Issuu

tech THE James webb telescope

environment electric cars: tesla vs the competition

Culture britpop, the rise and fall of an era Summer 2022

Below The Line ISSUE 14

CHANGING PERSPECTIVES

CULTURE

britpop, the rise and fall of an era Henry Cook explores the reasons Britpop became so popular in the 90s and how it created a legacy so strong it lives on today.

The era of 90s Britpop was one of creation, a lot of catchy guitar riffs and ﬁerce rivalries. Those rivalries created drama and that drama fuelled heated competition, not all in good humour. You could well have heard of the ‘Big 4’, made up of the rock bands Pulp, Suede, Blur, and Oasis. It was these bands that created a name for Britpop, and challenged popular music genres at the time, such as grunge. This rise of American grunge, including bands like Nirvana, created a strong

patriotic reaction for many Brits, as they wished to be back in the spotlight of the music scene. And so it began - Britpop swept through the country rapidly, preaching music, fashion and an overall lifestyle. Britpop itself began in the 90s - however British Pop/Rock had been around for years, including bands like Pink Floyd and The Beatles. We Brits can’t seem to keep our patriotic ways out of things, and it was then in the 90s the name Britpop emerged.

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This term deﬁned many British bands, whether they liked it or not; having mixed reactions. Many people embraced it and thought it was a great way to revitalise the British music scene, whereas others thought it stripped away individuality. Either way, the Britpop name went down in history along with the bands associated with it, especially a certain duo… Blur vs Oasis. A headline that was everywhere in 1995. It was dubbed ‘The Battle of Britpop’.

CULTURE The bands had initially praised each other but over the course of the year antagonisms between the two increased. Spurred by the media, the rivalry grew, and people began to take sides with the two bands in a battle between north and south; Oasis representing the north of England, Blur the south. It all began on 14th August 1995, with the pending release of Blur’s single Country House and Oasis’s Roll with It on the same day. The battle pitted the two bands against each other, with the conﬂict as much about British class and regional divisions as it was about music. Throughout the decade tension rose, and both bands loved to toy with and anger their rival: for example Blur performed on Top of the Pops with the band’s bassist Alex James wearing an ‘Oasis’ t-shirt. What goes up, must come down, and the raging rivalry, the media focus, could not last forever. Oasis’s third album Be Here Now in 1997 was highly anticipated.

Despite initially attracting positive reviews and selling strongly, the record was soon subjected to strong criticism from music critics, record-buyers and even Noel Gallagher himself for its overproduced and bloated sound. Blur’s fifth album Blur, aiming to distance the band from the Britpop label, was influenced by American music culture such as lo-fi. Britpop’s spirit was slowly fading, and lesser-known British bands such as The Verve and Radiohead were coming into the spotlight, as both Blur and Oasis soon split up.

The Britpop hype was lost - or was it? Its guitar-heavy sound, catchy, rock style inﬂuenced many bands to come. Going into the 21st century, a wave of garage rock style music including The Strokes and The Libertines hit the UK, sounding strangely similar to that of Britpop. This has continued and the Britpop style carries on shaping the music we hear today. Though the name may have died, the legacy lives on, guitars still blaring.

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

Technology

The james webb telescope Bing Brown looks at the risks and potential beneﬁts of the James Webb telescope, and how it will provide new perspectives on our universe.

The James Webb telescope has a huge mirror compared to other telescopes. The Gaia telescope’s mirror was 1.4 metres wide, the Hubble telescope’s mirror was a staggering 2.4 metres wide, but the James Webb telescope’s is 6.5 metres and coated in GOLD! With this new-found behemoth of a mirror, scientists say that it might be possible to see how the Big Bang played out and how everything was created. The theory is, that the infra-red light of the farthest and earliest stars take lots of time to reach us, so the bigger the mirror the more infra-red light you can see and

by using even the tiniest speck of infra-red light they can locate that and look straight into the heart of the universe. Because the light takes time to reach the telescope, you can practically see back in time. You may be wondering how this will beneﬁt us bearing in mind that it cost £7 billion (!) to make, but this project could help scientists discover the mysteries of dark matter. Dark matter is said to make up 27% of the known universe and where some black holes lurk. Black holes were discovered in 1967 but the ﬁrst physical sighting of one was in 1971.

