title: Hallstatt

text: The community at Hallstatt exploited the salt mines in the area, which had been worked from time to time since the Neolithic period, from the 8th to 5th centuries BC. The style and decoration of the grave goods found in the cemetery are very distinctive, and artifacts made in this style are widespread in Europe. In the mine workings themselves, the salt has preserved many organic materials such as textiles, wood and leather, and many abandoned artefacts such as shoes, pieces of cloth, and tools including miner's backpacks, have survived in good condition.


title: Hallstatt

text: Hallstatt A–B are part of the Bronze Age Urnfield culture. Phase A saw Villanovan influence. In this period, people were cremated and buried in simple graves. In phase B, tumulus (barrow or kurgan) burial becomes common, and cremation predominates. Little is known about this period in which the typical Celtic elements have not yet distinguished themselves from the earlier Villanova-culture. The "Hallstatt period" proper is restricted to HaC and HaD (8th to 5th centuries BC), corresponding to the early European Iron Age. Hallstatt lies in the area where the western and eastern zones of the Hallstatt culture meet, which is reflected in the finds from there. Hallstatt D is succeeded by the La Tène culture.


title: Hallstatt

text: Hallstatt C is characterized by the first appearance of iron swords mixed amongst the bronze ones. Inhumation and cremation co-occur. For the final phase, Hallstatt D, daggers, almost to the exclusion of swords, are found in western zone graves ranging from c. 600–500 BC. There are also differences in the pottery and brooches. Burials were mostly inhumations. Halstatt D has been further divided into the sub-phases D1–D3, relating only to the western zone, and mainly based on the form of brooches.


title: Hallstatt

text: Major activity at the site appears to have finished about 500 BC, for reasons that are unclear. Many Hallstatt graves were robbed, probably at this time. There was widespread disruption throughout the western Hallstatt zone, and the salt workings had by then become very deep. By then the focus of salt mining had shifted to the nearby Hallein Salt Mine, with graves at Dürrnberg nearby where there are significant finds from the late Hallstatt and early La Tène periods.


title: Hallstatt

text: Much of the material from early excavations was dispersed, and is now found in many collections, especially German and Austrian museums, but the Hallstatt Museum in the town has the largest collection.


title: Hallstatt

text: There are no recorded notable events that took place in Hallstatt during Roman rule or the early Middle Ages. In 1311, the Hallstatt citizens were vested with market rights by Queen dowager Elizabeth, a sign that it had not lost its economic value. Today, apart from production of salt, which since 1595 has been transported 40 kilometres from Hallstatt to Ebensee via a brine pipeline, tourism plays a major factor in the town's economic life.


title: Hallstatt

text: Tourists are told that Hallstatt is the site of "the world's oldest pipeline", which was constructed 400 years ago from 13,000 hollowed-out trees. There is so little space for cemeteries that every ten years bones used to be exhumed and removed into an ossuary, to make room for new burials. A collection of elaborately decorated skulls with the deceased's name, profession, date of death inscribed on them is on display at the local chapel.


title: Hallstatt

text: Until the late 19th century, it was only possible to reach Hallstatt by boat or via narrow trails. The land between the lake and mountains was sparse, and the town itself exhausted every free patch of it. Access between houses on the river bank was by boat or over the "upper path", a small corridor passing through attics. The first road to Hallstatt was only built in 1890, along the west shore, partially by rock blasting. Nevertheless, this secluded and inhospitable landscape counts as one of the first places of human settlement due to the rich sources of natural salt, which have been mined for thousands of years, originally in the shape of hearts owing to the use of antler picks.


title: Hallstatt

text: Some of Hallstatt's oldest archaeological finds, such as a shoe-last celt, date back to around 5500 BC. In 1846 Johann Georg Ramsauer discovered a large prehistoric cemetery near the current location of Hallstatt. Ramsauer's work at the Hallstatt cemeteries continued until 1863, unearthing more than 1000 burials. It is to his credit and to the enormous benefit of archaeology that he proceeded to excavate each one with the same slow, methodical care as the first. His methods included measuring and drawing each find. In an age before colour photography, he produced very detailed watercolours of each assemblage before it was removed from the ground.


title: Hallstatt

text: In the history of archaeology, Ramsauer's work at Hallstatt helped usher in a new, more systematic way of doing archaeology. In addition, one of the first blacksmith sites was excavated there. Active trade, and thus wealth, allowed for the development of a highly developed culture, which, after findings in the Salzberghochtal, was named the Hallstatt culture. This lasted from approximately 800 to 500 BC.


title: Hallstatt

text: The Hallstatt salt mine is the world's oldest working salt mine. The mine is located within the Upper Permian to Lower Triassic Haselgebirge Formation of the Northern Limestone Alps. The Hallstatt salt mine comprises 21 levels and several smaller shafts ranging from 514 m above sea level (Erbstollen level) to an elevation of around 1267 m (Erzherzog Matthias Schurf level).


title: Hallstatt

text: The problems and opportunities of greatly-increased tourism in Hallstatt were covered by "The Washington Post" in August 2019. Halstatt's tourism began in the 19th century but greatly increased after it was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997. It became popular among East Asian tourists in 2006 when it was featured on a South Korean television show.


title: Hallstatt

text: Social media images of Hallstatt, captioned "the most Instagrammable town in the world," went viral in Southeast Asia. A replica was planned and then built in China in 2011 in Huizhou, Guangdong province, Hallstatt's twin town. In 2013 it was rumored in China to be the model for the movie "Frozen"s Arendelle village. By 2017 local churches were employing bouncers to prevent services being disrupted by tourists. In 2020 the town had a population of 780, and estimates of 10,000 to nearly 30,000 tourists per day, primarily via bus tours which bring tourists briefly into the town for photo opportunities, then quickly move on.


title: Hallstatt

text: Hallstatt's economy depends on tourism, but according to locals the day-visitors drive away tourists who would stay longer. Hallstatt became the prime example of overtourism in Austria and led to controversies around limiting the number of tourists. The Austrian Public Broadcasting Organization made multiple documentaries about the situation.


title: Hallstatt

text: The town in 2020 focused on "quality" tourism. From fall 2020 there will be assigned time slots for tour buses to cope with the problem. The arrivals will be limited to 54 per day, which is about half of the current number. Buses with an overnight booking in the town will receive preference.


title: Hallstatt

text: On 16 June 2011, plans to build a replica in China were first reported. On 2 June 2012, it was reported that Chinese mining company China Minmetals Corporation built a full-scale replica of the entire town in Huizhou, Guangdong province.


title: Hallstatt

text: Hallstatt has an oceanic climate (Cfb) with warm, rainy summers and cold, snowy winters. Precipitation is plentiful year round but is at its highest during the three months of summer.


title: Ola Rapace

text: Sonny Ola Rapace Jawo (; né Pär Ola Norell; born 3 December 1971) is a Swedish actor best known for playing Patrice in the 2012 James Bond film "Skyfall".


title: Ola Rapace

text: Ola Rapace was born on the 3rd of December 1971 in Tyresö, a suburb southeast of Stockholm, Sweden and named Pär Ola Norell. Both parents were academics. He grew up mainly in Vallentuna, a middle-class suburb north of Stockholm. When he was one year old, his parents separated, and he was raised by his father. He grew up playing football and listening to heavy metal.


title: Ola Rapace

text: His first screen role was in Lukas Moodysson's film "Together", a bittersweet comedy about hippie-socialist values set in a Stockholm homeshare commune. The film won several awards at international film festivals, including the Paris Film Festival Special Jury Prize, and Philadelphia Film Festival Jury Award.


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace's big breakthrough came with the popular TV series "Tusenbröder" about a group of handymen who become involved with organised crime. Immediately followed the role as Stefan Lindman in "Wallander", which was based on Henning Mankell's Kurt Wallander books.


title: Ola Rapace

text: He continued with several police and crime-related TV series, including portraying Daniel Nordström in the Danish police TV show "Anna Pihl", "Crimes of Passion", a crime drama set in 1950's rural Sweden, "Farang" about a Scandinavian ex-convict living in Thailand and "Hassel", an updated dark and gritty cop show based on a classic series of books from the '70s and '80s. This was a cop show he also executive produced, and "Section Zéro", a French science fiction influenced cop drama.


title: Ola Rapace

text: While he has worked on many cop shows, Rapace has been very critical of the genre. In 2012 he told Cafe Magazine: "All the "Wallander" and "Beck" films are worthless. There is no credibility, it does not work to investigate thousands of murders in Ystad year after year. In the end it becomes a joke, and the quality becomes so low that one has no other option but to shut down the production".


title: Ola Rapace

text: His first English-language film was the 2004 independent movie "Rancid" starring Matthew Settle (from "Band of Brothers" and "Gossip Girl").


title: Ola Rapace

text: A much bigger project was the 2012 James Bond film "Skyfall", where he portrayed the hitman "Patrice".


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace lived in Paris from 2015-2020 and has since worked on Swedish, French and international projects. In 2016, he starred in the French science fiction film "Ares" and soon after followed "", a French TV-series about a para-military police squad in the near future.


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace had a supporting role as Major Gibson in Luc Besson's 2017 French/American big budget comic book/science fiction film "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets".


title: Ola Rapace

text: In 2018 Rapace was one of the main antagonists in series 3 of Netflix/BBC's popular Viking drama "The Last Kingdom" as "Jarl Sigurd Bloodhair".


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace joined the cast of "Below the Surface" ("Gidseltagningen"), a Danish drama about 15 innocent people held hostage underground in a subway train, as "Yusef" when it returned for a second series in 2019.


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace starred alongside Kellan Lutz in "Divertimento", an English language French thriller that came out in 2020.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In August 2022 director Lukas Moodysson announced the start of a sequel to the movie "Together" and that the role of "Lasse" would not be portrayed by Ola Racace as in the original film. Moodysson explained this was per request from SF Studios.


title: Ola Rapace

text: During September och October 2022 Rapace will portray "Mr. Y" in August Strindberg's Pariah at Lövstad Castle Theatre.


