Photo by Laura Thompson
Saturday, July 31, 2021
Friday, July 30, 2021
The Tokyo Games have shone a light on bullying, abuse and sexualisation, which are too often ignored in the pursuit of glory.
But the meaning of that choice deepened days later when Simone Biles, the brilliant 24-year-old American world champion, withdrew from the team gymnastics final saying she was battling “demons” she feared would hurt her teammates’ chances. After suffering an attack of “the twisties”, a condition where gymnasts lose their sense of space, she had become fearful of injury – devastating in a sport where one split-second mistake can mean a broken neck.
Yet many will wonder whether Biles’ loss of nerve has deeper roots.
All-Croatian Olympic Doubles Final
Only for the third time in Olympic history, but for the first time in more than 100 years, doubles teams from the same country played in the men’s doubles final. So far, tennis players from the same country have played in the men's doubles final only twice - Great Britain in 1908 in London and team USA in 1904 in St. Louis.
It's been three years but we remember it like it was yesterday.
Oliver Dragojević passed away on 29 July 2018 and all this week there will be tributes to the singer during the event “Trag u beskraju.”
Thursday, July 29, 2021
A Colorful Macro Photo of Beach Sand
A stunning macro image by Ole Bielfeldt lays out the individual elements that comprise a dusting of sand from a Mallorca beach, revealing a piece of microplastic embedded within the colorful composition.
Nature Timespiral
Who gives a crap about the history of toilets?
Francis de los Reyes does. He's a professor of civil engineering at North Carolina State University whose research focuses on "wastewater treatment plant design, environmental biotechnology and microbiology, fundamentals of environmental engineering, and water and sanitation for developing countries."
In this TED-Ed video, de los Reyes reveals how we've dealt with our own waste, from ancient Mesopotamia to Thomas Crapper to the present day.
Pelješac Bridge Finally Completed!
Tonci Plazibat/Cropix
What always seemed to be an unattainable dream (even in recent years) is now a reality: the Pelješac bridge has been completed tonight and Croatia is one again.
Wednesday, July 28, 2021
It will finally connect Croatian territory
Work on the 2.4-kilometer bridge, connecting Croatia’s Peljesac peninsula with the mainland to bypass a short stretch of the Bosnian coastline at the town of Neum started three years ago.
The project is worth €550 million, although most of the funding – €357 million – came from the European Union.
Atomic Bomb Shelters In China Used As Housing Units
When the government gave the opportunity to lease the shelters to private landlords, these fallout sanctuaries became tiny residential units. Today, the underground bunkers house more than a million people such as migrant workers and students from rural areas.
Photographer Antonio Faccilongo, fascinated by the people that live in these bunkers, visited Beijing to document the phenomenon.
The human cage, Hans-Jürgen Burkard
Taliban advance triggers exodus of Afghans
Zebah Gul sits with her eight children in the room at the transit centre in Herat, Afghanistan, after being arrested at the Iran-Turkey border. Photo by Charlie Faulkner
“Afghanistan is not a good place to be – there is war and the security situation is not good,” says Gul.
The family agreed to pay a smuggler $650 (£471) for each person if the crossing was successful, but their attempt was thwarted by Iranian border police. Everyone apart from Gul’s husband was arrested.
“We are devastated to have to return to Takhar. It is not safe,” says Gul.
Owning no property and with few work prospects, and facing daily conflict, the family have little to go back for, apart from a few relatives.
Their story is not unique; as Taliban fighters have swept across the country in recent weeks, civilians have been caught in the crossfire. On 21 July, the Pentagon admitted that half of all district centres are now in the hands of the Taliban, which surround 17 of Afghanistan’s 34 provincial capitals.
Tech giants' profits soar as pandemic boom continues
Tuesday, July 27, 2021
Corgi Cake
Too Cute To Eat
A baker named Rin created an adorable—and delectable—cheesecake that looks like three capybaras soaking in a Japanese onsen.
Salmon nearly roasted alive in Pacific north-west heatwave captured on video
The salmon had been traveling upstream in the Columbia River from the ocean, to return to their natal spawning areas, when they unexpectedly changed course, explained Brett VandenHeuvel, the executive director of Columbia Riverkeeper. He described the sockeye as veering off to the Little White Salmon River, a tributary of the Columbia River where the video was recorded, in an effort to essentially “escape a burning building”.
On the day the video was recorded, the river had hit just over 70F (21C), a lethal temperature for these anadromous fish if they are exposed to it for long periods. The Clean Water Act prohibits the Columbia River from rising over 68F (20C).
VandenHeuvel compared the situation to a person trying to run a marathon in over 100F (38C) temperatures.
Monday, July 26, 2021
Greece seeks spear fisher who killed famous seal
Kostis was named after the fisherman who saved it after a storm in 2018.
A Greek seal charity which looked after Kostis for several months as a pup thinks it was killed with a spear gun.
The endangered seals are protected under Greek law.
Kostis was "executed at close range with a spear gun", said the charity, MOm.
The spear probably came from a boat, spokesman Dimitris Tsiakalos told the BBC.
Croatia’s Plan to Put Tesla on Euro Coins Reignites Balkan Feud
"Nikola Tesla was born in Smiljan on the territory of Croatia. And he lived most of his life in the USA. It is citizens who have recommended that one of the future euro coins should include the image of Nikola Tesla, we do not appropriate anybody," PM Andrej Plenković said after the NBS said on Thursday that putting Tesla's image on the national side of euro coins if Croatia joined the euro area "would represent appropriation of the cultural and scientific legacy of the Serb people." Plenković elaborated that the suggestion made by Croatians amounted to a great gesture, having in mind the fact that Tesla was of Serb descent and his own merits globally were unquestionable. We can be proud of that. I cannot see why somebody may deem it as a problem. If I were on the helm of the National Bank of Serbia, I would send congratulations (for such a decision), the Croatian PM said.
Why some people don't want a Covid-19 vaccine
As many health practitioners have repeated, the risks of severe side effects from a vaccine are tiny in comparison to the risk of the disease itself.
Yet a sizeable number of people are still reluctant to get the shots. According to a recent report by the International Monetary Fund, that ranges from around 10-20% of people in the UK to around 50% in Japan and 60% in France.
The result is becoming something of a culture war on social media, with many online commentators claiming that the vaccine hesitant are simply ignorant or selfish.
But psychologists who specialise in medical decision-making argue these choices are often the result of many complicating factors that need to be addressed sensitively, if we are to have any hope of reaching population-level immunity.
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