The James Webb telescope is a very risky project because the goliath of a mirror was so big it had to be unfolded in space and unfurling 6.5 metres of gold in space is no easy task. The fact is if the unfurling process goes wrong there’s no way to ﬁx it because it would be hundreds of thousands of miles away and it would be one of the most expensive failures and disappointments in recent and past history. The James Webb telescope will surely give us new information to the beginning of time and space themselves and it will surely give us a new perspective.

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Technology

Concorde - success or failure? Anthony Skelly explores whether the revolutionary ‘Concorde’ was a feat of engineering or the implausible dream of two countries. Studies into the feasibility of building a supersonic aircraft commenced in 1954 and France and the UK signed a treaty on 29 November 1962 to design and build the aircraft together. The name for the project came from the treaty between countries, albeit with different spellings (which later lead to arguments), Concorde or Concord - both words meaning agreement, harmony, or union. The development of the aircraft did not go smoothly as it was a huge undertaking that had never been done before and so overran with the budget ballooning to an enormous £70 million (£1.39 billion in 2021). When the aircraft were sold to the flagship carriers of the two countries, Air France and British Airways respectively, and scheduled flights began on 21 January 1976, journey times on trans-Atlantic flights were cut in half. However, there was a

noticeable lack of passengers on the new aircraft which meant the airlines would need to cover their development costs and turn a profit, and because of the high development and the subsequent purchase price, the airlines had pushed up ticket prices to an eye-watering extent, leaving businessmen and the wealthy as the only people that could afford to buy tickets. However, there were not many of this class of passenger either, because of the relative lack of luxuries in the aircraft compared to cheaper options such as private business jets. Therefore, the two airlines could not make a profit and so operated the aircraft with large losses. The problems with the economics of supersonic flight were aggravated by the unfortunate product of accelerating to supersonic speeds - the sonic boom produced when an object

breaks the sound barrier. They are so loud that countries very quickly started banning aircraft from ﬂying at supersonic speeds over their airspace to prevent noise disruption to residents, greatly limiting the routes on which the aircraft could be used to their full advantage and forcing the airlines to suffer further losses. As a result of these two economic factors, all the other airlines that had placed orders for Concordes cancelled them and so British Airways and Air France were the only carriers that operated the Concorde throughout its entire career. The Concorde was eventually retired on 24 October 2003 due to a downturn in passenger numbers after the Air France Flight 4590 crash on 25 July 2000, the 911 attacks, and the end of maintenance support from Airbus who supplied their replacement parts, all of which made the project no longer economically feasible. It is unlikely that we will see any planes ﬂying at supersonic speeds in the near future, but you can always pay a visit to a select few number of museums in Europe and the USA to catch a glimpse of the revolutionary and iconic aircraft.

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

environment

electric cars: tesla vs the competition Tesla is currently leading the competition for producing the electric car with the greatest range. But Elon Musk’s innovative company is no longer the undisputed leader on all fronts, as Anthony Skelly explores. Whether you love or hate them, electric cars have advantages and disadvantages. For example, they are cheaper to run than petrol or diesel. The average family car needs £100 to ﬁll its fuel tank. However, to fully charge up Tesla’s new Model S battery is about £10. Obviously, the car, which new costs at £73,000, costs a lot more to purchase than the £37,000 for an average new UK saloon car. But the argument goes that the £46,000 difference in outlay can be quickly paid off over the years you own it, through reduced fuel costs. In addition, the argument in favour of electric cars can be found in maintenance costs. Electric cars have almost no moving parts to fail and therefore need replacing. However, there are some disadvantages of electric cars, most noticeably – as you’ve just read - the eye-watering initial price. The new Model S

with all the special trimmings will not give you much change from £100,000 which is a steep price and unjustiﬁable for most average car purchasers. Adding to this high price, you will need to fork out money for a fast charger to be installed at your

DID YOU KNOW? We like to think of electric cars as a new concept, but this is a common misconception. The ﬁrst-ever electric car was designed in 1884 by the English inventor Thomas Parker, responsible for many other innovations across the UK.

home so that your car does not take 24 hours to fully charge on your diveway. That is, if you even have a driveway or private space in which to charge it. Many newer homes and ﬂats these days do not come with garages or even drives in which you can park and run the cable to your car. And this is to say nothing of the millions of terrace homes in our major cities and towns where parking on the street is the only option, and where local government councils haven’t even begun to plan for the infrastructure needed for mass street-charging.

