STATUS UPDATES
A week in which a L’Oreal model steps up and then down, and even some camels succumb to the beauty myth
EVADING Shakira, allegedly. The Colombian singer is being investigated in Spain, accused of skipping out on some income taxes. She switched residences in 2015 from the Bahamas to Barcelona, but is suspected of having earlier lived in Barcelona, the Guardian reports. Last year, Shakira appeared in the Paradise Papers probe into offshore financing. GLAZED AND CONFUSED A doughnut-eating contest winner. Back in 2014, Bradley Hardison ate eight treats in two minutes in a police-run competition in North Carolina. At the time, he was also a robbery suspect, and shortly after his victory, he was arrested and convicted. This time, he’s been charged with breakin’ into a Dunkin’ Donuts.
TOO BITING The satire in the British movie The Death of Stalin. Certainly, Russian censors found the humour a bit much, with officials using the terms “ideological warfare,” BBC reports. The film by director Armando Iannucci depicts the power struggle following the dictator’s death in 1953. But its Russian screening licence has been cancelled. Perhaps catch it on Nyetflix?
FLAWED Some of the prized camels at King Abdulaziz Camel Festival. A dozen animals at the Saudi beauty contest have been disqualified — over Botox. Judges intervened when they found some of the owners were overzealous in trying to improve the animals’ good looks. The news website the National reported that Botox was used for the lips, the nose and even the jaw.
DODGING A Norwegian skier, when faced with snowballs during a race. Henrik Kristoffersen was competing at Schladming, Austria, in the night slalom when course spectators tossed snowballs. Errant but distracting, the projectiles prompted an apology by Austria’s sports minister. Shockingly but sportingly, Kristoffersen said he would have finished second regardless.
PRAISED AND EXCUSED A British model who was hired by and then parted ways with L’Oreal Paris all within a week. L’Oreal won plaudits for selecting Amena Khan as the first hijab-wearing woman to be part of a mainstream hair-care ad campaign, but Khan has since apologized for a series of alleged antiIsrael tweets from 2014, and announced she is stepping down.
TOO MUCH BITING That was the situation faced by a New Hampshire man. He bit — and was bitten by — a police dog, allegedly as part of a bid to evade arrest, The Associated Press reported. The incident in Boscawen, N.H., began when two men wanted on outstanding warrants refused to go quietly. The dog has been cleared to return to work; its attacker faces new charges.
FAULTY The ground under a worldfamous luxury shopping district. Data from California geologists shows a fault line runs below Rodeo Drive and Beverly Hills’ shopping district, the Los Angeles Times reports. A previous map had the Santa Monica fault zone ending on the western edge of Beverly Hills, but new information put it more than a kilometre further northeast.