It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open. The flea can jump 350 times its body length. It's like a human jumping the length of a football field. Canada lays claim to more water than any other nation. Almost the entire Cook Islands are covered by forest. Contrary to the popular rhyme, the rain falls mainly on Guinea. The average criminal sentence length is 137 years in Colombia. Around 1 in 3 persons in Australia is a victim of crime. Saudi diplomats have 367 outstanding parking fines in Britain. Americans top the world in the category of crimes. They also have the greatest number of burglaries, car thefts, rapes and assaults. 0.7% of Americans are currently in prison. India’s criminal courts acquitted over a million defendants in 1999, more than the next 48 surveyed countries combined. 715 of every 100,000 people in America are imprisoned, probably because 7 times more people are prosecuted there than in second-place Turkey. Ancient Egyptians shaved off their eyebrows to mourn the deaths of their cats. A bowling pin need only tilt 7.5 degrees in order to fall down. The Japanese word "Arigato" meaning thank you is derived from the Portugese word "Obrigado". Portugal once had a thriving trade with Japan. The bubbles in Guinness Beer sink to the bottom rather than float to the top like all other beers. No one knows why. Jupiter's core is in fact made of a non-metal, but due to the immense pressure inside Jupiter the core has become a metal. This metal is hydrogen. The Main Library at Indiana University sinks over an inch every year because when it was built, engineers failed to take into account the weight of all the books that would occupy the building. A fullgrown bear can run as fast as a horse. A beard grows an average of 140 mm a year. A hair is 70% easier to cut when soaked in warm water for two minutes. Women's hair is about half the diameter of men's hair. During an average lifetime, a man will spend 3,350 hours removing 8.4 meters of stubble. 4.5 million people have their health "adversely affected" by air pollutants each year. Every male over the 18 is considered part of the Arizona Militia according to state constitution. The word "karate" means "empty hand." A hamlet is a village without a church and a town is not a city until it has a cathedral. 49.6% of US residents live in Eastern time zone, 29.3% live in the Central time zone, 5.3% live in the Mountain time zone, 15.0% live in the Pacific time zone and 0.8% live in any other time zone. Texas is also the only state that is allowed to fly its state flag at the same height as the U.S. flag. Tommy Lee Jones and Al Gore were freshman roommates at Harvard. A lion's roar can be heard from five miles away. The reason firehouses have circular stairways is from the days of yore when the engines were pulled by horses. The horses were stabled on the ground floor and figured out how to walk up straight staircases. The launching mechanism of a carrier ship that helps planes to take off, could throw a pickup truck over a mile. If you told someone that they were one in a million, you'd be saying there were about 1,800 of them in China. A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why. The average sixty minute audio cassette tape has 562.5 feet of tape in it, nearly two football fields long. The ashes of the average cremated person weigh nine pounds. The "save" icon on Microsoft Word shows a floppy disk, with the shutter on backwards. Assuming Rudolph was in front, there are 40,320 ways to arrange the other eight reindeer. The fingerprints of koala bears are virtually indistinguishable from those of humans, so much so that they could be confused at a crime scene. Robert E. Lee, of the Confederate Army, remains the only person, to date, to have graduated from the West Point military academy without a single demerit. Croatia was the first country to recognize the United States in 1776. There are only 14 blimps in the world, and 10 of them are in the U.S. Pinocchio is Italian for "pine eyes." If you stretch a standard Slinky out flat it measures 87 feet long. Most Americans' car horns beep in the key of F. The telephone dial tone is also in the key of F. Barbie's measurements if she were life size: 39-23-33. The Chinese ideogram for "trouble" depicts two women living under one roof. And the Chinese words for crisis and opportunity are the same. Ralph Lauren's original name was Ralph Lifshitz. Lizzie Borden was acquitted. Isaac Asimov is the only author to have a book in every Dewey-decimal category. Approximately sixty circus performers have been shot from cannons. At last report, thirty-one of these have been killed. The Boeing 767 aircraft is a collection of 3.1 million parts from 800 different suppliers around the world: fuselage parts from Japan, center wing