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environment

Range is also an issue. If you want fossil-fuel style range, you may have to do some careful thinking before you buy. Range refers to how far an electric car will go on a single full charge. Currently, a Tesla is your best option in terms of range, with their new Model S boasting 400 miles or so of range, which is in the same broad ballpark as most fossil fuel cars. Other electric car manufacturers are getting there, but we buyers can’t yet rely on cars from the more established companies for the range provided by Tesla. They tend to be around the 200-ish mile mark; plenty for short day trips such as a local commute, but not if you need to regularly travel real distance.

as Mercedes and BMW. A big issue with Tesla cars today is ‘panel gaps.’ These are spaces between the different panels that make up the outer part of your car. Small panel gaps are expected as your car is not made of one continuous part of metal; however clear gaps are a problem, allowing the ingress of water, dirt and air. Until the majority of companies compete in this space and

push Tesla’s high prices down, I personally do not think that electric cars are a viable option yet for us - unless you can get one as a work car. Then you would get the beneﬁts of cheaper maintenance and refuelling, without the burden of the price and, given the state of the on-going climate emergency, it’s a car and infrastructure price we all have to hope comes down fast, and for all.

There is much popular criticism of Tesla’s build quality. One nameless member of staff who owned one asserted to me that Tesla does not have the high build standard that we have come to expect from more wellestablished companies such

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

literature

Third Form stories - superstition Boxes by Chloe Dunne I had never been up here before. It was like a whole other planet that had never been exposed to the human eye. It was cold. The room had a musty smell coming from its depths; there was a subtle draft brushing my ankles as if there was some other presence in the room. It was as if the spiders had made the room their own, dangling from corner to corner, ready to pounce at their prey. I heard creaking in the roof from the gusting wind outside. It was dancing through the cracks in the roof. It felt like the room could collapse any second. The moonlight was shining through a small hole in the celling exposing the knife-sharp edges of a displaced ﬂoorboard; there were old dusty boxes piled up on the ﬂoor as if they were making a path towards the bent plank. Another gust of wind brushed across my back as if someone was forcing me to look a little closer. I walked towards the shaft of moonlight. The boxes beside me were covered with the faded logos of removal companies who had long since gone bust. As I started to get closer, I got more scared and anxious, I felt another breeze crawl through the hairs on my hands, but this time

it had more force and strength as if it was desperate for me to open the ﬂoorboard. Pulling up the rotten piece of wood, I felt a strong release of air on my face, escorted by the strong scent of chlorine. My eyes started to water from the burning sensation and my throat felt rough and dry.

to swirl as if it was changing expression. A dusty breeze covered the face and then when the dust had gone the face had disappeared, like it was taken by some sort of spirit. I ran.

To my surprise I saw an old small, detailed glass bottle, with a dark red wax seal as if they never wanted the contents to be released. I immediately put it back as I felt a sudden rush of regret.

As I walked into my new white house, I felt alone. I had just bought an old cottage located in a small town. The cottage was dusty and dark; I could barely see because of the tiny windows. I walked into the empty living room to the right of me. There was a stain on the carpet. It looked like red wine. The living room led into the kitchen with round windows covered in cobwebs; upstairs was just as bad. I went to the big van outside and started getting all the boxes of my belongings into

I quickly turned around and tried to leave the room but abruptly I was thrown to the ﬂoor by a huge pressure of wind. As I looked back, on the side of the pile of boxes I saw a face from the advert which slowly started

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The White House by Tilly Walker

literature the cottage. I thought it had been a good idea after all. I wasn’t so keen to start with but it was the best way to move on. Just last year my wife and I were in a car accident. I was the only survivor. She was an angel and I miss her more and more every day. Once all the boxes were in the house and the van had driven off, I stood in the hallway and looked at all the work I had to do. I put all the boxes in the right rooms but decided to sit down in the warm garden. All the plants were overgrown; everything was covered in weeds. I chose there and then to tidy it up. I got my gardening tools from one of the boxes and started pulling weeds out of a corner bed in gloom by an old wall. As I was digging up the plants, I hit something in the ground with my shovel. I pulled it clear from the hole and scraped the dirt off it to ﬁnd a locked wooden box. As I was carrying it out into the middle of the garden to see it better, I smelt and saw smoke coming from the neighbour’s garden. I left the box

for a moment and looked over the fence. My new neighbours were having a barbecue. The woman, Maddie, invited me over to have lunch with them; but I said that I couldn’t because I needed to unpack boxes ﬁrst. So I walked away from the fence and looked at the box. It looked back at me. I picked up my shovel and smashed the lock. Inside was a rusty heart-shaped box which looked like it was made of lead. It had rough edges and was scratched all over. I brushed some of the grit off, went inside, and put it on the dining room table. Once I had ﬁnished gardening, I brought the tools in, and that was when the heart shaped box caught my eye. I put down the gardening tools and decided to polish it with a cloth. I shook it and heard something rattling around inside. I knocked and twisted it but it wouldn’t open. I put it on the shelf next to the television and continued to unbox.

