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Joy

See if you can watch these 'Magic Flute' videos without laughing at least once

It seems that few can make it through the Magic Flute Challenge without losing it.

four people doing the Magic Flute Challenge

The Magic Flute challenge has people trying to stifle their giggles.

They say laughter is the best medicine, and it's true. When we're in a bad mood, it's practically miraculous how a good laugh can lift us out of it. Giggles can help relieve stress, which is good for our overall health, and as Patch Adams taught us, raucous joy can even help our bodies heal.

However, research shows that adults only laugh an average of 15 times a day, compared to children who laugh around 400 times a day. So we can all use some ways to laugh more.

Ironically, one almost surefire way to laugh is to be in a group of people who are trying to keep a straight face when something funny happens. There's something about trying not to laugh that makes it nearly impossible not to, especially when you're with others.

The "Magic Flute Challenge" illustrates this phenomenon beautifully—and hilariously.


This challenge is simple—a group of people takes turns trying to sing a piece of the famous aria from Mozart's "The Magic Flute" with no one laughing. Sounds easy enough, but some people's singing is…well, it can't really be called singing. Squawking, perhaps? Imitating a rooster with a bad cold? Whatever it is, hearing someone attempt to opera sing and having it come out sounding like a wounded animal is so funny, especially when everyone is supposed to keep a straight face.

Take this video from Reddit's Contagious Laughter subreddit (make sure you watch with sound up from the beginning):

How long would you last? I lost it at the strangled rooster 😆
by u/enacheionut1991 in ContagiousLaughter

This is one of those videos where picking one person to watch the whole time makes it funnier and funnier. Not one of them lasted through the whole thing. Can't really blame them.

Here's another iteration of the same challenge from @ilse.faith on TikTok. Again, no one survives.

Tuck this one away for when you're trying to figure out an activity the whole family can do together, or for when you and your friends are bored, or for when everyone in the household is cranky. Instant mood lift, right here.

Keep laughing, everyone. It really is good for us.

The funny thing about love is that the person we fall in love with, more often than not, we run into by accident. Another strange twist is that the love of our life is likely to show up when we least expect it.

The following story, which feels like the promise of a hit rom-com, comes courtesy of a twist of fate created by the World Cup and an Airbnb.

In 2013, after six years of battling an illness, Ana was living in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Having been financially drained by years of being sick, she invested the last of her money to buy two bunk beds and convert one of her bedrooms into an Airbnb for small groups of friends.

The Airbnb was a last-ditch effort to pay her rent and medical bills. A year later, the modest investment grew into a success, Ana’s health began to return, and the World Cup, one of the largest sporting events in the world, was coming to Rio.

To take advantage of the soccer fanatics flocking to the Cidade Maravilhosa (Marvelous City), Ana and her roommate, Fabio, turned a half room in their apartment into an Airbnb rental to give tired soccer fans a place to sleep.

“Though it was a small (pantry!) room, we added a bunk bed and listed two beds on Airbnb. One day after the listing went live, we had tons of requests for ‘Fabio’s Pantry,’” she shared. “It was fully booked for the entire World Cup period except for one week in July.”

Around this time, Ana was feeling well enough to go on her first vacation in years and took a quick trip to Uruguay. Just before she left, Ana received a reservation from a man named "Darko B." for the only unbooked days in July.

“I have always been a big fan of the movie ‘Donnie Darko’ and thought it was a strange coincidence, but didn't think anything of it,” Ana wrote. “I accepted the request, let him know I would not be there for check-in and Fabio would care for him until I was back the following week.”

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