title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: With his impressive victory over Koscheck, Alves was on a 7-fight win streak, winning 9 of his past 10 bouts. After consecutive dominant performances against Parisyan, Hughes and Koscheck, Dana White announced that Alves had earned a title shot against the winner of the welterweight title-fight at UFC 94. After Georges St-Pierre defended his title at UFC 94, Alves entered the ring to congratulate him. St. Pierre said that he was looking forward to facing Alves in the cage. Thiago Alves fought Georges St-Pierre for the welterweight title at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas on 11 July 2009 at UFC 100. During the fight, Alves was taken down a total of ten times. Although he showed potential on his feet and put in a resilient performance on the ground, continually getting back up, he was ultimately subjected to a clinic put on by St. Pierre and being outwrestled in all five rounds ultimately losing via unanimous decision (50–45, 50–44, and 50–45).


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was scheduled to face Jon Fitch at UFC 107 in a rematch of their bout at UFC Ultimate Fight Night 5. However Alves suffered a knee injury, forcing him to withdrawfrom the fight. Alves was then scheduled to face Fitch on 27 March 2010 at UFC 111. However, on 25 March, Alves was taken off the card due to the discovery of an arteriovenous malformation in the brain from a pre fight CAT scan. Alves had the corrective surgery on 31 March 2010 at Roosevelt Hospital in New York. He took leave of absence, staying in New Jersey with his wife, Melissa Farrand Alves, and was expected to fight again during the summer of 2010.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: The Alves/Fitch rematch, originally slated for UFC 107, then UFC 111, then UFC 115, finally took place at UFC 117. This fight was confirmed to be the number one contendership for the welterweight championship (to fight the winner of the St-Pierre/Koscheck bout). Alves again failed to make weight, weighing in at 171.5 lb, meaning he had to give up 20% of his fight purse. Alves would go on to lose to Fitch via unanimous decision. Dana White stated in the post fight press conference that Alves could be moving to the middleweight division.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves faced John Howard on 11 December 2010 at UFC 124. Alves won by a dominant unanimous decision in one of his best performances in the UFC, out-striking and out-wrestling Howard and eventually getting a knockdown in the third round with a clean punch.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Following the victory over Howard, Alves lost to Rick Story on 28 May 2011 at UFC 130 via unanimous decision. Alves had a slow start to both the first and second round, during which Story pressured Alves against the cage but was unable to land any significant damage or takedowns. Alves managed to find his rhythm and began landing clean strikes that resulted in him winning the third round, however ended up losing 29–28 on all three judges' scorecards.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves faced promotional newcomer Papy Abedi at UFC 138. After exchanging hard leg and body kicks, and showing good takedown defence, Alves was able to land a two-punch combination that dropped Abedi, securing full mount and opening up a cut due to elbows. Displaying improved ground control, Alves defeated Abedi via submission (rear-naked choke) at 3:32 of round one to secure his first submission victory in the UFC (and first submission victory in his MMA career that wasn't due to strikes).


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves faced Martin Kampmann on 3 March 2012 at UFC on FX 2. After avoiding takedowns and outstriking Kampmann for the majority of the fight, Alves was submitted in the final minute of the bout after being caught in a guillotine while trying to secure a takedown.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Japanese superstar Yoshihiro Akiyama on 21 July 2012 at . However, Akiyama was forced out of the bout with an injury and replaced by Siyar Bahadurzada. Then on 1 June, Alves pulled out of the bout citing an injury and was replaced by Chris Clements.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Matt Brown on 17 August 2013 at UFC Fight Night 26. However, Alves pulled out of the bout citing another injury and was replaced by Mike Pyle.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: After over two years away from the sport due to a litany of injuries and lengthy rehabilitations, Alves returned to face Seth Baczynski on 19 April 2014 at UFC on Fox 11. He won the fight via unanimous decision. The win also earned Alves his second "Fight of the Night" bonus award.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Jordan Mein on 23 August 2014 at UFC Fight Night 49. However, Alves pulled out of the bout citing yet another injury, and was replaced by Brandon Thatch. Subsequently, Thatch also pulled out of the bout with Mein citing a toe injury. The bout between Alves and Mein would later be rescheduled and eventually took place on 31 January 2015 at UFC 183. Alves won the fight via TKO in the second round, after hurting Mein with a brutal kick in the solar plexus and capitalizing with subsequent punches. This win also won Alves his first "Performance of the Night" bonus award.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Fighting twice in a year for the first time since 2011, Alves returned to face Carlos Condit on 30 May 2015 in the main event at UFC Fight Night 67. Alves lost the fight via TKO after the cage-side doctor ended the contest between the second and third round due to the amount of damage Alves had taken.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Benson Henderson on 28 November 2015 at UFC Fight Night 79. However, on 14 November, Alves pulled out the bout citing injury and was replaced by Jorge Masvidal.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Al Iaquinta in a lightweight bout on 12 November 2016 at UFC 205. However, Iaquinta announced on 19 September that he would not be taking the fight due to a contract dispute with the promotion. Alves was rescheduled to face Jim Miller at the event. At the weigh-ins, Alves missed weight by nearly seven pounds, weighing in at 162.6 lbs. Miller, who was already on weight, had to rehydrate to keep their weight difference within 7 pounds. Because of that, he came in at 157.6 lbs and the bout proceeded at catchweight. New York State Athletic Commission and UFC officials indicated that Alves must not weigh more than 173 lbs the day of the fight or the fight would be cancelled. As a result, Alves was fined 20% of his fight purse, which went to Miller. He lost the fight by unanimous decision.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: After the failed attempt at lightweight, Alves returned to welterweight and faced Patrick Côté on 8 April 2017 at UFC 210. He won the fight by unanimous decision.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Mike Perry on 16 September 2017 at UFC Fight Night 116. However, Alves pulled out of the fight on 13 September for undisclosed reasons.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was scheduled to face Zak Cummings on 14 January 2018 at . On 13 January 2018, it was announced that Cummings injured his head after a bathroom slip and the bout against Alves was cancelled.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves faced promotional newcomer Curtis Millender on 18 February 2018 at UFC Fight Night 126. He lost the fight via technical knockout in the second round.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves faced promotional newcomer Alexey Kunchenko on 15 September 2018 at UFC Fight Night 136. He lost the fight by unanimous decision.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves was expected to face Gunnar Nelson on 28 September 2019 at UFC Fight Night 160. However, Alves pulled out of the fight in mid-September due to undisclosed injury.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves faced Tim Means on 7 December 2019 at UFC on ESPN 7. He lost the fight via a submission in round one.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: On 22 January 2020, news surfaced that Alves had signed a three-fight contract with Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship. He was expected to make his promotional debut against Phil Baroni, however Baroni was removed from the card as the organization could not reach him in timely fashion. Instead, he made his promotional debut against former contender from The Ultimate Fighter, Julian Lane, at in Daytona Beach, FL on 11 September 2020 Alves won the fight by split decision.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Alves then faced Ulysses Diaz for the inaugural middleweight championship at BKFC 18. He claimed the championship via technical knockout after the ringside doctor stopped the bout after the third round.


title: Thiago Alves (fighter)

text: Aside from his mixed martial arts athlete and coach careers, Alves is currently in the process of becoming a police officer in Florida.


title: Go Doo-shim

text: A native of Jeju Island, Go Doo-shim made her acting debut in 1972 and since then she had a prolific career on television, film and theater.


title: Go Doo-shim

text: Best known for playing the quintessential devoted, self-sacrificing mother figure on TV, Go has won the Daesang (the highest acting prize in Korea) a record number of seven times: for her performances in the dramas "Fetters of Love" (1989), "The Dancing Gayageum" (1990), "My Husband's Woman" (1992), "Virtue" (2000), "Ode to the Han River" (2004), "More Beautiful Than a Flower" (2004) and All About My Mom (2015). Go was reported to be the top earner among all actors and entertainers who appeared on the KBS network in 2004, with total earnings of .


title: Go Doo-shim

text: She also received acclaim for more atypical roles in the films "Jealousy" (1983), "My Mother, the Mermaid" (2004), "Family Ties" (2006), and "Good Morning President" (2009).


title: Go Doo-shim

text: To celebrate her 40th anniversary in the entertainment industry, Go returned to the stage in a 2012 production of Richard Alfieri's "Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks".


title: WKB approximation

text: In mathematical physics, the WKB approximation or WKB method is a method for finding approximate solutions to linear differential equations with spatially varying coefficients. It is typically used for a semiclassical calculation in quantum mechanics in which the wavefunction is recast as an exponential function, semiclassically expanded, and then either the amplitude or the phase is taken to be changing slowly.


title: WKB approximation

text: The name is an initialism for Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin. It is also known as the LG or Liouville–Green method. Other often-used letter combinations include JWKB and WKBJ, where the "J" stands for Jeffreys.


title: WKB approximation

text: This method is named after physicists Gregor Wentzel, Hendrik Anthony Kramers, and Léon Brillouin, who all developed it in 1926. In 1923, mathematician Harold Jeffreys had developed a general method of approximating solutions to linear, second-order differential equations, a class that includes the Schrödinger equation. The Schrödinger equation itself was not developed until two years later, and Wentzel, Kramers, and Brillouin were apparently unaware of this earlier work, so Jeffreys is often neglected credit. Early texts in quantum mechanics contain any number of combinations of their initials, including WBK, BWK, WKBJ, JWKB and BWKJ. An authoritative discussion and critical survey has been given by Robert B. Dingle.


title: WKB approximation

text: Earlier appearances of essentially equivalent methods are: Francesco Carlini in 1817, Joseph Liouville in 1837, George Green in 1837, Lord Rayleigh in 1912 and Richard Gans in 1915. Liouville and Green may be said to have founded the method in 1837, and it is also commonly referred to as the Liouville–Green or LG method.


title: WKB approximation

text: The important contribution of Jeffreys, Wentzel, Kramers, and Brillouin to the method was the inclusion of the treatment of turning points, connecting the evanescent and oscillatory solutions at either side of the turning point. For example, this may occur in the Schrödinger equation, due to a potential energy hill.


