› added 11 years ago

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TIL that, due to its isolation, a third of the plant life on the island of Socotra (Yemen) is found nowhere else on the planet, making it the “most alien-looking place on Earth”.

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ExaW TIL: The island of Bikini Atoll has a flag similar to the US’s as a symbol of the debt they believe the US owes them - while testing nuclear weapons, an H-Bomb detonated in 1954 resulted in the poisoning of many islanders from the nuclear fallout.
4Ke6 TIL there are several cases of foreign women visiting Dubai for business, being raped, and then being jailed when they report the rape.
N5rM TIL as a child, George R.R. Martin (Author of a Song of Ice and Fire) would write stories about a kingdom inhabited by his pet turtles, and since they died often, he wrote that they would kill each other in sinister plots.
Wg7X TIL the panama canal turns 100 today
WkrX9 TIL Sharks can suffer from cancer. The misconception that sharks do not get cancer was spread by the 1992 book 'Sharks Don't Get Cancer' by I. William Lane and used to sell extracts of shark cartilage as cancer prevention treatments.