10 Funny But True Facts About Life

1. If you come early, the bus is late. If you come late?? the bus is still late.

2. Once you have bought something, you will find the same item being sold somewhere else at a cheaper rate.

3. When in a queue, the other line always moves faster and the person in front of you will always have the most complex of transactions.

4. If you have paper, you don’t have a pen??. If you have a pen, you don’t have paper?? if you have both, no one calls.

Especially for Students

5. If you have bunked the class, the professor has taken attendance.

6. You will pick up maximum wrong numbers when on roaming.

7. The door bell or your mobile will always ring when you are in the bathroom.

8. After a long wait for bus, two buses will always pull in together and the bus which you get in will be more crowded than the other.

9. If your exam is tomorrow, there will be a power cut tonight.

10. Irrespective of the direction of the wind, the smoke from the cigarette will always tend to go to the non-smoker

White house info

White House History

For more than 200 years, the White House has been more than just the home of the Presidents and their families. Throughout the world, it is recognized as the symbol of the President, of the President's administration, and of the United States.

About the Building

For two hundred years, the White House has stood as a symbol of the Presidency, the United States government, and the American people. Its history, and the history of the nation's capital, began when President George Washington signed an Act of Congress in December of 1790 declaring that the federal government would reside in a district "not exceeding ten miles square…on the river Potomac." President Washington, together with city planner Pierre L’Enfant, chose the site for the new residence, which is now 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. As preparations began for the new federal city, a competition was held to find a builder of the "President’s House." Nine proposals were submitted, and Irish-born architect James Hoban won a gold medal for his practical and handsome design.

Construction began when the first cornerstone was laid in October of 1792. Although President Washington oversaw the construction of the house, he never lived in it. It was not until 1800, when the White House was nearly completed, that its first residents, President John Adams and his wife, Abigail, moved in. Since that time, each President has made his own changes and additions. The White House is, after all, the President’s private home. It is also the only private residence of a head of state that is open to the public, free of charge.

The White House has a unique and fascinating history. It survived a fire at the hands of the British in 1814 (during the war of 1812) and another fire in the West Wing in 1929, while Herbert Hoover was President. Throughout much of Harry S. Truman’s presidency, the interior of the house, with the exception of the third floor, was completely gutted and renovated while the Trumans lived at Blair House, right across Pennsylvania Avenue. Nonetheless, the exterior stone walls are those first put in place when the White House was constructed two centuries ago.

Presidents can express their individual style in how they decorate some parts of the house and in how they receive the public during their stay. Thomas Jefferson held the first Inaugural open house in 1805. Many of those who attended the swearing-in ceremony at the U.S. Capitol simply followed him home, where he greeted them in the Blue Room. President Jefferson also opened the house for public tours, and it has remained open, except during wartime, ever since. In addition, he welcomed visitors to annual receptions on New Year’s Day and on the Fourth of July. In 1829, a horde of 20,000 Inaugural callers forced President Andrew Jackson to flee to the safety of a hotel while, on the lawn, aides filled washtubs with orange juice and whiskey to lure the mob out of the mud-tracked White House.

After Abraham Lincoln’s presidency, Inaugural crowds became far too large for the White House to accommodate them comfortably. However, not until Grover Cleveland’s first presidency did this unsafe practice change. He held a presidential review of the troops from a flag-draped grandstand built in front of the White House. This procession evolved into the official Inaugural parade we know today. Receptions on New Year’s Day and the Fourth of July continued to be held until the early 1930s.

• There are 132 rooms, 35 bathrooms, and 6 levels in the Residence. There are also 412 doors, 147 windows, 28 fireplaces, 8 staircases, and 3 elevators.
• At various times in history, the White House has been known as the "President's Palace," the "President's House," and the "Executive Mansion." President Theodore Roosevelt officially gave the White House its current name in 1901.
• Presidential Firsts while in office... President James Polk (1845-49) was the first President to have his photograph taken... President Theodore Roosevelt (1901-09) was not only the first President to ride in an automobile, but also the first President to travel outside the country when he visited Panama... President Franklin Roosevelt (1933-45) was the first President to ride in an airplane.
• With five full-time chefs, the White House kitchen is able to serve dinner to as many as 140 guests and hors d'oeuvres to more than 1,000.
• The White House requires 570 gallons of paint to cover its outside surface.
• For recreation, the White House has a variety of facilities available to its residents, including a tennis court, jogging track, swimming pool, movie theater, and bowling lane.

World Trade Center

1.      The WTC opened in 1970 after 8 years of construction.

2.      The WTC was the dream of David Rockefeller, chairman of the Chase Manhattan Bank, and Nelson Rockefeller, former Governor of New York.

3.      The Rockefellers wanted to name the towers after themselves, but the mayor of NY, John Lindsay, insisted on the World Trade Center.

4.      The City chose to build the WTC instead of building a new tunnel and large bridge over the Hudson River.

5.      The World Trade Center was designed by architect Minoura Yamasaki.

6.      According to Yamasaki, downtown Manhattan was the perfect place to erect the towers because there wasn't "a single building worth saving in theeighborhood."

7.      Owners of nearby buildings disagreed, and delayed demolition by three weeks with their protests.

8.      Sixteen blocks were cleared to house the completed WTC.

9.      More than 10,000 workers involved in building the complex.

10.  More than 60 of them died during construction.

11.  The excavation work displaced enough soil to create Liberty Park, where four 60-floor towers and four apartment buildings were constructed.

