title: Josh Lyman

text: Aaron Sorkin, the creator of "The West Wing," originally wrote Josh Lyman with long-time friend Whitford in mind. An early draft of the pilot script, dated February 6, 1998, describes Josh as being "a youthful 38" and "a highly regarded brain." After reading the script, Whitford said he loved the character immediately and "desperately wanted" the part. While his audition impressed the show's executive producers, with Sorkin describing it as "simply the best audition for anything I'd ever seen," Warner Brothers casting director John Levey was not convinced Whitford had enough sex appeal to play a lead character and executive producer Thomas Schlamme was concerned that he did not have enough depth to carry the more dramatic scenes. After a second audition, Whitford was offered the role of Sam Seaborn. Whitford called Sorkin for help. "I just said, 'Aaron, I just feel this very strongly. This isn't about me wanting a job. This is the only time in my life I will play this card. I am this guy; I am not the other guy.'" Sorkin was impressed, and soon after Whitford was cast as Josh.


title: Josh Lyman

text: In researching the role, Whitford said he found former Clinton communications director George Stephanopoulos's book "All Too Human" very helpful, "just because it gave a sense of the sort of smell and the texture and the level of intimacy with the president, which I was just unaware of."


title: Josh Lyman

text: Josh shares his name with a character in the Garry Trudeau cartoon strip "Doonesbury", a White House deputy cabinet liaison encountered by "Doonesbury" regular Joanie Caucus. A framed copy of a "Doonesbury" strip hangs in Josh's office. The character is said to be based in part on Rahm Emanuel, although executive producer Lawrence O'Donnell denies this claim. In the Season 1 episode, 'Mandatory Minimums', Josh is called "Rambo" by one of the staff after an intense telephone conversation. In other instances, the character is said to be based on former Clinton advisor Paul Begala who notes that some of Josh's experiences in the first season are some of the same experiences he went through.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Josh comes from Westport, Connecticut. A Fulbright scholar, he graduated "cum laude" from Harvard University (where he worked at the "Harvard Crimson"), and Yale Law School, graduating c. 1984. He has been known to boast that he scored a 760 on the verbal portion of his SAT, although he claims, when trying to explain his lack of skill in serious relationships, his IQ does not "break the bank," so he had to work hard in college quipping that "by the time [his] roommates notched their 100th party of the year, I think I got my first full night of sleep."


title: Josh Lyman

text: Josh is a non-practicing Jew; his grandfather was held in the Nazi concentration camp Birkenau during World War II. He had an elder sister, Joanie, who died when he was a child. She was babysitting him when a fire broke out in her home and died trying to put out the fire while Josh ran outside - an event which continues to haunt Josh. His father, Noah Lyman, was a lawyer and old friend of Leo McGarry. Although Josh thinks his father would have preferred grandchildren to a son in politics, Noah was proud that Josh was working for Bartlet and often bragged about his son to his friends and neighbors. His father died in 1998 on the night of the Illinois primary, after developing an unexpected pulmonary embolism while undergoing chemotherapy for an unspecified form of cancer. His mother splits her time between Westport and West Palm Beach, Florida, before she sells the Connecticut house.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Though idealistic like every other member of the Bartlet administration, Josh is perhaps the most willing to resort to less-than-honorable tactics and on occasion suggests solutions and methods that others in the staff would not condone. It is not unknown for Josh to resort to threats, intimidation, lies and even blackmail to achieve what needs to be done for the Bartlet administration.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Before working for President Josiah Bartlet, Josh worked in several positions as an advisor and manager for Democratic politicians. Josh later became a staffer for then-Senator John Hoynes, the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for President in the upcoming 1998 election. However, Hoynes's tendency to go against Josh's advice, and to prioritize politics over Hoynes' own ideas and convictions, frustrates Josh. Thirteen weeks before the New Hampshire primary, Josh receives a visit from Leo McGarry, an old friend of his father's. At Leo's request, a skeptical Josh travels to New Hampshire to hear Bartlet speak. After hearing Bartlet give a surprisingly honest answer to a politically sensitive question Josh immediately leaves Hoynes' campaign to work for Bartlet; he also recruits his old friend Sam Seaborn to the campaign.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Shortly after joining the Bartlet for America campaign, Josh hires recent college dropout Donna Moss, who had been volunteering for the campaign, as his assistant. Donna remains as Josh's assistant until the sixth season. A largely unspoken friendship, and romantic tension, exists between the two for the majority of the series. In the first-season finale, Josh is critically wounded by gunfire during an assassination attempt on African-American presidential aide Charlie Young. Josh undergoes fourteen hours of surgery and is subsequently put through intensive psychotherapy with psychiatrist Stanley Keyworth after displaying symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, including raising his voice to President Bartlet in the Oval Office and breaking a window in his apartment.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Josh's position in the Bartlet administration is temporarily compromised after he leaks information to the press about an anonymous hold on military promotions placed by Idaho Senator Chris Carrick. Carrick tries to secure a promise from the White House that a missile defense system will be built in his home state, but Josh's competitive nature will not allow him to make a compromise. After the leak, Carrick releases the hold but resigns from the Democratic Party, informing Josh that he will seek re-election as a Republican and citing Josh as a key reason for his defection.


title: Josh Lyman

text: The resulting embarrassment to the administration and to the party leads Leo to leave Josh out of key budget negotiations, negotiations which eventually result in a complete shutdown of the federal government. Josh soon finds himself stripped of much of his political authority, as freelance political advisor Angela Blake takes up many of his duties. He eventually returns from isolation after the First Lady pointedly asks President Bartlet "Where's Josh?". Josh is the only senior staffer to support the President's firm stand against Speaker Jeff Haffley; the President's eventual political victory over Haffley during this conflict is largely due to Josh's advice.


title: Josh Lyman

text: After John Hoynes publishes an autobiography praising Josh for his time in Hoynes' campaign and trying to recruit Josh, he decides that he doesn't want Hoynes (or current Vice President Bob Russell) to be President, and instead convinces Texas Congressman Matt Santos to run for President, much in the same way Leo McGarry recruited Bartlet eight years earlier. Josh leaves his position at the White House to run Santos's presidential campaign, leaving his legislative portfolio to be taken up by Clifford Calley, a move encouraged by Leo after he and later C.J. notice that Clifford's personality and his skills are not unlike Josh. The Santos campaign initially loses the Iowa caucus, comes third in the New Hampshire primary and then goes on to win an upset victory in the California primary. Santos wins the Texas primary and the final New Jersey primary by a slim margin.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Going into the Democratic National Convention, no candidate has enough delegates to win the nomination, with delegates split among Russell, Santos, and Hoynes. At the convention, Pennsylvania Governor Eric Baker attempts an upstart campaign from the convention floor that further fractures the delegates. Ultimately Santos wins the nomination after an inspiring convention speech that was expected to be a concession, and behind-the-scenes maneuvering by President Bartlet. Josh is influential in recruiting Leo McGarry as the vice presidential nominee.


title: Josh Lyman

text: After Matt Santos is elected President of the United States in a narrow victory over Republican Senator Arnold Vinick, Josh becomes the White House Chief of Staff in the incoming Santos Administration. In his last appearance in the series, he is meeting privately with President Santos in the Oval Office.


title: Josh Lyman

text: John Spencer, who played Leo McGarry, described his character's relationship with Josh as a mentoring one, with Leo regarding Josh as a younger version of himself. Leo was an old friend of Josh's father, Noah Lyman. It is this connection that Leo uses to get Josh to travel and see then Governor Bartlet speak and later to join Bartlet's presidential campaign in the first place.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Assistant Secretary of State Albie Duncan refers to Josh as "McGarry's boy," and Bartlet believes that Josh would throw out the baby, the bath water, and the bathtub in order to avoid letting Leo down. Both show strong loyalty to one another, with Josh going to great lengths to prevent damaging details of Leo's past drug addiction and alcoholism from being made public and Leo supporting Josh as he struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder, promising that "as long as I got a job, you got a job." After Leo's death, President Bartlet says that Leo loved Josh like a son. On one occasion, Bartlet jokingly remarks to Leo that Josh, "frankly, is a lot smarter than you."


title: Josh Lyman

text: Josh's assistant Donna Moss, portrayed by Janel Moloney, was originally slated to be a minor recurring character; however, the chemistry between the two actors caught producers' attention early on. After seeing Moloney and Whitford perform together in the pilot, Aaron Sorkin added a scene in which Donna argues with Josh to change his shirt before attending a meeting, eventually convincing him by saying that "All the girls think you look really hot in this shirt." Although Mandy Hampton was originally intended to be Josh's romantic interest, by the end of the show's first season the character had been written out and the role taken over by Donna.


title: Josh Lyman

text: During the first four seasons, the relationship remains in stasis, with neither daring to make any real romantic move on the other. Sorkin admits that he was more inclined to move the relationship forward, but every time he discussed the possibility fellow executive producer Thomas Schlamme would shout, "No! Wait another year!" "Besides", adds Sorkin, "Sexual and romantic tension is, to me, much more fun than taking the tension away by having the sex and romance."


title: Josh Lyman

text: Other characters occasionally speculate on the pair's relationship. When Donna encourages Josh to ask Joey Lucas on a date, Joey guesses that Donna is attempting to cover her own feelings for Josh through misdirection. During the same episode Josh and Sam Seaborn discuss why Donna was so pushy about asking out Joey; Josh comments that he wonders why Donna wouldn't be jealous to which Sam asked if Josh gets jealous when Donna dates. Josh says he doesn't but does everything in his power to stop or hinder the dates from happening. During her first meeting with Josh, Amy Gardner asks him if he is dating his assistant, and later asks Donna directly, "Are you in love with Josh?", we do not see Donna's answer. When Donna recruits Josh to help her get a date with Jack Reese, Josh's behavior leads Jack to wonder whether he is getting "in between anything".


