Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi can be forgiven for his physical appearance these days. After all, his country is being bombed, rebels are fighting an increasingly bloody war with his army, and his "voluptuous blond" Ukrainian nurse left him. But things weren't always this way. Back in the heady days of 1995 Qaddafi, now 68 years old, gave a Brazilian plastic surgeon an envelope "full of U.S. dollars and Swiss francs" to halt the appearance of aging. The AP spoke to the doctor:

"He told me that he had been in power for 25 years at that time, and that he did not want the young people of his nation to see him as an old man," Dr. Liacyr Ribeiro recalled. "I recommended a facelift, but he refused."

Instead, Qaddafi got a hair transplant. That's no real surprise to anyone, and Libyan rebels have even referred to him as "the guy with really bad hair." But two things make Qaddafi's surgery special: He refused to be put under, and midway through the four-hour procedure Qaddafi became hungry, at which point, "Hamburgers were brought in for all and surgery was interrupted for several minutes while we ate," according to Ribeiro. Bravo, Brother Leader. Other dictators take note.

[Image via AP]