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace was one of the participants in SVT's reality series Maestro, Where Swedish celebrities were taught the basics of conducting a classical orchestra. The series aired in late summer and autumn 2011.


title: Ola Rapace

text: He was one of 5 Swedish celebrities featured in 2020 edition of popular TV series "Stars at the Castle". The basis of the show is: five famous people live together in a castle or manor house for five days. Each day focuses on one person and their career, as they eat dinners and they discuss their life and career, and the other celebrities ask questions. A few months before the announcement of Rapace joining the 2020 season, he had criticized this specific reality television show.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In 2021 Swedish Discovery+ announced he was one of several celebrities, including electropop musician Kleerup, and reality TV stars Jackie Ferm and Håkan Hallin, who would join the unscripted TV-series "Treatment", about mental illness and addiction problems. Discovery Networks Sweden describes the series as "individually adapted medical and therapeutic treatments, composed and led by addiction doctors and therapists" on an archipelago island.


title: Ola Rapace

text: Rapace married actress Noomi Rapace in 2001, divorcing in 2011; they have a son, Lev, who was born in 2003. Together they chose the surname Rapace after they were married, which means "bird of prey" in French and Italian. Rapace also has a daughter, Line, born in 1999, together with the actress Malin Morgan. Rapace lived in France for several years and speaks fluent French.


title: Ola Rapace

text: For years Ola and Noomi were preyed upon by Swedish tabloids. Noomi's international career was taking off, and she and Ola, who was never afraid of an argument, were frequently featured in gossip magazines and tabloids. He has had several run-ins with the law, including spending the night in a jail in Austria. In October 2008, he was arrested for possession of cocaine and steroids, which resulted in a fine for a minor drug offence in April 2009.


title: Ola Rapace

text: He moved to Paris, France in 2015, and returned to Sweden after five years after losing most of his wealth after an audit by French Tax Authorities.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In the podcast "Helt ärligt med Sebastian Stakset" released on April 4, 2020 Rapace explained how, during the filming of French TV-series "", he and the series creator Olivier Marchal used cocaine every night after filming, and the TV series ended up being really depressing.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In November 2020 real estate magazine "Hem & Hyra" reported he was one of several people suing a deceased landlord and the story revealed how apartment contracts were sold for millions. Rapace had paid 1,7 million SEK in cash to the landlord, and was now asking for the money back from the deceased landlord's estate.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In May 2019 he married Sonja Jawo in Paris. She is the older sister of Aino Jawo, of Swedish electropop duo "Icona pop". They divorced in the summer of 2021.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In 2021 he was arrested by police under suspicion of gross violation of women's rights /Sexual misconduct/spousal abuse Prosecutors announced on September 13, 2022 that they were closing the investigation and the case was dismissed.


title: Ola Rapace

text: In the podcast ”Sorry, allt gick åt helvete” ("Sorry, it all went to hell") Rapace explains how he while intoxicated stole a production van from a film shoot so he could drive to his house that apparently was on fire, after the producer told him not to use the van.


title: Horacio Pagani (auto executive)

text: Horacio Pagani (born 10 November 1955) is an Argentine-Italian businessman and engineer in the automotive industry. He is the founder of Pagani Automobili S.p.A., an Italian specialty auto-maker.


title: Horacio Pagani (auto executive)

text: Horacio Pagani was born in Casilda, Argentina to Luca and Maria Pagani. His father, Luca, was a baker from Italy.


title: Horacio Pagani (auto executive)

text: Pagani took an interest in engineering while still living in Argentina. However, he felt from the beginning that the rural town into which he was born was inadequate for fulfilling his dream of an engineering career. He opened a small shop where he worked at a very young age, gaining valuable experience in craftsmanship. By the age of 20, Pagani had designed and built his first F3 racer.


title: Horacio Pagani (auto executive)

text: The turning point in Pagani's life came when he was hired by Renault to improve the body of a racing car. His work offered staggering improvements and Pagani was able to showcase his talent. After having success on this small scale, Pagani visited Lamborghini and met with the company's chief technical director Giulio Alfieri. In 1982, he decided to move to Italy and he was hired by Lamborghini. Pagani began working basic jobs such as sweeping the floor, however he was able to work his way up the company.


title: Horacio Pagani (auto executive)

text: He became the chief engineer at Lamborghini and he built the Countach Evoluzione concept. He tried to persuade Lamborghini to buy an autoclave so they could extend the production of the carbon parts for the Evoluzione. They refused, saying that Ferrari did not have an autoclave, so Lamborghini didn't need to have one. Pagani borrowed the capital to buy his own autoclave late in 1987 and then, in 1991, he broke away from the company and founded his own consultancy called Modena Design which continues to make carbon fiber composites for Formula One cars and clients like Daimler, Ferrari and Aprilia.


title: Horacio Pagani (auto executive)

text: Pagani Automobili Modena was founded by Pagani in 1992. The first car he produced was the Zonda, which took seven years to complete, followed by the Huayra, named after Huayra-tata, the god of the wind in Incan Culture.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: Ring (), also known as The Ring, is a Japanese horror media franchise, based on the novel series of the same name written by Koji Suzuki. The franchise includes eight Japanese films, two television series, six manga adaptations, three English-language film remakes, a Korean film remake, and two video games "" and "".


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The "Ring" films revolve around a cursed video tape; whoever watches the tape dies seven days later, unless the tape is copied and shown to another person, who then must repeat the same process. The video tape was created by a psychic, Sadako Yamamura, who was murdered by her adoptive father and thrown into a well. After her supposed death, she returned as a ghostly serial killer, killing anyone who fails to copy and then send the video tape to someone else under a seven-day deadline (constricted to a two-day deadline in "Sadako vs. Kayako" and a one-day deadline in "Sadako DX").


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The franchise began with Koji Suzuki's 1991 novel "Ring". It was the first of a trilogy, with two sequels: "Spiral" (1995) and "Loop" (1998). Several later novels based on "Ring" were released: "Birthday" (1999) [which contains a prequel to "Ring", an epilogue to "Loop", and details what happened to a key character in "Spiral", "S" (2012), and "Tide" (2013).


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In 1998, Hideo Nakata made a new Japanese adaptation of the book in his film "Ring" (also known as "The Ring" or "Ringu"). The movie was a critical and commercial success, being credited with revolutionizing the J-horror genre and influencing many future films in the wider horror genre.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The first sequel to the 1998 film was "Rasen" (also known as "The Spiral" or simply "Spiral"). It was an adaptation of "Spiral", Suzuki's sequel to his first "Ring" book. It was released on 31 January 1998, the same day as "Ring". It was a critical and commercial failure compared with the first film. It was directed by George Lida, who had previously worked as the writer for the television film, "Ring" (1995).


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: A new sequel, "Ring 2", was released in 1999. The film continues the storyline of "Ring" (1998) and ignores the events of "Spiral" (1998) and many cast members from the original film return. Hideo Nakata also returned to direct. This was the first film in the franchise not based on any of Suzuki's novels. While not as critically well-received as the first film, the movie was a financial success, becoming the second-highest grossing Japanese film of 1999.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: A prequel, "", was released in 2000. The movie is based on the short story "Lemon Heart" from Suzuki's 1999 book, "Birthday" (the fourth book in the series). This film delved into a uniquely different mythos surrounding Sadako Yamamura and the cursed videotape.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In 2012, "Sadako 3D" was released, adapted from Suzuki's book "S" that released the same year. A direct sequel, "Sadako 3D 2" was released in 2013. Both were directed by Tsutomu Hanabusa and continued the timeline established in "Spiral".


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In 2016, "Sadako vs. Kayako", directed by Kōji Shiraishi, was released, a crossover of the "Ju-on" series of horror films. It features Sadakaya, a ghost that resulted from the fusion of Sadako and the "Ju-on" antagonist Kayako Saeki. It is not canon to either timeline and the deadline for the video tape is two days instead of seven.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "Sadako" was released in 2019. It saw the return of director Hideo Nakata to the Japanese film series for the first time since "Ring 2", 20 years prior. The film is loosely based on "Tide", the final novel in the series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "Sadako DX", directed by , was released in 2022. The film stars Fuka Koshiba as a college student attempting to unravel the curse of Sadako with the help of a psychic and a fortune teller.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The first adaption of "Ring" was the Japanese television film "Ring" (titled "Ring: Kanzenban" for home video release), released in 1995. This remained the closest to the book but didn't have the success and recognition of the later films.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "" is a 12 episode self-contained miniseries that aired in 1999, and is loosely based on the original "Ring" novel. It is not connected to the films or the previous television adaptation.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: Several manga series have been published by Kadokawa Shoten based on the films. The second manga adaptation is a two-volume series based on the first novel and the first Hideo Nakata film. The manga was written Hiroshi Takahashi and illustrated by Misao Inagaki. Both volumes were released on January 21, 1999. Dark Horse Comics compiled the first two volumes and released an english-language version on November 12, 2003.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The third adaptation, of Nakata's "Ring 2" film, was written by Hiroshi Takahashi and illustrated by Meimu, was released on February 3, 1999. Dark Horse Comics released it on May 19, 2004 as the second volume of "the Ring" manga series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The fourth adaptation, titled , is based on the novel and film of the same name. The manga was written by Koji Suzuki, illustrated by Sakura Mizuki, and released on September 10, 1999. Dark Horse released it on August 18, 2004 as volume 3 of "the Ring" manga series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The fifth adaptation, titled , is based on the novel of the same name. The manga was written by Koji Suzuki, illustrated by Meimu and released on December 22, 1999. Dark Horse Comics released it on November 3, 2004 as volume 4 of "the Ring" manga series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The sixth, named "", based on the film of that name, was also written by Hiroshi Takahashi and illustrated by Meimu, and released on January 28, 2000. Dark Horse Comics released it on March 30, 2005 as "Volume 0" of "the Ring" manga series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "The Ring Virus" was the first remake to be made, in 1999, where the villain is renamed as Park Eun-suh, who is intersex, as Sadako was in the books. Though the film copied multiple scenes from "Ring", it is, like "Ring: Kanzenban", very faithful to the original novel series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In 2002, an English-language remake was made, titled "The Ring", where the killer is renamed as Samara Morgan, who is a preteen instead of an adult. "The Ring" was one of the highest-grossing horror remakes, its box office gross surpassing that of "Ring". Two sequels were made, including a short film.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "The Ring" was released on 18 October 2002. The film follows journalist Rachel Keller as she investigates a videotape that may have killed four teenagers (including her niece). There is an urban legend about this tape: the viewer will die seven days after watching it. If the legend is correct, Rachel would have to run against time to save her son's and her own.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: A short film, "Rings" was released on 8 March 2005, originally as part of the DVD set of the first film. Jake Pierce, a young teenager, watches a cursed video tape after joining a teen cult named "Rings".


