Arisa Trew of Australia competes during the women's skateboarding park final at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Tuesday, August 6, 2024, in Paris, France. (Photo by Frank Franklin II/AP Photo)

28 year old Rupa has her hair shaven to donate to the Gods at the Thiruthani Murugan Temple November 10, 2016 in Thiruttani, India. Rupa donated her hair with the wish that her daughter's illness is cured. The process of shaving ones hair and donating it to the Gods is known as tonsuring. It is common for Hindu believers to tonsure their hair at a temple as a young child, and also to celebrate a wish coming true, such as the birth of a baby or the curing of an illness. The “temple hair”, as it's known, is then auctioned off to a processing plant and then sold as pricey wigs and weaves in the US, Europe and Africa. (Photo by Allison Joyce/Getty Images)

Residents protest a police operation targeting drug traffickers in the Jacarezinho favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Thursday, May 6, 2021. At least 25 people died during the operation, including one police officer and 24 suspects, according to the press office of Rio's civil police. (Photo by Silvia Izquierdo/AP Photo)

It's often said that pets and their owners can start to look alike, but these adorable photographs take the old mantra to a new extreme. They are the work of Svetlana Valyiskaya (27), from St Petersburg, who snaps pets in everyday poses in her spare time from her job as a commercial photographer. The vibrant costumes and scenes, which Svetlana designs herself, have made the photos a hit in her native Russia – and it's not hard to see why. She said: “I really love animals, they are loyal, faithful and true and always interesting to work with – plus they never criticise the photographs afterwards”. (Photo by Svetlana Valyiskaya/Mercury)

When you look at the picture of a furry pig that resembles a sheep from a distance, you may think that this may be the result of the work of some crazy scientist that tinkered with the pig’s genome. However, in this case, this is not true. Mangalica is a natural breed of pigs, which were bred in Europe for their lard. This breed of pigs is very unique, since the only other breed of pigs which had a long coat was Loncolnshire Curly Coat, which is now extinct. In the past, these pigs were quite popular, since they were able to produce a lot of lard. However, when the demand for pig lard dwindled, the population of these pigs rapidly decreased, making it a “rare breed”.

Boards stand lined up at the Rocinha Surf Association, ASR, headquarters at Rocinha slum in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Thursday, July 2, 2015. ASR has given free lessons to over 2,000 children from Rio's shantytowns in the hopes of keeping the boys, who are mostly in their early teens and a few girls occupied by the sport and off the streets. (Photo by Felipe Dana/AP Photo)

Pope Francis greets the crowd from his popemobile in downtown Rio de Janeiro. Pope Francis touched down in Rio de Janeiro on Monday, starting his first foreign trip as pontiff and a weeklong series of events expected to attract more than a million people to a gathering of young faithful in Brazil, home to the world's largest Roman Catholic population. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters)

A demonstrator attends a protest against fare hikes for city buses in Rio de Janeiro January 16, 2015. Amid a marked economic downturn and high inflation, bus fares went up in Sao Paulo, Brazil's largest city, from 3 to 3.50 reais, and in Rio, the former capital, from 3.0 to 3.40 reais. (Photo by Mauro Pimentel/Reuters)