title: Josh Lyman

text: Following Sorkin and Schlamme's departure from the series at the end of the fourth season, the relationship takes some new turns, with Donna attempting to broaden her horizons past Josh and pursue her own social life outside of the White House. In season 5, when Donna is badly injured in a terrorist attack in Gaza, Josh rushes to keep vigil at her bedside at a military hospital in Germany. In the sixth-season episode "Impact Winter," Donna quits her job as assistant to Josh, seeing no chance of career advancement. She begins working for Vice President Bob Russell's presidential campaign. About the same time, Josh leaves his job to work on Matt Santos' campaign. This puts Donna and Josh in direct confrontation as their candidates battle each other for the Democratic nomination. Santos beats Russell for the nomination in the season 6 finale "2162 Votes." Donna applies for a job in the Santos for President campaign in the Season 7 premiere "The Ticket," but Josh finds himself forced to reject her as she is on record trashing his candidate while she was working for the other team. During their conversation he reveals that he misses her "every day." Later, Lou Thornton hires Donna to work on the Santos campaign with Lou corralling the two into a meeting room for a quick reconciliation.


title: Josh Lyman

text: In the Season 7 episode "The Cold," Josh and Donna kiss passionately as she brings him the good news that Congressman Santos has caught up to Vinick and that they are tied in the national tracking polls. Josh later apologizes, saying the kiss was "inappropriate," but Donna says, "It was bound to happen sometime." Donna talks to Will, who says pursuing a relationship with Josh wouldn't be inappropriate. Later in the episode, Donna discreetly leaves the key to her hotel room on the table for Josh, but Edith Ortega notices the key before Josh can retrieve it and returns the key to Donna. In "Election Day," Josh and Donna consummate their relationship, sleeping together twice, both times at her initiative. Donna gives Josh four weeks to figure out "what they want from each other." She insists that if this cannot happen within four weeks, their relationship will remain in a constant state of ambiguity, which is not what Donna wants. After talking to Lou as well as his deputy-of-choice Sam Seaborn, Josh realizes that he desperately needs to take a break from work. At the end of the episode, Josh and Donna go on vacation together.


title: Josh Lyman

text: In the series finale "Tomorrow," Josh and Donna wake up in bed together on the morning of Inauguration Day, ten weeks after Donna set the four-week deadline.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Sam is Josh's close friend, remarking that he "love[s] Josh like a brother." After Leo recruits Josh to the campaign, Josh's first stop is to recruit Sam (who is working, unhappily, at a law firm) to join him. As two of the youngest members of the senior staff, they occasionally get themselves in trouble for various schemes and incidents, usually with the best intentions. Much like the relationship between Jed Bartlet and Leo McGarry, Josh and Sam's friendship extends far past their role as co-workers and the two are each other's confidants on personal matters and relationship troubles. They even spend some holidays together when not going home.


title: Josh Lyman

text: After Sam leaves the White House at the end of Bartlet's first term to run for Congress, the role of Josh's counterpart is taken over by Toby Ziegler, although that relationship becomes frayed when Josh leaves the White House to run the presidential campaign of Matthew Santos. After Santos is elected, Josh quickly resolves to include Sam (who lost his congressional bid) by flying out to Los Angeles on a same day round trip and offering him the position of Deputy Chief of Staff. Sam is initially reluctant because he is engaged and aware of the job commitment involved but ultimately accepts, though after giving a frazzled Josh an ultimatum: get much-needed rest for a week or watch Sam return to California and never come back. Josh and Sam's last scene shows them together in the Oval Office for the new President's first briefing.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Throughout the series, Bartlet (along with Leo) appears as a fatherly figure to Josh. Although flashbacks reveal that President Bartlet initially had trouble remembering Josh's name and telling him apart from his other advisors, the President develops a special affection for Josh and even refers to Josh as his son in the season two finale "Two Cathedrals". When Josh's father dies, Josh books a plane trip back to Connecticut when Bartlet makes a surprise appearance at the airport terminal. Bartlet offers his condolences and asks Josh if he wants him to go to Connecticut with him, to which a visibly moved Josh says no. Josh tells Bartlet that his father was proud to have him working on the campaign, citing that his father wanted Bartlet to win the election. Bartlet regards his young Deputy Chief of Staff as an integral part of the machine that makes the White House run properly; the brain behind the political strategic planning of the administration. When a powerful but difficult Hollywood studio chief threatens to cancel a critical fundraiser over an issue, he bosses Josh around in the process and later prompts an infuriated Bartlet to demand that Josh be treated with respect. When Josh tells the President he wants to leave the Bartlet administration to run the Santos campaign, he says he had never imagined having the conversation, and tells Leo that he doesn't "know how to tell him." During the primary and general election, Josh works to keep Santos from making any comments that would put Bartlet in any form of negative light. An example of this is very early in the campaign, Bartlet gives Josh some New Hampshire dropout numbers for Santos to use when talking about education, urging Josh to have Santos say Bartlet hadn't done enough. Immediately after the conversation, Josh burns the numbers. After Leo's funeral, a grieving Josh confides to Bartlet that "Leo and I were supposed to be doing this together" upon working under the new Santos presidency. Bartlet responds with "Leo and I are the past. You are the future." Bartlet informs Josh that he can always call him if he needs advice.


title: Josh Lyman

text: When Josh first meets then-Congressman Matt Santos he is impressed by his conviction and sees in him the same willingness to put his beliefs before political profit as he did in President Bartlet. Santos is ready to leave Washington and national politics to go back to Houston and spend more time with his family. When Josh gets caught up between offers from both major Democratic candidates for the presidential nomination in 2006, Vice President Bob Russell and former Vice President John Hoynes, he decides that he doesn't want to work for either of them. After a discussion with his mentor Leo McGarry, Josh discovers that he has already found his guy, Congressman Santos. He flies to Houston to pitch Santos his plan to make him President of the United States and after a few days Santos accepts by telling Josh "I'm in, if you're in with me". The two start a close relationship which appears to be complicated when they got into a number of fights, but they clearly care for each other, as for example in the Season 6 episode "La Palabra" when Josh urges Santos not to put his personal financial future at risk just to continue the campaign. During the general elections campaign, Santos seems to be ready to fire Josh as campaign manager in "The Wedding" but at Leo's persuasion, keeps him on and ends up winning the election. In "Election Day Part II", just after the final state (Nevada) is called, Santos looks at Josh across the room and thanks him, acknowledging Josh as the major architect behind his victory. Despite their close relationship, Santos has his own mind and disagrees with Josh at times due to Josh's willingness to resort to dirty politicking. When Santos passes over Josh to run his presidential transition team, he argues that it keeps Josh from "saying no" to the people Josh would later have to deal with in his capacity as Santos' Chief of Staff. Despite this, Santos considers Josh his top advisor (akin to Leo McGarry to Jed Bartlet) and tends to listen to Josh more often than not, for example when Josh recommends McGarry as Santos's running mate and when Josh tells Santos not to meddle in the speakership race. Another example of the connection the two have is shown when Santos begins to have concern for Josh's well-being when Josh seems to overwork himself during the transition. Santos questions Donna Moss about Josh's personal life and asks her whether Josh is seeing anyone or ever has any fun. When Josh decides to take a vacation, Santos remarks that he "would've driven you to the airport myself if it didn't require a motorcade." In the final episode Josh assumes his new position as White House Chief of Staff.


title: Josh Lyman

text: "The Washington Post" focuses on Josh's romantic tension with Donna Moss, Josh's assistant. They go on to say that while Josh and Donna's relationship was perceived as flirtatious and romantic in the time it was released, viewing the show after the Me Too movement shed a negative light on their story. The Post calls it "The Donna Problem" - that society and culture have moved on from what was acceptable back then, and now shows that are still well-written and produced are relics of that older time. They remark that Josh's behavior as the boss romantically interested in his subordinate is "an example of what we’re currently trying to educate men "not" to do in the workplace."


title: Josh Lyman

text: The Atlantic Wire ranked Josh as 17th on their list of characters in The West Wing, remarking that Lyman is "inarguably the show's most consistently dominant character" and "Arrogant, blustery and often tragically funny." The ranking was an average of the three writers who created that list, and while two of the writers ranked Josh Lyman as just below the main characters, a third writer ranked Josh as middle of the pack, bringing down the average. The relative public anger at the release of the list on social media, particularly of Lyman's low ranking, prompted two of the writers to interview themselves on a separate piece. The writer who gave the bad ranking, Kevin O'Keefe, explained that he saw Josh as "loud and immature... his attitude towards women – including and especially his treatment of his assistant Donna – is pretty terrible." O'Keefe also drew a parallel to Will McAvoy on another television show by Aaron Sorkin, The Newsroom, talking about a similarity in their pattern of sexual harassment. O'Keefe also mocked the internet response to his decision, saying that "the defense seems to be "but it's Josh! Josh is great!"... all the tweets and comments we got just baffled me." The writer who rated Lyman the highest, David Sims, argued that Josh is well-written regardless of his attitude, and is a central figure to the show. He also says that Josh has a complete character arc rivaled only by C. J. Cregg, and agreed that the internet response was silly by nature of those who were willing to defend Josh without clear reasoning.


title: Josh Lyman

text: Vulture Magazine ranked Josh as 7th on their list of all characters created by Aaron Sorkin, remarking that he takes his professional position quite personally. They also lauded Josh's drive, quipping that "not even a bullet could dampen his enthusiasm for governing."


title: AMD FX

text: AMD FX was a series of high-end AMD microprocessors for personal computers which debuted in 2011, claimed as AMD's first native 8-core desktop processor. The line was introduced with the Bulldozer microarchitecture at launch (codename Zambezi), and was then succeeded by its derivative Piledriver in 2012 (codename Vishera).


