Baiting the Dragon

Sanity Break #1

EFYI Group and Tianjin University in China won the for the longest animation performed by drones. More importantly, they won it for a stunning show that paid tribute to Vincent Van Gogh’s art. Watch!

Headlines that matter

BRITISH HIGH COMMISSIONER SUMMONED The External Affairs Ministry called in the commissioner to let him know that the discussion on the farm laws in the British Parliament amounts to “gross interference in the politics of another democratic country.” And officials “conveyed strong opposition to the unwarranted and tendentious discussion on agricultural reform in India in the British Parliament.” The trigger: A handful of opposition MPs had for the safety of the protesting farmers—which was the subject of a 90 minute debate on Monday. () THE GREAT PANDEMIC: A QUICK UPDATE * The Centre for Disease Control for people who have been fully vaccinated—i.e. are two weeks past their second dose. The basic gist: you can interact freely with other vaccinated people—but still take some precautions with the unvaccinated. The best bit: You can skip quarantine and self-isolation if you’ve been in contact with an infected person. * A found that 32% of ‘long haul’ cases—people whose symptoms last for months—were asymptomatic when they first became infected. In other words, they felt just fine when they got Covid, and started to feel worse weeks later, after the infection had passed. * Good read: Zoom fatigue is actually harder on extroverts than introverts. Wall Street Journal via explains why. * Sachin Tendulkar took a covid test yesterday—and entertained himself by the medical staff A NUN IN MYANMAR A nun—Sister Ann Rose Nu Tawng—went down on her knees to beg the military to stop shooting the “children.” The soldiers too got their knees and one of them touched his forehead to the ground. The powerful photo and went viral. But as moving as this photo may be, New York Times (via ) offers a stark reminder that this is “an army with a heart of darkness”—with a long legacy of atrocities. DIGITAL MEDIA SITES CHALLENGE NEW RULES The Wire and The News Minute filed a petition challenging new rules issued by the government that impose a variety of new requirements on all digital media sites (explained ). Their main argument in court: The Information Technology Act was intended to govern intermediaries (like Twitter, Facebook etc) that host user content—and cannot be used to essentially censor the press. The court issued a notice to the government to respond. () THE ‘NO NORMAL’ FOR UNILEVER The company—which makes Dove soap and other bath and beauty products—has decided to stop using the word “normal” on its packaging. It will also stop making digital alterations to bodies and skin colour of models used in its advertising. In India, Unilever swapped out ‘Fair & Lovely’ for ‘Glow & Lovely’. has more. PEPE LE PEW HAS BEEN CANCELLED First came a New York Times op-ed that argued that the sleazy (and beloved to many) French skunk “normalised rape.” Now, Disney announced that it has decided to scrub him both from the film ‘Space Jam 2’ and ban his character from future TV projects. () Certainly not canceled: Malala Yousafzai who has signed a multi-year deal with Apple+ to make a bunch of shows “including documentaries, comedies to children's programming”. () Looking for recognition: Connoisseurs of Bandel cheese in Bengal who are working hard to get a Geographic Indicator tag for their beloved form of dairy. This is similar to Champagne only being called champagne if it’s made in that particular district of France. () THE AMAZING HEADS OF SEA SLUGS Researchers were shocked to find that sea slugs can literally chop their own heads off, and then grow a new body: “They began feeding on algae within a few hours after losing their body parts and began to regenerate their heart within seven days. After 20 days, the slugs had regenerated their entire body.” Scientists aren’t exactly sure how the slugs survive without a heart, but the guess is that their small heads can absorb oxygen from their body's surface. See below. BIG VAGINA ENERGY IN IRELAND A group of Irish feminists are bringing back medieval carvings known as sheela na gigs. This week, new sheelas crafted in clay with 22-carat gold-covered labia and glazed vulvas will be covertly placed in sites that are significant to women’s struggle in Dublin. has more on what these controversial figures signified. In other art-related news: Banksy a new piece of art—painted on the walls of Reading Prison. Of course, it looks like this: In other sex-related news: According to a Greek study, the so-called ‘involuntary singles’—who wanted to be coupled up but are not—fail to find a partner for one big reason: “an inability to flirt. Even just a one-unit drop in scores for flirting was correlated with a 50% increase in the chance of being single.” A close second: how well participants perceived interest of the other person. () DINE WITH DATA: ALL ABOUT QOOHO 🤝 Editor’s Note: Here is DWD’s weekly installment of one cool, innovative or just plain quirky startup from around the world. Company: Qooho 🤝 About: A community-building platform, Qoohoo allows creators to directly interact with their fans and supporters, without relying on third party platforms like YouTube and Instagram. The platform also allows easy monetisation of support, and helps the creator build an independent revenue stream which they can further use for ambitious projects. The company announced a $800K seed round today, fuelled by highly relevant industry experts. Content creator Tanmay Bhat, Cred founder Kunal Shah, and Unacademy's Gaurav Munjal participated in the round. 💰 Food For Thought: Both founders have earlier built and sold edtech startups, or been creators on the internet themselves. The push to start Qoohoo came when one of their brothers had to move their music tuitions entirely online, and a number of problems came to light! DWD Take: Qoohoo is up against some stellar creator-economy companies like Circle and Buy Me a Coffee. Given that it's the only Indian one, we're hoping for Qoohoo to take the cake! 💯 Link: About DWD: sends you a short summary on one new startup every day, delivered straight to your Whatsapp inbox!

Sanity Break #2

Former Aussie captain Steve Waugh’s love affair with Indian cricket—or to be specific, Indians playing cricket—is lovingly captured in a coffee table book titled “”. The photos were taken on a 17-day multi-city trip—which is also the subject of a documentary that is currently streaming on Discovery-plus. offers a taste of the lovely moments it captures. Also: has a review of the doc.

Smart & Curious

A LIST OF CURIOUS FACTS One: This is apparently the ugliest Rolls Royce ever made. It’s named Camargue, and was the first ever designed by Italians back in 1975. Also: Like many appalling things of days gone by, the car is a hot commodity now. has more on that auto trend. Two: Data visualisation nerds went through the IMDB database and crunched the most filmed locations in the world. The winner: The Big Apple’s Central Park, followed by Niagara Falls. The winner in Europe: Trafalgar Square in London. In Asia/Oceania: the Sydney Opera House. See the full report . Three: A hospice doctor has made a comforting discovery about our last moments on Earth—after studying 1,400 hospice patients: > “Over 80% of his patients—no matter what walk of life, background or age group they came from—had end-of-life experiences that > seemed to entail more than just strange dreams. These were vivid, meaningful and transformative. And they always increased in > frequency near death. > > > > They included visions of long-lost mothers, fathers and relatives, as well as dead pets come back to comfort their former > owners. They were about relationships resurrected, love revived and forgiveness achieved. They often brought reassurance and > support, peace and acceptance.” All we can say is ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ has more on this research. Four: Billions of insects are accidentally having ‘gay sex’. The reason: They are in such a rush to reproduce that they don’t take the time to inspect their potential mate’s gender: “The cost of taking the time to identify the gender of mates or the cost of hesitation appears to be greater than the cost of making some mistakes.” has more. Five: Not sure why we never knew this, but houses in Bhutan have decorative phalluses to ward off the evil eye: “Walk just about anywhere in Bhutan… and you’ll likely find large, ejaculating penises with hairy balls. They’re painted on the exterior walls of buildings, perched on the roofs of houses and fixed in front of doors to ward off bad luck.” Really? Well, we can’t exactly dispute the proof below. has more on the country’s phallic obsession.