title: WKB approximation

text: Generally, WKB theory is a method for approximating the solution of a differential equation whose "highest derivative is multiplied by a small parameter" . The method of approximation is as follows.


title: WKB approximation

text: in the limit . The asymptotic scaling of in terms of will be determined by the equation – see the example below.


title: WKB approximation

text: Substituting the above ansatz into the differential equation and cancelling out the exponential terms allows one to solve for an arbitrary number of terms in the expansion.


title: WKB approximation

text: This example comes from the text of Carl M. Bender and Steven Orszag. Consider the second-order homogeneous linear differential equation


title: WKB approximation

text: To leading order (assuming, for the moment, the series will be asymptotically consistent), the above can be approximated as


title: WKB approximation

text: We now have a pair of approximations to the system (a pair, because can take two signs); the first-order WKB-approximation will be a linear combination of the two:


title: WKB approximation

text: The asymptotic series for is usually a divergent series, whose general term starts to increase after a certain value . Therefore, the smallest error achieved by the WKB method is at best of the order of the last included term.


title: WKB approximation

text: with <0 an analytic function, the value formula_16 and the magnitude of the last term can be estimated as follows:


title: WKB approximation

text: where formula_19 is the point at which formula_20 needs to be evaluated and formula_21 is the (complex) turning point where formula_22, closest to formula_23.


title: WKB approximation

text: The number can be interpreted as the number of oscillations between formula_19 and the closest turning point.


title: WKB approximation

text: the number will be large, and the minimum error of the asymptotic series will be exponentially small.


title: WKB approximation

text: The above example may be applied specifically to the one-dimensional, time-independent Schrödinger equation,


title: WKB approximation

text: The wavefunction can be rewritten as the exponential of another function (closely related to the action), which could be complex,


title: WKB approximation

text: where ' indicates the derivative of with respect to "x". This derivative ' can be separated into real and imaginary parts by introducing the real functions "A" and "B",


title: WKB approximation

text: Next, the semiclassical approximation is used. This means that each function is expanded as a power series in . From the above equations, it can be seen that the power series must start with at least an order of 1/ to satisfy the real part of the equation:


title: WKB approximation

text: The first derivatives and were discarded, because they include factors of order 1/, higher than the dominant .


title: WKB approximation

text: Then, if the amplitude varies sufficiently slowly as compared to the phase (formula_40), it follows that


title: WKB approximation

text: which is only valid when the total energy is greater than the potential energy, as is always the case in classical motion.


title: WKB approximation

text: On the other hand, if it is the phase that varies slowly (as compared to the amplitude), (formula_42) then


title: WKB approximation

text: which is only valid when the potential energy is greater than the total energy (the regime in which quantum tunneling occurs).


title: WKB approximation

text: In the classically allowed region, namely the region where formula_44 the integrand in the exponent is imaginary and the approximate wave function is oscillatory. In the classically forbidden region formula_45, the solutions are growing or decaying. It is evident in the denominator that both of these approximate solutions become singular near the classical turning points, where , and cannot be valid. (The turning points are the points where the classical particle changes direction.)


title: WKB approximation

text: We now consider the behavior of the wave function near the turning points. For this, we need a different method. Near the first turning points, , the term formula_46 can be expanded in a power series,


title: WKB approximation

text: This differential equation is known as the Airy equation, and the solution may be written in terms of Airy functions,


title: WKB approximation

text: Although for any fixed value of formula_50, the wave function is bounded near the turning points, the wave function will be peaked there, as can be seen in the images above. As formula_50 gets smaller, the height of the wave function at the turning points grows.


title: WKB approximation

text: It now remains to construct a global (approximate) solution to the Schrödinger equation. For the wave function to be square-integrable, we must take only the exponentially decaying solution in the two classically forbidden regions. These must then "connect" properly through the turning points to the classically allowed region. For most values of "E", this matching procedure will not work: The function obtained by connecting the solution near formula_52 to the classically allowed region will not agree with the function obtained by connecting the solution near formula_53 to the classically allowed region. The requirement that the two functions agree imposes a condition on the energy "E", which will give an approximation to the exact quantum energy levels.


title: WKB approximation

text: Given the two coefficients on one side of the classical turning point, the 2 coefficients on the other side of the classical turning point can be determined by using the Airy function to connect them. Thus, a relationship between formula_54 and formula_55 can be found. This relationship is obtained using known asymptotic of the Airy function. The relationship can be found to be as follows (often referred to as the "connection formulas"):


title: WKB approximation

text: Now the global (approximate) solutions can be constructed. The same can be done at the other turning points; assume there is just another one, . The expression there, however, will appear different than the one determined above at by a difference in the argument of these trigonometric functions.


title: WKB approximation

text: The matching condition, needed to get a single-valued, square-integrable approximate solution, takes the following form:


title: WKB approximation

text: where formula_59 are the turning points of the potential discussed, where the integrand vanishes. Here "n" is a non-negative integer. This condition can also be rewritten as saying that


title: WKB approximation

text: Either way, the condition on the energy is a version of the Bohr–Sommerfeld quantization condition, with a "Maslov correction" equal to 1/2.


title: WKB approximation

text: It is possible to show that after piecing together the approximations in the various regions, one obtains a good approximation to the actual eigenfunction. In particular, the Maslov-corrected Bohr–Sommerfeld energies are good approximations to the actual eigenvalues of the Schrödinger operator. Specifically, the error in the energies is small compared to the typical spacing of the quantum energy levels. Thus, although the "old quantum theory" of Bohr and Sommerfeld was ultimately replaced by the Schrödinger equation, some vestige of that theory remains, as an approximation to the eigenvalues of the appropriate Schrödinger operator.


title: WKB approximation

text: One can then compute the probability density associated to the approximate wave function. The probability that the quantum particle will be found in the classically forbidden region is small. In the classically allowed region, meanwhile, the probability the quantum particle will be found in a given interval is approximately the "fraction of time the classical particle spends in that interval" over one period of motion. Since the classical particle's velocity goes to zero at the turning points, it spends more time near the turning points than in other classically allowed regions. This observation accounts for the peak in the wave function (and its probability density) near the turning points.


title: WKB approximation

text: Applications of the WKB method to Schrödinger equations with a large variety of potentials and comparison with perturbation methods and path integrals are treated in Müller-Kirsten.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: Zhang Ruoyun (, born 24 August 1988) is a Chinese actor. He graduated from the Beijing Film Academy in 2007.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: Zhang made his acting debut in 2004, acting as the younger version of the male protagonist in "The Sea's Promise". He first gained attention for his roles in "Snow Leopard" (2010) and its companion series, "Black Fox" (2011). He won the Most Popular New Actor award in 2010 for his performance in "Snow Leopard". Zhang took on his first lead role in war drama "Sharp Sword".


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: In 2014, he starred in "New Snow Leopard", and won the Outstanding Actor award at the China TV Drama Awards.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: In 2015, Zhang starred in the web drama "". The series was popular in both China and Taiwan, and led to increased recognition for Zhang in the region. Zhang then starred in youth romance drama "Promise of Migratory Birds" and fantasy dramas "" and "Legend of Nine Tails Fox.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: In 2016, Zhang starred in the hit espionage drama "Sparrow". The popularity of the series propelled Zhang to mainstream popularity, and he won the Most Popular Actor award at the China TV Drama Awards. He then headlined the web drama "Medical Examiner Dr. Qin". The series gained over 1.5 billion views on Sohu TV, and earned praise for its storyline and his performance. The same year, Zhang starred in his first film, "Sky on Fire".


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: In 2017, he was cast in the titular role of Huo Qubing in upcoming historical drama, "The Fated General". The same year, Zhang starred in the Chinese remake of Korean drama "Dear My Friends". Zhang ranked 94th on "Forbes" China Celebrity 100 list.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: In 2019, Zhang starred in the spy drama "Awakening of Insects", the sequel to the 2016 hit drama "Sparrow". He then starred as the male lead in historical epic "Joy of Life" based on the novel "Qing Yu Nian" by Mao Ni. "Joy of Life" received positive reviews and was a hit.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: In 2020, Zhang was cast in the legal drama "Perfect Evidence". The same year, he reunited with "Joy of Life" writer Wang Juan in the wuxia drama "Sword Snow Stride". He ranked 37th on "Forbes" China Celebrity 100 list.


title: Zhang Ruoyun

text: Zhang and actress Tang Yixin revealed their relationship through Weibo on August 2, 2017. They got married in Ireland on June 27, 2019 after dating for close to 9 years.


title: Steve Blake

text: Steven Hanson Blake (born February 26, 1980) is an American professional basketball coach and former player. After winning the 2002 NCAA Championship with Maryland, Blake was selected by the Washington Wizards with the 38th overall pick in the 2003 NBA draft. Over his 13-year NBA career, Blake had stints with the Wizards, Milwaukee Bucks, Denver Nuggets, Los Angeles Clippers, Los Angeles Lakers, Golden State Warriors, Detroit Pistons, and three stints with the Portland Trail Blazers.


title: Steve Blake

text: Blake spent his freshman and sophomore year at Miami Killian High School and then transferred to Miami High School, where he played with another future NBA player, Udonis Haslem. Miami won consecutive state championships, but after the Miami New Times exposed the fact that Blake and other players, under head coach Frank Martin (himself later an NCAA Final Four coach), were using fake addresses to enroll in the school, the Stingarees were forced to forfeit their entire 1998 schedule. After the FHSAA banned him from playing for any public high school in Florida again, Blake attended Oak Hill Academy before enrolling at the University of Maryland.


title: Steve Blake

text: After high school, Blake attended the University of Maryland. Blake was the team's starter from the first game of his freshman year and was the first ACC player to compile 1,000 points, 800 assists, 400 rebounds and 200 steals. He finished his career 5th in NCAA all-time career assists with 972. Widely known for his superb passing ability, Blake helped lead the Terrapins to a Final Four appearance (2001) and the 2002 NCAA championship; less well known for his scoring, Blake did average 11.6 points per game in his senior year. He averaged over six assists per game in each of his four years, including averages of 7.9 and 7.1 in 2002 and 2003, respectively. For his efforts, he was named to a variety of all-ACC teams during his career, including the rookie and defensive squads, capped by a first-team All-ACC spot his senior year. At the start of the 2003–04 basketball season, Blake's uniform number (25) became only the 15th to be retired to the rafters of Maryland's Comcast Center.


