The Hurt Locker' broke another film industry record when it bagged six Oscars out of a total of nine nominations - including the coveted Best Picture gong - as the lowest-grossing movie to ever win at the Oscars. It is estimated to have earned $21 million at the box office, that's less than 2% of what its competitor 'Avatar' made in ticket sales in the same year.

In Uganda, the title "Omukama" translates to "superior milkman." The Bantu title alludes to the king's role as a provider for his people. Furthermore, rulers in ancient Ugandan kingdoms were of Hema descent—a cattle-owning minority group.

Cleopatra was an extremely strong queen who could afford luxury that others could only dream of. For example, she was dissatisfied with the beaches of Sedir Island in Turkey during her trip. So her boyfriend, Mark Antony, had the white sand she loved sent all the way from Egypt so she might enjoy it on other shores. Because of this, Sedir is today known as Cleopatra's Island.

When Princess Margaret was born in 1930, The Sunday Express decided to commission an analysis of her birth chart. The job ended up in the hands of R.H. Naylor, assistant to in-demand astrologer Cheiro. His piece was so popular, that the newspaper commissioned a regular astrology column from him—the grandfather of every newspaper's daily horoscope section.

Just like Venice, Bangkok is also a city built on dozens of canals and with buildings standing on stilts. Although most of these canals have now been paved in, the nickname has stuck. However, another, less-cheerful point of similarity is the sinking of Bangkok. Due to rising sea levels and extensive development, Bangkok is sinking at a rate of 2 - 2.5 cm per year. Parts of Bangkok could be submerged in a few decades, so you might want to prepone your vacation there.

 

Silent film 'The Artist' is widely tipped to win the Best Picture gong at this year's Oscars, but the only silent film to previously win an Oscar for Best Picture was 'Wings' in 1929. The movie is about two young fighter pilots during World War I who starred Charles ‘Buddy’ Rogers, Richard Arlen, Clara Bow, and a young Gary Cooper.

When you bite into a slice of pie, your mouth seems to fill with flavor. However, the majority of that taste sense occurs in your brain. More precisely, cranial nerves and taste bud receptors in your mouth deliver food molecules to olfactory nerve endings in your nose's roof. The chemicals connect to these nerve terminals, signaling the olfactory bulb to deliver scent instructions straight to two major cranial nerves, the facial nerve and the glossopharyngeal nerve, both of which communicate with the gustatory cortex in the brain. As taste and nerve information progress through the brain, they combine with smell messages to produce the impression of flavor, which appears to emanate from the mouth.

The median age in the 1950s was 33 years old, but it is increasing every year. The median age of the Swiss population in 2015 was 42.2 years. Switzerland, on the other side, has the greatest percentage of persons over 100 in Europe and the second-highest life expectancy after Japan. Of course, given the purity of the air, the amount of walking routes, and the availability of high-quality health care, they will live a long life.

Is anyone familiar with British expressions like "excellent" innings? How many innings does he have? Cricket was the inspiration behind it. The expression refers to someone who made a decent attempt or lasted a long time, as a result of cricket's "innings," which allow the player to achieve a large number of runs. Remember the origins of cricket the next time someone uses the phrase "good innings"!

A cricket test match usually lasts five days and consists of four innings. An innings is when all players take turns batting to score runs while the opponent tries to throw the wickets. Over 1,000 cricket tests have been played by the British cricket team around the world. It happened during the 2018 Edgbaston Test against India. See below for information on the current England team.

A command entered in the "master machine" where the animation for Toy Story 2 was stored deleted 90 percent of the work the Pixar team had done on it. As Mental Floss describes, "A plan was quickly hatched to restore the data from a regular backup, which meant that only half a day of work would have been lost. But the backup system had failed. Pixar, incredibly, did not have a copy of the Toy Story 2 files on its servers." Fortunately, the film's technical director had a copy she had been working on from home, and much of it was restored.

I thought it was only available in South Africa. Think again. Particularly Namibia has a sizable population of Afrikaans speakers, which is a neighbour of South Africa. Argentina, more specifically Patagonia, where a tiny community of Afrikaans-speaking farmers live, is unquestionably the most intriguing region. They are descended from an Afrikaner migration to South America that took place between 1903 and 1909, following the Anglo-Boer War, and involved roughly 800 people. Amazingly, the language has persisted among a select few of them up until this point.

Stingrays may appear to be soaring through the water, but a closer look reveals that they are actually moving through with a smooth flapping motion. The majority of species move by undulating their bodies, much like an aquatic wave, however, some prefer to flap their sides like wings. Stingrays in South Africa travelled at a speed of 1.35 kilometres per hour (0.83 miles per hour), and some species made migrations of up to 850 kilometres, according to research by the Save Our Seas Foundation (528 miles).

On occasion, hypnosis is shown on television. It's usually part of a plot where the hypnotised person loses control and becomes a "puppet." In reality, people in a relaxed state of hypnosis are fully conscious. They should be able to hear, understand, and remember what the hypnotist says. There should be no worries about being hypnotised and made to cluck like a chicken or sent on a murder spree. They are simply experiencing deep relaxation as a result of their concentrated attention.

Akira, a highly praised film, was also a significant technological success for the Japanese animation industry. It had 2,212 shots and 160,000 single images. This is around 2-3 times the cost of the average anime film. The majority of the film's scenes were planned to take place at night, which was normally avoided by animators during those days due to such sequences needing exceptionally high colour utilisation and that too with tremendous precision to make the picture seem pleasant. Akira defied all expectations by employing an incredible 327 hues throughout the picture, 50 of which were produced specifically for the film and its scene needs.

Unfortunately, they are poor breeders, making it difficult for them to rebound from their falling position. Females reach sexual maturity at seven or eight but do not normally begin breeding until a couple of years later. Males reach sexual maturity at a much later age.

In November 2015 the Museum broke a modern record. Mapped out and presented digitally, the Museum became the largest indoor space on Google Street View. You can explore it at your leisure from the comfort of your own home (or the discomfort of the bus, or anywhere really), plus there are stories of thousands of highlight objects at the Google Cultural Institute.

This fabled temple has been destroyed and rebuilt several times by Islamic invaders and Hindu rulers. It was most recently constructed in November 1947, when Vallabhbhai Patel visited the region for the integration of Junagadh and proposed a restoration plan. Following Patel's death, the reconstruction was overseen by Kanaiyalal Maneklal Munshi, another Government of India minister.

Being a spiritual person is synonymous with being a person whose highest goal is to be loving to oneself and others. His/her conviction that we are all One, motivates him/her to work for everyone's welfare and stay away from any harmful activities.

Did you know that the longest river in the world is located in Egypt? The Nile River cuts through Egypt and about 95 percent of the population of Egypt resides along the Nile River. With much of the country being occupied by desert, this fact about Egypt isn’t all that surprising. 90 percent of Egypt is made up of desert and the River Nile divides that desert.

The ancient Egyptians divided Egypt into two lands, the desert, and the Nile Valley. Contrary to what you would think, upper Egypt is located in the South and Lower Egypt is north. That is because the Nile flows north towards the Mediterranean Sea.

It required a lot of creativity to get the stones to stand up straight. The builders eventually chose a technique associated with woodworking rather than brickwork. They used tongue and groove joints to slot the stones together, creating mortice holes and protruding tenons. Timber poles were placed at the back of the pit as a brace support when the hole for the stones was dug. The stone was then placed into place and lifted up with ropes while rubble was stuffed into the pit to keep it in place.