Bizarre Inventions: Learn Mandarin with the World’s Strangest Ideas

·51 min·5 clips

Tom and Ula kick off with a bilingual chat about their busy to-do lists, including writing a book and designing a 3D-printed lamp.

The episode begins with Tom and Ula greeting listeners in both English and Mandarin, sharing updates on their busy schedules, including Tom writing a book and designing a 3D-printed lamp. Tom mentions his first novel, 'Fade,' which he now considers terrible after improving his writing skills. They transition to the main topic: bizarre inventions. The first invention is a baby mop onesie that lets crawling infants clean floors, which both hosts say they'd buy. Next, they discuss a toaster that prints your face on toast, with Ula seeing it as fun for special events like proposals and Tom dismissing it as a short-lived novelty. Other inventions include a hugging pillow for comfort, a banana slicer that Tom calls unnecessary, and anti-pervert tights with hairy legs to deter harassers. They talk about a robot pet butler that feeds and plays with pets, with both agreeing it's useful for owners who travel. Tom and Ula debate a shoe umbrella, with Ula wanting it for cuteness and Tom finding it impractical. They review a USB necktie fan for cooling in hot weather, which they consider buying for their home in Taiwan. Other items include a nose stylus for phone use, a silent karaoke microphone, diet water marketed as low-calorie, a toilet golf game, a face-slimming mask, a hair clip fan, a cat translation collar, a butter stick shaped like a glue stick, a chopstick fan to cool noodles, remote-control mop slippers, pollen-filtering nose plugs, and a donut-shaped desk pillow for napping. Throughout, they mix Mandarin vocabulary lessons with personal stories, such as hiding Ula's pregnancy during recordings and their children's ages. The episode ends with promotions for their Full Mandarin Stories playlist and app, along with farewells and a Mother's Day greeting.

As heard by us

A pillow with an arm, a baby mop, and a banana cutter turn convenience into family banter.

The odd inventions work best as tiny stress tests for convenience in ordinary life. A pillow with an arm, a baby mop that earns a buy, a printer toaster that does not, and a banana cutter that seems to solve nothing much give the hosts plenty to prod without making the premise…

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Why you'd press play

You want strange inventions judged with the practical ruthlessness of people deciding what would actually survive in a real home.

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