title: Steve Blake

text: Blake was selected by the Washington Wizards with the 38th pick in the 2003 NBA draft. He averaged 5.9 points, 2.8 assists, and 18.6 minutes per game while playing in 75 games his rookie season with the Wizards. In his second season Blake's playing time decreased to 14.7 minutes and only 44 games played.


title: Steve Blake

text: In September 2005, Blake (then a restricted free agent with the Wizards) was offered a contract by the Portland Trail Blazers, which the Wizards declined to match. This became the second reunion with former Maryland Terrapin and Washington Wizards backcourt teammate Juan Dixon, who also signed with the Trail Blazers in the 2005 off-season.


title: Steve Blake

text: In Blake's first season with the Blazers, he became a starter and played a significant role when Sebastian Telfair was injured. Blake's playing time increased from 14.7 minutes and 44 games with only one start in 2004–05 to 26.2 minutes and 68 games with 57 starts in 05–06. Blake reestablished himself as a terrific passer and fundamental point guard claiming third in the NBA in assist-to-turnover ratio. He also increased his field goal percentage by 11%.


title: Steve Blake

text: In July 2006, Blake was traded (along with Brian Skinner and Ha Seung-Jin) to the Milwaukee Bucks for Jamaal Magloire.


title: Steve Blake

text: On January 11, 2007, Blake was traded to the Denver Nuggets in return for Earl Boykins and Julius Hodge. Blake started in 40 of the 50 remaining games of the Nuggets' 2006–07 season, and in five playoff games in a 4–1 first-round loss to the San Antonio Spurs.


title: Steve Blake

text: Blake became an unrestricted free agent on July 1, 2007, and agreed to a three-year deal with the Portland Trail Blazers on July 13, 2007.


title: Steve Blake

text: The 2008–09 season saw a rise in Blake's numbers. Through his first 38 games, he averaged a career-high 11.7 points per game, while also achieving career highs in free throw percentage and three-point percentage.


title: Steve Blake

text: On February 22, 2009, Blake tied an NBA record with 14 assists in the first quarter of a game against the Los Angeles Clippers.


title: Steve Blake

text: On February 17, 2010, Blake was traded to the Los Angeles Clippers with Travis Outlaw and $1.5 million in cash for Marcus Camby.


title: Steve Blake

text: On July 8, 2010, Blake officially signed a four-year $16 million contract with the Los Angeles Lakers. In his first season for the Lakers, Blake averaged 4 points in 20 minutes per game. He missed games due to chicken pox. In his second season, he averaged 5.2 points in 23.2 minutes per game. He also played 5 of 53 games as a starter. He dealt with a costochondral fracture (fractured cartilage connecting the rib to the sternum). Statistically, he was a disappointment in those first two seasons under coach Phil Jackson's triangle offense and then coach Mike Brown's post-up offense, neither of which catered to his natural read-and-react skills.


title: Steve Blake

text: In the 2012–13 season, his training camp was spoiled when he punctured his foot stepping on a spike strip in a beach parking lot. In November 2012, Blake was fined $25,000 by the NBA for inappropriate language towards a fan. He started five straight games after a knee injury to starter Steve Nash. However, Blake was sidelined starting in November after suffering an abdominal strain that required surgery. He experienced groin problems during his recovery before returning in late January after missing 37 games. He was more comfortable playing under coach Mike D'Antoni, who had replaced Brown early in the season. In the playoffs that season, Blake left Game 2 in the first round against San Antonio after injuring his right hamstring and was declared out indefinitely.


title: Steve Blake

text: On February 19, 2014, Blake was traded to the Golden State Warriors in exchange for MarShon Brooks and Kent Bazemore.


title: Steve Blake

text: On July 10, 2014, Blake signed with the Portland Trail Blazers to a reported two-year, $4.2 million deal. On February 20, 2015, Blake changed his jersey number from #25 to #5 in a tribute to Jerome Kersey who died two days prior.


title: Steve Blake

text: On June 25, 2015, Blake was traded, along with the draft rights to Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, to the Brooklyn Nets in exchange for Mason Plumlee and the draft rights to Pat Connaughton. On July 13, 2015, he was traded to the Detroit Pistons in exchange for Quincy Miller.


title: Steve Blake

text: Blake's final NBA game was played in Game 4 of the 2016 Eastern Conference First Round on April 26th, 2016. The Pistons would lose the game 98 - 100 to the Cleveland Cavaliers with Blake recording 3 points, 2 assists and 1 rebound.


title: Steve Blake

text: On October 22, 2016, Blake signed with the Sydney Kings for the rest of the 2016–17 NBL season. He made his debut for the Kings on October 30, recording 12 points, four rebounds, four assists and two steals in an 87–78 win over the Brisbane Bullets. On November 28, he was granted leave by the Kings and returned to the United States indefinitely to address a private family matter. On December 6, Blake announced that he would not be returning to Sydney, effectively ending his stint with the Kings. In nine games for the Kings, he averaged 5.9 points, 2.3 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game.


title: Steve Blake

text: On September 27, 2017, Blake was reported to have joined the Portland Trail Blazers as a coaching intern. For the 2018–19 season, Blake was promoted to an on-court assistant for the Trail Blazers.


title: Steve Blake

text: On June 26, 2019, Blake was hired as an assistant coach for the Phoenix Suns. On July 18, 2020, Suns head coach Monty Williams announced that Blake was no longer with the team.


title: Aegan

text: Aegan is a 2008 Indian Tamil-language action comedy film directed and co-written by Raju Sundaram and produced by Ayngaran International. It stars Ajith Kumar and Nayanthara, with Suman, Jayaram, Nassar, Navdeep, and Piaa Bajpai in supporting roles. The music was composed by Yuvan Shankar Raja with cinematography by Arjun Jena and editing by V. T. Vijayan. It is based on the 2004 Indian film, "Main Hoon Na".


title: Aegan

text: The film revolves around a daredevil cop who, on behalf of his ailing father and the ambition of a lieutenant general, returns to college in Ooty. Whilst protecting the general's daughter, he attempts to reconcile with his stepbrother from his father's marriage. Furthermore, he has to ward off an international criminal who is trying to kill the general, an ex-aide of his who has turned police approver. How the cop manages to solve all three problems forms the crux of the story.


title: Aegan

text: The film opened to Indian audiences on 25 October 2008, coinciding with the Diwali season; it received mixed reviews. The film was dubbed into Hindi language as Jaanbaaz Commando.


title: Aegan

text: The film's story is based around Shiva, a CB-CID officer, and his efforts to foil the terrorist John Chinnappa. Shiva is simultaneously attempting to mend relations with his father's estranged first wife and his half-brother Narain. However, complications ensue.


title: Aegan

text: Major John Chinnappa is a scientist who had created tablets by operating on human guinea pigs. His ploys have always been controversial but inconclusive due to the lack of witnesses. However, an ex-gang member, General Ram Prasad, became a police approver and is on the verge of revealing John's ploys to the police. However, he is on the run to avoid charges. The case falls to Commissioner Karthikeyan, Shiva's father, who assigns his son to go and help solve the mission.


title: Aegan

text: Karthik tells Shiva to attend college in Tamil Nadu – St. John's College, Ooty – to protect Ram's daughter, Pooja, from meeting with her father. Shiva pleads that he has never undertaken this type of a mission before and does not know much about the current generation. The general points out that, by a strange coincidence, Pooja attends school in the same town where Ram is hiding. Shiva can protect Pooja and look for Ram at the same time. Shiva goes undercover as a student returning to college after many years away from taking care of the family business. He is much older than the other students, who at first make fun of him because of his lack of new-generation styles. He also has to deal with the many goofy teachers as well as Albert Aadiyapatham, the idiotic and forgetful principal of the college.


title: Aegan

text: Soon, Shiva finds Narain, who is later revealed to be his brother. Pooja is Narain's best friend, and she is secretly jealous that other girls can get his attention, but she cannot. Shiva saves Pooja from John's men, who kidnap her, while Narain and others think that it is a prank. He later becomes a sensation among the students and teachers. He befriends Narain and Pooja and falls in love with the chemistry teacher Mallika, after being attracted by her beauty and in a bid to convince other students that he is one of them. During his regular jogging, sessions Shiva spots Ram and chases him until he escapes with the help of an helmet-clad bike rider, who is later revealed to be Narain. Pooja discovers that Narain has been helping her father and feels cheated by him.


title: Aegan

text: Narain tries to apologise to Pooja many times, but she refuses to talk to him. Irked by this, Narain drinks and explains his actions when John's men come again to kidnap Pooja. They beat up Narain, but Shiva comes to their rescue. Narain and Pooja patch up after the fight sequences. Shiva takes Narain to his home, where he learns that Narain is his brother and meets his mother Kasthuri. The flashback sequences describe Shiva's childhood (he is an orphan) and explain why his mother and father live separately.


title: Aegan

text: The next day, when Pooja introduces Ram to Shiva, Shiva arrests him – much to the disappointment of Pooja and Narain. Then everyone in the college, including Mallika, learns that Shiva is a policeman. Shiva then drives Ram straight to John's hiding place, avoiding the traps that he had set. A fight ensues between Shiva and John's men in which John is finally killed.


title: Aegan

text: In the final scenes, Mallika is shown with Shiva's parents and brother, while Shiva has gone to Afghanistan as part of another mission.


title: Aegan

text: In September 2007, early indications suggested that Ayngaran International were set to make a film starring Ajith Kumar and directed by Venkat Prabhu, however the chance went to first-time director Raju Sundaram, in a project titled "Akbar". Despite denying the title, Ajith confirmed the project and stating that he had put on weight and grew a beard for his participation in the project. Following the success of "Billa", Ajith Kumar waited until the birth of his first child, in January 2008, before commencing his shoot for the film.


title: Aegan

text: The 40-member unit consisting of Ajith, director Raju Sundaram, cinematographer Arjun Jena, action choreographer Stun Siva, and a few stuntmen from Chennai flew to Hong Kong on 14 January 2008 and began their first schedule for a 10-day stint.


