"TIL about the Great Green Wall, an effort to plant trees to stop desertification in the Sahara that began in 2007. Ethiopia has planted over 5.5 billion seedling since."
"TIL after a chance encounter, Charles-Michel de l'Épée was taught to sign by the deaf. Believing the deaf should be able to receive the sacraments, he founded a school in 1760 to teach sign language. His public advocacy enabled deaf people to legally defend themselves in court for the first time."
"TIL the medals in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games were made from metals recovered from recycled cell phones collected since 2017."
"TIL alpacas are being used as bodyguards in some turkey farms, since they instinctively accept the birds into their herd and scare off foxes."
"TIL that anatomically dogs have two arms and two legs - not four legs; the front legs (arms) have wrist joints and are connected to the skeleton by muscle and the back legs have hip joints and knee caps."
"TIL A director made a ten hour movie that's just about paint on a wall drying, lasting for ten hours and seven minutes. The film was created by Charlie Lyne in order to troll the British Board of Film Classification (B.B.F.C.) who were forced to sit through the whole thing."
"TIL, The Netherlands gives Canada 20,000 tulips every year as a thank you for protecting the Dutch royal family in WW2."
"TIL of Eric Moussambani, who had never seen an olympic sized swimming pool before the 2000 olympics. He recorded the slowest time in 100m freestyle history at 1:52.72, however won his heat as all other competitors false started. He is now a national hero the head swimming coach of Equatorial Guinea."
"TIL in Rwanda people go to milk bars to socialise and drink milk."
"TIL British Parliament had an official discussion where they condemned the historical inaccuracies of the film U-571 and the rewriting of history to paint the Americans as heroes in an event they never even took part in. They felt it was unfair on the British sailors that lost their lives."
"Nas listed his then 7-year-old daughter, Destiny Jones, as an executive producer on his fifth studio album Stillmatic to ensure she would always receive royalty checks from the album."
"TIL the self-absorption paradox asserts that the more self-aware we are, the less likely we are to make social mistakes, but the more likely we are to torture ourselves over past mistakes. High self-awareness leads to more psychological distress."
"TIL of Vince Coleman, a train dispatcher who sacrificed his life to save hundreds, warning of a massive boat explosion nearby. The message: "Hold up the train. Ammunition ship afire in harbour making for Pier 6 and will explode. Guess this will be my last message. Good-bye, boys.""
"TIL of eagle hunters in Mongolia. Known as the Burkitshi, this nomadic tribe hunts with eagles (only female eagles as they are larger and believed to be fiercer). While eagles can live for decades, theirs are captured at the age of four and released after 10 years to live out their life in the wild."
"TIL that the Ginkgo Tree is unique, not obviously related to any living plant; a “living fossil,”unchanged in 200 million years."
"TIL Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1989. He was frustrated with the fact that he had to go and ask his coworkers what data was on their computer so he can add it to his computer which led to him creating an application that became the world wide Web."
"TIL the chemical reaction in glow sticks was discovered by Dr. Edwin Chandross in 1962, but he had no idea the "chemiluminescent" objects were popular at music shows until a Vice interview in 2013. "Is that so?" he said. "Maybe my granddaughter will think I'm cool now.""
"TIL In 1911 The Rigby family included their cat Tom in their census form. 'Tom Cat' was listed as being an 8-year old, married Mouse-Catcher, Soloist and Thief with 16 children. His birthplace was listed as Cheshire and he was described as being 'speechless' in the infirmity section of the form."
"TIL that even though Henry Heimlich demonstrated his signature maneuver thousands of times throughout his life he never got the chance to use it in an actual emergency until he was 96 when he saved a woman in his nursing home from choking on a burger."
"TIL Richard Simmons would wake up at 4AM to call up to 40 people who are isolated, alone, or needed empathy. Some credited Richard Simmons for saving their lives."
"TIL that in 1995, a man received a "check" for $95,000 as junk mail. Jokingly, he deposited it into his account. The "check" met all of the legal criteria for a check and was cashed."
"TIL Friends Thomas Cook and Joseph Feeney shook hands in 1992, swearing if either one won the Powerball jackpot, they would split the winnings. Well the power of friendship and a handshake has paid off: 28 years later Tom won €22 million and split the winnings with his friend."
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