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TIL of Richard Francis Burton, an 19th century British explorer and writer, who disguised himself as Muslim in order to get into both Mecca and Medina. While he was not the first European to go to either one of those cities, his pilgrimage is the most famous and best documented of the time.

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b9neE TIL that the number 8 is such a lucky number in China that the Chinese government scheduled the Beijing Olympics to begin 8 seconds after 8:08 on 8/8/2008.
16y1P TIL that SOS is a reverse acronym (a backronym). It is a distinctive and easy way to remember the morse code distress signal of three dots, three dashes, three dots. Only after its implementation did the mnemonic phrase such as "Save Our Souls come into use
k4aE TIL that Lon Perry used to apologize while restraining people during his robberies and would return family photos from their wallets. He once called 911 for a victim who had a heart attack during a robbery. In 1991, Lon turned himself in to prevent another man from being accused for his crimes.
e0aEn TIL Redd Foxx and Malcolm X met while working at the same restaurant in Harlem in the 1940s. They were called "Chicago Red" and "Detroit Red" respectively, due to their reddish hair. In his autobiography, Malcolm X refers to Foxx as "the funniest dishwasher on this earth."
yVnm8 TIL that Macaulay Culkin (Kevin from Home Alone) was in the NYC Ballet's Nutcracker, as the Nutcracker.