title: Aegan

text: The portions in Hong Kong were shot showing Ajith's introduction stunt scene set against the skyscrapers, Hong Kong airport, and the sea with the help of Chinese action choreographers. The crew shot schedules in Theni and Ooty and other locations in South India during the filming. The film finished its talkie portion in early September 2008, and the songs were canned in India as well as parts of Switzerland. The film, initially described as a "musical action comedy". The film previously referred to as "Akbar", "Ramakrishnan" and "Anthony Gonsalves" was christened as "Aegan", a name of Shiva.


title: Aegan

text: Following the announcement of the project, tentatively titled as "Akbar", Shriya Saran was rumoured to be the heroine, following her successful role in "". However, due to differences, Saran was ousted from the project due to her limited call sheets, as she had to fly to and from America where she was then shooting for her Hollywood film, "The Other End of the Line". However other indications claimed that Saran was ousted from the project due to her involvement in "Indiralohathil Na Azhagappan", in which she appeared in an item number, which Ajith Kumar was unhappy with due to previous feuds with the lead, Vadivelu of that film. Reports indicated that Parvati Melton had replaced Saran but later denied it signalling that she was not approached.


title: Aegan

text: Suhani Kalita was announced as the second heroine of the project but was later removed for unknown reasons. Several Bollywood heroines including Deepika Padukone, Bipasha Basu, Katrina Kaif, Ayesha Takia, Ileana D'Cruz, Tanushree Dutta and Sneha Ullal were linked to the role, as well as reports that Shriya Saran would reprise the role after making up with Ajith. The role eventually was given to Katrina Kaif, who was set to make her debut in Tamil films with "Aegan", however she later opted out due to callsheet clashes. It was announced that Nayantara would play the role of the heroine in the film, following her role opposite Ajith in "Billa". In February 2008, it was confirmed that Navdeep would play a role in the film as well as Suman, who will appear in a villainous role. Malayalam actor Jayaram will also play a role in the film, which will be co-produced by actor Arun Pandian.


title: Aegan

text: Nassar and Suhasini were selected to play the roles of the parents of Ajith, whilst Raju Sundaram's younger brother, Prabhu Deva was given a chance to make a cameo appearance in the film as a dancer but politely refused. Supporting actors Livingston, Sathyan and Sriman also play roles in "Aegan", as does model Piaa Bajpai, who appears as the ladylove to Navdeep. Sivakarthikeyan and Arunraja Kamaraj shot for the film for one day as comedians portraying spies, but following changes to the script, their roles were removed. Yuvan Shankar Raja was signed on as the music composer whilst Arjun Jena was the cinematographer for the project and Milan, who did the art direction for "Billa", renews his association with Ajith in the film.


title: Aegan

text: The soundtrack of "Aegan" was composed by Yuvan Shankar Raja as was the film score. It was noticeably, the third time Yuvan was scoring music for an Ajith Kumar film, after "Dheena" (2001) and "Billa" (2007), the songs of which had been very popular and went on to become chartbusters.


title: Aegan

text: The soundtrack released on 9 October 2008, at a private ceremony at the Hello FM Studios by composer Yuvan Shankar Raja as the lead cast and the director were away shooting the video for the song in Switzerland. The album features 6 tracks overall, including one of the songs ("Hey Salaa") repeated at the end.


title: Aegan

text: Sify.com claimed that "the trouble with the film is that it looks like an amateurish attempt by debutant director Raju Sundaram" dismissing the climax as "a colossal embarrassment", but adding that "no film is perfect". Ajith Kumar was praised for being "at his best but look[ed] plump and stiff in some scenes where he need to be relaxed and natural", drawing comparisons with a similar feedback from his previous venture, "Billa". Nayanthara was said to "look perfect as Mallika, a role that fits her like a glove" with her make-up and costumes "rocking". The reviewer added that "Piaa Bajpai is promising, Jayaram as Principal and Haneefa have been wasted and do little in the way of bringing smiles to the faces of the audience". The review also singles out the performance of rookie cinematographer, Arjun Jena, whose work is labelled as "eye-catching".


title: Aegan

text: Similarly Rediff.com labelled the film as "watchable in parts", giving it negative feedback in comparison with "Main Hoon Na". It like Sify, claims that "Aegan loses its spontaneity and meanders between humour and seriousness" in the second half. The reviewer praises Ajith claiming he looks as though he "really did enjoy himself on screen, after a really long time". The reviewer adds that "Nayantara's outfits get smaller and smaller, while the actress herself has nothing more to do than dance in transparent saris and high-heels. Sometimes she looks amused, at others, irritated and bored", comparing her unchallenging roles to previous roles in "Sathyam" and "Kuselan". It criticizes Piaa Bajpai claiming she "hams it to glory", and "makes you want to watch Amrita Rao's naivety in the original", however, it praises Navdeep citing he is "far more natural, but you pity the fact that his role is so small". Rediff also criticized Suman and Sriman labelling their portrayals as "pathetic". In reference to minor characters, Cochin Hanifa is praised while Suhasini Mani Ratnam's role is said to be "terribly dealt with, robbing her part of any sympathy".


title: Sleeping car

text: The sleeping car or sleeper (often ) is a railway passenger car that can accommodate all passengers in beds of one kind or another, for the purpose of sleeping. George Pullman was the American innovator of the sleeper car.


title: Sleeping car

text: The first such cars saw sporadic use on American and English railways in the 1830s; they could be configured for coach seating during the day.


title: Sleeping car

text: Possibly the earliest example of a sleeping car (or "bed carriage", as it was then called) was on the London & Birmingham and Grand Junction Railways between London and Lancashire, England. The bed carriage was first made available to first-class passengers in 1838.


title: Sleeping car

text: In the spring of 1839, the Cumberland Valley Railroad pioneered sleeping car service in America with a car named "Chambersburg", between Chambersburg and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. A couple of years later a second car, the "Carlisle", was introduced into service.


title: Sleeping car

text: In 1857, the Wason Manufacturing Company of Springfield, Massachusetts – one of the United States' first makers of railway passenger coach equipment – produced America's first specifically designed sleeping car. Canadian railways soon followed with their own sleeping cars: first the Grand Trunk in 1858, then the Great Western. The Great Western's sleeping cars were manufactured in-house, with the first three built in 1858, and the railway operating six by 1863.


title: Sleeping car

text: The man who ultimately made the sleeping car business profitable in the United States was George Pullman, who began by building a luxurious sleeping car (named "Pioneer") in 1865. The Pullman Company, founded as the Pullman Palace Car Company in 1867, owned and operated most sleeping cars in the United States until the mid-20th century, attaching them to passenger trains run by the various railroads; there were also some sleeping cars that were operated by Pullman but owned by the railroad running a given train. During the peak years of American passenger railroading, several all-Pullman trains existed, including the "20th Century Limited" on the New York Central Railroad, the "Broadway Limited" on the Pennsylvania Railroad, the "Panama Limited" on the Illinois Central Railroad, and the "Super Chief" on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway.


title: Sleeping car

text: Pullman cars were normally a dark "Pullman green", although some were painted in the host railroad's colors. The cars carried individual names, but usually did not carry visible numbers. In the 1920s, the Pullman Company went through a series of restructuring steps, which in the end resulted in a parent company, Pullman Incorporated, controlling the Pullman Company (which owned and operated sleeping cars) and the Pullman-Standard Car Manufacturing Company. Due to an antitrust verdict in 1947, a consortium of railroads bought the Pullman Company from Pullman Incorporated, and subsequently railroads owned and operated Pullman-made sleeping cars themselves. Pullman-Standard continued manufacturing sleeping cars and other passenger and freight railroad cars until 1980.


title: Sleeping car

text: For nearly a year at the end of World War II the United States government banned sleeping cars for runs of less than . The development of the Interstate Highway System in the 1950s and the expansion of jet airline travel in the same decade negatively impacted train travel.


title: Sleeping car

text: One unanticipated consequence of the rise of Pullman cars in the US in the 19th and early 20th centuries was their effect on civil rights and African-American culture. Each Pullman car was staffed by a uniformed porter. The majority of Pullman Porters were African Americans. While still a menial job in many respects, Pullman offered better pay and security than most jobs open to African Americans at the time, in addition to a chance for travel, and it was a well regarded job in the African-American community of the time. The Pullman attendants, regardless of their true name, were traditionally referred to as "George" by the travelers, the name of the company's founder, George Pullman. The Pullman company was the largest employer of African Americans in the United States. Subsequently, railway porters fought for political recognition and were eventually unionized. Their union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (established, 1925), became an important source of strength for the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement in the early 20th century, notably under the leadership of A. Philip Randolph. Because they moved about the country, Pullman porters also became an important means of communication for news and cultural information of all kinds. The African-American newspaper, the "Chicago Defender", gained a national circulation in this way. Porters also used to re-sell phonograph records bought in the great metropolitan centres, greatly adding to the distribution of jazz and blues and the popularity of the artists.


title: Sleeping car

text: From the mid-19th to the mid-20th centuries, the most common and more economical type of sleeping car accommodation on North American trains was the "open section". Open-section accommodations consist of pairs of seats, one seat facing forward and the other backward, situated on either side of a center aisle. The seat pairs can be converted into the combination of an upper and a lower "berth", each berth consisting of a bed screened from the aisle by a curtain. A famous example of open sections can be seen in the movie "Some Like It Hot" (1959).


title: Sleeping car

text: In the mid-to-late 20th century, an increasing variety of private rooms was offered. Most of these rooms provided significantly more space than open-section accommodations could offer. Open-sections were increasingly phased out in the 1950s, in favor of roomettes. Some of them, such as the rooms of the "Slumbercoach" cars manufactured by the Budd Company and first put into service in 1956, were triumphs of miniaturization. These allowed a single car to increase the number of sleepers over a conventional sleeping car of private rooms.


