Piece by piece, Afghanistan reclaims its history

KABUL (Reuters) - While everyone else is worrying about Afghanistan's future, a dedicated band of men and women is gathering up its past, hoping that a growing museum collection will show the world Afghan culture is more sophisticated than the tide of news reports suggest. Kabul's rebuilt National Museum, near the haunting remains the bombed-out royal palace, is running out of secure rooms to house centuries-old Buddhas, gold and silver coins from antiquity and other rare artifacts.

Crunchy crickets going mainstream in Australia?

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Looking for a taste treat for a special snack? Perhaps a packet of chocolate covered bugs, chocolate-chip mealworms or cricket lollipops will hit the spot. Australia's Aborigines have been eating witchetty grubs for centuries, but now etymologist Skye Blackburn is breeding edible bugs and selling them to Australians from all walks of life, and as special treats at corporate functions and children's parties.

Wasabi alarm, beetle sex win Ig Nobel spoof prizes

(Reuters) - Prognosticators who predicted the end of the world and got it wrong, scientists who built a wasabi fire alarm, and researchers who studied how the urge to urinate affects decision-making were among the winners of spoof Ig Nobel prizes on Thursday. The annual prizes, meant to entertain and encourage scientific research, are awarded by the Journal of Improbable Research as a whimsical counterpart to the Nobel Prizes, which will be announced next week.

Body Shop founder's legacy: laws to protect kids

GENEVA (Reuters) - Four years after her death, a campaign sparked by Body Shop founder Anita Roddick has had surprising success in getting governments to agree to toughen up child protection laws, the campaign's manager Christopher Davis said in an interview. The "Stop Sex Trafficking of Children" petition claims to have nudged 14 governments into changing their laws since it was launched three years ago and, with 7 million signatures so far, has high hopes of converting at least six more countries including Thailand to its cause.

Paris defends title as fashion research lab

PARIS (Reuters) - Balenciaga on Thursday proved yet again that Paris remained one of the world's most experimental fashion capitals despite efforts by rivals Milan, New York and London to upstage it. Fashion knows no taboo and for Balenciaga it is all about pushing the boundaries of acceptable combinations of radically different materials and colors in the same outfit.

Turkish morgue is equipped for the living

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Officials in a city in rural eastern Turkey, responding to an ancient local fear of being buried alive, have equipped the local morgue with the latest gadgetry in case any of the bodies stored there have been declared dead by mistake. Alarms and electronic motion detectors in the mortuary in Malatya, a town not otherwise known for its modernity, will detect the slightest movement by a living person emerging from a coma or long period of unconsciousness.

New book satirizes reality TV, "PC Britain," media

LONDON (Reuters) - James Palumbo is best known as the co-founder of Ministry of Sound, the music and nightclub business that claims to be the world's largest independent record company. But, for the time being at least, he is swapping the beats for books, self-publishing his second novel "Tancredi" -- a satire on everything from reality television to obesity and health care to political correctness.