What are some of the most mind-blowing facts about Belgium?

 There are many mind blowing facts about Belgium. We share a birthday, and I’ll get back to that.

Belgium’s languages are well documented. This is a country where language use and signage is meticulous. When travelling on a train, live travel information is either given in Dutch or French or both, depending on the language area where the train is travelling. Belgium participation in the annual Eurovision song contest alternatives between French and Dutch language television broadcasters. Yet, the Belgium 2003 entry - which can second - was sung in a fictious made up language.

Urban Trad singing the Belgian entry Sanomi in the 2003 Eurovision Song Contest. The song used a made up language and come second.

Belgium is one of the few countries that have become federal states. Many countries were created as federal states - the US, Australia, Australia and the Soviet Union. Following the 1993 St Michael's Agreement, Belgium became a federal country : with three regional governments and three communities. The Flemish regional government and Flemish community since unified.

Belgium politics is well know around the world. The longest periods without government. The 1990 constitutional crisis, when the monarch temporarily abdicated. The complex 2012 state reforms - including the division of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde (BHV), after years and years of talks. The 29 amendment to the constitutions since 1994.

Belgium has the world’s longest metre gauge tram network. Branded Kusttram runs for 67 km along the Belgian coast, serving 67 stops. On the other side of the country, is another impressive railway track. The legendary Ans–Liège Incline allows trains to descend into Liège/Luik - 6 km of gradient with 110 metre height difference. I’ve enjoyed this railway thrill many times.

The author of this answer Nicholas Stone, at the Belgian coast town of Blakenberge. Take the coast tram or train to this lively seaside report.

I particular like Belgium. Not just for the food, the beer, the Eurovision entries and public transport. Best of all, Belgium’s declaration of independence is also my birthday. Though I am somewhat younger than Belgium.

What are some mind-blowing facts about the Sun?

 The sunlight warming your skin today took just eight minutes to travel 93 million miles. But those exact photons spent tens of thousands of years trapped inside the Sun's core.

Born of nuclear fusion, a photon must constantly collide with densely packed atoms in the radiative zone, bouncing in a "random walk" that can last up to 100,000 years before finally reaching the surface and launching into space.

If an atmosphere existed between Earth and the Sun, the acoustic waves generated by the Sun's convective layer would reach Earth as a constant, crushing roar. Heliophysicists calculate that this roar would register on the ground at roughly 100 to 125 decibels—about the volume of a chainsaw or a rock concert, despite the Sun being nearly a hundred million miles away.

The Sun also sheds mass at an astronomical rate. Every second, it converts 600 million tons of hydrogen into helium. In this process, about 4 million tons of matter is converted directly into energy, while another 1.5 million tons is blown away as solar wind. Despite losing 5.5 million tons of mass every second, the Sun is so vast that it has lost only about 0.05% of its total mass over its entire 4.6 billion-year lifespan.

To visualize this scale, consider a coronal mass ejection (CME)—an eruption of magnetized plasma that bursts from the solar atmosphere.

A coronal mass ejection erupts from the Sun, with Earth superimposed to scale in the lower left. Photo by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

As shown in the image, a single solar prominence dwarfs the entire planet, rendering Earth a tiny speck next to a towering loop of plasma. The Sun accounts for 99.86% of all mass in the solar system, meaning everything else—every planet, asteroid, moon, and living organism—is made from the leftover dust of its creation.

What are some mind-blowing facts that sound like lies but are actually true?

 1. The crime rate is so low in the Netherlands that they have closed 23 prisons since 2004 because they do not have enough criminals to fill them.

2. Back in the 1990s, Denzel Washington covered the expenses of a young aspiring actor who didn't have enough money to attend the Oxford Summer Theatre School. That young actor was Chadwick Boseman (RIP).

Chadwick publicly thanked Denzel at the 2019 AFI Lifetime Achievement Awards.

3. In 1963, a Turkish man was renovating his house. After knocking down a wall in his basement, he found a tunnel. He followed the tunnel and discovered an ancient underground city called "Derinkuyu," which once had a population of 20,000.

4. In 2009, an autistic artist named Stephen Wiltshire was able to sketch the New York skyline from memory with a pen after taking a helicopter ride for about 20 minutes.

5. Lady Di was known for ignoring royal protocols. She often traveled by subway. At amusement parks, she refused preferential treatment and made William and Harry wait in line like everyone else.

