Man with performing stomach calls off Gulf tour

A British entertainer has abandoned plans to perform in Dubai and Bahrain this month, blaming regional tensions following the bombing of a U.S. warship.

Stevie Starr, also known as The Regurgitator, was due to bring his bizarre swallowing act to the Marco Polo Hotel on November 17 and 22, plus four dates in Bahrain in between.

But he cancelled his Gulf tour mainly because of the high state of alert of U.S. forces in Bahrain which were his primary audience there.

Mike Malley, Starr's manager, said, "Stevie is disappointed because he was looking forward to his first performances in Dubai.

"He performed in Bahrain last year and the majority of the audience were U.S. Navy personnel, but at the moment there will be no audience there."

> The U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet is based in Bahrain where servicemen and women have been on high alert since the suicide bomb attack on the USS Cole in Yemen last month.

Malley said he hoped to reschedule the performances next year.
"We definitely will be coming to Dubai and Bahrain as soon as we have the all-clear," he said. "It will either be May or November as those are the only dates we currently have free."

Starr's act is astonishing. He swallows a variety of items and then regurgitates them to order, including a miniature Rubik's cube which he regurgitates from his stomach with all the rows turned.

He also swallows a bowl of dry sugar followed by a glass of water and then brings the sugar back bone dry. Most amazing of all, he swallows a ring and then a locked padlock and key, which come back with the ring locked inside the padlock.
Starr spent his first 18 years in a children's home in Glasgow, and it was there that he discovered his unusual talent.

"I think I was about four when I started swallowing my pocket money," he said. "Then I tried other things like going out into the garden and swallowing a bumble bee and then bringing him back and letting him fly away."

He performed that stunt on the American TV show "That's Incredible" and has also appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Lenno and Late Night With Letterman in the U.S.