title: Sleeping car

text: A Roomette, in the historically correct sense of the word, is a private room for a single passenger, containing a single seat, a folding bed, a toilet ("not" in a private cubicle of its own), and a washbasin. When a traditional Roomette is in night mode, the bed blocks access to the toilet. Like open sections, Roomettes are placed on both sides of the car, with a corridor down the center. Duplex Roomettes, a Pullman-produced precursor to the Slumbercoach, are staggered vertically, with every second accommodation raised a few feet above the car's floor level, in order to make slightly more efficient use of the space. Single-passenger Slumbercoach accommodations are a particularly spartan form of roomette; Slumbercoaches also included a few two-passenger units.


title: Sleeping car

text: Compartments and Double Bedrooms are private rooms for two passengers, with upper and lower berths, washbasins, and private toilets, placed on one side of the car, with the corridor running down the other side (thus allowing the accommodation to be slightly over two thirds the width of the car). Frequently, these accommodations have movable partitions allowing adjacent accommodations to be combined into a suite.


title: Sleeping car

text: A Drawing Room is a relatively rare accommodation for three people traveling together, again with a washbasin and private toilet, again on one side of the car. Even rarer are larger rooms accommodating four or more; generally the needs of large parties were better served with multiple rooms, with or without the ability to combine them into a suite.


title: Sleeping car

text: Amtrak's Superliner Economy Bedrooms (now called Superliner Roomettes, although they are structurally closer to open sections) accommodate two passengers in facing seats that fold out into a lower berth, with an upper berth that folds down from above, a small closet, and no in-room washbasin or toilet, on both sides of both the upper and lower levels of the car. Effectively, they are open sections with walls, a door, and a built-in access ladder for the upper berth (which doubles as a nightstand for the lower berth passenger). Superliner Deluxe Bedrooms are essentially the same as historic Compartments and Double Bedrooms, with the toilet cubicle doubling as a private shower cubicle. In addition, each Superliner sleeping car has two special lower-level accommodations, each taking up the full width of the car: the Accessible Bedroom, at the restroom/shower end of the car (below the Deluxe Bedrooms), is a fully wheelchair-accessible accommodation for two, with a roll-in cubicle for the toilet and shower; the Family Bedroom, at the Economy Bedroom end of the car, accommodates two adults and up to three small children, without private toilet or shower facilities.


title: Sleeping car

text: When the Viewliner sleeping cars were built, the accommodations were patterned after the Superliner accommodations, except that the Economy Bedrooms (or "Viewliner Roomettes") include Roomette-style washbasins and toilets, as well as windows for the upper berths.


title: Sleeping car

text: Despite its recent overall decline in popularity, the overnight train still offers an enjoyable means of transportation for many. Many overnight trains are scheduled to arrive at their destination cities in the morning. Although reduced in prevalence in recent decades in the Western world, sleeping cars retain a powerful ability to provide travel that is both reasonably comfortable and potentially time-saving, especially between points that are between and apart, distances one can travel overnight, perhaps with dinner at the beginning of the journey and breakfast at the end. This offers efficiency in passing the time and distance by allowing travelers to do things that might be done in a hotel room during the same hours. The obvious advantage over day trains (even high-speed ones) is that the ride takes up less daytime.


title: Sleeping car

text: An interesting practice in sleeping car operation, one that is not currently employed in North America, is the use of "set-out" sleepers. Sleeping cars are picked up and/or dropped off at intermediate cities along a train's route so that what would otherwise be partial-night journeys can become (in effect) full-night journeys, with passengers allowed to occupy their sleeping accommodations from mid-evening to at least the early morning. Common practice on such occasions is to close the passages between sleeper cars for the night to prevent accidental wrong destinations.


title: Sleeping car

text: In Europe, the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits (French for "International Sleeping Car Company") first focused on sleeping cars, but later operated whole trains, including the "Simplon-Orient Express", "Nord Express", "Train Bleu", "Golden Arrow", and the "Transsiberien" (on the Trans-Siberian railway). Today it once again specializes in sleeping cars, along with onboard railroad catering.


title: Sleeping car

text: In modern Europe, a number of sleeping car services continue to operate, though they face strong competition from high-speed day trains and budget airlines, sometimes leading to the cancellation or consolidation of services. In some cases, trains are split and recombined in the dead of night, making it possible to offer several connections with a relatively small number of trains. Generally, the trains consist of sleeping cars with private compartments, couchette cars, and sometimes cars with normal seating.


title: Sleeping car

text: In Eastern Europe, night trains are still widely used. In Western Europe, they have been in decline for decades. However, in December 2020 the state railways of Germany, Austria, France and Switzerland announced a 500 million euro investment in a network of cross-border night trains linking 13 major European cities, in the largest extension of Europe's night network in many years.


title: Sleeping car

text: An example of a more basic type of sleeping car is the European couchette car, which is divided into compartments for four or six people, with bench-configuration seating during the day and "privacyless" double- or triple-level bunk-beds at night.


title: Sleeping car

text: In 2021 the French start-up company, Midnight Trains, announced plans to set up a network of sleeper trains, centered in Paris. Planned destinations include Edinburgh, Copenhagen, Berlin, Venice, Rome, Barcelona, Madrid, and Porto, with some intermediate stops. The plans are backed by telecoms billionaire Xavier Niel, the co-owner of Le Monde newspaper. Europe has seen a recent (in 2021) increase in the provision of sleeper trains which is thought to be the result of increasing awareness of the environmental effects of long distance travel.


title: Sleeping car

text: In 2022 the design and engineering faculties of three European universities – Aalto , KTH and TalTech – discussed plans to reshape sleeping cars for flow production. The ADLNE project aims to create the railcar from modules that are themselves composed of interchangeable segments, compartments and fittings, allowing bespoke designs at low cost.


title: Sleeping car

text: ÖBB's modern Nightjet services operate in Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, and Belgium, and Nightjet's partners will also take passengers to Slovakia, Croatia, Slovenia, Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. The services usually leave at around 20:00 hours and arrive at around 09:00 hours at the destination.


title: Sleeping car

text: In the Soviet Union overnight train travel formed the most common and accessible mode of long-distance travel, distances between the capital of Moscow and many outlying cities being ideal for overnight trips that depart in late evening and arrive at their destinations in the morning. Sleeping cars with berths are the only reasonable solution for railway trips lasting several days (e.g., trains running along the Trans-Siberian Railway, or direct trains from Moscow or Saint Petersburg to the capitals of the Central Asian Soviet Republics).


title: Sleeping car

text: Since then, the railroads in the smaller ex-Soviet nations have largely transitioned to daytime intercity trains, such as in Belarus, where the process is based on government-funded purchases of rolling stock supplied by Stadler, which operates a train factory in Minsk, or in Uzbekistan, which has established a 600 km Afrosiyob high-speed rail service between all of its major cities.


title: Sleeping car

text: In the larger Soviet Union successor states like Kazakhstan, Russia, and Ukraine, on the other hand, night trains are to this day a prime method of railway travel, as a shift towards faster daytime trains with seating rather than sleeping arrangements is hampered by insufficient investments in the railway infrastructure restricting the speed, lack of train sets, and most importantly, the distances involved. While certain numbers of high-speed trains have been acquired by the national railways of these countries (such as Talgo 250 in Kazakhstan, Siemens Sapsan in Russia, or Hyundai Rotem HRCS in Ukraine), all of them continue to operate a large number of sleeper trains both on domestic and international routes.


title: Sleeping car

text: The need to compete against the aviation with its soaring passenger numbers forces the railroads to maintain modest ticket prices, starting at below 10 Euros for third-class tickets in Ukraine, if higher in the richer ex-Soviet nations. Rolling stock age and quality also varies by country. In countries like Kazakhstan and Russia, locally-produced cars are purchased regularly to update the fleet, with newly introduced comforts such as showers, dry toilets, or conditioning units in passenger compartments becoming an increasingly common sight; Russian Railroads have also introduced double-deck sleeper cars; yet comfort levels still suffer from a modest degree of innovation in the bogie suspension systems and the passenger compartment design. Some other post-Soviet nations rely more heavily on the rolling stock fleet inherited from the Union, to a large extent based on vintage life-prolonged cars assembled in East Germany or Soviet Latvia back in the 1980s.


title: Sleeping car

text: Modern, air-conditioned sleeping cars and couchette cars are part of Croatian Railways rolling stock. Croatian sleeping coaches include single, double or 4-bed compartments with washbasin and many additional hygienic accessories. Passengers also have catering services at their disposal and are given complimentary breakfast, depending on the type of ticket bought. A night train with sleeping carriages included operates on the route between the two largest Croatian towns, Zagreb and Split, and Croatian sleeping coaches are included on the Zagreb-Munich-Zagreb and Zagreb-Zürich-Zagreb EuroNight lines.


title: Sleeping car

text: Another of the more substantial examples of current European sleeping-car service is the "Train Bleu", an all-sleeping-car train. It leaves Paris from the Gare d'Austerlitz in mid-evening and arrives in Nice at about 8 in the morning, providing both first-class rooms and couchette accommodation. The train's principal popularity is with older travelers; it has not won the same degree of popularity with younger travelers. Recently, the upper-class coaches (wagons lits) have been sold to foreign railroad companies, so that only couchette cars (1st and 2nd class) and seating coaches remain. The Train Bleu is part of the French night service network called "Intercités de Nuit".


title: Sleeping car

text: In Italy, Ferrovie dello Stato operates an extensive network of trains with sleeping cars, especially between the main cities in Northern Italy and the South, including Sicily using train ferry.


title: Sleeping car

text: Night train numbers have been reduced significantly, as the quality of the rail infrastructure is declining and repairs are insufficient, which leads to longer ride times between cities. A journey from the Bucharest main station to Arad (599 km) usually lasts 11 hours 20 minutes when there are no delays.


title: Sleeping car

text: Most night trains in Romania cross the country, covering distances of 400 to 750 km, usually to end at certain international destinations or in large cities at opposite ends of the country. The overwhelming majority of night trains with sleeping coaches are owned and operated by CFR Călători. Recently, private operators such as Astra Rail Carpatica, the newly founded private operator of Astra Vagoane Arad, has started offering sleeping train services, using own-made sleeping cars and Servtrans locomotives.