title: AMD FX

text: The line aimed at competing with the Intel Core line of desktop processors, and in particular the Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge architectures.


title: AMD FX

text: AMD's successor architecture, Zen, was released in 2017 under the Ryzen brand, replacing the FX series and competing with Intel's Skylake architecture.


title: AMD FX

text: In the years prior to the AMD FX range of processors, the AMD Phenom II and Athlon II lineup of processors, while not beating Intel's Core lineup in raw performance, were generally competitive when their price was taken into account. By the end of Phenom's lifespan, however, Intel's Sandy Bridge architecture could provide performance that Phenom II could not compete with. Rumors suggested that the FX line would change that as leaked information suggested improved performance on the upcoming Bulldozer architecture that AMD FX was based on.


title: AMD FX

text: The FX series launched on October 12, 2011, on the Bulldozer architecture. The launch lineup included the 4 core FX 4100 at $115, the 6 core FX 6100 at $165, and the 8 core FX 8120 at $205 and FX 8150 at $185. The FX refresh on the Piledriver architecture launched on October 23, 2012. The launch lineup included the refreshed 4 core FX 4300 at $122, 6 core FX 6300 at $132, and 8 core FX 8320 at $169 and FX 8350 at $195.


title: AMD FX

text: One notable feature of the AMD FX microprocessors is that they were all unlocked and overclockable, a feature usually reserved for the high-end "K" suffix SKUs from Intel. This allowed users to gain extra performance by raising the clock speed of their CPU. The personal world record for highest overclock was achieved on an FX-8350, which was clocked up to 8794.33 MHz.


title: AMD FX

text: Unlike the majority of their Intel counterparts, FX chips offered no integrated graphics, a feature reserved for AMD's APU line of processors.


title: AMD FX

text: Upon launch, the FX series was met with criticism from reviewers. Due to multiple cores sharing common resources, most tasks were substantially slower on the FX lineup than the Intel Sandy Bridge equivalent. In many single-threaded applications, it was worse than the previous generation of Phenom II microprocessors. The power consumption of the lineup, while not as poor as the Phenom II generation, was also worse than what Intel was providing at the time. The Piledriver-based FX refresh in 2012 generally improved performance across the board by increasing clock speeds at similar power consumption levels, but Intel's Ivy Bridge architecture was available and provided much better performance per watt and total performance to consumers. With AMD only being responsible for 20% of consumer CPU sales in 2016, Intel continued to gain market share in the industry during the lifespan of the FX series.


title: AMD FX

text: The AMD FX line-up generally performed worse than its Intel competitors during its lifespan. The floating-point performance was relatively poor due to a single shared FPU per module. Most games also could not take advantage of the high core counts that the series provided. In applications that benefitted from more threads, AMD SKUs typically pulled ahead. This came at a great cost, however, as thermal efficiency was often worse than the previous generation of processors. Updates to the architecture that came with the Piledriver revision allowed for higher clock speeds. This led to better performance, but that came with the cost of even higher thermal output on the high end, which can be seen with the FX 9590, which outputs 220 Watts of heat.


title: AMD FX

text: In 2015, AMD was accused of falsely advertising the core count of its FX lineup. The claim stated that because the FX series' cores shared common resources such as the FPU, AMD was falsely advertising its high core counts. The company had to pay out $12.1 million to California residents who bought a high-end FX chip.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: Mysore Dasara is the "Nadahabba" (state festival) of the state of Karnataka in India. It is a 10-day festival, starting with nine nights called Navaratri and the last day being Vijayadashami. The festival is observed on the tenth day in the Hindu calendar month of "Ashvina", which typically falls in the Gregorian months of September and October.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The Hindu festival of Dasara, Navratri and Vijayadashami celebrates the victory of good over evil. It was the day in the Hindu legends when Goddess Chamundeshwari (Durga) killed the demon Mahishasura. Mahishasura is the demon whose slaying by the Goddess gave the city the name Mysuru. The Mysuru tradition celebrates the warriors and the state fighting for the good during this festival, ritually worshipping and displaying the state sword, weapons, elephants, horses along with Hindu Devi goddess in her warrior form (predominantly) as well as the Vishnu avatar Rama. The ceremonies and a major procession is traditionally presided by the king of Mysuru.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The city of Mysuru has a long tradition of celebrating the Dasara festival with grandeur and pomp to mark the festival. The Dasara festival in Mysuru completed 409th anniversary in the year 2019, while evidence suggests the festivities were observed in Karnataka state by the Vijayanagara Empire kings in the 15th century.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The Dasara festivities began with the Vijayanagar kings as early as the 14th-15th Century. The festival played a historical role in the 14th-century Vijayanagara Empire, where it was called "Mahanavami" and the festivities are shown in the relief artwork of the outer wall of the Hazara Rama temple of Hampi.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The Italian traveller Niccolò de' Conti described the festival's intensity and importance as a grandeur religious and martial event with royal support. The event revered Durga as the warrior goddess (some texts refer to her as Chamundeshwari). The celebrations hosted athletic competitions, singing and dancing, fireworks, a pageantry military parade and charitable giving to the public.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: After the fall of the Vijayanagar to Deccan Sultanates, these Hindu celebrations came to an end under Muslim rulers. The Wodeyars of Mysore formed a kingdom in Southern parts of the Vijayanagara Empire and continued the Mahanavami (Dasara) festival celebration, a tradition started initially by Raja Wodeyar I (1578-1617 CE) in mid September 1610 at Srirangapatna.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The festivities included a special "durbar" (royal assembly). It was during the reign of Krishnaraja Wodeyar III in the year 1805, when the king started the tradition of having a special "durbar" in the Mysore Palace during Dasara; which was attended by members of the royal family, special invitees, officials and the masses. After the death of Srikanta Wadiyar in December 2013, this tradition has been continued by placing the "Pattada Katti" (royal sword) on the golden throne. The ninth day of Dasara called as "Mahanavami" is also an auspicious day on which the royal sword is worshipped and is taken on a procession involving elephants, camels and horses.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The main attraction of the ten-day Mysore Dasara festival is the Mysore Palace which is lighted daily with nearly 100,000 light bulbs from 7 pm to 10 pm on all days of the festival. Various cultural and religious programs highlighting the dance, music and culture of the State of Karnataka are performed in front of the illuminated Palace.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: On Vijayadashami, the traditional Dasara procession (locally known as "Jumboo Savari") is held on the streets of Mysore city. The main attraction of this procession is the idol of the Goddess Chamundeshwari which is placed on a golden mantapa (which is around 750 kilograms of gold) on the top of a decorated elephant. This idol is worshipped by the royal couple and other invitees before it is taken around in the procession. Colourful tableaux, dance groups, music bands, decorated elephants, horses and camels form a part of the procession which starts from the Mysore Palace and culminates at a place called "Bannimantap" where the "banni" tree ("Prosopis spicigera") is worshipped. According to a legend of the Mahabharata, "banni" tree was used by the Pandavas to hide their weapons during their one-year period of "Agnatavasa" (living life incognito). Before undertaking any warfare, the kings traditionally worshipped this tree to help them emerge victorious in the war. The Dasara festivities would culminate on the night of Vijayadashami with an event held in the grounds at Bannimantap called as "Panjina Kavayatthu" (torch-light parade).


title: Mysore Dasara

text: In Mysore, India, the Vijayadashami Elephant procession during Mysore Dasara is called Jumbo Savari (from the British during their control of Mysore State). The original name to this procession is "Jumbi Savari" ("going to the Shami (Banni) tree"). Now Goddess Chamundeshwari is taken in procession on an Elephant. But the "Jumbo" name is still intact.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: After the Jamboo Savari, a torchlight parade takes place in the evening at the Bannimantap Parade Grounds.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: Another major attraction during Dasara is the Dasara exhibition which is held in the exhibition grounds opposite to the Mysore Palace. The exhibition was started by the Maharaja of Mysore Chamaraja Wodeyar X in 1880 with the sole aim of introducing timely developments to the people of Mysore. The task of holding the exhibition is now entrusted with the "Karnataka Exhibition Authority (KEA)". This exhibition starts during Dasara and goes on till December. Various stalls which sell items like clothes, plastic items, kitchenware, cosmetics and eatables are set up and they attract a significant number of people. A play area containing attractions like a Ferris wheel is also present to provide entertainment to the people. Various Governmental agencies setup stalls to signify the achievements and projects that they have undertaken.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: On all the 10 days of Dasara, various music and dance concerts are held in auditoriums around Mysore city. Musicians and dance groups from all over India are invited to perform on this occasion. Another attraction during Dasara is the "Kusti Spardhe" (wrestling-bout) which attracts wrestlers from all around India. There are other events at bannimantap where various groups do bike parades etc.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: The Dasara procession has faced increasing pressure from activists and campaigners to end its controversial use of elephants. Procession elephants, as well as their handlers known as 'mahouts', have died from several shocking incidents over the years.


title: Mysore Dasara

text: In 2018, leaked footage from the elephants' training ground showed an elephant swaying in distress. International press labelled the video "heartbreaking", and reported on how the elephants must undergo two months of "rigorous training" in order to perform in the procession.


title: Operation Java

text: Operation Java is a 2021 Indian Malayalam-language crime thriller film produced by V Cinemas International, written and directed by Tharun Moorthy (in his feature film debut). It stars an ensemble cast including Balu Varghese, Lukman Avaran, Binu Pappu, Irshad, Shine Tom Chacko, Mamitha Baiju and Vinayakan. The story details an investigation undertaken by a cyber cell police station in Kochi. The film released on 12 February 2021 and received positive reviews from critics.


title: Operation Java

text: The film is based on real-life cases and portrays investigations undertaken by a cyber cell police station in Cochin over the period of a year and half with the help of two engineering graduates. Cases involve film piracy, job fraud, and murder. Antony George and Vinay Dasan are the two opportunist youths who join the team as temporary employees in the cyber cell and help the team solve cases using their skills. In the end, they end up not permanently hired, in spite of the initial promise. The film explores the darker side of information technology and its users. The film also conveys the struggles of temporary/ intern/ apprentice staff who work hard but don't get proper recognition or financial benefits for their work.