Most of the boxes were unpacked by the evening. I made pasta for dinner then sat in front of the TV in my empty living room on the one chair I owned to eat it. Watching the TV, the mysterious heart shaped box caught my eye, so I decided to try and open it again, this time with my pocketknife. I failed. I turned off the TV and put my plate in the sink; I was thinking of things that could be inside the heart box, a locket? A piece of jewellery? The next day I unpacked the last three boxes that were left in the late morning, then went for a walk in the cold air. I walked past a man and a woman with a child which made me think of my wife. Maybe that would’ve been us. I walked on. I passed a lake that was like a mirror. I looked at my reflection for a little while, thinking about who this man in front of me was. After a long walk I got home and sat on a chair in the living room with the love heart. I was cleaning it with my sleeve when it suddenly cracked open, revealing something broken and dried up, brown and worn. I looked at it more closely. And then I realised it was a human heart. It was my own broken heart… My eyes fell open in the hospital bed. I heard the doctors in the background confirming my heart wouldn’t last the night. As my head fell to one side, I saw my beautiful wife lying in the bed next to me with her eyes closed. She looked peaceful. Her blonde hair was dangling off the side of the pillow. I turned my head back to the bright light above me, breathed out one final time, and let me my eyes fall closed.

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

arts

fungible art Anthony Skelly explores fungible art and addresses some of the fundamental questions that people have about them. What is it? The most common form of fungible art are NFTs, which stands for Non-Fungible Tokens. These are irreplaceable tokens for the ownership of digital art: however, they differ from the rights for something. If you own the rights to something you can sell it to people, whereas if you have purchased an NFT for something you cannot. Everyone can have digital art, but your master would be classed as the original, while other people would just be distributing copies of that, even if to all intents and purposes they operate like the original.

time, but if you are willing and able to accept this risk then they can be a great way to support an artist and collect for your digital library. You can purchase NFTs through online marketplaces such as Coinbase. Most of these marketplaces use an Ethereum based network to power their transactions, so you will need to setup a cryptocurrency wallet, which is a digital address where you can store cryptocurrency, that is compatible with it.

What are the uses for NFTs? NFTs can be used by collectors to verify the authenticity of the assets that they are buying. For example, if a collector wants to purchase an NFT for an expensive artwork, they will want the reassurance that it is genuine before they pay for it. They also allow interesting experiments such as in Terra0’s’ ‘Two Degrees’ which is programmed to self-destruct if the average global temperature increases by 2 degrees Celsius. Should you purchase them? If so, how? NFTs, like cryptocurrency, are speculative markets driven by the fear of missing out. Because of this there is no guarantee that your NFT will appreciate over

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arts

arts Review dr who: time fracture Eddie Comerford takes a look at one of the UK’s most innovative and exciting pieces of theatre. ‘Doctor Who: Time Fracture’ is an immersive theatre show currently running in the heart of the West End. It follows a trend of immersive theatre over the past few years which plunges audiences into their own episode of the long-running science fiction shows where they come face-to-face with some of the most menacing aliens, including the infamous Daleks. Huge numbers of immersive shows have started to pop up around the UK. Unlike your normal sit-down theatre show, immersive theatre takes audiences through streams of fully detailed sets. As a huge Doctor Who fan myself, I was excited when the show was first announced through a series of cryptic ‘field logs’ and felt so fortunate to be able to finally attend earlier this year.

The show begins on an unassuming backstreet. Very quickly, it takes the audience into the UNIT lab which is studying the ‘Time Fracture.’ This cosmic phenomenon has wreaked havoc on the fundamental workings of the universe. On the the lab screens we see dangerous and somewhat bizarre events that have occurred because of the fracture, including the President turning into an orange.