12.  The WTC's foundations were laid at 60 feet below ground level.

13.  The complex covered 16 acres when finished.

14.  In addition to the towers, five other office buildings made up the WTC complex
The WTC had 12 million square feet of space.

15.  Each floor was 50,000 square feet.

16.  The buildings had their own ZIP codes - 10047 and 10048.

17.  The towers were designed to look like a futuristic sculpture.

18.  The structure was revolutionary. Its main supports were external, lining the four corners of each tower.

19.  Critics condemned the completed buildings as "boring."

20.  Completed, the buildings were 100 feet taller then the Empire State building.

21.  Until the construction of Chicago's Sears Tower and the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia, the twin towers were the world's tallest buildings.

22.  The North Tower's 347 foot radio tower technically allowed the WTC to still call itself the world's tallest building.

23.  The towers were different heights. The South tower was 1,362 feet tall, and big brother North tower was 1,368.

24.  Sixty-eight miles of steel were used in the construction of the buildings.

25.  The concrete poured was enough to build a road from New York to Washington, DC

26.  The steel inside the WTC could have made three more Brooklyn Bridges.

27.  The Twin Towers had more than 16 miles of staircases.

28.  There were 43,600 windows.

29.  The windows were small to reduce the of heat or cold entering the building. Regular size windows would have made the heat unbearable in the summertime.

30.  The WTC's 600,000 square feet of glass was cleaned by an automatic machine.

31.  The building had 20,000 elevator doors.

32.  Of the WTC's 239 banks of elevators, one was known as the fastest in the U.S.

33.  The main elevators at 27 feet a second reached the top in less than a  minute.

34.  There were 828 emergency exit doors.

35.  23,000 fluorescent light bulbs lit the interior.

36.  Originally, there were no light switches in the towers, because energy prices were one-third less than they are today. In 1982,switches were installed.

37.  12,000 miles of electrical cable snaked through the building, supplying power to 15 trading floors for stockbrokers.

38.  The 75,000 telephones were maintained by 19,600 miles of cable.

39.  There were more than 300 computer mainframes on site.

40.  The WTC used more power in one day than most small American cities.

41.  Steam supplied by a plant on New York's East River was used to heat the buildings.

42.  The buildings housed 49,000 tons of air-conditioning equipment.

43.  More than 250,000 cans of paint were needed every year for upkeep of the Towers.

44.  The surrounding shopping center complex included 3250,000 square feet of restaurants and stores.

45.  Six banks, five investment firms and three insurance companies called their headquarters there, in the building.

46.  The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey had its headquarters in the building.

47.  American Express had three floors in the WTC.

48.  The WTC was home base for Bank of America.

49.  The trade center housed two top restaurants - the Windows on the World and Wild Blue.

50.  Windows on the World had one of the best vintage wine collections in the United States.

51.  More than 50,000 people worked in the twin towers.

52.  By 9 a.m. each weekday morning, the buildings had an average of 35,000 employees at their desks.

53.  More than 200,000 people - half of them tourists - moved through the buildings each day.

54.  The South Tower had an observation deck that was visited by more than 26,000 people a day.

55.  An information sign at the top assured visitors that the buildings had been designed to withstand airplane crashes.

56.  The towers could be seen from at least 20 miles away.

57.  On a clear day, it was possible to see for 45 miles in every direction from the observation deck.

58.  The express elevator to the observation deck was the largest in the U.S. with a 55-person capacity.

59.  Every president since 1973 paid a visit to the landmark.

60.  President Ronald Reagan watched July 4th fireworks celebrations from the WTC on two occasions.

61.  Superstars Frank Sinatra, John Lennon, Mick Jagger and Liza Minelli all sang in WTC restaurants.

62.  Two New York TV stations incorporated the twin tower image into their logos.

63.  The towers served 10 New York TV stations with 10 antennas on the top.

64.  More postcards of the WTC were sent each year than any other building in the world.

65.  In 1974, a Frenchman, Phillipe Petit, strung a tightrope between the two towers and walked across.

66.  Three men successfully parachuted from the top of the towers.

67.  More than a dozen mountain climbers have scaled the building.

68.  In 1975 a jobless construction worker parachuted from the South Tower to publicize the plight of the unemployed.

69.  The most famous man to climb the building was George Willig - who was arrested at the top. Willig was fined one penny for each of the 110 floors he scaled.

70.  Last year, a man in a micro-light aircraft crashed into the North Tower.

71.  In the concourse beneath the towers, there were more than 75 stores.

72.  Each day, over 150,000 commuters passed through the three subway stations there.

73.  Eighty-seven tons of food was delivered to the building each day.

74.  Over 30,000 cups of coffee were poured daily in the basement cafes.

75.  Twenty-two doctors had practices there.

76.  Seventeen babies were born on the site.

77.  Irv Silverstein recently bought the WTC for almost $3.2 billion.

78.  The WTC generated $110 million a year in profit.

79.  More than three dozen movies have been filmed there.

80.  The best known film to use the WTC as a location was the 1976 remake of King Kong.

81.  The 1993 bombing of the WTC killed six people and injured 1,000 more. 1,300 pounds of explosives ripped through the garage in the 1993 attack.