title: Operation Java

text: Tharun Moorthy was a former assistant professor of Computer Science and Engineering in college Of Engineering Kidangoor who turned into an advertisement filmmaker. "Operation Java" is the feature film directorial debut of Moorthy who also wrote the screenplay. It was screenwriter John Paul Puthusery who invited Moorthy to make a feature film after seeing a short film he scripted. Director Moorthy described the film as an investigative thriller, and it's based on real-life cases that follows an investigation by a team over a period of a year-and-a-half. It takes place in 2015 - 2017 period. The film was produced by V Cinemas International


title: Operation Java

text: Principal photography took place at Kochi, Thiruvananthapuram, Vaikom, and Tamil Nadu. A location in Kakkanad served as the police station. Faiz Siddik was the cinematographer. Filming was wrapped in early March 2020. Dubbing of the film was held at a studio in Kochi in June 2020.


title: Operation Java

text: The satellite rights and digital rights of the film is acquired by Zee Keralam channel and ZEE5 OTT platform.


title: Operation Java

text: This film premiered on 15 May through the Television Channel Zee Keralam and through Zee5 OTT platform.


title: Operation Java

text: Baradwaj Rangan of Film Companion South wrote "The film is a beautiful combination of romance and practicality and the cruelty of the establishment."


title: Photokeratitis

text: Photokeratitis or ultraviolet keratitis is a painful eye condition caused by exposure of insufficiently protected eyes to the ultraviolet (UV) rays from either natural (e.g. intense sunlight) or artificial (e.g. the electric arc during welding) sources. Photokeratitis is akin to a sunburn of the cornea and conjunctiva.


title: Photokeratitis

text: The injury may be prevented by wearing eye protection that blocks most of the ultraviolet radiation, such as welding goggles with the proper filters, a welder's helmet, sunglasses rated for sufficient UV protection, or appropriate snow goggles. The condition is usually managed by removal from the source of ultraviolet radiation, covering the corneas, and administration of pain relief. Photokeratitis is known by a number of different terms including: snow blindness, arc eye, welder's flash, bake eyes, corneal flash burns, flash burns, niphablepsia, or keratoconjunctivitis photoelectrica.


title: Photokeratitis

text: Common symptoms include pain, intense tears, eyelid twitching, discomfort from bright light, and constricted pupils.


title: Photokeratitis

text: Any intense exposure to UV light can lead to photokeratitis. In 2010, the Department of Optometry at the Dublin Institute of Technology published that the threshold for photokeratitis is 0.12 J/m. (Prior to this, in 1975, the Division of Biological Effects at the US Bureau of Radiological Health had published that the human threshold for photokeratitis is 50 J/m.) Common causes include welding with failure to use adequate eye protection such as an appropriate welding helmet or welding goggles. This is termed "arc eye", while photokeratitis caused by exposure to sunlight reflected from ice and snow, particularly at elevation, is commonly called "snow blindness". It can also occur due to using tanning beds without proper eyewear. Natural sources include bright sunlight reflected from snow or ice or, less commonly, from sea or sand. Fresh snow reflects about 80% of the UV radiation compared to a dry, sandy beach (15%) or sea foam (25%). This is especially a problem in polar regions and at high altitudes, as with about every of elevation (above sea level), the intensity of UV rays increases by four percent.


title: Photokeratitis

text: Photokeratitis can be prevented by using sunglasses or eye protection that transmits 5–10% of visible light and absorbs almost all UV rays. Additionally, these glasses should have large lenses and side shields to avoid incidental light exposure. Sunglasses should always be worn, even when the sky is overcast, as UV rays can pass through clouds.


title: Photokeratitis

text: The Inuit, Yupik, and other Arctic peoples carved snow goggles from materials such as driftwood or caribou antlers to help prevent snow blindness. Curved to fit the user's face with a large groove cut in the back to allow for the nose, the goggles allowed in a small amount of light through a long thin slit cut along their length. The goggles were held to the head by a cord made of caribou sinew.


title: Photokeratitis

text: In the event of missing sunglass lenses, emergency lenses can be made by cutting slits in dark fabric or tape folded back onto itself. The "SAS Survival Guide" recommends blackening the skin underneath the eyes with charcoal (as the ancient Egyptians did) to avoid any further reflection.


title: Photokeratitis

text: The pain may be temporarily alleviated with anaesthetic eye drops for the examination; however, they are not used for continued treatment, as anaesthesia of the eye interferes with corneal healing, and may lead to corneal ulceration and even loss of the eye. Cool, wet compresses over the eyes and artificial tears may help local symptoms when the feeling returns. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) eyedrops are widely used to lessen inflammation and eye pain, but have not been proven in rigorous trials. Systemic (oral) pain medication is given if discomfort is severe. Healing is usually rapid (24–72 hours) if the injury source is removed. Further injury should be avoided by isolation in a dark room, removing contact lenses, not rubbing the eyes, and wearing sunglasses until the symptoms improve.


title: Phil Neal

text: Philip George Neal (born 20 February 1951) is an English retired footballer who played for Northampton Town, Liverpool and Bolton Wanderers as a full back. He is one of the most successful English players of all time, having won seven First Divisions, four League Cups, five FA Charity Shields, four European Cups, one UEFA Cup and one UEFA Super Cup during his eleven years at Liverpool. He later returned to Bolton Wanderers as manager, leading them to victory in the Football League Trophy before spells managing Coventry City, Cardiff City and Manchester City.


title: Phil Neal

text: Neal also had a long career with the England national team, winning 50 caps and playing in the 1982 World Cup. He would go on to be England's assistant manager under Graham Taylor.


title: Phil Neal

text: Phil Neal's nickname whilst at Liverpool was Zico – a reference to the Brazilian play maker and a compliment to Neal, who was known for scoring important goals throughout the club's history. Phil's son, Ashley Neal, also became a footballer.


title: Phil Neal

text: Neal began his playing career at Wellingborough Town, before he joined Northampton Town in 1968. He went on to make 187 appearances for the club before being signed on 9 October 1974 for £66,000 by Liverpool manager Bob Paisley. Paisley had intended to break Neal in as a replacement for the ageing Chris Lawler, meaning that he initially played as a left-back. It would be, however, his industrious and energetic performances at right-back where he made his name.


title: Phil Neal

text: Neal made his Liverpool début in the Merseyside derby against Everton at Goodison Park on 16 November 1974, a game which ended 0–0. Neal made his début alongside midfielder Terry McDermott. Neal's first goal for the club came almost exactly one year later on 4 November 1975, during the 6–0 defeat of Real Sociedad in a UEFA Cup game at Anfield.


title: Phil Neal

text: Neal scored from the penalty spot late in the 1977 European Cup Final, when the Anfield club beat Borussia Mönchengladbach 3–1 in Rome to win the European Cup for the first time. Neal subsequently played in the winning 1978 and 1981 finals, Liverpool beating Club Brugge and Real Madrid respectively. He scored in the first half of the 1984 final against A.S. Roma, which ended 1–1 and was decided on penalty kicks, won by Liverpool (with Neal scoring Liverpool's first goal of the shootout, from its second shot). Neal was the only player to appear in all four of Liverpool's European Cup wins of the 1970s and 1980s.


title: Phil Neal

text: In total, Neal won eight First Divisions, four League Cups, five FA Charity Shields, four European Cups, one UEFA Cup and one UEFA Super Cup during his eleven years at Liverpool, making him one of the most successful Englishmen ever to play the game. During his Liverpool career, Neal was ever-present in the starting line-up for several seasons. He played 366 consecutive league matches (a club record and among the highest in English football history) from 14 December 1974 until 24 September 1983, when he suffered an injury against Manchester United that forced him to miss the following week's match against Sunderland.


title: Phil Neal

text: Neal departed Anfield after 11 years in 1985, joining Bolton Wanderers as player-manager. He retired from playing in 1989 after more than 700 league appearances and 50 caps for England.


title: Phil Neal

text: In December 1985, Neal was appointed player-manager of Bolton Wanderers and managed the club for seven years. During this period, Neal led the club to win the Football League Trophy in 1989, although the club would later suffer relegation to the Fourth Division for the first time in their history. They won promotion back to the Third Division the following season, reaching the Third Division play-offs in 1990 and 1991 but failed to win promotion on either occasion. In 1991, they had been pipped to automatic promotion by Grimsby Town on goal difference, and lost to Tranmere Rovers in the playoff final. A year later, they finished 13th in the Third Division and Neal was sacked on 8 May 1992. His successor was Bruce Rioch, who guided Bolton to promotion from the newly named Division Two (rebranded as part of a reorganisation prompted by the creation of the FA Premier League) in 1993 and to the top flight in 1995.


title: Phil Neal

text: Neal returned to club management on 23 October 1993 with Coventry City, beginning his spell at Highfield Road on that day with a 5–1 defeat against QPR that left them 12th in the Premier League. Despite a shaky start to his time as Sky Blues manager, they did well in the second half of the season and finished 11th in the league – their highest finish since coming seventh in 1989. Perhaps the most impressive result that season after Neal's arrival was a 4–0 home win over Manchester City on 19 February 1994. However, Coventry struggled in 1994–95 despite the £2million arrival of striker Dion Dublin from Manchester United on 10 September, and Neal was sacked on 14 February 1995 despite a 2–0 away win over fellow strugglers Crystal Palace three days earlier, which saw them 17th in the Premier League and two places above the relegation zone. Neal's successor Ron Atkinson ensured City's survival.