section from Southern California, flaps from Italy. On the new hundred dollar bill the time on the clock tower of Independence Hall is 4:10. Parker Brothers prints about 50 billion dollars worth of Monopoly money in one year. Calvin and Hobbes: Hobbes originally had pads on his hands and feet but Bill Waterson (the creator) found them too distracting and removed them. It took Leo Tolstoy six years to write "War & Peace". Charlie Brown's father was a barber. In the name of art, Chris Burden arranged to be shot by a friend while another person photographed the event. He sold the series of pictures to an art dealer. He made $1750 on the deal, but his hospital bill was $84,000. In Britain’s House of Commons, the government and opposition sides of the House are separated by two red lines. The distance between the lines is two swords?lengths, a reminder of just how seriously the Brits used to take their politics. The surface area of an average-sized brick is 79 cm squared. In the kingdom of Bhutan, all citizens officially become a year older on New Year's Day. The diameter of the wire in a standard paper clip is 1 millimeter - or about 0.04 inch. Public typists work at typewriters charging about 14 cents per page. On a good day, a public typist earns about $3.50. On average, there are 333 squares of toilet paper on a roll. The numbers on opposite sides of a die always add up to 7. If you were born in Los Alamos, New Mexico during the Manhattan project (where they made the atomic bomb), your birth place is listed as a post office box in Albuquerque. The St. Louis Gateway Arch had a projected death toll while it was being built. No one died. The Hoover Dam was built to last 2,000 years. The concrete in it will not even be fully cured for another 500 years. The Chinese national anthem is called "the march of volunteers." "The Tale of Genji", a Japanese work from the early eleventh century, is considered by many scholars to be the world's first full novel. The novel was written by a woman: Murasaki Shikibu, or Lady Murasaki. The glue on Israeli postage stamps is certified kosher. In the movie "Toy Story", the carpet designs in Sid's hallway is the same as the carpet designs in "The Shining." In 1970, "MCI" stood for "Microwave Communications, Inc." No longer used as an acronym, it now stands alone. The short-term memory capacity for most people is between five and nine items or digits. This is one reason that phone numbers were kept to seven digits for so long. Dennis the Menace's favorite drink is Root beer. The hundred billionth crayon made by Crayola was Periwinkle Blue. Despite the fact that 77 percent of Americans go to the grocery store with a list, it's estimated that half of everything bought there is bought on impulse. Supermarkets report very strong sales of almost anything they stock at the check-out line. Golf was banned in England in 1457 because it was considered a distraction from the serious pursuit of archery. When the Hoovers did not want to be overheard by White House guests, they spoke to each other in Chinese. At Disneyland they have hundreds of wild domesticated cats running around the park. They never come out during the day because there's too many people, but the reason they're there is to catch the mice. Theaters in Glendale, California can show horror films only on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. You can't plow a cotton field with an elephant in North Carolina. In Lehigh, Nebraska it's against the law to sell donut holes. Under the law of Mississippi, there’s no such thing as a female Peeping Tom. Anti-modem laws restrict Internet access in the country of Burma. Illegal possession of a modem can lead to a prison term. Lawn darts are illegal in Canada. In Idaho a citizen is forbidden by law to give another citizen a box of candy that weighs more than 50 pounds. Every citizen of Kentucky is required by law to take a bath at least once a year. A Venetian law decrees that all gondolas must be painted black. The only exceptions are gondolas belonging to high public officials. In the state of Queensland, Australia, it is still constitutional law that all pubs (hotel/bar) must have a railing outside for patrons to tie up their horse. According to law, no store is allowed to sell a toothbrush on the Sabbath in Providence, Rhode Island. Yet these same stores are allowed to sell toothpaste and mouthwash on Sundays. Before the enactment of the 1978 law that made it mandatory for dog owners in New York City to clean up after their pets, approximately 40 million pounds of dog excrement were deposited on the streets every year. Chewing gum is outlawed in Singapore because it is a means of "tainting an environment free of dirt." For hundreds of years, the Chinese zealously guarded the secret of