› added 1 month ago

8

TIL that after Goathe's novel "Sorrows of Young Werther" was published there was a marked increase in young men shooting themselves in the head while dressed as Werther was when he did the same thing.

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VMwE8 TIL Every year in Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania, there's a two-week long mock medieval war that draws so many participants, it has its own mayor and post office for the weeks it is active
R7o49 TIL though Madagascar now produces 80% of the world’s vanilla, the vine is native to Mexico. The Maya were the first to cultivate it in the jungles of the Yucatan peninsular. They flavoured their chocolate drink with the spice.
nWoyY TIL the microstate of Andorra gets visited by an amount of tourists equal to its population every three days on average.
VBmp TIL Soviet forces raped 1/3rd of all German women living in Berlin during World War II
yQVlM TIL that 12,000 bears are farmed for their bile in Asia which is used in traditional Chinese medicine and generates $2bn per year. Farming always involves surgery on the bears to insert a catheter or to cut a hole through the abdomen by which the bile leaks. Bear bile has no medicinal effect.