Jalaiah Harmon, 14, performing the Renegade, a dance she created that has blown up on the internet. Photo / Jill Frank, The New York Times
Jalaiah Harmon, 14, performing the Renegade, a dance she created that has blown up on the internet. Photo / Jill Frank, The New York Times
The Covid-19 pandemic has thrown most of the world off its axis. It's taken lives, impacted the health of thousands of people and interrupted our very way of life.
It's easy to be overwhelmed by all the information coming at you, so it's important to take your mind off things,even for a little while.
To help you with this we've pulled together some of our favourite big reads from our international partners. There's not a Covid-19 story in sight, promise.
Today we take a look at a viral dance craze, Jennifer Aniston on ageing, the woman making millions eating for YouTube, the baby in a bag, and Indigenous Australians battling climate change.
The original Renegade: The teen who created the viral dance
Finding they have a lot more time on their hands at the moment, people are trying their hand at TikTok dances.
Jalaiah Harmon is responsible for one of the most famous of these viral dances.
Harmon trained in all the traditional ways, taking classes in hip-hop, ballet, lyrical, jazz, tumbling and tap after school at a dance studio near her home in the Atlanta suburbs. She also built a career online, studying viral dances, collaborating with peers and posting original choreography.
Then, a sequence of hers turned into one of the most viral dances online: the Renegade.
"I'm entering into what I feel is one of the most creatively fulfilling periods of my life," Aniston said, adding, "I feel like it's just about to really bloom." Photo / Sandy Kim, The New York Times
Meet the woman who made millions eating giant crabs for YouTube
Bethany Gaskin is an American mukbang star. Eating giant crab legs for YouTube has made her a millionaire, she says.
Hundreds of thousands of people tune in each week to watch her binge-eat shellfish.
On her two YouTube channels, Bethany Gaskin chats up her audience while downing huge meals, often seafood, like king crab. Photo / Maddie McGarvey, The New York Times
She was left in a bag as a newborn. DNA testing helped her understand why
After being abandoned in the foyer of a Brooklyn building by her mother in 1996, a young woman used genetic testing to gain a poignant introduction.
Eleni Liff, who was abandoned as a newborn by her mother in the foyer of this building and was reunited 22 years later with her biological father, Keith Cruz. Photo / James Estrin, The New York Times
Their islands are being eroded. So are their human rights, they say
A group of Indigenous Australians from low-lying islands in the Torres Strait argue that Australia, by failing to act on climate change, has violated their fundamental right to maintain their culture.
Indigenous Australians in the Torres Strait argue that Australia, by failing to act on climate change, has violated their fundamental right to maintain their culture. Photo / Matthew Abbott, NYT
