Leader of the Nazis, Hitler is responsible for the killing of approximately six million Jews (overwhelmingly Ashkenazim), as well as two million ethnic Poles and four million others who were deemed “unworthy of life” (including the disabled and mentally ill, Soviet POWs, homosexuals, Freemasons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the Roma) as part of a program of deliberate extermination. It’s no surprise then that he appears as number one in our list, having suffered over fifty intents of murdered. The first of them was in 1921 when shots got fired at him after a speech. In Warsaw 1939, October 5, the Polish army wanted to blow up Hitler’s car, when it crossed the (now called) Square Charles de Gaulles. A human error prevented the bomb to explode. There was another crazy plan of some American soldiers to throw down a lot of pornographic material on Hitler’s mountain to make the puritan Hitler go mad. The colonel the soldiers discussed the plan with, said that they were maniacs with an insane plan.

None of the plans succeed and it’s believed that Hitler finally died after committing suicide along with his wife Eva Braun by gunshot and cyanide poisoning.

Grigory Rasputin: was poisoned, shot four times, and beaten until he finally died of drowning

Rasputin has been tied in the immortality of history to the ill-fated Romanov family. Some may even say that he was the cause of their destruction. Whatever you may think about him: powerful mystic or drunken fruitcake, he wormed his way into the heart of the imperial family and he just didn’t wanna go. The legends surrounding the death of Rasputin are perhaps even more mysterious and bizarre than his life. The first attempt on Rasputin’s life failed; on June 29, 1914, after either just receiving a telegram or exiting church, he was attacked suddenly by Khionia Guseva, a former prostitute. The woman thrust a knife into Rasputin’s abdomen, and his entrails hung out of what seemed like a mortal wound. onvinced of her success, Guseva supposedly screamed, “I have killed the antichrist!”. After intensive surgery, however, Rasputin recovered. It was said of his survival that “the soul of this cursed muzhik was sewn on his body”.

On December 16, 1916, having decided that Rasputin’s influence over the Tsaritsa had made him a far-too-dangerous threat to the empire, a group of nobles led by Prince Felix Yusupov and the Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich and politician Vladimir Purishkevich, apparently lured Rasputin to the Yusupovs’ Moika Palace basement, where they served him cakes and red wine laced with a massive amount of cyanide. According to legend, Rasputin was unaffected, although Maklakov had supplied enough poison to kill five men. Determined to finish the job, Yusupov became anxious about the possibility that Rasputin might live until the morning, leaving the conspirators no time to conceal his body. Yusupov ran upstairs to consult the others and then came back down to shoot Rasputin through the back with a revolver. Rasputin fell, and the company left the palace for a while. Yusupov went to check up on the body. Suddenly, Rasputin opened his eyes and lunged at him. When he grabbed Prince Yusupov he ominously whispered in Yusupov’s ear “you bad boy” and attempted to escape. Yusopov and his co-conspirators chased Rasputin out into the yard, shooting him two more times and beating him with a rubber club. To ensure he didn’t rouse again, the men tied Rasputin in a blanket and dumped his body into the Neva River. His body was found with his right arm outstretched, presumably to make the sign of the cross, indicating that he was still alive when he hit the water and managed to partially free himself. An autopsy established that the cause of death was drowning. His arms were found in an upright position, as if he had tried to claw his way out from under the ice. It was found that he had indeed been poisoned, and that the poison alone should have been enough to kill him.

Fidel Castro: survived 638 assassinations attempts and counting

The infamous Cuba’s Dictator is probably the hardest man to kill on planet, or at least the one of the most number of attempts. Fabian Escalante, who was long tasked with protecting the life of Castro, estimated the number of assassination schemes or attempts by the CIA to be 638. Some such attempts allegedly included an exploding cigar, a fungal-infected scuba-diving suit, and a mafia-style shooting. Some of these plots are depicted in a documentary entitled 638 Ways to Kill Castro. One of these attempts was by his ex-lover Marita Lorenz whom he met in 1959. She allegedly agreed to aid the CIA and attempted to smuggle a jar of cold cream containing poison pills into his room. When Castro realized, he reportedly gave her a gun and told her to kill him but her nerve failed. Castro once said, in regards to the numerous attempts on his life he believes have been made, “If surviving assassination attempts were an Olympic event, I would win the gold medal.” One such assassination attempt before the Bay of Pigs invasion involved Johnny Roselli and Al Capone’s successor in the Chicago Outfit, Salvatore Giancana and his right-hand man Santos Trafficante.

Retired at the age of 83, with poor health, it’s hardly probable that Fidel will suffer the 639th attempt.