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "The Ring Two" was released on 18 March 2005. High school student Jake Pierce tries to make his girlfriend Emily watch the cursed videotape. After discovering that Emily covered her eyes and didn't watch the tape, he is killed by Samara Morgan. Rachel Keller learns of Jake's death and realizes she has to save her son Aidan from Samara.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "Rings" was released on 3 February 2017. The story follows Julia who becomes worried about her boyfriend when he explores a dark subculture surrounding a mysterious videotape said to kill the watcher seven days after they view the tape. Her actions lead her to make a horrifying discovery: there is a "movie within the movie" that no one has ever seen before.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In September 2019, "The Grudge" director Nicolas Pesce expressed interest in a crossover film between "The Grudge" and the English-language "The Ring" film series.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: The original 1991 novel "Ring" sold 500,000 copies by January 1998, and 1.5million copies by July 2000.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In his review of Sadako (2019), the film critic and psychoanalyst Pieter-Jan Van Haecke remarked that while Sadako does not work as a horror movie, the atmospheric tension that marks the films turn the film into an enjoyable experience.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In 2015, "Hikiko-san vs Sadako" (or simply "Hikiko vs Sadako"), directed by Nagaoka Hisaaki was released. While the DVD cover features a character resembling Sadako emerging from a well, the character in the film is named Sadako Takamura.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: In 2016 and 2017, "Bunshinsaba vs. Sadako" and "Bunshinsaba vs Sadako 2", both directed by River Huang, a crossover with the "Bunshinsaba" film series, were released. A third film, "Bunshinsaba vs Sadako 3", was originally scheduled for release in 2020, but was delayed and its release date is unknown.


title: The Ring (franchise)

text: "The Return of Sadako", released in 2018, was the first stand-alone Chinese "Ring" film to be made following the crossover film "Bunshinaba vs. Sadako" in 2016; produced by Scarecrow Pictures, the film's killers are renamed as sisters Sadako and Kawako, who flee to China alongside their father after the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War, before turning against one another for the love of a Japanese boy; years later a projector is discovered in their house with their souls imprinted upon it. Though the film was marketed as an unofficial sequel to "Sadako 3D 2", it is in-fact a remake.


title: Michaela McManus

text: Michaela McManus (born May 20, 1983) is an American actress, known for her portrayals of Lindsey Strauss on "One Tree Hill", A.D.A. Kim Greylek on "", and Grace Karn on the NBC drama "Aquarius".


title: Michaela McManus

text: McManus, a Warwick, Rhode Island, native, daughter of James "Jim" and Patricia McManus of Warwick, Kent County, Rhode Island, graduated from Fordham University, attended NYU's graduate acting program before leaving to pursue her career in Los Angeles.


title: Michaela McManus

text: In 2008, she joined the cast of season five of "One Tree Hill" playing Lindsey Strauss, the love interest of Lucas Scott (Chad Michael Murray). After completing her work on "One Tree Hill", she booked a guest role on season five of "". She was subsequently announced as joining the cast of season ten of "" as Assistant District Attorney Kim Greylek. She was abruptly written out of "SVU" in the middle of season ten in which ADA Alexandra Cabot (Stephanie March) returned. However, McManus continued to be credited in season ten's main titles, and it was later confirmed that McManus would not be returning to "SVU".


title: Michaela McManus

text: Since then, she has had guest roles in prime time shows such as "Castle, , The Vampire Diaries", and "Hawaii Five-0". She also appeared in the music video 'Glad You Came' by The Wanted. She starred as Tara on the NBC series "Awake" in 2012, and as Grace Karn on "Aquarius" in 2015. In 2017, McManus had supporting roles in "SEAL Team" as Alana Hayes, and "The Orville" as the Krill Teleya. She appeared in the short lived NBC series "The Village" as Sarah Campbell in 2019.


title: Michaela McManus

text: In November 2020, McManus was cast in a recurring role on the third season of the Netflix psychological thriller series "You".


title: Michaela McManus

text: McManus married writer/producer Mike Daniels on June 3, 2011. In January 2014, McManus announced that she was expecting their first child. The couple had son Gabriel October Daniels on April 3, 2014. Their second child, Declan Griffith Daniels, was born on September 13, 2016. Their third child, daughter Indigo Irene Daniels, was born May 12, 2021.


title: Sairat

text: Sairat () is a 2016 Indian Marathi-language romantic tragedy film directed by Nagraj Manjule and produced by Manjule himself under his banner Aatpat Production along with Nittin Keni and Nikhil Sane under Essel Vision Productions and Zee Studios. Starring Rinku Rajguru and Akash Thosar in their debuts, it tells the story of two young college students from different castes who fall in love, sparking conflict between their families.


title: Sairat

text: Manjule conceived the story in 2009, basing it on his experiences of caste discrimination, but scrapped it when he decided that it was boring. After making "Fandry" (2013), he revisited the story and completed its script the following year. The screenplay was written by Manjule, and his brother Bharat penned the dialogues. The film was shot in Manjule's village, Jeur in Karmala Taluka of Solapur district in Maharashtra. Sudhakar Reddy Yakkanti was the director of photography, and Kutub Inamdar edited the film.


title: Sairat

text: "Sairat" premiered at the 66th Berlin International Film Festival, where it received a standing ovation. It was released on 29 April 2016 in Maharashtra and several other locations in India, receiving positive reviews from critics. The film was a box-office success, and became the highest-grossing Marathi film of all time. Rajguru received the National Film Award – Special Mention at the 63rd National Film Awards. "Sairat" received 11 awards at the 2017 Filmfare Marathi Awards, including Best Film, Best Director (Manjule), Best Actress (Rajguru) and Best Music Album. Rajguru and Thosar won in the Best Debut female and male categories. The film was remade in several languages: "Dhadak" (2018) in Hindi, "Noor Jahaan" (2018) in Bengali, "Manasu Mallige" (2017) in Kannada, "Laila O Laila" (2017) in Odia and "Channa Mereya" (2017) in Punjabi.


title: Sairat

text: Prashant "Parshya" Kale is a low-caste young boy whose father is a fisherman. He does well in school, and is captain of the local cricket team. Archana "Archi" Patil is the daughter of a wealthy, upper-caste landlord and politician. Headstrong and also academically proficient, she enjoys driving a tractor and motorcycle. As they study in college, they fall in love and find ways to spend time with each other.


title: Sairat

text: At a birthday celebration for Archi's younger brother, Prince, they meet in the backyard and are discovered by Archi's family. Her father, Tatya, beats Parshya and his friends. Realising that there is no way out, Archi and Parshya try to elope; they are discovered by the police, and are taken into custody. Tatya forces the police to register a false complaint that Archi was gang-raped by Parshya and his friends. Archi destroys the complaint, insisting that Parshya and his friends be released. Soon afterwards, Tatya's goons beat Parshya and his friends. Archi grabs a pistol from them, threatening to shoot unless Parshya and his friends are released. She and Parshya jump on a moving train and escape the confines of their small town to Hyderabad.


title: Sairat

text: In the city, Archi and Parshya are broke and desperate. Surviving with what little they have, they are turned away from a lodge. The lovers sleep at the railway station, contemplating their next move. One night, several men awaken them and insist that they come to the police station. On the way, the men beat Parshya and one tries to rape Archi. A woman from a nearby slum, Suman Akka who lives with her young son, intervenes and saves Archi and Parshya from certain tragedy.


title: Sairat

text: Akka offers Parshya and Archi a spare shack to live in, and helps Archi find employment in a bottling factory; Parshya begins working as a cook at Akka's dosa stall. Archi slowly learns Telugu with the help of her coworker, Pooja. She begins to feel homesick, and is uncomfortable living in the slums. Archi and Parshya earn a meager living, trying to make the most of their situation with love, but begin to argue. After a heated argument Archi decides to return home and Parshya almost hangs himself before Archi changes her mind and returns to him. They marry at the registrar's office, and Archi becomes pregnant.


title: Sairat

text: Several years later, Parshya and Archi are better off financially and living in a better place. Archi phones her mother and hands the phone to her young son, Aakash. After the phone call, Prince and his relatives arrive with gifts from her mother in an apparent reconciliation. Aakash visits a neighbour; Archi and Parshya invite Prince and the other visitors into their flat, and serve them tea. Aakash returns with the neighbour who leaves him at his doorstep and sees his parents on the floor, bloody and hacked to death.


title: Sairat

text: Writer-director Nagraj Manjule wrote "Sairat" as a "classic love story" and a "story of impossible love", based on his own experiences of caste discrimination. He chose his own village, Jeur in Karmala Taluka of Solapur district, Maharashtra as the setting. Over two years, Manjule worked on 50 drafts of the screenplay before "intuition took over as the muse". Manjule said that the film is about "the challenges of an inter-caste romance, but in a mainstream format." He had begun working on the story of "Sairat" in 2009, but left it after he found it "boring". After writing the script, he read it to his family and friends and saw how it "moved people". Manjule finished the script in December 2014. The dialogue was written by his brother, Bharat.


title: Sairat

text: Manjule then directed "Fandry" (2013), which was also based on caste discrimination. While editing it, he came across the story of "Sairat" after he realised that many people did not watch "Fandry" because of its lack of songs, and decided to make a more commercial film. He said that he wrote the script after much deliberation: "I will tell my story, but I will tell it your way and then you will watch it." Manjule decided to tell the story from a woman's perspective, since he was "fed up of the male-dominated culture and the films" with a "muscular hero saving the damsel in distress". He added "colour" to the character, making her strong because he also wanted to address gender bias in society. Manjule made Archi do what men do, and made Parshya "sensible and capable", "imbibing good qualities of women in men." Several scenes, such as Parshya jumping into a well, were drawn from Manjule's life. He called the film's title self-explanatory that might imply "freedom of thought, liberation and progressive ideas" for some and "sheer wildness and recklessness" for others. According to Manjule, the film's "takeaway" is that "lovers shouldn't be subjected to violence."