title: Phil Neal

text: He was appointed manager of Cardiff City in Division Three in February 1996, but in October that year he left Ninian Park to become assistant manager to Steve Coppell at Manchester City who were struggling in Division One after relegation from the Premier League. However, Coppell resigned on 8 November 1996 and Neal became caretaker manager until the arrival of Frank Clark on 29 December.


title: Phil Neal

text: For the 1997–98 season, Neal was recruited as assistant manager to chairman-manager Barry Fry at Peterborough United after their relegation to Division Three, but he was axed by Fry on 15 March 1998.


title: Phil Neal

text: He has also played for and coached the Liverpool masters side which dominated the Sky Sports Masters series.


title: Phil Neal

text: In recent years, Neal has worked as a football pundit for various television and radio organisations.


title: Glossary of card game terms

text: The following is a glossary of terms used in card games. Besides the terms listed here, there are thousands of common and uncommon slang terms. Terms in this glossary should not be game-specific (e.g. specific to Bridge, Hearts, Poker or Rummy), but apply to a wide range of card games. For glossaries that relate primarily to one game or family of similar games, see Game-specific glossaries.


title: Glossary of card game terms

text: Note: Dummett prefers to restrict 'announce' for the intention to achieve certain feats in play, while using 'declare' for a statement that one has a special combination of cards in one's hand.


title: Glossary of card game terms

text: A few games or families of games have enough of their own specific terminology to warrant their own glossaries:


title: Digest access authentication

text: Digest access authentication is one of the agreed-upon methods a web server can use to negotiate credentials, such as username or password, with a user's web browser. This can be used to confirm the identity of a user before sending sensitive information, such as online banking transaction history. It applies a hash function to the username and password before sending them over the network. In contrast, basic access authentication uses the easily reversible Base64 encoding instead of hashing, making it non-secure unless used in conjunction with TLS.


title: Digest access authentication

text: Technically, digest authentication is an application of MD5 cryptographic hashing with usage of nonce values to prevent replay attacks. It uses the HTTP protocol.


title: Digest access authentication

text: Digest access authentication was originally specified by RFC 2069 ("An Extension to HTTP: Digest Access Authentication"). RFC 2069 specifies roughly a traditional digest authentication scheme with security maintained by a server-generated "nonce value". The authentication response is formed as follows (where HA1 and HA2 are names of string variables):


title: Digest access authentication

text: An MD5 hash is a 16-byte value. The HA1 and HA2 values used in the computation of the response are the hexadecimal representation (in lowercase) of the MD5 hashes respectively.


title: Digest access authentication

text: RFC 2069 was later replaced by RFC 2617 ("HTTP Authentication: Basic and Digest Access Authentication"). RFC 2617 introduced a number of optional security enhancements to digest authentication; "quality of protection" (qop), nonce counter incremented by client, and a client-generated random nonce. These enhancements are designed to protect against, for example, chosen-plaintext attack cryptanalysis.


title: Digest access authentication

text: In September 2015, RFC 7616 replaced RFC 2617 by adding 4 new algorithms: "SHA-256", "SHA-256-sess", "SHA-512-256" and "SHA-512-256-sess". The encoding is equivalent to "MD5" and "MD5-sess" algorithms, with MD5 hashing function replaced with SHA-256 and SHA-512-256. However, as of July 2021, none of popular browsers, including Firefox and Chrome, support SHA-256 as the hash function. As of October 2021, Firefox 93 officially supports "SHA-256" and "SHA-256-sess" algorithms for digest authentication. However, support for "SHA-512-256", "SHA-512-256-sess" algorithms and username hashing is still lacking.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The MD5 calculations used in HTTP digest authentication is intended to be "one way", meaning that it should be difficult to determine the original input when only the output is known. If the password itself is too simple, however, then it may be possible to test all possible inputs and find a matching output (a brute-force attack) – perhaps aided by a dictionary or suitable look-up list, which for MD5 is readily available.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The HTTP scheme was designed by Phillip Hallam-Baker at CERN in 1993 and does not incorporate subsequent improvements in authentication systems, such as the development of keyed-hash message authentication code (HMAC). Although the cryptographic construction that is used is based on the MD5 hash function, collision attacks were in 2004 generally believed to not affect applications where the plaintext (i.e. password) is not known. However, claims in 2006 cause some doubt over other MD5 applications as well. So far, however, MD5 collision attacks have not been shown to pose a threat to digest authentication, and the RFC 2617 allows servers to implement mechanisms to detect some collision and replay attacks.


title: Digest access authentication

text: HTTP digest authentication is designed to be more secure than traditional digest authentication schemes, for example "significantly stronger than (e.g.) CRAM-MD5 ..." (RFC 2617).


title: Digest access authentication

text: Also, since the MD5 algorithm is not allowed in FIPS, HTTP Digest authentication will not work with FIPS-certified crypto modules.


title: Digest access authentication

text: By far the most common approach is to use a HTTP+HTML form-based authentication cleartext protocol, or more rarely Basic access authentication. These weak cleartext protocols used together with HTTPS network encryption resolve many of the threats that digest access authentication is designed to prevent. However, this use of HTTPS relies upon the end user to accurately validate that they are accessing the correct URL each time to prevent sending their password to an untrusted server, which results in phishing attacks.


title: Digest access authentication

text: Users often fail to do this, which is why phishing has become the most common form of security breach.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The following example was originally given in RFC 2617 and is expanded here to show the full text expected for each request and response. Note that only the "auth" (authentication) quality of protection code is covered – , only the Opera and Konqueror web browsers are known to support "auth-int" (authentication with integrity protection). Although the specification mentions HTTP version 1.1, the scheme can be successfully added to a version 1.0 server, as shown here.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The "response" value is calculated in three steps, as follows. Where values are combined, they are delimited by colons.


title: Digest access authentication

text: Since the server has the same information as the client, the response can be checked by performing the same calculation. In the example given above the result is formed as follows, where codice_3 represents a function used to calculate an MD5 hash, backslashes represent a continuation and the quotes shown are not used in the calculation.


title: Digest access authentication

text: At this point the client may make another request, reusing the server nonce value (the server only issues a new nonce for each "401" response) but providing a new client nonce (cnonce). For subsequent requests, the hexadecimal request counter (nc) must be greater than the last value it used – otherwise an attacker could simply "replay" an old request with the same credentials. It is up to the server to ensure that the counter increases for each of the nonce values that it has issued, rejecting any bad requests appropriately. Obviously changing the method, URI and/or counter value will result in a different response value.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The server should remember nonce values that it has recently generated. It may also remember when each nonce value was issued, expiring them after a certain amount of time. If an expired value is used, the server should respond with the "401" status code and add codice_4 to the authentication header, indicating that the client should re-send with the new nonce provided, without prompting the user for another username and password.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The server does not need to keep any expired nonce values – it can simply assume that any unrecognised values have expired. It is also possible for the server to only allow each nonce value to be returned once, although this forces the client to repeat every request. Note that expiring a server nonce immediately will not work, as the client would never get a chance to use it.


title: Digest access authentication

text: .htdigest is a flat-file used to store usernames, realm and passwords for digest authentication of Apache HTTP Server. The name of the file is given in the .htaccess configuration, and can be anything, but ".htdigest" is the canonical name. The file name starts with a dot, because most Unix-like operating systems consider any file that begins with dot to be hidden. This file is often maintained with the shell command "htdigest" which can add, and update users, and will properly encode the password for use.


title: Digest access authentication

text: The "htdigest" command is found in the apache2-utils package on dpkg package management systems and the httpd-tools package on RPM package management systems.


title: Digest access authentication

text: Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) uses basically the same digest authentication algorithm. It is specified by RFC 3261.


title: Digest access authentication

text: Most browsers have substantially implemented the spec, some barring certain features such as auth-int checking or the MD5-sess algorithm. If the server requires that these optional features be handled, clients may not be able to authenticate (though note mod_auth_digest for Apache does not fully implement RFC 2617 either).


title: Digest access authentication

text: Because of the disadvantages of Digest authentication compared to Basic authentication over HTTPS it has been deprecated by a lot of software e.g.:


title: Apicius

text: Apicius, also known as De re culinaria or De re coquinaria ("On the Subject of Cooking") is a collection of Roman cookery recipes. It is thought to have been compiled in the fifth century AD. Its language is in many ways closer to Vulgar than to Classical Latin, with later recipes using Vulgar Latin (such as "ficatum", "bullire") added to earlier recipes using Classical Latin (such as "iecur", "fervere").


title: Apicius

text: The book has been attributed to an otherwise unknown Caelius Apicius, an invention based on the fact that one of the two manuscripts is headed with the words "API CAE" or rather because a few recipes are attributed to Apicius in the text: Patinam Apicianam sic facies (IV, 14) Ofellas Apicianas (VII, 2). It has also been attributed to Marcus Gavius Apicius, a Roman gourmet who lived sometime in the 1st century AD during the reign of Tiberius. The book also may have been authored by a number of different Roman cooks from the first century AD. Based on textual analysis, the food scholar Bruno Laurioux believes that the surviving version only dates from the fifth century (that is, the end of the Roman Empire): "The history of "De Re Coquinaria" indeed belongs then to the Middle Ages".


title: Apicius

text: The Latin text is organized in ten books with Greek titles, in an arrangement similar to that of a modern cookbook:


title: Apicius

text: The foods described in the book are useful for reconstructing the dietary habits of the ancient world around the Mediterranean Basin. But the recipes are geared for the wealthiest classes, and a few contain what were exotic ingredients at that time (e.g., flamingo). A sample recipe from Apicius (8.6.2–3) follows:


title: Apicius

text: In a completely different manuscript, there is also a very abbreviated epitome entitled "Apici excerpta a Vinidario", a "pocket Apicius" by "an illustrious man" named Vinidarius, made as late as the Carolingian era. The Vinidarius of this book may have been a Goth, in which case his Gothic name may have been Vinithaharjis (𐍅𐌹𐌽𐌹𐌸𐌰𐌷𐌰𐍂𐌾𐌹𐍃), but this is only conjecture. Despite being called "illustrious", nothing about him is truly known.


