Earthquake Rose
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 7, 2019
On February 28, 2001, an earthquake of magnitude 6.8 rocked the US state of Washington cracking sidewalks, toppling buildings, and causing s...
Lunatic Express: The Railway That Gave Birth to Kenya
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 5, 2019
More than a hundred years ago, before Europeans had set foot on what is now Kenya, a tribal prophet named Kimnyole spoke of a vicious “iron...
The Roadside Shrines of Greece
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 4, 2019
Roadside shrines erected in memory of those who lost their lives in road accidents are a common sight across Greece. They are found next to ...
How The Soviet Helped Vulcan, An American Town, Get a Bridge
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 2, 2019
In south West Virginia, near the border with Kentucky, the United States, is a small unincorporated community named Vulcan. Vulcan was onc...
The Last Gas Streetlights
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 1, 2019
For much of human history, people have lived in the dark. The sun shines for only half the day, or less—lesser still during winter. So ever...
Bone Records: Soviet-Era Bootlegged Music on X-Rays
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 28, 2019
During the Cold War, Soviet Russia was a very restrictive place. The media was heavily censored, foreign radio and television station waves...
Cat Ladders of Bern
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 28, 2019
Cats love climbing, and they certainly need no human help to navigate precarious-looking structures. But in the Swiss city of Bern, cat owne...
Buchette Del Vino: The Wine Windows of Florence
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 27, 2019
A unique architectural curiosity found only in the Italian city of Florence are tiny decorated openings on the outside walls of many sumptuo...
Qinngua Valley, Greenland’s Only Forest
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 25, 2019
Greenland is actually quite white and blue, due to all the glaciers that cover the world’s largest island like frosting on a cake. But near ...
Sergei Krikalev: The Man Who Went Up a Soviet And Came Down a Russian
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 25, 2019
Late in the spring of 1991, Soviet cosmonauts Sergei Krikalev and Anatoli Artsebarski, along with Britain's first astronaut, Helen Shar...
What a 7-Year-Old Russian Boy Doodled in The 13th Century
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 22, 2019
Fifty years ago, a trove of manuscripts written on birch bark was discovered in the Russian city of Novgorod, situated some 200 kilometers...
Mauritania’s Iron Ore Train
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 21, 2019
At one million square kilometers, Mauritania is not a small country, but a very small percentage of it is habitable. The rest is covered by...
Witch Windows of Vermont
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 19, 2019
Photo credit: Larry Lamsa/Flickr An architectural oddity found only in the US state of Vermont is the so-called “witch window”. These are ...
Water Powered Funiculars
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 19, 2019
Funiculars are an odd mode of transport, but at the same time, they are one of the most energy-efficient one. The system consist of two coun...
The Bolivian Clock That Runs Backwards
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 18, 2019
The building that houses Bolivia’s legislative assembly in Plaza Murillo, in central La Paz, features a clock above the entrance that looks ...
European Trees With The Most Interesting Stories
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 18, 2019
The Environmental Partnership Association (EPA) is seeking votes from the public to help them select the winner of the European Tree of the...
Cemetery Guns And Coffin Torpedoes
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 16, 2019
This unusual-looking gun, now exhibited at the Museum of Mourning Art in Arlington Cemetery, once kept body snatchers away from cemetery gr...
Yasukuni Shrine, Where War Criminals Are Revered
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 15, 2019
The Imperial Shrine of Yasukuni, in Chiyoda, Tokyo, is a beautiful spiritual place for remembering those who died in service for Japan. As m...
Shin's Tricycle
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 13, 2019
Behind a glass case at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum is a battered and rusted tricycle. The seat is missing, and so are the pedals an...
When Little Boys Wore Dresses
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 12, 2019
Until about a century ago, in the western world, you couldn’t tell whether a young child was a girl or a boy from the way he or she dressed....