Hussein of Jordan: survived 12 attempts of assassination and was saved once by a medal in his uniform

Hussein bin Talal was the King of Jordan from the abdication of his father, King Talal, in 1952, until his death, in 1999. During his life, he suffered at least 12 attempts of assassination, mostly during the 1950s and 1960s and once wrote ‘that sometimes I have felt like the central character in a detective novel’. The first attempt occurred in 1951. He was with his grandfather, the King Abdullah. A Palestinian extremist opened fire on Abdullah and his grandson on July 20 of that year as the pair walked into the mosque for Friday prayers. Abdullah was killed, but the 15-year-old Hussein pursued the gunman. The assailant turned his weapon on the young prince, who was saved when the bullet was deflected by a medal on his uniform given to him by his grandfather. In 1970, King Hussein survived an assassination attempt after gunmen opened fire on his motorcade as it was driving near his summer palace. The king was said to be unharmed but it is understood his driver was wounded in the attack, which took place in the town of Sweileh, 12 miles (19km) northeast of the capital, Amman. The king jumped out of his car and fired back at the attackers.

He died of cancer in 1999 at the age of 63.

Zog of Albania: suffered 55 killing attempts and once survived after shooting his potential assassins

Zog I, Skanderbeg III was the king of the Albanians from 1928 to 1939. During his reign, he is reputed to have survived over 55 assassination attempts. One of these occurred in 1931 while Zog was visiting a Vienna opera house for a performance of Pagliacci. The attackers struck whilst Zog was getting into his car, and he survived by firing back with a pistol that he always carried with him.

Yasser Arafat: escaped from several bombing attacks and a plane crash

Mohammed Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa Al-Husseini, more commonly known as Yasser Arafat was a Palestinian leader. During his life survived several assassination attempts. In 1985 he narrowly survived an Israeli assassination attempt when Israeli Air Force F-15s bombed his headquarters there as part of Operation Wooden Leg, leaving 73 people dead. Arafat had gone out jogging that morning. He also survived a car write-off and a plane crash in a sandstorm in the Libyan desert on April 7, 1992. Two pilots and an engineer were killed; Arafat was bruised and shaken. He died November 11, 2004, at age 75 in a hospital in Paris.

The cause of death was never announced, and remains a mystery. Conspiratorial suggestions that Israel was somehow involved were quickly rejected by Palestinian authorities. Rumors have circulated for decades that Arafat was gay, and much of the speculation about his death, and the associated secrecy of the circumstances, have led to suggestions that he may have died of Aids.

Alexander II of Russia: after several attempts, got killed with a plan that included 3 backup bombers

Also known as Alexander the Liberator, he was the Emperor, or Czar, of the Russian Empire from 3 March 1855 until his assassination in 1881. In 1866, there was an attempt on the tsar’s life in St. Petersburg by Dmitry Karakozov. To commemorate his narrow escape from death (which he himself referred to only as “the event of 4 April 1866″), a number of churches and chapels were built in many Russian cities. Thirteen years later, on the morning of 20 April 1879, Alexander II was briskly walking towards the Square of the Guards Staff and faced Alexander Soloviev, a 33-year-old former student. Having seen a menacing revolver in his hands, the Tsar fled. Soloviev fired five times but missed, and was sentenced to death and hanged on 28 May. In December 1879, the Narodnaya Volya , a radical revolutionary group which hoped to ignite a social revolution, organized an explosion on the railway from Livadia to Moscow, but they missed the tsar’s train. On the evening of 5 February 1880 Stephan Khalturin, also from Narodnaya Volya, set off a charge under the dining room of the Winter Palace. Eleven people were killed and 30 wounded but the tsar was unharmed because he was late for dinner.

Finally, On 13 March 1881, Alexander felt victim to an assassination plot. As he was known to do every Sunday for many years, the tsar went to the Manezh to review the Life Guards. He traveled both to and from the Manezh in a closed carriage accompanied by six Cossacks with a seventh sitting on the coachman’s left. The tsar’s carriage was followed by two sleighs carrying, among others, the chief of police and the chief of the tsar’s guards. The street was flanked by narrow sidewalks for the public. Another member of the Narodnaya Volya movement, Nikolai Rysakov, was carrying a small white package wrapped in a handkerchief. “After a moment’s hesitation I threw the bomb. I sent it under the horses’ hooves in the supposition that it would blow up under the carriage…The explosion knocked me into the fence.”

The explosion, while killing one of the Cossacks and seriously wounding the driver and people on the sidewalk, had only damaged the bulletproof carriage, a gift from Napoleon III of France. The tsar emerged shaken but unhurt. Rysakov was captured almost immediately. Police Chief Dvorzhitsky heard Rysakov shout out to someone else in the gathering crowd. The surrounding guards and the Cossacks urged the tsar to leave the area at once rather than being shown the site of the explosion. A second young member of the Narodnaya Volya, Ignacy Hryniewiecki, standing by the canal fence, raised both arms and threw another bomb at the tsar’s feet. Later it was learned there was a third bomber in the crowd that would be used if the other two bombers failed.