title: Sleeping car

text: CFR today prefers operating more couchettes than sleeping cars in its trains, a practice used in Italy and Austria, adopted by the CFR in the early 2010s, thus enabling it to increase the capacity on sleeping trains. The sleeping cars of the CFR in the 1990s consisted of Bautzen and Görlitz-made sleeping cars, standard in the Eastern Bloc. They were replaced by Grivița-made WLABmee 71-70 and Hansa-made WLABmee 71–31, bought second-hand from Deutsche Bahn. The most recent sleeping-cars are the WLABmee 70-91 made by Astra Arad, which is the same type used by Astra Rail (although the liveries differ), starting from 2014, 2 of the WLABmee 71-70 cars were refurbished, but no other examples have received the same treatment. Other examples that have been withdrawn since were second-hand examples of the TEN MU and T2S types.


title: Sleeping car

text: In Spain, "Trenhotel" is a long-distance, high-quality overnight train service which uses Talgo tilting trains technology and sleeping cars developed by the Spanish rail network operator Renfe. It is operated by Renfe and CP where it operates International Sud-Express and Lusitanea between Spain and Portugal, and by its subsidiary Elipsos (a joint venture between Renfe and French SNCF with a 50% share each) when operating in France, Switzerland and Italy. The Estrella (Star) is a low-cost night train between Madrid and Barcelona served by berth carriages, with compartments for up to 6 people.


title: Sleeping car

text: In the United Kingdom, a network of trains with sleeping cars operates daily between London and Scotland ("Caledonian Sleeper"), and between London and the West Country as far as Cornwall ("Night Riviera"). These services offer a choice of single- or double-occupancy bedrooms. These services operate all week, except Saturdays and usually depart London (Euston and Paddington) in the evening, arriving at their destinations at approx 08:00. The Night Riviera service uses British Rail Mk3 sleeper coaches, whereas Caledonian Sleeper uses Mk5 coaches.


title: Sleeping car

text: In Canada, all regularly scheduled sleeping car services are operated by Via Rail, using a mixture of relatively new cars and refurbished mid-century ones; the latter cars include both private rooms and "open section" accommodations.


title: Sleeping car

text: In the United States, all regularly scheduled sleeping car services are operated by Amtrak. Amtrak offers sleeping cars on most of its overnight trains, using modern cars of the private-room type exclusively.


title: Sleeping car

text: Today, Amtrak operates two main types of sleeping car: the bi-level Superliner sleeping cars, built from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s, and the single-level Viewliner sleeping cars, built in the mid-1990s. Superliners are used on most long-distance routes from Chicago westward, while Viewliners are used on most routes east of Chicago due to tunnel clearance issues in and around New York City and Baltimore.


title: Sleeping car

text: In the most common Superliner sleeping car configuration, the upper level is divided into two halves, one half containing "Bedrooms" (formerly "Deluxe Bedrooms") for one, two, or three travelers, each Bedroom containing an enclosed toilet-and-shower facility; and the other half containing "Roomettes" (formerly "Economy Bedrooms" or "Standard Bedrooms") for one or two travelers; plus a beverage area and a toilet. The lower level contains more Roomettes; a Family Bedroom for as many as two adults and two children; and an "Accessible Bedroom" (formerly "Special Bedroom") for a wheelchair-using traveler and a companion; plus toilets and a shower.


title: Sleeping car

text: The Viewliner cars contain an Accessible Bedroom (formerly "Special Bedroom") for a wheelchair-using traveler and a companion, with an enclosed toilet-and-shower facility; two Bedrooms (formerly "Deluxe Bedrooms") for one, two, or three travelers, each Bedroom containing an enclosed toilet-and-shower facility; "Roomettes" (formerly "Economy Bedrooms", "Standard Bedrooms", or "Compartments") for one or two travelers, each Roomette containing its own unenclosed toilet and washing facilities; and a shower room at the end of the car.


title: Sleeping car

text: China Railway operates an extensive network of conventional sleeper trains throughout the country, covering all provincial capitals and many major cities. The Chinese "hard" sleeping car in use today is very basic, consisting of 6 fixed bunk beds per compartment, which can be converted into seats in peak season, especially during Chinese New Year. The middle level bunk bed will be folded and top level bunk bed will still be sold as sleeper, while the lower bed will be occupied by three passengers. Chinese trains also offer "soft" or deluxe sleeping cars with four or two beds per room.


title: Sleeping car

text: China is the only country to operate high-speed sleeper trains. Sleeper services are operated using high-speed CRH1E, CRH2E and CRH5E trains outfitted with sleeping berths (couchette). Services run between Beijing - Shanghai and Beijing - Guangzhou at speeds of up to , one of the fastest sleeper trains in the world. A new variant of CRH2E consists of double level bunk capsules in lieu of sleeping berths. These trains have been dubbed "moving hotels".


title: Sleeping car

text: A major portion of passenger cars in India are sleeper/couchette cars. With railways as one of the primary mode of passenger transport, sleeper cars vary from economical to First Class AC (air conditioned). Most Indian trains come in combinations of first class A/C and non-A/C private sleeper cars with doors, and A/C 3-tier or 2-tier couchette arrangements.


title: Sleeping car

text: Japan once had many sleeping car trains, but most have been abolished because of the development of air travel, overnight bus services and high-speed rail. As of May 2016, sleeper car trains of regular service in Japan are as follows:


title: Sleeping car

text: The Indonesian State Railways once operated sleeper cars on the "" between its launch in 1967 and 1995, when the last berth ("couchette") cars were decommissioned.


title: Sleeping car

text: The successor to the Indonesian State Railways, PT Kereta Api Indonesia, operates some first-class train services that are officially called the Luxury class, but are misinterpreted as sleeper trains by mainstream media. There are two generations of Luxury class cars.


Les Misérables in Concert: The 25th Anniversary was performed and filmed at The O2 Arena in North Greenwich, London, England on 3 October 2010 at 1:30 pm and 7:00 pm. It marked the 25th anniversary of the original West End production of "Les Misérables", which was based on Victor Hugo's 1862 novel, and has been running since October 1985.


title: Les Misérables in Concert: The 25th Anniversary

text: The 25th anniversary concert stars Alfie Boe as Jean Valjean, Norm Lewis as Javert, Lea Salonga as Fantine, Nick Jonas as Marius, Katie Hall as Cosette, Ramin Karimloo as Enjolras, Samantha Barks as Éponine, Mia Jenkins as Young Cosette, Robert Madge as Gavroche, Matt Lucas and Jenny Galloway as the Thénardiers, and Earl Carpenter as the Bishop of Digne. Originally, Camilla Kerslake had been selected to perform as Cosette; however, she was unable to attend the concert. Hall was selected to play Cosette in her place. She had previously acted as Cosette at the Queen's Theatre from 2009 and in the 25th Anniversary Tour production at the Barbican. Casts of the contemporary London, international tour, and original 1985 London productions took part, comprising an ensemble of three hundred performers and musicians. The orchestra was conducted by David Charles Abell, who also conducted the 10th Anniversary performance in Royal Albert Hall in 1995.


text: For the encore, four Jean Valjeans sang "Bring Him Home": Colm Wilkinson from the original London cast, John Owen-Jones from the 25th Anniversary touring production, Simon Bowman from the contemporary London cast, and Alfie Boe, who sang the role in the concert. The original 1985 cast (excluding David Burt, who had played Enjolras and states he can no longer sing the part and Patti LuPone who originated Fantine but was not in attendance) then led the ensemble in a performance of "One Day More". After speeches from Cameron Mackintosh, Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg, the performance concluded with students from school productions of "Les Misérables" entering the arena through the audience and joining the casts for "The Finale".


text: The evening concert was shown live in cinemas across the UK, Ireland and around the world. The end credits of the concert confirmed a film adaptation of the stage musical for 2012 release.


text: A Blu-ray and DVD version of the O2 broadcast was released on 29 November 2010 in the UK (PAL DVD (Region 2) and Blu-ray). It was released in North America on DVD and Blu-ray on 22 February 2011.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: Beefeater Gin is a brand of gin owned by Pernod Ricard and bottled and distributed in the United Kingdom, by the company of James Burrough. Beefeater remained in the Burrough's family control until 1987. It is a 47% or 44% alcohol product (94 proof) in the US, and a 40% alcohol product (80 proof) elsewhere in the world (including the UK). The Beefeater distillery is one of 24 in London.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: This gin is produced from "100% grain spirit". The manufacturer has been in business since 1863 and is currently located in Kennington, London.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: According to the Beefeater website, Beefeater Gin contains nine different botanicals: juniper, angelica root, angelica seeds, coriander seeds, liquorice, almonds, orris root, seville oranges, and lemon peel.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: A super premium version of Beefeater was launched in 2009. Beefeater 24 with its additional botanicals of Chinese Green tea, rare Japanese sencha and Grapefruit peel is bottled at 45%abv.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: Beefeater's history can be traced back to 1862, when James Burrough, born 1835, bought the Cale Street-based Chelsea distillery from Rectifier & Compounder, John Taylor, for the sum of £400 and started to produce his own distinctive style of gin by 1863. At first, the distillery continued with the production of liqueurs started by its previous owners, further establishing its reputation and extending its customer base.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: The 1876 company stock lists showed an increasing portfolio of gins with brand names such as Ye Old Chelsea and James Burrough London Dry, as well as Old Tom styles. By spending time experimenting, inventing and using new processes he discovered that blending a particular recipe of botanicals produced a bold, full-flavoured gin, which he named Beefeater Gin.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: After the almost instant success of the gin, it was soon made the James Burrough Company's flagship product. The original Beefeater recipe book dated 1895, specifies that nine botanicals are essential (juniper, angelica root, angelica seeds, coriander seeds, liquorice, almonds, orris root, seville oranges and lemon peel) to create the full-bodied and robust flavour so distinct in this gin.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: The gin was owned by the James Burrough Company until 1987, when under the direction of Alan Burrough, the company was bought by Pernod Ricard.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: As the James Burrough Company went into rapid expansion, there was a requirement to increase distilling capacity and in 1908 a new larger Beefeater distillery was built in Lambeth.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: The Beefeater production moved in 1958 to Kennington, London. English still manufacturer John Dore was commissioned to create a new larger set of copper stills mimicking those of the former Chelsea Distillery.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: In February, 2013, Pernod Ricard announced that the company would begin construction of a visitor centre at the existing Beefeater Distillery site.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: The method of steeping and distilling devised by James Burrough in the 1860s along with the secret recipe he created remains virtually unchanged.