6. The Blue Lake, in New Zealand, has the clearest body of fresh water known to man, with visibility in the lake of up to 80,000 meters.

7. The record for the largest car theft of all time was 1,000 Volvo cars. The vehicles were ordered and delivered, then the invoice was ignored and, to this day, has still not been paid. The cars were ordered by and delivered to North Korea.

8. In 1963, the Bronx Zoo opened an exhibit titled "The World's Most Dangerous Animal." It was a mirror.

9. Two assailants in New York City once tried to attack former world heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey (who was in his 60s/70s at the time).

As expected, it ended with both assailants unconscious. The dates and circumstances leading up to this event are somewhat uncertain, although Dempsey referenced the incident in his book.

10. Personally, my favorite: In 1996, an avid birdwatcher in Devon, England, spent a whole year hooting at owls and recording their responses, unaware that it was one of his neighbors pretending to be an owl and answering him.

What are some mind-blowing facts about Norway?

 Norway is a country of mind-blowing extremes: they own 1.5% of all listed companies worldwide, hide the world's apocalypse seed backup in a frozen mountain, and knighted a penguin.

Every citizen is technically a millionaire
Norway discovered oil in the North Sea in 1969. Instead of spending the windfall, the government saved it, funneling the profits into a sovereign wealth fund. Today, that fund is worth over $1.5 trillion. Since Norway's population is only about 5.5 million, every single citizen is technically a millionaire in Norwegian kroner.

Their roads have psychological survival features
Driving through a mountain can be monotonous, and Norway has the longest road tunnel in the world. The Lærdal Tunnel stretches for 15.2 miles (24.5 kilometers). To keep drivers from falling asleep or experiencing claustrophobia during the 20-minute drive, engineers divided the tunnel into four sections separated by large rock chambers. These caves are illuminated with blue and yellow lights to simulate a sunrise, breaking up the visual monotony and giving drivers a psychological reset.

The Lærdal Tunnel features large rock caverns illuminated with blue and yellow lights to prevent driver fatigue over its 15.2-mile length. Photo by Markus Trienke is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

A king penguin is a high-ranking military officer
In 1972, the Norwegian King's Guard adopted a king penguin named Nils Olav at the Edinburgh Zoo. The tradition has continued through his successors. Sir Nils Olav III was knighted in 2008 and was recently promoted to the rank of Major General. When the Norwegian King's Guard visits Edinburgh, troops stand at attention while the penguin inspects them.

They host the world's agricultural backup
Deep inside a mountain on the remote archipelago of Svalbard, just 800 miles from the North Pole, sits the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. It is designed to survive natural disasters, nuclear war, and global warming. The vault holds over a million seed samples from nearly every country on Earth, acting as an ultimate safety net for the global food supply. Because it is buried deep in the permafrost, the seeds will remain frozen even if the mechanical cooling systems fail.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault sits partially buried in the permafrost of a remote Arctic mountain, holding backup copies of the world's crop seeds. Photo by Cierra Martin for Crop Trust is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

What are some mind-blowing facts that sound unreal but are actually true?

 That Sperm Oil was the primary source of illumination for most of the world, not very long ago.

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Before the discovery of Petroleum - the primary source of heat, light and energy in the world was this:

Well, not the Sperm Whale, but the Sperm Whale Oil, which was extracted from them. Each adult Sperm Whale Bull gave about 3 tonnes of whale oil.

This led to an intense whale hunting which drove the population of sperm whales down to its current figures. An estimated 250k whales were poached by American whalers alone in the 19th century.

Whale oil was multi purpose and was used for heating, lubrication, soaps along with processing textiles and ropes. But the biggest use of Whale Oil - Burning Lamps. It was smokeless, odorless and super cheap.

Thankfully, it was a Canadian who helped stop this American addiction. In 1849, Dr. Abraham Gesner, a geologist, figured a way to distill Kerosene from Petroleum and rest as they say, is history.

What are some mind-blowing facts & trivia about Indian Film Industry ?

 Here are some mind-blowing facts & trivia about Bollywood -

• Raj Kapoor is the face of optimism in Russia, as his smile in the movie Awara conquered the hearts of all the folks after the war with Germany.

• Bollywood’s first production which was a short film was produced in the the year 1899 – that is 11 years before the first Hollywood movie was released.

