After almost eight years at Wanderlust, I thought I had a pretty good overview of the weirdest the world had to throw at us. I was wrong.

The readers of Wanderlust and our online users of goWander.com sent an eye-popping (and sometimes stomach-churning) collection of stories and photos from their global travels. These are – for me, at least – the most bizarre of the bunch.

See the gallery, below left, left for the corresponding images

1 Phuket Vegetarian Festival, Thailand Nominated by Johnny Lawlor

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Thai Buddhist devotees give up meat – and partake in some more extreme devotional acts…

“He was just the first in a long procession. There were men with multiple blades skewered through each side of their faces and limbs pierced with dozens of needles.

"Many seemed to have entered a ‘stick the most unusual and unexpected implement through your face’ competition – hedge clippers, vegetation, musical instruments, rifles and umbrellas were among the more identifiable examples.

"One of the more bloody acts of self-mortification involved a devotee carrying a saw blade, which he licked in a vigorous fashion, drawing trickles of salivated blood from his mouth.

"At one stage men sporting large curved blades stopped nearby and, upon a spontaneous, unified, guttural call, flagellated themselves, drawing streams of blood down their own backs. Amazingly, a calm and peaceful atmosphere pervaded the entire proceedings.”

2 Female wrestling in Bolivia Sergeant_Pluck on goWander.com (photo by Michael Hylton)

A newly popular entertainment in '90s La Paz saw some unique contenders…

“Condor Rosa was 5’1” to my 6’3”, 7 stone to my 16. I was 26, a karate black belt and a champion kick-boxer. She was 47, an Aymara mother-of-six in full traditional dress – two long black pigtails under a bowler hat and oceans of coloured petticoats, with an over-cape of black (presumably condor) feathers.

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