› added 11 years ago

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TIL that Kalmykia, a republic of Russia, is the only Buddhist-majority region in Europe.

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via reddit.com

M7xmK TIL about Tommy Manville, the heir to the Johns-Manville fortune. The terms of his family trust granted him $250,000 "when he married." As a result he got married 13 times, giving the women a cut of the proceeds before quickly divorcing them.
QJ74k TIL that the US government uses a cartoon turtle to teach kids how to hide under their desks to survive a nuclear bomb attack.
ZmJR TIL the original bikini swimsuit was named after the then-recent Bikini Atoll nuclear test because the inventor expected the swimsuit to be “equally explosive”
jNj4X TIL Japanese researchers have created a fire-alarm for the deaf. It’s a gadget that emits a wasabi mist which will wake the endangered person and get them out of the building alive!
Gdog TIL: a Thermos flask creates a highly efficient thermal insulation by creating a partial vacuum between 2 barriers. Since there’s virtually no air/gas/matter, there’s nothing to carry energy away (bar the canister itself). This is how rocket fuel is stored - in a giant Thermos.