Photographer Dotan Saguy visited Cuba expecting to find resentment toward Americans, but he says that, instead, “Every Cuban I met was warm and welcoming despite me being an American”. Here: Several groups of locals relax on the Malecon in Old Havana, Cuba May 1, 2016. Some chat and drink rum while others dive into the warm Caribbean Sea. (Photo by Dotan Saguy)

Santa Claus greets a child during a visit to residents of the slum of Petare in Caracas, Venezuela, December 11, 2016. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters)

Farmer Zhang Xianping rides his pig "Big Precious" during an interview with the media, in Zhangjiakou, Hebei province, China, November 2, 2015. Zhang, a pig breeder, instead of killing it, decided to keep the two-year-old "Big Precious" as pet when its weight reached 600 kg, according to local media. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

Photo: Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870 – 1924) lying in state in the Kremlin. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images). 1924

Important! For the same article in Russian language click here.

Something quite intriguing is happening within Russian-speaking internet during the last few – should you type a fully academic inquiry (at least, according to Russian academic requirements) in national search engines for "Lenin's mausoleum" – the first thing you get (even in top 10 searches) is website pages talking about black magic and occult. Website authors view this construction differently, but unconditionally agree on one thing: the mausoleum of the "leader of the world proletariat” – the essence of a magical artifact, a sort of “energy vampire”. It was built with a certain purpose: to drain the energy out of miserable Soviet citizens on one hand; and to poison the anthroposphere of one-sixth part of the earth with its vibes (the exact territory that was occupied by the former Soviet Union), depriving the Russian people of will to resist on the other hand. Complete nonsense? No doubt. Nevertheless, an intriguing one. Well, probably because some oddities do exist in mausoleum's history. These oddities are the thing we are going to discuss this time. First, let me refresh you memory on the subject.

A stunning photographic collection featuring portraits of people from 30 countries and the food they eat in one day. In this fascinating study of people and their diets, 80 profiles are organized by the total number of calories each person puts away in a day. Featuring a Japanese sumo wrestler, a Massai herdswoman, world-renowned Spanish chef Ferran Adria, an American competitive eater, and more, these compulsively readable personal stories also include demographic particulars, including age, activity level, height, and weight. Essays from Harvard primatologist Richard Wrangham, journalist Michael Pollan, and others discuss the implications of our modern diets for our health and for the planet. This compelling blend of photography and investigative reportage expands our understanding of the complex relationships among individuals, culture, and food.

In this Monday, September 22, 2014 photo provided by the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, a young cougar is released back into Utah's mountains by the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources in an undisclosed site in central Utah. State wildlife officials received reports of the cougar roaming Sunday afternoon in a residential area of the city's eastern flank, a few miles from the base of the Wasatch Mountains. Authorities say cougars generally avoid humans but sometimes enter neighborhoods close to their mountain habitats. (Photo by Steve Gray/AP Photo/Utah Division of Wildlife Resources)

Devotees perform religious rituals by splashing holy water during the Madhav Narayan Festival, a month-long event dedicated to Lord Madhav Narayan, an incarnation of Lord Vishnu in Thacho, Lalitpur, Nepal on February 10, 2025. Devotees also carry butter lamps and blow conch shells (shankha) as part of the sacred observance. (Photo by Safal Prakash Shrestha/ZUMA Press Wire)