CULTURAL QA 01-2024-02 All the BELOW QA are from Quora digest to me on 02-01-2024.
Quora answers need not be 100% correct answers Compiled and posted byR. Gopala krishnan, on 02-01-2024 Q1 Can you name a celebrity who has beennicer than expected when meeting fans on public places (such as restaurants)? A1 Gopalkrishna Vishwanath, FormerStructural Engineer at Technical Consultancy Organisations (1974–2011)11h I can nametwo as I have had personal experiences. One was actor Omi Vaidya, who played the role ofChatur Ramalingam in the popular movie 3 Idiots. I met him ata party at my daughter’s neighbor’s house in California. He was charming totalk to and I spent over 15 minutes chatting with him. Omi is an American andtalks English only. Hestrugged to speak in Hindi with me. I switched to English as soon as I noticedthat. Anotherhumble and nice celebrity I met and talked to was the former India test bowler Venkatesh Prasad. We wereboth guests at a tree planting initiative. I enjoyed talking to him. No airs atall. I realized how short I was when I stood next to him! Q2 I've heard that Ravana is worshipped inSri Lanka. Is it true? If yes, why? A1 Kasun Senanayake,23h I'm a Srilankan sinhalese and I shall provide the answer. First you need to know whoyakkas are. There were several ethnic groups in the past in Sri lanka namelyyakkas, nagas, devas and certain other groups. Nagas doesn't mean they hadserpant like bodies. Devas doesn't mean they look like Gods. Similarly Yakkasdoesn't mean they are non-human asuras with evil outlook. They are just anormal human group of people.Lord Ravana was born among this people and uplift the living standards of thispeople by providing knowledge in various subject More we search about him more good things are found. So some peopleworship him as a god. Some consider him a true patriot who foughtfor his country. We only see agood side of him. People who worship him get his blessing. I have askedhim for help and I personally have received his help and blessing. He helps forgood stuff spiritual development and finding solutions for day today problems. Thestories that he is sleeping are baseless. He died naturally like the other people and born in heavenas a God. Thats why we receive his help when asked. There are people who speak withhim. Not toforget there areevidences in Sri lanka to prove that Seetha is lord Ravana’s daughter. Rama is not a special person for us because we don'tbelieve in the concepts of vaishvanism like the avatars of lord Vishnu.So Rama is just another human being for us. There are sinhalese indigenousdoctors with lord Ravana's medical books.There are Sinhala peoplewho claims to be relatives of lord Ravana. There's the mahayana lankavatharasutra. A sutra a buddha said to lord Ravana. Some says Gautama buddha time travelledto meet lord Ravana and said this sutra. However he is a special person. A god to worship. … Q3 Why did steam locomotives not havecondensers to recycle the spent steam? The thermal efficiency would be a lothigher. A3 Susanna Viljanen, Knows Finnish4h Actually, there have been condenser locomotives -and they indeed do have double the thermal efficiency than the ordinary doubleacting steam locomotives. This is not to say they were good, but to say thatthe thermal efficiency of an ordinary steam locomotive is abysmally bad. They have onedrawback. The condenser required is HUGE. Thecondenser really doesn’t matter on ships or stationary power plants, but trains have these things called “payload” and “load gauge”.Hauling the condenser is about the same as hauling one extra fully ladenfreight wagon, and the condenser needs to be designed to fit within the loadgauge. Moreover, onordinary steam engines, the spent steam is fed into the exhaust to improvefirebox draught(hence the “choo-choo” sound), but condenserlocomotives need an extra turbine to do so. Nevertheless,condenser locomotives have been used. They have proven worth the extrainvestment in regions where distances are long, where water is sparse and wherefuel is expensive. Another extra benefit is that they do not leave thetelltale vapour clouds behind them. The photo is of a South African condenserlocomotive, but also Deutsche Reichsbahn used condenser tenders in Russiaduring the WWII. They were especially good in Russia wheredistances are long - halving the fuel consumption and eliminating the need ofwater cranes and water troughs. Q4 Was Mysore ever a part of BritishIndia? A4 Dukhi Deccanکover of the IndianSubcontinent19h Nope! Well, Mysore as known in 1947 at least,was never a part of British India. In its final years as a realm, Mysore was not apart of British India, but there was an instance in which it was ruled by theBritish directly, and much of its original territory was merged into BritishIndia after its defeat in the fourth Anglo-Mysore war. That said, Mysore is