The Netherlands. Known since 1862 as a prison of the 19th century, Het Arresthuis prison as a luxury hotel

Het Arresthuis prison as a luxury hotel

Converted into a luxury hotel, the building of Het Arresthuis demonstrates a modern style with a touch of glamour, though with the preservation of its history. Thanks to the sauna and fitness center, staying in such a comfortable prison becomes even more enjoyable. The prison previously housed 150 cells, but now there are 45 rooms, including suites with themed titles, such as “Director”, “Warden”, “lawyer” and “judge.” The hotel also has a bar and a restaurant. So, the employees joke that it offers much more than bread and water.
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Japanese death house

Throughout the twentieth century, few industrialized countries carry out executions of criminals.
Most trace this attitude to the Biblical roots of the country and the dictum of ‘‘eye for an eye’’ justice.. Only in 2010 the Japanese government for the first time half opened to local journalists Japanese death house: how execution chamber looks like. Reporters who were taken to the prison traveled in a bus, its windows obscured by curtains to hide the chamber’s location. One of them said afterwards: ‘There was the smell of incense… The impression was that of sterile objects in a clean, carpeted room.’ Japan, along with the United States remains one of the few developed countries that retain the death penalty. From 2000 to 2009, Japan had been sentenced to 112 people. The average waiting term of execution is six years. Death row inmates are notified an hour before the execution. Execution is by hanging. 86% of Japanese approve death penalty.
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The cemetery which resembles an expensive city. Mausoleums of Mexican drug traffickers

Mausoleums of Mexican drug traffickers
Over the last 5 years in Mexico were killed five thousand members of the drug cartels. In the most powerful – Clan Sinaloa – about 500 people. This clan buries their people in mausoleums, the cost of which can reach hundreds of thousands dollars. Cemetery, the burial place of the Sinaloa mob, reminds an expensive city. For more than 10 years in Mexico continues unabated criminal and anti-criminal war. There are about 10 powerful cartels, and they are fighting with each other. And against them – police and army. And in recent years, mostly against the drug cartels are fighting the army special forces, as police are very corrupt and cowardly. Starting in 2007, during the war of 45-50 thousand people were killed and around 25 thousand missing.
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Forced to be fat. Force-feeding farm for girls in Mauritania

Force-feeding farm for girls in Mauritania

Thin woman in Mauritania, where obesity is traditionally regarded as desirable, has almost no chance for getting married. Slim girl’s parents have great concern at her 5-7 years old, when a girl has to make a match. For those who do not have enough weight are placed on a special farm where girls to 12 years are forced to gain weight 80-90 kg. The violent practice of force-feeding teenage girls, including girls as young as five, is called Leblouh, or gavage. The younger generations of males in Mauritania now see fattening negatively.
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1955 Soviet (the USSR) postage stamp depicting Nicolaus Copernicus in Conversation with God (1872), painted by Polish artist Jan Matejko. Nicolaus Copernicus 540

Nicolaus Copernicus 540

Brilliant astronomer, philosopher, mathematician, economist, physician and social activist of Renaissance epoch Nicolaus Copernicus was born 540 years ago, on February 19, 1473, in Torun, Poland. His mother was German and and his father was Polish. Nicolaus Copernicus is probably best known as the author of the heliocentric system of the world, launched the first scientific revolution. Copernicus died on 24 May 1543 at age 70 from a stroke. The location of Copernicus grave was unknown for a very long time, but in 2005 during the excavations in the Cathedral of Frombork in 2005 the remains of a great astronomer were found.

Nicolaus Copernicus

February 15 Friday 2013 Chelyabinsk meteorite in Russia

Chelyabinsk meteorite in Russia

Chelyabinsk meteorite struck Russia without warning. February 15 Friday meteorite streaking across Chelyabinsk sky before exploding in a fireball, was brighter than the sun. A school teacher from Chelyabinsk describes a fantastic light that lit up all the classrooms. “Such kind of light doesn’t happen in life, only at the end of the world – then a trail appeared like from a plane but only ten times bigger”. Chelyabinsk residents thought the world was ending. The terrifying sight caught people heading to work yesterday. Thanks God, there were no fatalities and most of the wounded were hurt by flying glass. The opinions on Russian net differ, some thought it was UFO, some share opinion of Vladimir Zhirinovsky, Russian LDPR leader, who traditionally blames the USA: “It’s not falling meteors. It’s the test of a new weapon by the Americans”. Some mentioned Super hero or Bruce Willis, who do not cope with their official duties, and it’s time for them to retire.
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Jeanne Calment world record of life

Jeanne Calment world record of life

French woman Jeanne Louise Calment was born in February 1875, died in August 1997. Thus she set a world record of life – 122 years and 164 days, and this is a proven fact. Jeanne Calment was born in Orly, France. When the Eiffel Tower was built, she was 14 years old. Madame Calment always led an active life. At her 85 she went into fencing, and at 100 rode a bike. Jeanne was married to a cousin, they lived together for 46 years. About Jeanne Calment became known in 1988, the centenary of Van Gogh, when she told in an interview about her meeting with the great artist. “He was dirty, badly dressed and gloomy.” Jeanne was also at funeral of Hugo.
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Fyodor Ivanovich Shalyapin (Chaliapin) as Tsar Boris Godunov

Fyodor Ivanovich Shalyapin, an outstanding Russian opera singer is better known as Feodor Chaliapin. He was born on February 13, 1873 in the city of Kazan in the family of a Vyatka peasant. Fedor was taught the craft of the shoemaker, and the turner. Soon, he graduated from a technical school with a Diploma of Honor. Feodor Chaliapin was hired to the Serebryakov amusement choir, where he met a future great writer Maxim Gorky. Later, in Nizhny Novgorod in 1900, they will make friends for life.
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A Russian soldier standing amid the rubble. Inside Hitler and Eva Braun Bunker

Inside Hitler and Eva Braun Bunker
Russian soldiers fought their way to the heart of Nazism, in a crusade of revenge for the 27 million deaths Hitler’s forces caused in their homeland. 33-year-old LIFE photographer William Vandivert was on the scene, photographing the city’s devastated landscape — and the eerie, almost unfathomable scene inside the bunker where Adolf Hitler spent the last months of his life; where he and Eva Braun were married; and where, just before war’s end, the two killed themselves, on April 30 1945. The photos have been compiled in a LIFE.com gallery for the first time. Bunker was beneath the Reich Chancellery which was reduced to brickdust by Russian artillery shells and Allied bombs.
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