› added 8 years ago

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TIL in order to qualify to be a police officer in Japan, the student must obtain a black belt in Judo. In addition, courses are given in calligraphy, flower arrangement, tea ceremony, poetry writing, and Japanese flute to sensitize a police officer to the artistic side of human nature.

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dDMnZ TIL that although Thomas Hart Benton was a loyal aide to future President Andrew Jackson, he still fought a duel with him, in which Jackson was nearly killed.
78M6r TIL Jason Statham was a professional diver and even tried to go to the Olympics
eee6 TIL two Christian monks smuggled silkworms out of China in bamboo canes. Those silkworms were used to give the Byzantine Empire a trade monopoly in Europe, which became the foundation of their economy for the next 650 years.
dK0K TIL that “Ugly Laws” in the US banned many disabled people from appearing in public until the 1970s.
A6jl TIL on September 19, 1985, when Frank Zappa famously testified before Congress to protest the PMRC’s attempt to legislate and censor heavy metal music lyrics, Zappa compared the proposed legislation to “treating dandruff by decapitation”