82.  That bomb created a crater 16 feet deep and badly damaged inner support beams.

83.  Before the 1993 attack, there were three closed circuit television networks for security.

84.  After the bombing, the cameras were increased to 300 monitored by computers.

85.  More than 300 security guards worked there.

86.  The WTC featured security centers on 14 different floors and its own police station.

87.  The entrance lobbies had 16 concierge desks and 12 X-ray machines.

88.  After the first bombing, no one could get inside the buildings without an ID check.

89.  It took an average of five minutes for a visitor to pass through
security checks.

90.  Before the 1993 bombing, there were more than 1,000 parking spaces beneath the buildings; 600 remained afterward.

91.  All vehicles using the parking lot had to show FBI security passes.

92.  On Sept. 11, the building was 95 percent full, with over 400 tenants.

93.  New York Gov. George Pataki had an office in the WTC, but wasn't there when the disaster struck.

94.  Both the Secret Service and the FBI rented office space there.

95.  $110.3 million in gold and 120.7 million in silver is buried in the rubble.

96.  The combined weight of the towers was more than 1.5 million tons. 1Each tower was built to safely sway about three feet during strong wind storms.

97.  Blue Cross-Blue Shield, New York's largest health insurance company, moved into the building 3 years ago.

98.  Nine chapels serving six different faiths called the WTC home.

99.  Twenty-nine countries had trade mission offices in the buildings.

100.   Every major U.S. airline had ticket offices inside the WTC.

101.    It is the first skyscraper in the world destroyed by terrorists

Intresting Knowledge

1. If you are right handed, you will tend to chew your food on your right side. If you are left handed, you will tend to chew your food on your left side.

2. If you stop getting thirsty, you need to drink more water. For when a human body is dehydrated, its thirst mechanism shuts off.

3. Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep you from crying.

4. Your tongue is germ free only if it is pink. If it is white there is a thin film of bacteria on it.

5. The Mercedes-Benz motto is “Das Beste oder Nichts” meaning “the best or nothing”.

6. The Titanic was the first ship to use the SOS signal.

7. The pupil of the eye expands as much as 45 percent when a person looks at something pleasing.

8. The average person who stops smoking requires one hour less sleep a night.

9. Laughing lowers levels of stress hormones and strengthens the immune system. Six-year-olds laugh an average of 300 times a day. Adults only laugh 15 to 100 times a day.

10. The roar that we hear when we place a seashell next to our ear is not the ocean, but rather the sound of blood surging through the veins in the ear.

11. Dalmatians are born without spots.

12. Bats always turn left when exiting a cave.

13. The ‘v’ in the name of a court case does not stand for ‘versus’, but for ‘and’ (in civil proceedings) or ‘against’ (in criminal proceedings).

14. Men’s shirts have the buttons on the right, but women’s shirts have the buttons on the left.

15. The owl is the only bird to drop its upper eyelid to wink. All other birds raise their lower eyelids.

16. The reason honey is so easy to digest is that it’s already been digested by a bee.

17. Roosters cannot crow if they cannot extend their necks.

18. The color blue has a calming effect. It causes the brain to release calming hormones.

19. Every time you sneeze some of your brain cells die.

20. Your left lung is smaller than your right lung to make room for your heart.

21. The verb “cleave” is the only English word with two synonyms which are antonyms of each other: adhere and separate.

22. When you blush, the lining of your stomach also turns red.

23. When hippos are upset, their sweat turns red.

24. The first Harley Davidson motorcycle was built in 1903, and used a tomato can for a carburetor.

25. The lion that roars in the MGM logo is named Volney.

26. Google is actually the common name for a number with a million zeros.

27. Switching letters is called spoonerism. For example, saying jag of Flapan, instead of flag of Japan.

28. It cost 7 million dollars to build the Titanic and 200 million to make a film about it.

29. The attachment of the human skin to muscles is what causes dimples.

30. There are 1,792 steps to the top of the Eiffel Tower.

31. The sound you hear when you crack your knuckles is actually the sound of nitrogen gas bubbles bursting.

32. Human hair and fingernails continue to grow after death.

33. It takes about 20 seconds for a red blood cell to circle the whole body.

34. The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets.

35. Most soccer players run 7 miles in a game.

36. The only part of the body that has no blood supply is the cornea in the eye. It takes in oxygen directly from the air.

37. Every day 200 million couples make love, 400,000 babies are born, and 140,000 people die.

38. In most watch advertisements the time displayed on the watch is 10:10 because then the arms frame the brand of the watch (and make it look like it
is smiling).

39. Colgate faced big obstacle marketing toothpaste in Spanish speaking countries. Colgate translates into the command “go hang yourself.”

40. The only 2 animals that can see behind itself without turning its head are the rabbit and the parrot.

41. Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.

42. The average person laughs 13 times a day.

43. Do you know the names of the three wise monkeys? They are:Mizaru(See no evil), Mikazaru(Hear no evil), and Mazaru(Speak no evil)

44. Women blink nearly twice as much as men.

45. German Shepherds bite humans more than any other breed of dog.

46. Large kangaroos cover more than 30 feet with each jump.

47. Whip makes a cracking sound because its tip moves faster than the speed of sound.

48. Two animal rights protesters were protesting at the cruelty of sending pigs to a slaughterhouse in Bonn. Suddenly the pigs, all two thousand of them, escaped through a broken fence and stampeded, trampling the two hapless protesters to death.