title: Apicius

text: "Apici excerpta a Vinidario" survives in a single 8th-century uncial manuscript. Despite the title, this booklet is not an excerpt purely from the "Apicius" text we have today, as it contains material not included in the longer "Apicius" manuscripts. Either some text was lost between the time the excerpt was made and the time the manuscripts were written, or there never was a "standard "Apicius"" text because the contents changed over time as it was adapted by readers.


title: Apicius

text: Once manuscripts surfaced, there were two early printed editions of "Apicius", in Milan (1498, under the title "In re quoquinaria") and Venice (1500). Four more editions in the next four decades reflect the appeal of "Apicius". In the long-standard edition of C. T. Schuch (Heidelberg, 1867), the editor added some recipes from the Vinidarius manuscript.


title: Apicius

text: Between 1498 (the date of the first printed edition) and 1936 (the date of Joseph Dommers Vehling's translation into English and bibliography of Apicius), there were 14 editions of the Latin text (plus one possibly apocryphal edition). The work was not widely translated, however; the first translation was into Italian, in 1852, followed in the 20th century by two translations into German and French. The French translation by Bertrand Guégan was awarded the 1934 Prix Langlois by the Académie française.


title: Apicius

text: Vehling made the first translation of the book into English under the title "Cookery and Dining in Imperial Rome". It was published in 1936 and is still in print, having been reprinted in 1977 by Dover Publications. It is now of historical interest only, since Vehling's knowledge of Latin was not always adequate for the difficult task of translation, and several later and more reliable translations now exist.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On January 2, 2021, during an hour-long conference call, then-U.S. President Donald Trump pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to change the state's election results from the 2020 presidential election. Trump had been defeated by Joe Biden in the election, but refused to accept the outcome and made a months-long effort to overturn the results. Prior to the call to Raffensperger, Trump spoke repeatedly to state and local officials in at least three states in which he had lost, urging them to recount votes, throw out some ballots, or replace the Democratic slate of electors with a Republican slate. Trump's call with Raffensperger was reported by "The Washington Post" and other media outlets the day after it took place.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: According to the publicly released recording of the call and reports made by multiple news agencies, Trump attempted to pressure the Secretary into "finding him votes", despite being repeatedly told that there was no electoral error. Trump's repeated efforts to convince the Secretary to find some basis to overturn the election results were perceived as pleading and threatening. At one point on the call, Trump told Raffensperger, "What I want to do is this. I just want to find, uh, 11,780 votes, which is one more than [the 11,779 vote margin of defeat] we have, because we won the state." During the call, Trump falsely suggested that Raffensperger could have committed a criminal offense. Legal experts have suggested that Trump's behavior and demands could have violated state and federal laws.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On January 11, the phone call was cited in the article of impeachment in the second impeachment of Donald Trump introduced in the House of Representatives. Raffensperger's office opened a fact-finding and administrative investigation of potential election interference regarding Trump's efforts to overturn the results in Georgia, and Fulton County prosecutors opened a criminal investigation in February.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: In the 2020 United States presidential election, former Vice President Joe Biden defeated incumbent President Donald Trump. Nevertheless, Trump and his campaign continued to falsely claim that voting fraud had cost him electoral victory in several states, including Georgia. Trump's baseless claims were rejected by numerous state and federal judges, elected officials, governors, and government agencies, including his own administration's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). Trump's attempts to overturn the election cost taxpayers $519 million according to an analysis by "The Washington Post," including $488 million in security fees during and after the U.S. Capitol attack, and $2.2 million in legal fees.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Trump's many legal challenges to the election results were unsuccessful, but he repeatedly refused to accept the outcome of the election. Audits and hand recounts revealed no evidence of fraud or any irregularity that would have changed the election results. Biden was officially confirmed the winner of Georgia on November 19.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: In November and December, as his lawsuits were repeatedly rejected in court, Trump personally communicated with Republican local and state officials in at least three states: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. He talked in person or via phone to state legislators, state attorneys general, and governors, pressuring them to recount the votes, throwing out some of the ballots, or getting the state legislature to replace the elected Democratic slate of Electoral College members with a Republican slate of electors chosen by the legislature. in order to overturn the election results in their states. In December he spoke by phone to the governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, and made public demands on the secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, both Republicans who had supported Trump in the election. He demanded that they reverse the Georgia election results, threatened them with political retaliation when they did not, strongly criticized them in speeches and tweets, and tweeted that Kemp should resign.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On December 23, 2020, Trump called the chief investigator for the Georgia secretary of state's office, who was then conducting a ballot audit in Cobb County. Raffensperger had ordered the audit in response to allegations of fraud. Trump asked her to scrutinize the ballots and said she would find "dishonesty". The "Washington Post" reported on the telephone conversation with apparent quotations of Trump's comments to the chief investigator. It based these quotations on an anonymous source purportedly familiar with the call. At the time of its reporting, it emphasized that Trump had instructed the investigator to "find the fraud" and that she would be a "national hero" if she did so. Based on this reporting, some legal experts said that this phone call appeared to be bribery or obstruction on Trump's part. On December 29, the audit ended. Georgia officials concluded that there was no fraud. Trump was unhappy with those results.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Secretary of State Raffensperger acknowledged Trump's December 23 phone call to the chief investigator during a "Good Morning America" interview on January 4. The "Washington Post" revealed more details of the phone call on January 9, but did not reveal the name of the chief investigator to protect that person's safety. Other news outlets published similar stories and stated that they had corroborated the story with their own investigations. In the second impeachment against Trump, House managers specifically cited the purported statements to the Georgia investigator as part of the evidence supporting the call for impeachment in their trial brief presented to the United States Senate.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: In March 2021, in the course of the criminal investigation by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis into Trump's attempt to overturn the November 3 election, investigators obtained the audio recording made by the individual Trump was speaking to, from her computer. In response to a public records request, officials made the audio recording available to the press. The transcript and recording revealed that the quotations in the original "Washington Post" article were inaccurate. The recording indicated that Trump had encouraged the investigator to look into "dishonesty" in the Fulton vote count, but had never used the words "find the fraud". The recording also indicated that Trump said "you'll be praised", but not that the investigator would be a "national hero". Following the Associated Press's reporting of the discovery of the recording, the "Washington Post" issued a correction to its original article, as did other outlets such as "The Hill" and the Associated Press. In its correction, the "Post" said that Trump had been "misquoted". The quotes by Trump were corrected to "[you would] find things that are gonna be unbelievable" and "when the right answer comes out, you'll be praised".


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On January 2, 2021, Trump held a one-hour phone call with Raffensperger. Trump was joined by chief of staff Mark Meadows, trade adviser Peter Navarro, Justice Department official John Lott, law professor John C. Eastman, and attorneys Rudy Giuliani, Cleta Mitchell, Alex Kaufman, and Kurt Hilbert. Raffensperger was joined by his general counsel Ryan Germany. On January 3, "The Washington Post" and other media outlets obtained a recording of this phone conversation.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: During the phone call, Trump maintained falsely that he had won Georgia by "hundreds of thousands of votes", insisting that the certified election results were wrong. He said that Raffensperger should "reevaluate" the election's results, citing a variety of different conspiracy theories regarding voting in the state. Raffensperger, in response, answered that the election results in that state were correct and legitimate, and that Trump "had got his data wrong". During his attempts to pressure Raffensperger into changing the election results, Trump said, "I just want to find 11,780 votes", the minimum number needed to overcome Biden's advantage in Georgia. Trump also tried to intimidate Raffensperger, hinting that Raffensperger and his attorney could face a possible criminal investigation. Trump said, "You know, that's a criminal offense. And you know, you can't let that happen. That's a big risk to you."


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: After the Georgia call, Trump and his team spoke on Zoom with officials in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On January 3 Trump said on Twitter that he had spoken to Raffensperger and that Raffensperger was "unwilling or unable to answer questions" about alleged election fraud and that he "has no clue". Later that day, the recording of the conversation was released to the "Washington Post" and other media outlets; a local television station said they had obtained it from "government sources".


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Raffensperger said he had not initially intended to release the tape, but felt compelled to respond after Trump misrepresented the call on Twitter. He added that the call had been hastily arranged after Trump saw Raffensperger say on Fox News that morning that the election had been fair and honest and that Trump had lost. It was later reported that the White House had made 18 attempts over the previous weeks to get the secretary of state's office on the phone. Raffensperger said he had preferred not to take such calls because his office was in "litigation mode" with the White House, and both sides would need to have their advisers present.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Some commentators raised legal concerns regarding Raffensperger recording and disclosing his phone call with Trump; right-wing media such as Gateway Pundit specifically wrote that Raffensperger might face an espionage charge. PolitiFact cited legal experts that the content of the phone call was not covered by the Espionage Act, as the conversation had nothing to do with national security.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: While there were rumors about a possible lawsuit against Raffensperger for recording the conversation without Trump's consent, the telephone call recording laws for both locations where this conversation was held, namely the state of Georgia and District of Columbia, only require "one-party consent", meaning any participant of a phone call can legally record it without another party's consent. As the conversation was hastily arranged, Raffensperger said that the parties did not establish any non-disclosure agreement before or during the phone call.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Legal experts said Trump's attempt to pressure Raffensperger could have violated election law, including federal and state laws against soliciting election fraud or interference in elections. Election-law scholar Edward B. Foley called Trump's conduct "inappropriate and contemptible" while the executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington called Trump's attempt "to rig a presidential election ... a low point in American history and unquestionably impeachable conduct."


