Uncle John's Bathroom Reader The World's Gone Crazy

by Bathroom Readers' Institute

  MEMOIR: Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan, by Norma Khouri (2003)

  WHAT SHE WROTE: Khouri and her best friend Dalia owned a hair salon in Amman, Jordan, in the 1990s. After Dalia fell in love with a Christian soldier, she was stabbed to death by her Muslim father in an “honor killing.” Khouri was forced to flee the country, first to Greece, then to Australia, and wrote her memoir in Internet cafés whenever she could. When Honor Lost became a bestseller in Australia, Khouri was subjected to threats against her life and had to go into hiding. The book quickly became an international success, and Khouri became a symbol of independence and courage for oppressed women throughout the Arab world.

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  At the same time? 17% of drivers pick their noses in the car, and 17% flirt with other drivers.

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  THE TRUTH: In July 2004, the Sydney Morning Herald exposed Khouri as a fake. She was born in Jordan—but her family moved away when she was three years old. She was raised in Chicago, where she lived for nearly 30 years. During the 1990s, Khouri and her American husband, John Toliopoulos, were reportedly involved in several shady real estate deals in Chicago, and in 1999, after being questioned by the FBI, they moved to Australia. She never owned a hair salon in Jordan, and there was no proof that “Dalia” ever existed. Khouri initially stood by the book, then in August 2004 admitted that most of it was made up. She defended it anyway, saying it was for a good cause. Honor Lost had sold half a million copies in 15 countries by the time the hoax was revealed.

  MEMOIR: The Blood Runs Like a River Through My Dreams, by Nasdijj (2000)

  WHAT HE WROTE: Nasdijj (pronounced NAS-de-gee) was born on a Navajo reservation to an alcoholic Indian mother who died young, and a white father who abused him. He eventually got married, had a daughter, then adopted a young boy who suffered from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. At the age of six, the boy died in Nasdijj’s arms. A section of the story was published in Esquire magazine in 1999, and the piece was nominated for a National Magazine Award. The full-length memoir followed, to wide critical acclaim, making the New York Times Notable Book list and winning the Salon.com Book Award. Nasdijj went on to write two more memoirs—both of them also critical successes.

  THE TRUTH: In 2006 the alternative news magazine LA Weekly published a story, titled “Navahoax,” that provided proof that Nasdijj was actually a white writer of gay erotica from East Lansing, Michigan, named Timothy Patrick Barrus. The entire story of Nasdijj the Navajo had been made up. Barrus lost a lucrative publishing contract and currently writes angry diatribes about the publishing industry on various Internet sites.

  MEMOIR: Love and Consequences, by Margaret B. Jones (2008)

  WHAT SHE WROTE: Half white and half American Indian, Jones was removed from her childhood home after being sexually abused by a relative. At the age of eight, she landed in a foster family in South Central, a predominantly African-American neighborhood in Los Angeles. There, she was raised by a black woman known as “Big Mom,” whose grandchildren became Jones’s foster brothers and sisters. By the time she was a young teenager, she had joined the “Bloods” street gang, started doing drugs and making crack cocaine, and witnessed one of her foster brothers gunned down in front of their house. Jones finally escaped that life, attended the University of Oregon, graduated with a degree in ethnic studies, and sold her fascinating story to Riverhead Books, a division of Penguin.

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  In May 1996, a tornado hit an Ontario, Canada, drive-in theater. Movie showing that night: Twister.

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  THE TRUTH: In February 2008, a week before its official release, Love and Consequences received a rave review in The New York Times. Alongside the review ran a photo of Jones. A woman named Cyndi Hoffman saw it and called the publisher…and said the story was all fake. How did she know? She was Jones’s older sister. And the author’s name wasn’t Jones; it was Seltzer, and she grew up in an upper-middle-class home in Sherman Oaks, California (where she went to the same private school as the Olsen twins). The publisher questioned Jones/Seltzer, and she eventually admitted that the entire story was made up. She said she was doing a good deed. “I thought it was my opportunity,” she tearfully told the Times, “to put a voice to people who people don’t listen to.” The 19,000 copies of the book that had already gone out to stores were recalled, and full refunds were given to people who had pre-ordered it. Seltzer has not been published since (we think).