49. If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural cause.

50. The human heart creates enough pressure while pumping to squirt blood 30 feet!!

Population Facts

Global Population Concerns

• The first billion took from the dawn of humanity until 1830.
• The second billion took only 100 years -- from 1830 to 1930.
• Three billion more arrived in the next 60 years.
• The next billion will take only 13 years (yes, just 13 years!) -- unless there is a tremendous effort to slow world birthrates!
• The ideal population of the United States was what it was around 1950, when doors were left unlocked and factors like housing, jobs, pace of life, crime, pollution, etc. were at comfortable levels.
• Some say there is a connection between runaway population growth and human suffering.
• It has been said that while recent environmental victories are very important, they will become meaningless if demand on the earth's resources continues to escalate as it has in the last century.
• The Chair of the National Academy of Sciences Panel on Global Warming calls population growth the driving force in global warming.
• Birth control and family planning are not available to all men and women.
• Dr. Nafis Sadik, Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund, recently said that, "We need to strengthen our resolve for greater economic and social justice, gender equality and global protection.... The issues are not different problems, they are part of the same synoptic worldview.  Whether we approach it from one direction or another -- the answers and approaches are linked."
• Bill McKibben, a renowned environmental author, recently concluded in The Atlantic Monthly that, "The next fifty years are a special time.  They will decide how strong and healthy the planet will be for centuries to come.  Between now and 2050 we'll see the zenith, or very nearly, of human population.  With luck we'll never see any greater production of carbon dioxide or toxic chemicals.  We'll never see more species extinction or soil erosion.  We need in these fifty years to be working on all parts of the equation -- on our ways of life, on our technologies, and on our population."
• It is evident the environment is being severely damaged by the impact of rapidly growing populations and over-exploitation of the earth's natrual resources.
• There is a direct population connection between human activities, global warming and the greenhouse effect.
• Almost all of the world's people now have access to modern family planning services, but they need to be educated and motivated to use them to have smaller families and to gain greater independence and self-determination.
• The population growth in Mexico dropped 34% in 10 years, boosting the nation's economic, social and environmental well-being.  Soap operas were the prime influence.

Population Concerns in the United States

POPULATION

• At the present growth rate of 1.1% per year, the United States' population will double to about 560 million in about the next 60 years, if current immigration and related trends continue.  Each year over 3 million people are added to the U.S. population.
• Over 70% of the United States' annual population growth (and over 90% of California, Florida and New York) results from immigration.
• Every person leaves an "ecological footprint" on the Earth -- that amount of land which, assuming it is endowed with an average amount of resources, is necessary to sustain one human being indefinitely.  The average American's ecological footprint is about 25 acres, an area far greater than that taken up by one's residence and place of school or work and other places where he or she is.  Those 25 additional acres supply the average American with food, fiber, and other resources, as well as capacity for waste assimilation and disposal. (The average footprint of everyone in the world is about 7 acres.)  For further information on the American ecological footprint, continue to the following links.

LAND & FOOD PRODUCTION

• One acre of natural habitat or farmland is converted to built-up space or highway for each person added to the U.S. population.
• More than 99.3% of the U.S. food comes from land, while less than .5% comes from aquatic systems.
• Of the nearly 470 million acres of arable land that are now in cultivation in the U.S., more than 1 million acres are lost from cultivation each year due to urbanization, multiplying transportation networks, and industrial expansion.  In addition, about 2 million acres of prime cropland are lost annually by erosion, salinization, and water logging.
• Iowa has lost 1/2 of its fertile topsoil after farming there for about 100 years.  Their topsoil is being lost about 30 times faster than sustainability.
• if present population gwoth and other trends continue, over the next 60 years, both degradation adn urbanization will diminish our arable land base of 470 million acres by 120 million acres.
• Only 0.6 acres of arable land per person will be available in 2050, whereas more tha 1.2 acres per person are needed to provide a divers diet (currently 1.6 acres of arable land are available),
• A doubling of the American population will accelerate the need for food.  For every 1% increase in food demand, the price at the farm gate increases 4.5%.

FOOD EXPORTS & OIL IMPORTS

• Currently the U.S. earns $40 billion per year as the largest food exporter in the world.  About 60% of the oil used in the U.S. is imported at a cost of $75 billion per year.  About 400 gallons of oil equivalents are expended to feed each American, about 17% of all energy used, each year.
• If present trends in population growth, domestic food consumption, and topsoil loss continue, the U.S. food wxports (and the income from them) will cease by 2030.

ENERGY

• Fossil energy use in the U.S. has increased from 20 to as much as 1,000-fold in just four decades.
• Currently, 92% of U.S. energy needs are provided byt finite fossil fuels, with 6% of the total energy used for agricultrual production.
• Renewable energy sources, like hydropower and biomass, provide 8% of the U.S. energy and are increasing very slowly.
• Approaching 2050, most of the oil and natural gas in the United States will be exhausted, and world supplies will be ever closer to depletion.
• A renewable energy source, solar energy, would require the use of about 20% of the U.S. land area (about 450 million acres) to support a system that would supply only 1/2 of all current energy consumption, and the U.S. oil and gas reserves will have nearly run out by 2050, leaving us with environmentally problematic coal, or nuclear energy.  The advantage of the land space required for solar is that the solar can be above the ground, allowing for multiple use of the land space, such as grazing, agriculture, and warehousing.