After an exciting encounter with the Daleks, the ﬁrst, and then current, incarnation of the Doctor, the audience enters ‘the fractures.’ It is here where they enter the main part of the show. The audience, who are on foot and able to roam around the many interlinking sets of the show, can then visit a huge number of worlds pushed together by the unravelling of time. At one point, I ended up having a one-on-one conversation with Leonardo Da Vinci in his study; later, I was bargaining with the leader of the Daleks before being chased by a troop of Cybermen. Following an interval on the ZZ1 spaceship, the fear-factor of the show ramps up with a terrifying encounter with the Weeping Angels. The show then concludes with an epic ﬁnale that I won’t reveal because I wouldn’t want to give any spoilers! What really separates this show from any other immersive shows is that if you revisit, you are likely to get a completely different show. Like an adventure with the Doctor, each visit will take your somewhere even more surprising.

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

arts

What’s on in oxford this season? A rundown of what is on this season in and around Oxford.

chicago

new theatre monday 18 july - saturday 23 july Blues behind bars from the writers of Cabaret. Justice is on trial for the husband killing bad girls of shady Chicago. A chorus girl murders her lover but manages to get off through a strange assortment of allies. She forms an unusual nightclub act with another murderess with the hopes of keeping them both out of trouble. Songs include All That Jazz, Razzle Dazzle and All I Care About. Tickets from £13.00.

gaia earth exhibition

University Church of St Mary the Virgin friday 24 June - sunday 10 july

The Gaia earth installation will be part of the Oxford Festival of Arts which has an Around the World in 80 Ways theme with Art and Artefacts.

The touring artwork by UK artist Luke Jerram measures six metres in diameter and has been created from 120dpi detailed NASA imagery of the Earth’s surface. It’s an amazing opportunity to see our planet ﬂoating in three dimensions. A specially made surround sound composition by BAFTA award-winning composer Dan Jones is played alongside the sculpture. It’s free to visit and no booking in advance required. Monday – Saturday 9.30am-5pm Sunday 12pm-5pm

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arts

Dreamboats and petticoats new theatre monday 25 July - saturday 30 july

The feel-good musical continues... Bobby & Laura, Norman, Sue & the gang get back together for the follow-on musical inspired by the million-selling albums. Catch up with the Dreamboats gang in this third instalment. Bringing On Back The Good Times features the original characters from Dreamboats and Petticoats and features the same wit, charm, and songs from the golden era of Rock’n’ Roll. Inspired by the smash hit, multimillion-selling Dreamboats and Petticoats albums, the Dreamboats’ musicals feature some of the greatest hit songs ever written and are guaranteed to have you reminiscing and singing out loud! Tickets from £13.00.

The oxford shakespeare festival the castle yard, oxford castle and prison monday 20 june - saturday 13 August The Oxford Shakespeare Festival is back for its 12th year! Wild Goose Theatre (previously Tomahawk Theatre), BMH Productions, and Siege Theatre will be putting on marvellous performances of Shakespeare’s ﬁnest classics. The Oxford Shakespeare Festival is an outdoor theatre experience that takes place in the castle yard of Oxford Castle & Prison. This year, expect: Hamlet by BMH Productions (20 June - 2 July) A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Wild Goose Theatre (4 - 30 July) King Lear by Siege Theatre (1 - 13 August) Tickets from £15.00.

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

lETTERS TO THE EDITOR Dear Editor,

Dear Editor,

I value personal space. It is important to me because a peron’s space is their space, yet I seem to live in a world where where people are constantly competing to occupy and dominate personal space on buses, pavements and corridors, as well as national spaces, as we see in the war in Ukraine.

I value equality, because I believe it is important when people are regarded the same in a single society.

I also feel that our cooperative sense of space is challenged. It happens in schools, when students are asked to read out extracts from a book. It causes stress because the students will worry about, say, their pronounciation, and then others will judge them.

However, I see this value being challenged when I see people treated differently because of their race or gender, or because they have different beliefs, creeds or cultures. I think a solution might be if we learn to accept people’s differences and tolerate their beliefs, even if they are different from us. This solution starts at school, in the home, and with everyone of us as individuals. The beneﬁt would be people feeling accepted in society and our nation becoming more respectful as a country and culture. Yours faithfully, Ella Hogeboom

Dear Editor,

The solution isn’t allowing everyone to opt out of their learning and demsontrate a lack of ambition or courage. But it is for all of us to insist that our fellow students repsect our efforts to enter into the ‘learning space’, which inevitably means taking a risk, and not to be pestered about it after the event. After all, if we can show mutual respect each other, then maybe we won’t feel the need to dominate other people’s physcial spaces – and that would beneﬁt a lot of poeple and their stress.