title: Sairat

text: Manjule chose students with no acting background for the lead roles. 15 year old Rinku Rajguru went with her mother to see Manjule shoot a film in Akluj, her village in Solapur district. Her mother knew him, since he is from Solapur. Rajguru was introduced to Manjule, and was asked to audition. She auditioned with dialogue and dancing, and was selected as the female lead. Manjule gave her a year to work on her personality. She played the role of Archana Patil, an upper-caste girl who is the daughter of a wealthy village politician. Twenty-year-old graduate student Akash Thosar was cast as Prashant Kale after he met Bharat Manjule at a railway station and showed him some of his photos. It was shown to Nagraj; Thosar was summoned for auditions and eventually selected for the role of a lower-caste fisherman's son. Tanaji Galgunde and Arbaz Shaikh played supporting roles in the film, and Manjule made a cameo appearance as a cricket commentator.


title: Sairat

text: Filming began in February 2014, and ended in May 2015; several portions were shot in Hyderabad. It took nearly 70 days for the entire shoot, usually long for a Marathi film. Manjule cited the reasons being a "lot of locations, a huge number of characters and many complicated crowd scenes" in the film. Thosar had difficulty crying on cue during the audition, and was tense filming the crying scene. Rajguru and Thosar lived with Manjule at his home in Pune for two to three months before filming, where they would discuss the script and rehearse scenes daily. Manjule said that they did not use glycerine, and actually cried while filming the emotional scenes; he made them understand the "layers in their characters".


title: Sairat

text: Manjule occasionally asked the actors what they would say they in a similar situation, prompting improvisation. The director of photography was Sudhakar Reddy Yakkanti and Kutub Inamdar served as the editor. "Sairat" was produced by Nagraj Manjule's AatPat Productions and Zee Studios. Rajguru, in grade 10, left school for the duration of filming. About the film's ending, Manjule said that he used silence to demonstrate that "two people who are in love and happy can die suddenly." He shot the ending without dialogue or background score, because he wanted "the violence in the scene to hit the audience." Thosar was a bodybuilder, and had to lose weight for the role. Rajguru lost , and worked on her voice for the role. Thosar said that he was like the character of Prashant. Rajguru admired Archana, and said that she was "inspired to be as dashing as Archie."


title: Sairat

text: "Sairat" songs and background score were composed by the Ajay–Atul duo, who had worked with Manjule on "Fandry" in 2013. The soundtrack includes Western classical music recorded at Sony Scoring Stage in Hollywood, California, a first for an Indian film. The four-song album featured vocals by Ajay Gogavale, Shreya Ghoshal and Chinmayi, with lyrics by Ajay–Atul and Manjule. It was released on 1 April 2016 on the Zee Music Company label. The 66-person orchestra – including a 45-piece string section, six-piece woodwind section, 13-piece brass section, six-piece horn section and a harp – was conducted by Mark Graham.


title: Sairat

text: Manjule described the lyrics as "rustic", with a "rural lingo". He said that the language and songs in the film differ from other films where characters inexplicably become poets. Mihir Bhanage of "The Times of India" called the film's music a "rarity" and "addictive": "It makes you fall in love with the songs from the word go." Sankhyana Ghosh of "The Hindu" also gave the album a positive review: "With joyous melodies and stirring orchestral touches, "Sairat" is an example of old-fashioned film music done right." Lalitha Suhasini of "The Indian Express" wrote that the score was "audacious" and "makes you laugh, cry and want to fall in love."


title: Sairat

text: The entirety of "Yad Lagla" and "Zingaat" was sampled by the duo in "Pehli Baar" and "Zingaat", which were songs from the film's Hindi remake Dhadak.


title: Sairat

text: "Sairat" premiered at the 66th Berlin International Film Festival as a part of the Generation 14plus section, where it received a standing ovation. The jury was composed of teenagers. The film was released domestically on 29 April 2016 in about 200 screens. It was released with English subtitles in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Goa, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Kolkata, Bhilai, Raipur, Bhiwadi, Karnataka, and Telangana. The film screened at more than 450 theatres, over 50 of which were outside Maharashtra. Due to "Sairat" popularity, additional shows at midnight and 3:00 am were introduced at a theatre in Rahimatpur in Satara district. The film was also screened at the India Habitat Centre Film Festival, the Brahmaputra Valley Film Festival, the International Film Festival of India and the Indian Film Festival in The Hague post its theatrical release. It was the first Marathi film released in the United Arab Emirates and South Korea.


title: Sairat

text: In April, Manjule filed a complaint with the Mumbai Police after the film was leaked online two days before its theatrical release. The film had a watermark indicating that it was a censor copy, intended for censorship-board officials to review before release. In May 2016, a mobile-shop owner in Pune was arrested for piracy. Cybercrime police arrested a Byculla (Mumbai)-based cable operator for broadcasting the pirated version of "Sairat" on his network. The film was released on DVD on 1 September 2016, and is also available on Netflix.


title: Sairat

text: "Sairat" received critical acclaim, with particular praise for Rajguru's performance. Meenakshi Shedde of "Forbes India" called the film "one of the great triumphs of Indian cinema this year", and a rare example of an "Indian director addressing caste issues from first-hand, lived experience, as distinct from that of a privileged, if empathetic, director." Pratik Ghosh of Daily News and Analysis called it a "gem" which "enriched Marathi cinema". He praised Rajguru: ""Sairat" remarkable find is the dusky Rinku Rajguru who is sterling as the fearless Archi." Mihir Bhanage gave a positive review: "The film can be divided into two parts; the first one, a dream and the second one, reality and both strike a chord. But the masterstroke of Manjule the story-teller and director, is the climax."


title: Sairat

text: Harish Wankhede in his review in Tehelka called the film 'a radical entry in the populist-fantasy ‘love story’ genre. However he argues that from the very beginning of the film, the female character takes a dynamic lead and gives the story a feminist-heroic tilt. Archi's courage and power is more male-like, vocal and aggressive than Parshya and his two friends. Her heroic posturing and confident outlook make her the lead hero of the film while pushing others to the periphery as dependent characters. The director allows Archie's character to break the stereotypes of a village girl but on the other hand asserts the power of her feudal-upper caste lineage. However, similar considerations are partially applied to her counterpart Dalit characters.


title: Sairat

text: Ganesh Matkari of "Pune Mirror" described the film as "significant", and not easy to "make or to grasp". Matkari expressed reservations about its length. Divya Unny from OPEN wrote: "The three-hour-long film draws the audience in with plenty of songs and slow-mos, emotion and drama, and then serves us reality right when we aren’t expecting it." Suprateek Chatterjee of "HuffPost" described it as "soaring" and "gut-wrenching", defying convention "even while sticking to established tropes". J. Hurtado of ScreenAnarchy called the film a "singular, astonishing, breathtaking achievement": "You owe it to yourself to experience the beauty, exhaltation, and pain that "Sairat" has to offer". Sowmya Rajendran of The News Minute cited it as a "brave film that gets to the root of the matter": "It could have been just another film made on the subject of forbidden teenage love but the maturity with which Nagraj Manjule has crafted his characters and narrative is breath-taking." Uday Bhatia of "Mint" compared the film to Michael Haneke's "Funny Games"; "both derive their sting from the way they play with audience expectations—raising hopes, dashing them, then raising them again."


title: Sairat

text: Shweta Parande of India.com called Rajguru's performance "impressive". Rochona Majumdar of "The Indian Express" wrote a positive review: "To describe it as a story of inter-caste love that ends brutally would be to do grave injustice to Manjule’s portrayal of a slice of contemporary India." Suhas Bhasme of "The Wire" noted that "Sairat" positions the issues of "caste discrimination and caste-based violence centre stage, which have often been denied or overlooked by mainstream Marathi movies." Baradwaj Rangan called the film a master class in "how to make the audience laugh, cry, swoon, eat out of your hand": ""Sairat" talks not just about the realities of caste and class, but of gender too." According to Ranjib Mazumdar of The Quint, the film refreshingly changes gender roles with its strong female character: "[Archie] is like a body of free water, unaware of limits and customs, flowing with a convinced passion we rarely see in our heroines." S. Shivakumar of "The Hindu" gave the film a positive review, praising Rajguru's performance and Manjule's direction: "Nagraj excels in making the dramatic scenes look realistic, effortlessly manipulating your emotions."


title: Sairat

text: "Sairat" earned on its opening day at the box office. It earned on its second day and on its third day, with a total of on its opening weekend. The film earned in its first week. Its screen count was increased from 400 to 450 in the second week, earning an additional . It earned a total of in its second weekend. The film earned more than in three weeks, and entered its fourth week at more than 525 screens. In addition to Maharashtra, it was released with subtitles in parts of Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Delhi and Goa. "Sairat" also did well on the overseas market. It earned a total of at the US box office in four weeks. The film earned in Maharashtra. Made on a budget of , "Sairat" earned a total of at the end of its theatrical run and is the highest-grossing Marathi film to date.


title: Sairat

text: Rinku Rajguru received the Special Mention at the 63rd National Film Awards for her "effective portrayal of a lively girl who defies societal norms but ultimately has to face the wrath of her family". Ajay–Atul received six awards at the Mirchi Music Awards Marathi 2017: Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Male Vocalist of the Year, Programmer and Arranger of the Year (for "Yad Lagala"), Composer of the Year and Song Recording and Mixing of the Year (for "Sairat Zala Ji"). The film received 11 awards at the 2017 Filmfare Marathi Awards: Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor (Female), Best Music Album, Best Lyrics, Best Playback Singer (Female), Best Playback Singer (Male), Best Debut Actress, Best Debut Male, Best Dialogue and Best Background Score.


title: Sairat

text: After "Sairat" success, the film was remade in several Indian languages. Its first remake was the Punjabi film "Channa Mereya" (2017), directed by Pankaj Batra. It received mixed reviews from critics. Rinku Rajguru reprised her role in the Kannada version, entitled "Manasu Mallige" (2017). The Odia version, "Laila O Laila" (2017) was directed by Susant Mani. The film was also remade in Bengali (an Bangladesh-India joint venture) as "Noor Jahaan" (2018), directed by Abhimanyu Mukherjee. The Hindi remake, "Dhadak" (directed by Shashank Khaitan and produced by Karan Johar), was released on 20 July 2018. As of July 2016, Rockline Venkatesh held the remake rights for Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam-language films.