sericulture; imperial law decreed death by torture to those who disclosed how to make silk. An old law in Bellingham, Washington, made it illegal for a woman to take more than 3 steps backwards while dancing. By law, information collected in a U.S. census must remain confidential for 72 years. Want your kids to stay in school? Send them to Norway. English speaking kids are the biggest novel readers but are the least enthusiastic comics readers. Japanese and South Korean kids are the best at science and maths. The top 10 countries for electricity generation using a nuclear energy source are all in Europe. Three quarters of Japanese kids read comics. American adults have been educated for the longest time. There are 22 countries where more than half the population is illiterate. Fifteen of them are in Africa. The women of Iceland earn two-thirds of their nation's university degrees. Candy made from pieces of barrel cactus was outlawed in the U.S. in 1952 to protect the species. In Breton, Alabama, there is a law on the town's books against riding down the street in a motorboat. Connecticut and Rhode Island never ratified the 18th Amendment: Prohibition. In most American states, a wedding ring is exempt by law from inclusion among the assets in a bankruptcy estate. This means that a wedding ring cannot be seized by creditors, no matter how much the bankrupt person owes. In New York State, it is still illegal to shoot a rabbit from a moving trolley car. Vermont, Alaska, Hawaii, and Maine are the four states in the U.S. that do not allow billboards. Wetaskiwin, Alberta from 1917: "It's against the law to tie a male horse next to a female horse on Main Street." Women were banned by royal decree from using hotel swimming pools in Jidda, Saudi Arabia, in 1979. In Riverside, California, there is an old law on the city's books which makes it illegal to kiss unless both people wipe their lips with rose water. In Saudi Arabia, a woman reportedly may divorce her husband if he does not keep her supplied with coffee. Muppets creator Jim Henson first created Kermit in 1955 - as a lizard. He was made from Henson's mother's coat and two halves of a Ping-Pong ball (no flipper feet or eleven-point collar) The person who performs the Muppets - Miss Piggy, Fozzie, Animal, and Grover is Frank Oz. Oz is also the voice of Star Wars Yoda. By the way, his real name is Frank Oznowicz. The 1997 Jack Nicholson film - "As Good As It Gets", is known in China as "Mr. Cat Poop". Of the six men who made up the Three Stooges, three of them were real brothers (Moe, Curly and Shemp.) The writers of The Simpsons have never revealed what state Springfield is in. A theater manager in Seoul, Korea felt that The Sound of Music was too long, so he shortened it by cutting out all the songs. Bruce was the nickname of the mechanical shark used in the "Jaws" movies. Donald Duck comics were banned from Finland because he doesn't wear pants. A two hour motion picture uses 10,800 feet of film. Not including the previews and commercials. For many years, the globe on the NBC Nightly News spun in the wrong direction. On January 2, 1984, NBC finally set the world spinning back in the proper direction. In the Mario Brothers movie, the Princess' first name is Daisy, but in Mario 64, the game, her first name is Peach. Before that, it's Princess Toadstool. "60 Minutes" is the only show on CBS that doesn’t have a theme song. You can be imprisoned for not voting in Fiji, Chile and Egypt - at least in theory. Costa Rica leads in per capita exports of bananas, cassava, melons, and pineapples, to the United States. They’re also first in pesticide use. You're 66 times more likely to be prosecuted in the USA as in France Nearly 1% of Montserrations are police. Former enemies, the Americans and Russians now have a great deal in common - they both lead the world in locking people up. Per capita, South Africa has the most assaults, rapes, and murders with firearms. Two-thirds of the world's executions occur in China. America puts many more of its citizens in prison than any other nation. Two-thirds of the world's kidnappings occur in Colombia. Venezuela is one of the happiest and most murderous places in the world. Russia has almost twice the number of judges and magistrates as compared to US, but US has 8 times more crimes committed than Russia. There are more than 2 jails for every 1000 men in Maldives. More than 20% of the votes in the last elections in Argentina were invalid. Women in Belgium, where the country’s first female parliamentarian was appointed in 1921, held 55 percent of ministerial level positions in 2000. Most people live in poverty in most African countries. Top per capita importing and exporting nations tend to be a little small. The top 8 most developed countries all speak Germanic languages. Every such country is in the top 20. 