title: Beefeater Gin

text: Typically considered a mid range gin, Beefeater's basic London Dry Gin has generally performed well at international spirit ratings competitions. The London Dry earned one double gold, two gold, two silver and two bronze medals from the San Francisco World Spirits Competition between 2006 and 2012. It received scores of 93 and 94 from the Beverage Testing Institute in 2005, 2008, and 2009. The higher-end "24" gin has also earned accolades, including a gold medal from the San Francisco World Spirits Competition in 2010 and silver medals in 2011 and 2012.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: ' (), sometimes also called ' or Essequibo, is a disputed territory of west of the Essequibo River that is administered and controlled by Guyana but claimed by Venezuela. The boundary dispute was inherited from the colonial powers (Spain in the case of Venezuela, and the Netherlands and the United Kingdom in the case of Guyana) and has been complicated by the independence of Guyana from the United Kingdom in 1966.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The status of the territory is subject to the Geneva Agreement, which was signed by the United Kingdom, Venezuela and British Guiana on 17 February 1966. This treaty stipulates that the parties will agree to find a practical, peaceful and satisfactory solution to the dispute. On 18 December 2020, the International Court of Justice accepted the case submitted by Guyana to settle the dispute.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The territory is divided by Guyana into six administrative regions: Barima-Waini, Cuyuni-Mazaruni, Pomeroon-Supenaam, Potaro-Siparuni, Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo and Essequibo Islands-West Demerara. Venezuela often depicts it on the map as a striped region. It is then included in the state constitutions of Bolívar and Delta Amacuro.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The Spanish name is either or , and in Venezuelan maps it often appears as , which translates to "Zone in Reclamation".


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The first European encounter of the region was by the ships of Juan de Esquivel, deputy of Don Diego Columbus, son of Christopher Columbus in 1498. The region was named after Esquivel. In 1499, Amerigo Vespucci and Alonso de Ojeda explored the mouths of the Orinoco, and reportedly were the first Europeans to explore the Essequibo.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Dutch colonisation of the Guianas occurred primarily between the mouths of the Orinoco River in the west and the Amazon River to the east. Their presence in the Guianas is noted by the late 1500s, though many documents of early Dutch discoveries in the region were destroyed. The Dutch were present as far west as the Araya Peninsula in Venezuela utilising salt pans in the area. By the 1570s, it was reported that the Dutch were commencing trade in the Guinanas, but little evidence exists. At the time, neither the Portuguese nor the Spanish had made any establishments in the area. A Dutch fort was built in 1596 at the mouth of the Essequibo River on an island, which was destroyed by the Spanish later that year.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In 1597, Dutch interest in travelling to the Guianas became common following the publication of "The Discovery of Guiana" by Sir Walter Raleigh. On 3 December 1597, a Dutch expedition left Brielle and travelled the coasts between the Amazon and Orinoco. The report, written by A. Cabeljau and described as having "more realistic information about the region" than that of Raleigh, showed how the Dutch had travelled the Orinoco and Caroní River, discovering dozens of rivers and other land previously unknown. Cabeljau wrote of good relations with the natives and that the Spanish were friendly when they encountered them in San Tomé. By 1598, Dutch ships frequented the Guiana to establish settlements.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Another Dutch fort supported by indigenous groups was established at the mouth of the Essequibo River in 1613, which was destroyed by the Spanish in November 1613. In 1616, Dutch ship captain Aert Adriaenszoon Groenewegen established Fort Kyk-Over-Al located down the Essequibo River, where he married the daughter of an indigenous chief, controlling the Dutch colony for nearly fifty years until his death in 1664.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: To protect the salt flats, the "white gold" of the time, from English, French and Dutch incursions, the Spanish Crown ordered the construction of a military fortress, which they finished building at the beginning of the year 1625. It was given the name of , (, by the patron of Spain; Arroyo, by the governor Diego de Arroyo Daza and Araya, by the name of the place). It was the first important fortress of the captaincy of Venezuela. As the years passed, the Spanish Crown was concerned about the high cost of maintaining the fortress. In 1720 it had 246 people, and a budget of 31,923 strong pesos per year to which is added the serious damage to the structure caused by the earthquake in 1684 and later the devastating effects of the hurricane that flooded the salt flats in 1725.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: By 1637, the Spanish wrote that the Dutch "In those three settlements of Amacuro, Essequibo and Berbis the [Dutch] have many people... all the Aruacs and Caribs are allied with him", with later reports of the Dutch building forts from Cape North at the Amazon River to the opening of the Orinoco River. In 1639, the Spanish stated that the Dutch in Essequibo "were further protected by 10,000 to 12,000 Caribs in the vicinity of which they frequent, and who are their allies". Captain Groenewegen was recognised as keeping both the Spanish and Portuguese from settling in the area.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In a speech to the Parliament of England that took place on 21 January 1644, English settlers who had explored the Guianas stated that the Dutch, English and Spanish had long sought to find El Dorado in the region. The English said that the Dutch were experienced with travelling the Orinoco River for many years. Due to their skilful travel of the Dutch on the Orinoco, the Spanish would later encounter the Dutch and prohibit them from travelling the river.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In 1648 Spain signed the Peace of Münster with the Dutch Republic, whereby Spain recognised the Republic's independence and also small Dutch possessions located east of the Essequibo River, which had been founded by the Dutch Republic before it was recognised by Spain. However, few decades after the Peace of Münster, the Dutch began to spread gradually west of the Essequibo River, inside the Spanish Guayana Province. These new settlements were regularly contested and destroyed by the Spanish authorities.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Serious Dutch colonisation west of the Essequibo began in the early 1650s, while the colony of Pomeroon being established between the Moruka River and Pomeroon River. Many of these colonists were Dutch-Brazilian Jews who had left Pernambuco. In 1673, Dutch settlements were established as far as the Barima River.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In 1732, the Swedes made an attempt to settle between Low Orinoco and the Barima River. Nevertheless, by 1737 the Major Sergeant Carlos Francisco Francois de Sucre y Pardo (Antonio José de Sucre's grandfather) expelled them from the forts at "Barima," preventing the Swedish attempt of colonisation by the time being. By 1745, the Dutch had several territories in the region, including Essequibo, Demerara, Berbice, and Surinam. Dutch settlements were also established on the Cuyuni River, Caroní River and Moruka River. Domingos, Bandeira Jerónimo and Roque described Essequibo and Demerara as "sophisticated and promising slave colonies".


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: When Spain created the Captaincy General of Venezuela in 1777, the Essequibo River was restated as the natural border between Spanish territory and the Dutch colony of Essequibo. Spanish authorities, in a report dated 10 July 1788, put forward an official claim against the Dutch expansion over her territory, and proposed a borderline:It has been stated that the south bank of the Orinoco from the point of Barima, 20 leagues more or less inland, up to the creek of Curucima, is low-lying and swampy land and, consequently, reckoning all this tract as useless, very few patches of fertile land being found therein, and hardly any savannahs and pastures, it is disregarded; so taking as chief base the said creek of Curucima, or the point of the chain and ridge in the great arm of the Imataka, an imaginary line will be drawn running to the south-south-east following the slopes of the ridge of the same name which is crossed by the rivers Aguire, Arature and Amacuro, and others, in the distance of 20 leagues, direct to the Cuyuni; from there it will run on to the Masaruni and Essequibo, parallel to the sources of the Berbis and Surinama; this is the directing line of the course which the new Settlements and foundations proposed must follow.Dutch slaves in Essequibo and Demerara recognised the Orinoco River as the boundary between Spanish and Dutch Guiana, with slaves often attempting to cross the Orinoco to live with increased, though limited, liberties in Spanish Guiana.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Under the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814, Dutch colonies of Demerara, Berbice and Essequibo were transferred to the United Kingdom. By this time, the Dutch had defended the territory from the British, French and Spanish for nearly two centuries, often allying with natives in the region who provided intelligence about Spanish incursions and escaped slaves. According to scholar Allan Brewer Carías, the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 did not establish a western border of what would later be known as the British Guiana, which is why explorer Robert Schomburgk would later be commissioned to draw a border.Following the establishment of Gran Colombia in 1819, territorial disputes began between Gran Colombia, later Venezuela, and the British. In 1822 José Rafael Revenga, Minister Plenipotentiary of Gran Colombia to Britain, complained to the British government at the direction of Simón Bolívar about the presence of British settlers in territory claimed by Venezuela: "The colonists of Demerara and Berbice have usurped a large portion of land, which according to recent treaties between Spain and Holland, belongs to our country at the west of Essequibo River. It is absolutely essential that these settlers be put under the jurisdiction and obedience to our laws, or be withdrawn to their former possessions."


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In 1824 Venezuela appointed José Manuel Hurtado as its new Ambassador to Britain. Hurtado officially presented to the British government Venezuela's claim to the border at the Essequibo River, which was not objected to by Britain. However, the British government continued to promote colonisation of territory west of the Essequibo River in succeeding years. In 1831, Britain merged the former Dutch territories of Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo into a single colony, British Guiana.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Under the aegis of the Royal Geographical Society, the German-born explorer and naturalist Robert Hermann Schomburgk conducted botanical and geographical exploration of British Guiana in 1835. This resulted in a sketch of the territory with a line marking what he believed to be the western boundary claimed by the Dutch. As a result of this, he was commissioned in 1840 by the British government to survey Guiana's boundaries. This survey resulted in what came to be known as the "Schomburgk Line". The Line went well beyond the area of British occupation and gave British Guiana control of the mouth of the Orinoco River. According to Schomburgk, it did not contain all the area that Britain might legitimately claim.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Venezuela disputed Schomburgk's placing of border markers at the Orinoco River, and in 1844 claimed all of Guiana west of the Essequibo River. Also in 1844, a British proposal to Venezuela to modify the border to give Venezuela full control of the Orinoco River mouth and adjacent territory was ignored. In 1850 both Britain and Venezuela reached an agreement whereby they accepted not to colonise the disputed territory, although it was not established where this territory began and ended.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Schomburgk's initial sketch, which had been published in 1840, was the only version of the "Schomburgk Line" published until 1886, which led to later accusations by US President Grover Cleveland that the line had been extended "in some mysterious way".