  MEMOIR: Angel at the Fence, by Herman Rosenblat (scheduled for publication in February 2009)

  WHAT HE WROTE: During World War II, Rosenblat was interned at Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany. One day in 1944 a young girl named Roma approached him from outside the fence—and threw him an apple. She was Jewish, but was posing as Christian with the help of a family that lived nearby. For the next seven months, the girl came to the spot regularly to sneak the boy food. Years later, in 1957, while living in Brooklyn, New York, Rosenblat went on a blind date…and his date turned out to be Roma. They fell in love and got married. The story appeared in numerous magazines over the years.

  THE TRUTH: Several Holocaust scholars and Buchenwald experts pointed out that the story couldn’t be true. For starters, there was no way anyone, much less a child, could have freely approached the fence surrounding the camp. And the spot where Roma supposedly waited outside would have been right next to an SS barracks. Also, Roma was supposedly being hidden by a Christian family near the camp. If that had been true, it’s unlikely that she would have left her hiding place…to stand outside of a concentration camp. The truth was that Rosenblat really did survive Buchenwald, and Roma really was hidden by a Christian family—200 miles from the camp; they never met in Germany. In late 2008, under pressure from the press and the publisher, Rosenblat admitted he made up the love story. “I wanted to bring happiness to people,” he said. “My motivation was to make good in this world.” The publication of Angel at the Fence was immediately cancelled.

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  President Obama is distantly related to both Brad Pitt and Wild Bill Hickok.

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  Freyed again: Before the hoax was uncovered, the couple appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show twice. Oprah called the book the “greatest love story ever told on this show.”

  MEMOIR: Misha: A Mémoire of the Holocaust Years, by Misha DeFonseca (1997)

  WHAT SHE WROTE: When her parents were taken to Auschwitz by the Nazis in 1941, seven-year-old Misha left Brussels, Belgium, to search for them. Over the next four years, she traveled 1,900 miles, during which time she fought with resistance groups, wandered in and out of the Warsaw Ghetto, killed a Nazi soldier with a pocketknife, and, most amazingly, was fed and protected for a time by a pack of wolves. The book was first published in the U.S., didn’t do well, but later became a bestseller in Europe. It even inspired an Italian opera and a French film.

  THE TRUTH: Like Angel at the Fence, the book drew the suspicion of Holocaust historians from the start. In 2008, after an investigation by a Belgian newspaper, Misha DeFonseca finally confessed: Her name was Monique De Wael, and while her parents were in fact taken away by the Nazis, they were members of the Belgian Resistance—and not Jews, but Catholics. And she never went looking for them, but had spent the war years with her grandfather in Brussels. After admitting her deception, Defonseca said she had always “felt Jewish.” And, she added, “The story in the book is mine. It is not the actual reality—it was my reality. I had been telling my story for years and believed it to be true.”

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  Tip tip: Studies show that tips increase by 18% when a waitress draws a happy face on the check.

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  THE HARSH REALITY OF

  REALITY SHOWS

  First, we found out that pro wrestling was fake, and now they tell us that reality shows are way more scripted than we realized. Why? Because entertainment (and ratings) can’t be left up to chance. Here are some behind-the-scenes stories.

  PROJECT RUNWAY (Bravo, 2
004–08; Lifetime, 2009-present)

  Premise: In this show hosted by model Heidi Klum, aspiring fashion designers compete to create the best new clothing line. Story: The judges send a contestant home at the end of each episode, but critics charge that it’s not the least talented one who gets booted, but the least entertaining. The proof, they say, is in the closing credits, which contain a disclaimer that says that the final decisions are made by the producers—although during the show, the judges make it sound like it’s their decision. “Project Runway has separated itself as the most shameless of all the reality shows in keeping around contestants who have no business being there just because they ‘make good TV,’” said Entertainment Weekly’s Dalton Ross.