72% of people in Mali earn less than $1 per day. 41% world's poor people live in India. The ten most generous countries are all in Europe. Americans are 15% more innovative than the Japanese. But the Japanese have 3.5 times more patents. United we stand? The United Kingdom and United States are both in the top ten for GDP and child poverty. Half of Indonesia's primary school teachers are under 30 years of age. Are you a teacher? Head to Switzerland. Salaries there start at $33,000 US. Teachers make up 7.8 percent of Iceland’s labor force and they only have to teach 38 weeks per year. Central European men don’t teach. In Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia, over 75 percent of lower secondary teachers are female. Japan has 53 working nuclear reactors and is planning to build another 12. The total area of Australia’s coral reefs is greater than the total area of 130 countries, including Slovakia, the Dominican Republic, Kuwait, Singapore, and Rwanda. America is first in McDonald’s restaurants per million people and mortality due to obesity, with more deaths than Mexico, Germany, Spain, Austria and Canada combined. Belgium is the only country in the world where women dominate the ministry. Got a parking ticket in Finland? Better just pay up - it is the least corrupt nation in the world. Members of the armed forces and the police cannot vote in the Dominican Republic. Nauru, Tokelau and Western Sahara are the only three countries without official capital cities. Most Zambians don't live to see their 40th birthday. On the probability of not reaching 40 graph, the top 34 countries are all African. Guinea has the wettest capital on Earth with 3.7 metres of rain a year. Clipperton Island wins our prize for the most unusual looking country. Only two countries in the world are doubly landlocked: Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan. Sick of crowds? Try Greenland where there's 38 sq km per person. If you thought Antarctica was inhospitable, think again - its land area is only 98% ice. Reassuringly, the other 2% is categorised as "barren rock". The Mall in Washington, D.C. is 1.4 times larger than Vatican City. The four largest nations are Russia, China, USA, and Canada. Brazil takes up 47.8% of South America. Hungarians die of cancer much, much more often than Finns. One in three adults aged 15-49 are infected with HIV/AIDS in Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Swaziland. On average, women in New Zealand do not give birth until they are 30 years old. Mexican women spend 15.3% of their life in ill health. 22% of American women aged 20 gave birth while in their teens. In Switzerland and Japan, only 2% did so. Nine out of ten women in Ethiopia give birth at home. US tops the world in plastic surgery procedures. Next comes Mexico. Patients stay in hospital for an average of almost 10 days in Switzerland, which has the most hospital beds per 1000 people. Libya is the only country with a single-coloured flag. Nepal’s flag isn’t square or rectangular. It’s a double triangle. Libya’s full name is the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. In 2002, every 1000 Swedes made a bus. Japan leads the world in car production, almost 50% more than Germany and the USA. The top six countries for percentage of houses with five rooms or more are all English-speaking. Norwegians drink 10.7 kilograms of coffee per person annually. They also lead the globe in anxiety disorders. 62% of Bulgarians describe themselves as either "not very" or "not at all" happy. More than a third of the time, Icelanders don't show up for work. Perhaps that's why they're the world's happiest nation. The fourteen unhappiest countries are all in Eastern Europe. 22% of New Zealanders have used cannabis. Australians are the most likely to join charities, educational organizations, environmental groups, professional organizations, sports groups and unions. But only three percent join political parties. Americans consume the sixth-most spirits, the eighth-most beer and the 18th-most wine. They’re also likely to view heavy drinkers as undesirable neighbors! Australians lead the world in hours worked and membership in many voluntary organizations. How do they find the energy? The five countries with the highest coffee consumption are also the five countries which trust people the most and they are all in Europe. The average person in the United Kingdom drinks as much tea as 23 Italians. Andorra has no unemployment, which is just as well because they have no broadcast TV channels either. China has the most workers, so it's a good thing they've also got the most TV's. Indians go out to the movies 3 billion times a year. The USA has more personal computers than the next 7 countries