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: According to "The Guardian", Trump might have committed a crime by attempting to pressure the Secretary of State, as he might have been "knowingly attempting to coerce state officials into corrupting the integrity of the election", said professor of Constitutional Law Richard Pildes. According to Michael Bromwich, Trump might have violated Title 52 of the United States Code when he said "I just want to find 11,780 votes", as reported in "The Guardian". Brad Raffensperger has said the calls from Trump to him and other officials could be reason for an investigation into possible conflicts of interest.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: In March 2022, a federal judge cited the phone call when ruling that Trump ally John Eastman's emails could be turned over to the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6th Attack. Since Trump's request of Raffensperger had been "obvious" in its "illegality", the judge wrote, Eastman's correspondence related to this topic appears to discuss how to help Trump commit a crime, and therefore Eastman is not entitled to the privacy granted by attorney–client privilege.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On January 4, 2021, Democratic congressional leaders, believing Trump "engaged in solicitation of, or conspiracy to commit, a number of election crimes", requested the FBI to investigate the incident. In addition, while some House Republicans tried to defend Trump's Georgia call, Democrats began drafting a censure resolution. After the U.S. Capitol attack, Democrats launched a drive to impeach Trump for "Incitement of Insurrection". The draft article of impeachment cited the January 2 phone call to Raffensperger as a "prior effort to subvert and obstruct the certification of the results of the 2020 presidential election". Lacking sufficient support from Republican senators to meet the two thirds majority threshold, the impeachment trial acquitted Trump on February 13.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: In early January, 2021, Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis said that she found the phone call with Trump and Raffensperger "disturbing" and said a Democratic appointee from the State Election Board had requested the Secretary's Elections Division investigate the call, after which the Board would refer the case to the office and the state Attorney General.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On February 9, Raffensperger’s office opened an investigation of potential election interference in Trump’s efforts to overturn the results in Georgia, including the phone call, a step that could lead to a criminal investigation by state and local authorities.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: District Attorney Willis launched a criminal investigation on February 10 to enable her to decide whether to prosecute Trump. Her team includes a former special prosecutor considered a "national authority on racketeering". Willis said in February that no Georgia official was currently a target of the investigation, but in September, she announced that state election officials were among the witnesses her team was interviewing. Subpoenas, if needed to gain information from uncooperative witnesses, had not yet been issued by September.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On November 6, reporting emerged that Willis was likely to empanel a special grand jury, which would allow her to proceed with the investigation more efficiently, as those jurors would be dedicated to the case. However, even if she obtained subpoenas, she would still be required to return to a regular grand jury for an indictment. (There was a county-wide backlog of over 10,000 cases due to the COVID-19 pandemic.) On January 20, 2022, Willis sent a letter to Fulton County Superior Court Chief Judge Christopher S. Brasher to request permission to convene a special grand jury, stating that there was a "reasonable probability" Georgia's election process in 2020 "was subject to possible criminal disruptions". This request was subsequently granted on January 24 by a majority of judges on the court, and the grand jurors were selected on May 2. Raffensperger's office was subpoenaed for documents, and Raffensperger, five of his staff members, and State Attorney General Chris Carr were subpoenaed to appear in June.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Willis' investigation focuses on Trump's phone call to Raffensperger and other attempts by Trump to influence Georgia officials, including the attorney general of Georgia and the governor. The investigation is also examining a November 13, 2020, phone call by Senator Lindsey Graham to Raffensperger in which Graham tried to influence the election result. Trump himself may have provided additional incriminating information when he publicly bragged at a September 25, 2021, rally in Perry, Georgia that he had asked Governor Kemp to "help us out and call a special election". On May 2, 2022, an updated overview of the related legal details and circumstances was reported in "The New York Times".


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: On July 5, the special grand jury issued subpoenas for Lindsey Graham, Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Cleta Mitchell, Kenneth Chesebro and Jenna Ellis.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: The day after the Trump call was disclosed, Republican Georgia voting system implementation manager Gabriel Sterling sharply refuted Trump's claims of election fraud during a press conference with Raffensperger, listing and debunking several allegations made by Trump and his allies that thousands of teenagers, dead people, and unregistered citizens had voted, and a misleading video that had been distributed supposedly showing fake ballots being secretly retrieved from suitcases. Sterling said, "The president's legal team had the entire tape, they watched the entire tape, and from our point of view, intentionally misled the state's senate, voters and the people of the United States about this. It was intentional. It was obvious. And anybody watching this knows that."


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Carl Bernstein, one of the investigative journalists who revealed the Watergate scandal, said the allegations were "far worse than Watergate" and called the recording of the phone call "the ultimate smoking gun tape". U.S. Representative Hank Johnson has called it "a violation of state and federal law", while Senator Dick Durbin has said it "merits nothing less than a criminal investigation." House Democrats were reported to be drafting a censure resolution. "The Washington Post" called it "extraordinary" that a sitting U.S. president would attempt to pressure a Secretary of a U.S. state into changing the votes of a state. David Worley, the Democratic appointee to the State Elections Board and a former Democratic Party of Georgia chairman, called for a criminal probe into Trump's actions, stating that Trump had solicited election fraud, constituting a violation of state law.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Democrats condemned Trump's conduct. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, as well as Representative Adam Schiff (the chief prosecutor at Trump's first impeachment trial) said that Trump's attempt to pressure Raffensperger was an abuse of power. Dick Durbin, the second highest-ranking Democrat in the Senate, called for a criminal investigation. On January 4, 2021, Democratic U.S. Representatives Ted Lieu and Kathleen Rice sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray asking him to open a criminal investigation of the incident, writing that they believed Trump had solicited, or conspired to commit, "a number of election crimes." More than 90 House Democrats support a formal censure resolution, introduced by Representative Hank Johnson of Georgia, to "censure and condemn" Trump for having "misused the power of his office by threatening an elected official with vague criminal consequences if he failed to pursue the president’s false claims" and for attempting "to willfully deprive the citizens of Georgia of a fair and impartial election process in direct contravention" of state and federal law. Some congressional Democrats called Trump's conduct an impeachable offense.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Several House and Senate Republicans also condemned Trump's conduct, although no Republican described the conduct as criminal or an impeachable offense. Republican Senator Pat Toomey called it a "new low in this whole futile and sorry episode" and commended "Republican election officials across the country who have discharged their duties with integrity over the past two months while weathering relentless pressure, disinformation, and attacks from the president and his campaign." Other congressional Republicans defended Trump's Georgia call, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Georgia Senator David Perdue, who told Fox News in an interview that he thinks releasing the tape of the call was "disgusting."


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Raffensperger tweeted that "the truth will come out" regarding the incident. On January 4, Raffensperger confirmed the phone conversation during an interview which aired on "Good Morning America". He said, "I’m not a lawyer. All I know is that we’re going to follow the law, follow the process. Truth matters. And we’ve been fighting these rumors for the last two months."


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: Republican legislators within the Georgia State Senate are attempting to interfere in the Fulton County District Attorney's investigation of the phone call by introducing a constitutional amendment to mandate the calling of a state-wide grand jury to investigate election crimes instead of a regular county-wide grand jury, named SR 100. According to numerous reports, this would force the District Attorney to summon grand jurors from more conservative, rural counties as well as dilute the diversity of the members present. However, due to the Republicans lacking a two-thirds majority in both houses of the Georgia General Assembly, the resolution appears unlikely to pass. As of April, 2022, the amendment is currently being considered by Georgia's State Legislature.


title: Trump–Raffensperger phone call

text: During the hand recount of all ballots of the state of Georgia between November 11 and 20, 2020, Republican Senator of South Carolina, Lindsey Graham, privately called Raffensperger about the audit. Raffensperger concluded that Graham intended to ask him to throw out all legal mail-in ballots and described that he felt "threatened" during the conversation, which Graham denied. "The Washington Post" reported in February 2021 that the Fulton County district attorney was examining Graham's phone call to Raffensperger as part of a criminal investigation into possible efforts to overturn the Georgia election results.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: Michael Stanley Regan (born August 6, 1976) is an American environmental regulator. He has been serving as the 16th administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency since March 11, 2021. He is the first African American man to serve in the role. Regan has formerly served as the secretary of North Carolina's Department of Environmental Quality and air quality specialist in the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). His elevation to that role was widely praised by environmental groups because of his track record for addressing environmental racism and supporting policy to address climate change.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: A native of Goldsboro, North Carolina, Regan is the son of Mavis Regan, a nurse for nearly 30 years, and Zeb Stuart Regan Jr., a Vietnam veteran, retired colonel in the North Carolina Army National Guard, and former agricultural extension agent. He has a brother and a sister. Growing up, he hunted and fished with his father and grandfather in the inner coastal plain of North Carolina.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: Regan attended North Carolina A&T State University, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in earth and environmental science. He then attended George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where he received a Master of Public Administration.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: Regan began his career as an environmental regulator for the Environmental Protection Agency during the Clinton administration and Bush administration from 1998 to 2008. He then joined the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), where he ultimately became the associate vice president for clean energy and a Southeast regional director. He remained at the EDF for over eight years.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: In 2017, North Carolina governor Roy Cooper selected Regan to serve as the secretary of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality. During his tenure, he launched the state's Environmental Justice and Equity Board with a charter to advise the Secretary on how best to advance environmental justice and promote community engagement, particularly across historically underserved and marginalized communities. He also worked to develop the state's Clean Energy Plan, which aims to reduce private sector greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and ultimately move towards carbon neutrality by 2050. The plan also outlines recommendations and goals of accelerating innovations in clean energy technologies, while creating opportunities for rural and urban communities across North Carolina. In addition, Regan oversees the state's climate change interagency council, which has worked to advance Governor Cooper's pledge to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: In January 2020, Regan secured an agreement with Duke Energy for the largest coal ash contamination cleanup in United States history. The company committed to excavating eighty million tons of ash across seven of nine coal ash deposits. His department also ordered the chemical company Chemours to address and eliminate toxic per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which they were dumping into the Cape Fear River upstream of a major source of drinking water. While generally favored by environmental organizations, Regan has clashed with the environmental movement. In 2018, he approved permits for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, though the project was ultimately cancelled.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: On December 17, 2020, members of the Biden presidential transition team told the press Regan would be nominated to serve as the next United States Environmental Protection Agency administrator. Regan is the first black man to run the agency and is responsible for helping to advance the Biden administration's commitment to combating climate change, promoting green energy innovations, and addressing the effects of environmental racism.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: Regan's nomination was endorsed by the Environmental Protection Network, an organization composed of former EPA appointees and career staff which was created to oppose the Trump administration's efforts to roll back environmental regulations. On February 9, 2021, members of the United States Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee voted 14–6 to send Regan's nomination as EPA administrator for a full Senate vote. The full Senate confirmed his nomination 66–34 on March 10, 2021, and he was sworn in on March 11, 2021.