title: Sairat

text: According to Smitha Verma of "The Financial Express", "Sairat" was a turning point for the Marathi film industry which restored faith in distributors of regional cinema. Its lead actors, Rinku Rajguru and Akash Thosar, became overnight celebrities; in January 2017, the Election Commission of India made them brand ambassadors for National Voters' Day to encourage citizens to vote. Karmala, where the film was shot, was visited by nearly 20,000 tourists within three weeks of its release. Three family reconciliations were reported in Mumbai after the film's release, including that of Sachin Lokhande (who was married to a Muslim girl and waited 12 years for both families to agree). His parents approved his marriage after watching "Sairat". Several fans of the film formed the Sairat Marriage Group, an organisation with nearly 100 volunteers across Maharashtra, to help runaway couples.


title: Casual sex

text: Casual sex is sexual activity that takes place outside a romantic relationship and implies an absence of commitment, emotional attachment, or familiarity between sexual partners. Examples are sexual activity while casually dating, one-night stands, prostitution or swinging.


title: Casual sex

text: A one-night stand is a single sexual encounter between individuals, where at least one of the parties has no immediate intention or expectation of establishing a longer-term sexual or romantic relationship. Anonymous sex is a form of one-night stand or casual sex between people who have very little or no history with each other, often engaging in sexual activity on the same day of their meeting and usually never seeing each other again afterwards.


title: Casual sex

text: The terms "friends with benefits" and "booty call" describe situations in which a person has sex with someone they generally consider a friend or someone they are fairly close to. They are not in an exclusive romantic relationship. The involved parties may have a degree of emotional attachment but do not want, for whatever reason, to have "strings attached".


title: Casual sex

text: A 2011 study, published in "The Journal of Sex Research", found that two out of five single women and one out of five single men in "friends with benefits" relationships hoped that their relationship would eventually turn into a full-fledged romance. This stands in contrast to swinger couples who are already in long-term relationships and are only seeking compatible friends with whom they can engage in recreational sex.


title: Casual sex

text: Recreational sex can take place in an open marriage, among swingers (where sex is viewed as a social occasion), or in an open relationship.


title: Casual sex

text: A "hookup" (colloquial American English) is a casual sexual encounter involving physical pleasure without necessarily including emotional bonding or long-term commitment. It can range from kissing (for example, making out) to other sexual activities. The practice of hooking up became a widespread among young people in the 1980s and 1990s. Researchers say that what differentiates hooking up from casual sex in previous generations of young people is the "virtual disappearance" of dating, which had been dominant from the postwar period onwards. In more modern times, rather than dating, casual sex is the primary path for young people into a relationship. With the use of apps becoming more common it has become easier to hook up or meet others for sexual activity.


title: Casual sex

text: With students, studies have shown that the group most likely to engage in casual sex is white middle- or upper-class heterosexuals. Black and Latino students are less likely to hook up, as are evangelical Christian students and working-class students. Data on gay and lesbian students show mixed results, as some research shows that they engage in hookups at the same rate as heterosexual students, while others suggest that it occurs less frequently because college parties are not always gay-friendly, as most hookups occur at such gatherings.


title: Casual sex

text: A study of hookup culture at the University of Iowa found that waiting to have sex does not contribute to a stronger future relationship. Instead, what mattered most was the goal individuals had going into a relationship. Individuals who started by hooking up tended to develop a full relationship later if that was their goal going in. Another survey revealed that the number of first dates that most college-aged students have been on is about half of the number of hookups that they have had. It has become a common dating practice for people to candidly talk about their casual sex encounters and personal views on the subject as early as the first date or meeting. Another study showed that condoms were used in only 69 out of every 100 penetrative sex hookups.


title: Casual sex

text: Swingers engage in casual sex with others for a variety of reasons. For many, an advantage is the increased quality, quantity and frequency of sex. Some swingers engage in casual sex to add variety to their otherwise conventional sex lives or for curiosity. Swingers who engage in casual sex maintain that sex among swingers is often more deliberative and therefore more honest than infidelity. Some couples see swinging as a healthy outlet and a means to strengthen their relationship. Others regard such activities as merely social and recreational interaction with others. A swinger party or partner-swapping party is a gathering at which individuals or couples in a committed relationship can engage in sexual activities with others as a recreational or social activity. Swinging can take place in various contexts, ranging from a spontaneous sexual activity at an informal social gathering of friends to a regular social gathering in a sex club (or swinger club), private residence, or other pre-arranged location such as a hotel, a resort, or a cruise ship.


title: Casual sex

text: In the United States, in the 1920s, "petting parties", in which petting ("making out" or foreplay) was the main attraction became a popular part of the flapper lifestyle. Because automobile ownership boomed and the number of options for dating venues, such as movie theaters and jazz halls, increased significantly during this time, parental involvement in the courtship process began to decrease. That allowed for casual hookups to become a more common occurrence in the teen and young adult dating experience. Automobiles began to be referred to as "brothels on wheels" for that reason, The young adults of the 1920s found the Victorian era sexual script and moral codes to be oppressive and thus the liberated flapper and vamp personas were born. The emerging movie industry furthered progress in the rebellion against Victorian era morals because films started depicting women owning their sexuality, a trend that has continued into current cinema. Women became sexually liberated through their adopted flapper and vamp identities, as well as through progress made in contraceptive and family planning methods.


title: Casual sex

text: During the sexual revolution in the United States and Europe during the 1960s and 1970s, social attitudes to sexual issues underwent considerable changes. The advent of "the pill" and other forms of birth control, the Women's Liberation movement, and the legalization of abortion in many countries are believed to have led to a wider practice of casual sex. That is also due in part to the younger generation's rejection of their parents' dating and matrimonial ideals and the rise of college party culture. In response to that insurgence in the 1960s, single women were denied access to birth control pills by their healthcare providers. That type of pushback is consistently observed throughout studies of the evolution of American sexual morals and beliefs. Younger generations are encouraged by their elders to engage in sexual activity only if it is within the bounds of marriage and for procreative purposes.


title: Casual sex

text: In the United States, one-time sexual encounters among college-aged students are growing increasingly common; nearly 70% of people in that age group have partaken in casual sex at least once because of their newfound adult identities and freedom to explore their sexualities.


title: Casual sex

text: Data from 2007 to 2017 indicates that there has been a decline in casual sex among young adults. A 2021 study attributed the decline to reduced alcohol consumption, increased video gaming, and a larger share of young adults living with their parents.


title: Casual sex

text: Casual sex is a high-risk activity during COVID-19 and research has shown that many people are limiting contact with sexual partners outside their social bubbles. When public health guidelines exist, the suggestions are fairly consistent: ‘solo sex’ and sex with a housemate (spouse, roommate, etc.) are safest and masks and disinfection (hand washing, shower, etc.) are essential for sex with a partner outside one's social bubble.


title: Casual sex

text: A study in 2019 found that 23% to 33% of women surveyed dated men for a free meal termed "foodie call".


title: Casual sex

text: Research suggests that as many as two thirds to three quarters of American students have casual sex at least once during college. On college campuses, casual sex may occur almost anywhere. The majority of hookups happen at parties. Other common casual sex venues are dorms, frat houses, bars, dance clubs, cars, and public places or wherever is available at the time.


title: Casual sex

text: Collegiate holidays and vacations, especially spring breaks, are times that undergraduates are more likely to purposely seek out casual sexual encounters and experiment with risky behaviors. This is due to the availability of alcohol and uninhibitedness of spring break venues. One study reported that about 30% of collegiate spring breakers, whether they are in a monogamous relationship or not, have penetrative sex with a person they meet during their break. A 1995 study of Canadian students who had traveled to Florida for spring break, found the key elements of a spring break vacation to include a group holiday with friends traveling and rooming together, a perpetual party atmosphere, high alcohol consumption, sexually-suggestive contests and displays, and the perception that casual sex is common. Overall, there was a perception that sexual norms are far more permissive on spring break vacation than at home, providing an atmosphere of greater sexual freedom and the opportunity for engaging in new sexual experiences. Of the 681 students who completed a questionnaire after the break, 15% of males and 13% of females had engaged in casual sex during the break. Nearly 61% of men and 34% of women who had casual sex over the break had slept together within 24 hours of meeting.


title: Casual sex

text: Men and women are found to engage in very similar casual sex conducts, despite popular social beliefs. Most young adults in this age group believe that their peers are having a higher frequency of casual sex than they actually are, and this is due to vocabulary choice. For example, using the term "hookup" denotes that the sexual activity, whether it is vaginal sex, oral sex, or sexual touching, is casual and between unfamiliar partners. However, it is vague and does not detail what specific sexual activities occurred. This is especially distorting towards others' impressions because 98% of college hookups involve kissing, 81% of hookups involve more than kissing, and only 34% of hookups involve penetrative sex. Studies have also linked this common misperception of peer hookup activity to media and pop culture portrayals of casual sexual encounters. Television and movies project distorted depictions of casual sex because they also commonly portray people who have just hooked up as emotionally satisfied and physically pleasured while simultaneously emotionally detached, which is not always the case. According to a 2004 peer-reviewed study published in the "Journal of Marriage and Family" found that women who have more than one premarital sexual relationship have a higher likelihood in the long run of disruptions if ever married, with this effect being the "strongest for women who have multiple premarital coresidential unions". Kahn and London (1991) found that premarital sex and divorce are positively correlated.


title: Casual sex

text: Attitudes to casual sex range from conservative and religious views, the extreme of which may result in imprisonment or even capital punishment for sexual relations outside heterosexual marriage, to liberal (libertarian or libertine) views, the extreme of which is free love.


title: Casual sex

text: The legality of adultery and prostitution varies around the world. In some countries there are laws which prohibit or restrict casual sex.


title: Casual sex

text: In some Muslim-majority countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Kuwait, Malaysia, Morocco, Oman, Mauritania, United Arab Emirates, Sudan, and Yemen, any form of sexual activity outside marriage is illegal.