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The dispute went unmentioned for many years until gold was discovered in the region, which disrupted relations between the United Kingdom and Venezuela. In 1876, gold mines inhabited mainly by English-speaking people had been established in the Cuyuni basin, which was Venezuelan territory beyond the Schomburgk line but within the area Schomburgk thought Britain could claim. That year, Venezuela reiterated its claim up to the Essequibo River, to which the British responded with a counterclaim including the entire Cuyuni basin, although this was a paper claim which the British never intended to pursue.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: On 21 February 1881, Venezuela proposed a frontier line starting from a point one mile to the north of the Moruka River, drawn from there westward to the 60th meridian and running south along that meridian. This would have granted the Barima District to Venezuela.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In October 1886 Britain declared the Schomburgk Line to be the provisional frontier of British Guiana, and in February 1887 Venezuela severed diplomatic relations. In 1894, Venezuela appealed to the United States to intervene, citing the Monroe Doctrine as justification. The United States did not want to get involved, only going as far as suggesting the possibility of arbitration.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The longstanding dispute became a diplomatic crisis in 1895. Venezuela hired William Lindsay Scruggs as its lobbyist in Washington, D.C. Scruggs took up Venezuela's argument that British action violated the Monroe Doctrine. Scruggs used his influence to get the US government to accept this claim and get involved. President Grover Cleveland adopted a broad interpretation of the Doctrine that did not just simply forbid new European colonies but declared an American interest in any matter within the hemisphere. British Prime Minister Lord Salisbury and British ambassador to the US Lord Pauncefote both misjudged the importance the American government placed on the dispute. The key issue in the crisis became Britain's refusal to include the territory east of the Schomburgk Line in the proposed international arbitration. Ultimately Britain backed down and tacitly accepted the US right to intervene under the Monroe Doctrine. This US intervention forced Britain to accept arbitration of the entire disputed territory.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The Treaty of Arbitration between the UK and Venezuela was signed in Washington on 2 February 1897. This treaty specifically stipulated the legal framework for the arbitration, and its first article stated that" "An arbitral Tribunal shall be immediately appointed to determine the boundary line between the United States of Venezuela and the Colony of British Guiana"."


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The Treaty provided the legal framework, procedures and conditions for the Tribunal in order to solve the issue and reach to determinate a border. Its third article established that ""The Tribunal shall investigate and ascertain the extent of the territories belonging to, or that might lawfully be claimed by the United Netherlands or by the Kingdom of Spain respectively at the time of the acquisition by Great Britain of the Colony of British Guiana, and shall determine the boundary line between the Colony of British Guiana and the United States of Venezuela"". The Treaty also established the rules and principles to be followed by the Tribunal in order to draw the borderline.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Venezuela argued that Spain–whose territory they had acquired–controlled land from the Orinoco River to the Amazon River in present-day Brazil. Spain, according to Venezuela, only designated its claimed Guiana territory to the Dutch, which did not include much land within the disputed territory. Meanwhile, Britain, who had acquired the Dutch territory, stated that the disputed Guiana region was not Spanish because it was so remote and uncontrolled, explaining that the original natives in the land had shared the territory's land with the Dutch instead of the Spanish and were thus under Dutch and British influence.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The rival claims were presented to a tribunal of five arbitrators: two from Britain, two from the US (representing Venezuela's interest) and one from Russia, who were presumed neutral. Venezuela reiterated its claim to the district immediately west of the Essequibo, and claimed that the boundary should run from the mouth of the Moruka River southwards to the Cuyuni River, near its junction with the Mazaruni River, and then along the east bank of the Essequibo to the Brazilian border.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: On 3 October 1899 the Tribunal ruled largely in favour of Britain. The Schomburgk Line was, with two deviations, established as the border between British Guiana and Venezuela. One deviation was that Venezuela received Barima Point at the mouth of the Orinoco, giving it undisputed control of the river, and thus the ability to levy duties on Venezuelan commerce. The second placed the border at the Wenamu River rather than the Cuyuni River, giving Venezuela substantial territory east of the line. However, Britain received most of the disputed territory, and all of the gold mines.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The Venezuelan representatives, claiming that Britain had unduly influenced the decision of the Russian member of the tribunal, protested the outcome. Periodic protests, however, were confined to the domestic political arena and international diplomatic forums.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In 1899, immediately after the arbitration ruling, the US counsel for Venezuela were interviewed jointly, and pointed out their first claims against the ruling:


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: "Great Britain, up to the time of the intervention of the United States, distinctly refused to arbitrate any portion of the territory east of the Schomburgk line, alleging that its title was unassailable. This territory included the Attacuri River and Point Barima, which is of the greatest value strategically and commercially. The award gives Point Barima, with a strip of land fifty miles long, to Venezuela, which thereby obtains entire control of the Orinoco River. Three thousand square miles in the interior are also awarded to Venezuela. Thus, by a decision in which the British arbitrators concurred, the position taken by Great Britain in 1895 is shown to be unfounded [...] The President of the tribunal in his closing address today had commented upon the unanimity of the present judgment and had referred to it as a proof of the success of the arbitration, but it did not require much intelligence to penetrate behind this superficial statement and to see that the line drawn is a line of compromise and not a line of right. If the British contention was right, the line should have been drawn further west; if it were wrong, the line should have been drawn much further east. There was nothing in the history of the controversy, nor in the legal principle involved, which could adequately explain why the line should be drawn where it had been. So long as arbitration was conducted on such principles, it could not be regarded as a success, at least by those who believe that arbitration should result in the admission of legal rights and not in compromises really diplomatic in character. Venezuela had gained much, but was entitled to much more, and if the arbitrators were unanimous, it must be because their failure to agree would have confirmed Great Britain in the possession of even more territory"."


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The Venezuelan government showed almost immediate disapproval with the 1899 Arbitral Award. As early as 7 October 1899 Venezuela voiced her condemnation of the Award, and demanded the renegotiation of her eastern border with British Guiana: that day, Venezuelan Foreign Minister José Andrade stated that the Arbitral Award was the product of political collusion and it should not be adhered to by Venezuela.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: On 26 October 1899 in a letter to a colleague, Severo Mallet-Prevost, the Official Secretary of the US–Venezuela delegation in the Tribunal of Arbitration, stated that the Arbitral Award was the result of pressures brought on the judges by the President of the Tribunal, Friedrich Martens.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: After numerous bilateral diplomatic attempts failed to convince the United Kingdom of her seriousness to nullify the award, Venezuela denounced it before the first assembly of the United Nations, in 1945.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: In 1949, the US jurist Otto Schoenrich gave the Venezuelan government a memorandum written by Mallet-Prevost, which was written in 1944 to be published only after his death. Mallet-Prevost surmised from the private behavior of the judges that there had a political deal between Russia and Britain, and said that the Russian chair of the panel, Friedrich Martens, had visited Britain with the two British arbitrators in the summer of 1899, and subsequently had offered the two American judges a choice between accepting a unanimous award along the lines ultimately agreed, or a 3 to 2 majority opinion even more favourable to the British. The alternative would have followed the Schomburgk Line entirely, and given the mouth of the Orinoco to the British. Mallet-Prevost said that the American judges and Venezuelan counsel were disgusted at the situation and considered the 3 to 2 option with a strongly worded minority opinion, but ultimately went along with Martens to avoid depriving Venezuela of even more territory. This memorandum provided further motives for Venezuela's contentions that there had in fact been a political deal between the British judges and the Russian judge at the Arbitral Tribunal, and led to Venezuela's revival of its claim to the disputed territory.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: By the 1950s, Venezuelan media led grassroots movements demanding the acquisition of Guayana Esequiba. Under the dictatorship of Marcos Pérez Jiménez, the Venezuelan government began plans to invade Guayana Esequiba. President Pérez Jiménez anticipated the invasion of Guyana in 1958, but was ultimately overthrown in the 1958 Venezuelan coup d'état before this was finalised.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: Venezuela formally raised the issue again at an international level before the United Nations in 1962, four years before Guyana won independence from Britain. On 12 November 1962, Venezuelan foreign minister gave an exposition in the Special Political and Decolonization Committee of the United Nations General Assembly to denounce the 1899 Paris Tribunal Arbitration. Citing the . Briceño argued that collusion and nullity vices led to the favourable ruling, and his exposition he stressed that Venezuela considered the Paris Arbitration as null and void because to "acts contrary to good faith" of the British government and the Tribunal members. Said complaints led to the 1966 Geneva Agreement. Venezuela also cited as several improprieties and vices in the ruling, especially "Ultra Vires", due to the fact that the referees drew the border between British Guiana, Brazil and Suriname, and also decreed freedom of navigation in the Amacuro and Barima rivers, exceeding the scope of powers granted by the arbitration treaty in 1897.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: The Venezuelan claim of the nullity of the 1899 ruling has been acknowledged by several foreign scholars and jurists, such as J. Gillis Wetter of Sweden, in his work "The International Arbitral Process" (1979), awarded by the American Society of International Law. By searching on the British official archives, Wetter provided further evidence of the deal between Britain and Russia, what made him conclude that the ruling was marred by serious procedural and substantive defects, evidence that it was more a political compromise than a court ruling. Uruguayan jurist Eduardo Jiménez de Aréchaga, former president of the International Court of Justice, came to similar conclusions.


title: Guayana Esequiba

text: At a meeting in Geneva on 17 February 1966, the governments of British Guiana, the United Kingdom and Venezuela signed the "Agreement to resolve the controversy over the frontier between Venezuela and British Guiana", best known thereafter as the Geneva Agreement of 1966. The agreement established the regulatory framework to be followed by the parties in order to resolve the issue. According to the agreement a Mixed Commission was installed with the purpose of seeking satisfactory solutions for the practical settlement of the border controversy, but the parties never agreed to implement a solution within this Commission due to different interpretations of the agreement.