself:
"Alien visitation" clock. (I want one)



Who cares if time is impossible to tell accurately? You might just fall in love with these time pieces, and then, you know, "Lovers ever run before the clock" (Shakespeare)

Choose a cool watch here