  Even some of the “real” moments are faked. One morning, Season 2 contestant Diana Eng woke up to find a camera staring her in the face. “They scared me so bad I jumped and screamed. They said that it wasn’t good enough, so I had to pretend to wake up again.”

  AMERICAN IDOL (Fox, 2002-present)

  Premise: Hoping to land a recording contract, amateur singers compete before a panel of judges. Viewers call in to vote for their favorite performer; whoever gets the fewest votes is off the show.

  Story: After Season 8 contestant Ju’Not Joyner was voted off, he said of the show: “It’s a fixed thing if I ever saw one”—referring to how the producers had labeled him a troublemaker after he called the show’s contract a “slavetract.” He also wouldn’t let the show do a story on how he grew up in “the ’hood.” Ju’Not said, “They wanted me to put that out to the world and expose my personal business for ratings. I wouldn’t do it.”

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  World’s most famous people, according to a U.K. poll of kids: 1) Simon Cowell, 2) God, 3) the Queen.

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  HELL’S KITCHEN (Fox, 2005-present)

  Premise: Aspiring chefs compete against each other in a working restaurant; one contestant is eliminated at the end of each episode. The winner—chosen by chef Gordon Ramsay—receives a coveted job as head chef at one of Ramsay’s restaurants.

  Story: Part of the premise is that the participants work long days and are cut off from the outside world, but many of the show’s contestants have complained that they were treated like prisoners. “They locked me in a hotel room for four days,” said Jen Yemola, a 2007 competitor. “They took all my books, my CDs, my phone, any newspapers. I was allowed to leave the room only with an escort. I couldn’t talk to my family.” The production crew are also under strict orders not to interact with them. Contestant Jessica Cabo said, “The only person I ever felt close to was the sound guy, because he was sticking a microphone up my shirt every day.”

  AMERICA’S NEXT TOP MODEL (CW, 2003–present)

  Premise: In this show created by supermodel Tyra Banks (who’s also the lead judge), young women compete for a modeling contract.

  Story: The rules make it clear that the contestants must not have previous experience as a model in a national campaign, and they can’t be friends of Banks. That’s why viewers complained in 2007 after Saleisha Stowers, 21, won the crown over fan favorite Chantal Jones, 19. For one thing, Stowers appeared in a Wendy’s commercial a year earlier (she says she was acting, not modeling). In addition, when she was 14, Stowers attended a “self-esteem camp” hosted by Tyra Banks. Then word got out that over the years, Stowers had modeled at several functions where Banks was present, including once on her talk show. Her rival, Jones, said, “I looked like an amateur because I am. Saleisha wasn’t exactly an amateur.”

  Ever notice how reality-show contestants say, “I’m not here to make friends,” and then later they all talk about how they’ve become such good friends? Turn to page 341 for more unreal reality stories.

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  De fence budget: The U.S. spends about $203 million dollars per year on barbed wire.

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  SEXY FINDING NEMO

  In recent years, it’s become popular for college-age women to wear “sexy” Halloween costumes like naughty nurses and French maids. Here are a few more costumes, proving that not everything can be sexed up (although somebody’s clearly trying).

  • Sexy Freddy Krueger. What’s sexier than a child killer back from the dead who haunts your dreams? This costume consists of Freddy’s striped sweater, lengthened into a short dress, along with a glove in the shape of the character’s signature knife-fingers.

  • Sexy Cab Driver. Since cab drivers don’t generally wear uniforms, this costume looks more like a “sexy cab”: a short, low-cut yellow jumpsuit with black-and-white checkered sides.

  • Sexy Little Bo Beep. A short blue-and-white dress. The weird part is that it comes with a matching costume for a small dog.