one of the few Native States to have been defeated by theBritish in war and still managed to retain its autonomy until the British leftthe Subcontinent. Unlike theSikh empire (Punjab) and Bengal, which were defeated by the British and cameunder direct British rule, or Oudh, which was under subsidiary rule for a whileuntil its complete annexation, or even Hyderabad, which never went to war with the British andadopted subsidiary status on its own, Mysore, whichdid go to war with the British (four times!), was never really part of BritishIndia. Perhaps thereason for letting Mysore remain autonomous was that 1. Tipu Sultan, as opposedto a ruler from the Wodeyar Dynasty, was defeated by the British atSeringapatam, and 2. The British did not want to add anothermassive region for it to control directly as part of British India. (The Kingdom of Mysore, during the reign ofTipu Sultan, before its defeat by the British and its transformation into asubsidiary ’Native State’) But… Mysoreas ruled by Tipu Sultan was not the Mysore that remained autonomous. Much of thenorthern regions of Mysore were merged into Hyderabad Deccan, while thesouthern regions were merged with Madras Presidency, leaving Mysore to become alandlocked state. (Mysore as it was in 1947, before itsaccession to India on August 9th of that year) So while anentity known as ‘Mysore’ was not a part of British India, more than half of itsterritories had been merged into British India (and Hyderabad Deccan). Forsomeone living in Calicut, for example, the land they knew as being part of theKingdom of Mysore had become a part of British India, while the capital city of Mysore remained part of a semi-autonomous Mysore. To furtheradd to this complexity, Mysore did come under Britishcommission rule for a while (known as the Mysore Commission), although this didnot bring the realm into British India legally. Q5 What are some of the most mind-blowingfacts? A5 Abdullahi Jaja,Founder | Work for Kade— Smartphone-based POS Updated Nov 4 Mind-blowingfacts on pineapple alone… • A pineapple is not a single fruit, but a clusterof hundreds of tiny fruits fusedtogether. Each scale on a pineapple is actually a separate berry that grew froma separate flower on the pineapple plant. • A pineapple plant can produce only onepineapple per year, but it can live and bear fruit for up to 50 years in thewild. • Pineapples contain a powerful enzyme calledbromelain, which can break down proteins in your mouth and make your tonguesore. Bromelain can also dissolve human flesh, and it is used as a meattenderizer and a treatment for burns. • Pineapples arethe only edible members of the bromeliad family, which includes over 3,000species of plants. Most bromeliadsare epiphytes, which means they grow on other plants and get their nutrientsfrom the air and rain. • Pineapples are native to South America, but theyare now grown in many tropical and subtropical regions of the world. Thelargest producer of pineapples is Costa Rica, followed by Brazil and thePhilippines. • Pineapples have a lot of health benefits, such asboosting immunity, improving digestion, reducing inflammation, and preventingscurvy. They are also rich in vitamin C, manganese, copper, and fiber. • Pineapples can be grown from the top part of astore-bought pineapple. You just need to cut off the crown, remove some of thelower leaves, and plant it in soil or water. It can take up to two years for a new pineapple plant toproduce fruit. More mind-blowing facts (non-pineapple)… The largest living organism on Earth is a fungus. TheArmillaria ostoyae fungus, also known as the honey mushroom, can grow to beover 2,000 acres in size. The coldest place on Earth is not the North or SouthPole, but a place called Vostok Station in Antarctica. The temperature atVostok Station has been recorded as low as -128.6 degrees Fahrenheit (-89.2degrees Celsius). The human tongue has over 10,000 taste buds. Thisallows us to taste a wide variety of flavors, from sweet to sour to bitter. The fastest animal on Earth is the peregrine falcon.Peregrine falcons can reach speeds of up to 242 miles per hour (390 kilometersper hour) in a dive. The largestanimal on Earth is the blue whale. Blue whales can grow to be over 100 feetlong and weigh up to 200 tons. The oldest living land animal on Earth is thetortoise. Tortoises can live for over 150 years. The deepest point in the ocean is the MarianaTrench. The Mariana Trench is located in the Pacific Ocean and is over 36,000feet deep (11,000 meters). These arejust a few examples of mind-blowing facts that sound unreal but are actuallytrue. The universe is a vast and amazing place, and there is still so much wedon't know. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Thatha_Patty" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/thatha_patty/2071176825.3565155.1704192684241%40mail.yahoo.com.
