■ BRAZIL
Priest confronts pigeons
A priest who blames ethanol production for a plague of pigeons outside his cathedral is threatening to set loose hawks and monkeys to frighten the birds away. Environmentalists warned on Tuesday that the scheme would break the law, but the priest seems unrepentant. "I know that these actions are prohibited," the Reverend Francisco Jaber Zanardo Moussa said in a statement. "But I don't care, I'll do everything I can to promote my people's well-being." The priest said the predators should frighten away a flock of 60,000 pigeons that have been forced from their natural habitat by the area's booming sugarcane plantations. He said the pigeons dirty the town's central plaza and could spread serious diseases in Ribeirao Preto city.
■ UNITED STATES
Man has last wishes tattooed
US Army veteran and cancer survivor Russell Parsons says he is not afraid to die -- and he has the tattoo to prove it. Tattooed on his right arm are instructions to the funeral home where he has a prepaid cremation: "Barlow Bonsall cook @ 1700-1800 for 2 to 3 hours." "It's a recipe," the 67-year-old widower said. "It's a recipe for cremation." Linda Wilson, manager of Barlow Bonsall Funeral Home and Crematorium in West Virginia, said she thought Parsons was joking several weeks ago when he said he was going to have his final wishes tattooed on his arm.
■ UNITED STATES
Simulation turns sour
Students said a three-week lesson that assigned the roles of Germans and Jews during the Holocaust got out of hand when some students took the role-playing too far. The exercise in the Waxahachie, Texas, Ninth Grade Academy school's Advanced Placement Geography course was meant to bring home the reality of intolerance during the Holocaust, school officials said. The point of the class was "learning about the problems of intolerance and the problems of discrimination and helping kids understand what some people went through to change the world," Principal John Aune said. The exercise got out of hand when the German students spat on or hit the Jewish students.
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