1,001 Facts That Will Scare the S#*t Out of You: The Ultimate Bathroom Reader (45 page)

320

FACT :
Ancient Egyptian sports and games were brutal. In Fishermen’s Jousting, teams of fishermen would knock their opponents out of their boats. Since many
fishermen were unable to swim
, drownings often resulted.
Because the best sport for guys who can’t swim is one where they try to knock each other off paper boats into the water.

“The Most Brutal,” Ancient Sports,
www.ancientsports.net
.

Steve Craig, Sports and Games of the Ancients (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002), 6.

321

FACT :
Chariot racing in ancient Rome was brutal. Drivers wrapped the reins of the chariot around their arms and could not let go if they crashed,
allowing them to be dragged behind their horses
unless they could free themselves. Many charioteers carried small knives for this purpose.
Then they realized a better solution: find a new hobby. One that doesn’t involve chariots.

“The Most Brutal,” Ancient Sports,
www.ancientsports.net
.

Eckart Köhne, Cornelia Ewigleben, and Ralph Jackson, Gladiators and Caesars: The Power of Spectacle in Ancient Rome (University of California Press, 2000).

322

FACT :
Spanish-style bullfights are
a gruesome tradition
. Picadors (lance-yielding men on blindfolded horses) and banderilleros (men on foot who wield sticks with harpoon points) stab a bull in the back and neck. When the bull is weakened, the matador forces a few charges from the bull for show, then kills it with a sword and cuts off the ears or tail as trophies.
Well that sounds like fun. I have to take the kids.

“What is wrong with bullfighting?” League Against Cruel Sports,
www.league.org.uk
.

323

FACT :
Six people died in bullfights
in 2004.
What a shame. That there weren’t more.

“What is wrong with bullfighting?” League Against Cruel Sports,
www.league.org.uk
.

324

FACT :
Since 1924,
thirteen people have been killed in Pamplona
, Spain’s annual “Running of the Bulls” at the San Fermin festival. Injuries have persisted in recent years despite the government’s attempts to make the event safer by coating the streets with a special anti-slip paint.
One year, instead of anti-slip paint, they covered the street with butter and banana peels just for fun. The number of injuries increased a bit.

Damien Simonis, Susan For-syth, and John Noble, Spain, 6th ed. (Lonely Planet, 2007).

325

FACT :
If you ascend too quickly while scuba diving, you risk lung over-expansion, a condition that occurs when air is inhaled underwater and not exhaled while rising to the surface. The air in the lungs expands as the diver ascends, and can result in
potentially lethal air bubbles in the blood
.
That doesn’t sound painful.

“Decompression Symptoms: The Bends,” eMedicineHealth,
www.emedicinehealth.com
.

326

FACT :
Scuba divers who ascend too quickly also risk decompression sickness, or “the bends,” which occurs when nitrogen that builds in tissues during the dive is forced back into the blood stream too quickly,
resulting in nitrogen bubbles in the blood
. The condition is extremely painful and potentially fatal.
Like any of this will matter the next time you’re diving and a fifteen-foot shark starts circling. You’ll ascend so fast you’ll look like Shamu coming out of the water.

“Decompression Symptoms: The Bends,” eMedicineHealth,
www.emedicinehealth.com
.

Bruce Iliff, “The Bends In Scuba Diving,”
suite101.com
,
www.suite101.com
.