Phallic pullout
Some lost things are meant to be found.
Over the weekend, the French bicycle renter Velib recovered 51 of its bikes that were never returned.
Clement Charret, a 20-year-old student, and his sidekick, Enzo, found the bikes in Pantin, a suburb of Paris, during their magnet fishing expedition.
More surprising than where the machines were found, beneath a portion of the Ourcq canal, was the quantity of the finds. The duo also fished a scooter and a traffic sign from the canal.
Charret, a resident of Pavillon- sous- Bois, also found more interesting items in the past by lowering magnets on canals and rivers. Those were a bayonet from World War I, a revolver pistol from the era of Napoleon II and two World War II shells that prompted a bomb squad to respond.
Meanwhile, there were newly-found things that became were “lost” again. It happened to a mysterious metal monolith found in a Utah desert last 18 November. The 12-foot structure was gone by 27 November. Some people apparently removed the object because it was in derelict state and they did not want curious folks flocking to the spot and spoiling the area.
Days after the Utah monolith went viral on social media, a shorter copycat mysteriously appeared on a hilltop in northern Romania.
The four- meter tall metal with spirals engraved on its side and weld marks also went viral after a man went to see it and took a video.
Like the Utah sculpture whose origin was not solved before it disappeared, the Romanian figure was gone by 30 December together with its mystery.
While no one is hot on the trail of the missing monoliths, another enigma of a sculpture, this time in the Gruenten mountain of Germany’s Bavarian Alps, has triggered an uproar.
The six-foot wooden artwork that appeared in the village of Rettenberg about four or five years ago (but whose maker and installer was unknown) has become sort of a tourist draw and entertainment for hikers. On Google Maps, it is even tagged as a “cultural monument.”
Over the weekend, however, the artwork disappeared and someone is suspected of sawing it off. Police are investigating who cut and took it though they are unsure whether a criminal offense has been committed since it remains unknown who created the giant penis or put it there in the first place.