WATER

• Water is essential for all life, including productive agriculture.  Agriculture consumes about 85% of all fresh water consumed by Americans.  In the West, water shortages are increasing.
• Rainfall is used directly by crops, is stored in diverse water bodies and in underground aquifers.  Groundwater provides 31% of the water used in U.S. agriculture.  Groundwater is being depleted 25% in excess of recharge rates.
• Even if water management were to be substantially improved, by 2060 the 560 million Americans will have only 700 gallons/day/capita, considered a minimum for all human needs.  This assumes even distribution, which is not the case -- much of our population and agricultural production is in arid and semi-arid regions.
• Almost every house that can afford one now owns some type of water filter.  Water quality is decreasing, as are our sources of potable water, due to development, salinity, and polution.

 
THE ECONOMY

• In America's Forgotten Majority, Ray Teixeria and Joel Rogers write that "from 1973 to 1988, an economy that almost doubled in real terms, the wage of the typical worker in production and nonsupervisory jobs (80 percent of the workforce) actually declined by 6 percent, from $13.61 to $12.77 an hour."

Fast Facts about China

Formal name: People's Republic of China (PRC)

Capital: Beijing

Head of State: President Hu Jintao elected March 15, 2003.

National flag: Red flag with five stars.

National emblem: Tiananmen Gatetower under five stars, encircled by ears of grain and with a gear wheel below.

National anthem: March of the Volunteers, written in 1935, with lyrics by the poet Tian Han and music by the composer Nie Er, honoring those who went to the front to fight the Japanese invaders in northeast China in the 1930s. Decided upon as the provisional national anthem of the new China on September 27, 1949, at the First Plenary Session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the song was officially adopted as the national anthem of the PRC on December 4, 1982, by the National People's Congress (NPC).

Animal: The giant panda is considered a Chinese national treasure. Just over 1,000 survive in the wild, most of them to be found in Sichuan Province.

Flower: China does not have an "official" national flower, but the tree peony can be regarded as a national favorite. The tree peony (mudan) received the most votes in an unofficial survey conducted in 1994 in every district in China asking people to select a national flower.

Bird: More bird species live in China than any other place in the world. Shaanxi Province's red ibis is also a national treasure. Only some 1,500 of this highly endangered bird species exist. Other cranes found in China include the Siberian white, common, black-necked, sarus, hooded, white-naped, and demoiselle.

Tree: The oldest tree in the world is China's gingko, which first appeared during the Jurassic Age some 160 million years ago.

National Day: Chinese celebrate October 1 as National Day in honor of the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1, 1949.

Other national holidays: Spring Festival (the celebration of Chinese New Year, generally between the last 10-day period of January and mid-February) and International Labor Day (May 1). Major holidays in China are occasions for family reunions and traveling. Starting in October 1999, China's three official holidays became "Golden Weeks" each with seven days vacation made possible by working four extra days before the commencement of the holiday and afterwards.

Land size: China has a landmass of 9,600,000 sq km, and is the third-largest country in the world, next only to Russia and Canada. Cultivated land is 130.04 million ha.

Location: In the east of the Asian continent, on the western shore of the Pacific Ocean.

Border countries: Korea, Mongolia, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tadzhikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam.

Climate: Extremely diverse; tropical in the south to subarctic in the north.

Geography: Mountains, high plateaus, and deserts in the west; plains, deltas, and hills in the east. The highest mountain in China is the highest mountain in the world: Mount Qomolangma. The mountain towers above all others at 29,035 feet or 8,848 m.

Population: China is the world's most populous country with 1.28453 billion at the end of 2002, one-fifth of the world's total. This figure does not include the Chinese living in the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions, and Taiwan Province.

Population density: The population density is 134 people per sq km, roughly four times greater than that of the U.S.

Population ethnicity: 91.6 percent of Chinese people are Han. The non-Han population includes 55 ethnic minorities, of which the major groups are the Zhuang, Manchu, Hui, Miao, Uygur, Yi, Tujia, Mongolian, and Tibetan.

Population distribution: Most of the population of China lives in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River, Yangtze River and Pearl River valleys, and the Northeast Plain. In 2000 a "go-west" campaign was launched by the government to help its relatively backward western and central areas catch up with more affluent eastern China.

Religions: The number of religious worshippers in China is estimated at well over 100 million, most of whom follow Buddhism. Other major religions are Taoism, Islam and Christianity in both its Catholic and Protestant forms.

Languages: Standard Chinese or Mandarin (Putonghua, based on the Beijing dialect), Yue (Cantonese), Wu (Shanghaiese), Minbei (Fuzhou), Minnan (Hokkien-Taiwanese), Xiang, Gan, and Hakka dialects, as well as minority languages. In 1958, the First National People's Congress approved, at its Fifth Session, the adoption of the Pinyin (Scheme for the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet) for spelling Chinese names and places in Roman letters, but the Pinyin system was not popularly used until the late 1970s. Pinyin is now widely seen in China, and it replaces earlier Romanization spelling systems.

Health: China provides wide access to primary health care and child immunizations. Average life expectancy was 71.8 years in 2002, having risen from 35 years on the eve of Liberation in 1949.