Gabriel Garcia Moreno: had his hand cut off with a machete, was shot 5 times but still managed to shout “God does not die”

Gabriel García Moreno (1821-1875) was the President of Ecuador in 1861. He was reelected three times. In 1875, when he got elected for the third time, it was considered to be his death warrant. He wrote immediately to Pope Pius IX asking for his blessing before inauguration day on August 30, and told him that he knew about conspiracies to assassinate him.

García Moreno’s prediction was correct; on August 6, 1875, President Moreno went to the Cathedral in Quito to adore the Blessed Sacrament as he did often. Leaving the Cathedral, his assassins sprang into action. Faustino Rayo, the leader of the band, suddenly attacked the President with a machete while his comrades opened fire with revolvers. But he didn’t die right away. Fallen from the porch and lying stretched out on the ground, his head bleeding, his left arm severed and right hand cut off by blows of a machete, the illustrious victim recognized his assailants. Some accounts say he gasped his last words, others that he was able to cry them out defiantly. All agree on the words themselves:“Dios no muere!” “God does not die!” Still conscious, he was brought back into the Cathedral and was laid before the altar of Our Lady of Sorrows. There he received the Last Rites and finally expired. Pope Pius IX, declared that Gabriel Garcia Moreno “died a victim of the Faith and Christian Charity for his beloved country.”

Compiled by: Nakul Shetty

Something to think about…..

Washington, DC Metro Station on a cold January morning in 2007.  The man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes.  During that time approximately two thousand people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.  After 3 minutes a middle aged man noticed there was a musician playing.  He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried to meet his schedule.

4 minutes later:
The violinist received his first dollar: a woman threw the money in the
hat and, without stopping, continued to  walk.

6 minutes:
A young man leaned against the wall to listen to him, then looked at his
watch and started to walk again.

10 minutes:
A 3-year old boy stopped but his mother tugged him along hurriedly.  The
kid stopped to look at the violinist again, but the mother pushed hard and
the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time.  This action
was repeated by several other children..  Every parent, without exception,
forced their children to move on quickly.

45 minutes:
The musician played continuously.  Only 6 people stopped and listened for
a short while.  About 20 gave money but continued to walk at their normal
pace.  The man collected a total of $32.

1 hour:
He finished playing and silence took over.  No one noticed.  No one
applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the greatest
musicians in the world.  He played one of the most intricate pieces ever
written, with a violin worth $3.5 million dollars.  Two days before,
Joshua Bell sold out a theater in Boston where the seats averaged $100.

This is a true story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station
was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about
perception, taste and people’s priorities .  The questions raised: in a
commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour, do we perceive beauty?
Do we stop to appreciate it?  Do we recognize talent in an unexpected
context?

One possible conclusion reached from this experiment could be this: If we
do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in
the world, playing some of the finest music ever written, with one of the
most beautiful instruments ever made….. How many other things are we
missing?

This was the Helmet worn by Rubens Barrichello, who won the 2009 FORMULA 1 TELEFONICA GRAND PRIX OF EUROPE.. as a tribute to his best friend / fellow driver Felipe Massa.

Barrichello with the champions trophy… Lewis hamilton came 2nd..followed by Kimi on 3rd position!

courtsey: f1.com / f1insight.blogspot.com

Was just brushing through mangalore news this morning on Mangalorean.com and found something which took me back to my childhood days …. trust me it was mouthwatering….

Mangalorean Traditional Delicacies

Courtesy: Mangalorean.com

Specifications:

It is the month of August, on the shores of the Black Sea. It is raining,
and the little town looks totally deserted. It is tough times, everybody
is in debt, and everybody lives on credit.
Suddenly, a rich tourist comes to town.
He enters the only hotel, lays a 100 Euro note on the reception counter,
and goes to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one.
The hotel proprietor takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to
the butcher.
The Butcher takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the pig grower.
The pig grower takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the
supplier of his feed and fuel.
The supplier of feed and fuel takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his
debt to the town’s prostitute that in these hard times, gave her “services”
on credit.
The hooker runs to the hotel, and pays off her debt with the 100 Euro note
to the hotel proprietor to pay for the rooms that she rented when she
brought her clients there.
The hotel proprietor then lays the 100 Euro note back on the counter so
that the rich tourist will not suspect anything.
At that moment, the rich tourist comes down after inspecting the rooms,
and takes his 100 Euro note, after saying that he did not like any of the
rooms,
and leaves town.
No one earned anything. However, the whole town is now without debt, and
looks to the future with a lot of optimism.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the United States Government is
doing business .

