Question - 685

Who is he and what is the occasion when this picture was taken?

Question - 664

What happened here?

Answer: The Boston Molasses disaster - In 1919, a gigantic molasses tank burst open creating a molasses wave over 10 ft tall that was strong enough to hurl trains off their tracks. There is an urban legend that the area still smells of molasses in hot summer days. Ameya, Divya Shankar and apoorv got it. Well done.

Question - 656

A lazy cop out of a question today. Identify the ladies and the two phrases that one of them trademarked.

Answer: Ann and Anna Jarvis - the women behind Mother's day. Siddarth Pai, Mekie, Krithi and Jaggi got it. Well done.

Question - 652

What incident is being portrayed?

Answer: Xerxes having the sea whipped as a punishment for destroying his bridges at Hellespont during his famous invasion of Greece. Karthik, Siddarth Pai, Raghu, Matti, Jaggi and Divya got it. Well done.

Question - 645

Who was fined and why? When and how was the fine repaid?

Answer: To quote giant amoeba, The US was fined for littering when parts of the skylab fell over Esperance, western Australia. The fine was paid in April 2009, when radio show host Scott Barley of Highway Radio raised the funds from his morning show listeners, and paid the fine on behalf of NASA. Iam, Saket, Swapnaa, Jamie, Raghu, giantamoeba, Divya, Matti and Krithi got it. Well done.

Question - 634

Sorry for the late update. A question symbolic of how my week has been. Identify.

Answer: This is the wreckage of Gary Powers's U-2 spy plane - the one that the Soviet shot down and the US denied ever existed. Matti, Jamie, Krithi, Siddarth Pai, Kaushik and Divya Shankar got it. Well done.

Question - 606

Identify the non-uniformed participants in this infamous 1937 meeting.

Answer: Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson (in the news through the movie "The King's Speech") meeting Hitler in 1937. Saket, matti tapaninen, mekie, Krithi, Dinesh, and Kaushik got it. Well done.

Question - 605

What was this curious event?

Answer: Tulip mania. The figure charts the price of tulip bulb contracts showing the tulip bubble burst dramatically in February 1637 (as Dinesh pointed out, a history-of-the-day question courtesy Wikipedia). Ameya, Dinesh, and Kaushik got it. Great job.

Question - 604

What is this? (via: Manix)

Answer: Internet traffic from Egypt during the January revolution. Sameer Gauria, Shyaps, Saket, arvind, and Jaggi got it. Well done.

Question - 592

Connect.

Question - 576

What is the significance of the highlighted spot?

Answer: The spot marks the location on the bus in Montgomery, Alabama on DEcember 1, 1955, where Rosa Parks sat when she was asked to move to the back of the bus. Dinesh, illiteratepoet, matti tapaninen, Divya Shankar, and Manix got it. Well done.

Question - 563

Identify and connect.

Answer: The War of Roses, depicted in Shakespeare's Henry VI (top left) and now continued as a sporting rivalry - cricket (Yorkshire v. Lancashire), football (Manchester Utd. v. Leeds Utd.) and rugby. mekie, Anand, Firebringer, and matti tapaninen got it. Well done.

Question - 556

Identify the location and its significance.

Answer: The site of the Battle of the Red Cliffs, which served as the precursor to the era of the Three Kingdoms in China - described in the Chinese epic, "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". mekie and Dinesh got it (though I still don't get Dinky's "Stannus occulus" reference).

Question - 543

Identify and connect the two people on the left.

Answer: Recently minted Nobel laureate Robert Edwards - who pioneered in vitro fertilization - and Louise Brown - the first "test-tube baby" - pictured alongside her own "naturally-conceived" baby. Divya Shankar, Matti Tapaninen, Shravan, mekie. anon, and Dinesh got it. Well done.

Question - 533

Connect the two visuals.

Answer: The connect is the ongoing trial of Liberian dictator Charles Taylor's war crimes and him presenting Naomi Campbell with blood diamonds during a party hosted by Nelson Mandela in 1997. The movie is of course Blood diamond. Karthik, Ameya, Krithi, Anand, anon, Arvind, Matti Tapaninen, Hari, Vetti, Mekie, nice try, Hirak, Kamal Rathi, Mihir, Raghu, Rajesh K and Nitin Sunny got it. Well done.

Question - 524

Connect the men on the left to the respective events on the right.

Answer: The men are General Yamashita and Captain Ernest Medina. The events are the Manila massacre by the Japanese troops in 1945 and the My Lai massacre by the American troops in 1971. The specific connect I was looking for is the notion of command responsibility also known as the Yamashita standard or the Medina standard. The doctrine states that a supervising officer is responsible for the crimes committed by those under his/her command. Read Matti's answer for more details. Matti Tapaninen and an anon gave the answer I had in mind. Mekie, Krithi, Jamie and Manix got partly there. Well done all. Also check out this wiki link for a massacre described by George Fernandes as India's My Lai.

Question - 521

What is the occasion for these (highly edited) ads?

Answer: Greenpeace ads in response to the world leaders' less than impressive showing at the Copenhagen climate conference 2009. Akshay, Kaushik, Sreekanth, Matti Tapaninen, Raghu, Krithi, Mekie, Vetti, mysore, Hari, Anand, Ramki, tsp and Ramji got it. Well done.

Question - 515

First visual is the map of an awesome concept (one of 3 such things in the US. Name all for brownie points). Unfortunately, it is now more famous for giving rise to a meme (like the one in the third visual) because of the guy in the second visual. Identify all.

Answer: The map is the trail of the Appalachian trail, one of the triple crown of American long distance hiking along with the Pacific Crest Trail and the Continental Divide Trail. Mark Sanford, the S. Carolina governor tried to conceal his trip to Argentina to visit his mistress by lying that he was hiking on the Appalachian trail. This has given rise to the euphemism of hiking to mean cheating on one's spouse. The blanked out word in the last word is hiking. Manix, Raghu Kainkaryam, Krithi, Ramji, Akshay, NJ, Mekie, anon, Anand, Hirak, Rajesh K, Karthik, Jamie, Arvind and Iam got it. Well done.

Question - 513

What resulted?

Answer: Andres Escobar's own goal for Colombia against USA during the 1994 FIFA world cup. It supposedly led to his assassination 10 days later when he was shot dead at a Colombian night club. The goal led to the heavily favored Colombian side eliminated in the first round and is said to have caused huge gambling losses to the drug lords in Colombia. Ramji, Arvind, nice try, v.chandrashekar, Anand, Matti Tapaninen, anon, Raghu Kainkaryam, Adi, Akshay, niru, Ramki, Vetti and Jaggi got it. Well done.

Question - 505

The structure shown in the second visual (the one with the white arch) is in front of a famous landmark and is built to commemorate the event shown in the first visual. Identify and connect.

Answer: The first event is the 1923 finals of the FA cup at the Wembley stadium dubbed the "White horse" final. The bridge in front of the stadium is called the white horse bridge to commemorate this. Ramki, anon, Matti Tapaninen and Shibin azad got it. Well done.