We value gender equality because it is not fair that people judge others based on something that they were born into or cannot change. We believe and stand for gender equality, because without it, it makes people uncooperative and resentful.

Yours faithfully,

Alex Hancox

Hattie Hunt & Freya Chandler

However, we see this value being challenged in the gender pay gap issue nationally, and reflected in schools when girls or boys cannot play the sport they desire. We think a solution would be that men and women get paid the same amount for the same job, or children at School can choose their sport, no matter how untraditional it may seem to those in charge. The benefits would be our homes, schools and offices becoming better places, and our friends, peers and fellow citizens having less resentment towards each other.

Dear Editor, I value tidiness because I think it is important to live in a tidy environment. However, I see this value being challenged around our schools and local communities when people litter and don’t bother to pick it up. We all need to be more careful; to think about what we are doing before we do it. Maybe in some places we do need some more bins around to help give us no excuse to litter, but really the problem shows a lack of integrity in those who do it. It is simply not necessary. If someone drops litter only because no one is going to challenge them, then they must have a weak or lazy personailty if they need self-discipline to come from outside them. So the beneﬁts to putting our litter in the bin is not just a cleaner environment, but better people. Yours faithfully, Sukhmani Panesar

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EDITORial Welcome to the Summer Term edition of Below the Line! The Editorial Team decided that an interesting theme for this edition would be ‘Changing Perspectives’, looking at how certain things can be viewed differently over time. Since our opinions are constantly changing with age and experience, our writers took on the challenge to create thought-provoking articles around this theme. For example with the growth of digital trading, does everyone view NFTs as the ‘next big thing’ and the future of art, or just a millennial craze? Or on a more literal note, how does the James Webb telescope change our perspectives on the universe we live in? How have views on the 90s Britpop name and lifestyle changed? As time has moved on, what is the legacy of bands such as Blur and Oasis? These questions have been tackled by our ever-changing team of talented writers, and as people come and go, new ideas are constantly coming. As a long-time member of ‘Below the Line’, the amount of fascinating topics brought up never ceases to amaze me. We’d love it if you came along and shared some thoughts - maybe be in our next edition. Writing for ‘Below the Line’ is a tremendous opportunity for you to explore ideas that interest you, to learn about the process of being a journalist – and to see your work and your name in print, which is always exciting! Lastly I hope everyone has a fantastic summer; 2022 has seen a return to normality after the Coronavirus outbreak, so we will all get a much-needed break. Enjoy it and have fun! We look forward to writing for you again. Henry

ays We alwe new welcom so if writers ld like u you woin the to jo et in g team, ch. tou

Chief Editor: Henry Cook

Meet the Team Writers and Contributors:

Samarth Agnihotri Joshua Briscoe Bing Brown Zoe Cameron Freya Chandler

Eddie Comerford Henry Cook Chloe Dunne Alex Hancox Felicity Hill Ella Hogeboom

Co-ordinators: Mr Elkin-Jones

Mr Allen

Designer: Mrs Logan

Hattie Hunt Sukhmani Panesar Anthony Skelly Antonio Virk Tillie Walker

Summer 2022 | Below The Line

MAD FACTS Fish can cough. In order to clear the particles and bacteria out of their gills, the ﬁsh’s ventilation cycle is interrupted with a cough. The bumblebee bat is the world’s smallest mammal, weighing in at 0.05 to 0.07 ounces, with a head-tobody length of 1.14 to 1.29 inches and a wingspan of 5.1 to 5.7 inches.

It would only take one hour to drive to space if you could go straight up in the air.

Sudan has more pyramids than any country in the world! Not only does Sudan have more pyramids than Egypt, but the numbers aren’t even close. While 138 pyramids have been discovered in Egypt, Sudan boasts around 255.

Your heart beats about

115,000

If you eat too many carrots, you will start turning orange! It is called Carotenemia.

times a day!

Your nose gets warmer when you lie.

A bolt of lightning is about six times hotter than the sun!

Snails take the longest naps, some lasting as long as 3 years.

Almonds are a member of the peach family.

Octopuses have 9 brains and 3 hearts.

Hawaiian pizza was actually invented in Canada.

The weight of the average cumulus cloud is 1.1 million pounds.

In the course of an average lifetime, while sleeping you might eat around 70 assorted insects and 10 spiders, or more.

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