Economy: China's economy has boomed since 1978, as a result of sweeping economic reforms. GNP grew from $128 billion in 1980 to $745 billion in 1998. China's economy continues to grow rapidly, with a GDP real growth rate of 9.1 percent in 2003, and an annual industrial production growth rate of 11.6 percent between 1979 and 2000.

The Constitution: After the founding of the PRC, four Constitutions have been formulated successively in 1954, 1975, 1978 and 1982. The first Constitution was adopted by the First Session of the First National People's Congress, the chief legislative branch, on September 20, 1954. The present Constitution was promulgated in 1982 and amended several times thereafter, in 1988, 1993 and 1999.

Political parties: The Communist Party of China (CPC) is the country's sole political party in power. Hu Jintao became general secretary of the CPC at its 16th National Congress in November 2002. Founded in July 1921, the CPC today has more than 66 million members and over 3.5 million basic organizations. Besides the CPC, there are eight political parties.

Administrative divisions: China is made up of 23 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities directly under the Central Government, and the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macao. The 23 provinces are Anhui, Fujian, Gansu, Guangdong, Guizhou, Hainan, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Jilin, Liaoning, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Shandong, Shanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan, Zhejiang; the five autonomous regions are Guangxi, Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Xinjiang, and Tibet; the four municipalities are Beijing, Chongqing, Shanghai and Tianjin.

Currency: Renminbi (RMB)/yuan

Military: The People's Liberation Army (PLA) includes the Army, Navy, Air Force, and the Second Artillery Force. Jiang Zemin is chairman of the Central Military Commission of China, the country's top military organ and commander of its armed forces

Info About Computer

• The day after Internet Explorer 4 was released, a few Microsoft employees left a 10 by 12-foot Internet Explorer logo on Netscape's front lawn with a message that said "We love you" at the height of the browser wars in the late 90s.

• Google logs each search queries into its systems to enhance future search.

• All the three founders of YouTube Steve Chen, Chad Hurley and Jawed Karim were working for Paypal when they started YouTube.

• The domain name www.youtube.com was registered on Valentines Day (February 14, 2005).

• One of the biggest leaps in Google's search engine usage came about when they introduced their much improved spell checker giving birth to the "Did you mean..." feature. This instantly doubled their traffic.

• The first ever video that was uploaded on Youtube is by Jawed Karim (one of youtube founders) titled "Me at zoo" on April 23rd, 2005. This video is all of 18 seconds long.

• Anthony Greco, aged 18, became the first person arrested for spim (unsolicited instant messages) on February 21,2005.

• The 80's arcade game Phoenix was the first game ever, to introduce the concept of end-level bosses. The game had players shoot their way through an alien mothership's defences.

• The first game to incorporate real time audio effects, or basically, the difference in the same sound in different physical environments was Duke Nukem 3D. When the player shot his gun in the water, the sound would be muffled and gurgly.

• The GNU license was around since 1976, the GNU Emacs were the first machines to be released with this license.

• Sony introduced the 3.5 inch floppy in 1981.

About China

1. China is a communist country ruled by 1 party with iron grip. CCP party bosses appoint the national/regional/local politicians and many private company managements since many private companies are ex-SOE (state owned enterprises).

2. Corruption in China is prevalent, rampant and one of the worst even down to lower ranking employees. For example, factory canteen worker receives an "envelopes" in scheme where he claims he received 10 bags of rice when only 8 bags are delivered.

3. There is almost no "law" since laws are written to support the communist party or corrupt local communist bosses. Judges are appointed by the local communist boss and few if any understand law. Many judges got job thru "guanxi" or connection and of course bribes.

4. The Chinese banks in are BIG TROUBLE. E&Y got in heaps of trouble for discussing hidden bad and noncollectable debts. Local communist cadres dictate banks to lend to their pet projects and of course friends who bribe them not to mention COMPLETE lack of transparency.

5. No one except pea size brains trusts the communist government's statistics which are MANIPULATED.

6. Many of the listed companies numbers are COOKED. Auditors and their management can be bribed and extorted. It's beyond me how anyone would trust Chinese companies' financials unless audited by Big 4. And even Big 4s audited numbers are suspect since most Chinese companies carry multiple books including one for taxation and another with slush funds and hidden losses.

7. Latest Chinese share and commodity appreciation have lot to do with communists pumping money to the economy by directing the banks to lend. This kind of stimulus cannot go on

INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT THE HOLY QURAN

The Holy Quran has 30 parts

The Holy Quran has 114 surahs

Bismillah Al-Rahman Al-Raheem is repeated 114 times in the Quran.

All except for Surat “Al Tawbah” start with Bismillah al-Rahman al-Raheem.

Surat “Al Namel, No. 27” has Bismillah Al-Rahman Al-Raheem in its body

Al-Baqarah is the longest surah in the Quran  

Al-Kawthar is the shortest surah in the Quran

Milk is the best drink mentioned in the Quran

Honey is the best food thing mentioned in the Quran

The best month is Ramadan

The best night is the Night of Power in Ramadan (Laylat al Qadr)

The most disliked thing by Allah, although being halal, is Divorce

Surat Yaseen is the HEART of the Quran

Surat Al-Ikhlas is considered 1/3 of the Quran

Quran was revealed over 23 years: 13 in Mecca and 10 in Madina

Surat Al-Dahr was revealed in respect to Ahlul Bayt (P)

Surat Al Nissa speaks about laws of marriage

Whoever reads one letter of the Quran gets 10 Rewards

Reading 1 verse in Ramadan is equal to reading the entire Quran in other months

Ramadan is the Spring of the Holy Quran

The Quran will intercede for people who recited it on Judgment Day

The Quran will complain of people who didn’t recite it on Judgment Day

Amazing Facts about Human body

A newborn baby's brain grows almost 3 times in course of first year

A person who smokes a pack of cigarettes a day will on average lose two teeth every ten years.