  • Sexy Elvira. The cable-TV and beer-commercial spokesperson (played by Cassandra Peterson) already wears a low-cut dress with a slit up the side. The “Sexy Elvira” costume has an even more plunging neckline and a higher leg slit, if that’s possible.

  • Sexy Finding Nemo. How did they make a child-age, lost, mildly disabled (one bad fin) clownfish into a sexy outfit? With a short orange-and-white dress and matching stockings.

  • Sexy Dora the Explorer. The cartoon character aimed at preschoolers is a preschooler herself, and she wears a purple shirt and orange shorts. This costume gives Dora a low-cut shirt and short skirt instead.

  • Sexy Super Mario Bros. The Nintendo video game characters Mario and Luigi are chubby, middle-aged, mustachioed, stereotypically Italian guys who work as plumbers in Brooklyn. But they can be “sexy”…if you put short skirts on them.

  • Sexy Nun. Short skirt, lots of cleavage, and a nun’s habit. How sinful.

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  Surprise! 23% of all psychiatrists in the U.S. do business in the New York City metro area.

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  MOUNTAIN

  OF THE DEAD

  More than 50 years ago, a group of experienced skiers met a gruesome end on a snowy mountain range. And to this day, no one knows for sure what happened to them.

  INTREPID EXPLORERS

  In January 1959, 23-year-old Igor Dyatlov led a group of 10 college students from the Ural Polytechnic Institute on a two-week cross-country ski trek across the northern Ural mountains of Russia (then the Soviet Union). To reach their destination, the eight men and two women first had to ski over a mountain pass known as Kholat Syakhl. In the language of the Mansi people native to the area, the name means “Mountain of the Dead.” But as far as Dyatlov’s team was concerned, that was just folklore.

  Just three days into the trip, one of the members, Yuri Yudin, felt sick, so he left the group and returned home. The remaining nine continued on…and no one ever saw them alive again.

  STORMY WEATHER

  A few facts about the days leading up to the disappearance were pieced together from diaries and cameras that were later found at one of the expedition’s campsites. On January 31, the group reached the base of the mountain and stored some equipment and food they would need on the way back. The next day, they started for the pass. But heavy snow caused whiteout conditions, and the group veered off course. Realizing their mistake, Dyatlov decided to make camp there on the slope and wait out the storm.

  After that, all that’s really known is that the group failed to report in as expected on February 12. Initially, this didn’t cause much alarm; overland ski trips often run longer than expected. But as the days ticked by, family members became more and more concerned. On February 20, a rescue expedition of students and teachers was launched. The Russian army and police soon joined in, and on February 26, the first team reached the abandoned campsite on Kholat Syakhl.

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  A person from Sweden is more likely to know the size of the U.S. population than an American is.

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  ONE CRAZY NIGHT

  When the film from one of the cameras was developed, the photographs showed the group of healthy young men and women posing for the camera, smiling, seemingly having a great time.
But the scene the rescuers came upon showed a much different picture: One of the heavy canvas tents had been slashed through from the inside, as if the occupants were desperate to escape. Footprints led the searchers down the mountain to find two men, dressed only in their underwear, frozen to death. About a hundred yards away was Dyatlov himself, wearing only one shoe, also frozen to death. Additional searches eventually turned up two more frozen corpses away from their tent, both of whom were wearing each other’s clothes. They all seemed to have no external wounds, and four bodies were still unaccounted for. They weren’t found until May, in a nearby ravine.

  When medical examiners couldn’t find any injuries on the first five bodies, they ruled the cause of death as hypothermia. But of the four bodies found later, three had severe (but not life-threatening) injuries, one to the skull and two to the chest. And one of the women was missing her tongue, though it was unclear if it had been cut out or if she’d bitten it off herself. “In the absence of a guilty party,” the final verdict stated, the members were deemed to have been killed by an “unknown compelling force.” The inquest was officially closed; the files were packed away until 1993 when they were finally declassified. But the “official files” have only added to the mystery.