27 amazing facts that give us a new perspective on the world
Reality is always stranger than fiction, and here are 27 amazing facts about things that seem very ordinary, but they will interest you because not many people know them.
1. It was possible to send anything by U.S. Mail before 1916
Tiny houses are the current trend, but this wasn’t the case when a Utah man sent a 40-ton house by mail in 1916, to avoid paying too much for shipping! Since then, the US government has passed a law that forbids sending buildings by mail! The same goes for children: it wasn’t uncommon for parents to send their children to their grandparents by mail in the early 20th century!
2. It’s raining frogs!
It is apparently an increasingly common phenomenon, but it can actually rain frogs! Actually, a lot of small animals, including frogs, are lifted by strong winds, and sent to another place where they fall back down with the rain.
3. Your sense of smell falls asleep when you do
During sleep, your sense of smell doesn’t work. And yet, wouldn’t it be useful if there were a fire?
4. Flatulence is a danger to astronauts
Astronauts are prohibited from eating beans before going into space: the gases could damage theit space suits.
5. Crocodiles fill up on stones
These dangerous animals aren’t stupid: they swallow stones on purpose to be able sink deeper when they’re hunting for prey.
6. Bhutan’s population is unknown
This small country is so mysterious that we don’t know the exact population (because of political problems with its minorities). It only legalized TV and the internet at the same time in 1999!
7. Polar bears aren’t selfish
Adult bears are not greedy: they only eat the skin and fat of their prey, leaving the rest for their cubs or other animals.
8. Fridges for Eskimos
Don’t Eskimos have enough ice around them to keep their food cold? Well that’s not it – it seems that they need fridges to prevent food from freezing!
9. The oceans are a gold mine
That's right, but first of all, most of the gold is so diluted that it would take 3.4 billion gallons of water to get just one gram of gold. Then there’s also gold under the sea, but it is several miles below the sea floor and surrounded by rock, so it isn’t profitable to try to extract it. What a shame!
10. Shakespeare or Shakspere?
Because of the rather creative orthographic and cultural rules of the Elizabethan period, the spelling of the author's surname has several variations, and each of them has a variable pronunciation as well, so it is true that there were several ways of pronouncing his name. Modern English has standardized how it is spelled and pronounced.
11. Lions are easily distracted
This is why tamers use stools that they turn around: the lion is distracted by the 4 legs. The beast doesn’t know where to focus and retreats.
12. Bread was used as an eraser before rubber was discovered
Bread crumbs (as well as rocks and wax) were used to erase mistakes before rubber was used.
13. The brain is more active when you sleep than when you watch TV
For this reason, sleep is so important for health, because during the night, your brain does a lot of “cleaning up” of everything it has stored or learned during the day: it stores useful information in long term memory, memorizes new information, and gets rid of what’s not important…While, on the other hand, TV uses a part of the brain that is more instinctive and less "working," and so when we’re in front of the TV, our brains can relax in another important way, almost like we’re in a state of light sleep.
14. The strongest being in the world: the Hercules beetle
It’s a beetle that only weighs 3 ½ oz. but is able to carry up to 17 ½ lbs., which makes it the strongest thing on earth.
15. The Legend of the One-legged Umbrella
Kasa-obake are little prankster spirits from Japan that have the shape of an umbrella with one eye, arms, and a long tongue. They only appear if an umbrella is left in one place for 100 years. Interpretations of it vary depending on the region: either they make people who are surprised by the rain without their umbrellas not able to move their feet, or they make the wind so strong that humans are sent into the sky.
16. The first fast food
It was in New York that it first appeared. It was a self-service restaurant, only for men, and people ate standing up.
17. The pill for gorillas
Human birth control pills would work to prevent gorillas from breeding...
18. Hummingbirds can’t walk
In fact, their legs are so small that they are unable to use them to walk. On the other hand, they’re the only bird that can fly backwards. You can’t have it all!
19. "Live free or die"
Ironically, the prisoners of the State of New Hampshire who make their state’s license plates, which include the motto "Live free or die." But the idea doesn’t come from them. It’s the state motto, uttered by their hero from the Revolution, John Stark, in 1809.
20. The fruit eaten by Adam and Eve
In fact, the Bible doesn’t specify whether Adam and Eve ate an apple. It only mentions "a fruit with pips." This erroneous interpretation results from a bad translation of the Latin "mali," which could mean “apple” or “evil.”
21. In France, all dolls must have a human face
This means that there may be dolls with a nonhuman face (such as an alien, or something else), but in this case, it is not considered a doll but instead a toy, and therefore subject to different customs taxes.
22. Loaded dice
The sum of the numbers on opposite sides of a die is always 7.
23. The meaning of the word "Canada"
(C) FarmersDaughterCountryMarket
The most accepted version is that the name of this great country comes from the Iroquois word "Kanata," which means village, colony, or territory. But there’s another less common version that says that explorers from the Iberian Peninsula who came to Canada in search of gold or silver wrote "acá nada" (nothing here) on their blank maps to signify that they hadn’t found any precious metals there.
24. There is only one country whose flag isn’t a square or rectangle
Nepal is the only country in the world that doesn’t have a square or rectangular national flag, and Switzerland and the Vatican are the only ones to fly a square flag.
25. Shoefiti (shoe + graffiti)
Many legends exist to explain the presence of sneakers hanging from electrical wires: students would celebrate their new diploma by throwing their shoes in the air, sports teams would launch their shoes on the wires when they win or lose a game, drug dealers would mark a place of sale - the color of the shoes indicates what drug is for sale, gangs would mark their territory, or, finally, burglars would create a short circuit allowing them to enter houses without electricity or an alarm.
26. Where does the gunk come from, that shows up in the corner of the eyes in the morning?
Eyes need natural tears to stay lubricated and clean. This liquid spreads when we blink our eyes, but during most of the night, we don’t move our eyelids, which causes tears to stick together in the corner of our eyes and dry.
27. The backside of Mount Rushmore in South Dakota
It’s funny to wonder what the back of Mount Rushmore might look like (the monument in South Dakota depicting the heads of the four most important presidents of the country - Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Lincoln). Here is one thought.
Photo credits: queer-travel.de
By Straker Julia
Writer
Passionate about writing, I write articles on the subjects that I love. Creativity and Animals themes are my favorites!
