› added 12 years ago

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TIL that Thich Quang Duc, a monk who set himself on fire to protest the persecution of Buddhists by the Catholic church in Saigon, remained motionless and never made a sound as he was burning alive. His heart remained intact afterwards. The photo of him burning alive won the Pulitzer prize.

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5VxYD TIL that an Illinois high school English teacher told two students, "Neither one of you will ever learn to write". Robert St. John, one of the students, became a famous journalist with many news scoops, including the Japanese surrender in WW2. The other student was Ernest Hemingway.
Q6Ve TIL that unlike James Bond, real MI6 agents don’t need a license to kill because everything they do outside the UK is already illegal. The UK spy agency makes Bond-like gadgets for operatives but, as one said after retiring, they “frequently fail to work upon arrival at our destination”.
4kbVX TIL about the temple of Aphrodite Kallipygos" in ancient Syracuse, Sicily. Literally translating to Aphrodite of the Beautiful Buttocks. There’s even a statue at the National Archeological Museum of Naples and another in the Jardin des Tuileries
6bom TIL of Roy Benavidez, a soldier from Vietnam who saved a trapped patrol although getting shot multiple times. Later he was thought dead, and when the doctor was zipping the body bag, Roy managed to spit on his face. Roy had 37 separate bullet, bayonet and shrapnel wounds.
69YrX TIL that Inca Ruins in Sacsayhuamán - Peru was built in 14th Century with Limestone blocks those weight vary from 128 to 200 tonnes. These stones were moved from an estimated 35 away. Stones are so precisely spaced that a single piece of paper will still not fit between many of the them.