title: Casual sex

text: Most religions disapprove of sex outside marriage (see religion and sexuality), and the consequences range from very serious to none. Also, marriage is defined in quite different ways in different cultures, for example, with "short-term marriage" (see Nikah mut'ah) a cover for prostitution, or polygamy.


title: Casual sex

text: Although some religious views look upon casual sex negatively, individual views on casual sex vary based on personal traits such as autonomy. Religious people and non-religious people mostly have similar feelings when it comes to having casual sex, with a bigger difference in attitude taking place between men and women.


title: Casual sex

text: Many specialist online dating services or other websites, known as "adult personals" or "adult matching" sites, cater to people looking for a purely sexual relationship without emotional attachments. These can provide a relatively anonymous forum where people who are geographically close but in totally separate work and social circles can make contact.


title: Casual sex

text: Tinder is a free smartphone dating app that boasts over 10 million daily users, making it the most popular dating app for iOS and Android. In this app, users can either swipe right (which indicates interest) or swipe left (which indicates disinterest) on other users in hopes of matching each other. If both users swipe right on one another, they are a match, and messaging can be initiated between parties. This app is used for a variety of reasons, one of which is casual hookups. Men are more likely than women to use Tinder to seek out casual sexual encounters. This is attributed to men, in comparison to women, placing sexual pleasure at a higher level of importance and using social networking sites to fulfill this need. However, overall, more users are motivated to use it to find romance rather than sex. Despite this, there is a social concern as some believe that the app encourages hookups between users.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Born and raised in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture, Hamasaki moved to Tokyo at 14 in 1993 to pursue a career in singing and acting. In 1998, Hamasaki released her debut single "Poker Face" and debut major-label album "A Song for XX". The album debuted at the top of the Oricon charts and remained there for five weeks, selling over a million copies. This rapid rise to fame is typically attributed, among other factors, to her unique style of lyric writing; this would continue to be a defining aspect of her work, listeners praising her poetic way of conveying relatable subjects. Her next ten albums shipped over a million copies in Japan, with her third, "Duty," selling nearly three million. "A Best", her first compilation album, further established her position as a crowning artist with more than four million copies sold in Japan.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: After "A Best", Hamasaki went on to experiment with her music style and lyricism, incorporating English into her work from "Rainbow" onwards. Later albums would range from electronic dream-pop to rock genres, with Hamasaki herself saying she does not feel tied to follow music trends, instead focusing on what she enjoys and wants to create "whether it is trendy or not". This perspective would continue to resonate with the public throughout her career, with her albums consistently placing in the top five of the Oricon charts to present day.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki has sold over 60.94 million units as of 2019, making her the best-selling Japanese solo artist in history. Hamasaki has several domestic record achievements for her singles, such as the most number-one hits by a female artist (38); the most consecutive number-one hits by a solo artist (25), and the most million-sellers. From 1999 to 2010, Hamasaki had at least two singles each year topping the charts. Hamasaki is also the first female recording artist to have ten studio albums since her debut to top the Oricon, and the first artist to have a number-one album for 13 consecutive years since her debut. In addition to this, Hamasaki's remix albums "Super Eurobeat Presents Ayu-ro Mix" and "Ayu-mi-x II Version Non-Stop Mega Mix", are recognized as two of the best selling remix albums of all time worldwide.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Born in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture, Hamasaki was raised as an only child by her mother and grandmother. Her father had left the family when she was three and never again came into contact with her. Hamasaki's mother worked to support the family, so Hamasaki was primarily taken care of by her grandmother. She described herself as a "tomboy" when she was a teenager, and as a "strange kid" who "liked to be alone".


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: At age seven, Hamasaki began modeling for local institutions, such as banks, to supplement the family's income. She continued this career path by leaving her family at fourteen and moving to Tokyo as a model under SOS, a talent agency. Her modeling career did not last long; SOS eventually deemed her too short for a model and transferred her to Sun Music, a musicians' agency. Under the name of "Ayumi", Hamasaki released a rap EP, "Nothing from Nothing", on the Nippon Columbia label in 1995. She was dismissed from the label when the album failed to chart on the Oricon. After this failure, Hamasaki took up acting and starred in B-movies such as "Ladys Ladys!! Sōcho Saigo no Hi" and television dramas such as "Miseinen", which were poorly received by the public. From August 1995 to March 1996, Hamasaki also co-hosted the SoundLink "magazine" "Hōkago no Ōsama" ("After-school King") for the Nintendo Satellaview once a week with Shigeru Izumiya. Growing dissatisfied with her job, Hamasaki quit acting and moved in with her mother, who had recently moved to Tokyo.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki initially earned good grades in junior high school. Eventually, she lost faith in the curriculum, thinking that the subjects were of no use to her. Her grades worsened as she refused to put her mind to her studies. While living in Tokyo, she attempted to further her studies at Horikoshi Gakuen, a high school for the arts, but dropped out in the first year. Hamasaki did not attend school or have a job, so she spent much of her time shopping at Shibuya boutiques and dancing at Velfarre, an Avex-owned disco club.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: At Velfarre, she was introduced to her future producer Max Matsuura through a friend. After hearing Hamasaki sing karaoke, Matsuura offered her a recording deal, but Hamasaki suspected ulterior motives and turned the offer down. He persisted and succeeded in recruiting her for the Avex label in the following year. Hamasaki started vocal training but skipped most of her classes after finding her instructors too rigid and the classes dull. When she mentioned this to Matsuura, he sent her to New York to train her vocals under another method. While abroad, Hamasaki frequently corresponded with Matsuura and impressed him with her style of writing. On her return to Japan, he suggested that she try writing her own lyrics.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki made her debut under Avex at 19 on April 8, 1998, with the single "Poker Face". It—and the following four singles—were not major hits; however, each release was better than the last, thus gradually increasing her exposure and presence on the market. Hamasaki's debut album, "A Song for ××" (released on January 1, 1999), was "unassuming": the tracks, composed by Yasuhiko Hoshino, Akio Togashi (of Da Pump), and Mitsuru Igarashi (of Every Little Thing), were "cautious" pop-rock songs. However, Hamasaki's lyrics, introspective observations about her feelings and experiences that focused on loneliness and individualism, resonated with the Japanese public. The songs gained Hamasaki a growing following, and the release of the album was a success: it topped the Oricon charts for five weeks and sold over a million copies. For her achievements, she earned a Japan Gold Disc Award for "Best New Artist of the Year".


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: With "Ayu-mi-x" (March 1999), the first of a series of remix albums, Hamasaki began moving beyond the pop-rock of "A Song for ××" and began to incorporate different styles including trance, dance, and orchestra. Hamasaki began to experiment with different musical styles in her singles as well, releasing dance tunes and ballads as well as remixes on the singles which spanned reggae and house. The singles were milestones: Hamasaki earned her first number-one single ("Love: Destiny") and first million-selling single ("A"). Her second studio album, "Loveppears" (November 1999), not only topped the Oricon charts, it sold nearly 3 million copies. The album also showcased a change in Hamasaki's lyrics. Though the lyrics of "Loveppears" still dealt with loneliness, many of them were written from a third-person perspective. In support of "Loveppears", she held her first tour, "Ayumi Hamasaki Concert Tour 2000 A".


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: A Film for XX is the first video clip collection by Ayumi Hamasaki, it was released on September 15, 1999.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: From April to June 2000, Hamasaki released the "Trilogy", a series of singles consisting of "Vogue", "Far Away", and "Seasons". The lyrics of these songs focused on hopelessness, a reflection of Hamasaki's disappointment that she had not expressed herself thoroughly in any of her previous lyrics and a sense of shame of her public image. Likewise, many of the songs she wrote for her subsequent studio album, "Duty" (September 2000), involved feelings of loneliness, chaos, confusion, and the burden of her responsibilities. She described her feelings after the writing as "unnatural" and "nervous". The musical style was darker as well; in contrast with "Loveppears", "Duty" was a rock-influenced album with only one dance song, "Audience". "Duty" resonated with fans: the "Trilogy" were "hit singles" ("Seasons" was a million-seller), and the album became Hamasaki's best-selling studio album. At the end of 2000, Hamasaki held her first New Year countdown concert at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In 2001, Avex forced Hamasaki to release her first compilation album, "A Best", on March 28, putting the album in "competition" with Hikaru Utada's second studio album, "Distance". The "competition" between the two singers (which both claimed was merely a creation of their record companies and the media) was supposedly the reason for the success of the albums; both sold over 5 million copies. In support of "Duty" and "A Best", Hamasaki held a tour of Japan's domes, making her one of few "top-drawer" Japanese artists to hold a concert at the Tokyo Dome.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: "I Am..." (January 2002) marked several milestones for Hamasaki. Hamasaki increased her control over her music by composing all of the songs on the album under the pseudonym "Crea", of which the 2000 single "M" was the first. "Connected" (November 2002) and "A Song Is Born" (December 2001) were the exceptions. "I Am..." also showed evolution in Hamasaki's lyrical style: it was a retreat from the themes of "loneliness and confusion" of some of her earlier songs. Moved by the September 11 attacks, Hamasaki revised her vision of "I Am...", focusing on issues such as faith and world peace. "A Song Is Born", in particular, was directly influenced by the events. The single, a duet with Keiko Yamada, was released as part of Avex's non-profit Song Nation project, which raised money for charity. She also dropped the planned cover and opted instead to be portrayed as a "peace muse", explaining,


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: The outlook inspired by the September 11 attacks extended beyond "I Am...". In 2002, Hamasaki held her first concert outside Japan, at the MTV Asia music awards ceremony in Singapore, a move interpreted as the beginning of a campaign prompted by a sluggish Japanese market. At the ceremony, she received the award for "Most Influential Japanese Singer in Asia". In support of "I Am...", Hamasaki held two tours, "Ayumi Hamasaki Arena Tour 2002 A" and "Ayumi Hamasaki Stadium Tour 2002 A". In November 2002, as "Ayu", she released her first European single, "Connected", a trance song from "I Am..." composed by DJ Ferry Corsten. It was released in Germany on the Drizzly label. Hamasaki continued to release singles (all of them remixes of previously released songs) in Germany on Drizzly until 2005.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In April 2002, Hamasaki released the single "Free & Easy". In collaboration with the magazine "Free&Easy", Hamasaki also released "Hamasaki Republic", a photobook that was actually a special issue of "Free&Easy", in conjunction with the single. "H", Hamasaki's next single, became the best-selling single of 2002. Hamasaki released her last single of 2002, "Voyage", on September 26. In lieu of a regular-length music video, the short film "Tsuki ni Shizumu", starring Hamasaki, was created for "Voyage" and was released at a select theater in Shibuya. Hamasaki's next studio album, "Rainbow" (December 2002) was her first to use English lyrics. After performing at the 2002 MTV Asia music awards, Hamasaki felt that by writing only Japanese lyrics, she was not able to bring her "message" to other countries. Realizing that English was a "common global language", she included English lyrics in three songs. The album was stylistically diverse; Hamasaki included rock- and trip hop-influenced tracks as well as "summery", "up-tempo" and "grand gothic" songs and experimented with new techniques such as gospel choruses and the yells of an audience. The lyrics were also varied: themes in the album included freedom, the struggles of women, and "a summer that ends in sadness".