title: Michael S. Regan

text: Regan lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, with his wife, Melvina, and son, Matthew. Their first-born son, Michael Stanley Regan, Jr. ("MJ") died on August 16, 2012 from stage IV high-risk neuroblastoma at the age of one.


title: Hemis National Park

text: Hemis National Park is a high-elevation national park in Ladakh, India. Globally famous for its snow leopards, it is believed to have the highest density of them in any protected area in the world. It is the only national park in India that is north of the Himalayas, the largest notified protected area in India (largest National park) and is the second largest contiguous protected area, after the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve and surrounding protected areas. The park is home to a number of species of endangered mammals, including the snow leopard. Hemis National Park is India's protected area inside the Palearctic realm, outside the Changthang Wildlife Sanctuary northeast of Hemis, and the proposed Tso Lhamo Cold Desert Conservation Area in North Sikkim.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The park is bounded on the north by the banks of the Indus River, and includes the catchments of Markha, Sumdah and Rumbak, and parts of the Zanskar Range.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The park was founded in 1981 by protecting the Rumbak and Markha catchments, an area of about . It grew in 1988 to around , by incorporating neighbouring lands,


title: Hemis National Park

text: The park lies within the Karakoram-West Tibetan Plateau alpine steppe ecoregion, and contains pine forests, alpine shrublands and meadows, and alpine tundra vegetation.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The park is home to a viable breeding population of about 200 snow leopards, especially in the Rumbak catchment area. The prey base for the apex predator in the Central Asian Highlands is primarily supported in Hemis by Argali (Great Tibetan Sheep), Bharal (Blue Sheep), Shapu (Ladakhi Urial), and livestock. A small population of the Asiatic ibex is also present in Hemis. Hemis is the only refuge in India containing the Shapu.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The Tibetan wolf, the Eurasian brown bear (endangered in India), and the red fox are also present in Hemis. Small mammals include the Himalayan marmot, mountain weasel and the Himalayan mouse hare.


title: Hemis National Park

text: Among birds of prey noted here are Himalayan and Trans-Himalayan birds of prey: the golden eagle, lammergeier vulture, and Himalayan griffon vulture. The Rumbak Valley offers opportunities for birdwatching, including several Tibetan species not common in other parts of India. Birds present here include brown accentor, robin accentor, Tickell's leaf warbler, streaked rosefinch, black-winged snowfinch, chukar, Blyth's swift, red-billed chough, Himalayan snowcock, and the fire-fronted serin.


title: Hemis National Park

text: This region is in the rain shadow of the Himalayas, and does not receive much precipitation. Hence, dry forests of juniper, "Populus" - "Salix" forests, subalpine dry birch - fir are present at lower elevations. Alpine and steppe trees are predominantly found here. These trees and shrubs are spread across the valley bottoms. Since the upper mountain slopes are moist, this area is characterized by alpine vegetation including "Anemone", "Gentiana", "Thalictrum", "Lloydia", "Veronica", "Delphinum", "Carex" and "Kobresia". The other parts of the park support steppe vegetation which is dominated by Caragana, Artemisia, Stachys, and Ephedra, present along the lower river courses. A study conducted by CP Kala reports 15 rare and endangered medicinal plants growing in the park, which include "Acantholimon lycopodioides", "Arnebia euchroma", "Artemisia maritima", "Bergenia stracheyi", "Ephedra gerardiana", "Ferula jaeschkeana", and "Hyoscyamus niger".


title: Hemis National Park

text: Over 1,600 people live inside the park boundaries, mostly pastoralists raising poultry, goats, and sheep. This results in considerable animal-human conflict within the region. Snow leopards prey on livestock, sometimes killing several animals from a single flock in one hunt. This has been attributed to the overgrazing of livestock. Crop damage caused by bharal has also been seen.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The Department of Wildlife Protection, Government of Jammu and Kashmir is the custodian of the park. Any activity in the park is prohibited unless special permission is obtained from the Chief Wildlife Warden J&K. The department has initiated many projects for biodiversity conservation and rural livelihood improvement in Ladakh, including the Hemis National Park, such as:


title: Hemis National Park

text: The park offers a number of routes for trekking from mid-June to mid-October; some of these trekking routes are among the most popular in Ladakh. This includes the Markha valley trek and the trek from Spituk to Stok over the Ganda La pass. The Hemis National Park is also famous for mountaineering expeditions. The Stok Kangri peak (6,153 metres (20,187 ft)) and the Kang Yatse peak (elevation 6,496 metres (21,312 ft)) are the two mountains which attract the highest number of climbers every year. The park has also become popular among tourists who want to observe the snow leopard. The best season for spotting snow leopards is in late winter. The historic Hemis Monastery is home to the Hemis Festival (Hemis Tsechu) every summer. Lodging is restricted to backcountry camps, villager homestays and accommodation at the monasteries.


title: Hemis National Park

text: There is no metalled road in Hemis National Park. However, a few rough roads enable local people to reach their villages. There is a rough road connecting Chilling bridge to Skiu village in the Markha valley and another one connecting Spituk to Zingchen and Rumbak village. On Hemis side, there is a road connecting Martselang to Shang Sumdo.


title: Hemis National Park

text: In order to protect the national park and its tourism-related activities (trekking, homestays, wildlife spotting), the in inhabitants of the region demanded in 2018 a regulation of vehicle access to the park. Since 2019, ALTOA (All Ladakh Tour Operator Association) and the Department of Wildlife Protection have set up checkposts at each entrance of the Hemis National Park. These checkposts are located at Chilling (at the bridge crossing the Zanskar river), at Zingchen, and at Shang Sumdo. Beyond these checkposts, only motorized vehicles used by villagers who live inside the park are allowed. Tourists are not allowed to use motorized vehicles inside the park, they shall walk. Tourists also need to pay a fee (called “wildlife fee”) when entering the park.


title: Hemis National Park

text: Ganda La (also called the Kanda La, ) is a high mountain pass located at around 4980 metres above sea level in Ladakh, south-west of Leh, in the Himalayas in India. It lies within the Hemis National Park. and connects the Markha valley villages to Leh, and is regularly used by local people. The summer pass is open from June, and the winter pass (half kilometre north-west of summer pass) is open from late April.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The Markha Valley trek crosses the pass on the section between Rumbak and Skiu villages, which is usually done over 2 days. The other pass on the trek is the Gongmaru La (Kongmaru La).


title: Hemis National Park

text: The park houses numerous Tibetan gompas and holy chortens within its boundaries. These include the famous 400-year-old Hemis Monastery. Hemis was a destination and via point on the silk routes of Tibet. Over 1,600 people live inside the park presently, with a large number of tourists and pilgrims visiting during the Hemis Tsechu festival.


title: Hemis National Park

text: The 400-year-old Hemis Monastery has long been a place of pilgrimage for Tibetan Buddhists. However, in the late 19th and early 20th century, the monastery attracted some attention due to the writings of Nicolas Notovitch, a Russian aristocrat and journalist, who claimed that Jesus had spent the missing years of his life in Tibet and Ladakh, specifically in Hemis. (see Lost years of Jesus)


title: Hemis National Park

text: The national park, monastery and the Changthang Wildlife Sanctuary were prominently featured in the award-winning documentary "Riding Solo to the Top of the World".


title: William Hootkins

text: William Michael "Hoot" Hootkins (July 5, 1948 – October 23, 2005) was an American actor, best known for supporting roles in Hollywood blockbusters such as "Star Wars", "Raiders of the Lost Ark", and "Batman".


title: William Hootkins

text: Hootkins was born in Dallas, Texas. He attended St. Mark's School of Texas from grade 1 through 12. At age 15, Hootkins found himself caught up in the FBI's investigation into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy when he was interviewed about Ruth Paine, his Russian teacher. Marina Oswald, the Russian wife of the assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, and their children had been living with Paine in Dallas. In school he also developed his taste for theatre, joining the same drama group as Tommy Lee Jones, who was a year ahead of him in high school. Hootkins would later say that, since Jones was better-looking and got all the best parts, "I supported from then on in."


title: William Hootkins

text: Hootkins attended Princeton University, studying astrophysics before transferring to oriental studies, where he became fluent in Mandarin Chinese. This stood him in good stead when he played the part of an interpreter in an episode of "The West Wing" titled "Impact Winter". He was a mainstay of the Theatre Intime, making a particular impact with his performance in Orson Welles' "Moby Dick—Rehearsed". On the recommendation of his friend John Lithgow, he moved to London in the early 1970s and trained as an actor at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA). He made his home in London until 2002, when he moved to Los Angeles.


title: William Hootkins

text: In England, Hootkins found work in the theatre as well as in film, and he would have his greatest success on stage portraying Alfred Hitchcock in Terry Johnson's 2003 hit play "Hitchcock Blonde", first at the Royal Court Theatre and in London's West End. The role was such a success that producers planned to take the show to Broadway, but it was canceled after he was diagnosed with cancer.