• Kalki Koechlin’s great grandfather happens to be the Chief Engineer of Eiffel Tower and was also in charge of construction of Statue Of Liberty. This is the picture of Maurice Koechlin.

• Lagaan was the first Indian film to be released in China.

• The entire film of ‘Ra One’ cost $27 million, making it the most expensive movie ever produced in Bollywood.

• Do Aankhein Baraah Haath is the first Indian film to have won the Golden Globe award under the Samuel Goldwyn category

• After ‘Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara’ was released, there was a 32% increase in Indians visiting Spain.

• Jeetendra started his career as a body double for a female actor Sandhya for the movie Navrang. We don’t who was more embarrassed in this case.

• Ghajini was the first film to have crossed 100 crores in the Box Office.

• The Indian film with the most number of songs- Indira Sabha, featured 71 songs and made its first appearance in 1932

• Sunil Dutt holds the Guinness World record for the being the only actor in a 113 minutes long feature film Yaadein.

Thanks For Reading!

Source:

• 26 Interesting Facts About Bollywood That Are Bigger Than Any BlockBuster!
• 10 INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT BOLLYWOOD YOU PROBABLY DIDN’T KNOW
• 15 Interesting Facts About Bollywood You Probably Didn't Know
• Image Source: Wikipedia - Maurice Koechlin.
  Google Images - Lagaan, Ra One & Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara.

What are some mind-blowing amazing facts about the human body?

 Consider one of the most unknown and mind blowing fact about our body, I want share ……

Cost of HUMAN BODY :

According to a recent article in Wired magazine, a body could be worth up to $45 million — Calculated by selling the bone marrow, DNA, lungs, kidneys, heart … as components.

What about the value of a body based around just the chemical elements that make up a corpse?

Let’s assume we possess a Superb Person Atomizing Machine (SPAM for short); a Sweeney Todd like device that can reduce a body to its elemental components. We throw a body in the top, press a red button, and out of the far end comes a pile of its elemental constituents. What would come out? (Remember, we’re talking about reducing our body to its elemental components, not compounds, so whilst a body might be 61% water, we’re not looking to get H2O out of the far end, we’re looking to split this into Hydrogen and Oxygen.)

O - Oxygen - 65 %

C - Carbon - 18 %

H - Hydrogen - 10.2 %

N- Nitrogen - 3.1

Ca -Calcium - 1.6

P - Phosphorus - 1.2

K - Potassium - 0.25

S - Sulfur - 0.25

Na - Sodium - 0.15

Cl - Chlorine - 0.15

Mg - Magnesium - 0.05

Fe- Iron - 6.00E-03

F Fluorine - 3.70E-03

Zn Zinc - 3.20E-03

Si Silicon -2.00E-03

Rb Rubidium - 4.60E-04

Sr Strontium - 4.60E-04

Br Bromine - 2.90E-04

PbLead - 1.70E-04

Cu Copper - 1.00E-04

Al Aluminium - 8.70E-05

Cd Cadmium - 7.20E-05

Ce Cerium - 5.00E-05

Ba Barium - 3.10E-05

Sn Tin - 2.40E-05

I Iodine - 1.60E-05

Ti Titanium - 1.30E-05

B Boron - 6.90E-05

Se Selenium - 1.90E-05

Ni Nickel - 1.40E-05

Cr Chromium - 2.40E-06

Mn Manganese - 1.70E-05

As Arsenic - 2.60E-05

Li Lithium - 3.10E-06

Hg Mercury - 1.90E-05

Cs Caesium - 2.10E-06

Mo Molybdenum - 1.30E-05

Ge Germanium 1.30E-05

Co Cobalt 2.10E-06

Sb Antimony 1.10E-05

Ag Silver 1.00E-06

Nb Niobium 1.60E-04

Zr Zirconium 6.00E-04

La Lanthanum 2.00E-04

Te Tellurium 1.20E-05

Ga Gallium 1.20E-05

Y Yttrium 1.20E-05

Bi Bismuth 1.20E-05

Tl Thallium 1.40E-05

In Indium 1.40E-05

Au Gold 1.40E-05

Sc Scandium - 1.40E-05%

Ta Tantalum - 1.40E-05%

V Vanadium -2.60E-05%

Th Thorium - 2.00E-07%

U Uranium - 1.30E-07%

Sm Samarium - 5.00E-09%

W Tungsten - 5.00E-09%

Be -Beryllium - 5.00E-09%

Ra -Radium - 1.00E-17%