An average women has 17 square feet of skin. When a women is in her ninth month of pregnancy she has 18.5 square feet of skin.

At one time it was thought that the heart controlled a person's emotions.

Due to eating habits in the USA, one in three children born in the year 2000 have a chance of getting type II diabetes.

Eating chocolate three times a month helps people live longer as opposed to people who overeat chocolate or do not eat chocolate at all.

Fingernails grow nearly 4 times faster than toenails.

Gardening is said to be one of the best exercises for maintaining healthy bones.

In 1900, a person could expect to live to be 47. Today, the average life expectancy for men and women in developed countries is longer than 70 years.

In a month, a fingernail grows an eighth of an inch.

It is not possible to tickle yourself. The cerebellum, a part of the brain, warns the rest of the brain that you are about to tickle yourself. Since your brain knows this, it ignores the resulting sensation.

Just behind the pupil is a lens. It is round and flat. It is thicker toward the middle.

Next to bone marrow, hair is the fastest growing tissue in the human body.

On average a person passes gas 14 times a day.

Over 40 million Americans have chronic bad breath.

People generally read 25% slower from a computer screen compared to paper.

Soaking beans for twelve hours in water before they are cooked can reduce flatulence caused by beans.

Studies indicate that listening to music is good for digestion.

The bones in your body are not white – they range in colour from beige to light brown. The bones you see in museums are white because they have been boiled and cleaned.

The DNA of humans is closer to a rat than a cat.

The human face is made up of 14 bones.

The incidents of immune system diseases has increased over 200% in the last five years.

The reason why your nose gets runny when you are crying is because the tears from the eyes drain into the nose.

The small intestine in the human body is about 2 inches around, and 22 feet long.

There are approximately 100 million acts of sexual intercourse each day.

Three years after a person quits smoking, there chance of having a heart attack is the same as someone who has never smoked before.

Your eyes blinks over 10,000,000 times a year!

A pregnant woman's dental health can affect her unborn child.

Bile produced by the liver is responsible for making your feces a brownish, green colour.

Eighty percent of 10 year old girls in the USA go on a diet.

Girls have more tastebud than boys.

In America, the most common mental illness is Anxiety Disorders.

Kissing can aid in reducing tooth decay. This is because the extra saliva helps in keeping the mouth clean.

On average, 90% of the people that have the disease Lupus are female.

People of Ancient China believed that swinging your arms could cure a headache.

Studies show that couples that smoke during the time of conception have a higher chance of having a girl compared to couples that do not smoke.

The early occurrence of a fetus yawning is at eleven weeks after conception.

The length from your wrist to your elbow is the same as the length of your foot.

The smile is the most frequently used facial expression. A smile can use anywhere from a pair of 5 to 53 facial muscles.

Two million red blood cells die every second.

A Russian man who wore a beard during the time of Peter the Great had to pay a special tax.

Blinking helps to wash tears over our eyeballs. That keeps them clean and moist. Also, if something is about to hit our eye, we will blink automatically.

Einstein’s brain was of average size (1375 grams – 49oz).

Hair and fingernails are made from the same substance, keratin.

In ancient Egypt, doctors used jolts from the electric catfish to reduce the pain of arthritis.

Lack of sleep can affect your immune system and reduce your ability to fight infections.

On average, a hair strand's life span is five and a half years.

People over the age of fifty will start to lose their dislike for foods that taste bitter.

Teenage cosmetic surgeries nearly doubled in the USA between 1996 and 1998.

The eight most popular foods to cause food allergies are: milk, eggs, wheat, peanuts, soy, tree nuts, fish, and shellfish.

The length of a human esophagus is 25 centimeters.

The smoke that is produced by a fire kills more people than a burn does because of carbon monoxide and other dangerous gases.

Unless food is mixed with saliva you cannot taste it.

85% of the population can curl their tongue into a tube.

A newborn baby’s head accounts for one-quarter of its weight.

A popular superstition is that if you put a piece of bread in a baby's crib, it will keep away diseases.

About twenty-five percent of the population sneeze when they are exposed to light.

An elephant's brain is about six times as large as a human brain. In relation to body size, however, humans have the largest brain of all the animals (about 2% of body weight).

Babies' eyes do not produce tears until the baby is approximately six to eight weeks old.

Chances of a women getting breast cancer are increased by excessive use of alcohol.

During a typical human life span, the human heart will beat approximately 2.5 billion times.

Eating foods rich in vitamin E, beta-carotene, and vitamin C may help lower your risk of Alzheimer's disease.

Every person has a unique tongue print.

Flu shots only work about 70% of the time.

Gases that build up in your large intestine cause flatulence. It usually takes about 30 to 45 minutes for these gases to pass through your system.

Humans have the most complex brain of any animal on earth.

In 1967, the first successful heart transplant was performed in Cape Town, South Africa.

In a year, there are 60,000 trampoline injuries that occur in the U.S.