combined. Americans and Icelanders go to the pictures on average 5 times a year, while Japanese go only once. The United States has the most money, power, airports, cell phones, radios and ISP's. Malaysia has the lowest rate of cinema attendance in the world. A three-minute local phone call in Ecuador costs 60 U.S. cents, 60 times as much as in Ukraine, Macedonia, Saudi Arabia, Nepal, or Uzbekistan. The United States spends more money on its military than the next 12 nations combined. Swedes and Norweigians rank top 5 for both providing aid and exporting weapons. If someone you know died from falling out of a tree, you’re probably Brazilian. Mental and behavioural disorders due tocannabinoids, cocaine, hallucinogens, opiods, sedatives and hypnotics, and volatile solvents killed 1,789 people. Those due to alcohol killed 32,622. Andorrans live the longest, four years longer than in neighbouring France and Spain. China's labor force stands at 706 million people, almost three times that of Europe and twice that of North and South America combined. Luxembourgers are the world's richest people - and also the most generous. If you like kids, then Uganda might be the place for you. Half the population is under 15! Senior gentlemen might consider a trip to Russia, where there's two over 65 women for every man. Single guys should check out The Virgin Islands. Apart from sounding good, it has five women to every four men! The United States consumes more energy than India, the Middle East, South America, Africa, South East Asia and Oceania combined - which means more than 3.1 billion people. South America is unusual in that it is both urbanized and poor. Many Americans live alone - America leads the world in one person households. Kazakhstan is the world's largest landlocked country. Looking for geniuses? Head straight to Iceland. There are more than 3.5 Nobel Prize Winners for every million Icelanders. Sri Lanka has lowest divorce rate in the world - and the highest rate of female suicide. Australians have a huge 380,000 sq m of land per person - and yet 91% live in urban areas. Nearly a quarter of people in Monaco are over 65. Americans have the world's highest marriage rates, divorce rates, teenage pregnancies and one person households. Go figure. There are three persons living per room in Pakistan. Married life must be complicated! Elderly Dutch and Swedish are the most likely to live in old-age homes. Elderly Japanese are the most likely to live with their children. At least 9 out 10 Nigerians attend church regularly. Only 4 out of 10 Americans claim to do so. Around the world, on average, the rich 30% of the people contribute more than 60% of all tax collected. More than 50% of the tax collected is personal income tax in Denmark, whereas it is less than 15% in Netherlands. Employees contribute less than 4% of social security in Denmark. It is around 10% in the USA and a whopping 20% in Netherlands. It is better to employ someone in Denmark - you contribute less than 1% of his social security. You might have to pay upto 25% in France. Living in developed countries has its drawbacks. People in Germany, Belgium, Hungary and Sweden have to pay up almost half their salaries to taxes. South Korea is the heliport capital of the world. In Australia, there's plenty of open road. Which is just as well, because you wouldn't want to park your car. More than 8.5 million planes take off from airports in the USA every year. That is almost half the number worldwide. More than a third of all the airports in the world are in the USA. One out of every two persons in Germany and Italy owns a car. The Pitcairn Islands have the world’s shortest highway system, with only 6.4 kilometers of roads. They also have the fourth-fewest main phone lines. If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days, you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee. Banging your head against a wall uses 150 calories an hour. The strongest muscle in the body is the tongue. Right-handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left-handed people do. The ant can lift 50 times its own weight, can pull 30 times itsown weight and always falls over on its right side when intoxicated. Polar bears are left handed. The flea can jump 350 times its body length. It's like a human jumping the length of a football field. A cockroach will live nine days without it's head, before it starves to death. Butterflies taste with their feet. An ostrich's eye is bigger than it's brain. Starfish don't have brains. The longest one-syllable word in the English language is "screeched." "Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt". Almonds are members of the peach family. The symbol on the "pound" key (#) is called an octothorpe. The dot over the letter "i" is called a tittle. Ingrown