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In 2003, Hamasaki released three singles, "&", "Forgiveness", and "No Way to Say". To celebrate the release of her thirtieth single ("Forgiveness"), Hamasaki held the "A Museum" concert at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium. Her mini-album "Memorial Address" (December 2003) was her first album to be released in CD+DVD format in addition to the regular CD-only format, a decision that came from her increased interest in the direction of her music videos. Like her previous albums, "Memorial Address" topped the Oricon chart and sold over a million copies. Sales of Hamasaki's singles began to wane. Although all three of the album's singles topped the Oricon charts, "&" was Hamasaki's last single to sell over 500,000 copies.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: By the end of her "Arena Tour 2003–2004", Hamasaki had grown dissatisfied with her position in Avex: she felt that the company was treating her as a product instead of a person. Along with her dissatisfaction over her last two studio albums (which she thought had been rushed), this led her to begin work on "My Story" (December 2004) early. In contrast with her previous albums, "My Story" had no set theme, nor did Hamasaki attempt to write "something good" or even "something that would give people hope"; rather, she simply wrote freely and honestly. As a result, the album contained mostly autobiographical lyrics about her emotions and reminiscences of her career. She approached the composition of the music with the same freedom as the lyrics, with the album's notable rock overtones expressing her liking for rock music. She was so pleased with the result that she declared "My Story" the first album she felt satisfied with. "My Story" and its singles, "Moments", "Inspire", and "Carols", all topped the weekly Oricon charts; moreover, with sales of over 1,100,000 units, "My Story" became Hamasaki's last million-selling studio album according to Oricon. From January to April 2005, Hamasaki held the nationwide "My Story" arena tour, her first album-based tour. Also in January, she began working with Lamoureux Orchestra to create "My Story Classical", a classical version of "My Story"; the album served as an "alter-ego" of the mostly aggressive "My Story". The orchestra also created a classical version of "A Song Is Born", which was included on "My Story Classical" and which Hamasaki performed at the opening of the Expo 2005.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: "(Miss)understood" (January 2006), Hamasaki's seventh studio album, showed new musical directions. Wanting to sing a tune like those of the group Sweetbox, Hamasaki obtained the permission of Sweetbox composer Roberto "Geo" Rosan to use demo songs he had intended to use in Sweetbox's upcoming album. She edited the songs to fit her personal vision, rewriting the lyrics and rearranging some of the songs. The result was more musically diverse than the previous album; "(Miss)understood" included ballads, funk, dance-pop, R&B, and rock songs. All of "(Miss)understood" singles reached the top of the Oricon; "Bold & Delicious" became Hamasaki's twenty-fifth number-one single, tying her with Seiko Matsuda for the record of most number-one singles by a solo female artist. Though "(Miss)understood" also reached the top of the charts, Oricon stated that it sold fewer than a million copies—Hamasaki's first studio album to do so. In support of the album, Hamasaki held the "(Miss)understood" arena tour, which spanned three months with thirty concerts, from Saitama on March 11, 2006, to Yoyogi on June 11, 2006.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki's first single of 2006, "Startin'", became Hamasaki's twenty-sixth number-one single, setting a new record for most number-one singles held by a solo female artist. The subsequent studio album, "Secret", was released in November 2006. "Secrets" was, appropriately, the theme of the album; the album also explored strong female figures, love, and sadness; songs depicted the artist's struggles and were written to encourage women. Although "Secret" was originally intended to be a mini-album, Hamasaki "began brimming with things to say" while producing the album and wrote five more songs. The album consisted mostly of rock songs and ballads; to complement these, Hamasaki experimented with new vocal techniques. The album also topped the Oricon weekly charts, making Hamasaki the only artist to have eight consecutive number-one studio albums.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On February 28, 2007, Hamasaki released "A Best 2", a pair of compilation albums containing songs from "I Am..." to "(Miss)understood". The two versions, "" and "", debuted at the first and second positions on the Oricon weekly charts, making Hamasaki the first female artist in 36 years to hold the top two positions on any Oricon album chart. At the end of 2007, the pair became Japan's fifth and seventh best-selling albums of the year respectively. In support of "A Best 2" and "Secret", Hamasaki held the four-month-long "Tour of Secret" from March to the end of June. Her foreign fanbase highly anticipated the concerts, and tickets for the Taipei and Hong Kong performances sold out in less than three hours.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In July 2007, Hamasaki released her first single in over a year, "Glitter/Fated". A short film, "Distance Love", was used as the music video for "Glitter" and "Fated". The film, shot in Hong Kong, co-starred Hong Kong actor Shawn Yue as Hamasaki's romantic interest. "Glitter/Fated" and the following single "Talkin' 2 Myself" reached the top of their respective charts, continuing Hamasaki's streak of number-one singles. In December, Hamasaki released her first digital-only single, "Together When...", which topped the RIAJ's monthly download chart. Unlike its predecessors, the writing of Hamasaki's ninth studio album, "Guilty" (January 2008), was not an emotional experience for her, nor did it have a set theme. However, she said later that the album's tracks appeared to tell a story. Most of the songs were dark; the album had a notable rock tinge. It contained some upbeat dance tracks and ballads, though the latter also had rock overtones. "Guilty" peaked at the number-two position on the weekly Oricon charts, making it Hamasaki's first studio album not to reach the top and ended Hamasaki's streak of eight consecutive number-one albums. "Guilty" was later released as a digital album in 26 countries outside Japan, 19 of them Western nations. That, along with Hamasaki's decision to employ western DJs such as The Young Punx, Coldcut, Para One and Armand Van Helden for her 2008 remix albums "" and "", has been interpreted as her first major step into the global market.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In April 2008, to commemorate her tenth anniversary in Avex, Hamasaki released the single "Mirrorcle World"; it topped the Oricon, making Hamasaki the only female solo artist to have a number-one single every year for ten consecutive years. Hamasaki also held her second tour of Asia, "", to celebrate her tenth anniversary. From April until June, she toured Japan, holding seventeen concerts. On September 10, 2008, Hamasaki released "", a compilation album that includes the A-sides of all her singles along with previously unreleased footage from her A-nation concerts, which became the 8th best selling album of 2008.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki's next two singles, "Days/Green" (December 2008) and "Rule/Sparkle" (February 2009), continued Hamasaki's streak of number-one singles. "Rule" is used as the international theme song for the film "Dragonball Evolution". The subsequent studio album, "Next Level", was released on March 25, 2009, in several formats: CD, CD+DVD, 2CD+DVD and a two-gigabyte USB flash drive. Sonically, "Next Level" was mainly an electronic dance album. "Next Level" reached the top of the Oricon charts, making Hamasaki the only artist to have a number-one album every year for eleven years in a row since her debut. However, the album was only certified double platinum, making it Hamasaki's lowest-selling studio album to that date.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On August 12, 2009, Hamasaki released her 46th single, "Sunrise/Sunset (Love Is All)". "Sunrise (Love Is All)", one of the A-sides, is being used as the opening theme song for the Japanese television drama "Dandy Daddy?". The single reached the top of the weekly charts, making it her 21st consecutive (33rd total) number-one single. "Sunrise/Sunset" is also her 44th single to enter the Top 10, making Hamasaki the artist with the most Top 10 singles ever. Hamasaki's third single of the year, "You Were.../Ballad", was released on December 29, 2009.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki's eleventh studio album "Rock 'n' Roll Circus" was released on April 14, 2010. Though the album contained a few "powerful and melodramatic gothic rock" tracks, it was mainly "pure and classic J-pop", with pop-rock songs and ballads. The album topped the charts, making Hamasaki the first female solo artist in twenty years to have ten number-one original studio albums. Hamasaki also began expanding her online presence, setting up accounts on MySpace, Ustream, and Twitter. In July, entertainment company Livespire announced that Hamasaki's would be shown in 3D at Toho cinemas nationwide beginning on August 28.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On July 14, Hamasaki released her forty-eighth single, "Moon/Blossom". The single was released as the first of a three-part project to celebrate her yet-unreleased fiftieth single. The two other singles in the project (her forty-ninth and fiftieth singles respectively), "Crossroad" and "L", were released within a week of each other, "Crossroad" on September 22 and "L" on September 29. "Crossroad" was composed by Tetsuya Komuro and its coupling was her cover version of Komuro's band TM Network's 1988 song "Seven Days War", which was her first cover of a male song. The three singles all topped the Oricon, becoming Hamasaki's twenty-third, twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth consecutive number-one singles and setting a new record for the most consecutive number-one singles by any female artist (solo or group) as well as by any solo artist.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On December 22, Hamasaki released her twelfth original studio album, "Love Songs". On the same day, Naoya Urata of AAA released his debut solo single "Dream On". The song, which featured Hamasaki, was written and produced by her, marking the first record she produced for another singer. "Love Songs" and "Dream On" both reached the top spots on their respective Oricon charts. "Love Songs" became Hamasaki's fourth consecutive and seventeenth total number-one album. The album also marked Hamasaki's thirteenth consecutive year with a number-one album, breaking her previous record.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In February 2011, it was announced that her arena tour of the year, "Hotel Love Songs", would start in April. Shortly after the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami hit, it was announced that the tour was rescheduled to start in late May, and the tour was renamed to "Power of Music". Deeply affected by the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami devastation, Hamasaki decided to collaborate with fashion magazine, "Vivi", with the sale of charity shirts and the profits going to help the victims in the devastation.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On April 20, 2011, Hamasaki simultaneously released four new remix albums, "Ayu-mi-x 7":"House", "Acoustic Orchestra", "Trance 4", "Ayu-ro Mix 4", and a "Limited Complete Box Set", which were also released internationally on iTunes. On that same day, Hamasaki also released "" and "" which topped the weekly chart at No. 1 and No. 2 respectively. The simultaneous releases made Hamasaki the first artist ever to have 4 albums in Oricon's top 10 and also the first artist to hold 2 top positions in the Oricon DVD chart. Their original release date of March 30 was postponed due to the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami and was pushed back to April 20 instead. On April 21, 2011, it was announced that she would perform in a-nation 10th Anniversary for Life Charge & Go! On May 4, it was announced that she broke another record – the female artist with the highest DVD sales with 2,313,000.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On August 31, Hamasaki released her second mini album "Five", her first since "Memorial Address" in 2003. This was her first album to have no singles released. "Five" topped the Oricon Charts for 2 consecutive weeks, her first to do so since "(Miss)understood". The lead song, "Progress", was used as a theme song for the videogame, "Tales of Xillia". The album also featured collaborations with singers Juno and Naoya Urata from AAA.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: This album managed to be certified Gold by RIAJ, making Hamasaki's first album not to be certified Platinum. "Complete Clip Box 1998–2011", consisting all her music videos from her first single, "Poker Face" until her latest mini-album, "Five", was released on January 1, 2012. "How Beautiful You Are" was later released as the theme song for a drama "Saigo Kara Nibanme no Koi", and also Hamasaki's second digital single (55th single overall) on February 8. Hamasaki described the song as a mid-tempo ballad, containing "feelings of gratitude towards another person".