“Don’t miss last Questions…

Some, rather most organizations reject his CV today because he has changed jobs frequently (10 in 14 years). My friend, the ‘job hopper’ (referred here as Mr. JH), does not mind it…. well he does not need to mind it at all. Having worked full-time with 10 employer companies in just 14 years gives Mr. JH the relaxing edge that most of the ‘company loyal’ employees are struggling for today. Today, Mr. JH too is laid off like some other 14-15 year experienced guys – the difference being the latter have just worked in 2-3 organizations in the same number of years.

Here are the excerpts of an interview with Mr. JH:

Q: Why have you changed 10 jobs in 14 years?
A: To get financially sound and stable before getting laid off the second time.

Q: So you knew you would be laid off in the year 2009?
A: Well I was laid off first in the year 2002 due to the first global economic slowdown. I had not got a full-time job before January 2003 when the economy started looking up; so I had struggled for almost a year without job and with compromises.

Q: Which number of job was that?
A: That was my third job.

Q: So from Jan 2003 to Jan 2009, in 6 years, you have changed 8 jobs to make the count as 10 jobs in 14 years?
A: I had no other option. In my first 8 years of professional life, I had worked only for 2 organizations thinking that jobs are deserved after lot of hard work and one should stay with an employer company to justify the saying ‘employer loyalty’. But I was an idiot.

Q: Why do you say so?
A: My salary in the first 8 years went up only marginally. I could not save enough and also, I had thought that I had a ‘permanent’ job, so I need not worry about ‘what will I do if I lose my job’. I could never imagine losing a job because of economic slowdown and not because of my performance. That was January 2002.

Q: Can you brief on what happened between January 2003 and 2009.
A: Well, I had learnt my lessons of being ‘company loyal’ and not ‘money earning and saving loyal’. But then you can save enough only when you earn enough. So I shifted my loyalty towards money making and saving – I changed 8 jobs in 6 years assuring all my interviewers about my stability.

Q: So you lied to your interviewers; you had already planned to change the job for which you were being interviewed on a particular day?
A: Yes, you can change jobs only when the market is up and companies are hiring. You tell me – can I get a job now because of the slowdown?

No. So one should change jobs for higher salaries only when the market is up because that is the only time when companies hire and can afford the expected salaries.

Q: What have you gained by doing such things?
A: That’s the question I was waiting for. In Jan 2003, I had a fixed salary (without variables) of say Rs. X p.a. In January 2009, my salary was 8X. So assuming my salary was Rs.3 lakh p.a. in Jan 2003, my last drawn salary in Jan 2009 was Rs.24 lakh p.a. (without variable). I never bothered about variable as I had no intention to stay for 1 year and go through the appraisal process to wait for the company to give me a hike.

Q: So you decided on your own hike?
A: Yes, in 2003, I could see the slowdown coming again in future like it had happened in 2001-02. Though I was not sure by when the next slowdown would come, I was pretty sure I wanted a ‘debt-free’ life before being laid off again. So I planned my hike targets on a yearly basis without waiting for the year to complete.

Q: So are you debt-free now?
A: Yes, I earned so much by virtue of job changes for money and spent so little that today I have a loan free 2 BR flat (1200 sq. feet) plus a loan free big car without bothering about any EMIs. I am laid off too but I do not complain at all. If I have laid off companies for money, it is OK if a company lays me off because of lack of money.

Q: Who is complaining?
A: All those guys who are not getting a job to pay their EMIs off are complaining. They had made fun of me saying I am a job hopper and do not have any company loyalty. Now I ask them what they gained by their company loyalty; they too are laid off like me and pass comments to me

- why will you bother about us, you are already debt-free. They were still in the bracket of 12-14 lakh p.a. when they were laid off.

Q: What is your advice to professionals?
A: Like Narayan Murthy had said – love your job and not your company because you never know when your company will stop loving you. In the same lines, love yourself and your family needs more than the company’s needs. Companies can keep coming and going; family will always remain the same. Make money for yourself first and simultaneously make money for the company, not the other way around.

Q: What is your biggest pain point with companies?
A: When a company does well, its CEO etc will address the entire company saying, ‘well done guys, it is YOUR company, keep up the hard work, I am with you.” But when the slowdown happens and the company does not do so well, the same CEO etc will say, “It is MY company and to save the company, I have to take tough decisions including asking people to go.”

So think about your financial stability first; when you get laid off, your kids will complain to you and not your boss!!!

Tech. Specifications:

Router : C2811 (IOS: C2800NM-ADVIPSERVICESK9-M, Version 12.4)
Switch : C2960 (IOS: C2960-LANBASEK9-M, Version 12.2)

MUST WATCH!!

Imdb :http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0910970/

Website: http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/wall-e/