toenails are hereditary. The word "set" has more definitions than any other word in the English language. "Underground" is the only word in the English language that begins and ends with the letters "und." The longest word in the English language, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. The only other word with the same amount of letters is its plural: pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosesl. The longest place-name still in use is Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturi- pukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwe-nuakit natahu, a New Zealand hill. Los Angeles's full name is "El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reinade los Angeles de Porciuncula" and can be abbreviated to 3.63% of its size, L.A. An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain. Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur. Donald Duck's middle name is Fauntleroy. The muzzle of a lion is like a fingerprint - no two lions have the same pattern of whiskers. A pregnant goldfish is called a twit. There is a seven-letter word in the English language that contains ten words without rearranging any of its letters, "therein": the, there, he, in, rein, her, here, ere, therein, herein. Cranberries are sorted for ripeness by bouncing them; a fully ripened cranberry can be dribbled like a basketball. The letters KGB stand for Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti. "Stewardesses" is the longest English word that is typed with only the left hand. The only 15 letter word that can be spelled without repeating a letter is uncopyrightable. Facetious and abstemious contain all the vowels in the correct order, as does arsenious, meaning "containing arsenic." Emus and kangaroos cannot walk backwards, and are on the Australian seal for that reason. Cats have over one hundred vocal sounds, while dogs only have about ten. The word "Checkmate" in chess comes from the Persian phrase "Shah Mat," which means "the king is dead." The reason firehouses have circular stairways is from the days of yore when the engines were pulled by horses. The horses were stabled on the ground floor and figured out how to walk up straight staircases. While sitting at your desk make clockwise circles with your right foot. While doing this, draw the number "6" in the air with your right hand. Your foot will change direction. Grapefruit scent will make middle aged women appear six years younger to men. The perception is not reciprocal and the grapefruit scent on men has no effect on women's perception. Women blink twice as many times as men do. Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair. We are about 1 cm taller in the morning than in the evening. Layers of cartilage in the joints gets compressed during the day. There are approx. 550 hairs in the eyebrow. The strongest muscle in the human body is the tongue. The life span of a taste bud is 10 days. The world's youngest parents were 8 and 9 and lived in China in 1910. The largest known kidney stone weighed 1.36 kilograms. Most dust particles in your house are made from dead skin. Kidney stones come in any color - from yellow to brown. Babies are born without kneecaps. They appear when the child is 2-6 years of age. The average human produces 10,000 gallons of saliva in a lifetime. If you ate too many carrots you would turn orange. The force of 1 billion people jumping at the same time is equal to 500 tons of TNT. A baby is born every seven seconds. You can tell if a skunk is about if you smell only 0.000000000000071 ounce of its spray. You breathe about 10 million times a year. The colder the room you sleep in, the better the chances are that you'll have a bad dream. The foot is the most common body part bitten by insects. The most common time for a wake up call is 7 a.m. The typical person goes to the bathroom 6 times a day. The fastest growing nail is on the middle finger. The most sensitive finger on the human hand is the index finger. The human body weighs 40 times more than the brain. After eating too much, your hearing is less sharp. A person swallows approx. 295 times while eating dinner. Your urine will turn bright yellow if you eat too much asparagus. There are more people alive today than have ever died. The human body is better suited to two four-hour sleep cycles than one eight-hour one. A man's beard contains between 7000 and 15,000 hairs. 4 million children die each year from inhaling smoke from indoor cooking fires that burn wood and Dung 4 million people die annually from diarrhea infections, caused by poor sanitary conditions The hardest bone in the human body is the jawbone. Dueling is legal in Paraguay as long as both parties are registered blood donors. A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.