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In 2012, The International 3D Society announced the winners of its 2012 3D Creative Arts Awards with Hamasaki receiving an award for "Electronic Broadcast Media (Television) – Live Event" for her "A3D Ayumi Hamasaki Arena Tour 2009 A: Next Level" tour.On March 21, Hamasaki released her thirteenth studio album, "Party Queen", which was recorded entirely in London. Its title track is inspired by the British slang of being a 'party queen' - someone who is partying hard and looks to be doing well, but is emotionally self-destructing. The album peaked at number two on the Oricon charts, becoming her second studio album to do so after 2008's "Guilty". The album spanned themes of grief, isolation, addiction, and regret, with the singer using upbeat dance beats on key tracks to represent the contrast of fame, glitz, and glamor with personal inner turmoil; she would later comment that the album cover includes callbacks to her previous work, "Duty", as if "(she) never succeeded in leaving the cage" originally depicted on the latter's own album art. During the press tour for "Party Queen", Hamasaki would say that songwriting had been so easy for her during this era, that at one point she had considered making the release her first double album.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On August 6, 2012, Hamasaki released her sixth compilation album "A Summer Best". It included two new songs which were digitally released for the promotion of the album: the TRF cover, "Happening Here", and "You & Me".


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In September 2012, it was announced that, to commemorate Hamasaki's 15th anniversary in the music industry on April 8, 2013, she would be releasing new material for five consecutive months starting on the 8th day of November, 2012, until the 8th of March, 2013. The first releases were two mini albums, "Love" and "Again", which were put on sale on the 8th of November and December, respectively. The third release for the 8th of January was her compilation album "A Classical", which included classical arrangements of previously released songs. The fourth release was Hamasaki's 14th studio album, "Love Again", which compiled the songs included in the two previous mini albums and debuted atop the weekly Oricon Albums Chart. The fifth and final release was the DVD/Blu-ray of her "", released in March.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In April 2013 Hamasaki began her "", which lasted for four months until the end of July. Its setlist was chosen by fans through online voting, and was later released as her first live album CD on September 18. The DVD and Blu-ray versions were released on October 30, 2013.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On December 25, 2013, Hamasaki released "Feel the Love/Merry-go-round", her first physical single in three years. "Feel the Love" was composed by Tetsuya Komuro and produced by Dj Hello Kitty, while "Merry-go-round" was produced by M-Flo's Taku Takahashi and features rapper Verbal. Both songs are heavily influenced by Western dance-pop music.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In January 2014, it was announced that a new song entitled "Pray" was chosen to be the theme song for the anime film "Osamu Tezuka's Budda 2—Owarinaki Tabi", which premiered on February 8, 2014, in Japan. The song was released digitally on January 27, 2014. Another new song, entitled "Hello New Me", was presented as theme song for a new season of Fuji TV drama "Zoku—Saigo Kara Nibanme no Koi." which started broadcasting in April, 2014. The song was released digitally on May 14, 2014. From May 30 to July 6, 2014, Hamasaki held her "" tour, on which she offered 11 concerts at 3 locations: Nagoya, Osaka and Tokyo. On this tour, Hamasaki abandoned for the first time the traditional format of her previous concerts and presented an uninterrupted, shorter show, on which she also debuted as an aerial acrobat.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Hamasaki's fifteenth studio album, entitled "Colours", was released on July 2, 2014. The album featured internationally renowned producers, such as RedOne, Rodney Jerkins, Armin van Buuren and Fedde le Grand, making the first time in Hamasaki's career in which primarily Western producers were appointed to produce one of her studio albums. "Colours" peaked at number five on its first week on the Oricon charts, becoming Hamasaki's first studio album to debut out of the Top 3. However, it also marked a new record for her, as with this achievement she became the second artist in Japan's history—after Yumi Matsutoya—to have 47 albums within the Top 10 of the charts.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In September 2014, Hamasaki released two recut singles from "Colours": "Terminal" and "XOXO" on the PlugAir platform. The single was released under Linkin Park's Machine Shop Records for the American release.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On October 18, 2014, Hamasaki performed as the closing act in the A-Nation premium concert held at the Marina Bay Sands' MasterCard Theatres in Singapore. This was the second time performing in Singapore after her MTV Asia Awards performance 12 years ago.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On November 2, 2014, Hamasaki announced through her official Facebook page that she had started recording new material composed by Tetsuya Komuro, Kunio Tago and Tetsuya Yukumi for a "winter ballad trilogy" single. On November 6, 2014, the title of the single was revealed to be "Zutto.../Last Minute/Walk", and its release date was set for December 24, 2014. It would later peak at number five on the Oricon charts. With this achievement, Hamasaki became the first solo artist in Japan's history to have 50 singles within the Top 10 of the Oricon charts. As for artists in general, Hamasaki became the third artist with more Top ten singles since Oricon's foundation in 1968—being surpassed by groups Morning Musume and SMAP, with 57 and 53 Top ten singles respectively


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On November 10, 2014, it was announced that Hamasaki would be collaborating in a tribute cover album for Hikaru Utada, entitled "Utada Hikaru no Uta", to be released on December 9, 2014. For the album she contributed with a cover of Utada's 1998 single "Movin' on Without You", which was arranged by the RedOne production team. This was reportedly the track Hamasaki insisted she cover, with her later stating that it was the first song she had in mind since being told of the project.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In December 2014 Hamasaki announced that she would be not attending the New Year show Kōhaku Uta Gassen for the first time in 15 years. She explained her decision stating that she wanted to lower her responsibilities and things she felt pressured to do, in order to focus on the projects she had for her career, mainly regarding her plans to expand her influence throughout Asia.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On February 15, 2015, Hamasaki made a surprise guest appearance during Singaporean singer JJ Lin's concert in Taipei, Taiwan. They performed a duet version of Hamasaki's 2000 single "Seasons", and announced that JJ Lin would be producing a song for Hamasaki's next studio album, "A One". "A One" was released on April 8, 2015, including singles "Zutto...", "Last Minute", "Walk", Utada's cover "Movin' on Without You", and JJ Lin-produced song "The Gift", for which a promotional music video was also made.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: Between April and July 2015, Hamasaki embarked on her "" tour throughout Japan, which was planned as an expanded version of her previous Countdown Live concerts held in late 2014. The tour consisted of a 34-song setlist show with a duration of 3 hours and 45 minutes, her longest concert held to date. At the final show of the aforementioned tour, Hamasaki announced that she would start another tour in September, this time exclusively for members of her official fan club, TeamAyu. The "TA Limited Live Tour", Hamasaki's first fan club exclusive tour in twelve years after 2003, began on September 29, 2015, and included a total of 16 concerts at 7 venues.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In April 2015, a new song entitled "Step by Step" began to be broadcast as the theme song of NHK TV drama "Bijo to Danshi", and was subsequently released as a digital single on July 1. It became the lead single for the later released "Sixxxxxx" on August 5, 2015. The mini album featured six new songs, including drama theme song "Step by Step", and "Sayonara", a new song featuring Taiwanese boyband SpeXial. "Sayonara" became #1 on digital downloads charts in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia, according to KK BOX, Asia's largest digital distribution site.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In addition, Hamasaki participated as one of the headliners of the A-Nation Stadium Fes 2015 held on August 30 at the Ajinomoto Stadium, where she also performed a cover of Globe's hit ballad song "Departures". Later in this same year, Hamasaki recorded a cover of Globe's "Many Classic Moments", which was included in the group's tribute album released on December 16, 2015.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: On December 23, 2015, Hamasaki released a winter-themed concept album entitled "", which included songs from her previous two albums "A One" and "Sixxxxxx" remixed with Classical arrangements, and one new song "Winter Diary", which was produced by Tetsuya Komuro. Hamasaki promoted the album by starting an Instagram account, that originally was stated to only be open until the end of January 2016. She shared pictures of the music video shooting of "Winter Diary" recorded in Taiwan, and also the preparations for her 2015–2016 countdown live concerts.


title: Ayumi Hamasaki

text: In December 2015, Hamasaki also contributed with the lyrics of "Diary", using her past composer name of Crea, to the debut single of Micchie. Micchie's single was released on December 23, 2015, through Nippon Crown.