In the United States, poisoning is the fourth leading cause of death among children.

It is very common for babies in New Zealand to sleep on sheepskins. This is to help them gain weight faster, and retain their body heat.

King Henry I, who ruled in the England in the 12th century, standardised the yard as the distance from the thumb of his outstretched arm to his nose.

Men in their early twenties shave an average of four times a week.

Not all our taste buds are on our tongue; about 10% are on the palette and the cheeks.

On average redheads have 90,000 hairs. People with black hair have about 110,000 hairs.

One average, men spend 60 hours a year shaving.

Over 436,000 U.S. Troops were exposed to depleted uranium during the first Gulf war.

People have the tendency to chew the food on the side that they most often use their hand.

Research has indicated that a tie that is on too tight cam increase the risk of glaucoma in men.

Soldiers disease is a term for morphine addiction. The Civil War produced over 400,000 morphine addicts.

Studies indicate that weightlifters working out in blue gyms can handle heavier weights.

The average life span of a single red blood cell is 120 days.

The brain feels like a ripe avocado and looks pink because of the blood flowing through it.

The Dutch people are known to be the tallest people in Europe.

The first successful human sex change took place in 1950 when Danish doctor Christian Hamburger operated on New Yorker George Jorgensen, who became Christine Jorgensen.

The human head contains 22 bones. More on the head and brains

The kidneys filter over 400 gallons of blood each day.

The muscle that lets your eye blink is the fastest muscle in your body. It allows you to blink 5 times a second.

The right lung of a human is larger than the left one. This is because of the space and placement of the heart.

The smallest bone in the human body is the stapes bone which is located in the ear.

The width of your armspan stretched out is the length of your whole body.

There are approximately 100,000 miles of blood vessels in the human body.

Toxins in commonplace items such as carpeting and shower curtains may be contributing to memory loss over time?

Your blood takes a very long trip through your body. If you could stretch out all of a human's blood vessels, they would be about 60,000 miles long. That's enough to go around the world twice.

Your heart beats 101,000 times a day. During your lifetime it will beat about 3 billion times and pump about 400 million litres (800 million pints) of blood.

A person that is struck by lightning has a greater chance of developing motor neurons disease.

Asthma affects one in fifteen children under the age of eighteen.

Each year in America there are about 300,000 deaths that can be attributed to obesity.

From the age of thirty, humans gradually begin to shrink in size.

In a lifetime, the heart pumps about one million barrels of blood.

It takes your food seven seconds to get from your mouth to your stomach.

On average a hiccup lasts 5 minutes.

Overexposure to aluminum compounds—in foil, cookware, deodorants, antacids, toothpaste—can affect brain function

Studies indicate that epileptic patients that listen to Mozart's Piano Sonata can dramatically decrease their chance of a seizure.

The cornea is the only living tissue in the human body that does not contain any blood vessels.

The human liver performs over 500 functions.

The slowest growing finger nail is on the thumb nail and the fastest growing is the finger nail on the middle finger.

There are as many hairs per square inch on your body as a chimpanzee. You don't see all of them because most are too fine and light to be noticed.

A study indicates that smokers are likely to die on average six and a half years earlier than non-smokers.

Blood accounts for about 8% of a human's body weight.

Enamel is hardest substance in the human body.

15 Facts about human body

1. The stomach’s digestive acids are strong enough to dissolve zinc. Fortunately for us, the cells in the stomach lining renew so quickly that the acids don’t have time to dissolve it.

2. The lungs contain over 300,000 million capillaries (tiny blood vessels). If they were laid end to end, they would stretch 2400km (1500 miles).

3. A mans testicles manufacture 10 million new sperm cells each day – enough that he could repopulate the entire planet in only 6 months!

4. Human bone is as strong as granite in supporting weight. A block of bone the size of a matchbox can support 9 tonnes – that is four times as much as concrete can support.

5. Each finger and toenail takes six months to grow from base to tip.

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Facts 6 – 10

6. The largest organ in the body is the skin. In an adult man it covers about 1.9m2 (20sq ft). The skin constantly flakes away – in a lifetime each person sheds around 18kg (40 lb) of skin.

7. When you sleep, you grow by about 8mm (0.3in). The next day you shrink back to your former height. The reason is that your cartilage discs are squeezed like sponges by the force of gravity when you stand or sit.

8. The average person in the West eats 50 tonnes of food and drinks 50,000 liters (11,000 gallons) of liquid during his life.

9. Each kidney contains 1 million individual filters. They filter an average of around 1.3 liters (2.2 pints) of blood per minute, and expel up to 1.4 liters (2.5 pints) a day of urine.

10. The focusing muscles of the eyes move around 100,000 times a day. To give your leg muscles the same workout, you would need to walk 80km (50 miles) every day.

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Facts 11 – 15

11. In 30 minutes, the average body gives off enough heat (combined) to bring a half gallon of water to boil.

12. A single human blood cell takes only 60 seconds to make a complete circuit of the body.

13. A foreskin, the size of a postage stamp, from circumcised babies take only 21 days to grow skin that can cover three (3) basketball courts. Amazing isn’t it. Thanks to science. The laboratory-grown skin is used in treating burn patients.

14. The eyes receive approximately 90 percent of all our information, making us basically visual creatures.

15. The female ovaries contain nearly half-a-million egg cells, yet only 400 or so will ever get the opportunity to create a new life.