China ‘trying to take control of the Moon’
And other stories from the stranger side of life

China has set its sights on trying to seize control of the Moon, an expert has claimed. Leonard David, author of Mars: Our Future on the Red Planet, said Beijing is “pressing forward on an agenda of lunar exploration - one that will eventually lead to China placing home-grown boots on the Moon”. The nation’s Tianwen-1 spacecraft entered Mars’s orbit last week.
One dollar painting is worth £10,000
A man has discovered that a drawing he bought in South America for 73p is actually worth £10,000 as it was drawn by a well-known artist. Santiago Taute paid only one dollar for the drawing at a street market in Ecuador. Later, his wife recognised that the work was by Lee Hadwin, an artist who has a rare condition that allows him to paint pictures while he is asleep. Hadwin has previously sold artworks to Donald Trump for £100,000.
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Lonely woman deluged with 100th birthday gifts
A woman was given a 100th birthday to remember when she received 10,500 cards and gifts from well-wishers around the world. Lillian Greenway, who has no close surviving family to celebrate her milestone birthday, received the presents from strangers following an online appeal by staff at Heartlands Care and Nursing Home in Yardley, Birmingham.
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Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.
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