Random Fact Sheet #54 – 35 Incredible Facts You Won’t Believe Are Real

Most pizza sold in Italy is specifically created to match the tourists' expectations of what authentic pizza is, not to match authentic Italian recipes. Tourists then go home and open up pizza shops to recreate this "authentic" experience. This is called the Pizza effect.

2. Tokyo has been destroyed and rebuilt on average, from 1608 to 1945, once every five years.

3. If you spent one day on each of the islands in the Phillippines, it would take you almost 21 years to visit them all.

4. Prior to their music careers, Sid Vicious and Johnny Rotten would often perform Alice Cooper covers on the streets for money. People would pay them to stop.

5. In 2009 Airmen Colton Read went in for gallbladder surgery and woke up with both legs amputated. Military doctors punctured his aorta and waited 8.5 hours to get him proper medical care. Read isn't legally allowed to sue for damages.

The warm-blooded Atlantic Bluefin Tuna is so powerful, it can cook its own flesh with sudden bursts of muscle activity.

7. In 1996 and 1997, Emily Rosa, at the age of 9, tested 21 therapeutic touch practitioners whether their claims to detect "human energy fields" were true. After finding they were right only 44% of the time, she published the results on 1998, becoming the youngest person to have a research paper published.

8. There was an anti-gang unit in the LAPD that had ties to the Bloods. Over 70 officers were implicated in misconduct like shooting civilians, robbing banks, beating suspects (or worse), stealing cocaine, and framing civilians. Some believe the unit was involved in the murder of Biggie Smalls.

9. J.R.R Tolkien got the name for Samwise Gamgee from a doctor called Joseph Sampson Gamgee, the inventor of the 'Gamgee tissue', an absorbent gauze surgical dressing made from cotton wool. Hence, Tolkien named Samwise's wife in The Lord of the Rings books Rosie Cotton.

10. Dover Castle is the largest castle in England. There are over 3 miles of secret wartime tunnels snaking deep into the cliff. Many of these tunnels are still undiscovered.

At the height of the siege of Sarajevo in 1994, Iron Maiden's frontman Bruce Dickinson and his band decided to smuggle themselves into the city and give a concert despite constant shelling and sniper-fire. When their arranged UN heli-transport bailed, they hitched a hike in the back of a truck.

12. The Norwegian immigrant and World War 2 veteran Andrew Haines requested and was granted a Viking funeral by the U.S. Coast Guard.

13. More Africans have access to cell phone service than piped water and electricity.

14. Terry Davis was a schizophrenic programmer who spent 10 years of his life programming an operating system (TempleOS) to talk to God.

15. Before being offered the role of Hannibal Lecter, Anthony Hopkins had quit Hollywood to go back to England, feeling that the rest of his mediocre career would be spent on stage and "doing respectable BBC work."

Smirnoff Vodka's creator Pyotr Smirnov launched his brand to quick success in 1864 by giving panhandlers food and drink in return for asking them to fan out around the city of Moscow, demanding Smirnoff Vodka at local bars.

17. CAPTCHA is an acronym: "Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart".

18. Mozart had an older sister (Maria Anna Mozart) who was also a child prodigy, considered one of the finest pianists in Europe until outshone by her younger brother.

19. The Miss South Carolina teen (Caitlin Upton) who became an internet meme for her incomprehensible answer contemplated suicide after her pageant flub.

20. When the Sears magazine printers switched from a thin, newspaper-like stock to a more modern glossy paper stock, people wrote into the company to complain that the magazine couldn't be used for toilet paper anymore.

In 2010, a disgruntled Jet Blue employee (Steven Slater) quit his job by broadcasting an angry rant over the intercom, activating the plane's emergency inflatable ramp, and sliding away with two beers he'd stolen from the galley.

22. In 1997, comedian Dana Carvey underwent heart bypass surgery for a blocked coronary artery, but the surgeon operated on the wrong artery. Carvey, later suffering from angina pectoris, sued for medical malpractice and was awarded millions in damages. He donated the money to charity.

23. In 2013, police in the Maldives detained a suspect for loitering near an election polling place on suspicion of black magic. The suspect in question was a coconut. A magician summoned by police established that the coconut was innocent. No arrests were made.

24. There is an Indian village named "Piplantri", which celebrates the birth of every girl child by planting 111 trees.

25. The "Just Missed it Club" was a group of people who, for one reason or another did not sail on the Titanic. One of these members was Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, son of the late shipping and railroad mogul Cornelius Vanderbilt. He died in the Lusitania disaster 3 years later.