Over-parking

Brain stimulation seems to work in helping comatose patients regain consciousness. The case of an eight-year-old Chinese boy who fell into a coma after a car accident in November is one example.

Liu Chuxi, a second-grader at Jin’e Primary School in Yueyang, suffered a severe traumatic brain injury, brain stem contusion, and diffuse axonal damage that doctors initially held little hope for his recovery, City News Service (CNS) reports.

On the advice of doctors at Xiangya Hospital of Central South University in Changsha, Liu’s mother made sounds to stimulate her son’s brain regions, which may aid consciousness recovery, according to CNS.

The mother played the school’s morning bell and exercise broadcast music for her son, plus classroom clips and heartfelt video messages recorded by his classmates. In the recordings, children called his name, shared classroom jokes, sang his favorite songs, and urged him to wake up and return, CNS reports.

The recordings were played repeatedly, and on the 45th day, Liu briefly opened his eyes. On the 51st day of coma, he smiled with his eyes closed when a recording of his teacher’s lesson was played.

When his classmates visited him four days later, Liu responded to his friends with hand movements and waved happily when his teacher joked about exempting him from homework, according to CNS.

While the boy had been comatose for 45 or so days before starting to move, a car was left for quite some time at a coin parking slot in Hyogo Prefecture, Japan, before it was discovered by authorities.

Police arrested its 47-year-old owner on 4 February and charged him with obstruction of business for preventing other customers from parking, Japan Today (JT) reports.

The car owner admitted parking his car there six years ago, and his bill reached more than three million yen, according to JT. However, police could not charge him with non-payment as the amount was only payable when the car is removed. It was reportedly still parked as of this writing.

The owner claimed that his car wouldn’t start when he tried to retrieve it.

Meanwhile, the parking lot owner may also be at fault for failing to tow away the parked car in a timely manner, while a law is necessary to stop coin parking fees from accruing endlessly, JT reports.